Wreck

by Fleur Ferris

  I definitely have a chance.

  I lie still and quiet on the back seat, hoping he thinks I will be passive when we stop. My self-defence instructor said ‘the element of surprise is your friend’. The car slows and he turns left. How many minutes has it been? I try to work it out but my sense of time is warped. We could be near the Palmerston Pine Plantation. A chill washes over my skin as I fight horrible thoughts about why he might be taking me into the woods. I try not to think about him disposing of my dead body.

  Stay calm, breathe, I tell myself. If I stay calm I have a chance.

  The element of surprise is my friend.

  Gravel crunches under the tyres as we leave the main road and it feels like we’re travelling at a slow pace. Finally, the car stops. I hear the zip of the handbrake, before the engine is cut. My heart is pounding so hard I worry it might explode inside my chest before I get a chance to surprise him.

  I have one shot at escaping.

  His car door opens, then closes.

  One shot.

  Then my door opens.

  I lie still and wait. I’m ready.

  Even though Dad’s new boat, Land and Sea, is a one-hundred-and-twenty-foot monohull superyacht, it’s being tossed around the ocean like a bottle. Aunty Selena looks at Mum with a scowl on her face.

  ‘I want to get off.’

  ‘Same,’ Mum says. She looks at Dad. ‘We want out. Call the chopper.’

  ‘Babe, everything is fine. This won’t last,’ Dad soothes.

  ‘This is not fun,’ Mum snaps.

  Aunty Sel looks up to the pilot house where Uncle Oliver is at the wheel.

  ‘I’ll go and talk to Oliver,’ Dad says. ‘I’ll see how far we are from the islands. If it’s going to take too long to find calmer waters, I’ll call a chopper. How does that sound?’

  Mum rolls her eyes. She’s livid.

  I don’t blame her, though. I’ve been seasick for long enough too.

  As I leave the dinette on the front deck I hold onto the side of the boat to steady myself. Inside, yellow cushions are scattered across the floor, having slid from the cream leather sofas against the walls. The shiny white floor reflects light onto the dark oak panelling that runs along the bar. Knox stands behind the bench making sure his muscles flex as he mixes a drink in the cocktail shaker. I wish he wasn’t here.

  ‘William, can I tempt you with some of this?’ Knox’s smile isn’t friendly. I’m fifteen and strictly not allowed to drink alcohol. If I got stuck into it, Dad would kill me, which would please Knox. Mostly, my half-brother hates me.

  My cousin, Christian, and his girlfriend, Portia, are sitting at the bar. They turn around to look at me.

  ‘You okay, mate?’ Christian says.

  The boat rolls over a swell and I take a few steps forward to stop myself from falling.

  I nod. ‘Just a bit seasick.’

  Knox exaggerates a sad face at me behind the others’ backs.

  Christian leaves the bar and retrieves Portia’s bright red bag from the sofa.

  ‘We’re heading towards the islands to find calmer waters,’ I say as he pulls a packet of capsules from the bag and holds them up so Portia can see.

  ‘Can he have some?’

  ‘Of course.’ Portia smiles, showing her perfectly white teeth. She’s dazzling. Long wavy blonde hair with large green eyes, picture-perfect everything. But the best thing about her is that she is smart and really nice, the kind of person who sees the good in everyone. ‘Maybe check with your mum first though, okay?’ she says to me.

  ‘Yeah, I hope you don’t spew,’ Knox says, making his sad face again.

  I sigh. I want to tell Knox to go screw himself, but stop because he’s got that mean look in his eyes that comes when he’s been drinking.

  The boat tips and again I take a few steps to steady myself. Barfing right here is on the cards.

  ‘You sit down and I’ll go and check with Aunty Jacki.’ Christian kisses Portia’s cheek as he walks past her. As soon as he’s out of sight, Knox leans across the bar and places a shot glass in front of Portia.

  ‘Let’s down a few before Mr Sensible gets back.’ Knox flirts with her every chance he gets. He wasn’t even going to come on this trip because he’s in Dad’s bad books, but he changed his mind when he found out Portia was coming. It’s pathetic, and Portia makes it clear she’s not interested.

