First Light

by Kody Boye

  “Yeah.”

  “E.J., E.J....” She paused. “Hey! Wait a minute! The notes, the initials, the impeccable jawline. You’re Echo James—the R&B singer from London!”

  “Yeah,” E.J. chuckled. “That’s me.

  “No shit. Me and the girls went to have a drink at the pub one night when we were in London and we’d just missed you.”

  “On account of food poisoning,” Rose mumbled.

  “Fuck you, you fuckin’ slag!”

  “Fuck you! You’re the one who ate those chicken wings!”

  “What? I was hungry!”

  “You could’ve eaten when we went to that place earlier!”

  “But I don’t like Vietnamese!”

  “That’s your own fault then!”

  Amidst the laughter—prompted mostly by Lyra’s outlandish actions, but also by the aura of normalcy in the air—E.J.’s eyes settled on Lyra. “What about you?” he asked. “You graduated from beauty school. What happened next?”

  “I became a receptionist,” she grumbled. “If that answers your question.”

  “It does,” E.J. smiled, idly chomping down on a chip. “You know... if you don’t mind me saying... I think you’re kinda cute.”

  Lyra’s cheeks turned red. “If you’ll excuse me,” Lyra said, rising with her plate and disappearing out the door.

  “She’ll come around,” Rose said. “Don’t worry. She’s just not used to anyone other than me giving her shit.”

  “Oh, she’ll learn,” E.J. said with a wink, taking a loud bite out of a chip. “Don’t you worry.”

  “I heard that!” Lyra called out.

  E.J. lowered his head to mask his chuckle.

  They sat at the stern and watched the sunset as E.J. sang and manned the helm.

  “He’s got a pretty voice,” Rose said, leaning back and pressing a cigarette to her lips.

  “Yeah,” Lyra said, seemingly unamused at her attempts to pry. She turned her eyes away from the sunset and glanced in her direction, her gaze briefly straying to the cigarette Rose was smoking. “Who said you could have one of those?”

  “Me. When I kept him busy so he wouldn’t follow you out of the room.”

  “Fuckin’ hell.”

  “Gimme your damn lighter.”

  The Zippo was exchanged and a flame was sparked, promptly followed by a sweet inhale and glorious exhale. “I hope you’re starting to wean yourself off of ‘em,” Rose said.

  “Why do you think I’ve been in such a foul mood?”

  “PMS.”

  “Fuck you, whore.”

  Giggling, Rose nudged her elbow into her friend’s side and took another drag before passing the smoke to Lyra.

  “There’s nothing wrong with a little attention,” Rose said, when Lyra made no further comment.

  “I’m trying to keep my wits, Rose.”

  “That doesn’t mean—”

  Her friend’s sharp look silenced her.

  Ok, Rose thought, giving Lyra a short nod before drawing her knees to her chest. I’ll drop it, then.

  She waited for what seemed like the most opportune time to speak—counting the passing of minutes, of seconds. The palpitations against her ribs swelled in tune with the waves, and with them came a low, dull force predicted only by caution.

  She’d obviously struck a nerve, though which, she couldn’t be sure. She’d merely considered her approach humorous, nothing more.

  Lyra took another puff off the cigarette. “Sorry,” she said, then coughed, smoke pooling from both her mouth and nose.

  Rose accepted the smoke without so much as a nod. She considered its insignificant length before inhaling. “Are you sure everything’s all right?” she asked.

  “I… I just don’t think it’s a good idea to get involved with anyone—not now, not with everything that’s going on.”

  “Don’t you think it would help, though?”

  “For what? Me to have to worry about someone other than myself? Other than you?”

  Unsure what to say, Rose lowered her eyes.

  “Look,” Lyra said. “I’m not saying it’s a bad idea—because really, it isn’t. I quite fancy the idea of finding a boyfriend someday, having kids… or, now that I’m thinking about it, maybe a dog. But right now? I barely know him. There’s no point in investing in someone who might turn out to be something completely different.”

  “I know.”

  “Besides—call me a wanker for saying it, but I love you, Rose. You’re my best friend. We’ve stuck it out through thick and thin. You’re the whole reason I’m alive.”

