Rights of Passage
Pete Kempshall
I missed it the first time, my eyes sliding across it like it wasn’t there. I wondered about that later, why I didn’t register the sight immediately. For a while I convinced myself it had been the salt wind making me squint, but to be honest, I probably wouldn’t have noticed it even on a clear, still day. I think my brain had simply removed it from the list of possibilities — it was like walking into your back garden and bumping into a T-Rex.
Even when I did spot the white cloth billowing out past the Palace Pier, my mental gears continued to grind for a few seconds…then finally they meshed, and I was running.
“Woah, someone’s had their spinach.”
Diane’s words were carried on a rush of warm air, redolent with the aroma of carrots, onions and pepper. In defiance of its nervous churning, my stomach rumbled.
She had her back to me, stirring the pot over the fireplace, and hadn’t bothered to glance around when I’d come through the door like a charging elephant. After all, she didn’t need to look to know it was me, just like I didn’t need to see her face to know she was smiling.
When I didn’t answer she turned from the fire. “Sorry. That was stupid of—” Her voice tailed off at the sight of me pale and panting: I could read the thoughts flashing across her face. The dread. “Oh God, you’re—”
“No,” I gasped quickly. “Not that. Boat. Out past the pier. I think it’s going to the marina.”
The flames from the grate caught in Diane’s eyes, glinting. “Fucking hell.”
When the little port where I lived started going from metaphorically dead to actually dead, I knew I would be the last man standing. Irony demanded it.
My problem meant that I’d been alone for years essentially, even amongst family and my few friends. So if anyone was going to be able to cope with the disappearance of every human on earth, I thought it would be me.
Truth was, I couldn’t survive on my own. And I knew I couldn’t stay at home, not with…not with them upstairs. So it was clear I had to leave. I had to find survivors.
West towards Brighton had seemed the best bet. The other way along the coast was Eastbourne — legendary seaside dumping ground for old folk — and I couldn’t imagine anyone had survived there.
I’d never learned to drive. I was 17 at the time and had been legally entitled to start lessons for months, but it just hadn’t seemed like a priority, not then. Now I had the freedom of the roads, I just wasn’t confident enough to try. A little voice kept asking me what the point was in surviving the plague just to lose control of a car and veer off Telscombe Cliffs.
So I borrowed a bike. “Borrowed” — that was the actual word that popped into my head, like there was someone I could give it back to when I was finished. It belonged to the man next door — he’d been insanely proud of it, all lightweight this and gears that. I like to think he’d be happy someone was taking care of it.
Tiredness was still a big problem though. Fortunately there were towns all along South Coast Road, with convenience stores for food and clifftop pubs to rest in. After a while I even got blasé about the various occupants I risked disturbing every time I entered a building. Frighteningly, I was becoming desensitized.
But even with the frequent rest stops, fatigue pulled at me like quicksand. The more I struggled against it, the stronger it held. The intervals between rests grew shorter and shorter, and what should have been a reasonably quick journey stretched on into days.
By the time I reached Brighton Marina I was fit to drop. It would only have taken a short while to get to the town centre, but I knew I simply wouldn’t make it, not before nightfall.
Besides, there were worse places to stop. The marina complex had shopping facilities and a cluster of homes — once fashionable and expensive — and that meant food and shelter. Plus, taking the slip road from the clifftop meant it was literally all downhill to get there.
Except that somewhere between the top of the road and the bottom, I passed out.
Looking back, I was lucky to wake up at all. If they’d found me first, I’d have been an easy meal for the wild dogs out scavenging for food every night. But I did wake up, tucked up in a bed so tightly that I immediately thought of hospitals. My side ached and my legs felt raw. I didn’t need to open my eyes to know it was road rash, didn’t want to look and confirm it.
Despite my closed eyes, I felt the shadow fall across me. I opened them — just for a second before passing out again — and when I did it was to brilliant light streaming through auburn hair, and a smile that gave the sunshine a run for its money.
“Morning, tiger. Sleep well?”
We took the bikes, hoping to make better time. Despite the wind off the sea doing its best to unsaddle us, we managed to coast down the marina road as the yacht slipped past the breakwater. While our eyes had been off it, someone had furled the sails, and now the sleek white vessel was chugging on its engines.
“They’ve got fuel,” Diane remarked, her eyebrows raised. Another rarity.
Whoever was at the wheel was spoilt for choice for places to tie up. Almost all the seaworthy vessels berthed at the marina had vanished in the early days of the plague, sailed out to sea by panicked owners — or desperate thieves — in the belief that if they could just get offshore, they wouldn’t get infected.
Except that by the time they sailed, they already were.
Many of the boats moored out to sea had since broken loose of their anchors and come back in on the tides. Shattered fragments had been washing up all down the coast from Rottingdean to Seaford for months. Against the odds, the anchors of two large yachts had continued to hold... They could still be seen off the coast at Saltdean, silent, floating tombs.
