Lost At Sea

by Erica Boyce

  Loud laughter, beer glasses clunked down on cardboard coasters.

  “I tell you, when he first hired Jess, I thought he was smoking something. Scrawny thing like her. Two of them together made quite a pair, painting the boat like some Mark Twain bullshit.”

  “She turned out all right, though.”

  “The boat or Jess?” More laughter.

  “Both, I guess. Mostly Jess.” Everyone nodded and drew gulps of their beer.

  “You hear she’s getting the boat?” Ben O’Malley said to nobody in particular.

  “No shit. Really?”

  “Yep. Overheard Tommy talking about it. Guess he was in the lawyer’s office filing some paperwork for his divorce when they were calling up his wife about the will.”

  Silence. Someone whistled low through his teeth.

  “That’s a damn fine boat.”

  “No way she could’ve afforded it on a crew wage, that’s for sure.”

  “You don’t think she could’ve—?”

  “Of course she offed him,” Sammy Mitchell yelled from the back. “I would’ve!”

  “Can it, Sammy.” Everyone rolled their eyes. “She probably didn’t even know about his will before today anyway.”

  “Diane must be pissed,” Will Feeney said, drawing out the last word so the air briefly rang with it.

  “Can’t imagine. Almost feel sorry for poor Jess. She was never one to stick herself in a fight.”

  “Think she’ll show tonight?”

  “Who, Jess? Who knows. Seemed pretty hung up last night, might be lying low.”

  “Nah, meant Diane.”

  “Diane? Diane Staybrook? Now you’re the one smoking something.”

  “She hasn’t stepped foot in here since the two of them got married.”

  “Too busy working.”

  “Something like that. And then they’ve got the kid, too.”

  “Jesus, the kid.”

  Each of them nodded and stared into their glasses, remembering the first time they saw Ella. John had taken her out to the docks a few times when she was just a newborn, strapped to his chest in a baby carrier, the soft pink sphere of her head peeking out over the top. “What happened, Johnny?” they yelled from their boats while they unloaded the day’s catch. “You run outta paternity leave already?” They heaved skates and dogfish into the tubs waiting on the dock, soon to be dumped into a huge metal lift that would load and file it all into the processor’s cold trucks.

  “Nah,” Johnny said, grinning. “Figured I’d give Diane a break so she could grocery shop. Gotta show the new intern the ropes.” He cupped his hand over Ella’s scalp, mist already collecting on the fine hairs there.

  When the men finished loading, they jumped down to say hello. They clicked their tongues at her and let her grip their grease-blackened fingers while they joked about her strength. Some of them hung back, smiling sideways from a safe distance. All of them saw her eyes, gray, wide open, staring. Even the single guys among them had known it was early for her to be so alert, that it was unusual in one so young.

  Jimmy reached for an empty glass and filled it. The foam spilling up over its edge seemed to break the silence in the bar.

  “She’s looking for her dad, you know. Ella. Doesn’t believe he would’ve gone out like that.”

  “Fuck me.”

  “I know. Bob over at the pawn shop told my cousin Rick that she stopped by today, and we all saw her with Jess. Put them through the wringer, sounds like.”

  “Just like her mom. Johnny, too, for that matter. Hate to be the guy who tried to pull one over on him,” Gus March said, smiling sadly.

  “Can’t say I blame her though, you know? The kid. She’s right. It’s downright odd he went out in that.”

  “When my old man went overboard, I spent a year thinking he’d swim up to shore any day now. Scare all the sunbathers at Oyster Beach, staggering out of the water in his survival suit.”

  “What’s she gonna do when she finds out the truth, that he’s really gone? You think she’s gonna lose it?”

  “Probably won’t ever get the truth. No closure in this game.”

  “She’ll just accept it one day. That’s what happened to me at least.”

  The men were quiet again. They’d all lost somebody, somewhere along the way, and it was hard not to think about them on a night like this.

  “Shit, man, what if she comes to one of us? What am I gonna tell her?”

