Stormy Summer

Chapter 1

I am laying on a towel in the shade of a large palm tree on Coronado beach, California, my home. I lay there, listening to the sounds of little children playing in the sand and the adults playing beach volleyball only a few metres away from where I am lying. The sound of the waves calms me into a kind of doze and I lie there, calm and content. I am suddenly awoken by a noise; ‘Avery!’ I hear my name being called out and I try my best to ignore it and go back into that lovely doze. But as time goes on, I hear the voice getting closer to the point that I can no longer ignore it. I sit up and groan as I squint in the direction of the voice. I see a blurry figure running towards me and as my eyes adjust to the bright glare of the sun I can see that it is my twin, Alysia.

‘Come out and play!’ she calls, ‘The water is fantastic!’

I glare at her in defiance and start to lie back down but I don’t get half way before cold salt water is thrown at me. I jump up with a startled gasp and stand there looking first at my soaked bathers, then at my drenched towel and lastly at my giggling sister. My mouth, at first a startled O, now began to change into a small smirk and my eyes narrowed.

‘Oh, you are SO asking for it.’ I say and, without another moment’s hesitation, run at her with all my strength. She squeals, wether with delight or fright I don’t know, and runs as I chase her down. We continue this mad fury until, quite deliberately, she runs straight to the water’s edge and plunges in. I, with all of the momentum behind me, cannot help but plunge in behind her with a surprised squeal which is shortly cut off by the water filling my mouth. I come up to the surface just seconds later, gasping, and I see that Alysia is doubled over laughing. I glare at her.

‘I was already awake and playing with you wasn’t I?’ I ask.

‘I just wanted to be completely sure that you were awake and not just sleep walking.’ She says still laughing.

‘Well are you happy now? Has you test succeeded?’

‘Yes, it has and thanks for asking.’

I sigh and start wading my way back to shore while trying to squeeze most of the water out of my long, blonde hair. My sister, whose hair is brown instead of blonde, follows me out, still laughing. We walk up the beach back to where our parents are sitting. I pick up my towel and try my best to get some of the water out so that I can at least dry myself a little. It isn’t that I’m cold, because the summer time in California is anything but cold, but more just because I want to sit down and sulk under the palm tree for a little while, at least until Alysia stops laughing which could take a while.

‘You’re not going to get any comfort out of a wet blanket.’ My Mother, Riana, says. ‘Here, you can use mine.’ She is holding my 3 year old sister, Belle, on her lap and she puts her on the sand as she starts to get up.

‘No, no mum, it’s OK. I can live without a towel for a little while. Besides, I think that someone else would be willing to lend me their towel since they were the one who got mine soaked in the first place.’ At that Alysia burst into another bout of laughter. I turned and glared at her. I then see my Father coming from down the beach holding 4 ice cold soft drinks and an apple juice for Belle. As Alysia wipes the tears from her eyes I go up and take some of the drinks from his hands.

‘Thanks, Ave,’ he says, juggling the drinks in his hands. ‘I thought I was going to drop ‘em.’

‘Well we couldn’t have that, now, could we.’ I say, grinning at him. I walk over and give Mum her drink then walk over and stand before my still smiling sister.

‘Do you have anything to say?’ I ask, ‘Maybe an apology?’

‘Now why would I need to apologise?’ she says still grinning.

‘You’re not gonna get a drink until you do.’ I say, stamping my foot like a little kid.

‘Then I’ll just steal your drink because I did nothing wrong.’

‘You wouldn’t!’ I say, narrowing my eyes.

‘I sure would.’

We proceeded to do the old fashioned, would not, would to, with Dad laughing, Belle giggling and Mum rolling her eyes at us.

‘Some people would think that you two were 4 instead of 14.’ She says in an exasperated tone. At that comment both me and my sister stopped, turned to look at her and grinned.  I yawned, quite suddenly, blinked a couple of times and then stretched my arms out wide.

‘I think,’ I said, ‘I will catch a few more moments of shut eye.’ I went and grabbed the spare towel from the beach bag and laid it out in the shade of the palm tree, but not on the still wet sand, obviously.

‘But, Avery, you said that we would be able to build a sand castle together before we left today!’ Alysia whined

‘Leave your sister alone, Alysia.’ My mother said absently while playing with peekaboo with belle. ‘She hasn’t been getting a lot of sleep lately.’

‘Fine’ Alysia sighed ‘I’ll start it off by myself.’ And with that she headed out a little farther away, sat down, and started to dig.

It didn’t take me long to fall asleep with the sound of the waves and giggling children. I don’t know how long it had been when I started to come to. For some reason the sounds of the waves had gotten closer and louder. At first I shrugged it off because the tide was coming in, but then I heard a scream, the scream of a little girl. Then someone started shouting and I became more and more awake. By the time I sat up people where running and screaming all around me.

‘Avery!’ my Dad said from just behind me, ‘Come on darling we have to go.’

‘Where is Mum, Belle and Alysia?’ I ask starting to get up. ‘And what’s happening?’

‘They’re already at the car.’ He replies, glancing around nervously. ‘And there is a storm coming up from across the ocean.’ My hair was being tossed around my face and I could feel some water droplets on my bare skin. I turn and face the ocean. People are running away from the surf and I can see why. The waves are twice my size and as the rain gets heavier and the wind picks up even more they just become bigger. But I am not just staring at the waves; I am also staring at something beyond the waves, something out at sea.

I think my Dad has seen it too because he shouts out to me, ‘Come back to me, Avery, it’s too dangerous!’ But I can’t hear him over the sound of the waves. I stare out at the waterspout forming out at sea and because of this I am missing the ginormous wave forming right in front of me, and I am in its path.

My Dad sees it before I do. ‘AVERY!’ He runs forward, grabs me around the waist and throws me back. But it was like when I ran with Alysia before and, with the momentum behind him, he plunges into the looming wave before it crashes down. I stare at where my Dad used to be as the notion of what just happened hit me. I sank to my knees and cried for what seemed like an eternity. My Dad is gone and never to be seen again.