Diane and I dumped the bikes and padded silently down to the waterfront, keeping low as we went. Crouched behind a wall I could make out a figure steering from the back of the ship, gently nosing it into place before jumping onto the jetty with a mooring rope. It was hard to make out details at that distance — I guessed it was a man but the weatherproof clothing gave the figure a bulky androgyny that would only be decipherable closer up. One thing leapt out at me, though.
“Check out his belt.”
“Yeah,” Diane murmured. “What do you think?”
“Can’t see anyone else on board.”
“They could be below.” She paused. “But if there was anyone else, wouldn’t they be helping to tie up?”
She had a point. The sole sailor was clearly struggling with the ropes, and while some assistance wasn’t essential it would certainly be desirable.
The breath hissed through my teeth. “Let’s wait a bit longer. At least until we know for certain if there’s anyone else on board.”
And until we knew if they were carrying guns on their hips too.
It took a couple of weeks for me to recover, during which time my savior breezily imparted her life story. Her name was Diane Platts, she informed me that first morning, popping another round of antibiotics into my mouth. Final year student of English Lit at the University of London, down from the city for a family party when the sickness hit. Her brother was getting married and the whole clan had gathered to celebrate the engagement. She’d really been looking forward to it.
As it turned out, she’d been forced to watch her entire family tree cut down in just a couple of days.
Eventually, she’d gone exploring and discovered a place near the seafront with a working fireplace for heat and cooking. Better yet, the owners appeared to have vacated so there was nothing to…clean up when she moved in.
For regular supply runs the marina shops were the closest to her new home, which is how she’d come to find me. She raised her eyebrows in mock exasperation as she told me of the trouble she’d had loading me into a shopping trolley and pushing me home. She had been hoping to fill up with tins.
When I could get a word in, I gave her the basics about me, keeping the more colorful details to myself.
She didn’t appear to notice I was withholding anything — she barely stopped talking for the first two days, flitting around me in a flurry of nervous energy.
So mostly I watched her. Outwardly, she was no different from the better-looking girls at school, but theirs had been a cold beauty. They knew they looked good and used that as a weapon. By contrast Diane’s beauty had a warmth that came from complete unawareness — or disregard — of her attractiveness.
As I started to recover, I could also see there was pride in her eyes, stronger with each passing day. My return to health meant she’d done it; she’d actually saved a life. All those aunts, uncles, brothers, sisters, all those people she couldn’t help…now at last she could chalk one up in the “win” column.
I let her believe that. After all, she did rescue me from a lunch date with roving packs of ravening hounds. But as far as my physical improvement was concerned…I didn’t feel ready to tell her she had nothing at all to do with it.
The yacht was securely moored now, but still no-one had emerged from the cabins. On the contrary, its only apparent crewman had disappeared below, leaving us nothing to watch except the boat, bobbing gently in the water.
When he did reappear — and by this time we could tell it was a he — the yachtsman had swapped his thick rubbers and lifejacket for a chunky blue sweater, jeans and a ragged baseball cap. All that remained of his original outfit was the holster, heavy on his right hip.
He jumped nimbly onto the jetty and strode in the direction of the shopping complex, pausing only to rummage in his pockets for a cigarette. Sparking up, he walked on.
We slid from cover and followed.
If the yachtsman was at all worried that he was being watched, he didn’t show it. He sauntered along the dockside in no particular hurry, smoking happily and stopping every now and again to glance in a window. We kept our distance, but were still close enough to see that he was tall — taller than either of us at any rate — and well built. The active type, it struck me. Outdoorsy.
Finally, he stopped outside a large chandlery, and gave the door a light push. It swung open unprotestingly, and he smiled. Shifting his weight to one side, he stuck a hand into the back pocket of his jeans and withdrew a crumpled piece of paper. To my side I could hear Diane stifle a snort.
“God,” she murmured. “He’s brought a shopping list.”
“You have got to try this.” Diane passed her glass across to me, the far rim slightly smeared from her lips. “If that’s not the best wine you’ve ever tasted I’m going to start giving you seawater to drink. You’ll never know the difference.”
She smiled broadly. I could see her studying my reaction as I drank, eager for my enjoyment to parallel hers.
“It’s good.”
“‘Good’.” She rolled her eyes. “‘Good’? I despair sometimes, I really do.”
“What, should I spit some in a bucket?”
She stuck her hand out. “Give it back. Now. Right now.”
I chuckled and passed the glass to her. She nestled into the huge leather beanbag that marked her favorite reading place, careful not to spill any of the wine, and opened a thick hardback. Then, poking her tongue out at me, she directed her attention to the pages.
And so it went. Once a week we’d loot the shops in the Churchill Square shopping precinct, her looking for books, me for music. MP3 players were useless now, but I’d unearthed a portable CD player and some speakers, and there were enough batteries in the shops to last me a lifetime. I’d let her pick the alcohol — largely because I didn’t drink much of it myself — and we were set for the week.
Every night we’d sit by the fire, read and talk. At 22, Diane had a few years on me, had seen some of the world where I’d seen precisely none. She introduced me to writers, styles and concepts I’d never heard of, while I introduced her to…well, frankly very little. But unlike every other woman I’d ever known, despite the paucity of my own life experience she was still interested in everything that came out of my mouth.
