Florissant's Sea of Fortune

Florissant walked briskly through the waves, her long curly blonde hair whipping back and forth. The late afternoon sun shone on the tops of the waves, causing her to squint as she scanned the horizon for the ship. She saw it, a mere speck on the surface of the water. It was getting closer every second.

She was almost there.

The sun was setting now, which made it harder to see. She stopped and blinked hard, trying to get her eyes to adjust to the light. When she looked up again, she saw something that made her heart stop in her chest. Right in front of her was a huge wave - at least twice as tall as any wave she had ever seen before - its peak curling into a frothy white collar of foam at its top.

"Oh my God," she muttered under her breath, "I'm not going to make it." She started running through the water toward the ship again. It appeared to be moving away from her now, its sails billowing in the wind as it plowed through the water toward home. She called out desperately as she ran, but no one heard her over the roar of the waves and wind in their sails.

Florissant's long legs churned through the waves like pistons; her arms churned through them like paddles. She could feel herself getting closer and closer to shore but she knew it wasn't enough. The wave was going to hit right where she would stand if she didn't move fast enough - if anyone could swim through this mess of water, it was Florissant, but even she couldn't outrun a wave this size with any hope of survival. She had no choice; she stopped running forward and dove into the waves instead, thinking that if she could find an opening in between them maybe she could swim around them and reach safety after all.

The surface was filled with foam from the breaking crests and it was so choppy it felt like someone had poured sand into a bowl of ocean water and swished it around with their hands until it was frothy. But Florissant fought against the surface currents and found an opening between two peaks of foam where she could swim beneath them down into calmer water below. If only I can keep doing that, she thought hopefully, I might be able to make it safe after all!

But just then another huge wave came along that blocked off all but one small opening between two crests that were almost touching each other above her head. "Ah!" Florissant cried out as she tried desperately to swim underneath it before it crashed down on top of her head. But just as she thought all hope was lost a hand reached down out of nowhere and grabbed hers firmly while pulling her up out of the space where she had been about to be crushed by a huge wave that was about to break over top of her head. As soon as Florissant reached safety on land with this mysterious stranger who had saved her life before disappearing without saying a word to her, another huge wave crashed over top of where they had been standing together only seconds before.

Florissant shivered uncontrollably on dry land - whoever this stranger was who had saved her twice now, he must have been a true angel sent from heaven itself because even angels couldn't have swum against these waves or run fast enough across them while they chased after them over such great distances like he did to save both Florissant's life and his own in such close succession during their very first encounter with each other on this beach for goodness sake!