Missing

Someone grabber the back of my wetsuit, and yanked me up out of the water. As soon as my face broke through the surface I gasped in the cold crisp morning air. I coughed a few times as I was sat up in the water. The guy rushed over to Jack, who was floating a few feet away, and did the same to him. The daylight stung my eyes as I looked around slowly.

My brain desperately trying to catch up with what was going on now. How did I get on the beach? What was I doing before this?

"Hey kid," The guy came back to me, "You alright?" He was wearing shorts, and a loose t-shirt, "Come on talk to me." he slapped my cheek gently, "Do you know what's going on right now?"

"Where am I?" The slap had been enough to make me realize I was awake, and this was very real, "I don't remember anything."

"I already called the paramedics they're on the way kid," He pulled me to my feet, and helped me out of the water, "Now you just sit here. I'm going to go check on the other guy."

He left me sitting in the sand to go check on Jack. I looked around slowly. How did we get to the beach? Weren't we in that freaky cave? What happened to our gear?

Jack was only wearing his wetsuit, and when I glanced down at myself it looked like I was only wearing my wetsuit. None of our other gear was on us. No goggles, no air tanks, and no mouthpieces. I could hear the sirens now as Jack was walked over, and sat down next to me. Jack seemed just as shocked, and confused as I was.

"Do you remember how we got here?" I looked at Jack.

"No," Jack rubbed his head slowly, "I thought we were in some cave."

I looked around at the beach, and nothing. Still had no clue how I got here or why I was face down in the water. Soaked t-shirt guy was waving down the paramedics as they rushed our way. The paramedics rushed up to us, and started asking us questions as they checked us over quickly. I didn't know what was going on, but I tried to answer all their questions as best I could.

They asked us if we could walk, and we were carefully walked over to the ambulance. Loaded up, and then we were looked over again. When we got to the hospital we were looked over a third time, and they did a bunch of quick tests, but they couldn't find anything wrong with either one of us. They wanted to keep us overnight for observation, but Jack refused, and called a cab. We were halfway through checking ourselves out of the hospital when the police showed up.

They asked us a bunch of questions as well. Turns out we had been gone for an entire week. By the time we got home we were both completely out of it. Jack threw himself into getting our boat back since it had been found anchored on the reef with no one on it five days ago. I went to my room, and flopped on my bed.

I wanted to check my phone, but it was still on the boat. It was a good thing Jack had a land line or he'd be driving out to argue with the guy impounding our boat. I didn't think it was a good idea for Jack to drive right now. My stomach growled, and I grumbled to myself as I pushed myself off the bed. I went to the kitchen, and opened the fridge to some nasty stink.

I started tossing the molding food into the garbage as I looked for something edible. I winced when my fingers touched the greasy wilted lettuce, and into the garbage it went. Jack came upstairs while I was still going through the fridge, and sat down at the table. I'd never seen my brother look so defeated.

"What'd they say?" I was using a fork to peel rotten spaghetti off one of the plates I'd gotten out of the fridge.

"400 bucks to get the boat back," Jack slapped the table, "And I have to pay to replace the equipment we lost as well."

I winced internally. The equipment part was all on me.

"You can use some of my savings for the gear," I gave up on the fridge, and went to the cupboard, "I'm not sure about the boat though. At least the busy season is coming up."

"We're not using your savings," Jack gave me a dirty look, "That's your collage fund. We can't waste it on stupid shit like this."

"When am I going to go to collage?" I pulled some canned pocket stuff out of the cupboard.

It didn't really matter what I'd grabbed for us to eat. Neither one of us really cared. We'd didn't even feel like eating. I microwaved us each a bowl. Sliding Jack's over first, and then sitting down with my own cheap bowl of food.

"How did we get back to the beach?" I mumbled.

The question just sat in the air. Neither one of us knew what had happened to us. I ignored the funny taste of the food as I ate it. Numb to the rest of the world. Neither one of us wanted to talk about what happened in the cave because neither one of us remembered what had happened.

We didn't want to remember almost drowning or hallucinating almost drowning or whatever had happened down there. I finished off the cheap bowl of food, dropped it in the sink, and walked to my room. I still had the charts spread out on my desk. I gathered it up, and threw it in the trash. It was time for that part of my life to be over.

Dad was gone. Finding the cave he was looking for wouldn't change anything. After our weird event neither one of us wanted to find that cave anymore. I collapsed on the bed, not bothering with a blanket, and falling asleep on the bed. I dreamed about the cave.