Triumph Over Tragedy: an anthology for the victims of Hurricane Sandy

by R. T. Kaelin

  * *** *

  There were lines up and down the waterfront. Islanders lined up and waiting to see the restored product, I thought. The taxi driver dropped me off, and I found the Rasta.

  “’Ere we ah go,” he said smiling.

  I noticed someone had painted a name on the rear: Marcus Garvey. One of the founders of the back to Africa movement a long time ago. I paced the length of the ship, trying to come to figure out what exactly it was they were doing.

  “This is insane,” I protested. The Rasta nodded again.

  “Massive insanity,” he agreed. I briskly walked back away to get a better view of the deck.

  An old woman in a green shawl stood just under the forecastle. A young boy in a green and white uniform from the school just up the street stepped in to the front of the deck. Her old withered hands reached out to give him a sip from the green gourd she held. He shivered and fainted, crumpling in on himself then rolling onto the deck. I could see the tiny chest rise with a slowing rhythm of breath, until the child fell still. My stomach flip-flopped with memories of stories of mass suicides.

  The woman next in line, maybe his mother, took the liquid just as calmly. Behind her a policeman waited his turn.

  As soon as they lay limp on the deck, two men would bear the unconscious down into the ship’s holds.

  The silent ritual repeated itself. I whirled upon the Rasta by my side.

  “What is this? What are you doing?” I demanded, heart pounding.

  “They sleep zombie-style 'till we ah come there.”

  “Where?” I asked.

  “Land of milk an’ honey.” He shrugged. “Or anywhere else. A new place. They will wake in Zion.”

  “But why this ship?” I wanted to know.

  “We ah bring we history with we. We face it, not run from it.”

  I made my way to the hull and touched it. It sang now, full of energy. It sounded like a temple of Buddhist monks, an ooom sound that hinted at deep power.

  My dispassion faltered for a moment. I was trying to think about work, rational facts, anything but deal with what was happening around me.

  “I have to go,” I said. I was expected to return soon back out at Sombrero Island; I had to leave tomorrow. What could I do here, when even the police were lined up?

  “You missin’ it,” the Rastaman said. He looked disappointed.

  I turned away and walked back to the taxi. My hand trembled as I opened the door.

  A slave ship could hold maybe four hundred bodies stacked in the worse imaginable manner. Yet it seemed that most of the population of the island stood waiting their turn to be led into the hold.

  Impossible.

  * *** *

  I slept fitfully that night until the deep ooom called me. I sat up, stood, and walked to the pool. The night was deathly quiet, and the clouds twisted in long strands above. The moon shone full on the shimmering harbor water, and lights blazed across the massive natural amphitheater of the harbor and curving backbone of the island’s mountains.

  Anchored in the air above the town was the ship. As I watched it cast itself free and floated up over the hill. The long streamers of cloud that usually just scraped the tip of Crown Mountain, the highest point on the island, seemed to reach down and take the ship up into their depths and out of sight.

  It’s a dream, I told myself, grabbing the railing. The cold metal railing told me different.

  * *** *

  I woke up the next morning nervous. Today I was to take the water taxi from the hotel’s dock into town where Ottley was to be waiting with the powerboat’s keys. From there I’d go back St. Croix. Then fly to Florida.

  Now, waiting by the dock, the taxi already late, I knew I hadn’t been dreaming. I couldn’t see the slave ship way off in the distance on the waterfront. Only bare concrete. No cars moved through the street.

  Hours later, after wandering throughout the deserted hotel to find something to eat, I walked down to the waterfront. The entire island had gotten into the boat yesterday and left. I understood that. Where they were going I still was not sure. I sat on the concrete rim of the waterfront, trying to explain to the wind why methane booster rockets were more efficient than kerosene, but I couldn’t remember, and it didn’t matter really. The entire waterfront, loud and bustling, lay dead quiet. I remembered other busy cities I'd lived in. I remembered production deadlines and dirt-free clean-suits, laptops and cellular modems, and being asked to have the numbers on the desk by the next morning.

