A Quick Adventure

A Quick Adventure

“Hurry up, Boots, it’s getting dark and the tide is coming in!” Sixteen year old Colleen tried pulling her little brother up the embankment, but the loose sand kept collapsing under her feet. Looking upward, she could barely see the root she was holding onto. She was afraid to look back towards the rapidly rising tidewaters.

Just as she managed to gain a little ground and hope that she could get them up, the twisted root she was grasping, gave way. As she felt herself going backwards, she pulled Boots across so he was on top of her. The two of them tumbled down, she managed to keep his body tight against herself, but she had no way of breaking her own fall. Her head cracked sharply against first one boulder and then another.

Boots pulled himself free of his sister’s grasp, giggling a little at the exciting ride they had taken. “Wow, that was fun, Sis. Let’s do it again!”

Brushing the sand out of his hair, he looked around and saw that his sister was still lying quietly among the pile of boulders. “Sis? Colleen? Are you all right?”

Bending down near his sister’s supine form, he noticed a trickle of blood oozing around her head. “Colleen?” He shook her arm gently. “Colleen? Please Colleen, don’t tease me. It’s getting darker and Mom doesn’t know where we are.” Boots shook her arm again, looking closely at her face he could see her eyes were closed and she wasn’t moving. With a quivering lip and teary eyes, Boots turned around in a circle, looking up at the high embankment, then back at the approaching water. “Colleen? HELP! Somebody HELP!”

A clatter of stones drew his attention back to the embankment. “Hey!” A voice called from above. “Are you all right?”

Squinting his eyes upward, Boots could see a strange teenage boy peering down at them. “My sister hit her head. She isn’t moving! Help us, please!”

“Hang on, little guy.” The stranger called. “I’ll see if I can get down there.”

“Please hurry, the water is coming in!” Despite himself, Boots could feel the tears running and he began to gasp.

The strange boy disappeared for a moment, then he peered over the edge again. “Hang on, I think I can get down there.”

Boots watched tearfully as the boy disappeared again. Just when he thought maybe the boy had gone away, he saw a slim brown rope slither down the bank. A few minutes more went by, then the boy began rappel down towards them. “Don’t worry, little guy, I’m coming.”

With a clatter of loose stones and sand, the boy was soon standing beside him. With a reassuring pat on Boots's shoulder, the young stranger bent over Colleen’s quiet form. “It looks like she banged her head pretty good.”

“Please, Mister,” Boots gasped, “can you wake her?”

“Ordinarily, the Scout manual says we shouldn’t try and move someone who has fallen,” the teen said, with a quick look at the approaching tide. “I think we don’t have a choice though.”

Quickly surveying the unconscious girl, he deftly felt her arms and legs and couldn’t see anything obviously broken. Gently lifting an eyelid, he peered at first one and then the other pupil. “Well, this kind of thing only works in fairy tales, but we got to get you guys back out of here.” With that, the young blond teen pressed his lips to the girl’s. As if by some magic, Colleen began to struggle to sit up.

“What the heck do you think you’re doing?”

His face reddening, the young teen stepped back. “Sorry, I had to wake you somehow.”

“Well that’s a strange way of going about it!” Colleen snapped, her own cheeks beginning to burn.

“We don’t have a lot of time for pleasantries right now.” The teen smiled quickly. “My name is Steve, we had better get back up the bank before we get wet.” With that, the teen grabbed Boots and set him on his shoulder. “Hang on little guy.” Turning to Colleen, he said, "Wait right there and I’ll be right back.”

Colleen started to stand up and follow them, but her knees buckled and she collapsed into a sitting position and watched as the teen quickly moved up the rope. A few seconds later he slid down the rope to stand beside her. “Okay, you’re next, but I don’t think I can carry you and climb too. If you go first I can kind of push you upwards as we go.”

Firmly pulling her to a standing position, Steve got behind and grasped the rope. “Okay, one, two, three!”

Her dizziness clearing, Colleen was able to pull herself upwards with only a little gentle prodding from behind. A few moments later, the three of them were standing at the top of the crumbly embankment.

“What the heck were the two of you doing down there anyway?” Steve asked. “This whole area is closed to the public, just because of things like this.”

“We were just exploring around.” Colleen tried to explain. “We’re new here and Boots wanted a closer look at the water. It was stupid, I know, but then I slipped.”

“Well next time, come and get me first. I live right down the road there.” Steve smiled. “I would be glad to show you around, but now we better get you home and get a bandage for that gash on your head.”

Despite the throb in her head and the embarrassment of their predicament, Colleen couldn’t help but smile back at the blonde teen. “Okay,” she said with a laugh, “I guess we will do that.” She was beginning to think moving far from her friends to this coastal town wasn’t going to be too bad after all.