  ‘I’ll have one, and only one.’ Portia laughs. ‘Last time you made me drinks I was sick, remember? I’m sure you must have been throwing yours over your shoulder.’

  Portia holds the shot in front of her face for a few seconds and then throws it back. She grimaces as she swallows it.

  ‘It burns,’ she whispers through clenched teeth. She holds the bar as the boat rides the swell.

  Knox laughs, steadies himself, holds the shot glass so it doesn’t skid along the bar, and refills it.

  ‘No way. I said one.’

  ‘This is only one.’

  She shakes her head.

  Knox walks to her side of the bar and leans in close to her. ‘If you don’t drink it, you have to kiss me.’

  ‘Don’t be ridiculous.’ Portia laughs.

  As the boat tips, Knox sways, allowing his weight to lean on Portia. Portia tries to push him away, but can’t until the boat reaches the crest of the wave and changes slant.

  ‘Dude, get off me,’ Portia says, joking but serious.

  ‘What? I can’t help it. It’s the motion of the ocean,’ Knox says.

  ‘Portia doesn’t want to kiss you, get off her,’ I say.

  Instantly, I know I’ve overstepped the mark and fear pulses in my temple. Knox glares at me. He wants to smash my face in.

  ‘Of course she doesn’t want to kiss me.’ Knox looks at Portia. ‘I’ve tried to convince her, countless times, that she’s with the wrong Chisel, but she can’t see it,’ he says, exaggerating wistfulness. He smiles at her and winks, then makes a snarly face in my direction before returning to the other side of the bar, where he continues to glare at me, biting the inside of his cheek. He’s telling me I’ve got it coming later. He’d never do anything here and now. He’ll wait until everyone’s in bed, then he’ll come to my room. Knox likes to leave bruises, but only where no one else can see them.

  Over the years, I’ve learned to play a game in my head when he is taunting me, to distract me from the pain. I imagine his death.

  Death scene: A violent twister emerges from nowhere and sucks Knox into its vortex.

  Knox and Portia hold the bar to ride the sway of the boat as it rolls over another wave. Then there’s relief while the boat settles as we hit some slack water.

  ‘Maybe you should piss off back to your mother,’ Knox says.

  ‘Hey, don’t be mean,’ says Portia. ‘But, Will, actually, you don’t look so good. Maybe I should take you out onto the deck for some air.’

  Knox rolls his eyes, reaches for Portia’s shot glass and throws it back. He pours another one, and does the same again. He’s going to wipe himself out. The sooner the better.

  Death scene: Knox drinks Flaming Lamborghinis until his brain catches on fire.

  Knox and Christian compete in everything they do and it drives Knox wild when Christian beats him. Christian seems to handle it better when Knox comes out on top, and this also irritates Knox. Not long after Portia came on the scene, Knox and Christian were both in the state rowing championship and Knox came home with the trophy. Knox, high on life, invited his friends over for a pool party to celebrate, but mostly he seemed to be enjoying baiting Christian and taunting him about losing. Portia was interstate and Christian was more interested in talking to her on the phone than he was in anyone at the party. I could tell this was infuriating Knox. Halfway through the night, he introduced Christian to a girl with bright red lips and a bikini to match. The girl was drunk and laughed at everything Knox said.

  ‘Christian needs cheering up,’ Knox said.

  ‘Aww,’ the girl said, placing h
er hand on Christian’s chest. ‘I can help with that.’

  Knox stood back and took a photo of her doing it. The girl then moved closer to Christian and snaked her arms around his waist and smiled while Knox took another one.

  ‘I might get another drink,’ Christian said, excusing himself from the girl’s clutches and making a quick getaway.

  ‘Don’t mind him, he just hates losing,’ Knox sneered loudly. ‘But if anyone can turn his night around, I bet it’s you.’ He and the girl smiled at each other like they’d made a secret pact.

  Before the girl could follow Christian to the bar, Christian hurried back past her looking ecstatic about something. Knox’s cold gaze followed Christian to the entrance hall, where Portia rushed through the front door and into his arms. Christian pulled her to him and they kissed and talked and kissed and talked, foreheads and noses touching. Christian’s smile was suddenly brighter than anything else in the room.

