“Toby, don’t get in de vater,” Claire warned, her heavy German accent growing thicker with anxiety.

“It’s water, not vater.” Toby dangled his feet over the edge of the dock. “And it’s stupid I can’t get in the water. The sea is calm. You’re just a scaredy-cat! Jenna would have let me go in.” Toby wished for the hundredth time that Jenna was still his nanny.

“Your mother says no swimming. You might get eaten by fish.”

“They aren’t fish. They’re sharks. And the water is too shallow here for sharks,” Toby snapped, angered by her ignorance. Jenna had known everything about sharks. She had once taken him to the Sydney Aquarium and introduced him to Ian Hammer, the famous shark diver. It still ranked as the best day of his life. The worse day was when Jenna left. Her schooling was over and she was going to work as a marine biologist for the Florida Marine Research Institute. He knew his father had helped get her the position and he was still angry about that.

Agitated, he dove into the water and swam swiftly away from the dock towards the vast ocean that lay before their Miami beachfront mansion. He could hear Claire shrieking from the shore. When her voice rose to a higher level of panic, he stopped swimming and turned to enjoy her silly hysterics. He had swum a hundred feet out, so her voice wasn’t clear. He could only pick up the occasional word “shark” in her screams. She became so distressed, that he felt sorry for her.

It wasn’t her fault she wasn’t Jenna. It wasn’t her fault she was afraid of water and knew nothing about sharks. She was from Germany , a country with no ocean.

He sighed and headed back to her. He could still hear her screeching, even under the water. God, she was really upset. She’d probably quit over this. Dad had threatened to send him to military school if he chased away another nanny. He picked up his speed. He’d have to apologize this time.

Suddenly something slammed against his side knocking him near senseless. His arms and legs flew about until he righted himself and stood up in the water. What had hit him? He looked around, almost deaf to Claire’s shrieking. Looking out to the ocean, he saw the grey black fin cutting through the water. Amazement turned to concern as he realized it turned and now headed straight at him.

With awkward gangly motions, he thrashed his way towards the shore. He had always loved the water, but today it seemed to be his enemy, holding him back as he struggled forward. He did not stop until he was in water only a foot deep. Taking deep gasping breaths of air, he turned to look at the ocean.

“Did you see that?” he cried out in wonder to Claire, who paced on the edge of the tide line begging him to come to her. He looked out, squinting against the sun. “Can you see him?” Realizing that he’d get no help from Claire on his search for the shark, he stepped back out into the ocean, but still safely in water that did not reach his knees.

A brief hint of black far out on the horizon caught his attention. “There it is,” he said, stepping out a little further, wishing he could see it better. “How big was it?” He sighed and he realized that Claire would never be able to answer that. If Jenna were here, she’d be able to tell him the size, species and eating habits.

Growing weary of Claire’s shrieks he turned to her. “Claire it’s all right. The shark is gone.”

Claire finally sensing the danger was over, collapsed on the sand and began to sob. “I hate you! I don’t want to do this anymore! I want to go home. I want to go home.”

Toby sighed. The military school loomed large in his future. “Claire, don’t be mad at me,” he pleaded in his sweetest voice. “There was no harm done. I’m okay. I won’t even tell my folks you let me go in the vater,” he added mischievously.

Claire looked up as if he had slapped her in the face. “You’re a devil child!” she screamed. “I wish the shark had eaten you,” she added and stormed up the beach.

Toby groaned and sat down in the water. He had done it this time. “It’s a military school for me…” he moaned.

Just then, the water exploded from the dock side and a giant blackness filled his view. A second later, his dread of military school ceased to be a concern. Toby was gone.