Loch Ness

by Donovan Galway

  “He’s running, boss.”

  “Away?” John called, steering the swift craft toward the signal.

  “Down. Wait.” As they watched the monitor, the image vanished as if erased from head to foot. Then it was gone.

  “That way!” Frank called, pointing off the starboard bow.

  “The kids!” Aisling reminded them. “You have to get the kids out of the water.”

  John turned toward the treading teens. She was right; they had to allow the beast to get away for now. It was gone from their instruments anyway and they had the most remarkable footage ever recorded. He was happy enough to heed her.

  They helped the kids into the boat and ferried them to shore. Aisling wrapped a blanket around the pair of shivering teens but heeded Kyle’s finger-to-lips gesture to keep silent when Lucie demanded to know what hit them.

  “You must’ve hit a rock or something,” Frank suggested.

  “How fast do you think I can row?” Mark snapped.

  “That was no rock,” Lucie said. “We didn’t hit it. It hit us!”

  “They’re right,” John said. All eyes turned on him as though he were about to divulge the secret of their find. “Something came up and hit that boat. A giant grouper or catfish, maybe.”

  Frank nodded. “You’re probably right, boss. How big would you say it was, son?”

  “Dunno. I dinnae see it.”

  “Well, you must’ve seen something while you were in the drink with it.”

  Mark looked at Lucie. “There was something out there, really close. But it swam off when I saw it.”

  Frank fed his memory, guiding it along. “Did you see the fin? How tall was the dorsal fin?”

  “Um… not very tall. Half a meter, maybe.”

  Kyle helped. “That sound like a grouper, Frank?”

  “Could be. But the bottlenose dolphins around here have been known to get aggressive.”

  “That wasn’t Flipper got us,” Lucie challenged.

  “We’re not talking about the little channel porpoises. The bottlenose males can get eight or nine foot long and nothing is faster or stronger. They can take out a great white with one blow of their snouts”

  John looked at Mark. “Something that strong and fast could sure take out a rowboat. You two are lucky we came along.”

  The kids nodded and huddled together under the blanket. Aisling quietly agreed but she had no idea why. It wasn’t until they let the kids off on the shore and turned the Esperanza back toward their pier that she challenged them.

  “So you don’t think they can handle the truth?”

  “In a word, no.” John held fast the steering wheel and his eye ahead. He knew what was coming.

  “Well, I can and I’m glad I was here to see it.”

  “I thought you’d feel that way. We need you to keep it quiet a bit longer though. Can you do that?”

  “Keep quiet? Not tell anybody? Hell no.”

  Frank was rerunning the image, frame by frame. “In truth, Teach. You didn’t see nothin’.”

  She looked around to all of the faces in the craft, hoping one of them would smile to signify the joke. None did. All were deathly serious. “I don’t get it. You find what you were looking for. What the whole world was looking for and you’ll say nothing?”

  “We can’t yet. We need proof.”

  “And what is that you’re looking at on the screen there?”

  “It’s a video,” John said calmly. “Nothing more. We believe it because we saw it but to anyone else it’s just a CG image of the monster.”

  “And a bad one at that. Spielberg wouldn’t touch it,” Kyle remarked.

  Aisling turned to appeal to John. “Please. You have to tell someone. That’s my job there on that screen. If they saw that the thing is really out there, I’d be free to teach again. I’d have me life back.”

  John shook his head. “You don’t understand what credibility is to this type of find. They’d rip it to shreds and say we made it to get attention. It’s a huge breakthrough. Maybe the biggest ever. But if you blow the whistle now, it’s over. They’ll not only discredit this one—”

  “So many boats and amateurs will go out after the monster, she’ll dive and be gone forever,” Mac added.

  “We can’t risk it. We’re too close.”

  “So how long do I have to keep quiet with the whole county thinking I’m some sort of a mad thing?”

  “Well, we’ve been looking for about a hundred and ten years so…” Frank pondered. “Give it a week.”

