Veracity

by Mark Lavorato

  I followed the direction of the wind to the horizon and could see some low-lying cloud crawling toward us, which, if Onni was correct, was actually land. I hoped he was right.

  I tiptoed over to the container that held the life raft, which was mounted near the gunwale, and carefully unlatched it. I'd almost succeeded in taking it out in perfect silence when I knocked one of the buckles of the plastic container, causing it to rattle a bit. I cringed at the sound; then stood and skulked to the rope ladder, cradling the heavy bundle protectively in my arms, as if someone were going to steal it from me. I had to put it down on the deck while I fed the ladder into the water, which I lowered with painful slowness, my body moving automatically, hand over hand, a few fingerprints of blood marking the rungs, the knife making subtle clicking sounds with every contact that it had with the wood, until finally, it was all in, stretching out into the wake, cutting frothing lines in the black water. I was almost there. I was almost free. I only had to climb down the ladder and let go. It was that simple.

  But I stopped. Or, rather, everything in my body stopped. I was immobile. It wasn't that I had heard something behind me, it was that the air at my back had become still, maybe even slightly warmed. Someone was there. Someone was about to stop me from escaping, after I had gotten so close to it that I'd almost tasted it. The ladder was in the water, the life raft out of its container and beside me, the land in the distance, the wind blowing in the perfect direction; every last thing was aligned in my favour. I knew that this window of opportunity would never come up again. Never. And if I missed it, I would die. The back of my eyes warmed. I tightened my grip on the knife. I would not miss it.

  In one quick motion, I stood up, spun around, and swiped the knife through the air as hard as I could.

  He was so close to me, that I thought my wrist would strike him before the blade would. He flung his hands high and forward, sucking his stomach in, trying to get as far from the metal as possible. As soon as I had followed through with the swing, his hands shot to his lower stomach, covering it. Neither of us really moved after that.

  "Shit!" I heard my voice whisper, "Shit!" It was Onni.

  Thinking about it now, I imagine he had simply heard the buckle of the container chatter, stood up from wherever he was sitting, saw me, and had walked over to bid me farewell, stepping as quietly as usual - nothing out of the ordinary.

  He didn't look up at me. He was far too busy looking down at his hands covering his stomach, as if he were watching for something - maybe blood to start streaming through his fingers, drawing long, dark lines down the front of his pants. But nothing came. And, for a moment, I let myself think that I had missed, that I hadn't even touched him, that he was fine, that he was just imagining things. But in the back of my mind, I knew what the resistance when the knife passed closest to his waist had meant. The blade had met with his skin. He would be injured in some way. It was only a question of the degree.

  Finally, after seconds passed without anything happening, his curiosity won over, and he withdrew his hands to inspect the wound. But when he did, there never seemed to be a space between his fingers and his stomach for us to see it. He turned to better face the grey light of the moon, and the brightness suddenly explained everything, hid nothing. He was holding something that we'd only seen in anatomy books and while cleaning fish: intestines. They were poking out from the deep gash across the lower part of his stomach.

  I will never forget the way he looked up at me at that point. He was calm as always, but also stunned, scared. He lowered his eyebrows, taking in my expression, taking in exactly what I was, and turning his head a bit, as if he wanted to sadly shake it, but didn't. He looked as if he were questioning himself, as if he were wondering whether or not he had set out to help the wrong person - maybe even someone who didn't deserve to be helped. Someone who was more base, more sordid than he'd ever suspected.

  "They'll kill you for sure now," he said, deadpan. "Better go while you can." He eyed the helm before continuing, his voice a perfect monotone, "I'll steer us away from the peninsula. You should be safe. Go." He turned and started shuffling away like an old man, his footsteps treading tender on the deck, one of his hands on the rail, the other on his stomach.

  I didn't move at first. I only stayed there, watching him trundle along the rail, wishing that there were something right that I could do or say. But I couldn't even remember my well-chosen words; and, even if I had, they would have been wrong. Everything was wrong.

