Being stranded in that valley alone, soaked and ill-equipped, has shaken me to my core. All I want is to go home, to bed with Ghost, and… “Eli,” I shout, my throat raspy and bone dry. I cough and cough until someone places a bottle of water to my lips, calmly telling me to take a drink.
When the cool water hits my lips, my mouth and senses leap with joy, as if overwhelmed by a rush of happiness, the receptors on my tongue firing rapidly, and I feel relief unlike anything I have ever experienced as the water wets my mouth.
I clutch the bottle of water, like it’s my lifeline, quickly chugging it down, not caring that it’s running down my chin.
Why should I, when I currently look like a swamp lady, my dress completely torn and stuck to my body like a wet rag?
I pull the bottle off my lips, the rim now covered in soil, but I don’t care, I don’t care about anything. I’m here.
They found me.
He found me.
Eli.
“Where’s Eli?” I gasp, darting my eyes left and right as the sound of rotors from a helicopter trails off, and that’s when I see him sprinting toward me.
“Sapphire,” he calls out for me, even though he can see me, pain written all over his face, his eyes rimmed with red.
I cry as he bolts toward me. My tears fall for myself, for him, for us, the fact that I thought I might not see him again.
If that mud had caught up with me, I wouldn’t have.
“Sapphire.” He’s beside me in seconds, and he stalls for a beat as if scared to touch me.
“I’m okay.” I’m not hurt. Well, I am; I’m bruised and battered, and have a sprained ankle but nothing is broken.
The mudslide tried to break me, but it didn’t.
I raise my arms in the air, and that’s all it takes to make him throw himself around me as much as he can because I’m lying down. Holding me close, squeezing me, he tucks his face into my neck, not caring if he gets covered in mud and dust.
Together, we stay like this until I have no tears left to cry. When my chest stops stuttering, he leans out of our embrace, wipes my dust-filled hair away from my face, and cups my cheek.
“I thought I’d lost you, baby,” he muffles into my neck, and all I can think about is how good he smells: like my Elijah.
“But you didn’t lose me.”
“What I said yesterday…”
I cut him off. “I don’t care about yesterday.”
“Don’t downplay what I did, Sapphire. What I said was unacceptable, and I’ll understand if you never forgive me. I should have run after you when you left, and I should never have let you go to your parents’ alone.”
“And I should have checked the weather report.” I feel so foolish, but what happened happened, and I can’t change it.
I breathe him in, clutching the fabric of his T-shirt to ground myself, to prove that I’m here and so is he.
“I’m so sorry, Sapphire. I never meant to hurt you. I called you over and over to apologize, and to tell you I love you.” His voice is husky, breaking in places.
“My phone’s in Mistee’s car. The mudslide washed her car down the valley.”
“Oh my God, how did you escape?” He backs away, looking deep into my eyes, and the pain reflected in his cuts me wide open. He’s so distraught, as if imagining what I’ve been through and wishing he was there to help.
“I jumped out of the car before it hit the car fully.”
He wraps himself around me again, this time squeezing me tighter. “I almost lost you.”
“But you didn’t.”