A Thousand Salt Kisses (Book 1 of Salt Kiss series)

><> Chapter Five <><

The heavens had opened yesterday evening, crushing all my hopes of going back to the beach. I had initially cursed the skies as they turned black but today I decided it had been a sign from above. I could have looked truly stalkerish showing up on the beach and hunting Llyr down.

The bad weather had continued all through today, meaning Dad had not been able to take me to the mainland for school.

Of course, when Dad came into my bedroom in the morning to tell me that we would not be able to travel on the seas I had reclined back into bed triumphantly, believing that I was going to have a lovely lazy day off.

Unfortunately, there was no such luck. All Coney School pupils from Starfish Island were summoned to special classes in the church, led by one of the teachers who lived here - Mrs. Vendercum. I had been gutted. Mrs. Vendercum, the Maths teacher, was straight out of boot camp and cut us no slack what so ever.

It was now three in the afternoon, and we were still in class. The only okay thing about it was that the age group was mixed, mainly with much younger kids, and so the lessons were ridiculously easy. I had done the exercises in no time, and now I sat passing notes back and forth with Rosie.

'HE STILL HASN'T CALLED', Rosie despaired in block capitals.

'OP SWEAT', I replied, with a smiley face.

'LMFAO' she srawled back, returning  to her work.

I watched for a moment as she tapped slowly at her calculator and realised she was far from amused. In fact, she was still so disturbed by her behavior on Saturday night that she had not even completed the first few tasks.

But she wasn't the only person in the room distracted by a guy. Although I was slightly more compos mentis than Rosie today, I would almost immediately find myself day-dreaming about Llyr at any opportunity.

I fantasized about finding him again. Maybe I would bump into him at another party. He might be juggling some fire or hanging out by a van like the other guys. Maybe he was a surfer too; it seemed to be that kind of party. Perhaps that was even why he had been such a good swimmer.

Maybe one day I would walk into a beach bar in another town, and he would be sitting at a table having a drink. He would probably be wearing just shorts and would look beyond gorgeous with his big tattooed arms. Our eyes would meet from across the room and he would break into a smile, not quite believing that we had found each other again...

And then I remembered. He could have seen me again. He could easily have followed me onto the beach and asked for my number. So why didn't he? 

Was he was annoyed I just left him like that, after he rescued me? No, he was a real man. He had understood that I was worried about my friend. Did I say something to offend him? No, he had seemed into me right up to the end, taking my hands like that and looking deep into my eyes. So what the hell? It was a total mystery.

I sighed and flicked through a local paper that had been left on the desk.

'BLAZE AT OFFICE KILLS FOUR'

I read the headline slowly, my frown deepening as I continued through the article. A father of four had been amongst the victims, trapped in the building with the fire. I winced uncomfortably. I would die if anything like that happened to my Dad.

"Crystal, are you bored with Maths?" barked Mrs. Vendercum. "There's some rather complex trigonometry I could teach you? You could even stay behind after class, for some extra tuition."

I pushed the paper aside and smiled sweetly. "That's alright," I said, picking up my pen and  frowning at my notebook.

But it wasn't long before my thoughts returned to my night in the sea.