A Thousand Shades of Blue

by Robin Stevenson

  He was standing at the bow of the boat, and I could tell he was about to make ones of his speeches.

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  Robin Stevenson

  Jen and I shuffled back into the crowd. I stared at my sneakers, white against the rough brown wood of the dock.

  Dad cleared his throat. “It’s wonderful to have so many of you here to see us off,” he said. “Our network of friends—our extended family. Thank you all for being a part of this wonderful adventure and wishing us well as we set sail for new horizons. Life is what you make it, and we are choosing to pursue our dreams. I hope that you will al do the same, whatever your dreams may be.”

  Jen caught my eye, and I poked my finger in my mouth and pretended to gag. Dad was so embarrassing.

  People on the dock were starting to fidget and look at their watches.

  “I have a surprise for you all,” he said. He moved to the bow of the boat and put his hands on a cloth that was draped over the lifelines.

  I hadn’t noticed it before.

  “In honor of this occasion, I’d like to have a naming ceremony.” He whisked the cloth away, revealing new black letters on the boat’s hul . Apparently the Wind Weaver was now called Shared Dreams.

  I folded my arms and said nothing. I’d liked the old name.

  Dad cracked a bottle of champagne over the bow rail and let the spray wash across the deck, completely oblivious to the irony of his single-handedly changing the boat’s name. Shared Dreams—not likely.

  Tim nudged me. “It’s bad luck to change a boat’s name,”

  he whispered.

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  A Thousand Shades of Blue

  Z

  We spent the entire fall—when I should have been starting grade eleven and hanging out with Jen—slogging through the canals from Ontario to New York, and then on down the Intra-Coastal Waterway.

  Of course, if you sailed in the ocean it would take only a week. On the icw, it took months. Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, Florida. We motored along winding rivers, slowly accumulating mile after mile on the odometer and staying right on Dad’s schedule to reach the Bahamas in early December. Every day he charted our slow progress, and a wiggly pencil line crept inch by inch along the chart. Five miles an hour. Pretty much like walking from Canada to the Bahamas, if you thought about it. I tried not to.

  Mom flew home from Florida to visit Emma, while Dad, Tim and I stayed and got the boat ready for the big crossing to the islands. We rented a car and bought whole cases of beans, tuna, chick peas, toilet paper and pop. The boat was so full of stuff that it was sitting a good couple of inches lower in the water. We re-sealed leaky stanchions, changed oil and fuel filters, and cleaned and refilled the water tanks.

  It was a ton of work, but it wasn’t as if there was much else to do: We were miles up some creek and stuck in a tiny marina where there was no one even close to my age to talk to.

  Most of the trip had been kind of boring, to be honest. Mile after mile of canal with nothing to look at except the odd pelican diving for a fish.

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  Dad lost it every time Tim or I dared to suggest it wasn’t total y thrilling.

  “How can you call this boring?” he demanded. “You’ve traveled through nine states; you’ve seen dolphins leaping out of the water right beside the boat—”

  “Yeah, like twice,” I said. “That was cool. But come on.

  That was maybe fifteen minutes of dolphins out of three months of steering in a straight line and staying between the red and green markers.”

  “Most kids would give anything for an opportunity like this.” He had that look on his face like he was about to start talking about the lousy lives of the kids he works with. Sometimes I envied those kids. Maybe if your whole family was screwed up—I mean, obviously screwed up, on the outside, not just secretly screwed up like our family—

  then maybe there’d be less pressure to be so freaking perfect. Maybe people wouldn’t expect you to be happy and grateful all the time.

  I shrugged. “I’m just saying that motoring down a canal for ten hours at a time isn’t exactly a thril , okay?”

  He shook his head. “Your frame of mind is directly related to your attitude. You choose to be bored, instead of appreciating what the day has to bring.”

  Dad was big on inspirational sayings. He was always going on about “living in the moment.” He had taped quotes up all over the boat, just like he used to do at home.

