by D. G. Driver
The feeling of instant relief washed over me as soon as I was free of the trees. I stood facing the water and waited for another blast from the foghorn. It took a couple minutes, but finally I heard it. I couldn’t tell for sure, but I thought it sounded a little closer than last time.
Finding this shore again would be hard without the yellow kayak, so I grabbed my soggy sweatpants and threw them up on the beach above the water line before wading into the water and pulling the kayak free of the rocks. My sweats were gray and would be hard to distinguish from a rock at a distance, but it was the only thing I could think of to use.
Keeping the kayak in as shallow water as possible, I tried to step into it. This was not easy to do, as I’d never been in a kayak before. It tipped on me six times until I finally figured out how to balance just right to be able to get inside. My legs stretched out flat in front of me, and my bottom settled in the seat. The oar had been stuffed inside the craft, so I pulled it out and did some practice tries at rowing with it.
Rowing with one oar that had two paddles was very different than rowing with two separate oars, and the kayak was so light and agile. The change gave me the illusion of being much stronger than I had felt all day. Confidence building in me, I set off in search of the boat with the foghorn. I knew it was out there somewhere, so I kept my head focused, listening for it to blast again.
Minutes passed, and I didn’t hear a thing. This worried me. Maybe they had given up and were headed back the other way. Was I rowing into oblivion again?
“Uncle Robert,” I tried once more. “Thanks for finding Alex’s kayak for me. I appreciate it. Just in time. If you’re rowing that little boat of ours back to the island, could you slow down a touch, so I can catch up? I’ll follow you, okay?”
I closed my eyes for a second. Just a second, I swear. And I rubbed them with the back of my left wrist. When I opened my eyes, dead ahead of me was a dark shape floating on the water.
No, I thought. It couldn’t be!
I rowed toward it. Sure enough, it was my rowboat, dragging in the lake because it was filled with water. It would sink soon enough, I knew. But somehow it had stayed afloat long enough for me to find it.
“Uncle Robert, you old devil,” I whispered. “I owe you one.”
12
Strange and Wonderful Happenings
A few short strokes had me right next to the slowly sinking rowboat. I could have passed it right by, but I hesitated to do that. Moonlight reflected on the black water inside the boat, giving the interior this pale blue cast in the middle of the inky water surrounding it. It was both eerie and beautiful at the same time.
I stopped rowing and sat there in the kayak bobbing alongside the rowboat. For some reason, I couldn’t take my eyes off of it. Splashes of water smacked at the left side of my kayak but not the right. The front tip of my kayak kept veering to the right as though that was where the current wanted to push it. Repeatedly, I had to dip my oars into the water to stay on the same path as the rowboat. Sinking or not, the rowboat should have been having the same trouble with the current. It should have been pointing a different direction. It should not be able to go straight ahead like it was.
It was almost as if the rowboat were being steered against the current.
I knew what I was seeing was impossible and inexplicable. Every ounce of logic in me fought what my eyes saw as real. Because it made so little sense, I felt compelled to follow the rowboat. All the doubts I had about the ghost of Robert Garrison began to flutter away with the cool night breeze. For the first time that night, I toyed with the concept that the ghost story had some truth to it.
The darkness prevented me from seeing the time on my watch, but I guessed it was well after ten. Maybe it was nearing midnight. I hadn’t heard the foghorn in several minutes. I thought I would have been to that boat by now. Had they given up looking and gone back to the other side of the island? Whoever was on that boat was supposed to rescue me from this never-ending body of water. Was yet another plan of mine going to be a bust?
A new wave of exhaustion washed over me as I sat in the kayak not moving much. I felt so trapped and so far from where I wanted to be. When would this night ever end?