  I thought I heard someone clearing his throat below deck, which seemed to wake me up. Onni was right. There was no use in standing around. I had to go.

  I bent down and picked up the bundle with the life raft in it, and noticed the knife still in my hand. I held it in front of my face, looked at it disgustedly for a moment, and threw it into the ocean. I crawled onto the rope ladder and climbed down, the bundle tucked awkwardly under one of my arms, and was fully submerged in the black water within seconds. I let go.

  Everything was black, boundless, desolate. I came up for air, eyes wide at the naked cold, and started treading water, my legs whirling in panicky circles. I gripped onto the life raft bundle with a grip that increased by the minute, watching the boat become smaller. While I waited, the expanse of ocean that surrounded me began to seem like a dizzying display of space in comparison to my cramped quarters, which only led me to the bleak realization of where I was and what I was doing. I was in the middle of the ocean with nothing but a red sack in my hand and a bit of empty faith that it would magically turn into something that would save me, while the only reliably buoyant object within days of travel was irrevocably drifting away. I had spent so much time imagining that the second I entered the water, I would be safe; but that couldn't have been further from the truth. I'd only traded in one form of critical danger for another.

  I waited until I thought the boat was well out of earshot, treading water, shivering. When I finally thought it was, I grabbed hold of the largest chord dangling out of the bag and yanked on it. Nothing happened. I pulled harder. Still nothing. I closed my eyes to stop myself from swearing at the very top of my lungs. I grabbed hold of another plastic strand that was sticking out and gave it a stout tug. There was a furious hissing noise and the bag leapt out of my hands. I dove below the surface to get away from it, afraid that whatever strange mechanism was responsible for instantly creating a ten-person raft from a small bag would kill me. When I surfaced, to my amazement, and exactly as Mitra had promised, there was a plastic raft bobbing on the surface. I swam over to it, grabbed hold of the side, and hoisted myself over its edge, foundering against one of its inflated walls.

  It took quite a while to catch my breath, and once I'd recovered a bit, I looked up at the vertical smile of the moon. I didn't smile back. Yes, I was finally safe; I had escaped; but I didn't feel free. I don't remember any sense of relief or joy. It was a coldness more than anything else, a detachedness.

  Already, I found myself busy pushing images out of my mind; the thin, black fingers of blood spreading through the lightness of Knut's hair; Toivo's arm sticking out from under his chest, his palm opening toward the ceiling; the moonlight glistening on what was in Onni's hands when he moved them away from his stomach, the expression on his face for that one, slow moment of recognition when he looked up at me. Yes. It was all I could do to push these images away, far away, shoving them back into some remote recess of my mind, where they would stay. Waiting. Patiently.

  * * *

  30

  I was cold, huddled with my back against the bulging plastic, my arms crossed over my chest, knees drawn up close to my body. The little pool of seawater that was inside the raft - either from the moment of its being inflated, or by my entering it soaking wet - gathered into my corner, sucking away any warmth my body could make.

  Every once in awhile I would stretch my neck over the rim of the raft to see if the ship had glided out of sight, its triangular sail like the needle of a compass, pointing at me, shr
inking and dimming with every fathom travelled, gauging how small I was - how much smaller I was becoming. Until finally, I lost sight of it altogether, and the enormity of the sea swallowed everything.

  I gathered my limbs into another crook of the raft, and the water that had been making me cold in the first corner, crawled over the glossy coating to collect around me again, lapping against my lower back, sifting my warmth through its fingers, giggling.

  The night seemed endless. I fell in and out of a shallow, fitful sleep; and when I woke, it was with stiff muscles and anxious movements. Though, once I realized where I was, along with the fact that the only thing I could do was wait, I would gradually crunch myself up into a ball again and attempt to doze off for another short while. At one point, I happened to stir awake in that brief period during the dawn of every clear day, when the light is a drab, featureless grey, and it's impossible to tell whether the sky is overcast, or perfectly clear. I squinted up at the zenith, felt a little uneasy at the fact that a stratum of cloud had somehow sheeted over since the last time I'd looked up and saw stars, and then slowly shut my eyes, my chin sinking back onto my chest, and nodded off once more.