  Above the table where Tim and I do our homework: Study as if you were to live forever. Live as if you were going to die tomorrow. By the navigation instruments: We are here 28

  A Thousand Shades of Blue

  and the time is now. They were scattered everywhere: reminders, Dad said, for us to be present. Do not dwel in the past, do not dream of the future, concentrate the mind on the present moment. When you are in the moment you are truly alive. Being in the moment means being aware and living in the flow of life. Etcetera, etcetera.

  You’d think with all those reminders, I’d be able to do it. But the truth is, when I’m not remembering the things that have already happened, I’m worrying about what’s going to happen next.

  Anyway, the crossing to the Bahamas was hellish. We left the day after Mom came back, and it was real y rough.

  Mom and I threw up the whole way. And it took forever, since Dad didn’t want to stop at the Berry Islands and insisted on going all the way to Nassau. A day and night and another day, non-stop puking. How’s that for quality family time?

  I hate that it’s always me and Mom who get sick. It seems so stereotypical—like women are weaker or something, which is such bullshit. I’m small—small for my age, everyone said, until I was about twelve and it became obvious that it wasn’t going to be a temporary state—but I’m stronger than Tim and a better sailor too. He’s always off in his head, thinking about the Second World War or about the conflict in the Middle East, totally oblivious to the fact that the sails need trimming or the boat is off course. But for some reason, motion doesn’t bother him. While I’m popping Gravol and staring grimly at the horizon, he sits down below and reads history books.

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  Z

  By the time we final y got to Nassau and cleared customs, I was weirdly tired and hungry and hyper, all at once. I went off for a walk by myself. And that was when I met Will and Sheila for the first time.

  I was walking down the main drag, which seemed to be a long row of liquor stores and souvenir trash, when a voice behind me said, “Ahoy, Shared Dreams.”

  I spun around. A couple about my parents’ age, with dark tans, loud T-shirts and lots of gold jewelry, were walking behind me.

  “Hi,” I said uncertainly.

  “Hey.” The man stuck out his hand. “We just met your folks. We’re on Freebird. You know, the trawler in the slip beside you at the marina.”

  “Oh. Hi.”

  They were both grinning like I was their long lost daughter.

  “We told your folks we’d keep an eye out for you,” the man said. “I’m Wil . This is my wife, Sheila.”

  Sheila smiled. She was blond, with dark sunglasses and those beaded braids that tourists apparently feel compelled to get whenever they go anywhere with a beach.

  “Nice to meet you,” I said politely. “I’m sure I’ll see you around.”

  Will winked at me. Good looking, but one of those guys who are always trying to seem younger and cooler than they really are. He reminded me of this guidance 30

  A Thousand Shades of Blue

  counselor at my school who was always bringing in his guitar and joking around like he was one of the students.

  Nice enough, but a bit of a goof.

  Z

  Anyway, that’s all history. It’s been a month since I met Will and Sheila in Nassau. A whole lifetime ago. Believe it or not, things are actual y a whole lot more messed up now. At least wit
h history, no matter how awful it is, you already know what happened.

  So now here we are. Limping back to Georgetown with a cracked rudder and no idea what is going to happen next.

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  Five

  I eye the low profile of Great Exuma Island, and my stomach tightens. The green hil s are speckled with little pastel squares: the houses of Georgetown.

  It is late afternoon, and the clouds cast shadows on the water; their dark shapes are indistinguishable from the coral heads that lie beneath the surface, waiting to tear apart the thin fibreglass hull that holds our home together.

  “It’s too late,” I tell Dad. “It’ll be too hard to navigate.”

  My hand is sweaty on the wheel.

  Dad looks up at the sky, shades his eyes with his hand.

  “The sun’s not that low in the sky.”

  I give the wheel an experimental wiggle. “I don’t trust the steering. It feels all wrong.”

  “There’s a big crack in the rudder,” he says. “Of course it feels wrong. It got us this far, it held together all night long.

  It’ll last another half hour.”

  I exchange glances with Tim.

