“I’d like you to change your course to two-eight-zero. Don’t forget to repeat the command.”
“Changing course to two-eight-zero.” I needed to turn the wheel to the right. Easy enough—I’d piloted small boats all the time back home. I pulled two spokes down to the right, hand over hand. Still at 270. Then a few more spokes. It moved a little, but was barely past 271. Two more spokes.
Suddenly, the bow swung right and the needle zipped past 275, past 280, and was rapidly passing 285. Oh, shit. I didn’t realize I’d spoken aloud until I heard snickers from the others.
Okay, I could do this. I’d gone (way) past 280. That meant I needed to go back the other way. I pushed up the spokes, two at a time, until the bow began to swing back to port. 285, 280, 275, and then it stayed steady. I turned back to the right, one spoke. Two. The bow swung right again, but just a little bit. One more spoke, and we were at 280. I turned the wheel one spoke to port, and we stayed at 280.
“Great job, Ari,” said Davey, a huge grin lighting up his face.
He turned to look at the rest of the group gathered there. “As you saw, it takes a moment or two for the rudder to respond to the wheel. So you make small corrections. Give her a moment to do what you ask, and she’ll get there. You want to remain within five degrees on either side of your course. If you stray more than ten degrees for more than a minute or two, tell the officer on deck. Ari, come left back to two-seven-zero. Good!”
I grinned, thrilled by Davey’s praise. Not too bad for my first try.
“Before long,” he continued, “you guys will not only be experts at steering by the compass, you will also learn to steer by the stars, the way sailors have been doing for centuries. But for now, when it’s your turn at the helm, keep an eye on that compass and focus on getting a feel for the way she handles.”
Steering by the stars. A little jolt of excitement went through me as I pictured myself doing just that, surrounded by a black sea and a glittering night sky.
It would be amazing.
Chapter Four
My first watch shift passed quickly. I learned how to do a boat check, which was a half-hourly check of the bilges and the engine room, and I stood bow watch, which literally involved standing at the bow of the ship and reporting anything I saw to the mate on duty. Since we were still fairly close to San Juan, there were tons of boats to report, including a monstrous cruise ship that blotted out the sun when it passed by on our starboard side. I also had a second shift at the helm.
After lunch we had Navigation and Seamanship class with the captain. He gave us our third tour of the ship, going over all the lines and sails again.
Now that we were a few hours away from San Juan and in the open water, the flat seas had been exchanged for two-to-three-foot swells. The ship rose and fell with each one, almost like a very slow amusement park ride, which made it hard to keep my balance, so I was grateful that it was time for literature class. I sat on the deck with my back against the starboard rail, my aching right leg straight out in front of me.
The other kids were sprawled out on benches, lockers, and the deck, and the prof, Sully, sat on a camp chair. “I’d like you guys to keep a journal.” There was a chorus of groans. “Yeah, yeah, you’re complaining now, but believe me, a few years down the line when you want to remember this voyage, you’ll be grateful to have it. For now, I want you to write a few paragraphs on your goals and expectations for this voyage. What do you think it will be like? What do you want to accomplish before the end of the trip?”
To remember why I loved the sea. To get my leg strong again. To become a sailor. To go in the ocean without being afraid. Not necessarily in that order. I tried to focus on the assignment, but I didn’t feel quite right. My stomach was in knots, and I couldn’t get comfortable. Suddenly, the ship seemed to drop out from under me, and my stomach lurched along with it. We rose up on another swell and then dropped again. There was a lump in my throat, and I felt sweaty and woozy.
“Are you okay, Ari?” Kevin laid his hand on my arm, his brow furrowed with concern.
“No.” I shoved my notebook at him and pulled myself to my feet, holding the rail for support. I needed to get away…now. I stumbled over my classmates’ legs and finally made it to the mainmast, hoping my stomach would settle. The ship crested on another swell, and my insides tumbled. I closed my eyes, waiting—hoping—for it to pass.