  “And you me,” Rose replied.

  Lyra smirked and shrugged an arm around Rose’s shoulder.

  Bumping their heads together, she tilted her head to the side and whispered, “You think he’s got a big one?”

  Rose snorted. “Lyra!”

  She chuckled and plucked the smoke from Rose’s mouth. “What?” she asked, glancing up at the helm. “He keeps singing like that, who knows what’ll happen.”

  Rose couldn’t help it.

  She howled.

  “Lyra,” Rose said, narrowing her eyes while adjusting her hold on the supplies she’d salvaged from the bathroom. “Is something wrong?”

  “No,” Lyra replied. “Why?”

  “You seem a little… off.”

  “Whatcha mean?”

  “What I mean is… you’re not being snoopy as hell.”

  “Maybe I’ve turned over a new leaf,” Lyra shrugged. “And fuck you!”

  “Fuck you back,” Rose laughed, brushing past Lyra and into the bedroom. She paused at the doorway and started to reach for the doorknob, but faltered before her fingers could wrap around it. “Lyra?”

  “Yeah?”

  “Has E.J. ever mentioned where we’re going?”

  “I don’t talk to the man. Why?”

  “Well… I just thought… it’s been almost a week, and we haven’t really discussed where we’re—”

  “I think we’re coasting, Rose.”

  “Coasting?”

  Lyra nodded. “Coasting,” she said. “Waiting to see what’ll happen and when it’ll happen.”

  “But that doesn’t make any sense.”

  “Why?”

  Because there’s no point in wasting gas if we’re just waiting for fate.

  Part of their ignorance was their fault. In the days since they’d united, not once had she questioned E.J. about their plans--what they were doing, or what they would do in the next few weeks. Fuel was limited, as was food. E.J. fished with line and a hook he’d found in a tacklebox hidden away in a storage closet, but he didn’t catch enough to feed everyone.

  The implications were tremendous.

  How could she have let this happen?

  She pressed her hand to the doorknob with what felt like the weight of the world upon her, and struggled to keep from trembling in her friend’s presence. Her bones were heavy, her joints sore, the cartilage made of wisps and tatters. But what of her mind? Was it really that weak?

  “I’m going to talk to him,” Rose said, after several moments of silence and indecision.

  “About what?” Lyra asked.

  “What we’re doing. Where we’re going.”

  And what, she didn’t say, was going to happen.

  They sat atop the helm come time for sunset. In near perfect formation—with E.J. at the helm, Rose in the passenger seat and Lyra behind her—they waited for the conversation that had yet to come. Ever the arbiter of personal salvation, Rose waited for inspiration to strike, though dreaded the knowledge that she was being mercilessly scrutinized.

  They’re waiting, the voice inside her head said. You’re waiting.

  She knew—unbearably, to the point where her apprehension was comparable to the girl waiting for the spider to climb onto her leg. Lying in bed, the covers pulled up to her chin and tucked under feet—the spider would not find her here. No. She was safe. It would not come this far. It would skitter of
f eventually and be done with her, but for the time being, it had simply wandered away—to the shadowed corners of the room, or through the crack in the door.

  That sort of logic would have normally proven to be foolproof, as it at least allowed some aspect of denial, but not here. There existed within the minds of all people a fallacy, which, when pressed into panic, was revealed like cracks across a pane of glass.

  Raising her eyes, Rose centered them on the man helming their boat. “We need to talk about where we’re going,” she said.

  “My main goal has been to keep us away from Ireland,” E.J. said, inclining his head to stare at a landmass that could no longer be seen. “It was an honest mistake to seek out the government for help, but after the no-tolerance quarantine, it… wasn’t worth it.” He sighed and pressed a hand to his brow. “I was afraid that the ships along the coast would start patrolling the borders and gun down anyone in their waters.”

  “Which is why you didn’t circle,” Rose said matter-of-factly, to which E.J. responded with a nod. “Ok. But what does that mean for us?”

  “It means I haven’t come up with a better plan.”