I wanted to row on ahead, just to be moving somewhere. It was like that thing my dad did when there was a bad traffic jam on the freeway. He’d get off at the nearest exit and try to go side streets. It didn’t matter if there were traffic lights or it would take twice as long as staying on the freeway in the first place. He liked to feel as though he was making some kind of progress. There were a few times my dad had gotten us pretty turned around, especially up in Los Angeles, where the streets didn’t always go straight or parallel to the freeway. We got really lost one time.
I remembered that, being lost in South Central after leaving a Lakers game at the Staples Center. It was scary, not knowing where we were, with so many homeless people on the corners and driving down streets lined with rundown liquor shops and adult video stores. My dad broke into a sweat that day and cursed at every red light. It took a while, but we finally made it back to a street he recognized. We joked about it a lot the rest of the way home, but I think my dad had been pretty anxious that day that we were going to get carjacked or something. I’d never seen him tense like that before or since.
At the moment, I had a hard time thinking I would ever find myself laughing about how lost I was on this massive lake. My best bet right then was to stay with the rowboat and hope that Uncle Robert really was leading me back to the island. Then, as I stared at the rowboat, it adjusted its direction the tiniest bit to the left, even more against the current. I saw a faint splash in the water to the side of the boat. A beat later I saw it again. Then again. Fascinated, I listened hard and heard an alternating splash on the far side of the boat. It sounded just like the oars had when I was using them to paddle the boat.
I blinked, and a form appeared inside the boat. It was faint, and I could see right through it. Although it wasn’t any more solid than a puff of smoke, it grew and stretched until it became the figure of a boy about the same age as me. He had shaggy hair and wore a plain T-shirt with jeans. The ghost of Robert Garrison had his back to me as he rowed, not terribly bothered by all the water filling his boat.
It took me a couple strokes of my own oars to get slightly ahead of him. I looked back at him over my shoulder, amazed to see him smiling. His face struck me with its familiarity. The shape of his eyes, nose, and chin were just like my mom’s. If his hair had been shorter, he would have looked just like me. Funny that his hair was longer than mine. Robert must have noticed the similarities too, because he touched his cheek as he studied my face. I did the same thing. Then he ran his hand through his hair and seemed to laugh. I guess he thought the hair thing was funny too. Could he tell I was a girl? Did he know somehow? I’m sure I looked anything but feminine at the moment.
He waved at me and appeared to say something, but I couldn’t hear him. I waved back. I didn’t speak to him like I had earlier when I thought he wasn’t real, because my throat was so dry with fear. Not even a whisper would escape me. I closed my eyes and thought as hard as I could.
Please. For Grandma. For my mom. Your mom and your sister. If you love them. If you remember them. Please, lead me the right way.
A distant steaming whistle forced me to open my eyes and crane my head the opposite direction. Straight ahead, a bright red flare arced in the sky. I smiled as much as I could with my cracked, chapped lips. The island was directly in front of me. Residual light from the flare revealed the outline of the trees and the width of the shoreline. In a few minutes I’d be safe.
I turned back to the boat, and it was empty once again. If Robert was still there, I couldn’t see him. Cautiously, I reached out a hand and held the edge of the rowboat for a moment, so thankful for my uncle’s help. For the briefest second, I thought I felt his hand press on top of mine.
Then I grabbed my oar and pushed ahead toward shore. I was just about to
land when, out of the corner of my eye, I saw lights coming toward me from the water. They were pretty far off still, but they were there. A blare of that same foghorn I’d been hearing made me certain that whoever was on it had seen me. I looked up at the stars in a huge effort to stop the tears forming under my eyes from falling.
Instead of rowing to shore, where I’d have to hike through the woods to get to camp, I chose to stay in the kayak and row back out a little bit. I’d let whoever was in that houseboat heading toward me pick me up and sail me around. That would be a lot quicker and easier. I floated out on the water until the rowboat caught up with me. A few moments later, the houseboat had nudged up beside me too. A couple of middle-aged men reached out and helped me climb out of the kayak and up the ladder on the side of their boat. Once I was safely on board, they snatched up the kayak. The rowboat they left alone.
