Billy’s Ocean

Based Upon True Life Events

The swells increased greatly as we came around, eight-foot giants were now being accompanied by their twelve to fifteen-foot brothers. Roger pulled the sails in, hitched his safety line tight to his waist, and took the console. I saw to the oil level in the engine, then made sure Roger was heading straight into the mounting walls of seawater. It had come upon us in a matter of minutes … we should have heeded the morning’s forecast.

It had come upon us in a matter of minutes and neither of us had much experience with super storms, since we tended to avoid them at all costs. The morning forecast had only called for a chance of big storms for the afternoon, but the South Carolina coast was known for producing big ones from out of nowhere, and this time it was no joke.

Fifteen miles out, we were surrounded by nothing but roiling and angry ocean mixing with monstrous black clouds which descended down to the ocean’s surface. To see anything at all, we had to shield our eyes from the penetrating sting of marble-sized rain and hail torpedoes. I tried searching the dark horizon in each direction for clear skies or even another vessel. Our boat was pitching and shuddering severely, and I prayed it would hold together and not break apart. And then there was Billy….

The boy’s thirteenth birthday was the occasion for our current fishing trip. Roger had been my friend from childhood and we had become successful business partners as adults. Sailing had become a passion that Billy, Roger, and I had shared for the past three years. At first it was a distraction from our sadness, but then it became our preferred method for living life to the fullest.

We taught Billy everything we had learned as children about boating and the sea. Thin, agile, and in constant motion, Billy loved the sea, loved boats … loved storms. Nothing could darken his spirit, despite everything he had been through, nor dampen the beautiful and hearty effects that the wind, sails, and seawater had on his countenance.

Now, his knowledge and expertise with sailing was such that he maneuvered around the element-challenged deck like he was the boat’s captain and first mate all-in-one. Just as the storm ramped-up, I realized Billy had unhooked his safety line so he could reach and tighten the lines which fastened the collapsed sails. As I was about to call him back to us, the next moment the deck of our thirty-six-foot boat plunged beneath a swell of immense proportions.

We were momentarily underwater and when we resurfaced, Billy was nowhere to be seen. I rapidly unhooked my safety line, grabbed a life preserver, and yelled “Man overboard!” as I jumped behind the boat and into the wild sea. I was uncertain Roger could hear me through the storm’s deafening fury.

I was immediately on a roller coaster with no car beneath me. Gasping for oxygen when the air around me was mostly water, I choked and went under, thankful that the rope from the life preserver, which was now twisting around and cutting into my wrist, would at least keep me from going under too deep. When I resurfaced, I looked all around, and already the boat was out of sight. How then, could I possibly hope to find Billy?

As I was raised high on the next swell, my eyes straining amidst the pounding of sea and rain in my face, I saw him sprawled across the valley in the shadow of the swells. I saw his body and prayed there was life left, thankful at least that he had chosen to wear his red t-shirt this morning. Yet … his face was buried in the water. He was not moving, and I struggled to get closer to my son.

I paddled down the trench of one wave, just as Billy rose high on the crest of another. Reaching him seemed impossible. Water and wind would not permit me to reach him quickly enough. I paddled helplessly down the trench of an imploding wave, reaching forward with every sweep of my arms, my neck aching to keep my head above the surface of the shrewd ocean.

Tirelessly I plowed forward, until finally, nearly exhausted, I reached Billy. With water pounding our bodies from above and below, I could not face believing that he had drowned. I fought to keep his face out of the sea as I slipped the preserver beneath his arms. I repeatedly called to him.

With one arm around him, we rose high on a swell, then slid down into the channel before the next swell came along. Fifty yards away, lightning struck, making a sickening crackle and sending devil’s pitchforks across the black sky. I prayed the boy would move. If he was dead, I thought nothing of my own life, and in this moment, the history of our lives together flashed through my mind in an instant ….

I saw images of the boy’s smile throughout his life on the sea. When he had been six years old, Billy had seen the ocean for the first time. His parents had both been public servants, his father a firefighter who had died during the 9/11 terrorist attack on the World Trade Center. Having been a paramedic and a first responder as well, his mom had given birth to Billy eight months later. She retired six years after that, and brought Billy south.

