Leveling

by Diana Knightley

  Luna rushed over and dropped to her knees. She grasped big, red, plump berries, plucked them, looked at them adoringly, and shoved them into her mouth. After a cool dozen, she asked, “I feel so bad.” Red juice dripped down her chin. “I should save you some.” Her cheeks were full, her voice muffled. “Do you want some?”

  “No thanks, I’ve had plenty.” Beckett watched her eat. “When was your last meal?”

  “A while. No fruit in forever.”

  Beckett headed to his kitchen. “I have some meat. Would you like a sandwich or two?”

  “I’d love two, thanks. Bread, mayo, cheese,” she answered without prompting.

  As Beckett made the sandwiches he watched her work her way down a row of strawberries. He had never seen someone behave so unselfconsciously. Unguarded. Free. Beckett couldn’t decide if he liked it or not—she wasn’t giving the gravity of the situation its due consideration, but it was nice to have someone to talk to. Beckett hadn’t done much but be alone, worrying, for a long, long time.

  Finally, satiated from the fruit, Luna brushed off her knees. “Wow, what a view. You must have the best view in the whole entire, covered-in-tons-of-water, world.” She walked along the long low perimeter wall, turned the corner, and walked along the next perimeter, calling back over her shoulder, “And in every direction there’s nothing. Isn’t it amazing? Just ocean, far and wide. So beautiful.”

  “Um hmm,” said Beckett. Unsure if he could agree. He had grown used to thinking of the ocean in a whole other way.

  Luna leaned out and over, pointing down. “There’s my paddleboard! It’s teeny tiny!”

  “I wish you wouldn’t.”

  “Wouldn’t what? Lean, like this?” Three quarters of her body was across the low railing now.

  “Yeah, yeah, like that, don’t.”

  Luna pulled back from the edge without noticing Beckett’s angst. “Have you jumped? You totally could from here. Thirty feet—maybe a tad more.” Her hands were on her hips as she appraised the distance.

  Beckett stopped mid-movement, frozen, mayo knife gripped in his fist.

  Would she jump?

  And what would he do if she did?

  The moment passed.

  Luna wandered toward the kitchen and Beckett exhaled his breath.

  They carried their sandwiches to a table and sat down. Luna peeled up the top bread and investigated her sandwich’s layers. “You’re a mayo on both top and bottom kind of guy, I see, very interesting. I would have pegged you for a top layer only.” She took a big bite.

  He watched her chew. Then took a big bite of his own sandwich and ate without response. Finally he said, “I don’t know, you aren’t what I expected.”

  She smiled widely. “Everyone says that.” But in truth they didn’t, nobody ever said that. Luna was a Nomad, just like every other Nomad. She traveled in a group and everyone knew her, had always known her. She was always just what everyone expected.

  “You haven’t told me your name.”

  “Oh me? I’m Anna Barlow. At your service,” said Luna.

  “Like the actress, huh? Okay, nice to meet you.”

  Beckett rubbed his hands on a napkin and tossed it to the table. He strode to a large trunk, opened it, and pulled out a large ruck sack. “I have these. One for each of you.” Luna walked to his side and watched him unzip the top of the sack. He pulled out some packages. “These are rations, food, enough for a week if you’re careful...How fast do you paddle?”

  Luna said, “As fast as a dolphin dives on an off day.”

  “I mean, if you’re paddling, in a day, how far can you go?”

  “I can go as far as I need to go. If I’m singing I can go farther. I’m not sure I get what you’re asking.”

  “In my training I was told that the Nomads would be able to get to the next Outpost east in a few days. The Mainland a few days after that. But you’d have to go fast, okay? Fast.”

  “Of course. Due Haste. East. Okay fast. You’re being serious again, I didn’t want to mention it, but Sam, the guy that lived here before you, was pretty lighthearted. I’m not sure he’d approve of your hospitality. Of course it’s been a few years.”

  “I didn’t know him.” Beckett’s brow knit, but he carried on with his instructions. “This is a water desalinization kit and a jug. It’s heavy. Do you think you can pull this too? Will it slow you down?”

