It was a scenario Shirley Willis said she had contemplated thousands of times but never wanted to experience.

Those thoughts became a terrifying reality Wednesday afternoon in McDonald Creek in Glacier National Park, where she was transformed from sightseer to rescuer.

A young boy apparently had drifted away from his family and was being jerked around by the swift current in the creek near Going-to-the-Sun Road just north of Lake McDonald.

Willis and dozens of family members had stopped on a reunion trip through the park at about 2:30 p.m. She said she was standing with her husband when she heard a frantic plea for help.

“I heard someone yell ‘my son, my son’ and I knew right away by the tone of his voice before I even saw” the boy, Willis said. “I just knew it.”

It was then that the 45-year-old Kalispell-area woman instinctively rushed to the boy’s aid. She sprinted along the rocky bank to a point where she knew he would emerge from the tumbling rapids.

She caught occasional glimpses of the boy’s red shirt as he bobbed around, seemingly limp and at the mercy of the current.

Without removing her shoes, clothing or a sweatshirt tied around her waist, she leaped into the water and grabbed the boy as he drifted through a calmer portion of the creek. The two careened down the waterway until her husband and other bystanders were able to pull the boy to safety.

Kip Willis said he was scared for his wife’s safety as he looked down at her and the young boy, but that she was more concerned with getting the boy to safety.

“I reached down and got ahold of his pinky finger and ring finger, and she just kind of pushed off,” Kip Willis said.

Shirley Willis was able to grab a large rock a short distance from where the boy was removed. Kip Willis said the boy, who looked lifeless moments earlier, tried to run “like a scared deer” when he finally regained his composure.

“I kept looking at him and saying, ‘Say something, say something,’” Kip said. “He finally opened his eyes and said ‘something.’”

The boy’s father —  whose cries for help sparked the initial rescue attempt — took the boy to a nearby vehicle before returning minutes later to thank his son’s rescuers.

The Willises said he appeared to be in a state of shock.

“He just stared at me, held my hand, said ‘Thank you’ and walked away,” Shirley Willis said.

The dramatic rescue took place in about a minute, according to bystanders. Shirley Willis said her reaction was at least partially sparked by maternal instinct: She’s the mother of a 15-year-old girl and 11-year-old boy.

The Willis family never learned the names of the boy and his father. Shirley Willis said she would like to find out exactly who they were. Adrenaline and shock prevented her from asking, she said.

Shirley Willis is the executive director of the Lighthouse Christian Home for developmentally delayed adults on North Somers Road south of Kalispell, and has lived in the area for seven years. During that time, she said her family often has taken advantage of the region’s various creeks and rivers.

Kip Willis said he thinks their presence along McDonald Creek on Wednesday was meant to be.

“There is definitely a reason we were there,” he said.

Shirley Willis said she won’t forget the cry for help.

“That was the most haunting thing,” she said. “Because I knew in my head that it wasn’t my own son, but I also knew it could have been my son.”

Reporter Eric Schwartz may be reached at 758-4441 or by e-mail at [email protected].