Georgie's Big Greek Wedding - By Emily Forbes Page 0,1

glad she’d changed her mind about the introductory dive—she wasn’t sure she could be bothered with all the paraphernalia and the air tanks looked awfully heavy.

There was one man, however, who managed to make the tank look as though it weighed no more than a sleeping bag. Georgie watched as he unclipped his buoyancy vest and slung it and his air tank off his shoulders before he removed his thin dive shirt by pulling it over his head. His torso was bare and she was treated to a rather attractive view of a smooth, lightly tanned back and rippling muscles as he stretched his arms overhead. His dark blond hair was cut short and when he ran his hands through it the salt water made it stick up in all directions. He had the physique of a man who worked out. He had broad, square shoulders that tapered nicely into his waist and the muscles on his arms were well defined.

He threw his shirt over his shoulder as her eyes travelled down his back. She could see the two small dimples at the base of his spine just visible above the waistband of his shorts. His shorts hugged the curve of his buttocks and were patterned like the Australian flag. If all divers looked like him, perhaps she would take up the challenge.

‘Help, somebody, please, help us.’

Georgie spun around, her meandering thoughts interrupted by a woman’s cries. The sound came from her right, out in the ocean. She searched the water and it took her a second or two to locate the woman. She was about fifty metres off the back of the pontoon in one of the snorkelling areas marked out by floating buoys. The woman was waving one arm and hanging onto someone else with her other hand. From the corner of her eye Georgie saw a flash of movement as someone dived off the starboard corner of the pontoon. She turned her head. The guy in the Australian flag board shorts had disappeared. In the time it took her to process the cries for help and to find the source of the sound he had dived into the water and was now swimming strongly towards the distressed woman.

A couple of crew members had raced to the back of the pontoon, one unhooking a lifebuoy and the other carrying a first-aid kit. Seeing other people in action galvanised Georgie. She made her way across the pontoon, past stunned tourists, to offer her assistance as the crewman with the lifebuoy jumped overboard and struck out towards the woman, trailing in the other guy’s wake.

Georgie followed him with her eyes. She could see that the diver in the Aussie flag shorts had almost reached the woman but it was getting difficult to see everything that was happening as the swell had picked up and the small waves breaking on the top of the reef were obscuring her vision. With two more over arm strokes, the guy in the board shorts had reached the woman and taken over control of the person she was supporting. He had hold of the person’s chin and Georgie could see him making his way back to the pontoon with a strong sidestroke action, dragging the person with him. The woman was doing her best to follow but she was being rapidly left behind. The crewman with the lifebuoy swam up to her, slipped the lifebuoy over her head and under her arms and started towing her back to the pontoon.

The guy in the board shorts was already back at the pontoon with the rescued man in his grip. One of the crewmen knelt down at the edge of the pontoon and hooked his hands under the distressed man’s armpits and hauled him onto the deck.

‘He’s complaining of chest pain,’ the diver in the board shorts told the crewman as he helped to lift the man’s legs out of the water, ‘and I suspect he’s aspirated some salt water.’

What sort of person used the term ‘aspirated’? Georgie wondered. It was a medical term but perhaps it was common in diving as well? She watched the diver as he hoisted himself up onto the deck. His biceps and triceps bulged as he lifted his weight clear of the sea. Salt water streamed from his body as he stood. His chest was smooth and tanned and despite having just swum a fast fifty metres while towing a heavy body, he was breathing normally. He didn’t appear to be