  I turned back to Knox and watched him straighten, his smug grin wiped from his face as his jaw clamped and eyes narrowed. I left the room before he could see me. I knew that look and didn’t want to provoke him. I headed upstairs and dragged my bed in front of the door, then lay down, intending to spend the rest of the night watching movies, hoping if I was out of sight I was also out of mind.

  Not long after, I heard Knox’s bedroom door shut and my heart started thudding at the threat of him being so close. I heard a loud crack, then another. He was smashing something, banging, breaking. Then it went quiet. I snuck out to my balcony and, when I was certain I heard Knox’s voice downstairs again, I pulled my bed away from the door and crept down the hallway to his room. The door was ajar, so I nudged it wide enough to see inside. On the floor was his rowing trophy, in a thousand pieces.

  Since that night Knox hasn’t been interested in anyone but Portia. If he’s hooking up with anybody, he certainly isn’t bragging about it like he used to.

  This whole trip was meant to be celebrating Knox and Christian going to uni and stepping into the family business. But that was before Knox and his mate Cameron got into a fight at a club a few weeks back. Dad was furious and told Knox he had to grow up before he started working, so Christian started at the business on his own. Knox is bleeding about it.

  The door opens and Christian comes in, his face flushed from the wind and spray. He smiles at Portia and then me.

  ‘It’s getting cold out there,’ he says. ‘Spray’s going right over the front of the boat. They’ve all moved up to the pilot house. Anyway, your mum said you can have some. She’s coming down in a minute to check on you.’

  Christian walks behind the bar and waits for the boat to be on the right angle before opening the fridge and taking out a bottle of water. He brings it to me and sits down. I hold out my hand and he pops a couple of pills into my palm. Christian is much more of a brother to me than Knox will ever be.

  ‘You’re meant to take them before you get seasick,’ Portia says. ‘I’m not sure if they work once you’re already sick. They make you drowsy too. Last time I had them they knocked me out for a few hours.’

  The thought of being knocked out for a few hours sounds awesome. I swallow the pills.

  Mum, Dad and Selena enter the cabin as Knox throws back another shot.

  ‘Go easy on it, Knox,’ Dad warns as he sits down with me and Christian.

  Knox rolls his eyes.

  ‘It’s better down here, I think,’ Selena says. ‘Not as rough.’

  ‘It seems worse now it’s dark,’ Mum says, pushing back my hair.

  ‘We shouldn’t be out here when it’s like this,’ Selena says, glancing at Dad.

  ‘So it’s a little rough, we’ll be fine.’ Dad walks over to the bar. ‘Knox, could you pour Selena and your mother one of those drinks, calm their nerves. We should all have a drink. Christian, you’ll have a beer with me? Portia, a champagne for you?’

  Knox pours himself another shot, throws it back and smacks the glass down hard on the bar. ‘Stepmother,’ he says.

  We all take a few seconds to work out that Knox was correcting Dad for referring to Mum as Knox’s mother. Knox never acknowledges my mum as his mother, he calls her Jacki. Mum says she doesn’t mind; she has never tried to replace Knox’s mother, who died from cancer when Knox was two.

  Dad eyes him. ‘I think you’ve had enough, Knox. Drinking makes you aggressive.’

  Knox takes the tops off two beers. ‘That must be embarrassing for you.’

  ‘It certainly was when I was dragged out of bed at four in the morning to haul your sorry arse out of jail,’ Dad says.

  Knox’s mate Cameron was arrested, too, but he wasn’t in jail with Knox. The police took him straight to the hospital because he’d been glassed in the face. Twenty-six stitches later, he had a permanent mark on his left cheek in the shape of a giant V to remind him of the occasion. Couldn’t have happened to a nicer guy.

  Knox pushes the beers across the bar. ‘Here, you and Christian enjoy those.’

  Christian goes to say something, but Dad shakes his head.

  ‘How cosy. You two don’t even need to speak these days.’ Knox looks at Dad. ‘Must be nice to have someone at work who does whatever you say.’

  The boat rises with the next swell and everyone holds on so they don’t slide to the other side.

  ‘You’ll start when I see you’re more reliable. Reliability is what our business needs.’

  Knox throws back another shot.

  ‘Think I’ll call it a night,’ Christian says. He and Portia stand.