  A thunderclap struck. This time, even Rose had trouble mustering up the nerve to speak.

  If he doesn’t know what to do, she thought, and he’s the one who can drive the boat, then what does that mean for—

  “What about a map?” Lyra asked. “Doesn’t that thing have GPS?”

  “Yes,” E.J. said, “but I haven’t trusted it since it started saying I was heading north three days ago.”

  “North?”

  “You mean the satellites are screwed up?” Rose asked.

  “Or offline,” E.J. offered.

  “How can that be?” Lyra asked. “It’s only been a few days.”

  “Terrorists, maybe? Electrical malfunctions? Who knows? Either way, it doesn’t matter.”

  “What about an island?”

  “Even if we found an island, it doesn’t mean we’d be able to live on it.”

  Rose glanced back at E.J. “Ok,” she said. “What else we got?”

  “Africa,” E.J. said. “If the current takes us there.”

  “If?” Lyra asked.

  “Africa?” Rose added, swallowing the ever-growing lump in her throat.

  Unable to restrain the grunt of frustration that poured from her chest, Rose pressed herself back into her seat, only vaguely glancing at Lyra before looking out at the ocean.

  “So,” Lyra said. “That’s it. We don’t know where we are. We’re drifting.”

  “We’re not drifting yet,” E.J. replied. “It’s just—”

  “What? You don’t know where we are. We already get that.”

  “I didn’t—”

  “We’re stuck. On a boat. In. The. Middle. Of. Fucking nowhere!” Lyra shrieked. “And you don’t know what the fuck you’re doing!”

  “I don’t know what I’m doing because I don’t know what to do!” E.J. cried. “I start going in a random direction and who knows where we’ll end up? Maybe nowhere, if our luck’s as shitty as it’s been.”

  “Shitty? That’s only the half of it!”

  “Calm down, Lyra,” Rose said.

  “Don’t you tell me to calm down! I’ve been calm enough! Sitting in our room, waiting for whatever’s going to happen to happen. And you think I haven’t been calm?”

  “Freaking out isn’t going to solve anything.”

  “I didn’t ask for your opinion,” Lyra snapped. “What I want to know is whether or not we’re fucked.”

  “We can do two things,” E.J. said. “We can turn the boat off now and let whatever’s going to happen happen, or we can pick a direction and go.”

  “But we have no idea where we are,” Rose said.

  E.J. shook his head.

  Rising, Rose shrugged past Lyra—who had launched herself from her seat in the fit of her tirade—and wrapped her fingers around the railing encompassing the helm. As she’d done before, she hopelessly wandered the ever-extending ocean with her eyes.

  She kept expecting there to rise a land in the great and undetermined beyond—for Africa, possibly, or a desert island to appear. But if she was to believe what E.J. was saying—that he did not know where they were or where they could be going—then she knew that there was nothing they could do.

  Adrift upon the sea, they would wait until they crashed into eternity—unless, she felt, it consumed them first.

  “I guess that’s it, then,” Rose said. “Nothing we can do.”

  No one replied.

  Contrary to anything she could have predicted, she was the first to leave.

  She was the first to walk down those stairs.

  Lyra didn’t say anything when she returned a short while later. Always cautious in the midst of Rose’s moods, she merely peeked in, as if to gauge the situation, then deposited herself in one of the armchairs without a word.

  Even without E.J.’s presence, Rose could feel the tension brewing in the air.

  Thick, she thought. Like a knife—

  She brought her fist up, then down.

  —cutting right through it.

  Lyra shifted, causing a plank to creak.

  “Sorry,” her friend said. “Didn’t mean to wake you.”

  “You didn’t,” Rose said, though knew it sounded like an unconvincing lie.

  Knowing that there was no way she would be able to get any true rest, Rose pushed herself upright and brushed her hair out of her eyes, centering her attention on her fiend. “Lyra,” she said. “Can I ask you a question?”

  “I dunno,” Lyra said. “Can you?”

  “Am I the only one who feels like we’re getting dicked around?”

  “Not sure how you mean.”

