The Boat

by Christine Dougherty

  Maggie thought she was probably going to have a hard time falling asleep. When she closed her eyes, she saw Sujon tumbling from the railing, revealing Steve where he stood, knife in hand. Funny how no sound accompanied this image, only the light breathing of the girl next to her and the ubiquitous whap, whap of waves against the hull. ThreeBees rocked. Maggie felt consciousness waning.

  Sujon fell again.

  A small gasp escaped Maggie’s lips and her eyes fluttered halfway open before shutting more firmly. She slid into sleep, watching Sujon fall, watching Steve revealed, his face a mask of revulsion and shock. And grief.

  Sujon fell again. Maggie felt the sensation in her own stomach, felt herself falling through blank space and she jerked without waking.

  Above her, the boards creaked as someone walked through the galley.

  Maggie slept.

  ~ ~ ~

  “Denny is gone. Maggie? Denny is gone.” Hands shook her.

  Joe? was her first, semi-coherent thought. Stop shaking me, hon, I’m up.

  But it wasn’t Joe, Joe was dead. Her eyes opened. Bonnie sat on the edge of the bed and everything had tilted toward her weight. Maggie felt herself pulled implacably to her as if Bonnie exerted her own weird gravity.

  Bonnie shook her again. “Maggie? Denny is gone.”

  “Gone?” Maggie sat up, trying to clear her muzzy head. “Denny?”

  “Yes, Maggie, like I told you. Denny is gone. Are you awake now?” Bonnie leaned over to peer into Maggie’s sleep puffy face and Maggie felt the force of her pull increase. She pushed herself further back to keep from toppling onto Bonnie.

  “Yeah, I’m awake. I am.” She scrubbed her hands over her face and looked automatically to her side for Babygirl. She wasn’t there. A tendril of unease whispered around her heart. “Where’s Babygirl?”

  “She’s up on deck with Randy; she’s fine. Look at you, mama bear!” Bonnie chuckled but then remembered her original business. “Denny is gone.”

  “Well, geez, Bonnie, he’s probably just over on Big Daddy. You know how he’s always crabbing about being stuck over here with us. Back up, okay? You’re blocking the whole damn room.” The space in the cabins was extremely limited. Maggie wouldn’t be able to get out of the bed until Bonnie retreated almost all the way to the door.

  Bonnie surveyed Maggie one more time, her face grave, almost watchful. It didn’t sit well on her happy, blowsy features. She stood and backed to the doorway.

  “He’s not on Big Daddy. Randy already radioed them,” she said. “We’re old, Maggie, not stupid.” She exited the room.

  Maggie sat for a moment longer, nonplussed. Whatever Bonnie’s problem was, she could go take it out on someone else, she thought. I’m not the boat’s whipping boy, am I? But even as she thought it, she cringed. None of them were; so none of them should act like it. But that doesn’t stop any of us from being human, does it?

  She sighed and stretched her way out of the bed. Then her thoughts went to Steve. Would he come for their visitor today? She quelled the small thrill of anticipation in her lower stomach and chided herself for her fickle grief.

  Joe deserved more than two months of mourning.

  She went on deck and Babygirl ran to her, wrapping her arms around Maggie’s legs. She looked up and her blue eyes held a scrim of worry. “Denny is gone,” she said. “We can’t find him.”

  Maggie put a hand on Babygirl’s head and glanced automatically over the side. Both jets were still tied up. Both rowboats were tethered neatly at the back of the ThreeBees.

  Randy was sitting on the deck bench and the survivor sat on a deck chair, his eyes closed and face to the sun. She could see Brian moving back and forth in the galley and Bonnie was in the salon, tidying the boy’s beds as she did every morning. The ‘boys’ as she called them were the perfect age to be substitute sons and for her to be their substitute mom.

  Bully for her, Maggie thought, feeling that uncomfortable itch of pique run through her again. What was wrong with her today? Why was she being so mean?

  Babygirl’s small hand curled into hers and squeezed but it was impatient, not reassuring. She seemed to be telling Maggie to forget about nonsense and focus on the important things.

  “Hi, Maggie.”