  A tiny wooden skiff bumped up against large truck tires hung off the edge of the concrete to protect the ferries. I looked down. The green, red, and yellow letters read Little Garvey. My hand started to tremble again, and I wished I still had another joint with me.

  The skiff had a bench in the middle, and two pegs on either side to put the oars between. It bobbed and hit the tire in rhythm with the swell. I carefully clambered in, untying the rope, and pushed off from the waterfront. Somehow they had all managed to subvert that horrible legacy, the slave ship and what it represented, from the past and take it with them proudly into a new future.

  How?

  I wanted to try.

  I set the oars between the two pegs, closed my eyes, and leaned back. The oars bit into the water, the small boat began to move. Trust, I figured, was important. And belief.

  I began to row.

  *

  Parting the Clouds

  by Bradley P. Beaulieu

  Twenty hours, Kinjin thought. Twenty hours from Vegas to L.A. to Tokyo and finally south to Kagoshima, and would his relatives give him one moment’s peace?

  Fat chance.

  A few pleasantries exchanged, but when they got him to the car, the worm turned. How can you fritter away your inheritance like this? Why won’t you settle down or go to school? Or even start a company? You must have enough money left for that! Isn’t there anything you want to do? Your parents would be ashamed!

  He did his best to deflect their questions, their concerns, but his aunt was persistent as all get out. She wouldn’t leave him alone, even though he’d only come to visit. The urge to skip town bubbled up inside him, but he knew he couldn’t leave, not until he’d made his peace with Sakurajima.

  Then the news came. Tropical Storm Yomo had found new life in the Pacific and had just reached typhoon status. During the next thirty-six hours it surged up to category 3 and appeared to be heading straight for southern Japan. As the news intensified, so did the mood around Kagoshima. Preparations were made to evacuate should the storm remain on course. Typhoon Yomo reached category 4 the next morning and showed no signs of changing direction.

  As the city mobilized, an utter sense of calm came over Kinjin. He had known since he’d first heard word of the storm that he would stay if it headed for Kagoshima, knew he would stand face-to-face with it and see what it had to offer.

  When his aunt and cousins left, Kinjin swore he would be right behind them, that he only wished to take a few pictures of the approaching storm from the bay. But when they finally packed up their car and headed north, he abandoned his camera and headed for the waterfront.

  Kinjin staked his ground on a grass-covered rise in Kamoike Park, a few dozen feet from Kagoshima’s breakwater, where twenty-foot waves crested and collapsed against the piled concrete. The chaos of the charcoal sky turned the once-busy dockside into a colorless menagerie. Against the backdrop of Kagoshima’s hotels and office buildings, the wholesale market shivered on the pier as the overspray from the waves pummeled it. Dozens of fishing boats waged a surreal game of king-of-the-mountain in the playground of the harbor.

  The raindrops were tacks driven into Kinjin’s face and hands and calves. His cutoff jeans and denim jacket did little to protect the skin beneath. Even the piercings over his left eyebrow and the tops of his ears felt sore.

  The wind rumbled like a jet engine. The bravado of moments ago ebbed, and he found himself more afraid of the physical act of dying than he had thought he would.
From beneath his shirt, he retrieved the one piece of his past he had retained over the years: a brass house key hanging from a dog-tag chain. He shivered and clutched the key. I need you, Mom and Dad. Please, tell me what to do.

  There was no answer, of course—never had been—but a renewed sense of calm returned, and soon he was able to stare out to sea, ready for the end. He was glad it would come in the form of a force of nature. There would be no questions of morality about drowning in the bay, no right or wrong. It would simply be.

  A sound like a brick against a block of wood thrummed through Kinjin’s head. The rumbling of the wind was replaced instantly with a high-pitched keening. Moments later, he realized he was lying on the ground in a deep puddle. He coughed from the inhaled water as the rain tried to beat him back down. Every part of him was numb.