And every night in a small house on the south coast, long after I’d come to believe I’d never hear it again, there was laughter.
“Jesus fucking Christ!”
The yachtsman all but dropped the cardboard boxes he was heaving through the door. We’d watched him position a trolley outside the shop before making several trips inside, each time returning laden with goods to load into the cart. We simply waited until he came out, arms full of goods, and stepped into his line of sight. The idea was that if he had his hands full of supplies he couldn’t pull his gun on us. Seeing him standing there, though, I suddenly wondered what we’d do if he just dropped the cartons.
“Mother of God, you scared the crap out of me,” he blustered. His accent was American, and I put him in his forties, but fit with it. He carried himself with the self-confidence of a man who’s in peak condition and knows it. That and the small cannon at his hip made me think he might be ex-military.
When he pulled off his hat to run his fingers through his hair — a gesture of disbelief at what he was seeing — I knew I was right. A buzz-cut, dark but graying.
“Where the hell did you come from?” he asked, repositioning his cap and pulling it on tight.
“I was just going to ask you that,” Diane said. The grin she was rewarded with intensified her own.
“Germany, via France,” he replied. “Been stationed with the Krauts for a couple of years.” He shot out a hand, transferring the weight of the boxes to his leg. “Sergeant Aldo Quinn, at your service, Ma’am.”
She returned the handclasp. “Diane.”
“Will,” I chipped in, taking his proffered hand. I winced slightly: he had one of those handshakes that grinds your knuckles together in a passive-aggressive show of strength. Diane hadn’t reacted to it. Maybe Aldo had saved it especially for me.
“Just passing through?” Diane asked, like that was still a perfectly normal thing to be doing.
“Needed to pick up some things,” he declared. “Didn’t expect to see anyone, that’s for damn sure!”
“You alone?” I asked.
“Sure am, boy.”
“You’ve not seen any other survivors?” asked Diane.
“Not til you. Hoping to change that, though. Got a big trip planned.” He fixed us with a look that was both amused and cagey. “What say you help me get this gear back to my boat and I’ll tell you all about it?”
It was strange: you’d think that in the face of an eternity alone Diane and I would want to spend every waking moment together. I knew that being alone was what she feared most. She thrived on company. To have that taken away from her…I sometimes wondered if she ceased to exist when there was no one else in the room.
But enforced loneliness and voluntary time out are entirely different things, and from the offset we both seemed to understand that little breaks were not just necessary, but essential.
“We can’t live in each other’s pockets,” she’d averred one morning as I asked nervously if she minded me going for a little walk. “That way madness lies.”
The time alone took on a huge importance for me, if only because my “little walks” gave me the chance to see to my old problem. All the time I was bed-ridden I’d had to wait for Diane to go out for supplies before I could deal with it. Even then I had to be careful — I couldn’t risk passing out and her coming home to find me flat out with a needle in my arm. Now I was finding that I could just slip away any time and see to my needs, no questions asked.
I hated doing it, tried hard to justify why I did. The whole reason I’d gone looking for survivors in the first place was that I couldn’t manage the problem on my own, yet there I was, sneaking around, keeping it secret. I don’t know why I didn’t just tell her up front.
That’s not true, I know exactly why. I’d been living with it for so long, living with the looks people gave me when they found out…
I didn’t want to see the same thing in her eyes.
Below decks th
e boat was surprisingly welcoming. The hatch led straight into a living area and kitchenette, each making full, intelligent use of the available space. A short passage led off the cooking area to the front of the boat. There were three doors coming off it — one was a washroom the remaining two would be cabins, I guessed. While Diane was eyeing the rest of the interior appreciatively, I was wondering how I could get a look through the doors, just to be sure. Aldo may have been the model of the genial host, but we still only had his word for it that he was alone.
“Please sit,” Aldo offered, gesturing to the seats in the dining nook. Diane slipped in behind the table, but I perched on the outside, just in case I needed to move quickly.
“Coffee?” The big American struck a match and lit the gas on the compact stove, before filling a kettle from a small tap and clanging it onto the hob. “I tell you, I can just about cope with the annihilation of the human race, but soon as I run out of joe…” He chortled throatily.
“You could always make do with something else,” I muttered as he popped open a cupboard and reached for the coffee tin. The brief glimpse inside the storage space revealed it was also loaded with bottles — scotch, bourbon, vodka. The majority were down to half volume or less.
“You said something about a trip?” Diane prompted.
“So I did, so I did.” He clinked a trio of tin mugs onto the work surface. “How’s about your boy there reaches over into that cabinet.”
Prickling, I remained seated. Aldo, busying himself with the drinks, seemed to interpret my lack of movement as confusion. Or idiocy. “That one there, boy, by the radio.”
I stood and pulled open the wooden panel. Inside, the cupboard was stuffed with papers, from charts to handwritten notes. A second handgun, smaller than the one on Aldo’s hip, sat atop the pile, alongside a tin with a red cross painted on it. Antithetic paperweights.
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