by Ron Vitale
“You look as though you are far away, thinking of other times and places.” Ishmael came to stand beside me.
At the bow of the ship, I could see far out across the water. The mid-afternoon sun shone bright with white puffy clouds peppering the sky. The wind brushed against our faces, and I closed my eyes to gather myself.
“I miss land. The feel of the ground on the bottom of my feet and the touch of a tree or flower. Where I grew up, I could walk out of town and see the fields stretch far out past the length of my eyesight. At this time of year, everything would be in bloom. The green grass would tickle the soles of my feet, and the smell of roses from our garden would be strong and intoxicating.” I kicked my foot forward, scraping it against the deck of the ship. “There’s nothing like that here. It’s just us and fathoms of water below us.”
“Many a sailor has had to deal with a sickness for both home and land. I remember my first time out at sea. The journey was long, mostly uneventful, but the smallness of the ship, and of its crew, trapped me here.” He joined me in staring out at sea.
“How did you manage that first time?” I asked.
He took a slow breath through his nose and closed his eyes, ignoring me for a moment, and after a few seconds opened his eyes but still faced the water. His attention turned to a bird that flew high in the sky. White feathers, with a few flecks of black, the bird flew toward us.
“I had a pressed flower in a book that I brought on board with me. A companion of mine gave it to me to remember her by when I decided to go to sea. Each night I would come to my bunk, and in the dark, I would touch the flower, trace my fingers around its length, and I would remember land, my home, and all the people I had lost. For weeks, I did this, and I remained homesick, and the flower did nothing to calm me. I clutched at it each morning and night until it wore on me. I pressed it to my side and wore it against my hip, thinking that it would ward off my fear and sickness. I clung to the flower like it were the last hope of my ever seeing land again.
“I so thought it would help me and that the bond that I made with it would save me or cause me to shore up against the world around me. But in the little bubble that I had made, I never did overcome my fear of missing land. Time passed and I came to realize that I might never see the people I loved again. I might never see the green fields, taste a fresh apple, and touch the dirt in the road. I had to come to terms with that.”
He turned toward me and his insinuation of my own predicament hit home.
“I have to keep going. Nathan’s my brother, and I have to try and save him and everyone else like him.” I said the words, but the deeper truth I kept to myself.
“You risk everything, don’t you?” He asked the question in a soft voice and not one filled with accusation or judgment.
“It’s the right thing to do.” I turned away so he could not see through me.
“You could have just had me go and do your work for you. Tell me true, why did you come yourself?” He would not back down and stood beside me like a mountain that I would either need to climb over or walk around.
I faced him and let him see the real me. “I’ve already told you, but I’ll tell you again. My mother is half-crazed with losing her husband and now her son, but for me the sea has taken so much. It took my father and many others from our town. But now my little brother’s run off, and I don’t want to see him throw his life away—I can’t let that happen.”
Ishmael reached out toward me but I pulled away. “But it’s not your choice to decide that.”
“And is it Nathan’s or this damn sea curse that takes the men in our town and lures them to sea?” I looked up at him and pointed out at the sea. “I will not stand by and let the sea take another. Too many families have suffered enough.”
I finished speaking and a tiredness washed over me.
Ishmael scratched his bearded chin and said, “I wonder if the girl who gave me the flower felt the same way that you do. I left her to go to sea. I chose adventure over love and family, wanting to make my way to see the seven oceans, new lands, and to be my own master. I cast off my family to go in ways that would broaden me to new heights.” He laughed at himself and shook his head slightly, still keeping his eye on the bird that flew high up in the sky.
“Did you ever regret your decision?” I chanced to ask him a truthful question, one that struck at the core of what I wanted to know. If I could see Nathan now, I would ask him that and more.