  Maggie was startled and then realized the voice was that of the survivor. He had opened his eyes to slits and surveyed her from his half-reclined position. His one leg was crossed over the other at the ankle. She could see now that his hair was an ashy, almost mousy, blond.

  She nodded in his direction. “You know my name; what’s yours?”

  He merely closed his slitted eyes and leaned his head the rest of the way back. A small, tight grin surfaced on his features.

  “His name is John,” Randy said and leaned forward to pat the man’s knee. “John Smith, isn’t that funny? You hear all the time how common it is, but you never meet one! But now we have one here. In the flesh!” He grinned at Maggie and nodded, inviting her to share in the humor.

  But Maggie wasn’t humored. She found the man to be creepy in some way she couldn’t put her finger on. Maybe it was the bruising around his eyes and forehead that was so off-putting, but face it, she’d seen worse. She shifted her attention to Randy.

  “Bonnie said Denny’s gone? And you already checked with Big Daddy?”

  “Yes and yes. I’m kind of worried, to tell you the truth. Where would he have gone?” He flung an arm out to indicate the expanse of ocean around them.

  Maggie shook her head. “Maybe someone came and got him from Flyboy. Like you said…where else could he be?”

  Inside the boat, a thin, tremulous cry arose. Maggie tilted her head, confused. It sounded almost like a teakettle or something mechanical. Then she realized what it was: Jade was screaming.

  Randy and Maggie looked at each other, startled, and Randy was the first to act. He jumped up and raced into the salon. Maggie was behind him but glanced back once at John Smith…he sat still as stone, unconcerned, and the small grin had not left his features.

  They followed Jade’s tremulous cry toward the front of the boat (aft? or fore? What’s it called? Maggie asked herself distractedly) and they pounded up the short flight of stairs to the cockpit. No one ever really went up there. No reason to, really. It had been decided that they would stay at anchor until they figured out how to pilot Flyboy and head south. In the meantime, they’d wait for any other survivors.

  Randy nearly knocked Jade over in his haste. She stood just inside the doorway, hands clasped under her breasts like an opera singer. Her mouth was an almost perfect ‘o’ as she screamed that one, unwavering note.

  Denny was in the main captain’s chair and his face was covered with thick plastic, taped fast to his neck with duct tape. Behind the plastic, his eyes had bulged nearly from their sockets and the whites had turned to shiny red. His tongue had swelled and it jutted from between his lips. Vomit had congealed at the bottom of the bag all around his neck. Traces of bright red blood threaded the vomit and a foamy pink layer floated on it. Maggie nearly gagged at the smell in the tight cockpit. Her nostrils were assaulted by the fetid stick of feces. He’d lost control of his bowels at the end.

  Randy put a shaking hand on Jade’s shoulder and her scream was cut off immediately. She looked at Randy, her beautiful black eyes consuming her face. “I wanted somewhere to read in private, that’s all…” Her eyes rolled up to whites. Randy caught her as she fell forward.

  “I’m going to put her in the salon,” he said, puffing. The girl could not weigh much, but she was still too heavy for him. He turned and Singer, Jade’s brother, was already there. His eyes widened in alarm.

  “Is she–”

  “She’s okay, she just fainted,” Randy said. “Can you take her? Put her in her room?”

  Singer nodded, stepping up and taking her from Randy’s arms.

  “Wait,” Maggie said and reached past Randy. She pinched Jade’s wrist in her fingers. She looked up for a brief second and the
n nodded. “She’s okay. Strong heartbeat. She’ll come around in no time.”

  Obligingly, Jade moaned and her eyelids fluttered. Maggie nodded reassurance to Singer and he left with his sister already beginning to wake.

  Maggie glanced at Randy and then reached a hand to Denny. She knew he was gone, she was positive…but she had to check. She placed her fingers at his throat, just under the tape and pressed. No pulse.

  He was gone. Long gone, by the stiffness of his skin. She wasn’t a coroner but she knew that rigor started setting in after three hours. The only thing she didn’t know was how far along he was. Not that it mattered.

  “Dead?” Randy said behind her and she nodded. He cleared his throat. “Killed himself.” It was halfway between a statement and a question. Maggie shrugged.

  “I guess so, yeah. But it’s so…Jesus, it’s so brutal.”

  “Randy?” Bonnie’s voice floated tremulously up the stairs.

