Both Sides ☯ h.s au

Two.

Really there is more to this story than you’ll ever know. I won’t bore you with the details but I’ve had quite the life. It has been up and down and at times I wanted it all to be over, I hid myself away waiting for the days to go by, not seeing anyone, not talking to my own family, having had 3 siblings and being in the middle age wise I guess the attention was more on the older and younger, never me stuck in the middle. That I reckon is the main reason I am the way I am now, that one night changing so much in the blink of an eye, and why I survived, out of everyone, I’ll never know.

Mum and I really hit rock bottom. I know you hear this a lot, all emotional and it sounds so clichéd but this is what happens when you lose 4 of your best friends sooner than you can think. That one impact, the one thing that held me on, people say things happen for a reason, but this, this doesn’t abide by those sayings rules, this was different.

Nothing can make me bring them back. The people I wish were around me today aren’t yet I still walk among you oblivious to reasoning to why I was spared. My father, my two sisters and my brother all died the night of June 21st 2006, but I didn’t, at 13 years of age I was spared over my 40 year old father, Jerome, sisters Teresa and Martha both twins at age 15 and my younger brother James only turned 10 the Wednesday just gone. Why? Why would god take them from me and let me walk this earth knowing they are gone. I couldn’t find the meaning or any reasons behind it all.

I think mum pretty much cried 2 weeks flat with ease after that night, and those two weeks she cried I staying in shock, still trying to accept and function what had happened. That night we thought going for a ride on dads new boat would be fun just as a way to let our hair down and chill out. Mum had a lot of homework to do seeing she was studying to be a registered nurse so she passed on it that night and we all understood, it was her choice. As we headed out of the docks the wind whipped past me as dad slowly crept his speed up. I trusted him. He had been diving boats for years. The amount of experience he had was enough reassurance that everything would be okay.

A little further out of the way once we had got out to sea we looked around into the empty plains of water rising up then falling down to slap the resting surface and explode in a raging rush of surging salt water. It was fascinating to just sit and watch, seeing nature take its course and cause us to think about all the ‘why’s’ in life. Like why was the sea blue. Why not orange? Why are waves called waves, why not something else like tumblers. This could go on forever and in that moment I was okay with that. Nothing but the noise of the sea calmed you to a point of extreme relaxation where you would fall into a deep trace enhanced by thought and wonder.

It was until the boat began rocking that I fell out of that all so mind boggling trance and was ripped into another as the swaying got rougher and rougher progressively. Soon enough dad was up at the wheel trying to steer us away and back to land, all his gear was working so finding our way back as the sun set and darkness fell wasn’t hard. He had done a full 180° turn and was abruptly stopped when the stern of the boat smashed into the rocks hidden below the water, gaping open a hole that filled with water faster than your own mind could process. The next thing I knew dad was throwing us all life jackets while telling James how to put his on at the same time he was buckling up his own. The inflatable raft was still in the cabin below as it was brand new he hadn’t quite set up every little thing yet, which was a good lesson for me to check your gear and if there could possibly be an emergency have something available to get to save your ass. 

Well I think you know how the rest of this goes, the boat sunk leaving up stranded in the middle of the sea floating helplessly in freezing waters while the sun slowly disappeared down under the horizon leaving us engulfed in darkness. Aware of all the dangers my sisters immediately began thrashing around, my dad desperately trying to calm them down, telling them that it was going to be alright and if we paddle on quietly we won’t attract any unwanted attention. Once calm we all began swimming in a group towards where dad believed the mainland to be. But after taking a quick glance behind me I could already see it was too late for someone. James had disappeared and seeing the girls were so frantic and mental we mustn’t have noticed him gone. His life jacket lay afloat on the water’s surface, my heart dropping seeing he wasn’t in it. The jacket was about 50 sizes too big for him as were ours but we had hung onto them and tweaked them in any way possible to make them fit better but seeing dad was in a rush to get us off and away from the boat as it sunk no one even had a second thought about it.

That’s how my 10 year old brother died that night, by wearing a life jacket that wasn’t the right size and by not being strong enough to hang onto it or swim. I just knew he had drowned and I quickly whipped my head around, some salt water flicking into my eye as I did so, squeezing them shut not wanting to accept that he was gone. By then dad and the girls has realized what I was looking at, once again the twins were hysterical and dad I could tell was on the verge of a major breakdown but he soldiered on pulling us all through it with him.

After I would say about 20 minutes of swimming my heart was pounding out of my chest. So many things had touched my foot and I wasn’t game enough to look down to see if it was my worst nightmare or just a curious little fish. I guess I found the answer to that out when Martha was ripped under the water suddenly. No bubbles surfaced, nothing, a small amount of splashing coming from a little way under if anything, other than that, just nothing. Nothing but the red ink that stained the water causing me to once again close my eyes and swallow hard, feeling as if an apple was jammed in my throat. There was nothing we could do and we all knew it. By now there were no tears left for Teresa to cry but plenty for dad and I although we held a steady exterior while our insides burned with emotion, fueled by a series of events played out in less than an hour.

Dad turned Teresa’s head away and pulled her forward, motioning with his hand to swim, that’s all we could do really wasn’t it, swim. Like there was anything else to do anyway, what were our options? Swim or sit and wait to die. Hmm, hard choice that one is…

We kept swimming and as soon as Teresa felt a huge block of coral under her feet she took it as an opportunity to rest a while. We had been swimming for god knows how long now and I think we all needed a well-earned break. Coming to a stop dad and I hovered in the water, held afloat by the life jackets as Teresa stay perched on the sharp bony coral below her. And before you knew it, it all began again. Dad’s cries could be heard miles away and something attacked his legs. His arms flailing around him frantically as I stared in complete shock, not knowing what to do. Teresa practically leap forward, when she reached dad the horror on her face changed to anger as she pumped her legs up and down repeatedly kicking the creature I guessed was a shark in the head as its jaws slowly released its nasty hold on dads left leg, leaving it bleeding out immensely. The blood surfaced around him, it swirled with its dark features whisking around as Dad disturbed the water with his movements. So much to take in in a matter of seconds, I was amazed at how my sister could possibly defend him like that and attack the shark, she was so courageous and as the tears welled up in my eyes Dad screamed in the intense pain, I didn’t blame him! I swam over, wrapping my arms around him trying to keep him slightly warmer as I knew all that blood loss wasn’t going to do much good for him at all.

Knowing we had to keep going I told them to keep pushing on, the faster we get there the faster we can help him. Nodding, we all set off again. Shock baffled us all as we were silent but our thoughts shrieked out as loud as Dad was. As I thought I was all over and we were going to make it as the city  line was now visible but distant it gave me that extra boost to keep going, that is before that shark decided taking one life wasn’t enough. It immediately went back to attack the already bleeding leg, as I think we all know thanks to Finding Nemo that sharks are attracted to blood. It ripped Dad under the surface almost taking Teresa with him as she refused to let go of his hand. Her grasp slipping her fingers one by one were pried out of his leaving us staring at each other, once again our train of thought not even running anymore.

Bubbles popped on the steady water’s surface giving me hope he was still okay but almost as soon as his bloody, ripped up body surfaced was as fast as Teresa’s disappeared. The shark coming back for more I thought I had no choice but to swim for my life. Teresa was gone, I knew it, dad, James, Martha all died right in front of my eyes. Yet the shark never came for me. I was never hurt physically, only mentally. As I swam faster than I knew I could the images flashed in front of my eyes as a haunting reminder of the events that were carried out that night.