Casting Off

by Cressida McLaughlin

  The room they were in ran almost the full length of the boat, and was bare of furniture save for a small, open-plan kitchen consisting of a fridge, a worktop and a hob. Behind that was a door, which Summer presumed led into the bathroom. The floor wasn’t carpeted, but was strewn with large cushions and worn beanbags, on which people were sitting or slouching, eating out of metal takeaway containers.

  ‘What is this boat for?’ Summer murmured, trying to pick out faces she recognized in the gloom.

  ‘It’s for whatever you want it to be.’ The man who approached was tall and slender, his walk almost a saunter, his blue eyes latched on to hers. His ash-blond hair was a shaggy mop, and his beard gave the impression of being left untamed, but Summer thought it was probably carefully cultivated to look that way. He wore a loose-fitting shirt with a paisley pattern in blues and pinks.

  ‘Summer,’ Claire said, ‘this is Ryder. Ryder, meet Summer.’

  ‘Hi,’ Summer said, ‘is this your boat?’

  ‘It is indeed,’ Ryder said, swinging his arm wide. ‘And at the same time, it’s everyone’s. A place we can all come together. We’ll set off shortly, I think most people are here.’

  ‘Where are we going?’

  ‘A bit of night cruising,’ Ryder said. ‘Stories, music, whatever you feel like. You and your pup. You should come and meet Jas, he’s got an Irish wolfhound.’

  ‘On a boat?’ Summer laughed.

  Ryder looked at her seriously, and Summer held her breath, but then the smile was back, wider than ever. ‘It takes all sorts,’ he said. ‘I once met someone who kept a pair of marmosets on his boat, called them Ethel and Eldred.’

  ‘Has storytelling started already?’

  Ryder flicked Claire a look as if to say Where did you get her from, and then snaked his arm around her shoulders. ‘Come and meet everyone.’

  Summer was introduced to Ralph, in his forties with wispy blond hair, who ran The Sandwich Shack, and Doug, slightly older and soft round the edges, with dark, heavily receding hair and a kind smile. He owned The Antiques Barge, and seemed slightly wary of Ryder, despite the younger man introducing him with what Summer thought was genuine affection.

  ‘This,’ Ryder said, his hand squeezing Summer’s shoulder as they weaved their way through the cushions, Claire following closely behind, ‘is Jas. Jas, say hello to Summer and her candyfloss dog.’

  The man scrambled to his feet, but Summer was distracted by the huge Irish wolfhound who, even sitting on his haunches, easily came up to her waist.

  ‘Hi.’ She held out her hand, and Jas shook it.

  He looked mid-twenties, his black hair thick, but flattened on top as if it lived most of the time under a hat, his beard much neater than Ryder’s. His eyes were attentive, and he had a gentleness about him that reminded Summer of Mason.

  ‘Nice to meet you,’ he said, ‘and your Bichon Frise. What’s his name?’

  ‘She’s called Latte. How about the bear you’ve brought with you?’

  Jas glanced at his dog and laughed. ‘This is Chester. He takes up a lot of room but he’s very placid.’

  ‘Can I?’ Jas nodded and Summer stroked the wolfhound’s nose. Latte struggled in her arms, and the large dog angled his snout up towards her. Summer watched them closely, but the overriding emotion was definitely curiosity, and Summer put Latte carefully on the floor. She padded forward to Chester, and the two dogs examined each other.

  ‘The bear and the candyfloss,’ Ryder said, watching them. ‘It could be the start of a great love story.’

  ‘Maybe you could tell it later,’ Jas said, ‘embellish it in the way that only you can.’

  Ryder folded his arms and nodded. ‘I might just do that,’ he said. ‘Once we’re somewhere a little bit more … atmospheric. Time to get our cruise on.’

  Summer glanced around her as Ryder sauntered his way towards the stern, thinking that the boat was already fairly atmospheric. She wondered if her mum had ever come across The Wanderer’s Rest before. It was just the kind of place she would have loved.

  Claire put a hand on her shoulder. ‘OK?’ she asked.

  ‘Yeah. Great. I’ve never been anywhere like this before.’

  ‘Ryder would take that as the biggest compliment. He’s harmless, by the way. I know he comes across as an arrogant knob, and there’s no denying he is that, but he’s genuinely kind-hearted, and he opens his boat up for anyone who fancies a get-together.’