  She ignored him and looked again to his boss for relief. John could give none but a passionate request.

  “Just give us a little time to use this. Now we know what it is, where it goes and how it moves. Let us come up with something no one can deny.”

  “It’s my career you’re risking. Mine for yours. How long?”

  “Four days. If we don’t have something more tangible by then, we’ll go public with the tape and you’ll hopefully be vindicated. Deal?”

  Aisling looked at the hopeful eyes of the men around her. They all looked to her for help. The corners of her mouth slowly turned up. “Two days.”

  “Three.”

  “Deal. So what do we do now?”

  Kyle allowed the first grin since the sighting. “We party!”

  Mac popped a bottle of beer open as if it were champagne. One by one the bottles were handed out and the celebration began. The sighting was the biggest ever recorded and they were doubly elated to have got it the first time out. They drank again and again to their unbelievable luck.

  “Luck?” John objected, only on his second beer and already feeling it. “Years of research to know where to look. One point three million dollars in equipment and boats and the smartest—” he paused, raising his bottle to the reciprocating team, “most bestest team in the world is hardly luck. Gentlemen. We were due.”

  “We had the tools,” Frank added. “And we had the talent.”

  The celebration lasted until the sun descended. Kyle and Frank knew they had a great deal of work ahead of them and Mac was fit to be carried. The three staggered away from Esperanza and into the unusually comfortable night. John was a much slower drinker, habitually preferring to keep his faculties sharp at all times. He casually sipped his brew and listened as Aisling spoke with the uninhibited slur of a rookie bar-hopper.

  “You know, I tolt them kiddoes all the stories of the day. I done it and would do it again. But if any of them were to ask me if the beastie was out here in this fookin’ lake, I’da tolt them no way.”

  “You would?”

  “Would.”

  “I thought you liked believing in monsters.”

  “I like to try. But reality is bigger than even that bloody big turtle we saw. Reality is the real monster. It’s there and we’ll deal with it on its own terms. Like it or not.” She took a long swallow of lager. “Not.”

  She was leaning against the side rail of the sleek vessel. With the word, she relaxed a bit and slid sideways.

  John was still alert enough to move and managed to catch her. Before she had a moment to become embarrassed or defensive, he chivalrously came back to her initial point as though he had never been distracted from it. “Reality’s not so bad. I’ve made a career out of it.”

  “Oh sure, for you it’s not so bad. But I am.” She grimaced at her own grammar but the schoolteacher in her was far too inebriated to help. She shook her head and continued. “Reality is all well and good as long as it’s leaving you be. But when it decides your turn is over and you have to quit the game, reality becomes the monster. The real bitch.”

  “We talking about your mother?”

  Aisling scoffed. “Okay. We can if you want.”

  “I thought that was what you meant about the game being over.”

  “Afraid it wasn’t satisfied with just one of us.”

  John mentally replayed the conversation in her home that night. “Your mother contracted a fatal illness from an
experimental drug. That’s what you told me. Right?”

  She barely nodded.

  “Are you telling me you inherited it?”

  She looked at him with raised eyebrows, though she had trouble raising both to the same level. “You figured that out already. Damn, you Americans are smart.”

  “Aisling, I’m sorry. What is it?”

  “It’s called… wait a minute. This takes lips.” She stretched her lips as though waking them up or preparing them. “Systemic Lupus Erythematosus. How’s that for a mouthful of reality?”

  “Lupus? You contracted lupus from your mother?”

  “Aye. They gave it to her and she gave it to me. I’ll let it die with me thank you very much.”

  “But lupus is treatable. I’m sure there are drugs and treatments for it.”

  “Only the symptoms. Only if I don’t live what’s left of my life as I want to live it. So I watch my blood pressure and make the best of what’s left.”

  “The kids? The teaching.”

  “I like to think I’m planting seeds of meself in all their little minds. If some of them grows up with an imagination and a love for adventure, a respect for life and a quest in him for the magic that might be out there, then I’m still going.”