Ishmael rubbed the wood railing in front of us. “It’s more complicated than that. I missed Lilly immensely, but I also knew that I needed to listen to myself first. I could never be there for her if I did not go on my journey. If I would have stayed for her, a part of me would have died, buried alive in the constraint of my life back on land. I would have worked long and hard hours at a trade and been like all those around me. But I wanted more and chose to do more.”
“And now I’ve dragged you back out to sea on a fool’s errand, chasing after my younger brother on some crazy quest to find the fabled island of nightmares.” I said the words out loud and laughed with a sarcastic twitch. “None of this makes sense any longer and too much time has passed for me to turn back and leave it all.” I kept my eye on the bird as well, noticing that the ship had turned ever so slightly. “I may have made the biggest mistake of my life, yet I don’t want to take any of it back. My mother probably weeps for me back home, and here I am standing on a merchant ship thousands of miles away.”
“I once felt the same way. I regretted leaving Lilly, for a short while, but I did make it back to land.” He squinted looking up at the sun. “I saw her again, but when I did, I realized I had waited too long. She had married swiftly after I departed and enjoyed a new life with a farmer who treated her well. I can still see the distance in her eyes when I came to call upon her, only to realize that life had moved on. She had done so because I never had given her the promise that I would be back. I never asked her to wait for me because I did not want to be cruel to her. She looked happy and had a small child. Nearly two years had passed before I came back to see her, and foolish me, I thought somehow that I could go back and fix all that had been said and we’d be together. I had rolled the dice with the sea, and on land, the stakes were different. Out here on the water, there is constancy all too often. The work we do to keep the ship running, the people we know, and even the storms and adventure of chasing a whale are so few and far between the normal days that time stretches slow out on the sea like a dream. But back on land, it’s not the same.”
He let his words float out past us to the ocean, to what was below, and to the open air. A whistle blew behind us, and a sailor called out from high up in the crow’s nest. “Land ho!”
I looked to where he pointed, and the bird we had been following flew south. From my vantage point, I still could not see land, but the bird did, and that would have to be enough for me.
***
Nathan stared out at the blue ocean that stretched for miles in all directions. He sat on a tiny stool in the crow’s nest and then stood up to stretch his legs. His right hamstring had cramped up, and as he stood, he massaged the tight muscle and yawned. The early morning sun beat down on him with a fierceness, and he could already feel the heat of the day.
“Did you get some breakfast?” Josep peeked his head into the crow’s nest and offered him some bread.
“Thank you.” Nathan took the bread and scooted over, making room for Josep.
“How many days now has it been?” He leaned against the mast for a moment but then moved to give Nathan a clearer view of the horizon.
“Hasn’t it been fifteen?” Nathan stuffed the bread in his mouth, and crumbs fell onto his lap.
“That sounds about right.” Josep scratched his scraggly beard and looked out at the ocean, taking in the beautiful view. “Zeke asked me to come check up on you and see if you needed anything.”
“I’m fine. I’ve only been up here a couple of hours, but I appreciate you bringing me
the bread.” Nathan offered a piece to his friend, but he declined.
“I already ate this morning.” Josep glanced up at the blue sky, and white morning clouds drifted to the east. “I didn’t think I would ever say this, but I’m starting to miss land.” He leaned on the railing and pointed out at the sea. “I miss pasta and a glass of wine with a side of clams cooked in lemon. It’s funny what you miss when you’re on the ocean for a long time and how easy you forget the everyday things you can do on land. What do you miss?”
Nathan wiped some crumbs around his mouth and coughed, and breadcrumbs flew everywhere. “Me? I don’t miss much.”
“I didn’t say that you would miss much, but you must miss something,” Josep said.
“I don’t want to talk about it.” Nathan clammed up and stuffed another piece of bread in his mouth. “I wish I had something to wash this down.”
Josep reached behind him and tossed Nathan a canteen. “Here you go.”
Nathan took a swig of water and sat back, staring up at the sky. “Okay, I’ll tell you what I miss, but don’t laugh at me.”