  Luna looked at the half-empty trunk, “Which families have you given packs to?”

  “About three weeks ago I gave out ten to the, um...” He pulled a notebook out of the trunk. “The Lacertilias.”

  Luna said, “I’ve met them.”

  “A month before that, um, close to twenty, that was a big group. The Coleopteras.”

  Luna leaned over his shoulder, reading down the family names. Recognizing some, searching them all.

  “Have you met any Saturniidaes?”

  He handed her the notebook. “If they’re not on the list, then no. Do you want me to add your name, what was it, Barton?”

  Luna handed it back to him. “Barlow,” she said, “One. For now.”

  Beckett checked the time on his watch, so Luna looked up at the sky. “Looks like 3:45.”

  He said, “15:54. I need to check the water level for the record. Will you be okay up here—I mean, I’ll be right back.”

  “I’d like to come, I need to check on my board.”

  Chapter 4

  Water dripped, lapped, and splashed up and around. Beckett led Luna down through the stairwell, descending two steps at a time. Luna had a shorter stride, but she easily kept up. She was compact and her legs were used to a workout. She said, “I see what you mean, it’s awfully loud and echoey in here, but also, there’s no noise from the outside. It’s silent and noisy.”

  “I hate it. I would never go in here if I didn’t have to.” He shoved through a door marked floor 118, and entered the cavernous room from before, winding through the office furniture maze, across the expanse of mottled-blue swirl-patterned carpeting, to the bright sunlit opening in the glass.

  “Whoa,” Luna shielded her eyes from the sun.

  Beckett didn’t look out at the horizon; he knelt and checked the water level first.

  Luna watched his investigation. “Want to go for a paddle around the perimeter? See a different perspective?”

  “Hmmm? Me? No, I have to get these numbers recorded, with the time. This is...” He shook his head at the tiny scores.

  Luna stepped onto her board, unlatched the paddle, and held an end toward him, expectantly.

  “I said, I’m not going—”

  “Just pull me closer.”

  “Oh,” he pulled, bringing Luna, her paddleboard, and the raft to the landing.

  Luna tossed him some rope. “Hold this.”

  Then she stepped onto the floor and began lifting and pulling the front edge of the paddleboard up and into the space.

  “Can I help?” Beckett tried to find a place to grab.

  “It’s okay, just hold Boosy’s rope.” She gestured toward the raft with the potted Palm tree. “I got this.”

  “Boosy?”

  Luna hefted the paddleboard all the way in through the window port and grinned, “Caboose, get it?”

  Beckett chuckled, “It’s pretty obvious.”

  “I made you laugh, I’m pretty proud of that, actually.”

  Luna pulled the paddleboard to a safe place in the middle of the floor, and with hands on her hips said, “Its name is Steve.”

  Beckett had no idea if she was joking or not, but either way, Steve, the paddleboard, looked out of place on carpet in the middle of a wrecked office space.

  Next she pulled Boosy to the building, removed two boxes, argued with Beckett for a minute about whether he should help or not, decided that he could, as long as he admitted that she could do it on her own, and then they both hauled the raft with the tree, up and onto the floor. She really did need his help, the potted Palm tree was heavy and tilted dange
rously requiring at least three hands.

  They tugged the raft to the middle of the cavern, the top of the tree brushing the ceiling, and placed it right beside Steve. Luna cocked her head to the side inspecting the tree. The leaves were chopped short.

  “Tree doesn’t like land, but I can’t risk him being in the water during another storm; his leaves shredded in the last one.”

  “Storm?” Beckett squinted through the port opening toward the horizon.

  “Of course, you can’t see it from this direction, but something is brewing on the horizon behind us.”

  Beckett asked, “Do you think the water has come up at all?”

  “You mean since I’ve been here, two hours?” She checked his face for a sign that he was joking, but no, he was serious.

  She said, “Definitely not.”

  “What about your family? Do they know—they should come in, right?”

  Luna leaned out of the opening and looked to the left and right. “They probably headed to the next Outpost. I’m sure they’ll find shelter. We’ll join up again as soon as the storm passes. No worries.”

