Not Without Hope (16 page)

Before I jumped into the water, I tried one more time to picture the canopy and the cooler under the captain’s bench. It was a white cooler with a front clasp, a big handle on each side, bungeed down. Our feet sat on the cooler when we were on the captain’s bench. I knew I had to be careful. There was nothing to hold on to. I knew that once I went under, I might not be coming back.

I took my sandals off and put them in the backpack. I wedged the life jacket and the backpack between the motor and the swim platform, lifted my leg over the motor, and slipped into the water. I tried to go slow, the way you go down a ladder into a pool, but the boat was rocking back and forth and I was so weak that I just dropped in. The water was cold again, not warm like the night before. My feet felt frigid. I got nailed by a couple of waves. I tried to keep my head up, then realized it didn’t matter—I was going under the boat anyway.

The water was cold and the salt stung my cuts. My whole body was stiff. I floated for a few minutes next to the boat. My lower body felt like one big cut, a raw scab, road rash.

I got as used to the water as I could and made my way to the side of the boat, trying to find something to hold on to, losing my grip. The part of my body beneath the surface moved like a duck, paddling and trying to swim and kick, but nothing was working. It was like I was at an amusement park and I was swimming the wrong way against the lazy river. I’d ride up and down on the swells, which were about five to eight feet. I was cold, more exhausted than ever. The waves slammed me against the boat. I felt I was wasting my energy. My hip flexor wasn’t working. I was very alert, though. I knew this was my last try.

I swam as fast as I could to position myself. I knew it was going to be next to impossible to get underwater. I felt too buoyant, almost inflated, in my sweatshirt and my orange winter jacket, but I was too cold to take them off. I prepared to dive, but as soon as I opened my mouth to take a deep breath, I got nailed by a wave. I took in a bunch of water and began coughing and gagging.

The second attempt, I timed it better and waited until the wave went by. I grabbed the railing and shoved myself beneath the boat. I opened my eyes and the water was clear and everything looked like I thought it would look. A lot of things were missing. I saw the gas cans still bungeed down. The fishing rods on the top of the canopy were gone. Other poles were still latched into grooves on the side of the boat. I could see the cooler and the red bungee cord, sitting between the deck and the captain’s chair at the center console. It was a big, white Igloo cooler, the same one where Will had found the Gatorade on Sunday. I knew there had to be sandwiches in there, snacks, more Gatorade, water, something.

I just about got to the cooler, but not quite. I just touched it and my heart felt like it was going to pop out of my chest. Just as my feet went under the boat, I slammed my back against the railing. It didn’t hurt but it threw me off. I felt like I was already out of breath, like I had swum back and forth across a pool under water. When I was a kid, my sister and I would see who could swim the farthest under water, or who could hold our breath the longest. I always hated it. I didn’t like the way my body felt, my chest. Now I felt like I was about to drown. I was under maybe five seconds. I came back up, gasping for air.

I swam to the stern to regroup so I could give it one more try. It was hard to catch my breath. I didn’t do a lot under the boat, but that was the most winded I had been in my life. I had been through two-a-days, wearing pads in hundred-degree weather and it wasn’t like this. I was cold, and I couldn’t catch my breath.

I waited a few minutes behind the boat, holding on to the
motor. I had one more chance left in me. I knew I couldn’t do this half-assed. It wouldn’t be easy. When a wave would go by, the boat would rise up and slam down. It had been hard to stay under the boat. The waves wanted to rip you along with them.

I went to the side of the boat again and tried to picture where everything was underneath. I waited for a wave to go by, but I kept getting water in my mouth. I went under, positioned myself at a forty-five-degree angle, put my heels on the inside of the boat and kicked. I reached the upside-down cooler and pulled the lid down maybe an inch. The bungee was tight and I was scared and out of breath and I couldn’t get it open more than that. The lid snapped closed.

I swam back to the surface; I was exhausted, absolutely discouraged, helpless—the same feeling I had had for forty hours. I felt like I was about to drown, like my lungs and heart were going to explode. I was breathing so hard and had such bad chest pains that I thought my heart was going to pop through my ribs. I took deep breaths quickly, one after the other, like I had just run sprints.

I went to the stern and saw something about fifty feet away, off the back of the motor. It was my life jacket. It had come untied and was floating way.

There was only one thing to do. I waited for a few seconds, trying to catch my breath, then I went hard after it. I couldn’t survive without it. I swam, but I was exhausted and kept going under, coming up, and going back under. It was the worst leg burn I had ever experienced. I had done every imaginable aerobic workout—sprints, running stadium steps—but this was far worse.

