The End of the World Survivors Club

by Adrian J. Walker

  ‘No, you don’t, because you never listened. Mum did. And she knew a lot of things you didn’t.’ At this, his mouth began to quiver and bend. ‘I wish she was here. I wish she was here and not you.’

  Richard’s face fell, and Josh stumbled back up the deck. Halfway up he slipped in a puddle and fell. Richard held out a hand but Josh, with his head turned, got to his feet and continued on his way more slowly.

  Richard fell into the seat behind him, hands on his knees, and for a while nobody spoke but the weather.

  Eventually I got to my feet, my head Catherine-wheeling with the rush of blood. I could feel nothing beneath my left knee but a dull and painless throb.

  ‘The storm’s almost on us,’ I said. My voice was brittle and high. ‘We need to decide what we’re doing.’

  Richard’s eyes were glazed and trained on the deck.

  I turned to Ed. ‘Ed, are you sure that we are where we are?’

  He took a breath and nodded. ‘I’m sure.’

  ‘How sure?’

  ‘I promise you. We need to adjust our heading north: 263.’

  Richard said nothing. I looked over the chart, then turned to the rest of them.

  ‘I believe my husband. We need to head further north. Does anyone object?’

  There was silence, then Maggie spoke. ‘What about water?’

  ‘We have some. We can ration it.’

  ‘It won’t last. How many more days do we have? Seven? Ten? We’re still closer to the Azores than we are to America. We could go back.’

  Colin lapped at a puddle on the deck behind her. I was about to speak, but Ed suddenly jumped forward and grabbed the set of plastic brandy cups from beneath the seat, setting them out on the table. They began to fill with rain. ‘We’re about to head into a storm. If we’re lucky then we can catch some water along the way. We still have bottles, buckets, basins. Josh?’

  Josh turned, wiping an eye.

  ‘Do you think you and Dani can be in charge of that?’

  Josh glanced at Dani. They both nodded.

  ‘Good. I’m sorry that you’re involved in this, all of you, and if we still had the Elma then I’d suggest we split up and go our separate ways, but unfortunately we only have one boat.’ He turned to Maggie. ‘And we need to find our children. Do you understand?’

  Having had his fill of rainwater, Colin hopped onto Maggie’s shoulder, curling into the crook of her neck. She reached up to stroke him, then nodded at Ed. ‘OK. All right, Ed.’

  ‘Then it’s settled?’ I said.

  Everybody nodded. So that was that; we would head further north.

  And it was then, almost immediately, that things went south.

  ‘Are you all right?’ Ed said to me as we cleared the deck. ‘You look green, and your limp’s getting worse.’

  ‘I’m fine. Just tired, and I feel sick after swallowing that water.’

  ‘You should get some rest.’

  ‘You know I can’t.’

  He nodded and went to untie the jib.

  ‘Ed?’

  He turned. ‘Yeah?’

  I nodded at Dani and Josh, who were busy securing bottles and cups to the guard rails. Dani had lashed an empty water canister to the deck and placed a funnel in its spout. ‘Good shout on the water.’

  He was about to speak when a flash lit the sky, followed by a deafening crack. We cowered instinctively, then straightened as the thunder rolled east.

  ‘We’d better get these sails up,’ said Richard, crouching over a winch; it was the first thing he had said since Josh’s bruising words, ‘before the wind picks up.’

  As if in retort, a terrific gust of wind tore across the deck, rendering the next few seconds into a blur of disasters.

  ‘No!’ said Josh, as a bottle was whisked from his grip. The boom swung starboard, knocking Carmela off her feet, and the rope Richard had been securing whizzed through his palm. It snagged, something snapped, then whipped clean away into the wind. Richard howled and stood, gripping his wrist and holding up his hand, from which two fingers had been torn clean away. Blood streamed down from the broken stubs as he staggered back. The boat’s pitch was sending him dangerously towards the guard rail.

  ‘Christ,’ said Ed, scrabbling to steady him. ‘Get him below deck.’

  Richard screamed again, staring at the space where his fingers had been, and Maggie, wincing and holding her shoulder, left the helm and hobbled to his aid, dragging him to the hatch just as the wind hurled another gust. The free boom swung like a madman’s axe over our heads. Carmela, stunned, was just getting to her feet, but I managed to leap across and flatten her before she was hit again.