  When I finally woke to the day, it was to a sky that was surprisingly cloudless. And, realizing that with the light of morning I would finally be able to tell whether or not the low-lying clouds I had seen were land, I shot up from where I was and looked around. Then I relaxed, smiled. The horizon was filled with the peninsula I had seen on the map. A coast emerged out of the haze on my right, while ahead of me, and exactly the spot I was drifting toward, was the end of the cape, where the coastline sunk back into the water. I was close - or at least closer than I thought I would be. The land looked green and inviting, and I imagined that it was high enough to have accumulated a bit of fresh water. I could also see that where the steep terrain met the ocean, there was a broad band of vegetation missing, a swath of wrinkled and exposed rock. Though, at the time, I didn't really make the connection of how important this was.

  The morning stretched on into afternoon, and the sun beat down on me with a sticky, relentless heat, despite the raising of the flimsy canopy I found tucked into one of the sides. (I remember there being only a few short minutes on the raft when the temperature was agreeable - the rest of the time I was either uncomfortably cold, or uncomfortably hot.) And while I sat there, grimacing against the glare of the water and sun, I realized that if I had been a little more clear headed, I would've almost drowned myself with freshwater before leaving my room the night before; guzzling cupfuls out of my bucket until streams spilled over my face and soaked my shirt. After the first hour of sunlight, I was already thirsty; which I could do nothing about, other than watch the land inch closer by the hour, looking for natural low spots and drainages that I could seek out once I was there. As I did this, I consciously tried to keep my mind away from how dry my throat was becoming, which, I must admit, is a difficult thing to do when the only thing you look for, see, hear, and feel, is water.

  Eventually, I tried to think of other things to busy myself with, which led me to bailing all of the seawater out of the raft; my hands cupped into a broad scoop, flinging arcs of it over the rim, watching the orange plastic through the streams of liquid as it distorted for a fraction of a second before the stringy lens disappeared over the side. Then I lay down on my back and watched the blank sky, sitting up to check the land every few minutes to gauge my progress.

  As the hours passed, and I was getting closer, I noticed that the winds had changed somewhat. And, after holding a wet hand in the air for several minutes, found that I was no longer heading toward the very tip of the peninsula, but just to the left of it. I would miss the cape. And if I didn't try to swim to it, the next land I would come to, or, more accurately, the shore that my shrivelled and decaying carcass would wash up upon in a week or two, would be wherever the massive gulf ended. Obviously my only option was to stay in the raft until I came as close to land as I could, and then jump out and try and swim the rest of the way. But from what it looked like, without knowing anything about the currents underneath of me, nor what they would be like near the tip of the peninsula, the distance would be a long one; something that could either be just close enough to feasibly swim, or just far enough not to.

  I waited, growing nervous, watching the land slope closer by the hour, its bulk in my periphery broadening. I began to be able to make out individual trees, even the features of some of the larger ones. I also started to become aware of a kind of low sigh, something that sounded like a damp wind humming through thick leaves. It was faint, but insistent, and getting louder. I honestly didn't know what it was until I stood up in the raft to look, wobbling precariously in the waves. The entire coastline was white; waves churning in on themselves, growling, clawing the shore, scraping the rocks, ripping any vegetation that had tried to grow there out and into the water, and gnashing it with their salty teeth.

  There is, of course, a leeward side and a windward side to everything at sea. And what I was looking at was the windward side; the side that the air and ocean currents, after having accumulated speed and strength over the breadth of an entire ocean, were pummelling against. It was interesting that we had thought of this land, of any land, as a kind of salvation when we were hit by the storm. But now it was plain to see that if we had managed to get there, we would only have succeeded in dashing our ship against the cliffs and killing ourselves.

