Rippler

Chapter 6

    IMPACT

I slammed into the wall: it hurt less than I'd expected. Was I too numbed by the cold water to feel things properly? It seemed as if my body pushed against the current. My eyes opened and, looking down at my waist, I saw strong arms wrapped tightly around me. Will!

He inched us along the boulder to shore, slipping once, but catching himself. I was too exhausted to speak, too numb from cold to help.

"Thank God," Will sighed low, hugging me to himself.

I felt the warmth of his body pressed into mine. I tried to hug back, but my frozen arms didn't respond. My head nestled in the space below his chin, and I breathed his scent of peanut-butter sandwich and pine and sweat. We collapsed on dry land, slipping apart, avoiding eye contact, embarrassed.

I shook from cold or from remembering the shape of Will's arms around me.

"You're bleeding," Will said, pointing to my elbow—a bloody gash.

It stung as I thawed.

"Firs-taid-tsin-mupack." My lungs and nostrils burned and my words slurred. I turned my head coughing out creek-water.

"I'm not leaving you here for Band-Aids."

I lifted my leaden arm to examine my elbow. It was an ugly scrape.

Will reached beyond me and placed something he'd grabbed onto the cut. I winced briefly.

"Wuz-zat?" I asked.

"Cobweb," he replied. "Stops small injuries from bleeding."

"Nuh-uh." I laughed, more like a snort. "Where-d-chu-hear-that?"

"Shakespeare."

I coughed, my throat stinging. Feeling was returning to my mouth and jaw muscles. "You're such a history geek." My words had returned.

Will shook his head grimly; his dark eyes were serious. "All I could think was I had to catch you before the falls. I remembered this spot where the boulders almost touch."

It made no sense that he could outrun the river, not with all the brush, fallen trees and uneven rocks surrounding the creek. "How did you get here so fast?"

"I rippled."

I recalled the friction-free movement. "You can move faster invisible."

"Well, yeah, if you glide straight through all the rocks and stuff."

"Um—wait a sec—you passed through things?" I felt dizzy.

He shrugged like it was no big deal for him.

I thought for a moment. "Guess I just 'passed through' water."

He nodded. "So, Sam, just now, when you rippled back solid upstream—what happened? I was watching for you and all the sudden there's this thunderclap and water flying everywhere and you in the middle of it all in the creek."

I shook my head. "You're the expert. Does an explosion happen like that every time you materialize in water?"

Will shook his head. "I've never done what you did."

I didn't like the idea that Will was as new to this as I was, but all I said was, "Huh."

So materializing in a creek was apparently not a good idea. My mind looked for explanations, for answers. When I vanished into thin air, what happened? The air shimmered. "Will, what if I did that—the explosion. What if my body displaced the water? You say the air ripples, right? Maybe the air shimmers like that because it's being disrupted somehow."