A hand latched on to my elbow. I snapped open my eyes to see Davey standing next to me. “This way, Ari.”
He took my arm and led me to the port side of the ship. “Hold on to the rail, lass.”
A wave of nausea rolled over me and I vomited into the sea below. Over and over again. Every time I thought I might be done, my stomach lurched and I’d start again.
Finally, there wasn’t anything left in my stomach.
“Ari?”
I turned to Davey, tears rolling down my face. My breath hitched, and I knew I was about to cry. He handed me a cup of water. I took small sips, afraid I’d just get sick again (I did).
He laid his hand on my shoulder. “Chin up, lass,” he said. “This happens to all of us at one time or another, whether you’ve been doing this for thirty minutes or thirty years. I guarantee before the end of the day, you won’t be the only one puking.”
After some water and crackers, I slowly started to feel better. “Come sit on the other side,” said Davey. “The breeze on your face will help.” We sat on the salon roof on the starboard side of the ship.
“I’ve been on tons of boats back home, but I’ve never gotten sick before. I even took some seasickness meds this morning. I don’t get it.”
“Recreational boats generally stay close to shore, where the seas are relatively calm. Over-the-counter medications usually work just fine for that. But we’re in open water now, and the seas are going to be rougher. Plus, you’re living on the ship, so the over-the-counter meds, which wear off after a few hours, just won’t work long-term. I have some Sea-Bands you can try.”
“Sea-Bands?”
“Aye, you wear them around your wrists. They use acupressure, which can be helpful against seasickness.”
“Can be?”
He shrugged. “Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t, just like pretty much every other seasickness remedy. Might as well give it a try, though, right? I suggest that you spend as little time as possible below deck. The best thing to do is stay hydrated and be in the fresh air. Don’t worry too much. You may be miserable for a while, but once you find your sea legs, you should be fine.”
“How long will that take?”
“Anywhere from a few hours to a few months.”
Months?
“Don’t worry. It usually doesn’t take months. I think you’ll be fine in a few days. But make it a habit to know which direction the wind is coming from, just in case.”
…
Oh God, not again! I slid out of my bunk and stumbled up the ladder to the deck. The utter darkness was disorienting. I needed to get to the rail, now. But which way? Breathing through my nose like a panicked horse, I spun to the left. Nothing. I spun to the right—and felt the wind on my face. I turned left again and ran for the starboard rail, barely making it.
When it was finally over, I slumped weakly against the shrouds. I was such a mess. I wasn’t the only one suffering, but it seemed that no one else had it this bad.
We’d only been at sea for two days—how was I going to survive two months? All the joy I had from raising the sails yesterday was gone. I should have just bagged the trip months ago and stayed home. I’d have eventually found something else to juice up my resume. No need to have put myself through the torture of seasickness while still dealing with the effects—physical, mental, and emotional—of my leg injury.
My stomach lurched and I leaned over the rail again. My braid swung forward, but I needed both hands on the rail and couldn’t grab it. God, could this get any worse?
A hand appeared out of the darkness, catching
my braid and sweeping it out of the way just in time. “You pukin’ again, Red?”
Yep, it could get worse.
Being seasick was awful, but doing it with a hot guy standing there sympathetically was beyond awful.
“Oh God—” I began, but I started retching again before I could tell him to go away.
“Oh, no need to call me ‘God,’” he said. “I’m a humble man. ‘My Lord’ will suffice.”
I couldn’t help it, I laughed. I was hurling over the rail in the middle of the night, with the cutest guy I’d ever seen holding back my hair while cracking lame jokes. It was some kind of twisted nightmare.
“Are you done?”
“I think so—” Nope, I wasn’t. “Please go away,” I whispered when I could speak again. “Why are you even up here?”
“I was feeling a little sick down below and thought I’d come up for some air. Saw you over here and thought you might want company.”
“You, feeling sick? I don’t believe it.”
