I stood on the balcony, looking out into the sea, a cup of tea warming my hands.

“This is ridiculous.” Jonah was in his bedroom, his phone wedged between his shoulder and his ear as he pulled on his trainers. “How can there be nothing new?” He paused to listen to the voice at the other end and shook his head.

“Fine, see you tomorrow.” Jonah threw his phone on the bed and came to stand besides me.

“This is ridiculous.” He repeated.

“No news then?” I asked him.

“Nothing.” He muttered “How can Josh just disappear without a trace? Without any sign?” Josh was our brother. The youngest of us, he was also the most adventurous. When we first heard he was missing we didn’t think too much into it to be honest, he was always wandering off to climb some mountain or tame a tiger, never giving a thought to letting people know where he’d gone. But when three days became a week, we began to panic.

“Shantelle’s getting on my nerves too.” Jonah said.

“She’s worried.”

“She should’ve called sooner.”

“We both know we’d of shook it off just the same if she’d called a day earlier.”

“I know.” He muttered. He looked out into the sea and shuddered. “You don’t suppose..”

“No.” I cut him off “he hated the water. He’d never go in.”

“Maybe he was trying to get over his fear or something.”

“He wouldn’t do it alone.”

“You know he would. Why else would he move into a beach house?”

I sipped my tea. He was right obviously. Josh would want to tackle it by himself. But still.. The waves were rippling calmly, gently kissing the sand and I wondered again why Josh had chosen to move here. Was it so he could get over his fear of water by staring it straight in the face?

Jonah’s shrill ringtone broke the silence, making us both jump.

“Hello?” He wandered off into his bedroom.

I wandered what Josh was doing right now. Was he off having another adventure? Or was he really in some sort of danger? Fear crawled through my body.

Jonah returned, staring down at his phone.

“Who was that?”

“Shantelle.” He whispered.

“What did she say?”

He looked up and it was only then that I saw that the colour had drained from his face and the fear in his eyes.

“They’ve found a body.”