  “What do you mean, dumbass? You tell her what you know, which is jack. Give her a hug, maybe, or pat her on the back. Sucks to lose a parent. She’s gotta deal with it in her own way.”

  “I dunno. There’s a reason I never had kids. If she starts crying on me, I don’t know what I’d do.”

  “You’d say ‘I’m sorry’ like a normal human being. Jesus, Danny.”

  Danny shrugged and shook his head like it still seemed impossible. He looked down at his beer.

  “Any of you notice who’s helping Ella out on this search?”

  “Who?”

  “Maureen Carson’s kid. Lacey.”

  “You’re shittin’ me.”

  “Nope. Kid can’t leave well enough alone. She should know better.”

  “Isn’t that one of the steps? Quit messing with innocent kids’ lives?”

  “Hold on now. She’s basically no more than a kid herself.”

  “Not sure any of the steps took with that one, though. You seen her lately? Looks strung out to me.”

  “It’s sad is what it is. Way too much of that going around nowadays. I know so many kids turned rotten with that shit.”

  “Don’t care if it’s sad or not, she’s a danger to the town and especially to that poor kid. She’ll stay away from Ella if she knows what’s good for her. I know you know what all went down at that methadone clinic over in Mayberry.”

  “Let ’em all die is what I say! They’ll do it to themselves eventually! Kids nowadays.”

  “Easy, Sammy. There was plenty of dope to go around in your day, too.”

  “He’s right, though. It’s gotten worse the last few years.”

  “Can’t even find a sober crew anymore.”

  “Abe had someone OD on him in the middle of a trip last month.”

  “Was wondering what those ambulances were doing at the pier.”

  “Yup. Kid fell over on the deck right as they were hauling in.”

  “Damn. They revive him?”

  “Not sure. He was an out-of-towner.”

  “You think Diane knows?”

  “That her daughter’s hanging out with an addict?”

  “Probably. She’s a smart cookie, that one. Might be she just can’t deal with it right now, with her grief and everything.”

  “Yeah. Your wife bringing her anything?”

  “Oh yeah. There was a second lasagna already in the oven when we were eating dinner.”

  “I should check with Ophelia. She’s usually pretty good with that shit, but she hasn’t mentioned anything.”

  “Poor kid. She really loved him. You could tell.”

  Chapter Nineteen

  Saturday, November 11, 2017

  Rebecca woke the next morning with a sharp crick in her neck. She sat up on the couch and groaned, turning her head from one side to the other. There was cold coffee in the pot on the kitchen counter and the house was silent, which meant Mack had probably gone down to the docks already. Just as well. She didn’t know what she was going to say to him. In the meantime, she had to get ready for his sister’s baby shower.

  A “sprinkle,” they called it, for their third baby, though it wasn’t clear how it was any different from a shower. When she got to her mother-in-law’s house, there were just as many loud family members, and the mound of pastel-wrapped gifts was just as large as when they
’d thrown a party for their first. It was going to be a long three hours, she knew from experience. She fixed a smile on her face as the room cooed over tiny onesies and her sister-in-law feigned excitement while unwrapping the same board book four times to shrieks of drunken laughter. “Oops! Guess it’s a popular one!” She clapped politely when Mack’s second cousin won baby shower bingo and hoisted the prize bottle of wine over her head, her safety-pinned name tag slightly askew.

  And when the other guests weren’t talking about babies, they were talking about John.

  “I can’t believe he’s really gone,” one woman at Rebecca’s table said to her neighbor. “I mean, I know there’s a risk in this business, but Danny was always so impressed by him. He said John was one of the best out there.”

  “He was,” her neighbor replied. “Everyone makes mistakes, though.” The women exchanged a glance. Both of them were thinking about their own husbands. Rebecca knew because she was, too, in spite of her fight with Mack. Her thoughts always ran reflexively to him in conversations like this.

  “And that poor little girl.” The two clucked their tongues in sympathy. “I just couldn’t imagine.”