  “Well, I better go up to the rooftop and secure some things.”

  “I’ll come help?”

  “Um, I mean, I don’t think I’m supposed to have you help, but I could use the extra hands.”

  “Then how about I help, anyway.”

  Beckett and Luna picked up her boxes and ascended to the roof.

  The distant horizon looked fine, but Luna said, “All the signs are there,” and Beckett believed her and set to work.

  Chapter 5

  Luna had known two types of men in her short life. The men of her family, who expected her to do her part for the survival of the group, gave her rules and chores and expected her to fulfill her part.

  The other type of men were the ones she met, who wanted to take care of her, to lift her board, to tell her where to go, and how the world worked. The second type of man expected her to be weak.

  Beckett was different, he offered to help and asked for her help. He tossed her a rope, without question or command, and caused Luna to falter for a second. Would he instruct? Or tell her to hold it until he came back for it? But no, he gave her the rope so she could do half the work. It was surprising and kind of cool.

  Together the two spread tarps and battened them over the trunks and strengthened the tie-downs on the kitchen’s canvas roof. When Luna looked out at the horizon again, a mountainous pile of clouds had bloomed. They were moving in the Outpost’s direction.

  Beckett asked, “What do you see?”

  Luna heart was beginning to race. She took a big gulp of air and answered with the calmest voice she could muster, “About an hour before the rain and there will be some wind in the middle.”

  Beckett covered the generator with a tarp and strapped the supplies to hooks situated along the walls.

  Finally, there was nothing else to tie down or cover, and the rain, according to Luna, was about ten minutes away. The wind had picked up a bit. Luna appraised their work. “I think it looks good. I’ve passed many a storm without this much preparation or cover.”

  Beckett shook his head. “I suppose you have, but I don’t know how you do.”

  “It’s just—something you get through, I suppose.” She checked over her shoulder at the sky. She was trying to put a nice spin on things but really wanted to get inside the tent. Shelter would be good for once.

  Beckett started the generator. Large floodlights attached at each corner blared on. They swept back and forth and around, lighting the Outpost, signaling that it was here in the dark. It is here, we are here, don’t crash, it is here.

  The ocean turned gray and brooding. The sky remained blue on one-half but darkened on the other, spreading. The clouds grew menacing, a dark wall of storm. The rain’s front edge approached. Luna pretended like she wasn’t afraid of the storm, assuaging her fear with role-play: she was Anna Barlow, unafraid of the weather.

  She said, “That’s lovely. I love watching a storm,” and turned to take in the scope of the rooftop. “You know, I haven’t spent the night at this Outpost in years. I’d forgotten how pretty it is with the garden and the glass, the sweeping lights and the endless view.”

  Wind ruffled the back of her hair as if creeping up behind.

  Beckett was too nervous to chatter about beauty and the view and had no desire to hide it. He grunted, “Umhhhm,” in reply and checked the knots on the generator’s tarp for the fourth time.

  Chapter 6

  Luna watched him, wondering how to help, but here’s the thing that Nomads know—every storm they survive is just one more storm gone by. Every storm. You have to survive. And how you survive, well that’s up to you. Totally up to you. Survival. Luna dug through one of her boxes for a light nylon jacket, pulled it over her tank top, zipped it to her chin, and hugged herself against the chill.

  Beckett touched her lightly on her back. “Let’s get under the tarp.”

  The first sprinkling rain hit their roof with splats and plonks then came in at an angle under the tarp. It was hard and cold and shocking to the skin, so they rushed into the safari tent dragging their chairs.

  The canvas tent was tall. Standing up inside was easy for Luna, but Beckett’s head brushed the top. They set the chairs up beside each other, and Beckett lit a lantern giving the whole space a warm glow. Rain pitter-pattered on the tent’s roof.

  Luna shivered. “Do you have a blanket?”

