Any Port in a Storm: Chapter 3

Tony's Story

I slowed down as I noticed the water become shallower and its color turned a lovely shade of crystal clear aquamarine.  Ash sat up and both of us looked down and ahead at our curious discovery.

“Wow!”  Ash gasped as she leaned over the side of the dinghy.

What we had found was indeed what looked like a sunken island.  At its highest point, right where the lone palm stuck out, water was only a few inches deep.  More palm trunks could be seen fallen over here and there, some buried in the sand.  It looked like at one time the kidney shaped island was roughly 50 yards long and about half of that across.  The island itself had a few small schools of minnows flitting about it but was otherwise lifeless.  What Ash had let out her exclamation about was what was around this area.

Brightly colored corals, waving anemones, scuttling crustaceans, and a staggering variety of impossibly vibrant tropical fish ringed the former island.  It was a tiny oasis in the vast dark dessert all around it.  An isolated ecosystem of its own and an explosion of life in the middle of nowhere.  Everywhere you looked below there was something happening.

Ash and I looked at each other in disbelief.  Suddenly getting lost didn't seem so bad after all.  What a find!

“Damnit!  I forgot the camera.”  I said.

“We can stay here a while.”  Ash replied as she slipped her sunglasses off to get a better look.  “Wow!  Wow!  Look at that!  Oh!  Look at that!  Wow!  Do you think we're the first to discover this place?”

I chuckled at the charmingly naive notion.  “I doubt it, still damn cool though.”  I slowed way down and steered us toward the palm.  “We'll tie off there.”  I stated the obvious as there was literally nothing else here.

Ash moves to the front and readied the line.  I turned off the motor and raised the propellor to let momentum carry us the rest of the way.  We lightly bumped into the trunk and Ash quickly secured our craft to it.

We looked to each other with giddy excitement.  This was so damned cool!  Purely by accident we had discovered our own private little playground to explore.

Ash shrugged off her shawl and didn't hesitate to step off the side of the boat.  Just as it looked the water was indeed less than a foot deep here by the tree.  My wife spun toward me laughing and holding her arms out wide.  “It's amazing!” 

Watching this moment of pure joy on her beautiful face I again wished I had my camera on me.

“Butler Island!”  She said as she began kicking about in the shallows.  “I'm naming it Butler Island.”

I chuckled.  “It's not even an island.”

“Close enough!”

Ash's Story

The sunken island, Butler Island as we dubbed it, was an incredible discovery.  As we ran and splashed and danced and played in the warm shallow water like children.  I couldn't remember ever being happier.  There was something about finding this gem of a location with no warning or any expectation that made it feel like we'd won some lottery on a long forgotten ticket.

It didn't take us long to grab our snorkels, goggles, and flippers and start to explore the reef that ringed the island.  The reef was an absolute treasure trove of marine life.  Butterfly fish, damsels, breams, angelfish, and species I didn't recognize swam all around us.  Beneath was a forest of delightfully colorful corral and anemones that faded off into darkness at the fringes.

Tony and I swam side by side all around the ring, sometimes even hand in hand, experiencing everything this watery wonderland had to offer together.  We were forging memories there.  As amazing as everything was that fact we were experiencing it all together, just the two of us, made it ten times better.  I tried to take in every detail, etching what we saw and what I felt into my mind for the years to come.  I already knew it would be a moment we would reminisce and talk about for as long as we lived.  A tale to tell our grandchildren.

I honestly don't know how long that happy time lasted.  It might have been an hour or more but it felt like a few fleeting seconds.

When we at last we swam back up to the shallows neither of us paid much attention to the cooler stronger wind and choppier waters lapping at our legs as we immediately pulled off our goggles and embraced each another to share a long and passionate kiss.

Tony's Story

What a time we had at Butler Island playing and exploring together.  It was possibly the happiest time of our entire marriage.  As I kissed my wife after our swim about it was brought home to me again just how perfect our life already was.

As seems to happen so often in life this high point was immediately followed by the lowest of lows.

Our kiss parted and we stared into each other eyes, smiling and happy.  I let out a joyful sigh then my eyes scanned up toward the horizon.

“What the...fuck?”  Out in the water, WAY out in the water, I could just barely see the lily white mast of our yacht poking up from the waves.  It was far more distant than it had been!

Just as I had noticed this Ash had witnessed a surprise of her own.  Her eyes widened as she stared off over my shoulder and she gasped.  “Tony...oh my god.  We have to go.”

KKRRRrrrrrrr

As if on cue the ominous sound of low rumbling thunder rolled over us.

“We have to go!”