The Boatbuilder

by Daniel Gumbiner

  The day she visited, they hiked the trail that ran along Sausal Creek and down to Miller’s Point. It was a warm day, with no fog, and all along the trail there were orange monkey flowers and sweet-smelling sagebrush. Berg brought sandwiches, a thermos of coffee, and a couple of bananas. As they walked toward the point, they passed a group of young men who were fishing. Nell greeted them and asked them what they had caught.

  “Rays, mostly,” one of the men said.

  “What are you trying to catch?” Nell asked.

  The man thought for a moment. “I guess… whatever,” he said.

  “Whatever,” Nell repeated.

  “Yeah, whatever,” he said, shrugging.

  They walked past the men, out to the point, and sat down on the grass with a crunch. Berg looked out at the water, which was full of small pale waves. Nell inspected her arm.

  “I think I might have brushed some poison oak back there,” she said.

  Nell was extremely allergic to poison oak. She seemed to get it every other time she went on a hike. When she was a junior in high school, she got it all around her mouth because she’d rubbed her face with a mango skin, which, it turns out, has the same toxin as poison oak. She toured colleges like this, the allergic skin red and swollen, ringing her lips like a goatee. Berg had seen photos.

  “Seems okay to me,” Berg said, looking at the arm in question.

  “It can take days to show up,” Nell said. “It’s okay. I’ll just wash myself with the poison oak soap when I get home. I brought some.”

  Berg handed Nell her sandwich. She took a bite and looked back toward the fishermen.

  “People fish over there a lot,” Berg said, following her gaze.

  “I get it,” Nell said. “It seems like a great place to hang out. Bring a few beers, sit in the sun, catch some whatever fish.”

  Berg laughed. “Lean this way,” he said. “I want to take a picture of you. The light is so good.”

  “With or without sandwich?”

  “With.”

  He took out his phone and aimed the camera. Nell pursed her lips, opened her eyes wide like she’d just heard something very surprising.

  “Relax,” he said. “You always make a weird face.”

  “I can’t help it.”

  She tried to strike a different pose but only looked stiffer, more self-conscious.

  “Don’t be weird,” Berg said. “Just be yourself.”

  “I’m weird in photos,” Nell replied. “That is myself.”

  After their picnic, Berg drove Nell over to Talinas and showed her around town. They bought a fancy cheese and stopped at the bakery for a cinnamon bun. They were heading to the car when Berg saw Lapley. He was standing on the other side of Main Street, next to the Station House diner, and leafing through the local paper. Nell would know what that friendship was about right away. Berg lowered his baseball cap over his eyes and picked up the pace. They were in the car and on the road before Lapley looked up from the news. Berg took a deep breath and put on a new podcast he’d been listening to.

  “Have you heard this show?” he said to Nell. “I think you’ll like it.”

  That night they cooked sausages and drank beer. When Berg drank he always wanted opioids and, at one point, he snuck off to his secret stash in the bedroom. He swallowed three Lortabs and then immediately felt a wave of shame. He’d come so far over the past couple of weeks but here he was, taking three pills at a time. If Nell knew, she’d be so disappointed. She smoked and drank but she’d never had a problem with substances. She always knew how far to push that kind of thing. It seemed intuitive for her. Nell had good intuition when it came to many things. Her best friend Jo often said that she‘d “been born knowing how to live.”

  They went to bed early, slipping into boxers and T-shirts. Nell lay on her back and smoked a joint while he kissed her neck. People always described opioid users as taking pills and then collapsing into the couch, their tongues lolling out the side of their mouths. But that’s not how it felt at all. Berg’s whole body surged with an overwhelming sense of well-being and energy. He was able to feel his feelings in a pure, unmediated fashion, like he could when he was a child.

  Nell put out the joint and rolled onto his chest. Boxers off, underwear off, slow at first, Nell on top, Berg’s feet and hands sweaty, Nell’s T-shirt still on, billowing before her like a kite. Then fast and hot, Mimi’s platform bed squeaking, Nell’s shirt off, Berg on top, his face buried in her hair, that Nell hair smell, ocean and honey and mint. An untraceable passage of time, perhaps elongated or compressed, who could say, certainly distorted, warped, sweaty and breathy and then, Nell coming, gulping in air, squeezing his arms, gasping. He finished with his head buried in the pillow, his heart beating thud thud thud, his chest uncorked.

