The Boat

by Clara Salaman

  He staggered blindly out of the cockpit and down the deck to the bows, hanging on to the forestay, still reeling, feeling as if he had just had the shit kicked out of him. He blinked, his eyes trying to adjust to the darkness. They were moored about two hundred yards out in the heart of a small bay surrounded on three sides by mountains. He could just make out strips of starlight over the water on the horizon and he wanted more than anything to be over there, off this boat. He sat down, back to the mast, hanging his head in his hands, trying to sort his head out as the air spun about him. Frank was a good man, an exceptional man, a man full of worthy longings, a man whose spirit soared higher than other men’s, whose mind dug deeper, a man who saw through things, a truth-seeker, a philosopher, a lover of mankind; he was blessed, he had touched Johnny in a way no other human being ever had; he had opened him up and turned him on to the world, taught him to look at it, to accept instead of struggle. Johnny’s gratitude had known no bounds; he would have done anything for him – he had done anything: he had given him his most beloved gift – Clemency Bailey. Johnny thought of him like a father, like a teacher, had even wanted him like a lover. But now the only impresion he had in his head was of Frank’s fingers kneading Smudge’s thigh. My daddy should be locked up and they should throw away the key.

  He pressed the back of his head hard against the mast until his neck hurt, needing to feel some physical pain, needing to press the thoughts out of his mind; he clenched his fists into his middle, feeling a sickness sitting in his stomach like a stone.

  He heard the companionway doors opening and turned to see Clem looking around for him, cupping her eyes, trying to block out the light from inside. They were spoilt; everything was tarnished; their love, she and he, it had all been tainted by him. She walked slowly down the deck towards him, pulling her cardigan tight around her body.

  ‘I couldn’t see you. You OK, Hoody?’ she said, crouching down at his side, her hand on his thigh. He couldn’t say anything; he didn’t know what to say, how to express himself.

  ‘I thought you wanted to…’ she said, getting it all wrong. ‘I thought it was all right.’

  ‘We have to get off the boat,’ he said, wiping his mouth.

  ‘We will, as soon as we find somewhere.’

  ‘I really need us to get off the boat,’ he said and she heard his desperation. He wanted to get in the dinghy and row right now. He didn’t care where. He’d rather stumble around on the land than be here.

  ‘I know,’ she said. But she didn’t. She didn’t know anything. She was ignorant and innocent and he wanted her to stay that way. There she was with her hand on his thigh, touching, together, but he felt miles away from her. He had to try and close the gap, to explain himself, but words fell short.

  ‘I think something’s going on’ he whispered. She turned her head and looked him the eye.

  She was, shaking her head, wanting to understand. ‘What do you mean?’

  What did he mean? He could feel her eyes burning into him, waiting for him to explain himself. He had to calm down. He looked up at the stars softly twinkling over there on the edge of the world and he wiped his mouth carefully. He’d try a different tack. ‘What did you think of Smudge’s dance today?’ he asked.

  She looked at him, puzzled by the change of subject. ‘What do you mean, what did I think of it?’

  ‘What did you think?’

  ‘It was funny.’

  ‘Yes. That’s what I thought,’ he said, looking back out into the darkness. ‘But I don’t think we should have been laughing.’

  ‘Why not?’

  He turned to her. ‘I don’t trust Frank.’

  She stared at him for a moment and then she blew out her disdain in a sigh. ‘Oh, for God’s sake, Johnny. I’m getting so sick of this.’

  ‘There’s something about him, Clem… I don’t want you alone with him.’

  ‘What!’ she said, turning on him, annoyed. ‘Why are you doing this? Why are you so jealous? It’s just so boring.’

  It was horrible to see her look at him that way; there was no love there at all. She wrapped the cardigan tight around herself again. ‘I thought you were bigger than that,’ she said and he heard the disappointment in her voice. ‘I didn’t think you’d be so… so…’ She couldn’t find the right word, but whatever word she looking for had a bad taste, he could see that. ‘… small-minded.’