I’d be trying to tread water and then I’d be a foot under. “This is it,” I thought to myself. “I’m about to drown.” Somehow, I kept treading water, slowly making headway. The waves weren’t like the day before when they were crashing randomly. I kept getting to the surface and going back under, thinking, I can’t get too low or I’ll
never come up. I tried to relax by doing the breaststroke or swimming freestyle, whatever hurt least at the moment. I gave about ten more big kicks and paddles with my arms and got the life jacket. I threw it underneath my stomach so it could hold me up, and swam back toward the boat. It took me twice as long to get back.

The backpack was still wedged against the motor, loosely. I put the life jacket on and just floated there, wanting to get out of the water but completely out of breath. My heart pounded so hard. I didn’t think I could pull myself onto the hull. I just concentrated on my breathing for five minutes. It didn’t get any better. I had to get out of the water, though, so somehow I swung my right leg over the motor and slammed my butt on the keel. I was in so much pain.

I thought I was down to my last few hours. It had already gone through my head that I was dying, but now I felt like I was going to die right there. My breathing didn’t change for forty-five minutes. Deep, deep, quick breaths. My heart rate felt like it was 180 beats a minute. It was pounding and wouldn’t stop. I didn’t know if I was going to have a heart attack or maybe even an asthma attack. I started to panic.

I took the steering cable and tied it as tight as I could to the motor and to my life jacket. I didn’t know if they had found the other guys yet, or if they ever would. But this way, if I had my life jacket on and I was tied to the boat, somebody would eventually find it. And unless something ate me, they would find me, too.

I kept wondering if there was a way I could leave some kind of message, something like “Love you, Mom,” or “Love you, guys” or “Be happy” or “Be strong.” I thought about my parents, my sister, and Paula. If only I had a pen in my bag. I wanted to let someone know that the boat flipped because of the anchor. I wanted there to be a way to explain how hard we had fought and how we just didn’t give up. It wasn’t like there was an explosion on the boat and we flipped and all died then and there. I wanted
them to know how long we fought, how we worked together, how we depended on one another to survive, how three helped when one got bad, then two helped when two got bad. Just the whole story. I knew that wasn’t possible on a sheet of paper. If I had a pen, I could have written on my arm. I wondered if there was a way I could cut myself on the prop and engrave a message on my arm or my body: “I love you guys.” Then I thought I might bleed to death right there.

My nose was running—the snot tasted salty—and I kept wiping it with what was left of my cotton gloves. I forgot all about the cold, almost like I wasn’t cold anymore. All my attention went to my breathing. Or I’d lean one way and then the other, trying to shake water out of my ears. My teeth were chattering, my lips were raw and blistered inside and out. I gargled with salt water, just to get some moisture in my mouth.

Finally, my heart rate slowed down. All of a sudden, it went from this race car to a slow turtle. I was straddling the motor, slouched over. My head was down on my hands. I could barely keep it up. I’d get thrown forward a bit, but for the most part I rode the waves up and down. Once my heartbeat relaxed, I started breathing so slow, like when I was sleeping. It scared me. I would gasp for air, like I was biting it, trying to get more oxygen.

I said my final words: “Please, God, protect my family. Give my dad the strength to figure out whatever makes him happy. Tell him I love him, and I’m proud of him regardless of some of the mistakes he had made in past. I love him and my sister loves him, too.

“Please help my sister find a good man, someone to protect her and love her and take care of her and make her feel like the great girl and fun, outgoing person she is.

“Dear God, protect Paula, give her the strength to get through this. Let her know I’ve always loved her and always will. Let her know I appreciate her even though I didn’t always show it. Help
her find a man down the line who will make her happy and love her like I did.”

I said all this out loud.

I could picture my mom.

“Dear God, give her the strength to get through this and give her someone who can make her happy. I just want her to be happy. I love her, and she was the best mom I could ever ask for. I’m so proud of her.”

My heart rate was so slow. I felt like my body was done, I couldn’t go any longer.

Then I saw a boat.

I
could see an orange racing stripe on the boat, so I knew it was the Coast Guard emblem. But was I seeing an actual boat? Was it a mirage? Was I so desperate to be rescued that I imagined the ship? I had already hallucinated, so maybe I was doing it again. But there it was, a boat in the distance. I tried to stand as much as I could on the hull. I took my life jacket off and swung it when I got to the top of a wave. The boat was a mile away, at least. I’d see it for a second and I’d go down the backside of a wave and lose it. Am I really seeing this? I kept asking myself.

This went on for twenty minutes or so. I’d see the boat and swing my life jacket and lose it behind a wave. I was choked up, upset. Please, God, please, I kept saying.

I tried to scream, “Help!” once, but my throat was shot, and the scream was smothered in my mouth. It was useless anyway. The boat was real, but it was too far away. It kept moving farther away and all of a sudden it was gone.

That’s it, I thought.

I hadn’t seen any choppers since early morning. I had done
what I could to get under the boat. I had said my prayers to my family. This was it. I was in my last few hours.

