Spencer's POV, Present Day

Somewhere in the depths of my mind, I heard, "I love you, Spencer."

Thoughts swirl in my mind as I fight off unconsciousness. Slowly opening my eyes, I feel pain flood every inch of my body. I blink off the blurriness until my vision becomes clear and what I see startles and scares me.

Ashley is bent over me with her eyes closed, holding my left hand in both of hers. I try to sit up, but shooting sharp pains take me by surprise and I let an audible gasp and lay back down. Ashley's eyes snap open. "Spencer?"

I look up and our eyes meet for the first time in three years. Hers are still the same chocolate brown that I fell in love with so long ago. I hold the gaze for about a second before the dizziness and pain take over, and I close my eyes. I feel Ashley's hand graze across my forehead as she calls over the others.

"Is she awake?"

"I'm going to kill Carmen!"

"Will she be okay?"

"Spence, can you hear us?"

"I'm going to kill Carmen!"

"Shut up, Glen!"

"Spencer?" Ashley whispers again.

I open my eyes again and see Glen, Aiden, Chelsea, Kyla, Madison, and Ashley all huddle around me. "W-what happened?"

Everyone is silent for a minute and then Aiden speaks up. "You were going for a wave and, well, uh..."

"Spit it out, Aiden," I say angrily. I sit up again, trying to ignore the agonizing pain.

"Spencer, you should really lay-" I shoot Ashley a look, making her shut up immediately. I don't really want to here anything from her right now. I look back up expectantly at Aiden.

He sighs. "You went for the wave and Carmen dropped down on you. The fins from her board cut your back, knocking you off your surfboard. You went underwater and got slammed into the pier. You resurfaced, but a wave crashed down on you, causing your head to slam against a rock. You went back under and stayed there. W-we," he gulps and his eyes tear up, "We thought you drowned." Everyone is quiet as I absorb all this.

I look down at my arms and legs, seeing cuts and bruises. I reach my right hand back to feel my back, and touch nothing but bandage as sharp pains overwhelm me. I let out a moan and everyone edges closer.

"Excuse me, excuse me." Chelsea and Madison step back to allow a short man with thick rimmed glasses to step up to my cot. "Miss Carlin, I'm Dr. Rivers, I was on call for the tournament. How are you feeling?" He moves on without waiting for a response, "Listen, you got banged up pretty badly. You have many cuts all over, but major ones on your back and a few concerning ones on your head. You have strained muscles, possibly something more worrisome. Also, you definitely have a concussion, and I would feel a lot better if we got you to the hospital as soon as possible to get some CAT scans done; you hit your head pretty hard. On that note, I am going to talk to the paramedics and then we'll have you off to the ER in no time."

He walks away and everyone turns their attention back to me. I nervously look around and notice that Ashley is still holding my hand. To break the silence and to try and not think about Ashley, I ask, "So is Carmen still in the competition?"

"Yes, that fucking bitch!" Glen yells out.

"Carmen convinced the judges that she didn't see you when she dropped down. So she's still in." Chelsea explains in a hollow voice.

"Which is bullshit because everyone knows she hates you and would do anything to win." Glen adds, grinding a fist into his other hand.

"What score did she get?"

"She got a 7.4. Everyone else did so badly because the waves were too choppy; they all got below a 6." Madison speaks up for the first time.

"And me? What did I get?"

"You got a 6.8. Does it matter though Spence?" Aiden questions timidly.

"Yeah, it does." No one says anything because they don't know what to say. So right now, I have a 16.1, and Carmen has a 16.4, and she's really the only competition that I have to worry about...

"Is my board okay?" I ask abruptly.

"Yeah, it's fine. Luckily, it didn't get smashed."

"Where's it at?"

"Over by the Hurley tent. Why?" Glen looks at me suspiciously as the warning bell goes off. I don't respond. I quickly think through the situation and before anyone knows it, I'm jumping off the cot, taking off towards where my surfboard is.

The pain is overwhelming but I push through it. The others are screaming for me to stop but I ignore them. I know I got a decent running head start since none of them were expecting that. I scoop up my board and use this chance to see that Aiden is ahead of the others, running towards me. "Spencer! Stop! You can't fucking compete!"

Ignoring him, I turn ninety degrees and head to the water. The others are still screaming my name but only Ashley's voice registers in my mind. I falter in my step because her screams make me hesitate, but I shake it off. I need to do this.

As the horn starts for the third heat to begin, I jump into the ocean and land on my board.

I paddle as hard as I can, and shoot like a bullet past Carmen and the other competitors. I hear her snarl but I keep going, determined.

I head over to my spot as I feel the pain, dizziness, and fatigue overtake my body.

What the hell am I doing? I think to myself. I can't do this. My body is too messed up. There's no way I'll win. No, NO. I have to do this, I HAVE to win!

I get over to my spot, noticing the waves aren't any better since the second heat. I wait impatiently for the right wave, and when I see it, I think, Let's do this.