“Was it Gavin?” I asked.
She nodded.
I shifted onto my back. Gavin leaned over me, water dripping off his face. “You scared me there for a minute.”
“Just for a minute?”
He smiled, but his eyes were still full of fear. “If a minute lasts sixty-seven years.”
“I think I’m going to need some help,” I said. “Real help.”
He closed his hands over mine. “We’ll get it for you. We’ll figure this out.”
We. He still said we.
Footsteps approached at a run. “Is this her?” a loud voice asked.
“She’s conscious now,” Gavin said.
“How long was she in?”
“A few minutes.”
Two men lifted me onto a stretcher, forcing me to let go of Gavin’s hand.
“Do you know her?” one of the medics asked.
Gavin looked down at me. “She’s the mother of my son.”
“Then you can come with us.”
One of the medics flashed a light in my eyes. “Can you tell us your name, miss?”
“Corabelle,” I said.
The medic nodded at the other, and suddenly I was moving. Jenny held her coat, rooted to the sand, growing smaller as we rushed down the beach. Gavin kept up.
We got to the ambulance, and the medics paused while one opened the door. Something fluttered next to my head, and I turned to it. A monarch butterfly fought against the wind, sailing forward, then getting pushed back again. The next gale sent it straight into Gavin’s chest.
Gavin stared down at the butterfly, flapping against his wet jacket.
“It’s Finn, isn’t it?” I asked.
“Has to be.”
The butterfly paused for another moment, showing off its black and orange wings, then flew back into the wind. The medics lifted me into the ambulance and started peeling off my coat. “Blankets behind you,” one said to Gavin. “You might want to get your coat off too.”
He took my temperature. “You’re very lucky. Not everybody who gets sucked into the Pacific wearing something like this comes back out breathing. People don’t realize how a coat can weigh you down. How did you end up in there?”
I glanced up at Gavin and decided not to answer. I could tell a social worker, or not. Take the doctor’s mental health clinic referral, or not. Those were decisions for another time. Gavin had said we’d figure it out. We’d saved each other time and time again. I had faith that whenever one of us needed rescue, the other would always be there.
THE END