  “That’s possibly the bravest and noblest thing I’ve ever heard.”

  “It’s also a load of crap. I’m just doing what I can while I can. I’m a teacher so I teach.”

  “Aisling. It’s all right to be scared. I understand—”

  “Scared? Do I look scared to you? Have I ever looked the least but scared to you, Dr. Navel? I meant but.”

  John was taken aback. She was sobering up right before his eyes. She looked at him with a clarity that belied the alcohol in her system. “Actually, I’m forced to repeat myself.”

  “There’s a shocker.”

  “You’re the bravest person I’ve ever met.”

  She smiled humbly at the turn. “You’re supposed to be the night in shining armor. Not me.”

  “Well, I’m not likely to ever qualify for a suit of armor but when my time comes, I only hope—”

  “Whoa there! Nobody’s time is coming yet.”

  “Oh I know. I didn’t mean.”

  “Listen. I’ll go when I go. But until then I’ll live. I don’t have time to be afraid of getting sick or people not liking me or even that stupid turtle beastie thing we saw.”

  “Well, that might be worth a little respect.”

  She perked up with a defiant expression close to a smile. “Are you afraid of it, Dr. Nagle?”

  “Let’s just say I wouldn’t care to go swimming with it.”

  “Wouldn’t you now?” She looked at him, than at the dark water below her. “So you wouldn’t want to be doing this?” With that she peeled off her shirt and kicked her shoes off. They fell off easily as she had never retied them from earlier.

  John immediately saw where this was leading and became alarmed. “Now Aisling. You’ve got one too many beers in you. You don’t need to prove anything to me.”

  Aisling snickered as she undid her jeans and kicked them off. Standing before John in her bra and panties and her dark green striped socks, she dared him to follow. “So are you going to let the monster rule you? How do you expect to catch it if you’re too afraid to go near it?” She swung one leg over the side. John started to move to grab her but she put up a warning palm to him. He heeded it as if she were a jumper on the rail of a tall bridge. He genuinely feared her going into the water and that fear, visible in his eyes and posture, fueled her. With a playful giggle she swung the other leg over and dropped into the cold water.

  John rushed to the rail and looked overboard. Eight feet below, the dark water rippled, a stream of bubbles marking the spot where she disappeared.

  “Aisling!” he called as he kicked off his own shoes. As he watched, one of the green socks floated to the surface. At that he was half way over the rail when she broke the surface and gasped for air.

  “God it’s cold!” she shouted. She looked up to be sure John saw the mischievous grin on her. He countered with an angry scowl.

  “Don’t do that! I almost went in after you.”

  “Almost, did ye? Am I not worth saving?” She still smiled.

  John finally gave in to the prank and allowed a smile of relief. “You want to come out now?”

  She suddenly ducked under the water. She bobbed back up in only a second but the smile was gone. She looked up at him in fear. “John. Something’s got me.”

  Before she could say what it might have been John was over the rail. Blind in the abysmal murk of Loch Ness, he plunged in headfirst aimed directly at her. Torpedoing through the water, his hands came to her thighs. He felt around for anything holding her. Frantically he searched her legs downward, past her knees, down her calves and to her ankles and feet. He felt nothing holding her. He missed it. Heading back up. He kept his palms on her for a second pass. As he came to the top of her thighs, he felt her hand clutch his shirt by the front of his collar and he was yanked to the surface.

  Holding him close, she looked him directly and assertively in the eye. “Your beastie’s not up there, doctor.” Then she released the laugh she could hold no longer.

  As angry as he wanted to be, he let even the sensation of relief go by quickly. The pleasant feeling he had now was a first for him. She made him smile when he didn’t want to. Logic dictated a stern response, but she dictated laughter so he laughed. She laughed louder pointing and taunting him for the terror-stricken face as he dove to her rescue. Even at this, he felt no shame or embarrassment. He laughed and dunked her for wickedness.

