Class V - Part IV

We hit Pillow Rock with a roar, the aerated waves and our momentum pushing the right side of the raft down into the torrent and forcing the left side up onto the rock, standing the raft up on its side. Remembering our brief training, I tried leaning into the rock, but almost as soon as I made the effort, I felt myself falling, interminably, into the bubbling foam. All of the other rafters had already been thrown out, now trying to keep their heads above the water that so forcefully pulled us down.

The first thing I consciously did was look at my paddle. In our training session that morning, the first thing they told us was, "If you get wet, cling to your paddle. It could be the only thing that saves you." So, with reckless abandon, I threw it away. It was hard enough to keep my head above the water with it in my hands. I now found it nearly impossible without it.

The churning current repeatedly yanked me below the surface, only allowing me a gulp of an air-water mixture when my previous breath was almost totally exhausted. Time after time I gulped in a short breath, only to hit another wave face first, pulled down by the river's unimaginable power. My lungs screamed for oxygen, but I was only able to give them a short burst at a time.

After fighting for my life for what seemed like an hour, but was only seconds, my head popped one more time above the white, turbulent froth. Trying to see through bloodshot eyes I saw what looked like a gray 1967 Beetle directly in my path. Volkswagen Rock.

Up to this point in my life, I'd only been really scared a few times, and those were mostly in dreams. When I was 6 or 7 I dreamed I was being chased by wolves. It was so real that I asked Marc, who occupied the lower bunk in our room, to go into the bathroom to make sure there were none there. On another occasion I was being put into a toaster by a two-headed giant. Nothing like a little toasted boy and jam for breakfast.

This time the fear shook me like never before. I could imagine myself going under the rock and being pinned there for weeks. I was sure I couldn't hold my breath for that long.

Seeing the rock come closer and closer at breakneck speed, I did the only thing I really could do. I put my feet downstream and tried to swim around it. Despite my efforts, though, I hit the rock hard with my left shoulder and pushed as hard as I could. The current pushed me to the left of the rock and spit me into a large pool on the back side.

Still not understand that I was out of danger, I tried to stay afloat long enough to find the raft, when a large pair of hands grabbed the back of my life vest and pulled me into a raft. So quick and powerful was this pull that it nearly yanked the life vest up over my head. Turning around and looking at the person who'd saved me from the monster rapid, I saw my own dad. He was smiling from ear to ear.

"Are you all right?" he asked, patting me on the back.

"I think so," I sputtered, spitting what seemed like buckets of water out of my mouth.

Looking around the raft I saw Akers, a couple of the other guys we didn't know and Tom. No Marc.

Turning around with a snap I quickly scanned the pool. Marc was not there, either.

"Where's Marc?" I said anxiously.

"We're not sure yet," dad said. "We're still looking for him."

Feeling that same fear well up in my chest that I had just felt slamming into Volkswagen Rock, I looked feverishly up the rapid. Where was he? Why wasn't he in the raft? Why wasn't he somewhere in the water?

Panicking and fearing the worst, I shouted again, "Where is he?" In my head I prayed frantically. "Please, God. Where's Marc? Please help him!"

Time slowed to a crawl and seconds stretched into hours. Breathing, already made difficult by the amount of water in my lungs, became almost unbearable. My heart beat faster than if I'd just run several miles. My hands shook. My knees quivered. My heart ached.

Then, dad put his hand on my shoulder and pointed up the river on the far bank. "There he is," he said.

I quickly scanned the shore and saw my brother walking down toward us, waving his paddle high over his head, the biggest smile on his face.

A collective sigh of relief emanated from the raft and we paddled toward the bank, behind Volkswagen Rock, to pick him up. "The river just pushed me right toward the shore and I got out," he said after climbing in. "I watched the whole thing!"

I learned in the next pool down that it wasn't Marc I should have been worried about, but rather my dad. After exiting the raft like the rest of us, he was pulled directly under the raft and below Pillow Rock. The violent water pushed him through a small hole on the under side, banging his helmet-covered head on the bottom of the rock, and spewing him out the other side.

"I guess I took a shortcut," he joked while we floated peacefully toward Lost Paddle rapids, the next rapid in line. "I was in the pool before the raft was!" I could see that gold-colored tooth he had on the right side of his mouth as he laughed and joked, but I could tell he was thankful to be alive.

Dad died of cancer about ten or fifteen years later. I miss him terribly and think about him every day. But the memories we founded on this day, and others, will last me until I see him again.

Since stepping out of the raft at the New River Gorge Bridge that afternoon, I've never been back on the Gauley. In fact, I've never been whitewater rafting, either. I must say, though, that it's not because of Pillow Rock. I have a family now and I just have other responsibilities. Some might say that I don't have a death wish anymore. Bungee jumping, whitewater rafting and spelunking no longer excite me the way they used to. One day maybe I'll introduce my own kids to their thrills, but not yet. They're still too young to conquer monsters much bigger than inconsiderate baseball coaches and having a fight with their best friend.

My monsters are a little smaller these days, too. The fire-breathers now only emit a small puff of smoke and crawl instead of fly. But I'll always be able to say that for one day, on that Indian-summer day, I felt the worst a truly big monster could dish out, and I came out on top.