Let Us Be Brave

by Linda Thompson

  “Absolutely, honey. Have a good time.”

  Soon the door closed, and Irene sat on the side of her bed looking down at her house shoes, feeling happy with no one telling her what to do. She walked over to her dresser and put on her pink flowered dress. She decided she would go out barefooted on the little balcony off their room. She struggled to open the door and stepped outside. The cool wind felt freezing cold to her San Diego body. It was luscious. At home it was summertime and a little too hot for her even in Point Loma where the ocean breezes blew all summer. It was nice to feel the cold for a change. It was raining lightly, just sprinkles, but soon she was damp right through to her skin. She got up and slipped back inside the room, but couldn’t completely close the heavy door, so she gave up.

  She changed into some dry white socks, slacks, and a pale green, long-sleeved turtleneck shirt. After finishing reading the old newspapers again from front to back, she wanted to know what the latest news was, especially on the missing Special Olympics athletes. She picked up her purse and left the room.

  Remembering how cool it was out on her balcony, she said, “Oh, my shoes, and my coat.” She turned around to retrieve them, but found she was locked out.

  “Oh, dear. I’ll just go find me a new newspaper and Danielle at the same time.” Off she walked, away from her room and her security. It felt good to get out and to be on a mission. She stepped into an elevator, and when she got off, she found she was on a floor that she didn’t recognize. Now where was that gift shop? I remember seeing it when we boarded. It’ll have a paper. She shuffled around in her socks on that deck and then took another elevator to another deck to continue her search. This floor didn’t have her newspaper, and she didn’t see Danielle either. She found some stairs and started up them, not knowing where they went. They seemed to go up and up with no end in sight, and she quickly tired. Every step was hard work. What was she thinking? She wasn’t a young sixty anymore.

  Finally she found a landing, but she wasn’t strong enough to open the door. She stood there pulling and pulling on the handle, but when she did manage to open it an inch or so, it swung closed on her again.

  “Can someone help me? Help, I can’t get out!” she called. She called again: “Someone help me!” but her voice was so soft, it could be easily missed. Exhausted, she sat down on the hard, cold, metal stairs and waited. Her feet were cold, and she wondered where she had left her shoes. She clasped her arms around her knees as she shivered and shook. The longer she sat there, the more confused and flustered she became; she couldn’t remember her deck, much less her room number. Reality was the ship held between four and five thousand passengers and staff. It was a huge, floating, confusing city.

  Her crooked upper back made looking up difficult, but in stretching and trying to sit up straight as she had been taught as a child, she noticed something on the wall. It was a map with information about the ship and where everything was located. She looked at it, hoping to glean some information about where she was and how to get herself out of the predicament she had gotten herself into, but she had always found it hard to understand plans and drawings. She was hopelessly trapped and lost. How long would it be before someone found her and let her free from the stairwell? Maybe if she looked at the map long enough, it would make sense to her and she could figure out why. . . .

  “Where am I?” she pondered aloud, but the answer to her question didn’t come. All she knew was she wasn’t at home in Point Loma.

  Danielle did a quick three miles on the deck where running was allowed. She thoroughly enjoyed herself and felt invigorated as she slowed down her jog to a walk in order to cool down. She had run around and around past a room filled with exercise equipment and people wearing expensive workout suits as they walked on Stairmasters and treadmills, rowed on rowing machines, worked out with weights, or did jazzercise led by a young lady in tight workout clothes. After a few trips around, another jogger about her age had joined her. They had enjoyed each other’s company.

  “It was nice running with you this morning,” said the young man who had identified himself as Nathan. He was tall, muscular, and handsome, and like Danielle he was on the cruise with his family. He had grown up in Alaska, but had recently graduated from NYU with a Master’s Degree in business and presently worked in New York.

  “It was a lot more fun running with someone than alone. I loved all your stories about Alaska. Thanks for keeping me company,” said Danielle.

  “My pleasure. I’m sure we’ll see each other again. We both have commitments with our families, but maybe we could get together before we get to Juneau. Let’s say, lunch?” He took a business card out of his pocket and wrote his room number on the back.

