by A. L. Knorr
We arrived at the boathouse and took the staff working there by surprise. They scrambled to get the laser down and ready to go. Although they weren't speaking in English, I could tell the context of what was being said from the expressions and tones of voices. Antoni kept apologizing and telling them not to worry, that it was a last minute decision. He was really kind, but they still looked embarrassed that they hadn't been able to read the mind of Martinius' PA.
The laser turned out to be even smaller than I imagined. There were two diminutive sails and the boom was so low that you had to almost lay flat in the boat to duck under it as it swung back and forth. The vessel was so shallow that it was more like a raft than a boat.
We pushed the boat into the shallows and Antoni held it while I got in. Just as we were pushing the boat out into deeper water one of the boathouse staff called something to Antoni from the dock. Antoni told me he'd asked us to wait a moment.
The man dashed back into the boathouse and emerged with a two-way radio, which he tossed to Antoni. Antoni caught it and snapped it onto his belt. He took hold of the rudder and turned us so the sail caught the wind. We immediately caught a strong gust and the little boat lurched forward. The shore began to fall away behind us. He steered so that we sailed parallel to the bay.
Antoni taught me how to steer with the rudder, and lean out over the water when the boat seemed like it was going to tip. The faster we went, the steeper the angle the boat sailed at.
"Want to go for another swim?" he asked. Before I could answer we were going so fast it took my breath away. I laughed, half joyful and half freaking that we were going to tip. The boat was flying along at a very steep angle. We were both leaning out for counterbalance. Antoni kept it from falling though and the feeling of being on the edge was exhilarating.
The wind pushed us along at an increasing speed and the beach curved alongside, moving away and then moving closer as we traveled. We sailed for close to an hour, and I was amazed at how much ground we'd covered in that time. I could see the Gdańsk port off in the distance.
At one point, a small ray jumped out of the water less than five feet from us. It flashed his belly at us and I got a clear view of his straight mouth and tiny eyes.
"He's checking us out. Those devil rays are curious little fellows," Antoni told me.
A few minutes later, Antoni called over the wind and waves, "We should turn around. Going back is going to take longer because we'll have to tack against the wind."
"Just a little further. Please?" I begged. I loved it. "I might have to put 'laser' on my Christmas list."
He grinned. "Like it?"
"I haven't had this much fun in... maybe ever."
"Ok, hang on to your sunglasses!" he said as we caught another gust of wind. We picked up speed again, and as we leaned out over the water together the boat went up on its side. I felt like my face was going to crack from grinning.
We hit some choppier waves and skipped along like a pebble. The scenery of the beach had changed, now there were more rocks and artificial breakers. There were a few people on the beach, picking their way along the rocks. They were just small figures in the distance. A few of them waved to us and I waved back.
After another fifteen minutes, Antoni slowed the laser down. "Let's turn around. The wind is picking up and those look mildly unfriendly." He pointed and I turned around and looked behind me in the direction we'd come. That was an understatement for the nasty thunderheads that had formed in the distance while our backs had been turned.
Calmly, Antoni steered the boat in a circle, giving me directions on how to help. He explained how to pull the tiller back towards me and lean my weight back to push the bow out of the water. We had to sail in a zigzag fashion when going against the wind. If he was calm, then I would be too. The thunderheads looked dark and full of rain, but I thought we had a good chance of making it back to the boathouse before the showers came.
Once Antoni had shown me how to tack, he stopped talking so much. He was at the rudder and I was in front. It wasn't until I looked back at his face after he'd been quiet for a while that I noticed that his mouth was tight and there was a deep line between his eyes that hadn't been there before.
"Anything wrong?" I asked. "The look on your face is making me nervous."
"We're ok. Just wish we'd headed back sooner. These waves are a little too choppy for me to like."
