“Stupid, stupid truck!” Fayre shouted, kicking the blown tire that had made the group of friends pull to the side of the road. This truck was old, but it had always been reliable. Yeah, she had to get a couple things checked out once in a blue moon, but it never crapped out on her while she had been driving on a highway. God, her heart nearly stopped when she heard it pop. Thankfully she was going at a slower speed or it really could have been worse. She grumbled a few other choice profanities under her breath.
Asaph opened the passenger door where she had been sitting, listening to Fay curse the truck. Hopping onto the dirt side road, she made her way over to her friend. Placing her hand on her arm, she glanced down at the tire and gave a passing, “oh no…” A very stressed Fayre ran a hand down her face, turning her head slightly to look down at Asa through her parted fingers. “Oh no? That’s it?” she muttered, giving her an incredulous look. Asa glanced up at her, mouth slightly gapped. “Uhm,” she started, looking back down at the tire again, “Oh no, that’s... unfortunate?” Fayre still stared at her with the same look. Asaph decided to try again. “Stupid, stupid truck?” she offered, repeating the words she had heard the girl say before. Fayre nodded with determination, echoing with conviction, “Yes. Stupid, stupid truck.”
Elas had stayed in the back seat of the truck, barley cracking his eyes open from the nap he had been taking. It’d had been a long trip so far from their town. They were going a couple of states over since Asaph was supposed to preform a piano piece at a fairly well known concert hall as apart of some recital. She said none of them had to attend, but Fayre had volunteered both him and Serrai to go. She said it would be a good weekend vacation. He didn’t mind much either way, but he knew how Asaph got a little nervous performing, most especially in front of friends.
After a few minutes of nothing happening, Elas sighed and cracked open his eyes. Turning his head to glance at Serrai in the seat beside him, he mumbled, “I hope they’re not just standing out there just staring at it.”
Sliding out of his seat and opening his door, he made his way around to the side of the truck where the damaged tire was. Low and behold, both girls were standing there with linked arms, heads cocked as they stared at the tire, mumbling to themselves. Crossing his arms, he questioned them, “has anyone called a tow truck yet?” Asaph's blue eyes snapped up towards him as she quickly fumbled to grab her phone out of her pink dress’s pockets. “Nope, but I’ll do that now!” She quipped, as she began walking a little ways away, scrolling through it until she held it up to her ear.
Shaking his head slightly, he bent down to closer inspect the tire. “I’m assuming there’s no spare tire?” He questioned, looking behind his shoulder to the black haired girl. Fayre shook her head as she grumbled, “that was the spare tire.” Nodding his head, he looked back at the shredded rubber. “Ah.”
Soon enough, Asaph bounced back over, triumphantly holding her phone up. “Alright! Good news is there on there way, bad news is they said it’ll be over an hour, which in their lingo will most likely be three.” Fayre threw her hands up dramatically, groaning out, “Just our luck. What are we supposed to do for three hours!” Elas just shrugged his shoulders.
“I think the truck is safe here for now,” Asaph commented, as she pulled her long blonde hair up into a pony tail. “Might as well just hang out on the beach?” The highway was along the coast line, making for a picturesque drive. Might as well wait it out while watching the ocean. As the others agreed, all four of them made their way down a small man-made trail, down to the water line.
After about an hour of waiting and doing almost nothing, Asaph boredly hopped along a bunch of rocks at the edge of the shore, making her way onto a larger rock slightly away from the others. Peering over the edge, she could see the light blue of the shallow water meet the deeper blue colour, signifying a deep drop off from the shallow edge. “Be careful, Asaph!” called Elas in a monotone voice from his spot laying on the beach. It was summer and the heat was stifling him. He really wasn’t one for hot weather. Turning her head to look at him, she gave a teasing smile as she called back, “What’s the worst that could happen?” What a way to jinx it.
As soon as her sentence cut off, a wave crashed against the large rock and washed over her feet where she stood at it’s edge. Like an odd grasp, the water pulled her off the rock face as she plunged into the biting cold water. Letting out an inadvertent scream, water filled up her lungs as she kept getting dragged down, down, down, unable to swim up no matter how much she thrashed.
As soon as Elas heard the splash of water and noticed the absence of Asaph’s form, he was up in action right away. Racing over towards the rock face she stood at before, he peered down just in time to see a glint of blonde hair before it disappeared completely. He barley heard Fayre ask, “what the hell happened?” as she quickly approached behind him before he jumped in after Asaph. A pulling sensation overtook him, and soon enough he felt himself sink, no matter how hard he tried to pull himself back up again.
After about a minute, Elas’s broke through surface as he took in a large gust of air, his lung screaming at the piercing cold. Somehow the water was much cooler than when he had first jumped in and- why was there ice?
Before he had time to even glance anymore at his surroundings, a gasping breath behind him drew his attention. Turning around in the water, he saw as a drenched Asaph tried to scramble her way up onto the ice, unable to get a grip. Holding his breath, he dunked back under the water and grabbed her waist, hoisting her up a bit so she could get out of the freezing cold water. Surfacing again once she was fully up, he grabbed the hands she had outstretched as he scrambled up to the ice himself.
Asaph sat there coughing up salt water, trying to speak as she sputtered out, “where… are-” Elas cut her off as he awkwardly patted her back, shivers racking up his body. “No idea.” Moving her head to look at him more fully, concern flooding her eyes, she questioned hoarsely "you okay?" He nodded his head, before turning to look back around as he heard more splashing. Watching as two familiar female heads popped up, he moved towards the edge again. Outstretching both his hands, he stated in a commanding voice, “come up before you freeze.” Fayre in her shock completely ignored his outstretched hand as she pulled herself up with the power of a thousands suns. Flopping onto the ice, she crawled over to Asaph and wrapped her body around hers, hollering rather unashamedly and loud, “why the fuck is it so cold!” as she tried to steal the coughing girls heat.