by Scott Cramer
“Where do they go if the entire planet is a natural disaster?” Derek said, matching the sarcasm of his earlier comment.
Abby remembered a discussion at council where they had argued which natural disaster had been worse: the large meteorite that had crashed into Earth millions of years ago, killing all the dinosaurs, or the comet that had poisoned the atmosphere, killing everyone who had passed through puberty. Most had agreed it was the latter.
Abby had her own outrageous theory. “The ship might be carrying the antibiotic,” she said. After all, she had willed the ship into existence through her many fantasies. Why not also imagine the antibiotic onboard?
“The CDC would tell us if they were sending it,” Emily said.
They all turned to Jimmy, who, as always, had his ear glued to the radio, listening to the CDC broadcasts. He simply shook his head.
Kevin suggested a possible reason for secrecy. “If everyone knew where a ship loaded with antibiotics was going,” he said, “millions of kids would show up. There’d be riots.”
Eddie hopped to his feet. “It’s moving north.”
Jordan was still against taking Sea Ray, saying they couldn’t afford to waste the fuel.
Eddie challenged him. “Explain why it’s moving north? You said yourself it should head south.”
“I can’t explain it,” Jordan said. “Anyway, it would take all our fuel just to get out there. We’d be stranded at sea.”
“We can tow the sailing skiff,” Eddie shot back.
Jordan shook his head. “I don’t think we should.”
Abby couldn’t understand why her brother was being so stubborn, but she offered him a compromise. “Ships turn on their lights at night, right? Let’s wait. If the crew turns on the lights when it gets dark, then you should take Sea Ray.”
Jordan agreed, although reluctantly.
“Let’s build a fire so they’ll know we’re here,” Abby said.
Like an army of ants, the kids carried armloads of wood from out back—their winter supply—and built a pyramid beside the road. Eddie sprinkled gasoline on the base, cautioned everyone to stand back, and touched the match to the fuel. Sprinting flames ignited a huge fire ball that radiated intense heat. They all fetched buckets of seawater to make smoke and throughout the afternoon alternated feeding and dousing the fire.
The day’s last light glowed on the western horizon and soon the dark of night swallowed the horizon and the ship with it. No lights appeared on the ghost ship.
“It’s drifting in the Gulf Stream,” Jordan said. Tucking his head, he walked toward the mansion.
Abby stayed on the beach until she was alone. The dying embers of the fire did little to ward off the chill she felt deep in her soul. They had wasted their wood supply because of her fantasy.
MONTH 8 – LOST
Toucan grinned and kicked her legs on her flying seat. “Jorie, I want to go higher,” she squealed. “Give me an under-doggy.” Danny was standing next to her, holding on to the swing chain.
Jordan had been coming to this playground, swinging here, since he was Touk’s age. Located halfway between the bowling alley and the docks, the harbor playground also had four seesaws, a sandbox, and an octagonal bandstand, where, in summers past, a band played marching music when the evening ferries docked.
The grass, which nobody had mowed since well before the night of the purple moon, rose to Jordan’s knees.
The swing-set was the highlight of the playground, constructed with sturdy pipe and chain, built for death-defying thrills.
“What’s an under-doggy?” Emily asked from over by the picnic table.
Jordan dropped his hands by his sides. “Are you kidding me?”
She pretended to pout. “Show me, smarty pants.”
“I will! Touk, you ready?”
His sister lit up. “Ready, Jorie.”
“Danny, step back.” Jordan waved his arm for added drama. “Toucan might fly out of the swing and land all the way across the street!”
“I want an under-doggy,” Danny cried.
“You’re next,” Jordan told him. “Now back up.”
Danny ran over to Emily.
It was a rare December day, mild as Indian Summer. Jordan tossed his jacket aside and positioned Toucan in the middle of the seat.
“Get ready,” he said, pulling her back.
Toucan giggled. “My tummy feels funny.”
His voice rang out with attempted seriousness. “One. Two …”
Toucan cried, “Under-doggy!”
