Chasing Forever Down (Great White Surf Saga, #1) [Wattpad Featured Story] | ✔

Chapter 13: Never Again

Topher stretches out on his orange beach towel and pops a sugar cube into his mouth. Seven hours ago, this very sand swirled through the air and created a tornado of salt water and beach particles. You'd never know by the looks of the sandcastles, surfers, and the scorching sun. I glance behind me for A.J. He left a few minutes ago to get bottled water and left me with the Hooligan. Apparently Topher has to surf in the cove due to the jellyfish clean up in Horn Island.

"Taylor's crazy, you know," Topher says in between chews. "Going out in that storm to surf. He's going to die for real doing that."

He knows more than he lets on. Why else would he have called Vin this morning? I'm beginning to doubt that he needed a mechanic. Still, I don't press for any juicy tidbits. He's not telling me anything I don't already know. He tugs at the loose strands of his swimming trunks and readjusts his sunglasses before popping up as quickly as he would on a surfboard in the water. Miles waves at us from a distance, dragging two surfboards and leaving his mark through the sand. He looks less than thrilled to be here.

"Will you be the keeper of my cubes?" Topher asks. He looks back down at me and shakes his bag of sugar cubes.

A.J. snatches the bag from over my head. "Go on, surf star wannabe," he says to Topher.

That's all it takes for Topher to jet off toward the water to meet Miles. A.J. drops down to the sand, stretches out on Topher's towel, and hands me a thick roll of blue tickets, like the ones you get at high school basketball games.

"Vin wants you to sell these," he says. He twists the lid off of his water bottle.

I spin the tickets around and wonder how in the hell I'll be able to sell one thousand tickets before this weekend's surf competition. The guys were talking about it last night, how Great White Surf is a sponsor. I'm pretty sure Vin is hoping I'll be back in North Carolina before then. He's probably protective of his dead best friend's old store, even if I still don't understand the hostility he has toward Colby. But there's one thing I'm more curious about.

"Vin? He actually wants my help?" I question. I can't imagine him trusting me with anything Colby-related.

"Damn it," A.J. says. "Strick, not Vin. I just saw Vin. Sorry. But no, Strick – he wants you to sell them. A dollar a ticket for a chance to win a custom Great White Surf surfboard. We try to help Shark's dad out as much as we can. Oh, and he said to tell you just to sell tickets to guys, no girls. Strick and Alston can take care of that."

I shake my head and keep spinning the roll from its center with my index fingers. "There's no way," I say.

"He said you would have them sold in no time because you're hot and guys will buy from you...but not to tell you he said that," A.J. blurts out.

"Reed said that?" I can't imagine him actually thinking A.J. wouldn't tell me.

"Uh...yeah. Strick said it. Don't tell him I told you."

A.J.'s stammers aren't the truth, but I know he's not going to tell me much more. The tickets fall in between our towels as I lie back and pull my shades over my eyes. When I talked to my mom mid-afternoon, she told me that a water pipe in the kitchen burst so they'd be in a hotel for a few days. She also said that Linzi and I needed to enjoy ourselves, so "take a few days away from this college search and sightsee, live a little." Oh Mom. If you only knew.

But thanks to that ruptured pipe, I'll have plenty of time to sell raffle tickets and extend my trip long enough to see Colby Taylor compete on the waves just once, if nothing else. Maybe seeing him chasing his forever down and living his dream will be enough to motivate me.

"I can help you, if you want," A.J. offers, pulling me away from my thoughts.

"What?" I ask. I prop up on my elbows to look at A.J.