P R O L O G U E

Welcome to the novel Tide! I would like to thank you for giving my novel a chance and I hope that you enjoy it. I appreciate all comments and votes that are given and will try my best to respond to all your positive words!

Tide:
A powerful surge of feeling or trend of events.

I was sitting on the golden sand of Chancier Cove. The minuscule grains of sand were burning my bare tanned legs as a cool breeze rustled my blonde hair. The waves would come crashing up onto the shore, reaching my toes before retreating back into the crystal clear ocean.

Menacing grey clouds were growing and growling overhead as the wind was slowly picking up in intensity. The weather stations were predicting that it was going to storm today but that didn't stop me from coming out the the spot that my best friend and I sat exactly one year ago.

Every year I found myself returning to this spot, waves of memories washing over myself as the wind blew my hair in front of my face.

I found myself being mesmerized by the ocean. Watching the waves roll in, hearing the seagulls sing, and smelling the fresh salty air. It took away all of the worries and misconceptions I had. They all seemed to be taken away just like everything that remained on the beach ended up being swept away by the tide.

I used to love the ocean. I loved splashing around, swimming, or surfing in the cool water that my house backed onto. That was until a tragic accident ruined it all for me...

I remember that day vividly. An image that is burned into my brain for as long as I shall live. No matter the amount of therapy I went through nothing could erase the past.

Crystal, who was my best friend of twelve years and myself had decided to go surfing on a particularly stormy day, we thought nothing of it as quite often the weather stations made the storms out to be a lot worse than they turned out to be.

The beach patrols had warned us about the dangers of going into the ocean but we ignored them because it was perfect conditions to catch a big one. The waves were eight foot plus, when we grabbed our boards and sprinted into the freezing cold water screaming and laughing as we went deeper and deeper into the unknown.

Crystal was right behind me, throwing water at my back as her laughs filled the air. She then hopped onto her board and came paddling up beside me. "You know, a little birdy told me that you were recruited for the Chancier surf team." she said laughing as she paddled past me heading further out from the bay.

"Does that little birdy have a name?" I asked hoping onto my board in an attempt to catch up to her. I dove my hands into the cool water scooping it back with every stroke I made.

"It's irrelevant. All I know is that you got asked to join the best surf team in all of California and you said you'd think about it. Ainsley Matthews." She said making sure I was listening. "You are one of the best surfers I know and it's not like you to pass up on an opportunity like this. I've known you since we were four and you've been dreaming of this ever since you caught your first wave. What's happened to you?"

"I am just second guessing if this is what I truly want to do. There is so much more out there in this world and I want to go out and experience it. Instead if I joined the team I'd be stuck getting home schooled because surfing always comes first. I just don't think I can do it."

"Bull shit." She screams as she abruptly stops her paddling to look at the waves coming our way. "Watch out. This is going to be a big one." She says as she starts paddling in the direction the wave is coming.

The wave pushes her up as she pushes down on the board standing up with ease. I hear her laughing. Her brown hair blowing in the breeze as she carves and cuts. Just as I was about to look for a wave of my own she lets out a scream before falling into the water.

I let out a laugh at her as her board popped out of the water and flew at least five feet in the air before landing with a loud crack. Water splashed up into the air on impact as I paddled over to where her board was expecting her to be swimming nearby.

Once I grabbed a hold of her board I pulled it towards me reached for her tether which should be attached to her ankle. I pulled at the string expecting to find crystal at the end of it but when I pulled at it all that came up was a frayed piece of string which looked like it hard been torn due to an excessive amount of tension.

That's when I started freaking out. I was driving under the water looking for her and screaming for help at the top of my lungs. My eyes were burning for the salt water as were my lungs for the amount of screaming and lack of oxygen I had.

I continued to search for her for a what seemed like forever. Diving down I would reach for whatever I could grabbing seaweed or brush but never coming up with Crystal. After ten minutes of searching a thought flashed across my mind. Maybe she is sitting on the beach waiting for me. I paddled through the water filled with hope as I realized she was probably waiting for me on the shore. She was never huge about surfing but always came with me when I needed somebody to go with.