Josep crossed his legs and settled back against the rail. He moved some strands of hair that had blown in front of his eyes and listened.
“I miss my sister.”
“Are you in love with her?” Josep laughed and slapped his thigh.
Nathan swatted at Josep and missed. “It’s not like that.” He took another sip of water and stared out at sea. “She and I were constant companions.” Lost in thought for a few moments, he then turned back to Josep and said, “She’s my twin.”
“You have a twin sister! What’s that like?” Josep asked.
“She always calls me her little brother because she was born a few minutes before me.” Nathan smiled and scratched the back of his head. “She never lets me forget it, but she always has looked after me and…”
He clammed up and let the silence drag on.
Josep nudged his friend. “You can’t end your story like that. Come on, tell me!”
Nathan acquiesced and replied, “I swore to her that I would never go off to sea. But I had to go. The sea called to me.” He faced Josep and let his guard down. “I lied to her and took off in the middle of the night. She must have been furious when she woke in the morning.”
“Oh, that is pretty bad. You lied to your twin. You two shared your mother’s womb.” Josep waited a moment and said, “That is pretty bad.”
“Great, even you think I’m horrible for what I did.” Nathan shook his head and said, “I feel bad enough for having left her and my mom. But I kept dreaming of the sea at night and that it called to me. I just had to come, you know?”
“Ah, to be young again. I sometimes forget the things that I used to do when I was young. One time I went with a girl who was my friend from my hometown in Italy, and her friend took a liking to me. I decided to take a chance and be with the friend, but when I had a falling out with her, I lost both her and my friend. I was stupid.” Josep scratched the back of his head and shook his head in shame.
“But what has that have to do with what I did?” Nathan asked.
“It doesn’t, but the point is not to be stupid.” Josep put his arm around Nathan. “Listen, what would you do if you had a chance to talk with your sister?” He stopped himself and asked, “What’s her name?”“
“It’s Morgan and this is stupid. She’s thousands of miles away back home, and she’s probably angry at me because I left her. I was a coward and just took off in the night without telling her how much I wanted to go. I feel stupid and bad that I hurt her like that.” Nathan pushed Josep’s arm off of him.
“Well, that’s a good start. I think if you were to tell her that you were a coward for not telling her that you were going and that you were truly sorry that it would go a long way to helping her forgive you. Sometimes people just want to hear that truth and to hear the person who hurt them tell them that they were wrong and are sorry. One time there was this girl—”
“Hey, Josep! Get down here,” Zeke called from down below.
Zeke startled them both and Josep moved away from Nathan and leaned over the crow’s nest. “What do you want?”
“It’s your turn to guard the room of our mummy friend. Come on down here.” Zeke had both his hands over his mouth and shouted up at them.
“Yeah, yeah. I’ll be down.” Josep patted Nathan on the back. “You think about what I told you. When you get back to land, you’ll have a choice. You can swallow down the mistake you made and live with it, or you can face what you did to your sister and ask her to forgive you. Can’t hurt to try and apologize. She’s your twin, after all, and she just might understand.”
“Thanks.” Nathan watched Josep climb back down, and he stared out at the sea. In all directions, there was only water.
Zeke popped his head into the crow’s nest. “Mind if I come up for a bit?”
“Sure.” Nathan made room for Zeke and helped his friend up.
“I expect Josep has been telling you his stories about women again?” Zeke laughed.
“Yeah, he was trying to help me, and I think some of what he said makes sense.” Nathan stood up and stretched his hands to the sky.
“Having time on a ship lets your mind wander. There’s a lot to think about. Choices you made back on land are often paused, held in suspension until you get back.” Zeke said. “But that’s not the truth. You learn that everyone’s moved on back on land, but you haven’t. I learned that the hard way. There isn’t anything you can do right now to fix whatever is bothering you. Best to let it go and move on. If you dwell on it, the wound will just fester as you pick on it.”