  “I might have to bring my grandmother. I can’t leave her alone for very long. She gets confused.”

  “Love to meet her. Call and tell me if it’ll work out for you.” He handed her the card, and his hand lingered on hers for a second. She felt a tingling sensation that made her regret letting go of him.

  She read the name Nathan Conroy and smiled. “Well, got to get going. I shouldn’t have left her as long as I already have.” She walked to the closest elevator, stepped inside and, glancing back at him, quickly hit the button to her deck. He was still watching her.

  While riding the elevator back to her deck, a sense of fear encompassed Danielle. She glanced at her cell phone for the time and realized she had been gone for over an hour and a half. She walked hastily to the door and opened it with the key card, saying, “Sorry, Grandma. I—Grandma? Grandma, where are you?” she asked as she checked the empty bathroom. The balcony door was open. She walked out onto the tiny private porch, looked over the railing, and gratefully didn’t see her grandma lying far below on a lower deck. After returning inside she looked for any notes or indications as to where her Grandma might be. “Nothing—there’s nothing,” she said in frustration.

  Maybe she went to have some breakfast, but all her shoes are still here. Oh God, where is she?” She would go looking and if she didn’t find her, she would call security and ask for help. She had to be somewhere. At least the ship wasn’t at a port where she could have wandered off. She was contained. There were only a few thousand people on board. She would find her. She pocketed her key card and headed for the elevator. She would start with where they had eaten breakfast the day before. Maybe her Grandma had remembered where it was. Talking to herself, she whispered, “I doubt it, but I’ll give you the benefit of the doubt, Grandma.”

  Chapter 14

  Day Four

  After three days of sitting in the shelter, life was miserable. Everyone was grumpy, dirty, and tired of being wet and cramped together. Sam and Nicholi escaped just after dawn and went for a walk up the beach in the strong wind with their space blanket raincoats flapping.

  Left behind in the shelter, Patrick said, “Before this trip, I fed these things to my uncle’s horses in Homer.” Having the small fire helped, but it was breakfast time and all the chocolate and protein bars were gone. The only things left were the green granola bars. “I never ate them, and I bet after this I never will again.” His powerful, uncontrolled hands crumbled the bar into little bits as he tried to eat it.

  Marie crawled over to him. “I’ll help you,” she said as she pushed the crumbs into his mouth.

  “Thanks. I know, every bit counts.”

  “You’re welcome.”

  Taking advantage of the opportunity to speak to Marie in confidence, he said, “Have you noticed a lot of the food has disappeared in the last day? Only one bag left.”

  “Yeah, I did, said Marie. “We can’t control Nicholi’s eating. He’s too big and too mean when people upset him.”

  “He thinks he’s hungry, but he can’t be. He’s not mean; he just makes mean faces in the mirror. He’s a big, strong guy and intimidating to be around because he doesn’t seem to care what others are thinking or doing. The world revolves around him.”

  “Now, that can’t be true. I think
the world revolves around me,” said Marie, joking.

  “Somebody confirm that? No, I really think he’s acting out movies in his head. He’s always saying lines from them.”

  “Why?”

  “’Cause he does. He’s not mean, sometimes a little scary, but nnaaht mean.”

  “He’d be mean if I took his granola bar,” said Marie.

  “He’d be frustrated and yell. He might even shove you down, but afterwards he would be mad at himself if he did that. Really though, I think he’s as tired of these green bars as we are, but he hasn’t figured it out yet. You don’t understand Nicholi. He is really upset with his dad and that’s what you see. Every time he thinks about his family, he gets upset.”

  “His mom is wonderful. I’ve seen her with him around Pebble Lake.”

  “It’s his dad that upsets him. Did you know that he used to live with his dad? Then his dad got a new girlfriend. Suddenly Nicholi was sent off to Pebble Lake with his mom. She moved down the chain to get away from the sadness of Anchorage. Nicholi thinks the girlfriend stole his dad and his home. The girlfriend tries to be nice to him, but he doesn’t want to have anything to do with her. He gets mad when he even hears her name. Anyway, give him some slack. You have a wonderful big sister that loves you, and your parents loved both of you before their accident.”