“You going to tie it on?” one of them asked the other.
“Nope,” the other answered. “Just let it drift. It looks like it’s finding its way.”
I couldn’t believe I’d just heard a grown man say that. Did they believe in the whole ghost story thing too? While a nice lady wrapped a thick fleece blanket around my shoulders, I stood and watched the rowboat bob in the water. Slowly, the back end began to dip farther into the lake as the water continued to seep into it.
“I think it might sink,” one of the men said.
“Maybe that’s just what it needs to do,” the other replied.
I stood there and watched until the boat dipped enough for the water around it to pour in from the sides. In only took seconds at that point for the boat to go completely under. A knot formed in my throat, and I had to work hard to keep my face from showing how upset I was. It was ridiculous to feel the way I did. I should hate the rowboat for all the trouble it caused me. Yet I felt sorry for it, like it was a pet drowning, and I couldn’t stop it. I felt guilty too, because that boat would still be behind Grandma’s garage if not for me. Wouldn’t it? Would she be heartbroken that her son’s boat was gone for good?
But then the weirdest thing happened. A fish jumped out of the water, doing this perfect little flip, right where the boat had sunk. At the same time, a shooting star slashed across the sky right above us. A feeling of peace took over, and the knot in my throat loosened. Somehow, I knew that my uncle was okay. That boat sinking was the best thing that could have happened for him. For some reason, I was certain he was all done haunting Center Hill Lake and headed to be with his dad, my grandpa, in some place much nicer than this.
“Come sit down,” said the nice lady who had stood next to me after putting the blanket over my shoulders. She put an arm around me and led me to a plastic deck chair. “Do you like coffee? It would warm you up a bit.”
The only coffee I liked was those cold mocha ones you get from the grocery store. They taste like chocolate milk, mostly. But a warm drink sounded good, and I didn’t figure these grown-ups were drinking hot cocoa.
“Yes, please,” I said through my chattering teeth. “Do you have cream and sugar? I’d like a lot of that, please.”
She smiled at me, although her eyes betrayed a lot of worry as they inspected all the bruises and scrapes on my face. I must have looked half-dead if the creases between her eyebrows told me anything. “One doctored-up coffee, absolutely,” she said with a false cheeriness.
I liked her. She had one of those more distinct Southern accents like you heard from the older country stars like Dolly Parton. That’s who she reminded me of, actually. Dolly Parton. Except that she was my mom’s age and had brown hair and was much more flat-chested. Not that I was looking. It’s just that she wasn’t like Dolly in that way.
While she got me something to drink, I looked around. There was another lady on the boat too, so I figured out that these people were two sets of parents. I wondered whose for a second before reminding myself I hardly knew any of the guys at the campout so it wouldn’t probably matter. The other lady smiled at me when I looked at her. She was the one steering the boat, so she didn’t come over.
“Glad we found you,” she said. “Looks like you were in some trouble.”
I nodded. “You could say that.”
One of the men sat down in a chair next to me while the other leaned against the railing, watching the spot where the rowboat sank and shaking his head. His hair was golden, parted and brushed neatly to the side, and he had pretty thick eyebrows over eyes that had lots of squinty wrinkles. They didn’t seem like laugh lines like my mom and dad had, more like the kind of lines you get when you’re always out in the sun without sunglasses. I wondered if he was a coach or had some kind of job like that where he worked outside. “Well, what do you know?” he said quietly. He picked up a beer, took a drink and then addressed me without looking at me. “Name’s Roger. This here is Bill.”
Bill reached across the distance between our chairs for me to shake his hand. He had a pleasant face, round with thinning brown hair. He was comfortable in a plaid flannel shirt with the sleeves rolled up to the elbows. Everyone else had light jackets on. “Nice to meet you.”