  ‘So he lives here?’

  Claire nodded. ‘Pulls out a sleeping bag every night.’

  ‘Or heads off to a local hotel,’ Jas said. ‘None of us are ever really sure.’

  Claire laughed. ‘Cynic.’

  Jas spread his arms wide. ‘Just calling it as I see it.’

  ‘Right,’ Claire said, ‘let’s get some of Ralph’s Thai curry, and wait for the fun to begin.’

  Once they had scooped curry into takeaway containers, and the boat had powered into action with a low, comforting thrum, Claire and Summer sat down on cushions alongside Jas.

  ‘Where have you come from, Summer?’ he asked, as he nudged Chester’s nose out of Claire’s dinner.

  ‘Willowbeck. I’ve got a permanent mooring there, and I’ve been running the café for about six weeks. I fancied a change of scene,’ she added, and felt Claire’s gaze on her intensify. ‘How about you?’

  ‘I’ve been a liveaboard for two years,’ he said. ‘It’s something I’ve wanted to do since before university. I travel with this lot, I’m a freelance writer, and I run a blog about life on the water.’ He laughed when he saw Summer’s surprise. ‘Not all blogs are run by teenage girls, you know.’

  ‘It’s got quite a following,’ Claire said. ‘How many are you up to now?’

  ‘Nearly twenty thousand. I think having Chester helps – who doesn’t want to read stories about a giant dog living aboard a narrowboat? It’s starting to make a bit of revenue through advertising, and the biggest struggle is keeping a steady signal so I can respond to the comments.’

  ‘Chester’s gorgeous,’ Summer said, stroking his rough brown fur. ‘And so calm.’

  ‘Not much bothers him,’ Jas laughed. ‘Except, for some reason, pugs. He gets really worked up by them, as if he thinks they’re not a real breed of dog, but some kind of strange imposter.’

  Summer nodded. ‘I can see where he’s coming from.’

  ‘Says the woman with the dog made from candyfloss,’ Claire said.

  ‘Hey.’ Summer put her hands over Latte’s ears. ‘Don’t you start.’

  ‘Yeah, Claire,’ Jas said, ‘if Ryder thinks you’re on his side for even a second, he’ll run with it and you’ll end up being his permanent sidekick.’

  ‘Ryder’s OK,’ Claire said, giving them a quick smile, and Summer saw the blush rise to her cheeks, despite the dim lighting. She tried to catch her eye, but Claire focused her attention on scraping up the residue of her curry with her plastic fork.

  The boat juddered to a halt, and people began slowly getting to their feet, the chatter rising in volume.

  ‘Where are we?’ Summer asked.

  ‘The fairy grove,’ Claire said in a dramatic whisper. Summer looked to Jas for clarification, but he just rolled his eyes and handed her a blanket. They filed out of the boat, Summer keeping Latte’s lead short.

  ‘This way, fair maidens.’ Ryder gave them a regal bow, and locked up the boat behind them.

  Claire took Summer’s arm as they stepped off the deck on to muddy ground. They were moored deep in the countryside, with no house or streetlights in view. The smell of vegetation was strong, the river a black hole, the air chilled but not perishing.

  They followed the trail of dancing torch beams across an expanse of grass and into a cluster of trees. Summer could hear Ryder’s light footfall behind her and, ahead of her, some of the others began to hum a soft, rhythmic tune. She shivered, despite herself, unsure whether curiosity or fear was winning the battle inside her, a vision flashing through her
mind of being tied to a makeshift altar in the middle of the woods. Claire, as if sensing her disquiet, squeezed her arm, and Summer pushed the thoughts away.

  The torch beams were soon joined by other, smaller lights, and Summer realized there were fairy lights strung up in the trees. The line dispersed, and people began perching on tree stumps, or sitting on the dry, dusty floor. They were in a small clearing amongst the trees, the fairy lights surrounding the makeshift arena.

  ‘The fairy grove?’ Summer asked.

  ‘That’s not its real name,’ Claire said. ‘I don’t think it has one. It’s just somewhere Ryder’s found, where we come when we’re on this stretch of river, and with the circle and the lights …’ She pointed upwards.

