Sweet Accident [4]

Dreamland Beach, Pecatu, Bali.

From the car parking lot, Dave, Nico, Annisa and Ella walked to the craggy cliff tops of Pecatu village area. They had to go down along the stairs from the high cliff to reach the sea shore. The view of Dreamland Beach surrounded by coral cliffs made a uniqueness that is favored by the tourists compared with other beaches.

Once got there, they were directly greeted by a stretch of beautiful white sand widely spread, complete with wide and white beach umbrellas lined neatly on the beach.

The atmosphere on the beach on a sunny Sunday morning was already crowded with a lot of people, especially by the tourists, both domestic and foreign. The sky was cloudy white, the sun was still shy revealing itself. A cool breeze greeted anyone who came to the coastal area at that time.

"Well, all the seats are already taken..." Annisa said while looking for empty sunbed chairs and beach umbrellas.

"Don't worry, Nisa... Look, over there! There are still some seats unoccupied. Let's go there..." Dave pointed to the vacant seats strategically located on the beach and near to the beautiful rocks around it.

Dave grabbed Annisa's hand gently and took her in the place he'd pointed out earlier. Annisa looked shy when Dave suddenly held her hand, but she didn't refuse, and take Dave's invitation instead. Nico and Ella looked at each other and smiled slightly, and then walked after Dave and Annisa.

"Wow, what a wonderful sight here. It is odd that the chairs in this strategic place haven't been occupied. Usually, they have been occupied earlier." Annisa said a little bit amazed.

"It seemed we're in a lucky day this morning, ha ha ..." Dave said as he scratched his not-itchy head. He then looked at Nico meaningfully. Meanwhile, Nico tried to hide something on his face. He looked away and pretended to see something interesting his attention in another place.

"Ella, let's swim in the sea shores..." invited Annisa to her best friend. "Dave and Nico, wanna join?" Annisa looked at both of them.

Dave shook his head and smiled, "I can't swim, Nisa. Have a good time for both of you at sea."

"Seriously? You can't swim, Dave?" Annisa widened her eyes in disbelief at Dave.

"Yes, unfortunately." Dave answered reluctantly while shrugging his shoulders and releasing them again.

"In fact, Dave can swim, Nisa. But when he was a kid, he slipped into the pool and was almost drowned because his left leg got cramp. That's why until now, Dave is still traumatized about it." Nico said comprehensively trying to explain to Annisa.

"Oops! Sorry about that, Dave. I do not know." Annisa regretted her words.

"Don't worry, Annisa. Just go and swim with Ella. Enjoy the beauty of the sea this morning before the sun rises up and the light burns us. Let me and Nico wait here to keep the place and stuff. If we all swim, who will keep them here?" Dave said and smiled.

"All right then, Dave. Ella, let's come on." Annisa immediately pulled Ella's hand to take her to the sea shore and swim.

At that time, the waves in the sea were quite high and large. They made a lot of both local and international surfers happy to play with the waves and showed their skill in conquering the waves.

Annisa and Ella swam not far from the surfers, staring at the amazement of their skill playing on the surfboard, wriggling their body flexibly, as if they had no trouble dancing on the such high and large waves.

"Watch out, Nisa!" Ella shouted to her best friend.

It was late for Annisa just before she realized what was happening. All of a sudden, a surfer on the surfboard bumped into Annisa from behind and the surfboard beat Annisa and instantly trapped her beneath. Annisa stuttered trying to reach the surface of the water. Due to panic, she even swallowed a lot of seawater and felt her body getting heavier to move. Her eyes got sore and her views got opaquer. She was dragged by the waves into the middle of the sea.

Ella tried to swim reaching Annisa but the waves grabbed her body ferociously over and over again. She was quite difficult to swim to where Annisa was.

"Dave! Nico! Help Nisa!" Ella shouted asking for help from the sea shore.

Hearing Ella's shout, Dave directly reflexed running to the sea shore without putting off his shirt and jeans and then swam to where Annisa was drowning.

"Dave, wait!" Called Nico. "Let me do it!" Nico shouted to warn Dave's reaction. He ran after his best friend.

Dave ignored Nico's call. He continued to swim at the sea to help Annisa. He managed to get to where Annisa was. But, there was a lot of seawater he swallowed because the big and high waves snatched him. The t-shirt and jean he was wearing made Dave harder to move freely, but he never gave up. He grabbed Annisa's body into his arms and swam carrying her back to the beach.

Once they got to the beach, he carried Annisa who was already weak because of lack of oxygen and walked to their seats. Nico helped Ella, who was already very tired, and they followed Dave from behind.

Dave slowly put Annisa on the sun lounger. He then fell kneeling from exhaustion. Dave wiped her wet and sticky hair from the sea water lovingly. He smiled with relief that he had managed to rescue her idolized girl.

Annisa looked at Dave with a weak smile. He coughed because she swallowed a lot of seawater before. Unexpectedly, her tears poured down her cheeks.