“Thanks.” Nathan changed the subject and asked, “How was your shift with the mummy?”
“I stood in front of a door for two hours, and nothing happened, so I guess that’s progress. Josep will probably have the same experience as I.” Zeke took out a pick from his pocket and put it in his mouth. “But I can understand why the captain is putting a guard on the door. A few members of the crew have some wild ways.”
“Is that the true reason why the captain has a guard on him?” Nathan asked.
“What do you mean?” Zeke looked to Nathan as he asked the question.
“What if…” Nathan let the words stumble out of his mouth, and he stopped himself before he made himself a fool.
“You don’t seriously think that the mummy is going to come back to life and attack us in our sleep, do you?” Zeke joked.
“We have seen some odd things on this journey. I don’t know what to think.”
“Mummies don’t come back to life. He’s just an unlucky British soldier who was mistakenly eaten by a whale.” Zeke drummed his fingers on the mast by him. “It’s just a coincidence.”
“And what about the man we found in the ocean? Was meeting him just a coincidence as well?” Nathan asked. He did not let Zeke respond but went on. “It’s almost as though there’s a trail that’s being left for us and we’re following along the way. And now we’re following that mummy’s map toward the island of nightmares. All of it has me worried.” Nathan stayed standing and slowly turned his head from port to starboard, searching for land.
Zeke chuckled. “You have an active imagination.” His tone became more serious and he said, “We still don’t know what happened to Roderick and if he really fell off the ship or if there is a creature on board with us. But you’re right—we’ve seen too many odd things for all of this to be a coincidence. The best that we can do is be aware and prepared for anything.”
Nathan ignored Zeke’s words and stayed rooted to one spot. He stared for a few moments at a spot on the horizon on the port side. Finally, he climbed up on the stool to get up higher, and he balanced himself by holding onto the ship’s mast. “I see land!”
Zeke stayed seated and asked, “Where?”
He pointed in the direction with his arm outstretched as far as it would go. “It’s right there. We just need to make a slight adjustment
to the port by a few degrees, and we’re headed right to it.”
Zeke pushed himself up and glanced out at the direction that Nathan pointed. “Well, it appears that you are right. I see it too. You better make the announcement.”
Nathan rang the bell up in the crow’s nest and called down below. “Land! I see land.” He let the words go with as loud of a call as he could muster and then called again, “Land!”
Zeke smiled and said, “Looks like you got your wish. We made it to some land.”
The fuzzy line on the horizon became clearer by the moment and Nathan replied, “It doesn’t look too big, but it’s still land.”
“We’ll need to be careful. None of us know exactly what is here, but I expect the captain and first mate think from the map they found that there’s something special here.” He stared out and thought he could see the tops of trees forming on the line on the horizon. “We’ll see soon enough.”
Nathan came down off the stool and looked to Zeke. “Tell me, when you get back on land, do you ever go back and try to undo the damage that you’ve done to people there?”
His frankness caught Zeke off guard. He sucked on his toothpick, thinking for a bit, and said, “It all depends on what was done to whom. Like I said, a wound might be best left to heal. Picking at the scab could only make it worse.”
“I’ll have to say something because it’s my sister.” He let his words trail off and looked out at the approaching island.
“With family, it all depends on what was said and who did what. Remember, time is moving on and you won’t be back home for a long time yet.” Zeke took the toothpick out of his mouth and pointed it at the island. “If it were me, I’d focus more on the present and adventure than thinking about the past. The past is over with, and there is nothing that you can do to change it. And when you do get back, everyone has moved on. It’s the sailor’s curse. We’re stuck in the past with our memories, rethinking the things we said and did, wanting to come back and fix them, but we can’t. The truth is that it’s too late. The damage we did is already done. We’re just reliving the incidents day after day, replaying the arguments, the harsh words that were said, but the people back on land have already moved on. I hate to tell it to you like this, but it’ll be for the best. Let it go. It’ll be for the best.”
