Capsized Semester

Capsized Semester

Melanie Velar

04/17/2023

Before we could hear the yelling quote “Hurry pull the rope, and go help them,” coming from Josh, the passerby’s mouth, we all thought we were going to die. It was 7pm on a Saturday in 2107 when Josh encountered us, a group of four college students that underwent the worst accident of their decade. The story was found all over Instax and the worldwide news channel, and you may be wondering how we ended up in this position, but surprisingly it’s not an unusual answer, it’s simple. The cravings of a typical college kids’ life are some listed: parties, alcohol, and clubs. Of course, no kid turns out to be this way automatically, it does take time for their personality to develop, and ultimately after developing mine, I wanted to be a part of that crazy life, so I risked it all for one stupid decision.

To begin, lets focus on the fact that I wasn’t always the girl who was down for five tequila shots, I had to evolve after being trapped during my whole childhood (not trapped literally, but trapped as in having strict parents). Before the horrid accident I went through, I was a lazy introvert who had pink strands of hair down to my ass, yea I said it, ass, don’t be surprised. My personality ever since high school has changed a lot and I knew from the beginning that being on the short end of the stick wasn’t what I wanted. So of course, I transformed overtime. I changed my appearance, vocabulary, and friends. Throughout the years, my life has been a whirlpool and I’ve undergone many historical events at a young age. I experienced the worst hurricane of mankind named Gremlin that destroyed all our beautiful beaches, I watched my mom give birth to my brother, and I sat through the slow rising waters taking over my small town in Miami, the Sinkglades. The name Sinklades seems a little odd, but it is derived from this, our silly mistake. The mistake of us humans not recycling, emitting fumes, and all in all damaging our earth. This so-called climate crisis was now actually reality, and ultimately me and many others didn’t think our consequences through. Houses, stores, markets, and farms all around Miami got reconstructed because of us. Now, the houses were close to the ocean on stilts and not only was there open ocean surrounding them but, around the houses were different town malls that were floating above water. Each store in the mall was like its own water home, they were solar powered and were able to withhold any wave impacts. My form of transportation was now through a six-seater engine Kayak, and the new hangout spots were in the floating town. This new world we thought would be impossible to manage was in fact manageable and maybe a little easier than expected.

As we go along, I want to talk about a good event that took place in my life, one I think was key to becoming who I am today. Before my last months of high school came to an end, the conversation of college applications took over the schools’ courtyards. The idea of going to college didn’t seem promising to me, I mean who wanted to pay to do schoolwork, not me. It took me a while to gain courage since I never wanted to write a college essay, do research, nor get a letter of recommendation until my counselor lit a fire behind me. Her convincing did the job, and I applied to a few universities. My aim while applying was to stick with what was close to home since my boats had low powered engines and couldn’t really make it too far without breaking down. Being the brain that I am, I got accepted into my first pick, Florida International University. After getting accepted into FIU I had a feeling that my life was set for the rest, I finally had a desire to try.

Furthermore, my typical day out in my new life “on the water” consisted of dressing in my SaintWater brand trousers and being prepared to always get soaked. Before college, I would always love to meet up with my elementary friends, driving in our kayaks at the farmers market, and gossiping on our future lives. I wished to keep these traditions going, but I wasn’t so sure how abrupt my life would change once I entered college.

As a few days passed, it was finally time to prepare, my first official semester at college began, the Fall semester of 2107. The morning of my first day consisted of me putting on my new black trousers with a waterproof long-sleeve in hopes of preventing mosquito bites on the ‘road’. Once I was ready, I ran outside and started my Kayaks engine, I went down the South side of Miami, passing the Everglades, and beat the Miami traffic that was no longer a thing due to our flooded streets. I entered my campus and was welcomed by the large palm tree filled area with many floating vehicles and students running into class. Before treading through the glazier waters, I took a deep breath, blinked, and I couldn’t believe it was now the beginning of a college journey I would never forget. After speaking to a few security guards on boats, I finally opened the blue painted door and took a seat in my first class, Intro to Anatomy. I sat there jittering, patiently waiting for my teacher to say “Magen” on the attendance roster. Once “Magen” was shouted out I realized I was finally free, I made it. I made it in a way we all think we made it, I was looking forward to making friends, going out, and drinking, but making it literally wasn’t by going down that path.

As I sat in class I heard, “I am really into the Sunquils, the plot of the movie is my all-time favorite” coming out of a student’s mouth. This quote was the beginning of a lifelong friendship I thought I would have, the Sunquils was my favorite movie, and I knew I could interrupt this conversation to make connections on campus. I responded to his statement with “No way, you are one of the few people who love this comedy, I think this means we are a perfect fit for each other in this boring Anatomy class.” After making a move, I found out later that his name was Conrad, and he was also from Miami. Conrad’s personality seemed to be outgoing, and I wanted to be surrounded by more people like him during the college days. In a blink of an eye, I made two new friends through Conrad and their names were Maya and Bryan. Each had a unique personality in which would bump heads ever so often as expected. The beginning of the semester was easy, easy in ways of navigating classes, submitting my work, and making new friends.