  Nell grabbed the towel next to the bed, arched her back up, and placed the towel beneath her. He slid out and she folded the towel over, wiped herself clean. She threw the towel onto the floor and rolled over onto a pillow. Berg looked out the window. A moth torpedoed into the glass, staggered backward upon impact, and then torpedoed once again.

  “These are your sheets, aren’t they?” Nell said. “If we ever move in together we’re not using these flannel sheets.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because you always sweat so much in them.”

  “I sweat in all sheets,” Berg said. “It’s just one my things. I sweat at night. I think it’s an Ashkenazi Jew thing. I know a lot of Ashkenazis who sweat at night.”

  “Okay,” Nell said. “All I’m saying is you sweat more in the flannel.”

  Berg disagreed but didn’t want to pursue the argument. “Maybe,” he offered. “Do you want any water?”

  “Sure.”

  He stood up and walked to the bathroom sink, filled two glasses. This took a long time. Mimi’s bathroom sink had terrible water pressure. The flow was so weak that it could not clear hairs from his razor when he shaved. He had to use the bathtub faucet instead, which was a cumbersome process, and made him shave less than usual. As he filled the glasses, he thought about how nice it was to see Nell, how much he wanted her to stay. If you had asked him a few weeks ago if he was lonely in Talinas, he would have said no. But now that Nell was here, he didn’t want her to go.

  “It’s so quiet here,” Nell said as he handed her a glass. “I’m going to sleep so well.”

  “I think you’d really like it up here,” Berg said.

  “I do like it up here.”

  “No, I mean, if you moved up here, with me. I think you’d like it.”

  Nell sat up straight, brushed her hair out of her eyes.

  “We talked about that before you moved,” she said. “I need to be in the city right now. This was our plan. I love coming up here to visit.”

  “This is the first time you’ve come up.”

  “And I’m loving it. I just got back. What do you want me to say?”

  “I know it’s not what we planned,” Berg said, “but I guess it’s just… it’s lonelier up here than I anticipated.”

  “So you’re saying it’s good to see me,” Nell said.

  Berg grinned. He wasn’t sure what he was saying.

  “You need to get out and meet some people,” she said, encouragingly. “I was talking about this with Jo the other day: how so many men I know seem to grow more isolated as they get older. My uncle, for example. I’m not saying you’re growing isolated. I’m just saying it seems like a challenge for men as they age, to keep friendships alive.”

  Berg felt immediately defensive. Was she saying he was a loner? He was not a loner. He had lots of friends from college, and he’d had friends in the city. But when was the last time he called any of them or saw them? The only people he hung out with these days were Garrett and Simon and they were not exactly his friends. He thought about all the time he’d spent by himself the past couple of weeks, building Lansing’s coop. He was closing in on himself, Nell was right. Even when he lived in the city he hadn’t
really had any close friends. A few coworkers he would get drinks with and a couple of guys, like Eugene, whom he partied with. Most of the time he hung out with Nell’s friends. They were his friends, too, but in a secondary way. He certainly hadn’t seen any of them since he moved to Talinas.

  “Relax your brow,” Nell said, stroking his forehead with the back of her hand. “Your brow is all scrunched up.”

  Berg tried to relax the muscles in his face, blinked a few times. Nell moved in to kiss him. It was a good, long kiss. When it was over she leaned back against the headboard, stared down at her shins.

  “Man,” she said, “I really need to shave my leg hair.”

  CHAPTER 6

  FRIDAY MORNING, BERG BIKING along the 1, his feet sore, his back sore, the specter of a headache on the horizon. The 1 ran north to south along the bay, and from there forked inland for a bit until it nosed its way out to Jensen Beach. After that it continued south, disappearing into the city, only to emerge, miles later, along the cliffs of Pacifica. Cyclists often cruised the 1, wending their way up to Talinas, where they stopped to buy coffee and pastries and admire the feed barn. On the weekend, they swarmed the town, and you would see them meandering from shop to shop, walking in the funny way the cyclists walked, on their heels, like penguins.

