Amber
"One..two...three....four..." The almost frantic counting matched up perfectly with the stabbing pressure pounding my chest. "Thirteen..fourteen... come on.. wake up."
I can't. I wanted to scream. Just leave me alone. But he didn't. He continued to pound my chest as I was trapped in a body that no longer wanted to function.
I couldn't open my eyes. I couldn't speak. I couldn't breathe.
"Damn it." The voice was now filled with defeat and the pounding finally stopped. My chest able to expand...then still...unable to function on its own.
I could feel myself drifting away. I wanted to fight, I really did. But at the same time, I was so tired. Tired of all the treatments, tired of always feeling bad, tired of always having to be perfect - always having to be the 'it' girl.
If he was giving up on me, maybe it would be easier just to let myself drift off.
"No...no..." His voice was back, pulling at me. "You don't get to die."
Distantly, I could feel my head being tipped back and a form moving over me. Then warm lips covered my own, forcing my lips to open. Warm air was forced down my throat, expanding my previously paralyzed lungs. Instantly, I could feel myself getting forcefully pulled back to the surface.
The first feeling to come back to me was the gentle hold of two large, rough hands cradling my face. The the soft lips pressed firmly to my own.
For a split second, those lips became less about providing life support and more about pleasure. As my own lips came back to life, sparks flew between us and almost involuntarily my lips started to move under his. Those gentle hands clutched me just a little tighter and the lips became more forceful on mine.
As fast as the CPR had turning into a kiss, it turned again. The lake water that had filled my body wanted out. I just had enough time to push him away and roll to my side before it started gushing from my mouth and nose in painful gags.
The guy, who somehow I knew was Alek without even looking at his face, moved behind me to support my back. Gently he pulled my knotted and wet hair out of my face to keep it out of the way.
"I know it hurts, but you've got to get it up." A warm hand rubbed into my back, warming skin that had turned ice cold.
"Why..why are you being so nice to me?" I managed to get out between heaves. "I was horrible to you guys today." If the situation had been reversed I can't guarantee I wouldn't have left me to drown.
"Seeing as you just attempted to swallow half the lake, I'm choosing to ignore my feelings about earlier today. But how about not testing me, huh?"
I turned to face my savior and was pierced once again with his green eyes. This time instead of hatred, they were filled with concern. "Okay." Was all I managed to get out.
For a couple minute he just sat there with me in the wet sand, allowing me to catch my breath. I was sure I looked like a drowned rat with my knotted hair, sand covered body and lips chapped from throwing up. I should have felt self-conscious about this, but I didn't. He never once looked at me with judgement in his eyes, like I had grown so used to from others. No, instead, all he did was sit there calming me with a hand running up and down my bare back.
Finally, my breaths evened out and the shivers that had wracked my body from my near death experience, dissipated. "I think I'm good now. Do you think you could help me stand?"
"You sure?" He didn't look as confident about my recovery as I was.
Truth was, even after almost drowning and having CPR performed on me, I was feeling better than I had before entering the water. There was pain in my chest where he had been pounding to keep my heart going, but the headache was gone. I felt lighter than I had in a while.
"I'm fine, besides the sand that's caking onto my skin." I snapped, needing to get space, because now that I wasn't dying all I could think about was his lips on mine. And the last thing that I needed was to jump him.
"I guess you are feeling back to yourself." His comforting warmth at my back disappeared so quickly that I almost tumbled onto my back. I caught myself just in time to not embarrass myself further.
Ignoring the hand that was offered to me, I managed to use one of the chair logs to push to my feet. I was surprised to find that without his touch, I was starting to feel the pains that had pushed me to the lakes depth again. I needed to get back in the water.
I was like a junky and the lake was my drug. As soon as I stepped back in, using washing the sand off as an excuse, relief hit.
I could feel his eyes burning into me as I emerged from dipping beneath the surface to get the sand out of my hair. I looked over just in time to catch his stare before he ran a frustrated hand over his face and turned away.
He might not like me as a person, but clearly in the looks department I was his type. I had never been very vain, but I knew the effect I had on guys.
To bad I couldn't show him the real me. The me that was not the person I put forward today at school. The me that few people actually knew.
"So is there a reason you tried to drown yourself?" Alek asked when I returned to sit on a log around the campfire pit. While I had been in the water he had taken the time to light a log, which I was thankful for, as the sun was almost completely behind the treeline, and there was now a chill in the air. Alek passed me a large towel from a pack that I hadn't noticed before then took a seat on the log next to my own.
"I wasn't trying to drown myself." I scoffed, as I wrapped the soft fabric around my shoulders. As I did I caught a whiff of the towel, it smelled like Alek, masculine and woodsy. Like the lake, it was comforting. He might not be getting this towel back.
"You were under a long time."
"I'm a good swimmer. I can hold my breath for longer than most...most well humans." For a minute I had forgotten he was an alien. But all I had to do to remind myself was look into those eyes that were to bright to be human, or at the markings that seemed to move before my eyes. He had one on his neck that seemed to be stretching further and further to his chin line.
"You're still human. You can't breath under water." He stated the obvious.
"And what? Zionian's can?" Wait, could they? I knew so little about them. What if they had abilities humans didn't. The news said they were just like human except for photographic memories. But what if they had lied so as to not freak everyone out. "Can you?"
"No. We can't." Why did I feel like he was lying.
"What's that thing down there anyways?"
"What 'thing'?" And once again he's looking at me like I'm loosing my mind.
"That large metallic thing." There's no way he hadn't seen it. "It was huge, I was trying to get a better look. That's why I almost drowned. Well that and you scaring the daylights out of me."
"There's nothing down there." He snapped, giving me a look that made it clear I shouldn't ask any more questions. "The waters too murky down there to see anything anyways."
"Well, I saw something. And it was big and made of metal." I would just have to dive deeper next time.
"Just forget about it okay?" Once again, he sounded angry with me. "How about from now on you stay on your side of the lake to swim? Maybe have your boyfriend, the Ken doll, there to save you so I don't have to again."
"You know about Ken dolls?" Why did this surprise me? I mean I guess he had grown up in the same town as me, even if it was in an alien compound.
"We do have television and internet."
We sat in silence as we watched the last rays of the sun reflect on the lake. I shouldn't even be driving the jet ski at night but it wouldn't be the first time I had broken that law.
I shouldn't have been comfortable sitting there with an Alien but I was. I felt like we had sat here a million times before. Even our silence was familiar.
"I better get going." I didn't want to leave though. As darkness took over the sky and fireflies appeared, dancing over the water in a magical way. This side of the lake almost felt like an untouched oasis.
"Guess so." He stood and started putting out the fire that had revived my bodies warmth. "Next time you try to kill yourself how about not doing it on my beach, okay."
I wasn't sure why his sudden hostility stung so much. "Are you even supposed to be down here?"
"You going to fib on me?" He snapped as I pushed my jet ski back in the waves and mounted it, keeping his towel wrapped around me. "Get me put into lock up?"
"Consider my silence thanks for saving my life." Then I left him standing on that beach, determined that would be my last trip to the north side of the lake.