by Leslie Lutz
I passed Graham my reg for a breath and checked my depth. Thirty feet. The needle on my air gauge sat in the red line. As the surface inched closer, light filtered down through the layers of silt.
And then a dark shadow appeared above us, descending. I stopped kicking, my eyes wide, taking in this new threat. We couldn’t head back down. Impossible. The shape grew.
A diver. Growing, growing. Small, a woman with a tank on her back. Steph. Steph had come for us?
The diver closed in. No. Not Steph. Black hair streamed out behind her as she fell in slow motion, and for a moment I thought I was dead and my grandmother was coming for us, her fifteen-year-old self descending from heaven to hold our hands and take us to the next world.
The diver closed in and slowed with precision, her fingers pulsing a few puffs of air into her BC. She stopped, floating a few feet away, and held her hand out flat, palm down, a signal I knew.
Stay here at this level.
She flashed her hand three times.
Fifteen minutes.
I blinked into the gloom. It couldn’t be. But it was.
Mom slipped her BC and tank off her back and handed it to me. Our safety stop. I didn’t know how, but she was there.
I was laughing into my regulator as Graham drank in the air from the new tank, as my mother slipped her hand behind my neck and pressed her mask to mine.
ENTRY 28
ONCE WE GOT TOPSIDE, we held on to each other for a long time, me and Felix and Mom, huddled in the soft mud by the sinkhole. Mom laughed and cried and held on to me in a way so desperate, I knew the last few weeks for her had been no easier than mine. Or maybe it had been months. Perhaps years? And even without you there, I felt the lines that tied my family together draw tight. One perfect moment.
“How did you find us?” I asked her.
“We heard gunshots a couple of miles away from our camp. It seemed to come from the center of the island, so we plotted a course and here we are.”
I glanced at Ben over her shoulder, and he met my eye briefly before he looked away. My body felt wrung out. I was shivering from exposure and stress and hunger. Mom felt so warm I could fall asleep on her, the way I used to when I was little, when we’d come back from a day at the beach and doze off watching TV, my face pressed into her neck.
Graham sat nearby on a mass of roots, his wet suit peeled down to his waist, watching us. When I caught his eyes, the gratitude there was so intense I had to look away. I thought he hadn’t understood the choice I made down below, but it was clear he did.
The clink of cans being sorted drew me out of the huddle. It came from the other side of the sinkhole, just inside the ring of palm trees. I turned, expecting Ben. Or Steph. But the figure with his back to me, examining each can and making two piles, wore a familiar stonewashed purple wife beater.
Phil.
Steph stood next to Ben off to the side, an open medical kit in front of her, and a syringe in her hands. But she wasn’t injecting Ben with anything. She was watching Phil quietly, a wary look in her eyes.
Phil turned to me. He’d lost at least fifteen pounds, his usual round cheeks concave, the hollows under his eyes dark. His gray, thinning hair was out of the ponytail and hung loose around his shoulders. It looked greasy, as if he hadn’t been in the water since he’d arrived on the island.
Phil held up a can and raised his eyebrow. “Either of you geniuses think to get a can opener when you were down there?”
“Well, hello to you too, Phil,” I said.
He glanced at me and went back to sorting, and I got this feeling he thought the whole pile of cans belonged to him. “That’s Captain to you, girlie,” he said over his shoulder.
“You’re not on a boat anymore, Phil.”
Mom put a hand on my shoulder and squeezed. When I turned to look at her, she gave me the barest of head shakes. I tried to read the look in her eyes, and as usual I couldn’t. But I got the gist. My usual Captain Phil baiting was no longer a good idea.
Phil turned again and pointed at Graham. “Who’s this yahoo?”
Graham answered before I could. “Seaman Fitch, sir.” He started to stand, and I put a hand on his shoulder.
“He’s not that kind of captain, Graham. You don’t have to salute him.”
Phil laughed and the sound of it bounced around the palm forest, up into the canopy of fronds. A flock of birds took flight far above.
