When I was five years old, my mom enrolled me in swim lessons at the local pool. Unfortunately, the swim teacher was madly in love with the lifeguard, so when I strayed too far from the wall in the deep end they were both too distracted by each other to notice. I started drowning, and if a helicopter parent who'd stayed at the lesson to watch her own kid hadn't seen me, I probably would have finished drowning, too.

I've been afraid of deep water ever since, and thus never properly learned to swim—a skill which would have come in quite handy at the moment.

Reflexively, I hold my breath as the rush of surf tumbles me like a load of clothes in the wash. My leg and shoulder scrape on the rocks and something hot touches my brow. Breaking the surface, I see the back-flow of the wave has sucked me further down the channel and into the surf. I try to get my feet under me, but I can't touch the bottom and go under again.

Panic explodes in my chest. I thrash clumsily, weighed down by my clothes, and when my head breaks through the waves again, I inhale some seawater and choke. I make a desperate grab for the rocks, but they're at once slippery and sharp, covered in slimy algae and encrusted with mussels and barnacles. They elude my grasp and cut me at the same time.

The cold bites, pain eats at my strength, and I go under again, likely for the last time. I read about how easy it is to drown, how even the best swimmers can succumb in the right—or wrong—circumstances, and I can barely dog paddle on a good day.

This is it. I'm drowning, and some unfortunate beach-goer will find my crab-eaten corpse in a few days, washed up on shore like a dead whale. My greatest contribution to the world will be a statistic: one more idiot who underestimated the sea. Good job, Charlie.

If that seems like a lot to think about while drowning, it feels like I have time. I've stopped struggling and, having surrendered to my fate, find myself carried almost gently by the waves. I've gone numb, pain fading to a memory, and let myself drift where the current takes me. It's almost peaceful, except I'm vaguely aware that I'm in shock.

Then, abruptly, I break the surface again and—much to my surprise—find myself lifted clear of the churning brine, dragged up and over the slimy rocks by a pair of wet-suit clad arms, and deposited on dry land.

I cough and retch, vomiting seawater, of which I'd swallowed several mouthfuls in my attempts not to breathe it in. My ears ring, my eyes sting, and the pain returns with a vengeance, the cold biting to my bones. A different pain—hot like fire—burns the scrapes on my arm and leg, while the side of my face feels like someone scrubbed it with sandpaper.

I roll onto my back, sand and salt blurring my vision, and struggled to catch my breath as my throat and lungs burn. A human-shaped shadow blocks my hazy view of the over-bright sky, and I stare up into a pair of blue eyes in a handsome face. In my half-stunned state, I absorb a handful of random details: chapped lips, wind-tousled hair, the kind of jawline modeling agencies fight over. If not for the pain telling me I'm very much alive, I'd think I drowned after all, and an angel plucked my soul from the waves.

Angel-boy's lips move, but I can't hear past the ringing in my ears. Then my senses clear a little and sound returns.

"Come on, bro. That's it. Keep breathing. Nice and steady. That's it. Whoa!"

Thoroughly mortified, I sit up, then instantly regret it as a throb of pain goes through my head. As if things could get worse, I double over and retch again, spewing a bit more seawater and half-digested granola bar over my lap. All the irritation has triggered my asthma, too, and my next breath is more of a strained wheeze.

"I need... my stuff." I wave vaguely towards the cliffs where I'd left my pack. "Inhaler."

I make an attempt to rise, but angel-boy, who I now recognize as one of the surfer dudes, holds me back.

"Dave will get it," he says, and waves to his friend, who stands a little ways back on the rocks, holding his phone and apparently filming my brush with death. "Dave, stop fucking around and get his pack!"

The other guy raises his hand in acknowledgment and jogs across the rocks to my things, picks up my pack, and trots over.

"Holy shit, dude," he says, dropping it next to me. "Are you okay?"

Shaking my head, I reach for the pack, but my hands are shaking too badly to get the zipper. Angel-boy takes it from me.

"Where's your inhaler?" he asks.

"Front... pocket."

He unzips it, rummages inside, extracts my rescue inhaler, gives it a few good shakes, and helps me hold it as I take two puffs, breathing in as deeply as I can. The albuterol works quickly, opening my airways enough that I can breathe without wheezing, and my panic recedes as embarrassment takes its place as my primary emotion.