  As Kinjin staggered to his feet the gash over his ear flared to life, and the sound of the wind returned with renewed fury. He felt warmth in the form of a trickle running down the right side of his face. It tasted of blood. The pain made him cower and shut his eyes tight. His hands shook. But finally, after a dozen shivering breaths, it receded.

  The foamy waves—nearly thirty feet high—assaulted the rise Kinjin stood upon, breaking only at the last moment before slipping back under the hungry mass of the next. One wave, over a hundred yards off, strode forward like the general behind the vanguard. Kinjin renewed his grip on the key. The muscle of his arm became so taut that he feared the chain would break, but he couldn’t relax. Who knew nature could make something so large!

  And then the strangest thing happened. Two faint notes from an instrument—a flute?—intermingled among the locomotive thunder of the wind and rain. How was that possible? Kinjin wrote it off as just the whistling of the wind, but the notes returned a moment later, louder and closer. It was a flute. The melody seesawed between wistful and serious.

  The mammoth wave sucked the sea back from the breakwater—one deep breath before this grand exhalation. Kinjin could do nothing to ease his grip on the key even though he felt its teeth break the skin of his palm.

  The seawater struck like a juggernaut, snatching Kinjin’s legs from under him and tossing him backward like a pebble in the surf. As the water receded, Kinjin fought madly, clawing and lunging against the wave’s pull. He lost more and more ground. He was going to be sucked out to sea, lost forever.

  But finally the wave spat him out. Kinjin coughed and gasped for breath and scrabbled up and over the rise. He stood on shaking legs, mouth agape.

  The gale was now little more than a breeze, and only a light rain pattered the ground around him. The clouds seemed beaten, for they gave way and allowed the sun to shine through. Patches of blue sky shone through the maelstrom above. The eye of the typhoon towered miles into the air all around him, as if the entire world was made of roiling clouds save for this one place.

  A giggle escaped Kinjin’s throat, and he thrust his arms to the sky and laughed and laughed and laughed.

  A half-mile east, the wall of the typhoon pulled back further to reveal Kagoshima Bay, and Kinjin’s laughter was snuffed like a candle left out in the rain. Beyond the dark, roiling water, the active volcano, Sakurajima, stared angrily down as it spewed ash high into the air.

  It was the place he’d been avoiding since he’d arrived in Kagoshima. He hadn’t even looked at it until now. It was the reason his parents had died. They had come here on vacation four years ago and chartered a helicopter to tour the mountain. They’d never returned. Hell, they’d never even made it. Their helicopter crashed into the bay a few minutes into the flight.

  Kinjin turned when the sound of the flute resumed behind him. Below him lay the debris-riddled soccer field of Tempozan Park. Seven Chinese men—or Mongolian, perhaps—wearing saffron shirts and wheat-colored leggings walked single file toward the center of the field. Braided strips of bamboo wrapped the men’s elbows and knees, segmenting them like rag dolls. Each bore a tanned water skin hanging from a thick leather strap over his shoulder. All of them had shaved heads, and the six at the front of the line held wooden bowls. The man at the rear, shorter and older than the rest, played a Japanese flute, a shakuhachi.

  When they reached the center, the bowl-carrying monks spread into a rough circle and paced counter-clockwise around the shakuhachi player. Gazing skyward, they held the bowls above their heads as the rain fell. The shakuhachi’s song harmonized their movements with those of the storm. It was as if the monks and the typhoon were sharing a communal experience by common agreement. They were obviously collecting rain, but it seemed like they were worshipping the eye as well, for their movements seemed too similar to the spin of the storm to think otherwise.

  It was…beautiful, and so incredibly peaceful. If Kinjin could find that sort of peace, he knew he’d be able to deal with his demons.

  With no conscious effort, Kinjin’s wobbly legs stepped forward. The monks ignored Kinjin until he came within ten paces, and then the monk playing the shakuhachi lowered his instrument and stared at Kinjin. The monk, now that he’d stopped playing, looked jaundiced and sickly.

  Kinjin realized the wind was steadily picking up its pace. It drove harder against his skin, chilled him more hungrily. Kinjin shivered, unsure what to say.

