Waves
Chapter 14 Everyone Has to be Somewhere

Why did Hannah save my life? She was part of the enemy wasn’t she? She and her sister Chrysta lured me into the ocean while the three ball was stolen, so why this? I didn’t mind, of course, but why? The more I thought about it though, the more I realized that it was Chrysta who engaged me. She was the one who kept everything going, not Hannah. Hannah was the quiet one on the side, so much so that I didn’t pay that much attention to her. Usually, in my life, it’s the other way around. Maybe Hannah didn’t know anything about this deceit and only found out later. And there was something else that added to my theory, something that the green hat guy said in the spaceship house. He said that he paid the girl to distract me. He didn’t say girls.

You know, even though it didn’t seem right, intellectually speaking, that Hannah saved my life, something about it felt right. Maybe she had as much of an adventurous, unbelievable day that I had. I really wanted to see Hannah again, I needed to see her, but she had flown away. Besides, I had a task to finish.

I got up from the ground, the three ball still secured in my right hand. We had been through a lot together, it and me. I was banged and bruised from the day, but that didn’t matter now. I looked around and saw an ambulance, near the edge of the parking lot, this had to be it. My imagination ran away, wondering who it would be that would soon receive this gift. Who will have their life saved? I thought that it might be a great statesman, ready to engage in peace talks, or perhaps a scientist on the verge of a breakthrough discovery. Then I switched gears and thought that it might be a child, a little girl with her whole life ahead of her who had fallen on the rocks. I was excited and energized.

There was no activity near the ambulance but over to the right I saw a crowd of people near the path down to Black’s Beach that I had walked down earlier that day. So I went over there and forced my way through the people. Coming up the path were two medics carrying an occupied stretcher. It was difficult for them, with all the steep angles and sharp turns, but they managed. I couldn’t see the patient but it was clearly an adult. As they got closer to the top, my heart started pounding. I didn’t know what to do. I had this thing and this task, but how to accomplish it? I successfully used the power with Derek’s would-be assassins, but failed miserably just moments ago. I guess like the rest of this day, it would unfold.

When the medics carrying the stretcher got to the top, they were moving quickly. I had to do something and fast. I didn’t know what to do so I extended my arm straight forward, the three ball in my hand. There was a low pitched rumble then nothing. Everyone froze. I wasn’t sure if the whole world stopped or just the people right here, but I was surrounded by statues. Now was the time. This was it. I moved up closer to the dying person and I couldn’t believe what I saw. It was Mindy, the very person who was critical to me and reluctant to tell me who stole the red ball. Mindy hated me.

“I risked my life for her?” I said audibly.

“Why not?” said a voice from behind.

That Finnegan had such a knack at arriving at the most dramatic moments. But he was right you know. Is one person’s life more important than another? Does the life of a statesman have more value than that of a housewife or a plumber? But why her, I thought, people die every day. Why this one? Of course I knew the answer to that too. Why not this one?

So I looked deeper at Mindy as she lay there unconscious and deeper still. What did I see? I saw someone with joys but also heartache. I saw someone with wounds, unfulfilled dreams and loneliness. Doesn’t that describe all of us to one degree or another, I thought, uncharacteristically philosophical.

So I reached over and touched the red ball to Mindy’s side, another low pitched rumble and then an incredible energy exchange, similar to symploncy but in reverse, then nothing. She opened her eyes and smiled. I knew she was going to be fine. For the last hour or so I had anticipated this moment. I had thought that perhaps after it happened I would feel drained then collapse in fatigue, as if the life had been sucked from me. That didn’t happen at all. I also wondered if I would feel exhilarated and invincible, like a twenty foot giant. That wasn’t the case either. Instead I felt just like me, and what’s so bad about that?

So I pulled the three ball back, away from Mindy and let it dangle in my right arm beside me. There was no ploncedite left, it was just a billiard ball now. Everyone started moving again. I turned and walked through the crowd, no one spoke. I kept walking toward the little blue hut. I didn’t look back, well once. I glanced over my right shoulder and when I did, someone took my left hand. It was Hannah. It felt perfectly right to hold her hand as we walked together without saying a word. I had been through so much today, but I had this feeling that Hannah had too. We had a connection that words couldn’t enhance.

Maybe the ploncedite left a remnant of itself that granted me a heightened perception. I don’t know how it works; all I know is that Hannah had an adventure today too. I could sense it. I think Hannah was plucked out of reality much like I was, probably right after her sister stole the three ball from me. I could tell now that Hannah was the one guiding and directing me away from my melting world. She was the one calling to me, keeping me from giving in to my failures. Ah, fear and failure, my oldest friends.

When we got through the parking lot and walked around the building, there were two men playing pool. I dropped the three ball on the table. One of the men barked at me.

“There it is! You jerk.”

“Sorry,” I said as we kept walking.

We sat down in the chairs and looked out at the remaining hang gliders milking every last second of daylight, as the sun elegantly set over the Pacific Ocean. Hannah looked so peaceful and beautiful sitting there next to me. I so wanted to kiss her but surely I hadn’t the courage for that. But you know folks, I did. I leaned in and kissed those perfect lips, and she kissed me back. Then we sat some more. And as the last hang glider landed, I thought back a few hours to when I was floating in the water with Chrysta and how I thought that that was the best moment of my life. In hindsight, it was probably the worst.

This right here, sitting and holding hands with Hannah, the sun melting into the ocean in a color-filled spectacle, was the best… so far.

Everyone has to be somewhere. I’m here.