“Two and a half. Two and three quarters.” Jordan charged forward and pushed his sister as hard as he could. “Three!” At her highest point, the swing chains were parallel with the ground. “That,” Jordan proclaimed proudly, “is an under-doggy.”
After giving the kids several thrilling rides, Jordan sat next to Emily at the picnic table. Toucan and Danny were now playing on the see-saw.
Emily handed him a small package from the picnic basket wrapped in foil. “Guess what it is?”
“Uh, a cracker sandwich?”
She smiled. “That’s right. But what’s in it?”
Jordan didn’t want to play guess-what’s-in-the-cracker-sandwich. He wanted to kiss Emily, even at the risk of starting the kids howling. “Hmm,” he said and closed his eyes.
The sun warmed his face and the sounds of Danny and Toucan laughing and chattering filled his ears. The scent of Emily’s Pink Sugar perfume wafted all around him. At times like this, Jordan thought he could almost forget about their dire situation.
Emily playfully poked him in the ribs. “Well?”
All of a sudden Sea Ray’s engine fired up. Stunned, Jordan snapped his head toward the dock and saw Glen hop out of the boat and bend over the huge cleat. He realized Glen was clearing the mooring line. Was Toby with him? Jordan hadn’t seen either boy since Chad had died.
Jordan shot off the bench and sprinted toward the dock.
Glen freed the line, hopped back onto Sea Ray, and moved straight to the helm.
“Stop!” Jordan shouted.
Soon the burble of the engine deepened and the boat pulled away from the dock.
Jordan flew over the wide dock planks. Should he try to leap onto the boat? Everyone’s survival depended on Sea Ray. They were saving Sea Ray for a trip to the mainland to secure the antibiotic. Last week he and Eddie had charged the trawler’s battery, burning up ten precious minutes of fuel. Glen was about to burn up the rest. Jordan thought he might be able to reach the stern and pull himself over the railing, but if he fell short, he’d plunge into the frigid water.
He slowed to a stop when he realized the gap between the dock and the moving boat was too great. He waved his arms and jumped. “Glen! Come back. Glen. We don’t have any more diesel fuel.”
Glen didn’t look back once. Where was he going? Nothing made sense.
Jordan set off for the jetty. The boat would pass close to the tip of the jetty before leaving the harbor. It offered him one last attempt to reason with Glen, to beg Glen to return to the dock.
Jordan moved like a machine, lungs inflating and expelling rushes of air, arms pumping. He deftly navigated ruts, rocks, tar, gravel, dirt, loose sand, and then scrambled up the huge blocks of granite and raced toward the beacon, keeping an eye on Sea Ray. She was churning up a steep rolling wake, her bow angled high.
Jordan landed awkwardly in a crevice and his ankle buckled. He hobbled the rest of the way. At the tip of the jetty, he held onto the beacon’s metal brace and shouted until he was hoarse.
Sea Ray motored by less than twenty yards away, heading straight out to sea, with Glen at the helm, standing stiff as a soldier.
Suddenly, in the blink of an eye, the trawler disappeared! It was as if a giant squid had wrapped its tentacles around the boat and pulled it down to a watery grave.
Jordan understood what had happened and quickly reached for his walkie-talkie. As he was about to report the devastating news, the fog swallowed him,
too.
* * *
Emily blinked. The jetty had just vanished before her eyes. The warehouse and sailboats in dry dock disappeared next. The white wave rolled toward her. She thought to get the kids and stay together.
“Toucan, Danny,” she said. “Don’t move.”
Danny had pinned Toucan up in the air on the see-saw. He hopped off his end, and Toucan crashed down. Both giggling, they looked at Emily with impish grins and then, hand in hand, ran in the other direction.
The fog consumed them and her.
The cold mist pressed against her eyeballs. Emily couldn’t tell which way was up or down. She shouted, “Danny! Toucan! Where are you?” It was like screaming into a pillow.
“Em’ly.”
It was impossible to locate Toucan from her cry. The voice seemed to come from all directions.
“Toucan!” Emily cried and listened. All she heard was her heart thudding heavily in her chest.