I began to think again about the things I would have changed in my life. I should have stuck with football. I should have been better to my mom. I should have spent more time with my dad. I should have kissed Paula one more time before I left.

I wished I hadn’t invited Will on this trip.

It was hard to focus, I’d get so sidetracked. I would be coherent for a while, then out of it for a second. I’d come back and look up. I felt like I was drugged up. Had I gone to the bathroom in my swimsuit? I stood up and shook my shorts and reached inside to get it out. There was nothing there. I couldn’t tell if I went.

I felt like I had more swelling around my butt. I felt I was sitting on an inch of iron or a brick. It was so raw and tender. My whole ass felt like a scab that had been ripped open. Blood was in the water, dripping off my legs. I felt light-headed, more than usual. I thought I was going to bleed to death. Okay, I thought, my ass is literally falling off. My insides are eating away at me. This is just another way that you die. I was the living dead. I couldn’t sit flat anymore. I’d put the majority of my weight on one cheek, then the other. I wanted to cry, but I didn’t have the energy even to do that.

I had always told people that crying didn’t solve any problems, didn’t make you feel better. Now I wanted to cry, but I didn’t have the strength.

I was coughing a lot. It hurt my ribs. It felt like I had to vomit, but there was nothing to throw up. It would have been straight bile or blood. I worried that I was bleeding internally from banging against the boat. As blood kept dripping in the water, I knew I needed to stay on the hull in case any sharks came back.

I
WENT IN
and out of consciousness. I had forgotten about the cold. My whole attention was on the pain in my butt. I’d try to lean forward on my hands to get a little relief. Then I would fall asleep for a minute, a random wave would come, and I’d hit the motor with my crotch, which would startle me awake. The boat seemed to be getting lower, losing some of its buoyancy. As I sat on the hull, water washed over my butt.

I felt woozy. I put my head down on my hands, which were holding on to the motor, and I put my cross in my mouth. I looked at my legs; it seemed like my calves were an inch and a half bigger. They were swollen, bruised, and pale. The little cuts on my legs had scabbed and were soggy and pruned. My ankles were fatter and had no shape. I had lumps on my shins.

I had been in the water about forty-two hours. I was both awake and not awake. The cold was gone. I knew I was starting to lose it, but I never lost my pain. It was direct and ceaseless. It shot down my back, through my whole body. I couldn’t straighten my back. My posture was gone.

I straightened out my right leg, but something wasn’t right. It was tight and sore, and I didn’t have a lot of movement with it. This was my last couple of hours, I figured. I made sure the steering cable was tied tightly to my life jacket. If I died, I’d be within a couple feet of the boat when they finally found me.

I went through the whole story one more time: Marquis’s face right before I let him go. The dark of the night and the grueling sounds, the constant blowing of the wind and the waves crashing against the boat. Marquis’s cold, hard face, his eyes closed, head fallen to the side. Corey’s last words, “I’m a kill you”—mean, wide-eyed, the words coming from his mouth but not from his mind. I knew it wasn’t him, but I wished those weren’t his last words.

I remembered the few words Will had said: “I love you.” His face was the saddest. He was defenseless—the water dripped off his
face and his nose was running. That was even worse than letting go of Marquis.

I said it again now, “I love you, Will,” and I pictured him saying it back.

In my head, I saw my family and Paula at my funeral, in front of the coffin, crying, holding one another. Later, I would tell my sister that I thought I saw my friend from Ohio, Nate Milstead, the cop from Akron. He was standing on shore at Shephard’s Beach Resort on Clearwater Beach, near the spot where we caught our bait fish early Saturday morning. I guess I thought I was on a boat, ready to dock, or I was swimming in the water. I could see Nate on shore and I kept telling him, “Come pick me up, come get me, I’m so close!”

A
BOUT ELEVEN THIRTY
I was slouched down, straddling the motor, head in my hands, when I heard something crashing. It was the same crashing noise the boat made when it went up a wave and flopped back down against the water, but it was louder and it didn’t sound like it was close.

I moved my head to the left, eyes half open, and I caught something in the corner of my eye. It was a boat, a big gray boat. I put my head back down. I’m seeing things, I thought. I shook my head and closed my eyes and opened them wide. The boat was still there.

I turned my head even more. I could barely keep my eyes open. I just stared for about ten seconds. I tried to yell, but my throat was dry, blistered, and closed up. “Over here, over here!” I whispered.

I took off my life jacket and stood as much as I could. I didn’t have the strength to get all the way up, so I really just leaned forward against the motor. I swung my life jacket over my head. If they hadn’t seen me, I was going to get in the water and try to swim toward them. I was already more than dying.

The boat kept getting closer. “Thank you, God, thank you, God,” I began saying. I probably said it twenty times. “Oh my God, thank you. I can’t believe it.”

This boat was big and gray and I could see the orange Coast Guard emblem again. I was thinking, How the hell am I going to swim and get on that boat?