It was true; the water was rough now. We settled back to the business of sailing, but soon I felt like Antoni was having difficulty keeping us on course. The wind was much stronger now, ripping at the sails and ropes. I realized that it was going to take us a lot longer to get back to the boathouse than it had taken us to get here because we were going against the wind which had only increased in force.
A huge gust caught our sail and before I could react, the laser was wrenched over and I was dumped back into the cold embrace of the Baltic.
Thirteen
I flailed under the water, twisting to right myself. When I finally popped up I saw that the laser was on its side and Antoni had crawled up on top of it. It looked like he hadn't fallen off at all, he must have clung to it like a monkey. I swm towards him but the wind was pushed the boat away from me much faster than I was able to swim.
Antoni looked around, his face serious. He spotted me and called over the growing expanse of ocean between us, "Targa, are you hurt?"
"No, I'm ok!" I replied, and received a mouthful of water for my efforts. I coughed and spat and then called, "The wind is pushing you away from me. I can't keep up!" I was swimming as fast as I could but the waves had more control over where I went than I did, and the lifejacket made my movements sluggish.
I watched as Antoni tried to yank the laser upright. He'd look back at me every few seconds and I was surprised by how rapidly he was moving away from me. His face was growing smaller, harder to read. I never would have thought the wind could push a tipped boat at such speed through the waves.
The laser wasn't very big but it had two sails that were now under the water. It was completely on its side with Antoni perched awkwardly on top. It wasn't going to sink because it was made of fiberglass, but the only chance Antoni had of rescuing himself and me was to get it sitting upright again. Then he'd be able to turn it around and sail it back to pick me up.
He yanked and pulled on the mast with all of his might, trying to use his considerable weight to tip the boat upright. The sails lifted out of the water a few inches but wouldn't go any higher. Lasers were made to flip upright easily, but this one was designed for two people.
"The radio," I called, and got slapped in the face with another wave. I gasped and coughed.
It was as though he had the same thought because he already had the radio up to his mouth. I couldn't hear him over the wind. Suddenly he threw the radio violently into the water in one angry motion. Why had he done that? A cold feeling of dread grew in the pit of my stomach.
He called something over the water to me but he was so far away now that I couldn't make out a word. I was beginning to tire and I realized that if he didn't right the boat now, we each had an impossible decision to make. Antoni could abandon the laser, stay with me, and we could try to swim to land together. Or, he could continue to try to right the laser. The longer he tried, the more exhausted he would become and the further from me the wind would push him. At what point would we not be able to find each other anymore?
I on the other hand, could flail after him uselessly with my life vest holding me back, or just stop swimming and bob in the wind and the waves and wait for him, hoping for him to make it back to me. Or, I could take off the lifejacket and hold it out in front of me like a waterboard and use my legs to swim, either after the laser or towards the shore. I knew that I could swim a lot faster than I was swimming now. With every stroke I could feel the water swirl between my back and the life vest, creating drag.
Antoni and the laser were now so far away that I couldn't make out his face anymore. The boat was s
till on its side and I could see him pulling on it for all he was worth. He was yanking on it so violently, I wondered if he might accidentally snap the mast off.
I lay back in my life vest and floated, mulling the situation over. I closed my eyes and took deep breaths to squash the voice screaming panic in my head.
The cold was finally beginning to seep into my bones and I did not relish the thought of waiting and getting colder. I always felt better when I took action. This must have been something that my mother passed on to me. Never was she one to sit around and react to what life dealt her, she always took matters into her own hands.
I opened my eyes and my heart fell into a pit. The sky was getting darker by the second. A huge wave smashed me in the face, leaving me spitting and panting. That was it. I had to try.
I unsnapped my life vest, twisted the loose ends of the belt around my wrists and pushed it out in front of me like a paddleboard. Up and down in the swells I went. I strained to look over the waves to see what had happened to Antoni and he was now a distant figure, barely visible. The waves would obscure him momentarily, and then he would appear again, still struggling.