Emily created a map of the playground in her mind and followed it to the see-saw, counting her steps. After fifteen paces, she bumped into something hard. She patted the object until she recognized it was a fire hydrant. She had been going the wrong way.
She turned, ready to race back. Had she turned ninety degrees? Or one-hundred-and-eighty? Emily told herself to stay calm. She decided on a direction that would put her in the general vicinity of the see-saw.
Emily took two steps and tripped over the fire hydrant.
* * *
Kevin charged into Abby’s bedroom without knocking. Abby had just opened the window to let in the warm, spring-like breeze.
“Glen took Sea Ray!” he stammered.
Abby hardly took a breath as Kevin relayed what Jordan had told him over the walkie-talkie. “Even if Glen returns,” Kevin said, “the fuel will be used up.”
“Was Toby with him?” she asked.
“Jordan didn’t see him,” Kevin said. “Abby, there’s something else. Fog moved into the harbor. Jordan says it’s pretty thick.”
Her thoughts swirled, stirred by fear. Sea Ray, their lifeline to the mainland, was gone for good. But Abby knew they could find another way to reach the mainland. It wasn’t as if they hadn’t discussed other options. She worried more about her brother alone on the jetty in the fog. The water was frigid. If Jordan fell off the jetty, he’d die of hypothermia, assuming that he survived after hitting the jagged rocks.
“What’s Jordan going to do?” she asked, hearing the panic in her tone.
“Abby, he’s fine. He says he’s crawling.”
She didn’t believe that for a minute. “What about Touk, Emily, and Danny?”
“He said they’re fine.”
“Kevin, he can’t possibly know that. He’s on the jetty. In the fog! They’re at the playground, right?”
Looking past her, Kevin’s eyes suddenly widened.
Abby wheeled around and saw that the window panes were solid white. Fog was pouring through the opening, thick as cream.
* * *
Jordan held his finger before his eyes to measure the fog’s thickness. He poked his eye, unable to see anything. It was classic Castine Island fog brewed up from the combination of warm air and frigid water. Fog like this sometimes settled in for a long time.
He continued to crawl a few more feet but then realized it would take him hours to get off the jetty, not to mention his knees really hurt. He wanted to reach Emily as quickly as possible for her sake. She’d be worried about him. He wasn’t the least bit worried about her, though. She would know to gather Toucan and Danny and stay put, wait it out.
Jordan rose shakily to his feet. Gravity’s compass gave him only the general direction of down. He tapped his toe on stone, took a step, and repeated the maneuver. After making steady progress, he suddenly toed air. Fear rippled through him. He had thought he was in the center of jetty, not the edge.
It took a moment for his heart to stop racing. He decided to use the jetty’s edge as a guide. He dipped his left foot and slid it along the outer edge of the boulders. If he paid attention and if he didn’t stumble, he’d be safe.
Two big ifs.
“Jordan!” Abby’s voice crackled over the walkie-talkie.
He heard the panic in her tone in that one word. His sister’s fear of fog seemed to fluctuate from severe to extremely severe. He could see how his being on the jetty might intensify her phobia. Her imagination was going wild; she probably thought he’d fall off and drown.
Jordan did not hesitate to lie. He told her the fog had started to lift and that he was going to stay on the jetty until it lifted further. Then he remembered telling Kevin that he was crawling.
“I’ve given up crawling,” he said. “It makes my knees too sore.”
That was true.
“Please be safe,” she said.
Jordan knew that she didn’t believe him.
“What about Emily and the kids?” Abby asked.
“I can’t see them, Abby, but I know they’re fine. They’re all together at the playground.”
When Abby called again, Jordan was still on the jetty. He had just reached the base. He knew his location because of the crunching sound he made stepping on broken clamshells.
“It’s lifting slowly but surely,” he told his sister.
“Not here, Jordan.”
“Hey, I should be able to see Emily and the kids pretty soon. I’ll call you the minute I see them.”
Jordan thought that it would take Abby a long time before she forgave him for lying. But she would also feel a lot better when he called to say that he and Emily and Toucan and Danny were together at the playground. He hoped to radio her soon with this news.