"Shit, that's a nasty cut," angel-boy says, his expression scrunching as he examines the side of my head. "We got a first-aid kit in our van. Can you walk?"

I touch my fingers to my brow. They come away bloody. I must have scraped it on a rock. "Yeah, I can walk," I say, testing the truth in this statement as angel-boy helps me to my feet. "I just got banged up a little."

Angel-boy's friend Dave scoffs. "A little? Dude, you were done for. You're lucky Haze saw you fall in that gap."

"I didn't fall," I say, trying and failing to shake off 'Haze,' who insists on helping me across the uneven rocks to the smooth sand. "I jumped on purpose."

Dave's eyes go wide. "Whoa. Dude, no! That's not the answer. I know things might seem rough, but—"

I cough and wave my hand, cutting him off. "No, that's not what I mean. There was a... a fossil. I climbed down to get it, and..."

As I speak, my hand goes to the pocket of my hoodie, but the pocket is empty, plastered flat against my body like the rest of my wet clothes. The perfect spiral shell is gone, probably lost forever now.

Or maybe not; maybe it got washed back up the channel and I can still get it.

I try to turn back, but angel-boy grabs my arm. "Whoa! Where are you going?"

"The fossil. It fell out of my pocket."

"Dude, it's a dead clam. The whole damn cliff is full of them. Let it go."

"It's not a dead clam. It's a... fossilized snail."

'Haze' laughs. "Well, lucky for you, there's plenty more where it came from. So how 'bout you let that one go and live to find another, 'kay?"

I realize he's right and that I'm not thinking rationally, and keep my mouth shut the rest of the way across the rocks, over the beach, and up the steep trail to the parking lot. There, 'Haze' and Dave lead me over to an old Dodge Caravan with a surfboard painted on the side and a roof rack on top. Dave opens the sliding side door and angel-boy makes me sit on the step while he gets the first-aid kit.

"So, what's your name?" he asks as he cleans the cut above my eye with an antiseptic pad. "I'm Hazel, and this is Dave, by the way."

Dave waves and grins awkwardly.

"Charlie," I say.

He sticks a large Band-Aid to my forehead. "So, what's your interest in dead clams, Charlie?"

I frown and pull away as he tries to get a look at the cuts on my palms. "They're not clams. There are nearly a hundred species of various marine invertebrates in those cliffs, including trace fossils. And isn't Hazel a girl's name?"

Hating myself, I bite the inside of my bottom lip. My already tenuous grasp on social etiquette tends to slip when I get emotional, excited, or distressed. At the moment, I'm all three.

Fortunately, Hazel laughs. "Maybe. But I'm a boy, and it's mine, so I guess that makes it a boy's name, too."

I get to my feet. "Well, thanks for the rescue, anyway. I better get home and change."

Picking up my pack from where Dave set it beside the van, I start off across the parking lot, but Hazel gets in front of me, forcing me to a halt. Now that we're standing face to face, I perceive he's half a head taller than me and his hair is a wavy dark brown.

"Whoa, whoa! You had a serious accident, Charlie." He holds my shoulders lightly. "You should go to the emergency room. Get checked by a doctor, at least."

"I don't need the ER for a few cuts and bruises," I say, brushing aside his concern. "I'm fine."

"You heard of secondary drowning? It can happen twenty-four to forty-eight hours later, and only a tiny amount of water has to get in your lungs. Your blood oxygen can drop to fatal levels."

I hadn't heard of that, and it did sound concerning, honestly.

Perhaps detecting something in my expression, Hazel lets go of me and raises his hands. "Hey, at least let us drive you home. You look like shit."

It's either laugh or cry at that point, so I laugh. A little hysterically.

"Okay," I say, wiping my eyes. "The last thing I need is to get picked up by Crestwood PD for looking like shit in public." Which was a real thing, unfortunately. Tourism is Crestwood's primary source of income, so by unwritten law, only 'respectable bums' are allowed to grace its streets—the sort who can play violin or guitar half decently, or who have a hip, bohemian 'homeless by choice' vibe. The troubled vets and people who dressed as Santa Claus or the Easter Bunny year round know better than to try their luck. "I'm in the student apartments on West River Street."