  Berg had gotten a headache around the same time yesterday, as he was biking to work. It had lasted the whole day and into the night. The headaches made sleep difficult and, this morning, he had woken up feeling unrested, foggy, as if he’d been drinking whiskey the night before. He reached for the glass of water next to the bed, took a sip, and then spit out the water. It tasted terrible, like a dirty puddle. He’d forgotten that he’d left the glass there for the past three days. He got up and threw the rest of the water into the potted fern by the bed, walked to the kitchen. The sun was already up so he made coffee and toast. While he waited for the coffee to brew, he washed a few dishes in the sink, lathering them in lemony soap.

  He thought about calling in sick, but he’d already done that a couple of times earlier in the month, when he’d taken too many Lortabs and slept through his alarm. After Nell’s visit, he’d started taking more pills again. It wasn’t until he missed multiple days of work that he realized his tapering project had failed. He decided he would quit cold turkey instead.

  The next two weeks, without any opioids at all, were excruciating. Constant headaches, his whole body in a state of general discomfort. He took a lot of acetaminophen and ibuprofen but it wasn’t the same. He had very little energy and he suffered from diarrhea and nausea. At work he was always sneaking off to the staff outhouse by the water or running to the head if they were on a charter. One day Garrett saw him leaving the outhouse for the third time that morning and he gave him a pitying look.

  “Whatever Chinese restaurant you’re going to,” Garrett said, “I would stop going to it. That’s my advice to you.”

  So here he was today, another headache looming, biking toward Fernwood. They were scheduled to do a charter out of Pier 4 at 11:00. It was BYO, which meant that Berg would have to serve whatever kind of food and drinks the clients brought. BYOs could work in your favor or they could be terrible. Sometimes people brought almost no food and drink and Berg was able to help Simon sail the whole trip. Other times people brought twelve bottles of rosé and got drunk and Berg had to clean vomit out of the head. One time, a woman brought an elaborate fondue setup and Berg found himself heating cheese in a cauldron on the cabin top.

  Berg and Simon refueled the boats in the marina and then began prepping Blown Away for the charter. They put the deck gear on deck, tested the engine, clipped in the halyard, secured all the hatches. By 10 a.m. they had cast off and were en route to Pier 4. Simon was steering the boat and Berg and Garrett were sitting below the dodger. Garrett seemed to be in a particularly buoyant mood.

  “Going to the Oysters game later tonight,” he said.

  The Muire County Oysters were the local minor-league baseball team. Their mascot was a talking oyster that looked more like a frog than an oyster. People around the county had signs in front of their homes that said SHUCK ’EM UP. GO OYSTERS.

  “Who’s pitching?” Simon asked.

  “Santorini,” Garrett said.

  “Oh yeah, Santorini. He’s good.”

  “He’s really good. He’s probably the best Oysters pitcher of all time. If not the best, then at least in the top three.”

  “What about Lew Brown?” Simon said.

  “He’s in the top three, too.”

  “Who else is in the top three?”

  “There’s one other. That’s why it’s a top three.”

  “Who is it?”

  “I’m not going to feed everything to you like a baby bird, Simon. Go get a history book. Educate yourself.”

  “You’re not going to tell me ’cause you don’t know.”

  “What?”

  “You just made up this arbitrary list.”

  “Is the galley clean, Simon? Berg, come steer for a bit. You need the practice and Simon needs to clean the galley.”

  When they got close to Pier 4, Garrett took the wheel and Berg kicked over the fenders, draped the dock lines along the lifelines for easy access. Garrett brought the boat in at an angle and then threw it into reverse, using the prop walk to swing the stern around. After Berg had made fast the dock lines, he came back on board and began placing life vests on deck.

  “How many people are we?” he asked Garrett.

  “Twelve. So fifteen life vests. Make sure you text Mangini after we’re underway, too.”

  Once Berg set up the life vests, he gathered the liability waivers and stepped off the boat onto the pier. Garrett was sitting on top of a dock box, talking to the client on his cell phone.