  “Billy loves you.”

  “But Billy’s not my family. I don’t want to talk about it anymore.” He cut her off sharply and turned his back by rolling over. Everyone was very quiet for a few minutes.

  “Patrick, how long till someone finds us?”

  “I don’t know, but I think we need to hide what’s left of the food from Nicholi, just in case it’s several more days.”

  “I’ll put them in Helen’s bag. He won’t look there.” Marie got out one bar for each person and hid the rest.

  When Nicholi and Sam came back from a trip to the creek, Marie handed out the bars. Helen was still asleep, so she put the extra bar out of sight under Helen’s blanket. Lillian looked blankly at her own bar but didn’t open it.

  “Lillian,” Patrick said, “You have hardly eaten anything. You should eat.”

  She looked at him with a slight curl of her lip on one side as if saying, “No way.”

  “If you don’t want it, can I have it?” begged Nicholi.

  She pushed the bar in his direction and whispered so softly that only Nicholi could hear her.

  “She said I can.” He grabbed the bar from her, quickly tore off the wrapper, and devoured the bar in seconds. Chunks of it stuck to his dirty face around his mouth. He didn’t wipe them off.

  After days of only doing the minimum—going to the bathroom or helping a little with firewood—Lillian crawled out of her sleeping area, opened the orange survival bag, and pulled out two head nets. She took her space blanket and a piece of string from the bag and tied the blanket around her neck so she had a cape on her shoulders and head. She stood bent over under the tarp for a few seconds, then grabbed the narrow shovel and head nets and walked out into the pouring rain.

  “Where you going?” asked Marie.

  Lillian turned around and looked at Marie, but said nothing. Then she focused on Nicholi and whispered.

  “I don’t owe you,” Nicholi replied.

  She whispered again.

  “Okay! Okay, Yoda! I’ll come.” He took his space blanket and string and walked out into the rain. Lillian stopped him and arranged the makeshift raincoat so he would stay as dry as possible. Then off went big, grumpy Nicholi and delicate, quiet Lillian in the heavy downpour, walking side by side.

  Helen had woken up during the encounter between the two. She felt terribly tired, exhausted. Holding up her head was too much work. Her mouth worked fine, but her speech was slower than usual. “Ya know, sometimes I’m grateful. . . My hearing is normal . . . and I don’t know what she’s saying . . . She’s small, gentle, but a mighty force with him. . . that’s for sure.”

  “Helen, you’re awake! Wonderful! I was worried. You slept long that time,” said Patrick. “I’ve been checking your pulse over and over for hours. You hungry? We have only green granola bars left. The third bag of food disappeared.”

  “Are you sure? There was a week’s rations in that survival bag. What happened to it?”

  “You weren’t planning on a Nicholi,” said Marie as she unwrapped the green packaging and started to feed Helen.

  “We’re not sure what he did with a third of the food, but it’s gone,” said Patrick. “How’s your head?”

  “Really aches. I must need to sleep, the way I feel.”

  “Well, that’s good. With this weather, we’ve just been watching you sleep hour after hour. No sign of any low-flying planes yet. Ceiling’s right on the deck, so I guess it’s too dangerous still. This storm has got to break up sometime. Boy, would I love to sit up in my chair.”

  “I take it Lillian finally got tired of eating the bars. You can live on them, but they get boring.”

  “She’s been eating half or less of what I am and giving the rest away. Nicholi begs the loudest, so now it’s like he’s her slave or something.”

  Helen laughed and made the mistake of moving her head. “Gall darn, when is this spinning and headache gonna stop?” She put her head back down on the shirt pillow and watched everyone. After a few minutes she rolled on her side. Her world overturned again, but eventually everything slowed down and she refocused her eyes on her surroundings. Ahh, there, now everything looks normal. “Fire—you have one going,” she said.