  Beckett rummaged through a small trunk, happy to have something to do. He had rushed with this young woman into the harbor of his tent without considering what they might talk about once there. When entertaining mainland girls he had common interests, a place to begin with in conversation. Music, sports, school. He couldn’t imagine having anything in common with this exotic creature. But he wanted to. And the thing was, he had spent the day with her, and she was comfortable. She worked. She talked. She laughed and joked. He was nervous because of his idea of her, yet her company relaxed him. It made no sense. But nothing much made sense anymore, anyway. He handed Luna an antique-looking quilt.

  “This is beautiful,” Luna said. “Yours?” She stood to wrap it around, then sat back in the chair.

  “My grandmother gave it to me. She’d be pissed if she knew it was this close to a drowning.”

  “She wasn’t a big fan of a drowning?”

  Beckett chuckled. “Her great-great-grandmother was a sea captain’s wife. The quilt has been passed down to her descendants as long as they promise not to go to sea.”

  “Oh.” The pattering rain grew louder, making speech impossible.

  When it waned, she said, “So you’re the kind of guy who doesn’t do what you’re told.”

  Beckett tilted his head back and took in Luna, going by the name of Anna, wrapped in his family’s heirloom blanket. She looked mussed-hair, wet-bedraggled, lantern-glow beautiful. “No, I’m the kind of guy who knows better, thinks it through, can’t think any good will come of it, but then does it anyway.”

  “Sounds a lot like the same.” Luna grinned.

  “Well, your version has me rushing headlong in reaction. Believe me,” He leaned back in his chair, both hands on his head, rubbing around on the top of his too-short hair, “A lot of thought and preparation went into this voyage to a sinking ship.”

  “You think it’s sinking?”

  “The ocean is rising, it’s very much the same thing.”

  Luna’s voice took on the soft sultry tone that happens in caves with only one source of light and raging elements outside. “So what made you come here, Beckett?”

  “Oh, that’s a long story and not a very interesting one.”

  “From the sound of the rain we have a while and not much else to do. How about I try to guess?” She stood and headed to his bedside table.

  He chuckled, “What are you doing?”

  “Shhhh, I’m investigating.” She walked around the room looking on tables and shelves. Search
ing his personal effects, chewing her bottom lip, deep in thought. Her eyes were lidded by a fringe of dark lashes, not catching the light, absorbing it.

  “Aha!” She held up a dog-eared copy of Walden by Henry David Thoreau. “Are you reading this?”

  Beckett said, “I did, months ago.”

  “So that’s why you’re here, this is your Walden.”

  “Wait, you’ve read Thoreau?”

  “Of course and don’t distract. I guessed, right—with the water and the tiny house and the little garden? You’re living Thoreau’s dream. I’m right, I know it.”

  Beckett appraised her, chuckling. “You know, I never even thought about that, but nope, wrong. I read Walden because I’m planning to live in a small mountain house when I get back...”

  “Oh, drat,” She returned the book to the shelf. “Okay, second guess.” She spun slowly, then in her most queenly accent said, “You’re here to earn the money to buy a small mountain house, that you’ll live in with a beautiful mountain girl and your ten frolicking mountain babies. Ta da!”

  “Ta da, huh?” Beckett teased, “You know, you’re better at reading the sky than the room. I already have the house.”

  “Double drat. So let’s see, you’re not in it because of a dream, or the for the job, you must...hmmmmm.” She crinkled her eyes and drew out another long, “hmmmmmmmm,” and then, “I don’t know, I keep coming back to, you want to piss off your great-grandmother by bringing her quilt out to the middle of the ocean—”

  Thunder clapped and lightning flashed.

  Beckett sat up straight in his chair.

  Luna looked wide-eyed, “I didn’t see that coming.”

  Beckett grabbed a bundle of blankets from his cot and a flashlight. “Well, you are in a tent, even you can’t read a storm from inside the tent.” He peered out the door flap. “Let’s get down below until the electrical part of the night is over. Are you bundled?”

  Luna had the quilt tightly wrapped, but seeing the intense rainfall, bundled it into a ball and stuffed it under the front of her jacket.

  Beckett yelled, “Run!” and they dashed across the expanse of the rooftop toward the stairwell in the far corner. The rain drenched, poured, splashed. By the time they shoved through the door together they were laughing and breathless.