“Here we go!” Colton’s voice says from behind me. The kayak surges forward, then rocks hard as he jumps in, knocking me off balance for a moment. But in the next moment his weight steadies us, and I feel his paddle dig into the water on one side and then the other, and we’re moving forward. I tense as a wave rolls toward us, standing up taller as it gets closer, like it’s going to break before we can make it over; but Colton digs his paddle in harder, and we pass over it easily, the kayak climbing up the front of the wave and sliding down the back. Colton digs in one more time on each side and then we glide, smooth and steady over the surface of the water. Finally, I exhale.
“That wasn’t as scary as you thought it was gonna be, was it?” he says from behind me.
I turn around as best I can in the stiff life jacket, surprised, and proud when I answer, “It wasn’t at all.”
“Little victories,” he says.
I watch him a moment longer, watch him lean back in the seat and take a deep breath like he’s drinking in the morning, as if doing that is a little victory in itself; and I suppose it is. It makes me feel like I do know him right then. Like in those two words is a glimpse of the kind of person he is.
“I love that,” I say. “Little victories.”
“They’re the ones that count. Like being out here today, right now.”
His words hang there between us in the bright sunlight, and I can see he means them. When his eyes sweep over the sky and the water and the rocks, and then come back to mine and rest there, green and calm, I want to tell him I know the truth. That I know why he can see things that way. I want to tell him who I am and what I was doing in the café the other day. The words all start to push their way to the surface, rising like stray air bubbles through the water.
“We’re drifting,” Colton says. The bubbles dissipate, and my words float away, unspoken, on the current.
He smiles and lifts the paddle from his lap, pulling me back to the moment. “Time to learn. You ready?”
I nod, still twisted around.
“All right. You’re gonna hold on to the paddle here, and here, where these grips are,” he says, demonstrating.
“Okay.” Thankful for something else to focus on, I face forward, grab my own paddle that’s been balancing on my legs, wrap my hands around the grips, and hold it straight out in front of me. “Like this?”
Colton laughs. “Perfect. Now turn back around for a sec so I can show you how to do it.”
I do, and he digs his paddle into the water on one side in a strong and steady stroke that sends us gliding gently over the inky-smooth surface. Then he brings that side out and does the same with the opposite end of the paddle. “It’s like you’re making circles with your hands, the way you do with your feet when you pedal a bike. Try it.”
He rests his paddle on his legs again, and I nod and turn around to try it. The first stroke I take is too shallow, and my paddle just skips over the surface of the water. We don’t budge. I feel my cheeks redden.
“Try again. Dig it in deeper.”
I concentrate on using my arms to push the paddle down through the water like Colton did and am astonished when we actually sail forward a few feet.
“There you go,” Colton says.
Encouraged by him and the fact that we actually moved, I bring the first end back in deep, feeling the resistance of the water as my paddle pushes through it. I think of the circles, like pedals on a bike the way he said, and I keep going, and after a few good strokes we’re cutting through the glassy surface at a decent clip. I laugh, happy and proud that I’m the one powering this little boat.
“You got it,” Colton says from behind me, and I feel the forward momentum of his paddle moving through the water too. I look over my shoulder. “Just paddle,” he says. “I’ll sync up with you.”
I nod and turn back around, face the wide expanse of blue ocean and sky in front of me, and plunge my paddle in again, and again, until I make my own steady rhythm. At first I can feel Colton’s strokes working to match mine, but after a few more, we fall into a synchronized, two-part rhythm that carries us away from the shore, beyond the rock-islands, out to deeper water.
A dolphin fin breaks the surface as we paddle past a patch of seaweed drifting in the sun. The only sounds are of the steady rhythm of our paddles, and my breath, in and out, in and out with each paddle stroke, and I feel like I could do this forever, paddle all the way out to the horizon and keep right on going. It feels good to get lost in the natural rhythms of breath and movement without thinking of anything else. Like I used to when I ran. Until now, I didn’t realize I’d almost forgotten that feeling—or that I missed it.
“I’m impressed,” Colton calls from behind me. “You’re stronger than you look.”
“Thanks a lot,” I shoot back over my shoulder with a grin. But I take it as a compliment. I do feel strong right now, and it surprises me that my body remembers how to be.
“So did you want to paddle on out to Hawaii, or do you want to see the cave?” I can hear the smile in his voice again, and then I feel the absence of his strokes. I lift my paddle from the water and rest it on my legs, noticing the burning in my arms and shoulders.
“What cave?” I ask, turning around.
“The cave we came out to see,” he answers simply. I look around warily, not seeing any caves anywhere. “At the base of that rock we passed. The big one.”