They had moved into the beach house next to mine in Beaufort, and from my porch I would see them both during the long and hot summer mornings. Billy loved to swim in the waves, dance with their motion, and surrender to their force. Every morning, his mom and he would be on the beach and in the warm, blue, ocean water. Soon, his mom’s beauty and elegance filled me with awe, and I brought her a cup of fresh coffee one morning a few weeks after they had arrived.

We then spent every day together thereafter.

Billy used to point to the pelicans, the crazy seagulls, and more than once his mom or me had to call him in when his enthusiasm for exploration had inevitably brought him too far out into the ocean, which he had learned to call his own. Even at a young age, his tender laugh, determined blue eyes, and eager smile dared us to question his prowess.

His mom had raised him to be an independent soul, and my love for her was such that I would never question any of her decisions. “His father would have loved watching him in the ocean,” she said to me one morning as we watched the boy bodysurfing in the five foot waves. “He always said that people feel much better and are happier when they are next to the sea.”

As he grew, Billy had morphed into something part human, part dolphin, and was always in the water. His mom and I married, and Billy never once saw me as anything but his best friend. He kept a photo of his father beside him by his bed and would say prayers each morning and evening for his dad to watch over he and his mom. Eventually, he included me in those petitions.

With wind, rain, thunder and lightning now attacking us from every side, I could not think clearly as we rose high up and plummeted straight down with the cascading sea in a continuous pattern. He was still not responding and I slapped him harshly on the back and prayed.

I hugged him to myself and cried. I would not be able to live knowing I had caused his death. Desperate, I held him over my shoulder and pried his mouth open with my fingers. Water poured out like a fountain. I began blowing air into his lungs for what seemed much too long a time. I soon became both exhausted and delirious. I gave it one more try ….

Suddenly, Billy’s eyes flashed open. I knew in that instant that I could die peacefully now, if I could just find a way to keep the boy alive. He breathed and coughed out more seawater as I held him above the water. He found a way to smile at me even as saltwater trickled out of his mouth. Billy had come back!

I should have known the ocean, which had been the source of so much of his joy and comfort, could never take his life.

“You alright, Julian?” He said loudly enough to overcome the violent sounds of the storm, and as if it had been just another day bodysurfing and one of us had just tumbled beneath a powerful wave.

Peering into his eyes, I managed to smile, and then I announced, “You went over. I thought I had lost you!”

He looked around and I could tell he was remembering what had happened. His eyes squinted as the pounding rain, swells, and whitecaps made it difficult to see beyond thirty yards or so. “Where’s the boat?”

I tried searching, but it was useless.

He looked at me with a dazed expression for a moment. “Where’s mom?’”

I did not know what he meant. For a moment, I thought he had suffered from lack of oxygen or the trauma itself had harmed his memory.

“She was just here, Julian. I swear! Mom took my hand and held me above the water until you got here!” He was dead serious and inexplicably, I searched the roiling seas again, but instead of the boat, this time thinking I might find his mom somehow.

I then realized Roger was alone on a boat, which would be uncontrollable for one man to handle in a storm like this. Billy must have seen my concern.

We both turned our heads in every direction once again, but no boat was in sight. Holding onto each other with the life preserver between us, we swung up and down with the waves, lost at sea.

Finally, Billy said, “Don’t worry, we’ll be okay, Julian. Mom told me that Roger saved us. He had called for help just before she went to go meet him.” He sounded so confident.

We held onto each other, bouncing in the waves for what turned out to be two more hours.

The storm subsided and the ocean calmed, holding us in her breast now as a gentle giant, cradling us, as if it did not want us to leave. We kept looking, but there was no sign of Roger or the boat.

With immense relief, we finally spotted a Coast Guard cutter out on the horizon and heading our way. We waved her down and she rescued us. They informed us that Roger had radioed a ‘mayday,’ giving them our last known position. They had tried radioing back to him but got no response. After picking us up, the cutter, and later several helicopters, searched for three more hours but no boat was found. They said that he must have radioed the mayday right before trying to bring her around to come for us when the onslaught of horrific swells had capsized her. Roger and the Crazy Camille have never been found.

Billy’s father had grown up on the ocean along the beaches of Southern Jersey, and like his mother, had always wanted Billy to be at one with its grace, to fear her power, and to always admire her beauty.

When Billy’s mom left us two years ago, finally succumbing after a long battle with cancer, Billy became my son. We both inherited the ocean and Camille, Billy’s mom, seems like she has never been too far away from either or us….

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