  “Stay down there, Bonnie. Don’t come up here,” Randy said.

  “Bonnie, who has Babygirl?” Maggie asked.

  “She’s fine, she’s right here next to me. Why was Jade screaming? Did you find Denny? Is Denny okay?”

  “No, honey bunny, he’s not,” Randy said, surprising Maggie with his honesty. “Go tell Brian to call Steve. See if he can get a few guys together and come over here. Keep Brian out of her, too, Bonnie, okay?”

  “Yes, Randy,” Bonnie said and then there was silence.

  Maggie stared helplessly at Randy. He looked older today than he had yesterday. He looked older than he’d looked ten minutes ago on the bright, sun washed deck. She wondered if her own face was just as shocked, just as haggard.

  She looked back at Denny and her stomach somersaulted, forcing hot bile into her throat. She grimaced over the acid taste of it.

  Most likely it was, yeah, she thought. More likely than not.

  ~ ~ ~

  Steve put a hand to Denny’s neck then looked apologetically at Maggie. “I just have to check for myself, okay?”

  She nodded, but it was stiff, perfunctory. She crossed her arms over her chest. The movement was not lost on Steve. He sighed.

  “I’m sorry,” he said. “I just get used to doing things a certain way. I double-check everything. Forgive me?”

  “You don’t have to apologize, I’m just…I’m just kind of in a little bit of shock myself. I’m not seeing things right. What are we going to do?”

  Steve shook his head and shrugged. “Burial at sea. What else is there to do?” He glanced back at Denny’s unintentionally leering face. Steve’s eyebrows drew together. “Look at the plastic, Maggie,” he said. She looked and then looked at Steve.

  “Yeah?” she asked.

  “It’s not ripped…not torn at all. Is it possible to kill yourself by suffocation? Wouldn’t you fight at the end? Even involuntarily?”

  Maggie nodded, thinking. “Yeah, it would be…well, but unless he took drugs, too. We’ve got lots of sleeping pills on the boat. He could have taken something and then…it would explain the vomit.”

  Steve glanced around the tight bridge. “Where’s the pill bottle?”

  “Maybe he threw it overboard. Who knows?” She felt herself getting angry again. “Who cares? He did it to himself, that’s all that matters.” She burst into tears. She was remembering her conversation with Denny the night before when she’d come up so woefully short in the comfort department. If you spun it a certain way, hadn’t she almost advocated suicide as a way out? Maybe. Anyway, maybe that’s how Denny had taken it.

  Steve moved toward her, but then the walkie-talkie at Maggie’s hip crackled to life.

  “ThreeBees, what’s going on over there? Over.”

  Adam.

  Maggie unhitched the walkie and threw Steve a despairing glance. “Hi, Adam, it’s Maggie. We do have a problem, but I’m not going to go into it over an open line. Over.”

  Maggie stared at he speaker of the walkie-talkie; she could almost feel the annoyance coming from Adam on Flyboy.

  “Steve’s there?” Adam’s voice was just shy of a hiss. Maggie waited, wiping the tears from under her eyes. Then she realized he was too perturbed to remember walkie protocol. He’d forgotten his ‘over’.

  “Yes, he’s here with me. Over.”

  “Tell him to report to me on Flyboy.” The walkie went blank for a split second and then Adam’s voice snapped through the speaker. “Immediately.”

  Blank line.

  Maggie glanced up at Steve. He stood very close. A small thrill of butterflies coursed rapidly through her lower stomach and she stepped back, confused and angry with herself.

  He stared at her intently and then took her upper arms in his hands. “Maggie…” he said. His voice was low, bordering on rough.

  She stepped back again. “You better go.”

  Steve’s hands dropped abruptly from her arms. She could still feel the heat from where his hands had been as though they’d burned some trace of themselves into her.

  He studied her for a moment more. Then he glanced at Denny. “I’ll be back in a half hour at the most. I’ll help you with him then.” He turned back to Maggie. “Keep an eye on your passenger, okay? Keep Brian and Randy near him. I’ll send someone from Big Daddy if you think–”

  Maggie had a flash of impatience at the mention of an enforcer–a babysitter, really–being assigned to them. “Why?” she asked even though she’d felt it, herself…something was off about that guy. But murdering off? No. No way.