  She got up without even looking at him, shooing him away with her hands and he watched her go back down the deck. Small-minded. He really hoped that she was right, that the only problem was his small-mindedness. He peered through the saloon hatch and caught glimpses of Annie and Frank moving about inside, putting away the table, Clem joining them, picking up the fallen cards,and carrying on just the same as they always had. He stayed up there, watching the sky for hours, waiting and thinking, listening to the wolves over on the mountains howling into the darkness. He kept his eyes on the horizon waiting for their only salvation: wind. He listened to the waves. Every now and then an impotent anger churned about inside him, rose up and then subsided in a fog of confusion. At one stage he saw the port lights of a boat crossing the horizon and he wondered who was in it, what they were doing, what they were thinking. He envied them their everyday worries. The night seemed eternal, as if the sun was refusing to shine on the Little Utopia. But at some hour the wolves stopped their howling and the fingers of dawn crept slowly across the sky giving colour to the world, to the deserted, scrubby, mountainous backdrop behind, yet he could see no beauty in it. But with the light it seemed that all the demons of the night scurried away back into the darkness and he wondered whether the sea madness had started to get to him.

  7

  Happy Birthday

  Johnny had not thought he would sleep but evidently he had. Someone had put a sleeping bag over him, a tender gesture he appreciated, whoever it was. He had a moment’s calm before the shameful thoughts slunk into his mind, like sewage into the open sea. The certainties of last night had lost their edge, were now just fuzzy, indistinguishable shapes. In the glaring light of day they seemed absurd. He sat up and looked over the flat, windless water at the white-gold morning sun, pulling the bag around his shoulders.

  All he and Clem had to do was get off the boat and everything would be fine. They would come across a village or a town, maybe even today, and there they could say farewell and disembark. That sense of urgent panic, of need for escape that he had felt last night, had abated. It seemed ridiculous now to think of himself rowing the dinghy out into the darkness, stumbling about in the wilderness. He was going stir crazy. Clem was right. This jealousy was new and he didn’t like it. He had never felt inadequate before. He closed his eyes and felt the warmth of the sun caress his eyelids.

  This was the first morning he could remember not waking up with Clem in his arms and he missed her. He felt alone. The hatch door beside him fell open with a bang. Smudge stuck her head up through it and was smiling from ear to ear. She was wearing her Captain Hook coat but was also wearing a paper crown on her head. ‘It’s my birthday!’

  ‘Hey!’ he said, pretending that he hadn’t totally forgotten.

  ‘Don’t wake him!’ Frank’s voice called from inside the forecabin.

  ‘It’s all right,’ Johnny called back. ‘I’m awake!’

  Nothing had changed. Everything was the same. Johnny and his jealousy just needed to get off the boat now; that was all. When he looked at Smudge’s radiant smiling face he saw an untroubled soul. He wanted to hug her, to apologise. ‘Happy birthday!’ he said and she climbed out of the hatch and jumped at him, knocking him backwards, her wild black hair sharp against the blueness of the sky behind, her eyes as dark and impenetrable as her father’s.

  ‘Coffee, Johnny?’ Frank yelled through the hatch.

  ‘Please.’

  ‘Mummy said I wasn’t allowed to ask for my present.’ She paused, staring at him hard, pinning his arms down. ‘So I’m not.’

  ‘You might have to
ask Clem about that…’ He would apologize to Clem.

  ‘Why are you sleeping up here?’ Smudge asked him, turning herself around, wriggling into a comfortable position, using his knees as arm rests.

  He ran a hand through his hair. ‘I’m looking out for wind,’ he said as cheerfully as he could because there wasn’t any at all, the sea was like a mirror. She looked out for wind as well and then after a while she turned round again.

  ‘Shall we talk about five?’ she said.

  ‘Yes please,’ he said. ‘Tell me all about five.’ He wondered whether Clem was up. He wanted to see her, to make amends, for things to go back to how they had been.

  ‘Well, there’s one and four. Then there’s two and three. Then there’s five and zero…’ She went through it again in her head. He watched her soft, little, chubby fingers as she counted off the possibilities, the frown of concentration on her brow. She was adorable. He would miss her when they left.