  ‘Beth,’ said Ed above the now howling wind. ‘The helm!’

  The wheel was loose. Leaving Carmela on the deck, I fell down into the cockpit and braced myself against it. The compass was spinning like crazy – 320, then 200, 220 … 263, that’s what Ed had said. I steadied the wheel, trying to find the magic number, but with every wave we were tossed another ten degrees from it. Ed was struggling to secure the boom, the mainsail’s halyard now flying in the wind, whipping back and forth from stern to bow.

  ‘We need that rope!’ yelled Ed, looking wildly about for help as he braced himself against the cabin wall. Dani was flat against the deck, but Josh was already inching out across the guard rail. The rope straightened, then curled and darted back. He made a grab for it but missed, almost sending himself over the side.

  ‘Josh!’ called Dani. ‘Get back!’

  He turned. ‘I need your help.’

  She looked back, terrified, but then a fierceness gripped her and she slithered across. The deck was now awash with rain and seawater, and she slipped the last few feet, landing in a heap by his legs. He helped her to her feet.

  ‘Just hold on to me, OK?’ he said.

  She nodded and wrapped her arms around his waist, pinning him to the mainstay. The boat tossed and turned and the wind tugged at the wayward rope, keeping it just out of reach. Then, as if tiring of the game, it threw it back towards the bow. Josh leaped, catching the rope in one hand and pulling it back in. He handed it to Ed, who grinned and slapped his shoulder.

  I blew out my held breath and returned to the compass. We had already been shifted by twenty degrees, but slowly I inched it back to the magic 263.

  The measure of my trust in Ed: 263. If he was right, it would take us to our children.

  The boom was finally secure and the boat’s pitch softened. Ed, Josh and Dani began to unfurl the great mainsail while Carmela, still stunned and holding her head, made for the hatch, from which we could all hear Richard’s cries of pain.

  The compass had steadied, along with my breathing and pulse. Things began to settle. A shot of sunlight streamed through a gap in the cloud, and we bobbed for a few moments in this window of peace.

  But the window closed as quickly as it had opened. The sunlight winked out like a light, swallowed by cloud, and another crack of thunder shattered the air. Fresh wind slammed into us with a torrent of rain that sent Ed, Josh and Dani sprawling on the slick deck. The boat tossed and groaned, the compass spun, and from somewhere above came a terrible snap. There was a flash, and I looked up to see that a stay had broken from its tether and was now as loose as the rope had been, swinging wildly about the deck.

  It whiplashed across the foredeck and back to the stern, and I ducked just in time to miss the heavy steel hook rocketing overhead. It was intact at least.

  The sea had renewed its raucous swill and the wind played along, provoking the waves to toss the boat like a cat with a mouse. But the Buccaneer’s keel was long, I remembered Richard saying, and wouldn’t be pushed around so easily. It seemed to dig hard, gripping the water with unseen claws.

  The cable was still loose. It had passed me by and was now heading for Ed, Josh and Dani.

  ‘Get down!’ I screamed as it whistled towards them.

  Ed was almost on his feet, but Dani yanked him down. With every swing of the boa
t the cable built momentum, until it was zigzagging across the deck with no discernible pattern. There was no way to predict where it would end up next.

  The wind roared. Ed shouted something. I wiped the water from my eyes and saw him point below deck.

  ‘Not safe,’ he mouthed. ‘Not safe.’

  The three of them shimmied towards the hatch. I looked at the compass – 190 now. Knowing it was useless – the next bit wave would throw us off course – I eased our heading back to 263 and I followed them, tumbling down into the cabin and shutting the hatch behind me.

  The cabin was hot and wet, full of a dozen different stinks and bodies gasping for breath. Richard was groaning, his face creased with pain as Carmela tried to stop his recently de-fingered hand from bleeding out. She was bleeding too from the fresh welt the beam had delivered to her head. Maggie was next to her, clutching her shoulder, eyes shut tight.

  It was growing dark outside. The roar of rain on the cabin roof was deafening.

  Ed peered through the window. ‘We have to secure that cable. If we can’t raise the sail then we’ve no chance of negotiating the storm.’

