by Seren Goode
We quickly put the gleaming windows of the city of San Francisco behind us and turned toward the sparkling water of the ocean, pushing past the mouth and out into open water. The weather was good, and my heart sang a happy tune as the long swells rocked the boat in a familiar rhythm.
As I kept a lookout for the coastal markers, Jaxon settled into one of the side seats in the back of the boat, a life vest strapped on and a waterproof blanket protecting him from the spray. He stretched out with his head turned to watch the receding shore with a look of yearning.
Shim stayed with me all morning. Soon, I was even able to turn the helm over to him for bathroom breaks. By afternoon, he was getting more confident, and I took a nap on the bench across from Jaxon.
We made it to Bodega Bay and anchored out in the protected harbor before dark. It was a great place to stop, something we wouldn’t have most nights—there weren’t a lot of harbor options heading north, and most were rough to get into—so we needed to take the opportunity where we could.
Breeze and Skylar made a simple meal and tried to tempt Jaxon into eating. This first day at sea had been awful for him. I slid on to the bench across from him and pulled out the charts and books to double check the route. A while later, Shim finished up on top and joined the rest of us in the cabin, sliding in next to me. For once, I didn’t reach up to touch my necklace. The subconscious gesture had come to represent my desire to talk to the Shim in my head, but now I was finding the real-life Shim equally easy to talk to. The two were starting to merge into one.
Shim said, “It’s strange the way the motion of the water hits Jax. I’ve seen him do backflips on his bike and roll in circles for hours on his skateboard. But put him on water, and he turns Kermit-green until he hits land again.”
I smiled. “He did great today.” I then raised my voice so everyone could hear me. “So, I wanted to explain the plan.”
“You have a plan?” Jaxon challenged me, a small spark of his old self returning.
“Well, sort of.” I tapped the book confidently. “I didn’t want to push too hard today to give us a chance to adjust. We need to make sure we get a lot of rest tonight and pray to the Stars the weather holds. It’s going to be a real grind heading north against the prevailing northwest wind.”
“Are we going to stop at a place like this each night?” Breeze asked.
“I’ll try. I’m thinking with a hard day tomorrow, we can make Fort Bragg, next Humboldt Bay, then Brookings, maybe Coos Bay or Newport, and so on. We’ll need to fill up on fuel at each stop too. We’ll go through a lot motor sailing like we are. It’s going to be tricky, trying not to be spotted. We just need to keep moving and stay ahead of whoever might be following us.”
“Was this the hardest day?” Jaxon perked up, voice full of hope.
“Dude,” Skylar cut in before I could break the news, “This was probably the easiest day.” He looked up at me, and I nodded.
“We need to rest up the next few days while it’s relatively easy and get ready for the rough weather we will get into around Mendocino. That’s also the longest leg of the trip. There are no safe harbors, so we will sail overnight.”
“Argh,” Jaxon groaned. “I’m gonna be skin and bones by the time we get to Seattle.”
“If we even survive,” Skylar added.
“Don’t be a downer!” Breeze admonished him. Flicking on the radio, she started to clean up the galley. The only station they could get in played 70s dance music. Skylar jumped up and helped her, and before long, they were both singing along.
Shim and Jaxon groaned at the music. After a couple of songs, Jaxon pulled out a deck of cards he had found and started to shuffle.
Shim pulled me over and whispered in my ear, “I’ve been wanting to ask you something. The book that Lincoln had, was that your mother’s diary?”
After a sharp inhale, I collapsed down, suddenly exhausted in a way the day at sea couldn’t match. “It had to be. She always had it on her, and she never let me look at it.” I felt so stupid admitting it, but he needed to know. “I have no idea what was so important in the diary that someone would kill for it.”
Shim studied me silently, then nodded. “Do you know why Micah thought she had sent it to Kindle?”
“No—it’s so strange. She never would have parted with it. I don’t know how Lincoln got it.” A horrible suspicion had been floating through my thoughts since Herb mentioned seeing Lincoln with the book. “What—what if he hurt her to get it? What if he took it from her?”
Shim cocked his head to the side and stared off into the pitch blackness outside the round window beside us. “That seems unlikely from everything we heard about the relationship from Waters, and Herb and Linda. But I’d like to see what’s in that diary.”
Me too!
He wrapped an arm around me and gave a squeeze. Something in my body responded to the comfort and the touch, waking up. Too soon, it ended. Jaxon called us over to join the others as he played out the rules for poker.
Inside, I knew everything had changed.
Chapter 18
Calm Water
It was still dark out when I heard a noise in one of the cabins. I was in the galley pulling on one of the wind jackets we had found on board when I caught sight of Shim exiting the berth he and Jaxon had claimed. I hoped I hadn’t woken him. I raised a brow as he started to pull on a jacket. He shrugged. I smiled and headed up the stairs. He followed.
“How’s Jaxon?” I whispered once we were above deck.
“Passed out, thank Stars. He’s pretty amazing. Sick as a dog, but all in. Solid,” Shim whispered back. The two of us worked quietly in the darkness with whispered directions when needed. When we finally powered out of the bay, I had us head south of Bodega Rock before turning north. The boat’s navigation lights cut through the inky blackness, illuminating the ocean’s merge with a moonless sky.
