Currents

It didn't look like this. I wish.

She inhaled. The breath was sharp and deep, salt-laced, tingling in her lungs. She barely noticed the sting.

The sun burned, sulking in the sky and pulling the skin of her cheekbones tight, but she ignored it. Her attention was caught in the pull of the rip against her legs and the wall of water rising in front of her. She reveled in the hiss of the foam, the smell of the land that embraces the sea, the dull roar of the surf on the beach behind--but it was just background. Every active scrap of attention focused on the building wave, calculating height and pushing back the tinge of fear as it built and began to break, so far above her head.

She dove deep, slicing the base of the falling wave as tiny particles of sand laced her outstretched arms, gritting under her nails as she sank her finger in and stretched out on the bottom, clinging. The sea crashed down with the low-liquid growl of a waking mountain.

But this wave was different. Usually, they roared overhead, grasping currents lifting her feet gently before moving on. This one, however, forced liquid fingers between her and the sand, yanking her upside down and sending her careening into the rip.

Gravity didn't exist in this tumbling, seething world. She only struggled briefly before relaxing, letting the water drag her where it would as she waited, counting her heartbeats. It felt strange, oddly peaceful in the midst of chaos. Time may as well have stopped, except for the dull thud against her ribs that marked the passing seconds.

The surge gave her one last spin before it slowed, the angry tugging turning curious, ruffling her hair and playing with the edges of her skin. It released her at the edge of the breakers.

She opened her eyes, searching for the surface through strands of floating hair. She wasn't desperate. There was still air in her lungs, driving her thoughts as she drifted, suspended, quiet. The waves grumbled dully at her back. In front of her, when she opened her eyes, the dark expanse of open sea stretched on forever.

Her lungs should have been burning. She wondered at it, briefly, but mentally shrugged--why question a good thing? The surface above her head began to fall away from her as it rose and built, and on impulse she kicked up into the body of the wave. It pulled her up and into the surge, and she broke up and out of it just as it crested and fell. The currents dragged her under again, this time spitting her out and sending her tumbling into a friend. They came up laughing.

It was a beautiful day.