  ‘That’s all I can think of,’ she said.

  ‘And six minus one,’ he said.

  ‘Oh yes, and seven minus two.’

  ‘And two and a half add two and a half.’

  Her eyes lit up. ‘Who would have thought five was such a busy number? How old are you?’ she asked, twisting her neck, looking up to his face.

  ‘I’m twenty-one,’ he said.

  ‘How many fives is that?’

  ‘Four and one left over.’

  ‘I’m five,’ she said as if that were an answer in itself. He nodded and kissed the top of her head and was glad she couldn’t see his eyes and the ugliness that lay behind them.

  ‘Coffee’s up!’ Frank was standing in the companionway, placing mugs on the coachroof, a cigarette dangling from his lips, his dark, curly mop of hair standing on end, the sweet, bitter aroma of the coffee filling the air.

  ‘Today is going to be the best day ever. We’re going to play musical statues,’ Smudge said, pulling Johnny up and along the deck. ‘We’re going to have a picnic on the beach and Mummy’s going to make me a cake.’ She was grinning from ear to ear. ‘We’re going to eat roasting chicken and play hide and seek.’

  Clem was in the cockpit. She had Smudge’s presents in her hand. She had put the necklace into one of her collecting boxes and wrapped towels around the monster-killing stick. She looked up at him cautiously, gauging his mood. Johnny bent down and kissed her and she smiled and touched his hand. He was forgiven.

  ‘This is from me,’ she said, handing over the box to Smudge. ‘And this one is from Johnny.’

  Smudge was so excited she was bouncing with suspense, her little body rigid, her hands clutched to her chest. Johnny couldn’t remember ever feeling such excitement over birthdays; his own family had never really gone in for them.

  Annie came up from the galley while Clem was tying the necklace around Smudge’s neck and Johnny noticed that she didn’t meet his eye when he greeted her. She was smiling, carrying more presents, but when he spoke she didn’t look at him and busied herself going up and down the steps. Even when Smudge opened her monster-killing stick, Annie admired it, said all the right things, but didn’t once actually acknowledge him.

  It carried on that way. When they played musical statues to some shitty Abba song, Annie didn’t once look at him. No one else would have noticed; it was an accomplished ignoring. Briefly, as they hovered in frozen dance inches away from one another he caught her eye but she had looked away at once. She kept herself busy in the kitchen – taking the chicken out of the coolbox, wrapping potatoes in tinfoil, pouring out ingredients for her cake. It was subtle and it was working; he felt told off and troubled. He kept looking out at the horizon for signs of wind. But there was no chance of that today as he watched the bags full of food and crockery being passed out into the cockpit. Frank was in the tender loading the bags neatly. There was no going back: they were going to have a party on the beach.

  Annie asked for Frank to come back for her in twenty minutes as she hadn’t finished the cake and there wouldn’t be room for everyone in the tender anyway. Frank sat down in the boat, balancing out the weight of the bags. He put the oars in the rowlocks and for a moment Johnny thought he was going to row off and how easy it might be to pull up the anchor and start the engine and maroon him on this deserted piece of shore with a tender full of food.

  ‘Johnny, you row us,’ Frank said. ‘Pass me the birthday girl, please.’ He stood up and held out one arm to take her.

  Johnny lifted Smudge up. She had Granny in one hand, the spear in the other and a lollipop in her mouth; he passed her over the side of the Little Utopia, to Frank. Johnny found himself being particularly jovial as if to make up for the grimness of his thoughts.

  So with the tender very low in the water, its holes bunged up with old corks from red wine bottles, Johnny got in and rowed the four of them ashore while Annie remained on board to make the cake. Frank was pointing things out to Smudge, explaining how the birds hunted their prey, how the shapes on the water’s surface gave away where the fish underneath were, what the rock formations told us, his musings on primitive life forms and Johnny thought how lucky Smudge was being brought up like this, in this alternative childhood. He looked over at Clem and she smiled at him and he felt renewed, full of new hope for them. He wanted her all to himself. They really had to leave the boat now. It had been long enough.He looked over to the south, at the huge, majestic mountains shrouded by the deep blue sky, their reflections dancing on the glassy surface of the water, disturbed only by the ripples from the oars. It was like they were stuck inside a snow globe – a sunny globule of undisturbed time.