“Phil!” my mother said in a stage whisper, fear rising up in her eyes. She glanced around at the ring of trees.
I had a thousand questions for Mom: how she survived the explosion, where she’d been all this time. But all I could manage was, “What happened?”
She touched my cheek, gave me a small smile, and pulled Felix in close to her side. “It’s a long story.” She scanned the palms that surrounded the sinkhole, her eyes troubled. “Let’s get to the beach first.” She smiled at Felix and rubbed his back. “And get a meal into you.”
I nodded. She didn’t have to say it. They’d seen strange things in the forest as well, perhaps Marshall. My stomach flipped when I considered who else might be out there. Candy, the girls from the roof. Whatever was left of Teague. I still didn’t know what would happen if we encountered one of them again. The way my mother hurried told me perhaps she and Phil had had a few close encounters of a more revealing nature.
A tap on my shoulder made me jump. It was Steph, her hands full of medical supplies. “We don’t know which one is antibiotic.”
I poked around the collection, finding a few clear vials, along with something that looked like tubes of superglue topped with needles. “Mom?”
Mom examined all of it and handed Steph the vial. “This one.” As Steph turned away, I saw Mom glance at Phil over her shoulder and pocket the tubes. Something in her eyes told me to ask later, when he was out of earshot.
We left the empty tanks by the sinkhole and headed into the forest. Mom kept Felix by her side, constantly scanning the trees and looking behind her. By the time we’d made it back to the beach, I was thoroughly spooked. Other than the day that thing attacked the boat, and the day they took you off in handcuffs, I’ve never seen her so scared.
That night we ate a feast, using my dive knife to pry open the cans. At first, I ate without warming anything up—peaches—and the juice was so good and sweet I couldn’t help but close my eyes. Oh, the sheer pleasure of food, food, delicious food. Steph laughed and talked between bites. I saw another side of her come out, the girl from the mainland. Funny, pretty, charismatic. The side of her Ben fell for. I caught him glancing at her every so often. And then he would look into his can and take another bite. It almost took the taste out of my food, seeing that. Then Felix would stuff his mouth and grin at me, and I’d forget all about my crush. Or whatever it was.
Phil had arranged the rest of the food in two piles on either side of him, and he sat between them like a grocery king on his makeshift throne. He’d make a big show about passing out US rations to us, making recommendations, pretending he could read the Japanese tins. As if it had been him, not me and Graham, who’d almost died bringing them this feast. Graham had become absolutely ridiculous since meeting the captain, nodding in thanks and calling him sir, until I was sick of both of them.
Felix wolfed down a can of apple pudding so fast he almost threw up. After that, Mom sat next to him and portioned out his food, with a small, motherly smile I hadn’t seen on her in so long. My first day of freshman year, when she dropped me off near the front entrance, she had the same look—her hope and love and pride all wrapped up in one moment.
Phil stopped eating and sniffed the air. His gaze finally settled on Ben.
“Good God, man, is that your leg I smell?”
Ben gave him a sharp side-eye and took another bite from his can. Without a word, I helped Ben change his bandage, which did smell like death.
When I walked by Phil with the bandage, he made an exaggerated gagging sound. “I woulda dumped you in the drink
by now,” he said. “Let the tide take you out.”
“Sit upwind if it bothers you,” I said, and Mom shot me another warning look.
I sat back next to Ben.
“Thanks,” he said, rubbing the top of his thigh just above the bandage and wincing. “It feels better already. I think.”
“Give it a day.”
Steph leaned over and looked at the red streaks spreading down his leg. “I gave him a quarter of the vial. I hope it’s enough.”
I nodded. “We’ll give him another shot tomorrow.” Steph met my eyes, and it was strange to see something other than anger or fear there, as if I’d just met her and she wasn’t so bad after all. And then I realized why. For the first time since we’d been on the island, Steph and I had agreed on something.