  Rather than fight her way back up, she grabbed his trousers and tried to unbutton them. He fought off the attack and she surfaced out of arms’ reach. “Why, doctor. You didn’t strike me as the modest type. Stuck up. Prudish. Nerdy. Even boring. But modest?”

  “Well, I have to say none of my schoolteachers were quite so… open.”

  “Oh so I’m open now. Am I?” With a wicked grin, she maneuvered a bit and then tossed her bra at him. “Consider yourself dared.”

  John turned around and looked to the shore. They were moored far enough out that the shoreline was lost in the darkness. Some distant lights up the hills shone from houses too far away to see or hear them. He began unbuttoning his shirt but was cut short as she again grabbed his trousers from underwater and this time freed him of them. The shirt was his job and he elected to keep an eye on her from that point on. He paddled backward as she stalked him, gator-like.

  “Now don’t be holding back on me, Dr. Nagle.”

  “Well, as the water is remarkably cold and this is sort of a first, I fear the first impression might be better if I hold on to a bit. Know what I mean?”

  The wickedness left her smile. “So why are we still in the water?”

  John stroked over to the ladder and climbed back into the boat. Once over the rail, he shook the water from his clinging boxers to satisfy his inhibitions. Then he turned to help the nearly naked schoolteacher aboard. Aisling climbed slowly up the ladder, keeping her eyes fixed on him. The cotton briefs she still wore were too tiny to conceal much. She expressed no modesty and in fact made certain he was looking as she came to the top of the ladder.

  John gasped as she seductively stepped over the rail. She was beautiful and so uninhibited that he felt permitted to stare. She stood and allowed the visual inspection, doing her best to pose as subtly as she could without appearing to pose. A dozen thoughts raced through John’s head that he knew better than to voice. They ranged from boyishly adolescent to morbidly philosophical. He wandered as he gazed upon her, if this was proof that there was no God. Why would a divine being create something so beautiful only to destroy it? He left the guaranteed mood-killer unsaid and, finally satisfied, managed to bring his eyes back to hers. “You lost your socks.” She maintained a smile but it seemed to be a different smile, like one telling of a mood going the other way. Like one seen n
ear the end of an evening. He took a breath and tried again. “You’re incredibly beautiful, Aisling.” He gave a mental sigh of relief that he managed to get the words out without his voice cracking like an adolescent.

  Her original smile returned as an acceptance. “Why don’t we get out of these wet things?”

  They embraced for a long, passionate first kiss. Then their silhouettes moved from what little light there was and down to the small cabin below decks. Once he was certain they were down for the count, the shadowed cameraman who had been hiding in the shrubbery on the shoreline took his eye from the viewfinder of the digital camera with the enormous telephoto lens he had been glued to since Esperanza came back to her mooring.

  Connor Murdock left the camera on the tripod and leaned back to pull his cell phone from his pocket. Shielding himself as the LED screen illuminated his forty-year-old face, he found the number he needed in the directory and pressed dial. Phone at his ear, he listened to one ring, then two. His eyes almost had time to trail back to the boat when the subject picked up.

  “Did you see them?” the voice asked without greeting. He had seen the name on his screen and was expecting this call.

  “Oh I saw them. She went out with them.”

  “Really? Perfect. Did you get a shot of them together? Something that looks like they know each other.”

  “Oh yeah. I got plenty. She turned out to be a perfect model. I’ll thank you for the lead once this is in the papers.”

  “Now remember. It has to be enough to discredit her. She’s going to try to claim it was all innocent.”

  “I think we got that covered, MacKenzie. Tell me what else you got on her. What else can we dig up?”

  “What do you mean? This is all I needed,” Mike MacKenzie replied.

  “Well, we’re going to need something for the next edition. She only met this bloke. Who was she with before? What are we going to print next?”

  “About someone else? She’s the only one I’m on about. Her and that scientist bloke. Connecting her to him was the deal.”