As we continue to steer through first semester at college, there wasn’t much to talk about except that I spent lots of hours studying, chatting, and overusing my engine to always be at Mayas house when I got bored during the week. My friend Maya lived down the block which was so convenient because fixing an engine wasn’t so cheap nowadays, I know this from experience. Our friend group bloomed so easily, and we all bonded over so many different shows, astrology signs, and hobbies. During the week we loved to study on our school floating dock, or we loved spending hours at our local Subwaze boat. Subwaze was the new Sub sandwich store that conveniently changed onto a boat once the ocean water swarmed their store. Me and my friend group always spent hours of the week sitting that their floating bench chatting and doing work. As the last days of the semester rolled around, we had our last Fall lunch sitting at the sub shop. That afternoon the lunch ran smoothly, I ordered my footlong Tuna Sub with extra mayo slathered on the white toasted bread and had a relieving school talk along my friends who I now called family. During the lunch, Maya, Cj, Bryan, and I were fishing for an idea on what to do during our usual Saturday hangout summer edition, we wanted something different. We had all ended our Fall term in our first year of college and were looking to have the best Summer imagined celebrating our passing grades. Our conversation went something like this, after it all started with Conrad’s suggestion.
“I think the cheapest, best summer plan would be taking my boat out for the weekend, we would seem so cool and can party all day long.”
“I think so too,” said Maya, “and we can all do a different task so our plans run smoothly, Magen can get the food, I can get the ice, Bryan can get the alcohol, and Cj can obviously provide the boat, it would be perfect!”
After hearing these ideas of course, I had to run along with it, I didn’t want to be a party pooper, so I agreed too.
“I’ve never been so down! Let’s get this show on a road and meet next weekend to make our plan come to life.”
Since our new homes were adjusted to our current weather, they were dock accessible, so our plan was quite convenient. Our master plan was set, and we went about it without thinking of the consequences we could possibly face.

Fast-forward to October 17 of 2107, the summer after fall term, was finally the day we were executing the perfect summer plan, merely the day we all lost our lives. We each began our day waking up early, drinking coffee to get pumped for our afternoon shots. The plan was to meet at Cjs house with the connecting dock around 12 to have an early party. I showed up wearing my favorite one-piece pink bikini that showed off my curves and I brought the best foods including chicken nuggets, chips, Subwaze and popsicles. Moreover, Maya brought ice from the floating FarmStore and Bryan brought three packs of Twisted Teas, with a half-filled Tito’s handle, the perfect amount for us to down. The meeting time was perfect, and overall, everyone’s morning ran smoothly as we were all hyped up for what was to come.

After all, we were finally settled in the boat, and before Cj began steering the boat is when my nerves took over my body, I was in awe this was happening, it felt surreal. I connected to aux and played my favorite song Hymen for the Weekend as we left the dock and headed out to sea. The ocean looked so different now, it was mapped out differently, it wasn’t like it was back in time, and now it seemed to be harder to navigate the rough sea waters amid our climate changing constantly. It was a choppy ride out, but we made it to the Elliot Key, where there once used to be a sandbar that’s now covered solely by rough tides and no land, it was a sad scene to see but we made it a happy place by backing vodka shots.
“On the count of three the Cuban Lingo comes in,” said Maya, “one two three, pa arriva, pa bajo, pa centro, pa dentro.”
“Crap that was a hard shot to swallow,” I said as Cj poured his next shot back-to-back.

I ultimately was worried for us, I wasn’t used to this and drinking, and driving was a felony I didn’t want to be a part of. I slapped myself back into reality away from my thoughts to try and have a good time, but my inner gut knew something was wrong the moment I stepped on the boat. Time was ticking fast, the bottle was now a quarter of the way filled and half of the Twisted Teas were gone, everyone was feeling vibey and the music was on full blast as we all sang along to our favorite top hits. The top songs coming from Justin Strongmy, Bill Easty, and Rill Warrel, the most fire artists in 2107. The bumping of the heads traveled throughout the boat, and the sunset came faster than we expected, it was now 7 o’clock and we were stuck in the roughest waters I have ever seen in my life.
“Everyone freaking sit down and turn off the music, I can’t do this!” Yelled Cj.
He started getting fired up, and I’ve never witnessed this side of him before, I was so scared for my life in panic mode, not even feeling my drunkenness anymore. I thought I was going to die, and no one did anything about it.
“Magen would you please hurry and help me clean the boat as fast as we can we gotta get outta here now.” Said Bryan.

Peer panic shifted the mood on the boat, we packed all our scraps and threw them into the trash, we all sat down and prayed Cj would bring us home safely. As Cj navigated his way home, he dove into four-foot waves causing us to get drenched on the back end of the haul, he was swerving in and out of riptides and almost sent one of us overboard. Just before I thought I could get used to sitting in this traumatic condition as we were only a few minutes from home, was the moment I saw everything go blank, black dots quickly covered my vision.

I was now sitting in a hospital bed wondering how I possibly got here, I had no recollection of time or what had happened. It was a miracle I woke up with no injuries other than memory loss. I asked where my friends were, and my mom went down the line explaining the accident in further detail.
“You woke up with no issues sweety, but I have never been so happy to see you survive something in my life,” My mom said. “Your friend Bryan is next door; he woke up with two broken bones and he is still waiting for his family to arrive.” She continued, “I am only worried for Cj, he did wake up but he broke his collarbone, which is possibly the most uncomfortable injury to pertain,” she explained, “besides the fact, I am glad you all are okay and survived being stupid.” Once my mom finished explaining, I thought I woke up from a crazy dream, but it was real life. I had survived the worst boat crash after my friend Cj capsized his boat hitting a 22-mile marker that was visibly right Infront of his eyes. The story went further into details as doctors, nurses, and my family kept putting puzzle pieces together. They had told me I was floating straight above water when a passerby Josh saw we needed help. Josh witnessed Cj holding Maya up as she struggled to breathe panicking, and he potentially saved all our lives catching the accident so early. It was a quick coast guard emergency call and the help of Josh, a stranger that kept us all alive. The result of our freshman year Summer wasn’t what we had in mind, and we were now a friend group who merely lost all contact with each other. We each spent the summer days sitting on our couches hoping to get better before our second year of college, and we lost everything we once thought we had. Our perfect little life was now filled with trauma we hoped to never endear again, and if I had a lesson for anyone out there it would be to never play games with alcohol or mother earth.