  “You’ve heard Maureen Carson’s daughter is helping her look for him, right?”

  The other woman gasped. “No, really?”

  Her friend nodded.

  “Honestly, what has gotten into that girl? Lord knows, my son went through some rough patches when he was a teenager, but if I’d ever caught him interfering with a grieving family…”

  The two nodded. One leaned in closer and muttered, just loud enough so Rebecca could still hear, “She was adopted, remember. I’m not saying that’s why things went south for her, but…”

  “Oh, come now,” the other said. “That can’t be the only reason.”

  And maybe it was the setting, or maybe it was her third cup of spiked punch slicking its way down her throat, but Rebecca let the thought settle in—the one she usually steered herself away from because it was so bitter, it was almost cruel: Why were some women—teenagers, even—allowed to have babies just to wash their hands of them and give them away for adoption when she couldn’t even get pregnant? Where was the sense in that?

  She shook the thought out of her head and took another sip of punch, the high-fructose corn syrup and rum coating the inside of her mouth. By the time the party had ended and she was helping her mother-in-law fold chairs, her burps were a little acidic.

  “Thank you so much for helping, Becca.” Her sister-in-law appeared at her side, touching Rebecca’s arm.

  As if in a dream, as if of its own accord, Rebecca’s hand reached out and pressed itself against her sister-in-law’s stomach. It was taut as a trampoline. The baby kicked obligingly, and she felt it like an earthquake.

  “You know,” Rebecca said from far away, “I often think of these as bulbs”—she nodded toward her hand, the baby—“like the kind you plant in the garden. They’re just the right shape, and after a few months, something beautiful sprouts out of them.”

  Her sister-in-law glanced at Mack’s mother, who had paused midfold to take in the spectacle, and burst out laughing. “Oh, honey,” she said, wiping tears from her eyes. “It’s nowhere near that poetic. You’ll see for yourself if my brother ever gets around to knocking you up. Excuse me. I’ve gotta go pee for the hundredth time today.”

  Rebecca’s phone rang. Mack. Desperate for something to do besides crawl into a corner and die from embarrassment, she picked up.

  “Hi,” she said flatly lest he forget their last conversation.

  “I know you’re still mad at me and there’s some shit we need to work out,” he said, “but I’m down at the pier, and one of the guys found something.”

  “What? Like a turtle or something?” Mack’s mother was still staring at her. Rebecca turned her back.

  “No, actually, it’s—” He hesitated. “You should just come see it.”

  Rebecca had half a mind to refuse him. What could it possibly be? But then, anywhere was better than her mother-in-law’s house at the moment. Besides, the pier was a few blocks away and would give her a chance to walk off the rum punch before she had to get back in her car. “All right. I’ll be there in a few minutes,” she said, waving goodbye to his mother.

  * * *

  Down at the docks, the men stood clustered around something, murmuring to each other. The first prickle of dread grew in Rebecca’s abdomen. Their faces were solemn, and the usual noise of the pier was gone, no shouts or laughter or loud whumps of rope hitting wood and metal.

  Mack saw her and motioned her over. The men shuffled apart to let her in.

  In the center of their huddle, lying on the dock, there was a boot.

  “I found it doing a quick tow on my way out to the channel,” Danny Colbert said. “Sometimes, the currents, they push debris around. Can’t predict where anything will end up.”

  “It’s John’s,” Mack said, placing one hand on the small of her back.

  “How could you possibly know that?” Rebecca said. “You all wear those boots.”

  Mack pointed at a white scrawl on the rubber, near the toe. Rebecca squinted and leaned in. The markings were half worn away, but up close, they coalesced into letters. A name. Not John’s. “Oh,” she breathed.

  Mack laced his fingers with hers. “Danny wants to bring it to the Coast Guard, but it doesn’t seem right. Diane should have it,” he said. “We were thinking, since you’d been spending time with the Staybrooks and all.” There was no trace of their fight on his face.

  Rebecca closed her eyes. What else could she do? “I’ll bring it to her,” she said.

