Page 155 of The End of the World As We Know It
So, Marie told him. And watched light spill into his shadowed eyes.
Marie couldn’t remember the last time she’d been so excited in the hours before she went to bed, stuffing her belongings into her father’s old army duffel bag: photos, her birth certificate, Manman’s good winter houndstooth coat, her bathing suit. She felt like she was going on vacation. She packed in such a frenzy that she didn’t remember to be heartbroken about leaving the house she had grown up in. Or the island that had been her home.
Night was when the worries came. And the dreams.
She expected to see the old lady—perhaps to congratulate Marie on such a bold and sensible plan—but this time she dreamed of being on the deck of theProud Mary, lightning flashing in the sky like floodlights to reveal a roiling night sea. The waves were so high that theProud Marypitched and heeled, sometimes close to turning over on its side. Water flooded the deck.
Marie clung to the mast, hugging it like a loved one as water drenched her. But no: it wasn’t the mast! She was clinging to the swollen blob of the dead woman she’d seen floating.
She called for Edmund and the Boat Man, but her mouth made no sound when she screamed. Or, if it did, she could not hear her voice against the ocean battering the hull.
This is how I’m going to die, she thought.
With that thought, she saw the man standing at the bow. (When she was awake, she had trouble remembering nautical terms, but she thoughtbowin sleep.) He stood legs akimbo, hands on his hips, a statue defying the boat’s swaying.
The sail whipped in the wind, tearing to tatters. One of the ropes lashed above her, snakelike, and she barely ducked in time before it might have coiled itself around her neck. After the rope missed, it snapped back toward her with a mind of its own, ensnaring her upper arm. The rope yanked her upward, to her toes.
“Help me!” she screamed.
In the blinding strobe of lightning, the bearded man grinned at her. His eyes were hidden beneath an old-fashioned pirate’s hat with skull and crossbones, but she knew those brown teeth. The Boat Man. He was holding her machete, she realized. With impossible balance, he raised it high and floated toward her like a phantom, lightning gleaming across the steel blade.
Marie woke with a scream on her lips. She panted, grateful for the dawn light.
But her bed was damp. Her face and skin were wet. Marie screamed again, thinking it was a dream inside a dream, like inA Nightmare on Elm Street, but although the moisture on her skin tasted salty like the sea, she had only sweated through her sheets as she slept. And worse, she had wet her bed—the odor of urine beneath her was sharp. Marie talked to herself for twenty minutes with reassurances before she could climb out of bed to wash.
Then she heard a knock. And went to meet Edmund and the Boat Man at her front door.
They had come to collect the rest of the water.
Unlike in her dream, the sea was placid and welcoming at the start of their leaving day.
Although they had spent two days bickering as they gathered supplies from other boats—cans of diesel, nonperishable food, blankets and a couple of water-desalination kits-–all of them were agreeable now, not wanting to jinx the trip. Edmund, too, was on his best behavior, deferring to the Boat Man’s instructions as they prepped for their long sail by hauling their supplies on board, including the Boat Man’s chicken cages with three hens and a rooster.
The Boat Man walked with a jaunt, as if he had been reunited with the boat that burned. He’d found a white captain’s cap somewhere, which made it all feel official. Edmund didn’t even complain when the Boat Man said he wanted the larger cabin to himself, and that Edmund and Marie would have to share the berth in the smaller one despite the way the dank space was already crowded with junk. They were all too excited for any more arguing, eager to go.
So Marie was fine with her job to clean up the filthy two-burner stove and sink in the galley while Edmund and the Boat Man worked loudly prepping the vessel on the deck above her, with the Boat Man calling out orders and Edmund saying, “Aye aye, Captain!” Edmund had taken her out for a short sail once and he knew his way around the boat surprisingly well, but the relief of having the Boat Man’s expertise was immeasurable.
If only she could forget her dream.
Her nightmare about the Boat Man had felt as real as her dreams about the old lady serving her lemonade like Manman’s while she talked about freedom with the passion of Harriet Tubman on the Underground Railroad. Maybemorereal, if she were honest. Now she just had to figure out what her dream about him had meant. In her dream, had he planned to chop her up with that machete? Or cut her loose from the rope? Why had the dead woman appeared?
Or was her dream just her fears about the journey bubbling to the surface as she slept?
The galley went dark. A prickling across Marie’s scalp made her look at the narrow steps up to the deck, where the Boat Man’s bulkwas blocking the sunlight as he leaned in. Again, she could not see his face in his silhouette. (Thathad to mean something, didn’t it?)
“Bring up those maps, girlie,” he said.
Marie thought she should say,Aye, aye. But she couldn’t make herself speak to his shadowy face. She hated it when he called hergirlie, not only because it was a lazy nickname but because she tried so hard to dress in jeans and loose clothes that would help him forget that she was a girl. She’d never been more grateful that her body had not developed early, but looking like a tomboy hadn’t helped him come up with a more creative name.
Maybe she and Edmund should have sailed alone. Even without the previous days’ constant arguing, when they had taken turns telling each other to fuck off and die, the Boat Man’s presence felt risky. But it might be too late now.
With the chicken cages nestled underneath the table, they barely had room to sit on the mildewed, rain-dampened cushions as Marie spread out Granpè Jean’s nautical map of the Gulf of Mexico, where Key West was a pinprick in waters that looked as vast as space. Cuba was closer, only ninety miles south. Close enough to touch, just about.
“So, there’s our route,” the Boat Man said, tracing their journey far away from Cuba with a calloused fingertip. “Gulf of Mexico meets the Mississippi about a hundred miles from New Orleans. We’ll hug the shoreline in case there’s a storm front or we run out of fuel. Those Gulf waters can get pretty high, and we’re still in hurricane season. My guess? At least eighty hours. Maybe more. Once we get up there, we figure out the rest. Dump the boat. Resupply.”
“We’re not dumpingProud Mary!” Edmund said.
Marie was afraid of another eruption to shatter their alliance—or maybe hoped for it—but the Boat Man chose patience. “I know you love this boat… I loved mine, too… but this is diesel, one thing. Harder to refuel. We’ll have enough wind till we get to the river, but after that we’ll mostly be motoring on the water. Plus, thatfifty-five-foot mast won’t make it under some of those bridges on the Ole Mississippi. So, we’ll see what we see. Lots of boats up there. Got it?”
