'Where was I? Why was I running? Suddenly, somebody grabbed hold of my hand.

Larisa?

"Quick, we need to escape before it's too late!" she yelled, giving me a light slap on the cheek to snap me out of my confused daze. "We don't have time to freak out. Trust me, we'll make it to the deck." With that, Larisa led us through endless wooden hallways, the swaying and rocking making it clear that we were at sea and on a ship. I couldn't talk nor think straight as Larisa took us up some stairs and my breath left my body as we found ourselves face-to-face with Jamie. "Candace, Larisa, over here! We can make it to safety before the ship sinks. Hurry!"

The ship was sinking? I found myself hyperventilating and taking quick breaths, but Larisa remained calm and steady. "What's wrong?" she asked, her smile unwavering. I couldn't form coherent words, and as I struggled to catch my breath, I jumped back when a bolt of thunder obstructs our way, creating a ring of fire around the three of us.

"Aw, would you look at that," scowled Jamie, "Looks like we won't get to the boats, after all."

What-what are you saying?

Larisa turned to Jamie, a defeated grin on her face before looking at my alarmed expression. "Well, at least we'll all die together, right?" I tried to pull away from her tight grip, desperate to find another way to escape the sinking ship. But Larisa and Jamie remained still, calmly watching as the storm engulfed our vessel deck by deck.

As my panic intensified, tears streamed down my face while I looked between them. I fought with all my might to break free from Larisa's grasp, but she only tightened her hold, her smile never faltering. "It's okay, Candace," she whispered. "We'll be together soon."

The ship groaned and creaked as it collapsed, and I was tossed around by the debris. Finally, I was sucked into the dark, never-ending void of the ocean, my mouth not producing any sound even as I felt myself screaming my throat out. Panic set in as I struggled to breathe, my chest constricting painfully. I was sinking deeper and deeper, the surface becoming a blur. I looked around frantically, seeing the unmoving bodies of Larisa and Jamie sinking with me.

A scream of horror lodged in my throat as I choked, water filling my lungs. I fought to keep breathing until all my senses left me...'

...My eyes shot wide open. My heart was beating so loud and fast I could hear nothing else as I breathlessly stared into nothing but darkness. I waited unmoving, as I took in my bearings.

What-what happened? I was sinking, Larisa and Jamie-they-they sank with me...

A creak under me startled me back into reality and I took quick silent breaths, realizing that I was nowhere but, in the ocean, in a boat with Tavin.

It was just a nightmare, Candace. Nothing, but a nightmare.

Seeing Jamie had shocked me, and a tear escaped my eye as a wave of sadness washed over me. I thought about the selfless act of bravery he had shown in saving so many lives by helping them board the lifeboats, even at the cost of his own. My finger grazed my chapped lips. It was no use wondering about the reason why he kissed me.

I hoped that wherever he was, he was at peace and knew how much of a hero he was to everyone on board. I wished I had known him better, to have been able to thank him for his sacrifice and bravery.

Despite my hunger, I was afraid to fall back asleep, so I closed my eyes shakily and took deep breaths. As I lay there, still shaken by the nightmare, I suddenly became aware of the gut-wrenching sobs coming from next to me.

Though I wasn't facing him, I knew the heart-wrenching cries only be coming from Tavin.

I laid still in shock, making sure I was not hearing things.

"I-I'm sorry, I-I wasn't there for y-you gu-guys," I heard him say, his voice cracking as he drew deep breaths. "I'm s-sorry I'm a-alive i-instead."

With a trembling hand, I covered my mouth and squeezed my eyes shut, my heart tearing at the sheer pain in his voice. The stillness of the night was shattered by his uncontrollable crying, which felt like a physical weight on my chest. Even the calming sound of the waves crashing against the boat's hull felt like a piece of sad background music to the heartrending story of Tavin's agony.

It was clear that Tavin had been hiding all that pain behind his flirtatious and teasing demeanor that he put up whenever he was with me. But now that he thought I was sleeping, he had let his guard down and was giving in to the overwhelming grief of losing his family in such a tragic way.

Although I longed to console Tavin, I knew that he wouldn't want my pity, especially after what he said before. He needed time to himself, to grieve in peace without anyone seeing him in such a vulnerable state.