He sat down, ready to inch his way on his butt down to the sand. The fog had slobbered over the granite, making the giant blocks slick as ice cubes, and he slid all the way.
He moved faster now, navigating by the texture of the ground. He realized he was in the vicinity of the playground when he felt himself wading into tall grass.
“Toucan. Danny!”
Emily’s voice seemed far away. A chill rippled down his spine knowing that she was not with the kids.
“Emily!” he shouted. “Where are you? Emily!”
“Jordan!”
He guessed her position and moved forward. When they bumped into each other, she grabbed his arm with a death grip.
“They’re lost!” she cried.
He felt her trembling. “Emily, it’s ok. Don’t worry. We’ll find them.”
Jordan reached for his walkie-talkie, dreading what he was about to tell Abby.
* * *
Abby assembled a search party to look for Touk and Danny. “Dress warm,” she told the group inside the mansion. “Everyone should bring a flashlight. Put new batteries in your radios. Eddie, Duke, and Derek will drive.”
“Are you kidding me?” Derek said. “How will we stay on the road? You can’t see three feet.”
Abby felt her throat crimp. She couldn’t speak. Eddie eyed her with concern and then seemed to sense what had happened to her.
He took over as leader. “Stay right behind me,” Eddie told Derek. “I’ll keep the flashing lights on.”
Each kid who stepped out the door disappeared instantly, erased by fog. Eddie took Abby by the arm and pulled her as much as he guided her. She froze before the cold white wall, too terrified to continue.
“I can’t,” she stuttered. Her heart was beating so rapidly it was humming.
Eddie tugged hard. “Yes, you can.”
She dug her nails into his arm and shuddered as icy fingers of mist clutched at her face and neck. Light-headed and nauseated, she somehow kept shuffling her feet and finally they reached the cruiser. Eddie opened the car door and gave her a gentle shove. Abby suddenly felt trapped inside an airtight bottle. She struggled to breathe.
Eddie fired up the engine and raised the microphone to his lips. “Jordan, we’re leaving now.”
“Call when you get closer,” Jordan res
ponded. “Let’s meet outside the bowling alley.”
Abby grabbed the mic. “Jordan, how did this happen?”
He didn’t respond.
She thought about his lies. He had told her the fog was lifting and he would remain on the jetty. Why had he left Emily and the kids in the first place? Abby exploded. “Answer me!” she screamed. “How could you lose them?”
Eddie pried the mic out of her hands. “Don’t worry, we’ll find them.”
Abby burst into tears.
* * *
Emily found Jordan’s shoulder and worked her hand down his arm. “Give me the radio,” she said. “I want to tell Abby what happened. It’s my fault they’re lost.”
His hand was empty, which meant he had the walkie-talkie in his other hand. Emily felt him pivot away from her to keep her from getting it.
“Emily, it’s nobody’s fault,” Jordan said. “The fog came in fast. Abby didn’t mean to yell. She’s frightened.”
Emily vowed to herself that she would tell Abby the truth at some point, but right now precious seconds were slipping away.
“Let’s keep looking,” she said.
Emily gripped Jordan’s left hand with her right hand and they both stretched their arms wide and swept their feet back and forth with each step forward, calling out the kids’ names. Eddie’s voice also penetrated the blinding fog. He reported his advancing position over the radio. “We’ve gone a quarter mile … half mile … I think we just passed the fishing jetty.”
“What if they left the playground?” Emily said.
“We need to check the docks,” Jordan said with an urgency that left a sick feeling in Emily’s gut.
They moved faster and bumped into a car, a mailbox. They stubbed toes on rocks and the curbstone.
They finally reached the wooden planks of the dock. The quarter-inch gaps between the planks served as milestones of their progress. Emily thought they were about halfway to the end when she kicked something small and familiar. “Wait,” she said and dropped to her knees.
Emily grasped the object. It was not quite as long and wide as her hand. She had only to pinch the tip of the shoelace for her heart to sink.
It was Toucan’s red sneaker.