  ‘Oh, come on, stay for one more drink,’ Mum says. ‘Let’s finish the evening on a friendly note. Then we’ll all get some rest while we travel to calmer seas.’

  ‘I’ll have one more champagne,’ Selena says, leaning back into her seat.

  Selena and Mum start chatting between themselves while Knox pours them a drink. Portia leaves her seat at the bar and joins Mum and Selena.

  ‘I might go to bed,’ I say.

  Mum hugs me and kisses my forehead. ‘You’re as white as a ghost,’ she says. ‘It would be good if you could get some sleep. Hopefully by the time you wake up the storm will have passed. Night, love.’

  ‘Okay, night,’ I say as I leave, relieved not to have to sit through the let’s-pretend-Knox-and-Dad-aren’t-fighting drink.

  The master stateroom is on the main deck, but my room is one of the four bedrooms below deck. Now that I’m on my way, all I want to do is lie down and try to sleep through to calmer waters. I kick off my shoes and get into bed fully clothed. I roll onto my side, pulling the doona over me. My eyes start to feel heavy and once they’re closed I can’t open them. Sleep rushes in.

  I wake as I hit the floor at full force. I immediately cover my head to shield myself from the expected blows. But Knox isn’t there. A sickening vibration goes through me and then there’s a loud crack and a tearing groan. It seems to last forever, as the boat scrapes along whatever it is we’ve hit. The Land and Sea tips sharply and I roll a number of times before smashing into the wall. The vessel keeps tipping onto its side and I think it’s going right over, then it rocks back with a massive gush. An alarm bell sounds through the cabin as the boat slowly rolls before settling on an angle that feels all wrong.

  The boat isn’t right over on its side, but it’s not sitting flat in the water either. It keeps rising up and down, side to side, over the swell. More alarm bells ring out and emergency lights flicker to life. I poke my head out of my bedroom door, clutching at the handle to stay on my feet. Outside, the wind howls, gusts hitting the boat with powerful force. Christian and Portia are making their way towards me, using the wall as support, both dressed in shorts and warm jumpers and bright yellow life jackets. Surely they don’t think this boat will actually sink? I dash back into my room, open the cupboard, grab a life jacket and slip it over my head. Dad will have a rescue chopper coming. I bet he’s already called for one.

  Seeing Christian and Portia with their jackets on give
s me my second massive release of adrenaline in the space of a few minutes and now my whole body thrums. My fingers tremble as I secure the waist belt of my life jacket and leave my room. I’m back in the hallway just in time to see Christian dart into Knox’s bedroom. I follow. The alcohol fumes are thick and sickly. Knox is off the bed and against the wall, out cold. I wonder if he smacked his head when he was flung out of bed and is unconscious, or whether he’s just wasted from the shots he knocked back at the bar.

  ‘Help me get him up,’ Christian says.

  Christian and I pull Knox away from the wall. He groans with the movement. We get on either side of him and hook our arms under his.

  ‘On three,’ Christian says. ‘You ready?’

  I nod.

  ‘One, two … wait …’ We ride the next wave. I crouch down low to the floor, feet planted wide. ‘Okay.’ Christian looks at me. ‘One, two … and up.’

  Knox is a dead weight. He swats us away with slow and clumsy arms and his words are unintelligible. The boat rolls the next wave and we slam into the wall.

  ‘Easy, buddy,’ Christian says.

  The boat rises so high I wonder if we’re being lifted out of the water. It then crashes down, tumbling over, then comes to rest on its side.

  Portia screams as we go over. We all lean against the wall as we tip and now we’re all lying down.

  Christian springs to his feet. ‘Again. Quick, get up. Help me with Knox,’ he yells over the alarm. ‘We’ve got to get out. Right now.’ Christian takes his life jacket off, places it over Knox’s head and secures it. He pulls the inflation cord and adds extra air by blowing into the orange pipes. He looks into my eyes. ‘You right, buddy?’

  The boat rises with the next swell of the ocean. We ride it out.

  ‘Let’s go,’ Christian says.

  I do everything he instructs. We scoop Knox onto his feet and drag him as fast as we can towards the orange flashing lights at the end of the hall.