  “Yeah. Sam’s our fire man. He’s been off in the rain for hours since yesterday, breaking off dead spruce branches under live standing trees, peeling birch bark, and chopping up all the beetle-killed spruce trees that are down in the woods. It burns great and there’s plenty of it. He’s been storing it under that big spruce tree.” He pointed to the huge healthy tree that had a large canopy of branches sticking out wide.

  “Ya ’ii der” (yeah dry under), said and signed Sam. “I ’et ’or” (I’ll get more). He got up with the ax and headed off into the woods. Soon they heard him chopping not too far away but out of sight.

  “You warm enough? We’re all wet, so we sit close to the smoky fire and dry off a bit,” said Marie.

  “You’re sitting close to a fire now? You’re afraid of fire.”

  “I got cold so I got close. I’m still afraid, but I do it.”

  “Could you help me move closer again? I’d like that.” Marie helped her big sister move to the edge of the tarp by the fire. Once in a while the rain still would get her wet, but she could feel the warmth. With her head on the ground tarp, she was content.

  “Oh, you rigged up the other tarp to keep out the rain and wind. Smart.”

  “Nicholi and I did it. It slows down the rain from putting the fire out. Patrick’s idea too.”

  “I’m so proud of you guys. If I’m ever in another plane crash and huge storm, I couldn’t be with a better group of people.”

  “E lub oo” (We love you), said Sam as he dropped a new bunch of dry spruce by the ever-burning fire. He smiled lovingly at Helen before going off to chop more wood.

  The tide was almost at its lowest. First Lillian just walked and looked out at the beach as if surveying it. She headed for the rocks sticking up to the west of camp. After carefully balancing and walking on the uneven, slimy beach rocks, she stopped and bent down, looking at green seaweed in a tide pool. She picked clumps of flat, very delicate, lime green seaweed (sea lettuce) that looked similar to wilted lettuce and put it in one of the bug head nets. Then she picked one larger handful, which she stuffed in her mouth after rinsing it off in a small, narrow, freshwater creek that flowed out of the forest into the inlet. She chewed carefully and slowly with a look of satisfaction on her face.

  Nicholi picked up a piece of the cellophane-thin weed and noticed he could see his hand through the larger fronds. The single leaves (fronds) were somewhat round with slightly ruffled edges.


  “I like dried,” she said very softly, “but I hungry.” She walked up the beach to another clear tide pool, rinsed another handful of weeds off, and stuffed the salty things into her mouth. She chewed slowly and swallowed the several bites until they were all gone. Now she had had breakfast and was ready to go to work.

  Nicholi timidly mimicked her with one six-inch-long frond. He scrunched up his nose as if it were disgusting and put the frond on his tongue, chewed quickly, and swallowed. “It’s okay, but I’ll wait until we’re out of green bars before I eat more.”

  After she had had enough, Lillian started prying up little single-shell animals (limpets) off the rocks with her shovel. “One shell safe—not favorite.” She put them in the head net.

  Nicholi hovered over her as she searched for the little animals. He watched intently but said nothing. He watched everything while she searched. He did a little talking to his mirror and was making lots of faces at his reflection when something caught his eye up the hillside.

  In another tide pool Lillian found dark grey limpets. She pried a few of them off also. “Same, not favorite, but food.” She looked at him and pulled his trouser leg to get his attention.

  He stopped looking up the hill and focused back down at the ground. “I remember my grandpa getting food like this. He loved it.”

  “My grandma too,” she said very slowly and softly. “I ’member stories of two shells ‘round here. I love them—they safe too—maybe find.”

  Nicholi’s dad was a Tlingit Indian from Hoonah, Alaska, and his mom was an Athabascan Indian from Fairbanks, the town Nicholi had been born in. He had lived in Fairbanks most of his life before his dad got a job as an engineer in Anchorage. His company was working on plans for a shipping dock to be built in Portage Bay by the old town site of Kanatak. When his parents got divorced, his mom moved the two of them to Pebble Lake. She got a job as a secretary for the school. Nicholi had heard lots of tales from the locals about people traveling by dog sled and harvesting food from waters of Shelikof Strait. The old folks said subsistence food was free and tasted best. He would try Lillian’s food.