I tried my best to ignore the harrowing wails of Tavin as he cried and wished he had been with his family on the ship, spending their last moments together and being able to protect them. I laid there silently, tears streaming down my face, crying for Tavin's loss as the heart-wrenching sobs filled the ocean before I eventually, wept myself to sleep.

° ° °

I wearily watched Tavin as he washed his face with the sparkling water before spotting me. "So, how was your first night on the lifeboat?" he grinned, as the sun shined behind his tall frame.

"I made it through all right," I replied, observing him carefully, "How about you?"

"Oh, I slept like a log! We do nothing but sit in here all day, but man was I exhausted!" I raised my eyebrows as his grin never faltered, nobody would've believed that this was the same man who had been wailing in grief just the previous night.

Of course, I never commented on it, but my heart tore shred by shred when I caught glimpses of him staring into the ocean with a melancholic expression as if he had lost everything in the world when he thought I wasn't looking. I wondered if he even realized he gets those momentary relapses, but I managed to bring him out of those situations by asking striking up a conversation, just like I was doing right now.

"So, how old are you exactly?" I inquired, eating up the protein bar that would fuel me for the day.

"Last month, I turned 23 years old. I just started my final year, majoring in Business Management," he explained, looking up from the ocean with an interest in his gray eyes. "And what about you?"

"I'll be turning 24 next month," I laughed as Tavin's eyes widened, and his protein bar stopped halfway in front of his mouth. "I just graduated, majoring in Fine Arts."

"That's amazing. I could widen my range for someone older than me." Tavin wiggled his eyebrows with a beam and I bit my lower lip to keep myself from lashing out. "Just one hour, one hour is all I ask, can you please stop toying with me?"

"Fine, fine," he chuckled, then asked his eyes sparkling with curiosity, "What made you choose Fine Arts?"

"Well, I've always had a passion for art since I was young, and I just knew that was what I wanted to pursue," I replied, a smile spreading across my face. "I couldn't see myself doing anything else."

Tavin nodded thoughtfully, "That's great. You must have a lot of talent. Have you considered what you're going to do with your degree?"

"I'm thinking about opening up my own art studio," I said, my mind wandering to the opening of my first-ever gallery next month. I really wish I could make it out alive in time for it.

"Oh, that's very cool. You must be good at what you are doing then."

I smiled bashfully at that and Tavin exclaimed, "Had I finally managed to make the stoic Candace shy?"

"Shut up," I frowned at him and the boat shook a little at his cackles. "So, have you considered what you are going to do in the future?"

"I'm an heir to our family business. We maintain a chain of hotels across several countries," his expression turned grave as if he just realized something, "Now that my Dad is g-gone...I guess I'm no longer the heir, but the CEO..."

Memories of the previous night flooded my mind as his eyes grew gloomy again. I quickly placed a hand on top of his. "Don't worry, Tavin. We'll get through this together. We just have to stay hopeful."

Tavin gave me a grateful smile, and for a moment, I was taken aback by how vibrant and attractive he looked when he genuinely smiled instead of his usual flirty ones. Yet, I could tell that I was slowly warming up to him, especially after I heard glimpses of his vulnerable side last night, which made me realize that his flirtatious demeanor was merely a façade.

° ° °

"How long do you think we'll be here?" Tavin wondered sometime in the afternoon after he woke up from a small nap.

"I have no idea. I just...I just don't know what to expect at all," I told him, hugging my knees to my chest, a blue blanket that we found in the boat covering my body.

"Do you think we might experience something similar to the movies? Will we be stranded on an uninhabited island and be attacked by cannibals? We do have a flare with us, which could potentially attract the attention of a passing helicopter," he pondered with a serious expression while examining the emergency equipment on our boat.

"You have a way with your imagination," I commented, although I couldn't help but consider his words.

We had nothing to do while we waited in this boat for about two days, however, time seemed to blur together and I lost track of the days that passed. However, it was surprisingly Tavin who kept track of the days, and according to him, we'd been in the ocean for six days already. Despite the stress of the situation, I tried to stay positive and focused on survival, planning for different scenarios that could arise.