  Chapter Twenty

  “Mom! Your phone’s ringing.”

  Even in her sleep, Diane’s heartbeat sped at the sound of her daughter’s voice. She pulled herself up from the couch, ratty blanket falling to the floor, but Ella was already gone. Diane watched her feet disappear up the stairs. Those ridiculous slippers. They were stuffed sharks, and the openings were their mouths, so you put your foot in through a ring of pointed felt teeth. John had given them to Ella last Christmas, and the two of them had giggled at them all day. It was a wonder they still fit her.

  The phone was, in fact, ringing. She shook the sleep from her head and picked it up.

  “Good morning, ma’am. I’m sorry to bother you on the home phone like this. John gave me your cell, too, but it kept going straight to voicemail.”

  Her cell phone sat on the coffee table, its face dark and lifeless. The battery’d died at some point yesterday. “Who is this, please?”

  “Oh, right. Sorry. My name’s Burt McGovern. And, uh, this is a little awkward.”

  She found her eyebrows raising.

  “You see,” he continued, “I owned the boat. The one John took? I hired him to run it, but I hadn’t heard from him since he left. I was starting to worry, and then his crewman, or crewwoman—Jess? Jen?—called and told me he’d gone missing.”

  Bile rose in her throat. She sat back into the couch as the chilly truth settled over her. John really had taken another boat out. A bigger part of her than she cared to admit hadn’t really believed it. But here it was. There was no foul play here. Jess hadn’t pushed him overboard or failed to rescue him when he’d tripped and fallen. She hadn’t made up this unbelievable story to cover it up. There was no one to blame. It was just bad luck. Stupid, reckless choices.

  “First off, I’m real sorry to hear what happened,” this man was saying. “Such a tragedy.” He paused. She begged him silently not to go further. “But secondly, well…uh…see, I’m trying to file an insurance claim. For the boat. And they’re asking me all these questions I can’t answer. About John and such.”

  She swallowed a laugh.

  “I wouldn’t bother with it at all, except the boat wasn’t cheap, you know? I was wondering if you could maybe help me
out with some of these answers.”

  Diane straightened the shirt she’d been wearing since Thursday night. In her sweetest, most patronizing voice, she said, “Listen. Burt, was it? I’m very sorry for your loss. Do you think maybe we could revisit this at some point in the future? Perhaps after we’ve had time to hold a funeral for my husband?”

  She hung up on his backpedaling apologies and laid the phone gently back on its cradle. She picked up a throw pillow from the end of the couch, dented from her sleeping body, and began to fluff it. Dust flew through the air and up her nose. John always threw every pillow to the floor before stretching out on the couch, his body filling the space almost perfectly. Every night, when she followed him up to bed, she picked the pillows up, perked them back up again, and placed them in the corners of the couch just so.

  She pressed the pillow to her face, the nubby fabric rough on her skin, and screamed and screamed and screamed.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Ella waited until she’d heard the door of her parents’ room close before she crept back down the stairs. She needed time to plan today’s schedule before she met with Lacey, and she always did her best thinking outside. The colder the better.

  Today, they were interviewing more of her dad’s friends, who might’ve heard him talking about his wife and any escape plans he’d made. She’d been up half the night, or at least until eleven, brainstorming the names of men they should find. She wrote them down in the back of her assignment book, her head ducked under the covers with a flashlight in case her mom appeared in the doorway.

  As she eased open the front door, she dug in her pocket to make sure the list was there. So she didn’t see Rebecca at first. She stood on the front steps with a beat-up box in her arms. Her mouth was open like she’d forgotten what to say.

  “Hey, Rebecca!” Ella said. “We’re not hanging out until Monday, remember?”

  “I know.” Rebecca looked down at the box. “Is your mom here?”

  “She’s up in her room. Someone just called, and she got really mad at them. What else is new. She’s always mad at someone.” Ella rolled her eyes, but Rebecca didn’t laugh. “Is that for us?” Ella pointed at the box.