Chapter 1

A Chapter by Ashley Beeson

“Kat! Come on!” Thomas scrambled under the “DO NOT CROSS” tape onto the soft dunes and crouched down. As Katherine fumbled with her sandals she took her spot next to Thomas.

“When I say go, okay?” Kat nodded crouched down just as Thomas had. When he shouted they both leaped from the dune on the sand below.

“I obviously got way farther than you.” Looking down at their placement it was a close call, but Kat had jumped longer. Pain shot up through Kat’s knee and it buckled under her weight. Tom ran over to the bag and brought Kat her medicine.

“Maybe next time I’ll just watch.” He always got scared when Kat got hurt; anything that had to do with a doctor’s visit or medicine freaked Tom out. “It’s not your fault, don’t worry about it,” Kat patted him on the shoulder. She used to lean her arm on top of his head, but lately he has grown so much it’s just uncomfortable. Kat sat down and leaned back in her chair. She was about to close her eyes and just listen to the ocean when a figure standing behind her clamped his hands over her eyes. Suddenly everything went black and the water from his hair dripped down onto her face and into her mouth. Tom laughed as Kat struggled to remove the hands from her face.

“I swear to god J, if you don’t get your f*****g hands off my face I’ll-”

“You’ll what?”

“I’ll… I’ll kiss you!” He immediately dropped his hands.

“Dude, you know she would never, you’re disgusting!” Tom and Jeremy laughed and sat down. Kat just rolled her eyes at them, wondered how she could be friends with them, then just sat back and relaxed. Kat woke to the sound of Tom and Jeremy running to the water. She got up and removed her shirt to join them.

“Wait for me!” They stopped a couple feet from the water and waited for Kat to jog down with them. The water made the sand squishy beneath their feet. They waded farther until the water was around their waists. Just as they always had Kat, then Jeremy, then Tom dunked their heads. Under the clear water they could see each other trying to hold their breath. Tom came up first gasping for air, even though they always gave him a head start he just had the weakest lungs. Jeremy and Kat stared at each other daring the other to come up first. Kat counted on her fingers, 3, 2, 1 and both of them cam up at the same time.

“Why do you two always do that?” They both just shrugged their shoulders and splashed Tom.

“Seriously?” Kat and Jeremy swan towards the rock. The rock was this huge boulder that was so big it was basically an island. Tom tried to keep up, although, like always, he was failing.

They all stretched out under the sun and themselves dry off. As Kat and Tom drifted off, Jeremy got up and walked around. He sat down on a ledge close to the water and let his toes dip in. He stared back at Kat and Tom falling asleep on the hard surface of the rock. Kat looked so beautiful just lying there as the sun hit the water on her skin. Her hair fell around her bathing suit, her bright pink hair contrasted with her black suit. Her eyes were scrunched from the bright sun.

Jeremy looked away quickly as Kat’s eyelashes flickered open slightly. She stood up and as she did the top of her bathing suit fell down because she had untied it to protect herself from weird tanning lines. Kat carried the top in her hand and walked over to Jeremy. He blushed furiously.

“Can you tie it for me? Its super tricky.”

“Oh, um yeah, sure whatever,” Jeremy tried to look away. Kat turned around and handed the strings to him. He carefully tied a bow around her back, then again around her neck. He spread his hands across her shoulders, then quickly pulled them back in realizing what he was doing.

“Um, well, yeah you’re welcome.”

“Yeah thanks.”

Tom got up and walked towards them. Kat let him sit in her spot then sat on top of his lap, facing Jeremy. Realizing she was too heavy for Tom, Kat pushed herself off his lap and onto the rock next to him.

“How’re your legs doin’?”

“Did you have problems earlier?” Jeremy suddenly became worried that Kat didn’t tell him.

“It’s no biggie. Their fine now…” Just as Kat said that her right leg writhed with pain. She squeezed Tom’s arm as her leg was overtaken with pain.

“Woah! Are you sure you’re okay?” Jeremy got up ready to swim Kat back to the beach where the medicine was sitting in her bag.

“Yeah, it’ll probably go away soon,” Kat said through clenched teeth.

“Hey, um, OW! How about you take, over with the uh, the OW! The arm squeezing J?”

“Sure.” Kat transferred her hands to Jeremy’s arm and Tom got up to retrieve the hat he had left over where he had been resting.

“Strong grip, huh?”

“Don’t joke J, it actually really hurts now. I think something is wrong.” Worry filled Jeremy’s eyes. He couldn’t remember the last time Kat’s leg had hurt this much.

“Do you want me to swim back and get your stuff?”

“Yes!” Kat’s leg felt horrible. It was like millions of knives were being stabbed into her leg all at the same time. She looked up and scrunched her eyes in pain while gripping her leg. Tears started forming in her eyes and Tom came back to help her.

“Hey! Its gonna be okay… Don’t worry, J will be back soon.”

“Make him go faster!” Tears started pouring down Kat’s cheeks. Her vision blurry, she saw Jeremy run along the beach to her bag and retrieve her pills. He looked back at Kat hunched over in pain with Tom rubbing her back. He race back into the water and swim as fast as he could without getting the medicine wet in the water. He climbed onto the rock and hurried over to Kat.

“Here Kat.” She swallowed them dry and hunched back over while Tom and Jeremy rubbed her back and tried to calm her down. After a while Kat started to get up. Her tear stained cheeks worried Tom and Jeremy.

“Let’s just get home please. It’s getting late.” Kat started to drop herself into the water to swim back to shore.

“Are you sure you’re okay to swim?” Tom wasn’t sure if it was such a good idea.

“Um… Yeah I’ll be fine.” Just to be sure on the swim back Jeremy stayed right next to Kat.

They walked back onto the dry sand to their chairs. The sun was just starting to go down. Kat sat down in her chair and watched as the sky turned a light pink, then a dark orange, until the sky was a dark blue and dotted with bright stars.

“He is gorgeous.”

“I know… But he looks like he really likes that other girl, the one with pink hair.”

“Whatever, its getting late we should go back home.” Off they swam into the night talking and giggling about the new people at their beach.