“I’m Dannie,” I said, trying to shake his hand as firmly as possible. I think I failed, because Bill took his hand back and laughed softly, his shoulders bobbing up and down a couple times. The men looked at each other and nodded like I had just answered some question they had.
“You missed the island, you know,” Roger said. “It’s back a ways.”
“I know. I’ve been there.”
“You have?” the lady with the coffee said. She was stirring it as she walked back to me. “Well then, what on earth are you doin’ out here then, honey?” She handed me the coffee, and I let the mug warm my hands. Cinnamon wafted up from the cup, letting me know she took the time to make sure the drink would delight my tongue. I thanked her for it with a nod and smile.
“Did they kick you out?” Roger asked.
“Kick me out? Why?”
Roger turned away from the view and looked me squarely in the eyes. “Because you didn’t belong there.”
Bill grabbed a beer out of a cooler next to him and clicked Roger’s glass.
“Boys, be nice,” the coffee lady said gently, like a little warning a mom says to kids who are about to get rowdy.
I didn’t want to defend myself to these grown-ups. I knew I was from out of town, but they didn’t need to be rude about it. If the boys in town said I could come to their campout, then that’s what mattered. Who cared what the dads thought?
“They invited me,” I told them plainly, “and they were fine with me being there. I left because I was looking for Alex. I don’t know his last name. We were rowing together this afternoon, and he went on ahead. But when I got to the island, the guys said he never showed up. So, I figured he was lost.”
“And you went back out lookin’ for him? In that old boat?” she asked. “You got a death wish?”
“Elizabeth.” This time it was Roger warning her. Not as nicely.
“It’s okay,” I said. “The guys on the island told me the whole story about my boat.” I decided not to tell them that I had just seen old Robert’s ghost for real. It was one thing to pass on a story, it was another thing to sound like a crazy nut.
The lady driving the boat said, “It’s true, darlin’. Every word of it.”
It was Bill’s turn to stop his wife from going on. “Carol, that’s enough,” he said to her.
“Anyway,” I said, not wanting to get into the whole haunted-boat thing again, “I went back out to look for him.” I paused and studied their faces. “That’s why you’re on this side of the island, right? To look for Alex?”
“No, dear,” Elizabeth said. “We were looking for you.”
13
Safe but Still Worried
It turns out that Grandma had put two and two together when I hadn’t come home after a couple hours. She noticed the rowboat was missing and called everyone she knew. Several people had claimed seeing the rowboat on the lake
this afternoon but thought it was empty, like usual, so they didn’t do anything about it. I guess me falling asleep in the bottom of it prevented me from being rescued much earlier in the day.
When Grandma found out this evening that people had seen the boat, she insisted that I had to either be at the campout or lost somewhere, because I was the only person who could have taken the boat. She had purposely stashed it behind her garage, and there was no way it could have gotten into the water on its own. Her orders were that if anyone found me, they were to call the police and have me picked up and sent home. Following directions, Carol must have already taken care of radioing the police while I was watching the boat sink, because she said a rescue boat was on its way to pick me up and take me home.
“Just don’t know how you fooled ’em,” Roger said, shaking his head. He stuck out his hand at me, like I was a thing instead of a person and said to the other adults, “I mean, look at her. Does she look like a boy to you?”
Bill’s shoulders bobbed again as he did that throaty chuckle. “Well, she don’t look much like a girl.”
Roger knelt down next to me and studied my face. “Were you trying to trick them? Is it some kind of game?”
“I…” I didn’t know what to say. He was being so mean. What did he care if I wasn’t a boy? Did it hurt him in some way? I wanted to ask him that, but I didn’t want him to get even madder. They might toss me back in the water with the kayak again.
“Leave her alone, Roger,” Elizabeth said to her husband, poking him in the shoulder to get him to back away. He stood up and went back to the railing. “Honestly. These men. They act like their campout is a sacred thing. I’m amazed that it’s taken this long for a girl to infiltrate it. One of these days, it’ll be a coed event.”