He was too far now for me to reach, so I oriented myself towards shore, which was alarmingly far away. I flattened out on the surface and began to kick my legs, but my kicks seemed useless to propel me. Was it possible that, despite my efforts, I was getting further from land? I felt like I was getting dragged out to sea.
Just then a huge wave engulfed me and I was pulled under. My right hand let go of the lifejacket only for a moment, and that was all it took. The vest yanked out of my left hand like it was the ripcord of a lawn mower. The rope burn was hot and sudden. What a stupid mistake I had made in taking it off. If I had had time for emotions other than fear and panic I'm sure I would have felt humiliated, angry, and stupid.
Immediately I sank. All energy redirected from trying to propel myself towards shore to locating the surface again. My lungs burned for air. I finally emerged and gulped oxygen greedily, looking around for the lifejacket.
The yellow vest was already several meters away. I splashed toward it but my exhausted limbs flailed uselessly, powerlessly. I had no control anymore and without something to hang onto I sank low in the water, feeling the enemy of my own weight in this unsalty sea. Another wave buried me, this one pulling me under, pushing me down and turning me over.
Panic finally set in full blast as I tumbled like a sock in a washing machine. Survive, my mind screamed. Oxygen, my lungs wailed. Surface, my limbs cried. Which direction was up?
I opened my eyes and saw that there was a source of light and an area of dark in my muddled vision, but I was churning around so fast that the light kept changing direction.
Stop spinning and swim away from the dark, Targa! said a voice. My chest burned painfully. I rallied my fatigued limbs and made a push towards what I thought was the surface, but given my disorientation, I could have been sending myself deeper.
Where are you, mother? came a voice deep from within. And another voice, one that was unattached to the outcome, laughed at the irony of the daughter of a mermaid, dead by drowning. Was this really how it was going to end?
As I made one more desperate push toward what I thought was the surface, something hard hit me brutally on the very top of my head.
In shock and pain, I gasped for air, but there was none to be had. Water flooded my mouth and filled my lungs. Liquid went where it was not wanted and filled every branch in my lungs that was screaming for sweet, life-filled oxygen. The pain was excruciating, but worse than that was a feeling of betrayal. My own body had failed me. My body spasmed in an effort to expel the sea water but it lasted only a moment, for everything then went black and I knew no more.
Fourteen
Pain.
I was alive. I had to be, because I was in agony. There wasn't supposed to be pain in heaven, right? Or maybe I'd gone to hell. I didn't think hell would be quite so prescriptive with its discomforts though. My eyes hurt and my neck burned. My head ached with a dull throb. I felt weightless, temperature-less. I felt myself turning, drifting, being cradled. I was aware of a sensation of being suspended in fluid, but this fluid was richer than water. There was so much more... information, in this fluid. Had I died and been re-born? Was I drifting in amniotic fluid, about to be born anew as some other person?
A crack of light entered my pupils and pain sliced through my head like a searing line of fire. I squeezed my eyes shut again. I felt hands cover my face. I slowly came to realize that they were my hands. I forced my eyes open. Why did they hurt so much? I felt confused, disoriented. My memory was fuzzy, as though I was trapped in that dream state that came between deep sleep and consciousness.
Fluid. Not amniotic fluid. Water. Traces of salt. I could taste the salt, what little there was, through my skin. The salt pulled me, tugged me gently back to consciousness.
Why was I in the sea? I tried to take a deep breath to clear my head. Oxygen flooded my brain but no air filled my lungs. With the oxygen my vision cleared, and cleared, and cleared, becoming so sharp it was painful. Everything became sharp lines, striking contrasts and jagged edges against softness.
I looked toward the source of light above me. Baltic. I was twenty or so feet below the surface, the water moving ferociously above me. Yet down here it was so very peaceful. I looked down and saw there was another thirty feet between the ocean floor and myself. A small blue item rolling across the sand caught my eye. A water shoe. Mine?