  The monk pointed with his shakuhachi toward downtown. “Leave!” he said in Chinese and, when Kinjin didn’t respond, “Go!” in Japanese.

  Kinjin was so surprised by the monk’s vehemence that he replied in English. “I can’t.”

  The man continued to point, his round face rigid, his deep-set eyes angry. “Go, go!”

  “I can’t!” Kinjin said, switching to Japanese.

  The monk’s eyes surveyed the area around them, then the sky above. He shook his head ever so slightly and hung the shakuhachi from a loop of twine at his rope belt. He stepped out of the circle and faced Kinjin. “You’re lucky to be alive.” His Japanese, though clear, had a Mongolian accent.

  “Am I?” Kinjin asked, blinking away the rain falling in his face.

  The monk’s eyes narrowed. There was contempt in that gaze, but also a touch of curiosity. “Yes,” he said matter-of-factly, “you are.”

  “What are you doing here?”

  “Our purpose is no concern of yours.” The monk coughed and glanced back at his brothers. “And someone like you would never understand. Go back to your world and leave us to ours.” A large tattoo marked the inside of the monk’s forearm—a rooster, pig, and snake, all three in a circle around a maroon maple tree, each biting the tail of the next. Where had he seen that before?

  “I don’t have a world to go back to.”

  The monk looked Kinjin up and down. “Look at you. Pierced eyebrows, Levis, diver’s watch. You’re probably so buried by your world that you’ve convinced yourself you can no longer live in it.”

  Kinjin opened his mouth to speak, but stopped himself. The monk wasn’t correct, but he’d struck close enough to the mark. As the silence lengthened, the monk’s expression turned to one of embarrassment.

  Nearby, what Kinjin had thought to be a rock lying near a rangy bush turned out to be a sea turtle. It tried flipping over several times before finally succeeding and scuffling away as if the typhoon had never passed over. As the light rain continued to settle over the city, a sad laugh escaped Kinjin’s throat.

  The old man’s eyes were hard again as he pointed toward the Sun Royal Hotel. “Find shelter before the eye wall approaches. Do not hide in a cellar or the storm will drown you.” Then he pointed to his ear. “And find clean cloth for that wound. You’re still bleeding.”

  He walked back to the center of the circle and began to play the same song as before, though louder.

  Kinjin almost turned to follow the monk’s advice. It was the smart thing to do. But these men, so heedless of the typhoon, so confident in their dealings with it… He could not simply leave.

  Each monk emptied the contents of his wooden bowl into the skin hanging at his side. A day ago Kinjin m
ight have schemed to retrieve one of the skins, to examine the water they had collected. Here, in such divine presence, the mere thought was profane.

  The wind howled through the city, louder and louder. Kinjin hadn’t realized, but the eastern wall of the eye was nearly upon them. The clouds began to block out the bits of blue sky, the light from the sun.

  The monks collected the last of the typhoon’s water into their skins and tied the necks securely. They formed a line and returned the way they’d come, the shakuhachi player now leading instead of trailing. Fear surged up in Kinjin like an unholy swell of seawater. It wasn’t fear of death that had him in its grip, or even the fear of being left alone. It was the simple act of not knowing what they had just done, the feeling that he would never know if he didn’t do something about it right now.

  He ran up to the flutist and paced him. “Please, take me with you.”

  The old man’s only reply was a short coughing fit.

  “Please.”

  The line of monks trudged forward, heedless of the calls, and Kinjin stopped, sure of their determination.

  The rain felt colder than before, and the howling wind laughed.

  Please.

  The monks trudged onward, but then, as if he’d heard Kinjin’s unuttered plea, the flutist slowed. He turned, shoulders hunched, and shook his head ever so slightly. He made his way back to Kinjin and held out his shakuhachi.

  Kinjin stared at it. “What?”

  “You need it more than I do.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “No, you wouldn’t, would you?” The monk shook the instrument, and Kinjin accepted it reflexively. “But perhaps you will someday.” Then the old man turned, jogged back to his brethren, and followed them into the gathering winds.