Cole Racich returned to class at Dos Pueblos High School last month after spending 123 days in the cancer ward at Children's Hospital Los Angeles

Cole Racich felt the calming warmth of a safe harbor when he returned to Dos Pueblos High School's Elings Aquatics Center on Thursday.

He was back on the pool deck with his water polo teammates for the first time since a helicopter airlifted him to Children's Hospital Los Angeles 11 months ago.

The reunion was joyously festive in spite of a 9-8 defeat to a strong Carlsbad High team in the first round of the Santa Barbara Invitational.

"They were all pretty pumped up and definitely glad to have me watching," he told Noozhawk.

"They told me, 'Hey, just wake up tomorrow at 160 pounds' -- I'm up to 130 right now -- 'and hop into the pool and play with us.'"

Racich, last year's starting sprinter as a freshman in a lineup of seniors, must take it slow for now.

He needs to regain the weight, strength and stamina that was stripped from his 5-foot-11 frame before he can get his feet wet again.

Four rounds of chemotherapy took their toll during the 123-day battle he waged against a rare form of leukemia.

"It was intense and gnarly," his mother, Linda, said. "He endured a lot.

"He's so happy now to be back with his friends because he was literally within four walls -- stuck inside the hospital with only adults -- from October to March."

Racich, who celebrated his 15th birthday in a cancer ward last February, rang the hospital bell on March 4. It's a hospital tradition for patients to signal the completion of their therapy.

"The tests came back negative, so everything was turning out well," he said. "I'm just glad to be back to my life."

He hopes to compete for Dos Pueblos' swim team in the spring and then rejoin the water polo squad next fall.

"It'd be cool to play in college some day, like my brother," Cole said.

Chase Racich, a 2011 graduate of Dos Pueblos, continued on in water polo to earn all-league honors at UC Santa Barbara.

"He's such a cool dude, I love him so much," Cole said. "He's such a big inspiration to me.

"But I just want to get back in the pool for now ... just take it day-by-day to get stronger before I play again."

Cole was actually back in the water on Aug. 17 as the designated honoree in the annual Keiki Paddle.

The event originated in 2008 as a children's version of Santa Barbara's long-standing Friendship Paddle.

It provides local youth a way to give "emotional and financial support" to fellow children who are "fighting life-threatening illnesses."

Racich's whirlwind return continued just two days later when he rejoined his classmates for the first day of school at Dos Pueblos.

"They were all super-happy to see me," he said. "All four of my siblings went to DP, so a lot of the teachers know our family and were excited, too.

"All of the love really came to me."

Racich, the youngest of Linda and Randy Racich's five children, soldiered through sickness during the early part of last year's water polo season.

"I kept getting these weird infections ... and I wasn't able to hear so well out of my left ear," he said.

"Coach (Chris) Parrish would shout out something like, 'Go to the left side!' and I wouldn't be able to hear him."

Racich's parents took him to the emergency room at Goleta Valley Cottage Hospital after a particularly brutal, five-day stretch of illness dropped his weight to just 99 pounds.

"We thought he just had a terrible flu ... The worst flu that wouldn't stop," Linda said. "But there was this amazing doctor there who just wouldn't let it go.

"Finally, at about 3:30 in the morning, they were like, 'We see something in the CT scan, and there's a helicopter coming in 45 minutes with a team from Children's Hospital in Los Angeles.'"

Cole felt as though he'd been hit in the face by a water polo ball at point-blank range.

"I went, 'Whoa! ... What is happening?'" he recalled. "It was a pretty shocking moment in my life."

But the rally of support began from close range, as well.

Racich's mother looked him in his wide-open eyes and said, "Cole, you will never be alone ... I will be with you every step of the way ... Every second! ... We're going to be a team."

It wound up growing into a pretty large team, starting with his close-knit, sports-minded family.

Cole's cell phone lit up constantly with FaceTime calls from his dad and siblings during his five months at Children's Hospital.

"Tristan is a nurse and she'd call to ask how I was doing every day on each of the three breaks she got during her 12-hour shift," he said. "My brother -- all my siblings -- did the same thing.

"We'd do family calls, and I'd talk sometimes to my entire set of cousins. They all just tried to keep me occupied as much as possible."

Chase, who now works as a Marin County firefighter, got fellow firefighter Kevin Schulz to help him lift Cole's spirits with a new surfboard.

"Kevin is also a competitive surfer with a couple of sponsors, including Firewire Surfboards (Firewater/Slater Designs)," Cole said.

"My brother asked him about the newest, coolest board that everyone is talking about, and he said, 'Well, Kelly Slater is making this new one called The Great White Twin.'"

When Slater learned that the surfboard was for Cole, the 11-time World Surf League champion gave it to him for free.

"Chase brought it to the hospital," Cole recalled, "and it included this little note from Kelly which said, 'I can't wait to surf with you.'

"It was so super-cool."

The local aquatics community launched its own mission of support. Schoolmates from both the boys and girls water polo teams got the ball rolling.

"They'd call me while having lunch at a tournament, just keeping in touch," Racich said. "It meant so much to realize that they really cared about me."

The DP boys wound up advancing to the CIF-Southern Section's Division 2 final before losing to cross-town rival San Marcos.

"It was a great team ... all good guys," Cole said. "All the seniors were super-kind."