  I grew more nervous, watched the tip of the peninsula sidle closer, watched the waves pound the steep rocks and bounce back through the air in towering curls, looking like twisting arms, falling fists, sprawling fingers.

  It was only when the sun was almost setting that I started to think of the peninsula as being within swimming distance. I was right about the raft missing the cape, as well as the distance that I would have to swim to reach it. But, after watching the waves for as many hours as I had, I could also appreciate that the change in wind direction was a lucky one. If I had any chance of surviving, it would be in accessing the leeward side of the promontory - the side that I could not see, but soon would, as I floated past the tip of the cape.

  I neared the apex, watching the rest of the coastline become obscured by its rocky point, until it was the only thing I could see. I was close enough for the waves to sound as deep as thunder, and to be tossed up and down in the surf by their after effects. The water had become creamy with tiny air bubbles, and it hissed as they rose to the surface in the millions and burst around the raft.

  Seeing the dividing line between the part of the ocean current that collided with the peninsula, and the part that continued on, I could get a feeling as to the strength of the undercurrents and eddies that I would have to swim through. It didn't look all that promising. But I also didn't have much of a choice.

  I studied the other side of the peninsula as it slowly opened up. It was just as steep - maybe even a bit steeper - though at least the water there was relatively calm. I looked for some kind of target to swim toward along the cliff, but didn't really find one.

  Then the moment came; the second that I could tell I was getting further away from land instead of closer to it. The sun was sinking into the sea behind me, the light almost inviting, gentle. I thought about taking my clothes off before diving in, but remembered how cold I was during the night. I would need them when I got to shore. If I got to shore.

  Finally, I shook my head, swore aloud, focused on the closest point of land, and jumped into the water. I started swimming as frantically as I could, and after only a few minutes, was already reasonably spent. I paused to look behind me and see where the raft was, as if I might be able to hold onto it for a few minutes and catch my breath. It had already become small, remote, jauntily springing up and down in the surf, being swept away with the light wind, out into the bay that looked the same as any endless ocean.

  I knew that if I could get into the leeward shadow, where the current was being blocked by the land, there might be an eddy that
would pull me back toward the cape, so I swam parallel with the cliff, though still watching its features closely, trying to judge where the unseen currents were dragging me. The new side of the peninsula was opening up like a broad-shouldered body turning toward me, which meant (and not very surprisingly) that I was being carried out to sea. And within a few minutes, the land that had only seemed like a long swim away had come to appear impossibly far, almost intangible.

  I had to think of ways to stop myself from panicking. I began counting my strokes, slow methodical arcs with my arms, smooth kicks with my feet, whispering numbers out to the fading light.

  Then, finally, I passed through a few strange waves that were twisting the surface with tiny whirlpools, and felt a rush of current tug at my clothing in one direction, and then in another. This was the eddy line. I had crossed over from the main current that was pushing me into the bay, and was in the eddy that would draw me closer to the peninsula. After only a few more minutes of swimming, now toward the cliff, I noticed it rising for the first time. Which was lucky, because I was getting incredibly tired. At one point, I rolled onto my back to take a rest, heaving air into my lungs that never seemed to fill them. My strokes were becoming ineffective, my limbs sloppily sifting through the water, probably holding me back more than they were propelling me. It was up to the currents now.

  The sky was growing pasty, its colour fading. Soon it would be dark, and it occurred to me that I might meet my end while scraping along the rocks, looking for a way onto land during the night, which almost seemed worse than being crushed by the waves during the day. I could picture myself struggling to climb out of the swells and onto the cliff, the inky sea pulling me in after each failed attempt, wrapping around my face, shoving its fingers up my nose and down my throat, smothering me, putting its palms on my shoulders and pushing me under the surface. Understandably, I allowed this image to enter my mind only once.