When all of us had stuffed ourselves sick, we lay on our backs in the sand. A sense of well-being flowed through me, a good humor that came from having a full belly. My limbs hummed with fresh calories. I was uncomfortably full and already planning my next meal. Lobster marinated in the juice from the mandarin oranges and a drizzle of butter, all wrapped in a palm leaf, then cooked on the coals nice and slow. I didn’t need to go out into the ocean anymore, take the risk, but as I sat by the fire, listening to it swell and fade in the darkness, I wanted to go. Like I said, Dad, I’m pretty sure something’s seriously wrong with me.
Felix fell asleep on Mom’s lap, a half-eaten can of apples in his hand. She carried him a few feet away and settled him in a hollow in the sand. The rest of us sat around the fire and fell quiet. I stared into the flames.
When Mom returned, she was lost in thought, a warm glow drawing the angles of her face, the flickering light shining in her eyes. Her hand lay next to mine in the sand, her pinkie finger overlapping the edge of mine. Still trying to convince herself I was real, I guess.
“Have you guys been on the other side of the island the whole time?” I asked.
She nodded.
“So how did you and Captain Phil find each other?” Ben asked.
She and Phil looked at each other, and Phil broke eye contact first. “Another time,” Mom said. “I’m pretty tired.” Then she cleared her throat and put a hand on my shoulder. “Tasia, let’s go down to the charter. I want to see what’s there.”
Phil sat up a bit next to the cans. “No need to do that, ladies. We got all day tomorrow to sort through things.”
Steph and Ben looked from Phil to me, then to Mom. We could all feel the weird vibe. Phil didn’t want to let Mom out of his sight.
Mom held up a hand. “I need a moment with my daughter.” Her voice broke in a way I’d never heard before, not even when you went away to prison, not when she cried on her ex-boyfriend’s shoulder at the edge of that lake in Texas. And I realized she was acting, putting on a show for Phil.
Phil sat back, the expression in his eyes settling into something dismissive. She was a silly, emotional woman, the look said, and he didn’t want to be around to watch the sloppy reunion talk. He waved us toward the surf and went back to contemplating the piles of cans surrounding him.
Mom and I walked through the soft sand, the ocean pulsing in the background. Both of us had gone quiet, like we’d just finished a four-tank day. Since you went away, most of our relationship exists in this silence, her head always in the next morning’s dive and next week’s money, and mine wondering when we’ll ever have a break to be something other than boss and employee. But down here on the beach, surrounded by darkness and wave song and salt spray, the silence felt different. The words were all there under the surface, and she was desperate to tell me something.
The charter formed in the darkness, listing starboard. Its white paint glowed faintly in the moonlight. High tide had arrived, and the sea-foam brushed its keel, bringing swell and pulse and the scent of brine. She stopped and looked back toward the fire for a good ten seconds, which I thought strange. Counting silhouettes, I finally realized. To make sure Phil hadn’t followed us.
She pulled out something from her pocket and leaned in close. “I need you to hide these somewhere Phil can’t find them.” She opened her palm. The needle-topped tubes glinted in the moonlight.
“I know Phil is a jerk, but why do you need to hide medicine from him?”
She shook her head. “Ben and Steph have the only vial of antibiotic. This”—she pushed the tubes into my hand—“is morphine.”
I squinted at them. I still wasn’t following her. “It’s a painkiller. It could come in handy for Ben. Why would—”
“There’s enough in these syrettes to keep Phil high for two straight weeks. You know what Phil’s like when he’s drunk. Imagine him with morphine in his system.” She went quiet, a dusky figure looking out over the dark ocean. “There was another survivor.”
“What happened?”
Phil’s voice rolled through the darkness. “What are you girls doing?”
She put her arms around me, and I smelled salt in her hair and stress sweat. “Another time.”
She squeezed once and let go.
When Mom and I got back, Felix was still sleeping peacefully under the shelter. Steph sat close to Ben, next to the fire, braiding her long red hair over one shoulder. Phil still sat between the piles of cans and tins, his elbows resting on his knees, watching Graham intensely. Graham fingered the tattered hem of his pants, which were so far from white now they’d pass for khaki. He scratched his pale beard absently, as if deciding something. I got the feeling I’d interrupted an important conversation.