He was especially touched when shown a photograph of San Marcos' players posing with his DP teammates before their cross-town match of Oct. 10. Each Royal had Racich's No. 5 written on his chest.

"Cole likes that as his number because he's the fifth kid in our family," Linda explained. "For them to be all really united for him at this rivalry game ... It really meant a lot to him."

The water polo teams from all three local high schools, both boys and girls, raised $2,000 in Uber Eats cards so Cole wouldn't be stuck eating hospital food. They also bought him "cozy blankets."

"Coach Parrish and his family hand delivered it all to us at the hospital," Linda said.

Hats and bracelets emblazoned with Cole's initials and number -- CR5 -- were soon worn on every pool deck in town. Santa Barbara High's players donned T-shirts that said, "Dons Play for Cole."

"The DP girls water polo team made these temporary tattoos which said, 'Strong Like Cole" and wore them to every one of their games," Linda said.

"It was hard on a lot of kids when Cole was abruptly taken away like that," she explained. "The water polo community ... we're all one.

"There's just this beauty that came from all of this, of all these kids from different high schools rallying for Cole."

DP's teachers and administrators did their part, keeping Cole on track with his course work.

"They were super-awesome and understanding about it all," Racich said. "Engineering (class) gave me videos of stuff I could do. They tried very hard to keep me on pace.

"The same with English, assigning me to read all these books.

"I had a home hospital teacher for math. She was very kind."

The nurses and doctors at CHLA became like family, Linda said.

"They all love me and I love them so much," Cole said. "They healed me.

"They were so excited to see me when I went back for a visit. One of them said, 'Oh my gosh, you're already more tan than me!'"

Goleta Valley Cottage Hospital came up with its own demonstration of love.

"We were there from only 5 p.m. to 3:30 a.m. before getting whisked away, but Goleta's Cottage ER chose Cole and our family to adopt for Christmas," Linda said.

"The nurses and doctors and radiologists all came together to bring us these gifts."

Bianca Castro, who had been a teammate of Taylor and Tristan Racich on DP's Channel League championship girls volleyball teams of 2010 and 2011, nominated Cole for the Keiki Paddle.

The event enlists 135 youngsters from the ages of 7 to 18 to paddle eight miles from UCSB's Campus Point to Leadbetter Beach near the Santa Barbara Harbor.

Each paddler commits to raising funds to offset the medical and other expenses incurred by the honoree.

"They paddled these big, 15-foot Bark boards all the way down to a little foamy board that this kid got from Costco," Linda said. "He told me, 'I'm doing this for Cole.'

"I saw two of the kids paddling on the same board. It was just all so sweet."

One of the youngest paddlers gave Cole a lei that he'd made out of dental floss.

"He was kind of embarrassed to give it to him," Linda said, "but my daughter told him, 'No! No! No! He'll love it.'"

Cole hung it in a place of honor inside their Goleta home.

More than $71,000 has been raised so far to help the Racich family with the enormous costs of Cole's long hospitalization. The Teddy Bear Cancer Foundation donated $5,000.

"That was the first Santa Barbara hug -- the Teddy Bear Cancer Foundation reaching out," Linda said. "And then the water polo community reached out. And then the Keiki Paddle.

"Each time, it really felt like the Santa Barbara community was hugging my son ... Was hugging us."

They Racich family plans to give their own hugs from the interest the money earns.

"Cole and I talked about it when we left CHLA," Linda said. "Every penny earned from this money will be paid forward to make sure that kids in the hospital get loved on like we were.

"The Keiki Paddle was especially healing for our whole family after all the sadness and hardship.

"It was such a day of love."

So many kids signed up for the Keiki Paddle that the waiting list swelled to 40.

The paddlers were accompanied by a fleet of 28 vessels. Randy Racich took the helm of his son's support boat, although Cole paddled on a stand-up board for most of the eight-mile journey.

"I haven't done that many miles in a while, but I pushed myself in a good way," he said. "And at the end, when we went around the Leadbetter corner, there was already like 150 people paddling with all the boats.

"I looked back, and it seemed like there were another 200 behind me."

Several adults -- Cole's siblings included -- were among the flotilla of paddlers.

Another was Kai Lenny, a world champion stand-up paddler and big wave surfer.

He stunned Cole by showing up unannounced at Campus Point to join Cole on his journey.

"It was the biggest surprise," Cole said. "I talked to him a lot during the paddle.

"At the end, he gave me this super-cool surfboard and the book he wrote about all the stuff he's done throughout his life."

Cole, who was a starter in the U.S. Olympic Development Program before taking ill, has already done plenty during his own 15-plus years.

He was swimming by the age 2 and surfing Campus Point just three years later. He was 8 when he joined the Santa Barbara Junior Lifeguards program and 11 when he started playing for the Channel Islands Water Polo Club.

"It runs in the family -- we all love the water," Cole said.

A shared Christian faith helped him deal with the grueling days of treatment.

"We said lots of prayers, and I'd watch the services of our little Anthem Chapel Church online," Cole said. "I kept telling myself, 'God's got me ... I'm going to get through this.'"

He amazed his mother by never complaining throughout his 123-day ordeal.

"Not once," Linda said. "He was the one always saying, 'Don't worry, Mom ... It's all good!'"

Their 11-month journey came full circle for Mom last week when Cole rushed out of their house to join his friends.

"Before he got through the door," she said, "He called out, 'Mom, I love my life!'"