  It whizzed past the glass. Ed ducked, and there was a crack as it hit something; the mast, I thought.

  ‘It’s going to break something,’ I said. ‘We’ll be stranded. We’ll drift.’

  Ed turned from the window. ‘I’m going out there.’

  ‘Don’t be a bloody fool.’ Richard grimaced, face streaming with sweat. Carmela was tying off a bandage. ‘There’s no way you can catch a loose cable, and even if you did, it would maim you or knock you clean over the side.’

  ‘I have to try.’

  ‘The only thing we can do is wait it out and hope it doesn’t do too much damage before the storm passes.’

  I looked out at the dark, flashing sky. ‘That’s not happening any time soon.’

  Ed and I shared a look.

  ‘I’m going out,’ he said, making for the hatch.

  I followed.

  ‘I’m coming t—’

  Suddenly I was on the floor. My nose was flat against the wood.

  Ed and Dani pulled me up, and all at once I was back on the seat. The side of my face stung.

  ‘What happened?’ I said.

  ‘You passed out,’ said Ed.

  My vision pitched and swam like the boat.

  ‘You don’t look well,’ said Dani, putting a hand to my forehead. ‘You’re burning up too.’ She wrinkled her nose. ‘And what’s that smell?’

  ‘Christ, not you as well.’ My words slurred. ‘I haven’t had a bath for a while, all right?’

  ‘No, it’s not that. It’s something else.’

  I looked up at Ed.

  ‘Ed?’

  ‘Stay here.’

  He turned and clambered up the ladder. Screams of wind and rain burst in as he opened the hatch, cut short as it slammed behind him. Richard shook his head at the space where he had been. ‘Bloody fool.’

  Finding some balance, I got up and made for the seat opposite. Through the window I watched the hunched figure of my husband stagger into the wind. The cable flashed as it passed him and he swiped at the air, slipped and fell. My fingernails bit into the window’s rubber seal, and for a few moments he stayed where he had fallen. The cable passed twice, goading him to try again. Steadily, he pulled himself up. He swung twice, ducked, and on the cable’s third pass the hook struck his head with a sickening crack that I could feel through the hull.

  ‘Ed!’

  His face whipped round as if he was an extra in some Hollywood brawl, but rather than stagger back and fall, he retained his footing and clutched the side of his head. Inspecting his hand, he sank to his knees and crawled back to the hatch.

  ‘Are you all right?’ I said, pushing back from the window and standing shakily on the tilting cabin floor. The hatch vanquished another scream of wind and rain and Ed slid clumsily down the rungs, holding his ear. He was pale-faced, drenched and panting. A dark trickle of blood ran through on his fingers.

  ‘It’s OK,’ he said. ‘But Richard’s right –’ he dropped his gaze ‘– there’s no way I can catch that thing.’

  ‘But we have to,’ I said. ‘We have to or—’

  There was a crash. One of the windows shattered. Dani screamed as glass showered the cabin floor and the cable’s hook darted, tongue-like, in and out of the hole it had made. We all fell against the opposite wall. Rain poured in through the gaping wound, drenching the seats and making an instant river of the floor.

  ‘We have to stop it!’ I screamed, getting to my feet.

  ‘Beth, no!’

  It didn’t feel like I was walking. It felt more like the boat was ushering me with its sway towards the ladder, but that was OK because it was where I wanted to go. I had pushed past him, put my foot on the first rung – my left, and with the pressure came the nauseous yet pain-free swell of bile in my throat. It was as if my foot and gut had bypassed the usual chain of command and were talking to each other on a direct line. I was no longer in the equation. I pushed harder and saw only the black outline of the rung before me. My vision fizzed. Gravity released me for a second. It really did feel as if I could float away into nothingness, and that scratchy cartoon loop of me melting like butter played up again, only this time the butter was burned and bubbling, and more images joined it too, each with that same rubbery, black-and-white style: Ed strolling down a street on bouncing legs with his thumbs in his lapels, whistling through overgrown blood-soaked lips; Alice reaching for a heart-shaped balloon floating just out of reach, like that graffiti by the artist who nobody knows, except this was a real heart, fresh and pumping and torn from a chest, dripping down its cord; Arthur, grown into a boy, skinny, in rags and sitting in a dark corner, munching feverishly on a bone, his teeth making a click-clack, click-clack, click-clack noise with every bite; and a dead bird on the ground, neck broken, crosses for eyes, maggots crawling from its backside, but still whistling. Somehow still whistling. A terrible tune.