  “I mean… he said he was trying to get us away from Ireland because of the quarantine policies, but… before they started shooting, they said we could seek asylum at medical checkpoints at designated ports.”

  “Yeah.”

  “So if that’s the case, why didn’t he take us there?”

  “Because of the guns. The people. The zombies.” Lyra shrugged. “Beats me. We were scared. You and I both know people do stupid things in hellish situations.”

  “I know, but—” She sighed, unsure how to proceed. “It’s just… I—”

  “I think you’re thinking about this way too much,” Lyra said, crossing the room and settling down at Rose’s side. Her hand, always close but so far away, tentatively fell across Rose’s wrist. “We have to realize, Rose, that E.J.’s the reason we’re alive. I sure as hell don’t trust him yet, but I do know we’d have been screwed if he hadn’t shown up.”

  “I know.”

  Lyra forced a smile. “Listen,” she said. “I’m sorry I freaked out earlier. I know coming from me it must’ve been a real commotion—”

  “It was.”

  “—and I know it probably didn’t help your case, but if it means anything at all, I do mean it.”

  “I know you do,” Rose sighed, falling into Lyra’s embrace. “You were just scared. We all are.”

  “We’ve all been,” Lyra whispered.

  She tightened her grip on Rose’s back.

  Those three words, no matter how insignificant, haunted her.

  “Looks like we’ve got ourselves a big one,” E.J. said as Rose came up onto the deck, the muscles on his naked arms and torso flexing as he fought to maintain hold on his line. “We’ll be eating great tonight.”

  “You really think the three of us will be able to eat a whole fish?”

  “Only if we’re hungry enough,” the man replied.

  Rose watched in silence as E.J. continued his life-or-death struggle with the fish. Teeth bared, sweat trickling down his forehead, he spaced his feet apart and took a few steps back, carefully wrapping the line about his wrists. At first, Rose wasn’t sure how he managed to bear such pressure. Then she saw he was wearing gloves, and discounted everything about it.

  I know it ain’t
much, he’d said the day she’d pulled him onto the deck, but I can fish.

  She’d completely forgotten.

  “You need any help?” Rose asked, as she realized she was doing little more than standing around.

  “No. I… wait! Wait! The net!”

  “What net?”

  “The one over there! On the hooks on the wall!” He jutted his chin in the direction Rose had just come from and grimaced as the line tightened. “Hurry! I’m gonna pull it in!”

  “How are you—”

  A splash cut her off mid-sentence.

  E.J. grunted.

  He stepped back.

  His abdomen heaved as he hurled himself backward.

  He hit the deck, but the fish came with, soaring majestically like a bird retarded in its growth. It flailed once, then twice before slamming into the deck.

  Rose grabbed the net and slapped the mesh down around its body. “What the hell is that thing?” she asked.

  “A cod,” E.J. replied, brushing himself off as he stood. “Thanks for the help, Rose.”

  “I actually didn’t come up to help you fish,” she said.

  The humor in his face vanished in an instant. His grey eyes, usually calm and mellow, darkened to steel. “Ok,” he said.

  “It’s about what you said,” Rose continued. “About you having no idea where to go.”

  “I don’t.”

  “I need to know how sure you are about this.”

  “My educated guess is, we’re fucked.”

  The blow hit harder than expected. Maybe it was because she’d spent so much time conjuring this illicit fantasy that E.J. had overreacted, or maybe it was that his words were final and nothing could change them. Either way, it didn’t matter—she still felt the same: gutted, torn, ripped apart by hordes of teeth.

  “If it means anything,” E.J. said as he stepped up to take take control of the net, “I didn’t mean to get us into this situation. I wanted to go around—circle the coast and try and dock at another port. But I…”

  “What?”

  “Got scared, Rose. Not just for me, but for you guys.”

  She glanced up at him. “What’d you just say?”

  “It’d be one thing if I’d been alone and been gunned down, but the two of you? Especially after you risked your lives to save me? I couldn’t risk it. I wouldn’t risk it.” E.J. shook his head, his shoulders trembling and glistening in the midafternoon heat. “I wanted to give the three of us a chance. Now I might’ve fucked us by doing that.”