"Right." Hazel guides me toward his surfer van and into the back seat, even going so far as to strap me in like a kid who doesn't know how to buckle his own seatbelt. Catching sight of my bloodied blond curls in the van's bead-strewn rearview mirror, I don't blame him for doubting my ability to reach the nearest bus stop without dying. "Okay, hang tight. We gotta get our stuff. B-R-B."

By the time I figure out what he means, he's right back, as promised. I didn't even have time to contemplate an escape. On the other hand, a glance at my watch tells me fifteen minutes have passed, and I could have sworn it was no more than three. Maybe angel-boy is right about the ER.

I shake off this thought as he and Dave climb into the front and maneuver the van out of the parking lot.

Hazel and Dave rehash the thrilling events of my rescue to one another as Hazel drives us across town, the tale becoming more dramatic by the minute, until I sound ridiculous, idiotic, and helpless all at once.

As we reach the side of town closest to University Hill, where most of the off-campus student housing is located, I make an ill-advised attempt to take back the narrative.

"You guys really shouldn't surf at that beach, you know," I say, my voice sounding petulant in my own ears. "It's dangerous."

"Speaking from experience, huh?" Hazel says, his blue eyes, fringed by dark lashes, flashing with mirth as they meet mine in the mirror. "Duly noted."

There's something strange in his tone, and my instincts tell me to drop it, but in true 'me' fashion, I double down.

"I'm not kidding. My professor says three people die on this beach, on average, every year."

"Oh, your professor!" Hazel nods. "I bet he's a great guy. What's he teach? The history of dead clams, or something?"

Having once again proved my social ineptitude, I hug myself and look away. "Yeah. Something like that. Oh, hey. This is me." I point to the nearest street corner. "You can drop me off here."

"No way, man. West River is another half mile down. I'm not making you walk that far in wet, sandy clothes. You'll get a rash. Believe me, your boyfriend will thank me later."

If he'd turned around and shot me with a stun gun, I would not have been more shocked.

"What?"

He glances back at me in the rearview. "I saw your watchband."

I look down at my wrist as if seeing the accessory for the first time. It's a very subtle rainbow and the only outward symbol of the fact I'm not straight. The first few times I dared to wear it, I'd been terrified it would stand out like a house on fire, the equivalent of writing GAY on my forehead in permanent marker. As nervous as it made me, I'd also fantasized that some cute boy would see it, maybe in the line at the coffee shop or in the library, and ask me out.

In reality, almost no one noticed, and those who did notice didn't care. I'd almost forgotten it was anything but a plain old band.

Now, confronted with Hazel-the-angel-boy's attention, I completely panic.

"Oh, that. No. It's just, um... to show support, you know."

"Support, huh? Well, thanks; I appreciate that."

Too flustered to tell if I've heard or interpreted his words correctly, I glance up and meet his eyes in the mirror again. He winks.

"So, no boyfriend, huh?"

Face burning, I look away. "No, no boyfriend."

"Well, here we are." He pulls to the curb, right in front of my apartment building.

I grab my pack and get out. "Thanks for the ride," I mumble, and shut the door.

Hazel rolls down his window. "Be careful out there, Charlie," Hazel calls. "Especially around those cliffs. My dad's always talking about how dangerous they are. I'll tell him you said hi." His smile, warm and humorous until now, takes on a strange, bitter edge.

Confused, I pause and look back at him. "Your dad?"

"Yeah. You're one of Professor MacDowell's students, right?"

I nod.

Hazel laughs. "Never met anyone as obsessed with dead clams as he is before. He's my old man."

I gape at him dumbly.

He salutes me. "See ya 'round, Charlie. Take care."

Dave, looking about as awkward as I feel, waves from the passenger seat. Hazel rolls up his window and drives away.

I stand there, immobilized, until the van is out of sight.

Wonderful. I lost a prize specimen, almost died, embarrassed myself, told a cute guy I'm not gay, and found out my angel-boy is the son of my hero, and will probably tell his dad what an idiot I am. Best day ever.

The only solution, I decide as I turn and climb the stairs to the second-floor apartment I share with a friend, is to become a recluse and never leave my room again.

Remembering I have classes in the morning and in-person assignments due, including for Professor MacDowell, I sigh.

Right, Charlie. Good luck with that.

Well, at least I can avoid the beach, and thus (hopefully) any chance of running to Hazel and Dave again.