I approached the shore, my feet touching the sand as I grabbed my board running until I made it to the waters end. I stood ankle deep in the water looking for any footprints on the sand or even Crystal laying down on the beach.

My heart was screaming at me to find her. My mind was racing a thousand miles per minute as I realized that she's not here, my best friend is not here beside me. I screamed again for help collapsing onto the cool sand of the beach with tears flowing down my face in a constant stream. I continued to scream, my throat burning raw until one of the beach patrols came running over to where I was laying in the sand.

"Miss, are you alright?" He said as he looking at my lifeless body laying on the ground. All I could do was shake my head no and point out towards the ocean.

"I-it's not me. My fr-friend she- she's out there somewhere" I managed to make out between my sobs. "I can't find her." I said in a hushed voice as he blew his whistle and radioed other patrols and coast guards over.

I sat there shivering from the cold. The beach patrol had draped a towel over my shoulders as my eyes stayed fixed on the ocean looking for her brown head of hair to suddenly pop up.

The beach patrols kept on saying how we shouldn't have been out in the water, how it was too dangerous to be out there alone, but I heard nothing they were saying. Their words kept washing over me as I was fixated on the skidoo's and rescue boats searching the bay.

The rain started coming down as they continued to search. I never moved. I remained in the same place I had been for hours hoping that they would find Crystal.

As day faded into dusk the patrols started coming in one by one. Each time a boat docked itself I got excited thinking that this was the one that found Crystal, but they all came back empty.

Eventually the search was called off. The conditions had become to dangerous to continue searching as it was putting the lives of the patrols at risk.

"My best friend is out there!" I screamed, brushing the towel off my body as I ran towards the ocean. The water was up to my shins as I collapsed into the cool ocean with the sound of the patrols running towards me.

A man gathered me into his arms, pulling me from the water as I tried breaking free from his grasp. "I can't leave her out there." I plea as tears poured down my face, mixing with the rain that was coming down overhead. "I need to find her. I can't live without her."

"Miss, we'll do everything in our power to find her, but right now it's not safe. As soon as the weather clears up we'll be out there again. We will find her I promise." He says to me in a saddened voice as he carries me out of the ocean.

—

The search for missing Crystal Rodgers continued for days. One member of the search team had found Crystals friendship bracelet that I gave her years ago washed up on the shore the morning after her disappearance.

Five days after Crystal went missing, the search was called off.

A local fisherman was checking his nets when he noticed a mop of brown hair bobbing up and down from the waves. He reports moving closer towards the hair before noticing that it was attached to a head as well as a body. He called the coast guards and they recovered her body.

Her lifeless body.

She was covered in bruises and gashes as I watched them wrap her body up in one of the black body bags. Her once perfect hair was matted and had seaweed tangled in it, her nails were chipped and her face was almost unrecognizable.

Police reports stated that she had drowned, which I couldn't come to terms with. Crystal knew how to swim, she was a lifeguard for years.

The funeral was the following Monday. The church was filled with people from all over our seaside town. Everyone in attendance was crying, her friends, family, parents, and her younger brother.

The service was short and during my time in the small church I could not stop crying even when it was my turn to say a small speech. I had to get someone else to read it for me because I could not even get out any words as I looked at her white coffin covered in flowers and her family in the front row.

I blamed myself for Crystals death, and I was pretty sure that her family, and the rest of the town did the same.

After her death I gave up surfing. I locked all of my boards down in a storage shed by the water and made myself forget all of the good times and enjoyment surfing had created.

I threw part of my life away because the other part of me had been buried with Crystal. I could no longer stand the beach and all of the fun the children were having because all that I could think of was her never touching the sand again. I could no longer stand the clear blue water I use to love. I could only look at it as the horrible monster that claimed he life of my best friend.

I was responsible. It was my fault that she was even out in the water. It was my fault she died. My fault that her life was swiped from her at such a young age. It was my fault that her parents had to bury their kid.

It was all my fault.

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Word Count: 1989