"Nisa, why are you crying? Where do you feel the pain? Let's get to the doctor right away!" Dave got panic attack at seeing Annisa crying. He immediately stood to take Annisa away.

Nisa grabbed Dave's arm gently and told him to sit back.

"No need, Dave. I am fine. Don't worry. I cried since I am touched. You deigned to swim out to the sea to save me. You are traumatized to swim, but you swam to help me. You're so kind to me, Dave. I don't know how to pay your favor," Annisa said while sobbing slowly.

Dave was bashful. His tongue suddenly dumbed and couldn't say anything. He could only look into Annisa's shady eyes, and Dave gave her the best smile. His right hand grabbed Annisa's hand and held it tightly, as if he did not want to lose her even for a second.

Annisa quickly let her hand go of Dave's hands and then folded her arms in front of the chest. She pretended to be angry at Dave's behavior and intended to hide the truth of Annisa's feelings.

"It doesn't mean that I agree with your reaction, jumping to the middle of the sea to help me, Dave!" said Annisa rudely.

"What you just did was very dangerous for your own safety! You could ask Nico to swim to help me! What was it if suddenly in the middle of the sea you got the trauma again?" complained Annisa angrily.

"B ... bu ... but Nisa ... I ... I ... I ..." Dave got stammered and surprised as he didn't expect Annisa's before.

"I have tried to overcome my traumas long time ago but never succeeded. My childhood incident of nearly drowned had completely haunted my life. Along the time, I didn't dare to swim because I could feel my chest tightening and my breathing becomes immediately heavy, even just by remembering it."

Dave's face paled, his forehead creased and suddenly he felt his body cold sweaty. He clenched his sweaty palms reinforcing himself to stay firm against the fear inside.

Annisa tried to get up from a lying position to calm Dave down, but her pride still took a grip on her. Annisa was discouraged and let Dave tried to solve his own problems first.

The atmosphere became quiet. Dave managed his breath slowly. Once he could regain control of himself, he continued to speak.

"I do not know why I abruptly dared to jump into the water and swim to save you. What I had in mind was to imagine yourself in my position when I almost drowned in the past. I could feel your fears like I did."

Dave's mind wandered away remembering his despair as he tried to move his whole body, his hands and feet, in an effort to push his body upward, reaching out to the surface of the water.

"I don't want you to experience the trauma I experienced, Nisa. I want you to know that there are people who will help you in such a difficult situation, and I want that person is me. Not someone else." Dave said softly and bowed his head.

"I don't want you to face your own fears of fighting in the middle of the sea, as I felt my own fears of almost drowned in the pool when I was a child, no one came to help me there. And I had to fight by myself to reach the edge of the pool to save my own soul."

Annisa softened heart as she heard Dave's statement. While holding back a smile, she patted Dave on the shoulder.

"Okay, Dave. I can take your excuses this time. But next time, please think carefully before you make such a decision again. I don't want you take reckless actions and neglected the calculation before." Said Nisa while still pretending a little angry but voice tone had turned softer and more encouraging to Dave.

Nico and Ella who witnessed this romantic accident felt a rather awkward atmosphere. They pretended to look the other way ignoring what was happening at the moment. But, Nico and Ella could not hide their smiles and shared the happiness felt by their friends that day.

Once Dave and Nico arrived in the hotel room and as soon as Nico closed the bedroom door to lie down on the bed because of being exhausted, Dave suddenly grabbed Nico's collar and pushed him against the wall roughly.

"Tell me, Nico. What do you mean to have the surfer collide with Annisa from behind with his surfboard when Nisa was swimming? It almost made Nisa in danger," Dave asked furiously.

"If you want to make me dare to face the trauma of my childhood, it isn't the way!" Dave shouted and almost wanted to punch Nico in the face.

Nico swiftly caught Dave's right-hand fist in his face and held it with all his might.

"Take it easy, Dave. What's wrong? It was not me sending the surfer. I had nothing to do with it. There's no way I could do anything that endangers both of you," Nico said slowly but firmly, trying to calm Dave down who was full of anger at that moment.

Dave slowly loosened his fist and backed out. He then sat on the edge of the bed and rubbed his face with his palms and a confused mind.

"Then, who arranged it? Why?" Dave asked and thought hard about the today's incident.

"Why do you think it is something planned, Dave? Who knows it's just an inadvertency of the surfer itself. Just an unplanned accident." Nico tried to give his point of view.

"It is not like that, Nico. I have a strong feeling that today's accident was not only coincidence. If it is true that the surfer accidentally hit Nisa who was swimming, the surfer would had surely swum to help Nisa and had not left her drowned there. He had definitely more skillful swimmer than me. Or at least, the surfer would definitely come to apologize to Nisa for his negligence," Dave told Nico about his theory.

"But as you saw, the surfer immediately ran away after his board crashed and drowned Nisa. It was as if he did not want to be identified. I suspected somebody had arranged it, who knows or for what purpose. My instinct says that. And I want you to find out about everything."

Dave immediately assigned Nico to find out what really happened and who really was behind it.