I showed Shim how to do the watcher’s job, keeping an eye out for obstacles and traffic. He sat at the front of the boat, his back against the mast, his attention on the surrounding area.
When we were farther from land, I tilted my head back and looked up at the sky. The moonlight was a sailor’s beacon, cutting through midnight blue fabric that was popping with stars and the thick band of the Milky Way.
I walked up next to Shim, locked in the sky’s exquisite spell. “This is one of my favorite times of the day. We’re lucky the fog lifted.” I whispered. Shim jumped at the sound of my voice next to him. Surprised, he slipped off his perch.
“How can you be here?” He questioned, pushing himself back into his seat and then looking back at the empty helm.
“AP.” At his blank look, I explained, “Autopilot. I wish there was a wind vane, but this will do. It’s good for short breaks.”
“Ah. Didn’t even know boats had that. Makes sense.” After a quick scan of the water, he glanced back at me and stared.
I looked down. My skin was glowing, almost luminescent, in the moon’s radiance. I was so pale, I could be a lighthouse. I sighed and ducked my head, but Shim caught my chin with his thumb and rubbed lightly at my skin, studying my face before letting go. He had a faint smile on his mouth when he turned forward again. I hid my grin.
Something had been bothering me, and now that I had Shim alone, it seemed a good time to ask about it. Maybe.
“Shim?”
Shim sat and waited for me to say more. It was something he was good at. Most people thought they were good listeners, but actually, they were good at nodding until it was their turn to talk. Shim was a good listener because he was good at waiting.
“I wanted to ask about the stones. Do you think…Well, did you feel…I mean, I—” I stumbled, paused, and tried to collect my thoughts. I started again and seemed to find my footing. “I felt, when we were talking through the stones, like I got to know this one guy, then later, in person, yo
u were different. Colder or tougher, totally someone else. You know?”
“You saying I’m not tough?” He growled like it was a sensitive subject.
“No, Stars, you’re one of the strongest people I’ve ever met.” I was careful not to use the word tough, since it seemed to mean something different to him than it did to me. He was silent, waiting, so I continued, “Did you feel that way?” My voice shrank down at the end until it trailed off.
“Like there were two different Graces?” Shim questioned. “One Grace totally decisive and confident, and one that was conflicted and confused?” he challenged.
“Yes!” Did I come across that way? I was disappointed. I thought I’d done a better job faking my confidence. “Once I realized I was talking to you, I started to worry what you thought of me in real life.”
“You didn’t have to put on a front.” He paused and tilted his head. “Maybe it’s good you did. We didn’t know each other. But how could you not have doubts about everything that was going on? None of us know what we’re doing. You know, in motocross, you have a course, a direction, but every second, you’re making decisions. Sometimes, you’re going so fast you make decisions and commit to them on pure instinct. You have to have confidence in what you’ve decided and move on to the next thing. You do that. I’ve seen it time and again.”
“Me?” The sky was growing lighter, and I could see it reflected in his amber eyes.
“Yeah,” Shim said.
We let that settle, sitting in silence for several minutes.
“I want to ask you something else, but I have to check the helm.”
I grabbed the guideline and headed to the back, immediately missing his warmth. I could feel him watch me for a minute, then he left his perch and took the bench on one side of the helm as he waited.
After making a few minor adjustments to the controls, I settled in on the bench across from him.
My voice was more confident now. “So after we fell in the dumpster, and you pulled up your shirt to clean off, I saw the scars and bruises on your side and back.”
His eyebrows rose.
I was silent, watching him. This time, I was the one waiting.
“And you were wondering what? If I was the poster child for abuse?” He scoffed. My brows drew together, but I stayed silent. Finally, he relented. “It’s not what you think. Not exactly, anyway.” He raked a hand through his hair, blowing out a puff of air that held for a second in the cold morning.
I got the impression it was ingrained in him to keep his mouth shut about anything personal. Maybe I shouldn’t have asked him. But I felt like he knew about my mother and other things I’d never shared with anyone. I wanted to know about him.
“It’s complicated,” he finally said.
“I’m not asking your dating status.”
He smirked, then grew serious. “I don’t talk about this, about Logan—my dad,” he explained, and then shrugged. “He doesn’t like me.”
“And…he hits you?” An angry flush spread across my skin.
“What? No! Not what I meant at all, and that would be really bad since he’s a former boxer. No, he is just very…difficult to live around, especially if his expectations aren’t met. Football, motocross, boarding, just about every sport there is, he expects me to be the best or die bloody on the side of the field trying. There isn’t any room for second place. Most of those scars are road rash, a couple of broken ribs, a wrist, that kind of thing.”
“And it’s the same for Jaxon?”
“Oh no, he loves Jaxon.” Shim looked down, his finger tapping a strap on the seat cushion. “Jaxon can do no wrong. I can do no right.”
“That is not fair,” I said.
“Facts of life.” He looked over my shoulder, his eyes distant.
We sat in silence for a minute.
“Shim, why doesn’t your dad like you?”