I could easily see a long way in every direction. Underwater terrain and ocean scape stretched out beneath me. Sand drifted slowly back and forth across the marine floor. Seaweed fronds waved at me with green tendrils, welcoming me to their environment. They were mesmerizing, as was the play of light and shadow across the rocks.
Red rock formations rose up from the sandy floor. One so high that it nearly reached the surface. A fuzzy memory of sudden pain on the top of my head surfaced to consciousness like a slow-moving leviathan and I wondered if that was what I had crashed into. I touched my skull and winced. A goose-egg had formed, tall and proud like a horn.
A tickling sensation floated past my belly and I looked down, my shorts were shredded and caught around my waist. Below that I no longer had legs, but a silvery white tail. It gleamed in the light. The metallic, pearly sheen of it was all colours and no colours, like a sardine flashing in the sun. The light glinted harshly off it and into my eyes and I blinked at the strange sensation. My eyes had developed a new way of seeing, and what entered my vision and then into my brain was like sitting down to a feast of overly rich foods. I didn't have the ability to digest what was in front of me. It was all too much colour, too much texture, too much depth, too many dimensions.
I was conscious of a dull sensation of shock and my brain tried to move the legs that I no longer had. The metallic tail moved instead, propelling me abruptly and awkwardly towards the surface. I floundered and tried to stop; the sensation of movement threw every sense into turmoil. Being still was all I could handle for the moment. I felt awkward in this foreign body, almost afraid of it. Underneath the information my senses were taking in, there was a throb of power, as though I had gone to sleep as weak an infant and woken up fully grown and strong.
Underneath the processing of my new reality was an awareness that this change, my new self, was something I had wanted for my entire life. There was someone that I loved deeply who needed to know what was happening to me, someone who would be incredulous. Joyful.
All concept of time vanished as I drifted, too overwhelmed to move. My brain adjusted slowly to my hyper-powerful eyes, and to the new sensations and information that my skin and scales were taking in. The painful edges of details jarring my heightened senses began to soften. The overwhelm slowly dimmed.
I curled my tail back and forth, using my arms and hands to stabilize and direct myself. I drifted forward, giving myself time to become accustomed to how to move my body.
I was n
ot drawn to the choppy surface. Instinctively, I knew that down here was where the peace was. I changed direction and familiarized myself with my new musculature. My heart was pounding hard, but the speed of it was slow, much slower than my heart had ever beaten before. It was a heavy, powerful thud in my chest, but not more than once every two seconds. Though I was in shock I did not panic. I felt a calm amidst my confusion.
I looked down, inspecting myself closely for the first time. My tail was very long and covered in layered scales. Long delicate and transparent fins trailed from the end, which I could spread or close in a similar way to fingers. I ran my hands down my tail and discovered with surprise that it was much more sensitive to the touch than my skin was. I could feel the currents of water sweeping around me, and that the water below me was moving in a different direction than the water above me. I could read that the temperature closer to the surface was different than the temperature below me, but I felt neither cold nor hot myself.
A flash of annoyance at the fabric that was encasing me, irritating me, and I ripped my sun shirt off. I held it for a moment, looking at it with disdain. Why did I need such a hindrance? Not willing to discard it to float in the ocean like so much garbage, I knotted the long sleeves around my waist.
I began to swim with more purpose this time, and as my speed increased rapidly, I couldn't help but smile for the first time since my re-birth. The feeling was pure joy. I was flying! I lost all care for the pains throughout my body. The sensation of propelling myself through water was intoxicating. I laughed spontaneously and then laughed again at the queer sound of my own voice, and how loud it was. Then I became aware of the sounds all around me.
Distant fish gliding through the water, snapping and crackling sounds, even the sound of a whale many miles away. In the back of my brain, very far away, someone had told me that there wasn't much sea life in the Baltic. I knew differently now because there was a symphony of sounds all around me proving there was plenty of life down here.