  They sat on the ground and Summer wrapped the blanket around her shoulders, shooting a grateful glance at Jas. Someone had lit a fire in the middle of the clearing, its orange flames soon crackling and spitting into the darkness, and Ralph began handing out plastic cups and filling them with a dark liquid.

  ‘What is this?’ Summer asked, as she held out her cup. ‘And on a scale of one to ten, how lethal is it?’

  ‘It’s homemade plum wine,’ he said proudly, ‘and I’d say it’s about a seven.’

  ‘Thanks.’ Summer took a tiny sip and closed her eyes as the warmth hit her. It was sweet, and easy to drink once she got used to the burn, and so she put her cup on the floor, almost out of reach.

  Ryder raised his glass and everyone followed suit in a silent cheers, but it was Doug who cleared his throat and started talking, his voice carrying easily across the clearing.

  ‘A little way from here, running alongside the narrow, bubbling creek,’ he started, ‘is a road you never want to go down after dark, for fear of finding a Shucky Dog. Not like you, Chester,’ he said, and the Irish wolfhound pricked up his ears, ‘and as far as you can possibly get from the little lapdog over there,’ he pointed at Latte. ‘The Shucky Dog is a fearsome creature, and each and every one of you should be praying that you never come across one.’ He took a sip of his drink, and then continued.

  ‘When it comes, you may not even see it. There’ll be a prickling on your neck, as if someone has walked up close behind you, and the rattling of chains, distant so as to be almost a figment, but just on the edge of your hearing. Listen.’ He stopped talking and cupped his hand behind his ear. The small group, already quiet, fell completely silent, and Summer tried to still her breathing, could feel the tension in her chest. She strained to hear a sound, but prayed that it wouldn’t be the soft tinkling of chains rattling together.

  ‘Next,’ Doug said loudly, making them jump and sending a nervous titter round the circle, ‘you’ll hear the breathing. A wet, heavy rasping as the hound, its mouth full of spittle, prepares to take its next victim. If you’re unlucky enough to see it – because the Shucky Dog, ladies and gentlemen, is a harbinger of death – then it will be a flash of red eyes, a blur of thick black fur. Nobody has ever got a clear look at it, but a glimpse is all you need for death to chase you down. So heed my advice, stay away from the creek road, and if you hear heavy panting behind you or the clink of chains, pray that it’s just a traveller, a lost boatsman who’s strayed from the water. Don’t travel down that road at night.’

  Doug nodded once and took another sip of his drink. Summer raised her hands, ready to applaud – she could feel the hairs prickling on the back of her neck, and nobody, nobody could convince her to turn around right now and peer into the black woods behind her – but nobody else put their hands together.

  Instead, an older man with white hair down to his shoulders, who Summer hadn’t yet been introduced to, leant forward and began speaking.

  The stories kept coming, some ghostly, some tragic, some funny and ridiculous, told in turn by members of the small group. Everyone had their own style, their own way of hooking their audience in. Ralph was blisteringly funny when he told the tale of a local theatre group who had, unbeknown to them, cast – and then spurned – a famous actor in a play, and the humiliation that followed. Jas told a creepy story about a boat that cruised the waterways with no helmsman, just a low wailing and the occasional flash of a face at the window, and Claire’s story was musical, both in theme and in the telling, with snippets of folk songs littered throughout.

  Summer was entranced, her face burning in the glowing fire while Latte snoozed in her lap. She laughed and shuddered and, on a couple of occasions, squealed aloud. She had no idea what the time was, but she would have been happy listening to the stories until the sun began to glimmer through the trees.

  And then Ryder’s eyes turned to her, the fairy lights casting shadows of his eyelashes on his cheeks. ‘Summer, do you have a story you want to tell?’

  She swallowed and reached for her cup, glanced at Claire who raised her eyebrows.

  ‘I – I’m sorry, I’ve not done this before,’ she said. ‘I haven’t thought.’ She waited, her breath in her throat, wondering what Ryder’s reaction would be.

  ‘Of course,’ he said, ‘maybe next time?’ His smile was full, his eyes finding hers out despite the shadows, and Summer felt a rush of relief.

  ‘Next time,’ she nodded. ‘Thank you.’ If there was a next time – and the fact that she was being allowed back was pleasing enough – she would be bold, she would find a story to tell.