  “I just don’t trust him.”

  Just then, Jade’s thin, teakettle whistle wound up the stairs and onto the bridge.

  Maggie turned in alarm.

  What now?

  ~ ~ ~

  “She was old, Jade. In her eighties? At least that.” Maggie rubbed Jade’s thin back as she huddled over herself, crying. They were both crammed in the stateroom Jade shared with Mrs. Allen.

  Mrs. Allen was dead.

  “I was resting, listening to her breath. It helped to calm me. But then…” Jade had an odd way of speaking, almost foreign in her intonation, but with no true accent. She had told Maggie this same thing three times already. Maggie looked back at Bonnie standing in the doorway. Babygirl peeked out from behind her and Bonnie was absently trying to keep her hand over Babygirl’s eyes.

  “Then she stopped breathing,” Jade continued. “I couldn’t wake her.”

  Maggie patted Jade’s back, at a loss for what else to do. Jade must be at least in her twenties; she shouldn’t be taking this so hard. She’d only known Mrs. Allen for two months, just under. How could she have so much grief?

  “She lived a long time, Jade. I’m sure she had a good life, lots of good times and family and friends.” Maggie shrugged and looked at Bonnie with a ‘help me out here’ expression.

  “Jade,” Bonnie said, her voice slightly sharp, commanding. Jade looked up, wiping the tears from her cheeks. “It’s better; you know it is. She was an old lady, vulnerable and not fitted to…to what we’re going through. Be happy for her that she’s out.”

  Maggie was shocked that Bonnie could be so blunt and she expected a fresh wave of hysteria from Jade, but she sat straighter, nodding. “Yes, you are right, of course. It was hard on her, being on this boat. Everything she knew was gone.” Jade glanced at Bonnie. “It is better for her, I know. But I will miss her.”

  “I know you will, sweetie,” Bonnie said and gave Jade a warm smile. “We all will.”

  Maggie stood, glad to have it settled. “We’ll get her…buried…have a nice ceremony of some kind, maybe, and then–”

  “Not at sea,” Jade said, her voice steely.

  “Well, but, Jade, how else? We can’t bury her on land,” Maggie said. “You know that.”

  “She hated this boat! She was terrified of the ocean! Why do you think she never came out of this cramped room?” Jade’s voice was lowering with vehemence. “She told me many times how much she hated being surrounded by the water. She was terrif
ied of everything in it. Now you want to throw her in there like…like a piece of trash? You want her to be pissed on when the men piss off the side of the boat? Is that right for an old woman who…who only wanted…to live out her life with…family and grandchildren…but ended up…” Jade’s sobs wrenched Maggie’s heart.

  Singer pushed past Bonnie. “We’ll bury her on the land, Jade, of course we will.” His eyes raked Maggie and Bonnie. “Do not worry, dear sister.” Jade reached out for her brother, the sobs wracking her thin body. He glared at Maggie and Maggie shuffled past him to the doorway.

  “Singer, you know we can’t,” she said.

  He curled his sister into his arms.

  “We will.”

  ~ ~ ~

  “This is ridiculous,” Maggie said. She and Steve stood on the deck of ThreeBees, watching as Singer and Brian brought Mrs. Allen’s body up from her room. She was wrapped in two sheets, and to Maggie, she resembled a large, wrinkly, white maggot.

  Steve glanced at her, eyebrows raised. “I agree. But I can’t let Signer go alone. And there’s no way to stop him. I’m not the police, you know?”

  “We should have just taken her body and given her a ceremony and then…” Maggie trailed off, unable to finish.

  “And dumped her in the ocean? With Jade screaming bloody murder and Singer fighting us every step of the way? You really think that would have been better?”

  Maggie felt stung. “Better than risking more lives, yes!” But she could picture the scene as Steve described it, and even if they did just dump that poor old lady overboard, then what? What would Singer and Jade do and how would they feel?

  This isn’t a dictatorship; it’s a boat full of random survivors, Maggie thought, missing her unintentional pun. There was no policy, no procedure to follow. “We’re going to do that to Denny…put him in the ocean…why don’t you carry him to land then, too?” She was still angry, but not sure at who.