Justin Heckert:

Swept out to sea by a riptide, a father and his 12-year-old son struggle to stay alive miles from shore.

...

Only his breath in the darkness, a silence as everything settled in. For half an hour, Walt had yelled, begging for Christopher to answer. He had given up conserving energy, had been swimming as hard as he could to try and find his son. "Who's my best boy?" Nothing. "Christopher, who's my buddy?" Only the fish beneath him, brushing against his back and legs.

"Christopher?!"

Walt spun in every direction, trying to spot the small white face and the dark-brown hair.

But he was gone.

David Foster Wallace:

If you've never wept and want to, have a child.

Julian Schnabel:

Being in the water alone sharpens a particular kind of concentration, an ability to agree with the ocean, to react with a force that is larger than you are.

Cormac McCarthy, "The Road":

We're going to be okay, aren't we Papa?
Yes. We are.
And nothing bad is going to happen to us.
That's right.
Because we're carrying the fire.
Yes. Because we're carrying the fire.

Lost in the Waves