“We’ve all been there, Red, even those of us who have been sailing for years. Most times, I’m used to the roll of the sea, but sometimes she catches me off guard, the sneaky bitch. It’s the worst feeling in the world, and all you want to do is slip overboard and let the sea take you.”
“That’s pretty much where I’m at now.”
“I still remember my worst seasickness experience,” he continued, absently playing with the end of my braid. I tried to focus on what he was saying and not think about the fact that he was playing with my hair. “It was back in Scotland. My folks used to take school groups out in the Moray Firth near Inverness to see the dolphins there. It was a day trip on their small schooner. I was fourteen, and this particular group was from an all-girls’ school. Ten or twelve pretty lassies around my age, and of course, I was in my glory. I was the cool lad who knew how to sail.”
He paused, his hand still holding my hair, while I puked again—since obviously, I wouldn’t be able to hear him. When I finished, he continued. “But there was a strong wind that day, comin’ in from the North Sea, and I had forgotten to take my seasick meds that mornin’. There was a huge swell, and I just lost it, right in front of all the girls. Didn’t even make it to the rail. Can you imagine?”
“Unfortunately, yes.”
“I was mortified. I went down below and didn’t come back on deck for the rest of the day.”
“Didn’t you feel worse below deck, though?” I spent as little time as possible down there, where the lack of air and the inability to see the horizon made me feel truly awful.
“Oh, aye, it was ten times worse. But it was better than pukin’ in front of all those lassies.” His fingers suddenly grazed my shoulder under my tank top strap, and I jolted. “I’m not being fresh, I’m just tucking your hair down your shirt in case you’re not done. I’ll be right back.”
“You don’t have to—”
“Be right back,” he repeated. I sank to my knees, resting my forehead on the cool, damp rail, wishing his hands had been on me for a more romantic reason. He returned a few minutes later. “Here’s some water and crackers. Let’s pretend you’re done and sit down.”
We sat on the deck, our backs against the rail. “I shouldn’t have come out here,” I muttered.
“Well, it’s better than puking in your bunk, no?”
I snorted at that. “I mean out here on the Meg.”
He looked at me in surprise. “Why would you say that? It’s only been a few days. Lots of people get seasick their first time out.”
“I just feel like I’m never going to catch a break. I…injured my leg really badly while scuba diving six months ago. It aches if I sit or stand for too long, and sometimes I just get shooting pains for no reason. I almost backed out of this program so many times.”
I hadn’t told anyone on the ship about my injury, playing it off as a sore muscle if anyone noticed. But there was something about Tristan that made me want to tell him everything. Maybe it was just that he seemed genuinely interested in what I had to say. “And with the seasickness, I can’t eat, I can’t sleep, I can barely sit through class. The only thing I seem to be able to do is steer. For some reason, I don’t feel as sick when I’m at the helm. The stupid Sea-Bands didn’t help at all.” I sighed. “And now I’m just whining.”
“You’re not whining, you just need someone to talk to. And hey, it’s great that you feel better when you’re at the wheel. Why do you think that is?”
“I don’t know. Maybe it’s just because I have something real to focus on. Or…”
“Or what?”
“You’ll think it’s stupid.”
“I just told you my worst puking story, ever. It doesn’t get stupider than that.”
True. “Okay. I was going to say that it’s almost like my body somehow knows it’s my responsibility to steer the ship safely, and for those thirty minutes or an hour I can’t be sick, because then I’d be failing to do my job and putting everyone at risk.” My face grew hot, and I was grateful for the darkness.
“I don’t think that’s stupid at all.”
“You don’t?”
“No. I think that at least some aspect of seasickness is psychological, and the human mind can be a very powerful thing. You hear all these stories about people who are seriously ill, but…hold on to life through sheer determination.” He paused, clearing his throat. “So to me it makes sense that you’re able to subconsciously hold your seasickness at bay when you’re at the helm and feeling responsible for the well-being of the ship and crew.”
“That was deeper than I expected for whatever the hell time of night this is,” I said.
