“Nicole, can we go in the water yet?” I asked impatiently.

“No, we have to wait.” I groaned at her response and then went back to drawing in the sand. It was a hot summer day and my sister, her best friend Sarah, and I were enjoying the day at Deo’s hole. Everyone was having a great time in the water, everyone except me. I had to lie on the beach with my sister until she got hot enough to go in the water. Everyone was scattered throughout the beach enjoying various activities with their families. Some were sunbathing on the small cliffs across the water while others were throwing a Frisbee. I loved Deo’s hole. It was wondrous place hidden from the road by a bulk of trees. It was a somewhat small river only one hundred feet across but extremely long. It had a soft and comfortable sandy beach but the river bed was filled with tough rocks that constantly scratched at your feet.

I don’t remember when it happened exactly, but one, by one, everyone packed up their stuff and left the beach until it was just my sister Sarah and I left.

“Nicole can we go in now?” I asked excitedly.

“Fine. I suppose we can,” she said with a tone of boredom. As soon as she gave me the go ahead, I ran into the water as fast as my twelve year old legs could carry me. Nicole and Sarah joined me shortly after. The water felt fantastic on my overheated body. I could feel the strong current whiz past me and the rough rocks beneath my feet.

I quickly dove under water. I loved the way the watered cradled me and comforted me; I would have stayed under forever if I didn’t need oxygen to live. I bent my knees, pushed off the bottom and flung myself out of the water trying to look majestic. As usual my sister hadn’t gone under yet. She had barely gone in past her knees and her thick long brown hair was still up in a bun. She was wearing a green bikini that day. The color complimented her olive toned skin well. Sarah was almost her polar opposite with blue eyes and freckles all over her body. She looked pale in comparison to Nicole.

“Hey, who’s that guy?” Sarah asked pointing to the man on the rocks across the river. I hadn’t noticed him until she pointed him out, but I saw him now. He was lying on the rocks across the water basking in the warm yellow sunlight; the only weird thing about him was the fact that he was naked. He had perfectly positioned his leg, so no one could see anything.

We tried our best to ignore him; Sarah and Nicole stood in the water talking as I swam in circles around them eager for someone to play with. of course though they ignored me as well. Without us even noticing, he hastily and gracefully got off the rock and slithered into the water. I could see him clearly now. He was a man no older than thirty- five. He had short dark hair and stubble on his rat like face. He wasn’t a very buff or scary looking man, but still he seemed intimidating. He started to lazily doggy paddle across the water, slowly closing the gap between himself and us.

“Come on,” Nicole said a bit uneasily. “Let’s get out of the water.” We then slowly stared to pull ourselves out of the water. I glanced behind me to see if he was still there and sure enough, he was right behind us still slithering toward us.

We were finally out of the water and swiftly packing up our stuff. He was still walking toward us though.

“Hey, what are you doing?” he yelled at us. “You don’t have to leave. Why don’t you guys stay?”

“Uhh, no thanks, “my sister responded as quickly as she could, grabbing my arm and pulling me away.

“Come on, where you going?!” he yelled as we made our way to the car. We drove away as quickly as we could.

“Oh my God! What just happened!?” my sister yelled from the front seat. I was sitting quietly in the back trying to process what just happened. I think I was a little too young to understand at first. A few minutes later Sarah was on the phone with the police reporting what happened to us. When we got home, we had to explain the whole thing to my mom
“Oh my God! Are you kidding me!?” Was all I could remember her saying. We then quickly changed into some new clothes and waited for the policeman to come over and take our statement. He was a tall man with sandy hair and broad shoulders and even though he was very kind and courteous, I was still wary of him.

“It looks like you got out of there in the nick of time,” I remember him saying, “just before he could do anything else.”

Thinking back on it now the whole thing still freaks me out. I’ve been back to Deo’s hole since. It’s not the beach that makes me freak out. It’s when I have to be alone with an older guy that I tend to freak out a little. I know that what happened to me is nothing compared to most, but I can’t help it I still think about it, Probably more than I should