  I felt hands on me, heard a voice – my own – screaming ‘No!’ Then felt the thud of a plastic seat on my back. Thunder roared like laughing gods. The sky flickered and flashed and for a second I saw the whole horizon lit up. The clouds were right upon us, unearthly, thick and billowing like smoke from an enormous forest fire.

  I felt a sudden calm, though the cabin was still filled with screams and voices and I couldn’t move because of the limbs holding me down. My cartoon loop fell away and I stared into those clouds and I swear I saw a face in them. It was a woman’s face, impassive and beautiful, wordlessly asking me to stop.

  Give up, she seemed to say. Give in. There’s no hope here, so stop searching for it.

  As I stared at it, an enormous crack of thunder shook the boat and the door to the front berth burst open. There stood Bryce, legs apart, grim-faced and paler than ever.

  ‘Tell me what I have to do.’

  Nobody spoke. He glared around the room, eyes popping from their sockets.

  ‘Well?’

  ‘There’s a cable,’ I said. ‘Loose, outside. If we can’t secure it then we’re done for.’

  Bryce looked at the broken window and took a long, shuddering breath.

  ‘Right,’ he said, and stepped into the cabin.

  ‘Bryce, stop,’ said Richard, struggling up from where he had fallen.

  Bryce looked down at him. ‘What is it, Dick?’

  ‘There’s no way you can catch that thing. If it hits you it could kill you. Ed just tried, look at him.’

  ‘Richard’s right,’ said Ed. ‘It’s faster and heavier than you imagine. Even for you, Bryce.’

  Bryce looked at Ed, narrowing his eyes. ‘Got a wee clip, did you?’

  Carmela stood up and walked steadily to Bryce.

  She said nothing, just looked at him eye to eye. She wasn’t there to stop him. Instead she reached into the galley and pulled out a large pot, which she presented to him. He took it by the handle and looked it over.
/>
  ‘Good idea, pigeon,’ he said with a devilish grin. Then he turned to the shelves above and found a long, thick screwdriver and a mallet. Laying the pot on its side, he drove the screwdriver into the metal, roaring with every blow, until he had made two holes side-by-side.

  Inspecting his work, he tossed the tools to one side and placed the pot over his head. Two bright eyes peered out through the jagged holes.

  ‘There. Job done.’

  Carmela smiled with pride as he marched to the ladder. At the first rung, he stopped and looked down at the cupboard to his right. With another roar, he tore its door from its hinges and held it by the handle like a shield. Then, grabbing a boat hook from the bucket on the floor, he climbed outside.

  I don’t know exactly how he did it. By the time he was outside I was fading again. The cartoon loop had returned – my burned melting butter routine now joined seamlessly by Ed’s jaunty whistle, Alice’s grab for the beating heart and Arthur’s bone-gnawing in the corner – and everything else stuttered in and out of focus, making no sense.

  I heard thumps, clangs and crashes outside, punctuated by Bryce’s gruff yells as the cable lashed at him. I heard the others’ calls of encouragement, saw them cower and eesh at every failure and then, at some point, raise their hands and cry for joy. At this I remember seeing Bryce’s silhouette against the lightning-bright sky, cable in one hand and guard rail in the other as wind and rain lashed the wildly rocking deck, but I couldn’t have done. I could barely see my own fingers in front of me by that time. Could barely feel my own bones, think my own thoughts, feel my own feelings.

  And when he was inside again, and the cabin seemed to be at the end of a long corridor, full of figures moving, voices chattering, shoulders being slapped. And then all faces turning to me. Ed’s voice above the others, his face a million miles away.

  ‘Beth? Beth, wake up. Christ …’

  Chapter 26

  Drifting away. Into the void.

  Again.

  Why?

  Why now, when I need so much to be awake? When I need so much to be up and moving about, getting things done. Getting to my children.