I settled myself a few feet away from the fire. Steph and I made eye contact, and I noticed she’d sat as far away from Phil as possible. Smart girl.
After a few loaded seconds, Graham wiped his palms on his pant legs and nodded, as if answering a voice in his head.
“It all started when we anchored off of this island,” he said.
Now that Captain Phil had asked the question, it was time to tell us everything.
“Who’s we?” Phil asked.
“The USS Andrews.” Graham nodded west into the darkness. “The one that’s out there now, lying at the bottom of the ocean. I’d been on that ship for two years, me and four hundred other guys, and we’d been everywhere, seen things you can’t imagine.”
“Let’s skip the history lesson, son,” Phil said, and Graham straightened up.
“So we’d just finished a few weeks of hell near the Ryuku Islands, getting worked over by every Japanese destroyer in the South Pacific, when we were called away. No explanation. I wasn’t someone who got to know things, and none of us enlisted had a clue. We just changed directions. A few days later we met up with a small supply ship and some white coats got on board, and—”
“White coats?” Steph asked.
“Scientist types. Snobby and talking in low voices all the time, shutting up when anyone passed them in the halls, which was all the time, we were squeezed into the Andrews so tight. Anyway, we docked off this here island.”
“Where is here?” Phil asked.
“The Solomons.”
Mom and Phil exchanged a shocked look. Graham kept talking. “The Vermont had bombed the tar out of it a week before and taken control.” Graham grabbed the can of apples Felix had left unfinished. “Took out the whole place.” He hooked a piece of fruit with one finger, popped it into his mouth, and chewed thoughtfully. “Me and some others, we were sent to shore with the white coats to be mules. You know, carry stuff.”
“I thought you were a gunner’s mate,” I said. “Why did they have you doing grunt work?”
He paused before he answered, as if considering whether or not he should lie. Then he sighed. “I was in the brig. They used us for grunt work sometimes.”
“What did you do?” Steph asked, and I was reminded again of that night by the fire, her and Ben asking about you.
He put the can down. “My bunkmate, well, I let it slip how old I was, that I wasn’t even fifteen when I enlisted and had lied about it. He blabbed to the captain.”
“Why would they throw you in the brig for that?” Steph asked.
“Even if the Navy wants to keep you, they can’t, legally. You lie on your application, it’s like lying to Uncle Sam, right to his face. They’ll strip you of all your medals. When we got stateside, they were going to court martial me.”
He shrugged as if it didn’t matter, then went on about how many crates they hauled through the jungle, how they stacked them up in a clearing. Steph’s suspicious expression had melted away, and Ben and Mom watched Graham talk, slow and steady in his Texas drawl. All I could think was that this guy had lost more than anyone I knew, except for you. It’s why he didn’t want to go home—ever.
When he finished the can I handed him another, and he took it, avoiding my eyes as he pried it open.
“Back then the coconuts weren’t blighted yet—that happened after the accident—so we gathered them up for later, to share with the kitchen so we’d have something to drink other than armored heifer. And the white coats took us to this little nub of a building smack dab in the middle of this island. I thought it was nothing but an arsenal or storage area or something. But then they told us to leave the coconuts outside.” He chewed thoughtfully, still trying to make sense of things. “And then we got in an elevator.”
He took another bite of apples, the firelight playing over his face, his eyes full of memories. Phil looked fascinated, his elbow on his knee and his fist propping up his chin. All I felt was dread. Because part of me felt I’d heard this before, and the memory was just on the tip of my brain.
“Twenty stories down. That’s how deep that elevator went.” He nodded at me. “You seen how deep it goes. And strange, fancy machinery on every floor, like the whole thing isn’t really a building, more like a machine with offices and hallways honeycombed in its gears and pieces.” He shook his head and put the can down. “I never been claustrophobic before, but it’s weird, being inside something like that.”