PANIC ROOM • KENJI KON

XLVIII. In Love With Our Best Friends

She watched as Yasmina dove into the waves. Sammy, Ben and Darius happily jumped in, while Brooklynn climbed down the rocks and stepped into the water, unbothered.

They were all wearing various bathing suits they scavenged yesterday, and while Eva didn't give a damn about who saw her in one, she cared too much about what could happen while she's in the water.

"You'll be fine," Kenji repeated.

"This is controlled," she continued. "There's no waves."

"There's some waves." Eva glared at him. "But nothing you can't handle."

"It's, what, fifty meters?"

"What's a meter?"

Eva bit her cheek, watching the water lap against the rocks.

"Okay, look, think of it like a wave pool at a waterpark. Do you remember the field trip to Summer's Kingdom? When our entire class got into the wave pool?"

"That was like, the most chaotic moment of freshman year."

"Yeah, but the waves weren't there to drown us." She finally pulled her attention from the rocks and to Kenji. "They just rocked us a little. That's what this'll be like. We'll swim through the waves, but they'll just pull us around a little bit."

"But I'm not a swimmer."

"Yeah, but I watched you take down a six foot tall, gigantosaurus wall of muscle— that was definitely on steroids— in the middle of a lacrosse game last year because he injured one of your teammates. If you can win a fight against the scariest kid from West Bridge, you can win a fight against something that gets bossed around by a giant hunk of rock in space."

Eva looked down, her eyes resting on Kenji's abs. He looked just as good as every other time she stared at him for too long. Squeaking, she glanced back to his soft brown eyes. "I don't know, I might die."

Kenji outstretched his hand. "I'm not going to let that happen."

Eva softly placed her hand in his. He led her to the edge of the rocks, where they carefully slid down until they were just above the water. Kenji dipped in first, hand still in Eva's.

"See? We're good so far, right?"

Eva stepped in carefully, but her left foot still slipped. She fell forward, colliding with Kenji.

"Oof!"

Alarms bell rang in her head. Water slid over her skin. Cold. She sucked in a breath, choking on air. Or was that water? Her vision waned. The air grew dark, and suddenly Eva was convinced there was a harness over her chest, keeping her in place.

"Angel— Eva. Look at me. Look at me— you're not drowning. You're above water. You're doing this."

She nodded slowly.

Suddenly, she could see the grey clouds above them. She could feel the breeze on her face.

"We're gonna move now, okay?"

Again, she nodded.

It took them a while to reach the boat. As they swam, Eva's mind turned to their adventures in Kenji's hot tub. She forced herself to relive those moments, where she was in water but she had no risk of dying. She forced herself to remember that Kenji was beside her, helping her every step of the way.

Her cheeks flushed pink in embarrassment, but also maybe in exhaustion. They were close to the boat— maybe a dozen more feet. All Eva wanted to do was collapse somewhere and take a nap.

Kenji helped Eva up first before climbing on the edge after her. They split off, everyone going in their own separate directions to search the boat.

Eva entered the bridge with Darius and Sammy to find shattered glass and blood.