  “What did you say? You’re at Pier 1½? Why are you at Pier 1½? Yeah, we had you scheduled for 12:00 at Pier 4. Two-hour cruise. You guys said you were bringing an ice cream cake. Right. There’s a boat there already? You must have double-booked. Yeah. I don’t know how. We don’t pick up at Pier 1½. What’s the Captain’s name? Billy? Yeah, okay, and how many people are you again? Twelve. Perfect. Thanks, Todd. Well, you head off with them. We’ll settle this up tomorrow over the phone. Okay. Enjoy yourself. Yeah, no problem. No, no, really it’s no problem.”

  He hung up and pumped his fist.

  “Yes, yes, yes!” he shouted. “We are going to nail those fuckers. I am going to nail Billy. He’s been doing this for years.”

  “Doing what?” Berg asked.

  “Chartering out of Pier 1½ with a six-pack license. He is not licensed to carry twelve passengers. Do you know how much it cost us to get Blown Away to pass Coast Guard inspection? And these guys are fucking stealing charters out from under our noses with insufficient licenses. But oh, we ’re gonna destroy ’em. We’re gonna destroy ’em. I am so pumped.”

  He climbed down into the galley and called the Coast Guard. A young man picked up and Garrett put him on loudspeaker. Garrett always put calls on loudspeaker.

  “United States Coast Guard Sector Eleven,” the man said.

  “Good afternoon. I want to report an illegal charter that is happening right now, departing from Pier 1½.” Garrett was rubbing his jaw, pacing back and forth in the small galley.

  “Okay, sir, what can you tell me about the charter?”

  “It is motor vessel Chico Rico, that’s M/V Chico Rico, and it’s departing from Pier 1½ as we speak with twelve passengers and the captain is only licensed with a six-pack, and I know this because they were supposed to be my charter but they were taken out from under my nose.”

  “Sir, we currently have a rescue taking place along the coast. We will probably have to handle this administratively. Or we’ll board the vessel next time we see it. In any case, we’ll have an investigator give you a call tomorrow.”

  “But they’re gonna deny it,” Garrett said. “There will be no evidence.”

  “I’m sorry sir, but we don’t have the cap
acity to address the issue at this time.”

  The Coast Guard officer hung up.

  “Motherfuckers,” Garrett said. “We’ll go it alone.”

  “What?” Berg said.

  “You heard me. We’ll go it alone.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “I’m not scared of anyone, man. I’m not scared of anyone. Cast off the dock lines, Berg.”

  “Oh yeah,” Simon said. “We’re gonna get these fuckers.”

  They motored over to Pier 1½ but by the time they got there Chico Rico had departed. There was nothing around except an abandoned orange motorboat with a broken windshield and a seagull pecking at fish guts. Berg’s headache was steadily emerging. He did not want to chase down M/V Chico Rico so they could narc them out to the Coast Guard, but Garrett and Simon were galvanized, and Berg sensed that the trip was far from over.

  “They probably went to Horse Island,” Simon said. “Probably doing a little spin around Horse Island.”

  “Good idea,” Garrett said.

  They motored southwest toward the island. Simon steered and Garrett scanned the bay with his binoculars. Berg went to the bow, held onto the forestay, and surveyed the bay. There were a few other boats out but no sign of Chico Rico. A platoon of cormorants flew low along the shore and Muire birds dipped their heads in and out of the cold water. The shiny back of a seal appeared and then slipped below the surface. At the bow, Simon and Garrett could not see him, and Berg was able to close his eyes. This held the headache at bay to a certain extent. He was able to keep his eyes closed for several minutes, until Simon shouted.

  “Over there!” he said. “It’s them.”

  Chico Rico was a thirty-five-foot motorboat with a small galley. There were grooves running along her hull to present the illusion of wooden planking but she was made out of fiberglass. The boat was heading straight at them, slightly to port. Simon throttled down as the vessels neared each other.

  “Get your phone ready,” Garrett shouted at Berg. “We’re going to take photos when we pass them.”

  A few minutes later the boats passed each other, port to port, and Garrett and Berg casually took photos. Berg tried to act like he was checking something on his phone and not photographing the other boat. It was hard to say if there were twelve people on board but there were certainly more than six. Once they passed the boat, Berg looked back at its stern: there were two men sitting in wooden chairs, drinking white wine from stemless glasses. Berg waved at them and they waved back.