  When they finally stood, Summer found that her legs had gone numb, and Jas helped haul her to her feet. Back on the boat, with the warmth of the woodburner seeping into her bones, Summer felt her eyelids begin to drop. She forced herself to speak, in an attempt to stay awake until they got back to Foxburn.

  ‘You have a wonderful voice,’ she said to Claire. ‘You must have music going all the way through you, like “Southwold” in a stick of rock.’

  Claire laughed. ‘There’s nothing I’m more passionate about,’ she said. ‘Nothing that a tune or a song can’t improve. Will you do a story, next time?’

  Summer nodded. ‘I’d like to.’

  ‘For now, tell me about Willowbeck. What sent you north? Was it really just competition at the pub?’

  ‘It was a variety of things,’ she admitted. ‘I hadn’t been there that long. It took me a while after … Mum died to even want to see the boat. And then, in my absence, her best friend was trying to run it and fell into some difficulty. My intention was to go and get her back on her feet – not that I thought that I really could – and then it … It sort of all came back to me. Why I’d loved being on the boat. Lots of it was to do with spending time with Mum, but not all of it.’

  It had become clearer to her since she’d travelled away from Willowbeck. She had previously thought that if her mum had been running a café in a shopping centre or on a high street then she would have loved that, and had memories that were just as happy, but she was beginning to see that it was more than that. The river really was a magical, calming place to be.

  ‘Once a water baby, always a water baby,’ Claire said.

  ‘Have you lived on boats all your life?’

  ‘Not at all,’ Claire said, ‘though I’ve always grown up around narrowboats. I come from Brecon, and the Mon and Brec canal is stunning. We used to take trips on it all the time. We got to spending so much of our money on the day cruisers that the boatsmen ended up letting me and my brothers ride for free, as long as we helped with handing out teas and coffees, and did a bit of the tour-guide business here and there.’

  ‘So you always wanted to be a liveaboard?’

  ‘Not consciously. I fell into it after a relationship ended. I was trawling through the flat listings online, it was a bloody nightmare and I thought – why not? Why not do something different? The shop came later, when I realized how hard it was to find a residential mooring, and so a fixed place of work wasn’t that easy either. It’s haphazard, but I couldn’t imagine not being on my boat. And there are nights like tonight, these get-togethers. Nothing’s too formulaic or routine, and that suits me. What’s next for you after Foxburn?’


  Summer shrugged. ‘I don’t know.’ Her visitor mooring was for fourteen days, and after that she had to move on. The residential mooring at Willowbeck was never too far from her thoughts, though after tonight, Summer could see that there was so much more to explore, things that she’d never dreamed of.

  ‘Don’t think about that now,’ Claire said. ‘Think about the next week.’ She held up a hand in greeting as Ryder approached, a bottle of local cider in his hand.

  ‘Can I offer you ladies a drink? Help to warm you up.’

  Summer shook her head, but Ryder sat alongside them anyway.

  ‘Who’s steering?’ Claire asked.

  ‘I’ve left Jas in charge. He’s a better helmsman than I am anyway, especially in the dark. How did you find our little gathering?’ He leaned in close to Summer. He smelt of apples and charred wood.

  ‘It was fun,’ Summer said. ‘A bit cold and creepy in the woods, but I suppose that’s all part of it.’

  ‘Claire mentioned that you run a café on your boat?’

  ‘I do.’ In his company, her blackboard, her gingham apron and vases of flowers all seemed a bit tame. ‘You should come aboard, have a coffee on the house.’

  Ryder narrowed his eyes, but didn’t respond.

  ‘I’m going to help her branch out,’ Claire said. ‘Make a list of all the delicacies she should be baking.’

  ‘Oh, I already have a list,’ Summer said. ‘It’s the things customers asked me for this afternoon. In the time I was at Willowbeck, three people asked me if I made a certain kind of cake, and one of those was Jenny, who was just showing off about her own red velvet cakes.’

  ‘I love a red velvet cake!’

  ‘Don’t side with the enemy,’ Summer said. ‘Anyway, the point is, this afternoon eight different people asked for cheesecake or fondant fancies or cream horns.’

  ‘The people of Foxburn are a diverse lot,’ Claire said, looking away.

  ‘Don’t think I don’t know it was you,’ Summer said.