“Aye, well, I’ve had many hours of staring at the sea and the stars and thinking deep thoughts. We spent most of my childhood out at sea, in the Caribbean during the winter and in Scotland during the summer. Mum homeschooled me until I was twelve and they thought it was time for me to go to a real school and make friends my age.”
“Wow. That must have been amazing!” I had a pretty great childhood in the playground of the Florida Keys, but how cool that he grew up sailing, seeing different places and meeting people from around the world.
“It was brilliant.”
He’d mentioned his mother, and I wondered where she was while he and his father were sailing around the Caribbean with a bunch of college kids. “Hey, speaking of family—” I felt his body tense and glanced over at him. It was too dark to see his face, and he didn’t say anything, but I could tell that I’d ventured into a subject he didn’t want to discuss. I hurried to think of something to say. “Are you and Davey related?”
He relaxed slightly. “Why, because we’re both Scottish?” I heard the smile in his voice and knew he was teasing.
“Well, it seemed weird for there to be three people from Scotland here on this small ship, in a U.S. college program, thousands of miles from Scotland.”
“Fair enough. We’re not related by blood, but Davey and my father have been friends their whole lives. Your turn. You said you almost backed out. But you didn’t. Why?”
I blinked, surprised by the sudden change of subject. “It’s been hard at home, especially hard to be around my twin brother, Josh, who was…with me when I got hurt. The weight of everyone’s constant worry”—and guilt—“and my own anger and fear got to be so stifling. I needed to get away from them hovering over me, to prove to them—and to myself—that I could do it, you know? Or else everything I’ve been working for goes down the drain.”
“You did the right thing, then. It’s never a mistake to spend time at sea, Red. Standin’ at the bow, with the wind in your hair, listenin’ to the creak of the hull and the snap of the sails, watchin’ the full moon rise…”
Tristan’s voice was as soothing as his words, and I leaned my head against the rail and stared up at the stars, just as a shooting star zoomed across the sky. I needed to make a wish. There were so many things I longed for: no more seasickness, no more pain in my thigh—
but what came into my head was neither of those.
I wish that when it’s time to get in the water, I’ll finally be able to push aside my fear and jump in like I always used to do. I watched the star until it fizzled out.
“You feeling any better, Red?”
“A little, maybe. Definitely more relaxed.”
“I’ve been known to have that effect on people,” he said dryly. “But you should go below and try to get some sleep. We only have a couple of hours before midnight watch.”
“I wish I could stay on deck,” I said. “It’s so stuffy down below.”
“I know, but you can’t sleep here while we’re underway.” He got to his feet. “Take my hand. Your leg might be stiff from sitting.” Trying not to gape in surprise at his thoughtfulness, I reached up and felt his warm hand close around mine. He pulled me up, waited for me to be steady on my feet, and then we headed down the ladder. “G’night, Red. See you in a few hours.”
“’Night. Thanks for sitting with me.”
“Anytime,” he murmured, and then he faded into the blackness of the cabin.
I climbed into my bunk and curled on my side, replaying my conversation with Tristan. He was so unlike the guys I knew from campus. Not just the kindness he showed by sitting with me and helping me up, but the way he spoke, the way he listened. Even in the darkness on deck, I’d felt his gaze on me, knew he was paying attention to every word I said. Most of my guy friends, no matter how nice and genuine they were, never seemed interested in a serious conversation, and would either change the subject or listen half-heartedly if I attempted one. Not Tristan—he not only listened and asked questions, he had no problem sharing his own thoughts with a virtual stranger. A girl would be lucky to be with him.
I rolled over, willing sleep to come. After a few moments, I fumbled at the foot of the bunk for my duffel bag, pulled Lancelot out of his pillowcase, and tucked him under my arm, feeling only slightly foolish. I closed my eyes, and hearing Tristan’s lilting voice in my head, finally felt myself drift off to sleep.
A Star to Steer Her By Page 4