Page 54 of Fighting With Light

“Good luck, Tarzan. Go shred the gnar,” she says with a lip gloss-covered smile. I chuckle.

“Where did you learn that?”

She shrugs. “I’ve been researching.”

I shake my head. “Thank you, princess. I’ll see you soon.”

She waves and I watch her walk away on the sand towards all the other spectators.

With my board under my arm and bag in my other hand, I get checked in and hope that the judge calls the waves good. They look like utter perfection right now, so that gives me some hope that I canshred the gnaras Aelia put it.

When we woke up this morning, it put another nail in my coffin. Waking up to her is unlike anything I’ve experienced. It doesn’t matter if she was drooling a little, it doesn’t matter that her hair was in my face. None of that bothered me. I can feel the tide change within me, and as cliché as it sounds, I’m not sure how I’m supposed to ride it. I’m not sure how to adjust to it because it’s unfamiliar territory. It’s a different ocean.

Aelia is a woman you fight for, and I don’t know if I’m the man who’s meant to fight for her because she deserves better than me.

I get checked in and start stretching. My heat is the second one of the day and the first is already out and waiting for the go-ahead. I said hi to a few friends I’m competing against and then went out to study the waves. I have a plan in my head, but that’s the thing with surfing, it’s a little unpredictable. You can know what you have to do in order to get the points you need, but the wave isn’t always consistent and it can throw you off before you have a chance to accommodate the change.

Surfing is about going with the flow and responding accordingly. It’s been almost a week since I’ve been out on the water and it’s killing me. I need to get out there. I need to feel her warm caress on my skin.

Aelia is down the beach and I can’t see a lot of her, but she’s leaning back on the towel in her bikini and cover-up. I love the one she wore yesterday, but this one made me have to tie my mouth together.

It’s a little black bikini that leaves nothing to the imagination. It’s borderline lingerie if you ask me, but she’s not swimming, so I’m aware it’s more of a fashion statement. She didn’t go with the sheer cover-up dress this time. She’s wearing a thin sarong around her hips, so it hides nothing. The top is like a bra with underwire pushing her chest together and her bottoms sit high on her hips, and don’t even bother trying to cover her butt. I had to swallow the growl that bubbled up when she walked out of the house. Based on the look she gave me,she got exactly what she wanted out of that exchange, so my response was no response at all.Two can play that game, princess.

The first heat begins and I watch one of the four surfers paddle into their waves. A guy from Australia biffs it and falls off his board. The Brazilian kills it in the nick of time with a great top turn. The heat goes on for about thirty minutes and I get ready to get in the water and prove myself.

Once the first heat is on their way back, me and two other guys all jog into the water and hop onto our boards. Water splashes, making me smile as I paddle towards the larger waves. We duck dive down under the wave and pop back up, getting behind the break.

Everyone gets turned around while we wait for the flag and horn to give us the start of the heat. Excitement bubbles in my veins and my muscles almost twitch, ready to shred. The wait time is the worst, you have to let the waves pass you even if they look good. We wait and wait. A few rolled by that didn’t look so hot, but that’s not unusual. Part of the competition is being able to judge the wave so you have the best chance to show off enough skill to score high and get your points. Right now, my standing is second overall and today I wanted to push my way into first.

“Man, what’s taking so long?” James says. James is from Australia while my other competitors are from South Africa.

I shake my head and look towards shore and try to spot Aelia. She was sitting closer to the water, only she’s not where I last saw her. I continue scanning the shore and find her standing in the water. Her hair is up and she’s standing with her hands on her hips, looking out towards me with sunglasses covering her eyes. I smile, staring at her figure focused on me, cheering me on from the sidelines. It feels good to see someone there for me. It makes me feel like I can grab my twenty points without even trying.

A horn sounds and a flag is waved, signaling for us to come back in. We all grumble and swim back to shore.

The judge meets us at the edge. “Hey guys, sorry, we’re going to push this to tomorrow. Wave deterioration is too great, but the weather is looking frothy fortomorrow. We’ll see you then.” I shake hands with a couple of guys, and then we pack up, and I go look for Aelia in the same place we separated.

“Again?” she says, shielding her eyes from the sun.

“Yeah,” I grumble.

“I’m sorry,” she says carefully.

“Hey, it’s all good. Tomorrow is expected to be a good day.”

She smiles and takes my hand. My steps falter a little at the natural move.What is this woman doing to me?

20

Liam

When we got backto the house, Aelia and I plopped in front of the computer together. “Are you sure you’re comfortable? I can move a couch over here or we can move to the living room. It will take me a second, but if you would rather do that...” I trail off.

“Why are you so concerned about me sitting in thiscomfortablechair next to you?”

I study Aelia for a moment with her feet tucked up under her. She has shorts and a baggie t-shirt on with her hair on top of her head. “I’m not. I just…want to make sure you’re comfortable.”

She smiles and grips my forearm, her long nails gently dragging across my skin.