  “Let’s look on the bright side,” Dad says cheerfully.

  “We’re lucky the damage isn’t worse.”

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  A Thousand Shades of Blue

  If only we hadn’t hit the rocks, we’d be sailing in the opposite direction. If only Long Island’s marina hadn’t been wiped out in the last hurricane, we could have got the rudder fixed there. If only, if only, if only.

  I look at Georgetown, slowly but inevitably getting closer. I didn’t expect to be coming back. Didn’t ever want to see this place again.

  Mom doesn’t say anything, just gazes at the harbor entrance. I wonder what she is thinking. I couldn’t tell how she felt about leaving Georgetown, and I can’t tell now how she feels about going back. Excited? Anxious?

  I have no idea.

  I don’t even know who she is anymore.

  I stand up and look at Dad. “Fine. You can take us in then. I’m not doing it.”

  He shakes his head. “Look, I know you’re nervous.

  We’re all shaky from hitting those rocks. But it’s your watch, and I know you can do this.”

  I shake my head stubbornly. “I’m not doing it.” It’s not the navigation or the visibility that is worrying me. It’s this: When everything falls apart, I don’t want to have been the one who guided our boat back to the place where the unraveling began.

  “Rachel. I don’t want to make a big deal of this, but it is about responsibility,” Dad says. “We all agreed on a rotating watch system while we’re at sea. It’s your watch from one pm until three pm.”

  “I’m not doing it,” I say again.

  He puts on his disappointed-parent expression.

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  “We’re a team out here, Rachel. You know that. And a chain is only as strong as its weakest link.”

  Tim stands up. “I’ll do it, Rach.”

  My jaw practical y drops. Tim and I have never talked about what happened last time we were here. Does Nerd Boy actual y understand why I don’t want to do this? Or is he just looking to score some points with Dad?

  “Cheers,” I say, letting him take the wheel from me.

  I don’t even look at Dad as I walk past him and up to the foredeck.

  The wind blows my hair off my face as I stare at the water ahead. To be honest, the unraveling of our family probably began long before what happened in Georgetown. I can try to sift backward through the layers of the past, but I can’t identify the point at which things started to go wrong. Emma moving out, Dad spending all his time at the office, all the fights between him and Mom. Were things okay before all of that? When we were younger? I thought so, but maybe little kids always do.

  Maybe as long as no one is hitting or shouting, as long as there’s food to eat and toys to play with, kids always think their family is just dandy.

  I was four and Emma was six when she had her accident. She was in hospital for months, but I don’t remember any of that. I didn’t really understand that there was anything wrong with her until my friends started asking questions. To me, she was just Em. I knew she couldn’t talk as well as me, and I knew she was different, but none of that means much when you’re a little kid.

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  A Thousand Shades of Blue

  As I got older, Mom started to tell me more. I knew that Emma’s brain had been damaged, and that the doctors hadn’t even known if she’d ever come out of the coma. I knew that when she started walking and talking again, everyone said it was a miracle. And I knew that as she got older, it had slowly become clear that the miracle hadn’t been quite enough. Emma had seizures, even with the medication she took every day. Dad started talking about developmental milestones and how Emma wasn’t meeting them. She was having all kinds of difficulties with learning and memory and behavior. She was in a special class at school.

  Em was the oldest, but Tim and I caught up with her and overtook her and treated her like she was the baby of the family. I’ve always felt kind of guilty about that. About being able to do so many things that she couldn’t do.

  Sometimes I wonder if guilt about the accident was what started the unraveling for Mom and Dad. It wasn’t something either of them ever talked about.

  Z

  Tim guides the boat back in the southeastern entrance of Elizabeth Harbor, careful y navigating between reefs and shoals and taking us back to Georgetown.

  The harbor is huge: nine miles long, a narrow channel running between the barrier islands and the south end of Great Exuma Island, which is practical y the southernmost island in a chain of hundreds. Most of them are inhabited 35

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  only by iguanas, so Georgetown is pretty much a metrop-olis by local standards. It has a few hundred residents, a hotel, several restaurants and bars and a tiny library.