I still heard Tavin stirring at night when he thought I was asleep. Sometimes, I could hear him sniffling, weeping, or grieving the loss of his family. Throughout those nights, I remained silent, allowing Tavin to believe that I was unaware of his nightly emotional outbursts. I never confronted or comforted him, fearing that I might disrupt the progress we had made as colleagues. Tavin seemed to want to keep his vulnerable moments hidden from me, and I respected his need for privacy.

However, over time, he seemed to cope better and began sleeping at night instead of during the afternoons. We had also considerably grown a tad bit close, in the sense; I found myself trusting him more and no longer feeling the need to keep my guard up.

He, just like me, was worried about our survival, attempting once to catch fish with his bare hands. We had a lighter in our emergency survival kit, which Tavin thought he could use to 'cook' a small fish he caught, but I convinced him to stop when I expressed my distaste for raw fish.

At one point, Tavin had also stripped and jumped into the sea, scaring me to death. He claimed that he had felt sticky and that was his way of washing himself up. I would always anxiously watch him and his surroundings with panic, fearful that any killer whales would gobble him while he carefreely swam near the boat, flexing his muscles in front of me, no matter how much I tried to act like they didn't impress me.

Nu-uh, we weren't going through men again.

I had to admit that I did feel dirty and sticky in my unchanged evening dress too, but I didn't want to strip in front of him or jump into the deep sea, even though Tavin told me that he wouldn't peep and keep a lookout.

Still, I couldn't fathom myself washing my body in the sea, reducing to wetting the blanket and wiping it on my body when Tavin wasn't looking instead.

We had about eight plastic water bottles left. When he was too bored, Tavin cut off the bottom of the empty two bottles and sanded the edges to smooth them out using the pocket knife from our survival kit to create two cups for us to drink water from. Well, that was one useful thing he did (even though we drink directly from the bottles most of the time).

We had no way of knowing where we were, or if we would come out alive. Our boat was at the mercy of the waves, taking us in directions that were unknown to us. We had to rely on the natural guidance of the wind and the current; we had no other choice. But whatever happened, I was just glad that I was not alone at the sea. The fear of not knowing whether we will survive or not can be overwhelming, and weighed heavily on my mind, like an ominous storm cloud that never seemed to dissipate.

I would feel a sense of extreme discomfort and physical exhaustion at times, even if I hadn't worked my body. The constant exposure to the sun, salt water, and wind caused us dehydration, and sometimes our skin suffered the consequences of sunburns. Luckily for us, the emergency first aid kit had a sunscreen that was nearing its demise.

You could tell that we'd gotten thinner with the lack of food, and despite the little snacks we ate, there wasn't an hour that passed without us getting hungrier than before. We were basically living off of our water supply.

Staying in a boat with a man whom I've slowly grown accustomed to was considerably not lonely but it was boring. I slept at night, and he would sleep in the evenings, we would share a piece of protein bar or snacks, talk a little, organize the boat repeatedly, and go to sleep again.

We literally had nothing to do, so we retorted to playing word games, or we would look at the sky, questioning each other on what the different clouds looked like.

This went on for days, and we managed to stay sane and alive for one week and four days; which was calculated according to Tavin.

"I'm telling you, that cloud looks like a cookie!" argued Tavin one day.

"How can you be so simple-minded? That is just a distorted-looking cloud! It might as well be a ball, a coin or whatever!" I retorted but he just shook his head, "You see the small random openings in the cloud? Those are the chocolate chips! Hence, it is a chocolate chip cookie! Damn, I'm craving one right now," he declared, his tone final as he stroked his stomach.

"Then it can be a button too," I disclosed, and he looked at me with his eyes narrowed, "No, no, Candy. A button can never be as delicious looking as a chocolate chip cookie." As if his statement didn't irritate me enough, he had to call me his infamous nickname for me; 'Candy', which had me cringing and gagging every time he called me that.

Rolling my eyes, because there was no debating his beliefs, I shifted my gaze from the sky to the sea. Suddenly, I spotted something in the distance and sat up abruptly, almost losing my balance. "Woah, Candace! You almost fell off!" Tavin yelled as he caught me from plopping into the sea.

"Look! I see a boat!"