The Undrowned

Chapter 4

I know I should try and help her.

     My mom's voice is screaming in my head to go find help. Call 911. Grab a stick and reach in and try to fish her out. 

            Or jump in.

                            Swim.

                                          Dive.

     Find her in the seaweed.

     I know how to swim.

          Rachel doesn't.

     I should be trying to help her. I should be trying to save her life.

     But I am frozen at the edge of the dock.

     Frozen by fear. And by something else. Something I can't quite place.

     Like the rage before, a calm settles over me.

             Immobilizes me.

     Soothes and stills my mother's rational voice inside. It's okay. It's all okay.

     This is precisely what I wanted to happen.

     Precisely what was supposed to happen.

     I don't know how long I stand at the edge of the pier.

     Waiting for Rachel to surface, even though I know she won't be surfacing by now. No one can hold their breath that long. Especially not her.

     I stare out over the crystalline waters, at the clear blue sky, and for the first time all day, I feel--horrible as it may sound---at peace.

     Rachel is gone.

     And since she was the reason my life was bad, that means my problems have to be gone as well.

     I look down and see the sketchbook still on the edge of the dock. It teeters on the corner, just about to fall in. The sight of it brings me back to motion; I lean over and grab it.

     The moment I touch the water-flecked cover, my clam fades.

     Reality sinks in.

     Rachel isn't coming back.

                                                                                 I've killed her.

                                                                                I'm a murderer.

     Quickly, I glance around, but there's no one else in the woods or by the lake, no one who would have seen what happened.

     No one knows.

     No one knows that she was here.

     No one knows that I was here.

                                                                              I need to keep it that way.

     At that moment, as panic starts racing through me, the only thing I can think of its getting out of here before someone walks out of the woods and discovers me. Starts asking questions.

     I take one last look around at the placid lake, then run to my backpack and shove the sketchbook inside. I don't pause or look back.

     I keep running, and I don't stop until I leave the woods.

     Rachel is dead.

     She isn't coming back.

     And no one knows it but me.