  He rowed to the shore and they got out of the tender and pulled it up on to the sand. He took Smudge’s hand and the pair of them and Granny went off looking for driftwood while Frank and Clem started building the fire.

  ‘‘Shall I go and get Annie?’ Johnny said after he’d dumped a pile of sticks and logs on the sand.

  ‘Sure,’ Frank said. ‘Thanks.’

  Johnny pushed the little dinghy back into the water, climbed in and began to row back to the Little Utopia. He looked up at the windless sky, the only breeze coming from his own movements through the water. Why did he still feel so trapped? He thought of the Old Rangoon and throwing all those things into the sea – how free and unhampered he had felt then. He yearned for such escapism again. He let his mind ride with fantasies: he and Clem could go for a row in the tender and just not come back to the boat, take their chances on land. Or they could row back to the old woman’s cottage, although there wouldn’t be much point in that: there was nothing there, no transport, no village, just the donkey. He should take another browse through the crappy old chart and try to find out exactly where they were. But he was only daydreaming, he knew that. He looked back at the mountains, at Frank and Clem making the fire, at Smudge in the shallows – they’d arrive somewhere soon enough. He would just have to be patient.

  Clem sat on the sand watching Frank attaching the scrawny chicken corpse to the spit he’d made, his dextrous fingers manipulating the pale flesh as he dug the stick deep inside its body. Smudge was splashing about in the shallows with her fishing net and her monster-killing stick, naked save for her Captain Hook jacket. Clem looked away over at Johnny rowing the dinghy back to the Little Utopia. He had that frown etched on to his brow. She watched him pulling back the oars, drifting further and further away from her. She could feel the void however much they pretended it wasn’t there. She was glad he had slept up on the deck last night, glad that he hadn’t come down wanting sex with her. This was new, this distancing of herself. She was changing; she could feel it. Up until now she had always thought of Johnny as invincible; she was the flawed one and he was perfect. But it wasn’t so. She could see the chinks in his armour and, though she knew it was shallow, it made him less attractive to her. She found his jealousy quite repellent; it magnified his immaturity. How silly she had once been to wish for it, to feel as if it were proof of love, when all it did was make
him seem weak and less of a man. He should be learning from Frank, not jealous of him – Frank would never stoop to such neediness. Her father had once said that about her mother. She’s so needy. She hadn’t understood it at the time; she’d thought he was being callous and cruel, justifying leaving them. She had already learnt to dislike him by then; her mother had taught her that, with her drip-feeding of resentments. But her mother was needy, it was true, needy and preoccupied by the little things. She remembered her mother’s outrage on discovering that Liz was eight years older than her and had varicose veins and no style. As if it was all about looks. But she was beginning to understand that attraction was a much more complicated thing.

  ‘Penny for your thoughts?’ Frank said. She took her eyes off the horizon and glanced at him, at his broad dented shoulder, his huge gentle hands picking out the dud matches from the box, putting them neatly on the stack of wood beneath the spit. She watched as he pulled out a live match and struck it firmly against the side of the box. The sunlight was so bright, the wind so absent, the flame so upright, it was almost invisible. He bent down and lit the rolled-up newspaper at the bottom of the pile. He blew out the match and flicked it on the pile, then sat back to watch the fire burn.

  ‘I was thinking about my dad,’ she said. Even she sounded surprised. Prior to this trip she rarely thought of him, let alone talked about him, not even with Johnny. He was not a feature in her life any more.

  ‘You’re not close, are you?’

  ‘God, no. I’ve hardly seen him in years.’

  Frank looked up at her. ‘That’s a shame.’

  She shrugged. ‘Not really.’ But it was. She knew it was. She didn’t like to think about all the shames that had stacked up over the years.

  ‘For him, I mean.’