  In the winter, the boats flood in. Hundreds of boats. The population of Georgetown doubles.

  Once we’re in the harbor, I go back to the cockpit. Tim and I argue that we should anchor in Kidd Cove, to be close to town, or over near Volleyball Beach. Anywhere but Red Shanks. Of course, we can’t say why, and Dad overrules us.

  “Maybe our spot will still be there,” he says.

  He’s all excited, and I feel weird about it. Sort of embarrassed for him and angry that he can be so oblivious. He’s the only one who doesn’t know. The only one for whom Red Shanks is just a beautiful secluded anchorage and nothing more.

  Dad takes the helm, and Tim and I drop the sails. Mom is up on the bow, reading the depth of the water by the shade of blue, using hand signals to direct Dad. People go aground in here all the time, but it’s a soft sandy bottom.

  If you get stuck, you just wait for the tide to lift you free.

  In the end, I’m the one who lowers the heavy plough anchor. Right where we were before, in the innermost part of the anchorage. The same three sailboats sit quietly in the stil shallow water. The trawler Freebird, Will and Sheila’s boat, is tucked into the back corner where the water is too shallow for most sailboat keels. It hasn’t budged since we left.

  The water is a crystal-clear turquoise. The slight hint of green in the blueness means it’s less than eight feet deep.

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  A Thousand Shades of Blue

  I can see the anchor settling into the sand even before Dad puts the engine in reverse. The boat tugs against the anchor chain, and I watch the shoreline. We’re not moving. I give a thumbs-up signal to let Dad know the anchor is set.

  Back in the cockpit, Dad gives Tim a high five and then a big pat on the back. “Great job, Tim. Thanks for taking the helm and bringing the boat in. Nice work.”

  He’s talking to Tim, but he keeps looking at me. It’s all about making me feel bad, not about Tim doing a good job at al .

  “It is a relief to be anchored s
afely,” Mom says. “I was a little nervous, I have to admit. If the rudder had fallen off out there in the Sound…” She is looking back the way we came, toward the rough, dark blue water of Exuma Sound.

  “I knew it’d be fine,” Dad says. “We were al upset by the little incident at Long Island, but we pulled together and we made it back here just fine.” He nods and looks at me again. “This is a good example of how we choose our experiences. You can give in to the failure messages and make excuses. Not be willing to try. Or you can choose to be positive and greet life’s experiences eagerly.”

  I roll my eyes and lean back against the bulkhead. “Can we go ashore? I think my leg muscles are atrophying from being stuck on the boat.”

  “We should wait and make sure the anchor is set properly,” Dad says.

  Mom stands up and stretches. “How about you and Tim stay on the boat? Rachel and I will dinghy over to town and see if we can arrange to get the boat hauled out 37

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  tomorrow. Get that rudder fixed as soon as possible.” She shrugs. “We can pick up some provisions too. Maybe we’ll only need to be here for a couple of days.”

  I exchange glances with Tim. It sounds like Mom is as eager to get out of here as we are.

  I guess that’s a good thing.

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  Six

  Mom and I scramble into the dinghy and head toward town. Neither of us says much, which is kind of how things are with us these days.

  I used to feel like we knew each other better than anyone else. When I was little, she’d just look at my face when I came home from school and know what kind of day I’d had. She was the kind of mom who would dress up as a cowboy with us, didn’t mind if we wanted to eat nothing but cream cheese on toast for a week, was happy to cut our sandwiches into triangles instead of squares and gave us Pooh-bear stickers for remembering to floss. Al my friends thought she was the greatest.

  I don’t know exactly when things started to change.

  Just the last couple of years, I guess. Tim and I outgrew cowboys and triangular food—though Emma still likes that stuff—and Mom found other things to do. Volunteering for the community living association, raising money for programs for special needs kids, organizing community awareness campaigns. More and more, she’d ask Tim and 39