Shim was silent a long time before he answered. “I was born three months after they got married.”
“Oh, wow.”
“Yeah, guess he felt like I trapped him,” Shim said.
“Not you. Kindle,” I reminded him.
“Doesn’t really matter.”
“What Waters said, about who your dad was—have you ever asked her?” I groaned in my head. I wasn’t going to ask him this—ever.
He didn’t look confused or ask me what I was talking about. He knew. Shim stared out into the ocean, away from the shore and into the vast inky darkness. The silence stretched out like the water ahead of us, and I wondered if I’d damaged the fragile link that was growing between us, a connection I was just starting to recognize and appreciate.
“Don’t want to ask. I’ve always suspected Logan wasn’t…” he hesitated. His voice trembled, and in the wind, I strained to hear him “…my father. But if I ask her, then I’ll know, and knowing—that’s different.”
We sat in silence for a few minutes more before Shim cleared his throat. “You, um, want a hot drink?”
I studied him. I don’t know if he was expecting pity and maybe a little remorse for bringing up the topic. Instead, I met his eyes and held them. I hope I came across as understanding, maybe a little angry on his behalf. I gave a brisk nod. “A hot chocolate would be good.”
Shim quickly made his escape.
∞
I awoke with a start, completely disoriented until I felt the boat rock and I remembered where I was. We were being tossed roughly by the wind, and I was surprised I had fallen asleep. Shim was at the helm, feet braced, riding the waves. He was humming a soundtrack, guns rat-a-tatting, great bangs of explosions, whooshing of aircraft landing. It sounded like he was building his own World of Warcraft battle in his head, the noise competing with the crashing ocean’s roar.
When he had offered to take control for a while, I had forced myself to sit down, thinking I would just rest a minute. Shaking my arms to wake up, I looked out at the water. It had gotten rougher while I slept, but we were making steady progress, keeping the coast on our right.
I pushed up off the bench and headed to the cabin. I made a quick trip to the head, then grabbed a cold sandwich. The twins had prepared a truckload of them two days ago in Fort Bragg, where we had spent the night, stocked up, and refueled.
Grabbing a bottle of water, I headed back up to relieve Shim. This was our fourth day at sea, and the clear weather had lasted till late this morning. By early afternoon, it turned, and sticking close to the shore meant we were frequently in thick, disorienting fog, riding up and down on swells that rarely broke for calm water.
We had spent last night at Humboldt Bay. It was the first time we’d had any problems on shore. While the others had gone to reload supplies, I had gotten updated tide and current data from the Coast Guard. The information was essential, and because of the projected bad weather, I decided we should skip the channel and go outside the St. George Reef. It would get us out of the fog, but the tradeoff made for a rougher ride. The problem came when we went to top off the fuel; they had required boat registration info. So far, we had avoided having to produce anything that would get us tracked. Concerned, we had backed off and not refueled. The fear of running out and the bad weather made for a miserable day, so we were all looking forward to pulling into the harbor at Brookings.
“You sleep?” Shim’s voice was hoarse. A curl of cocoa hair was plastered to his forehead below the rim of his hat. His cheeks and lips were rosy from the wind. He was alert, coiled, ready to spring into action. Shim made an excellent sailor.
“Yeah. I can’t believe I was knocked out for a good two hours. Crazy, huh?”
“You needed it,” he acknowledged, and he was right.
I’d been pulling a lot of hours above deck and spending a lot of time below deck mapping a course and stressing about everyone and everything. I couldn’t stop myself from asking, “How do you think everyo
ne else is doing?” I indicated with my head the twins who were playing word games while acting as the watchers for Shim.
“Tight. Good sailors.” The ultimate compliment.
“Jaxon?”
“Napping,” said Shim. That’s what I’d expected. Jaxon had been taking the Dramamine we had found in the emergency kit, knocking himself out during the day, and trying to help in the evenings.
“He’s doing great. I can’t imagine being sick like him whenever I was on the water.” I leaned over him and made a slight adjustment at the helm.
“How long have you been sailing?” Shim asked.
I thought back. “Always. One of my earliest memories is from when we were living on our boat. We followed my dad’s job. Marine biologists get around, and my mom homeschooled me. I helped with everything: repairs, cleaning, piloting, plotting the course.”
“That must have been an amazing way to grow up.”
We swapped positions, me taking the helm and Shim stretching out on the bench for a break, his coiled body relaxing. “It was. We lived and breathed the sea: sailed, swam, dove…until my mom died.”
“You dive?” he exclaimed.
“Certified Junior Open Water Diver.” I smiled. “That’s just a certification. I was diving with my mom for years before I was certified.”
“Bold!” He laughed. I liked talking to him like this. It reminded me of before, when we would talk through the stones. We hadn’t used them since we left Sausalito. His face grew serious.
“I gotta go to the bathroom,” a female voice wailed from the bow. Breeze darted below, leaving Skylar on watch. With Skylar’s hair hidden in the hood of his windbreaker, he looked so different: serious, older, more mature. Maybe it wasn’t the hood; maybe it was the absence of Breeze. You almost never saw one of them alone.
Shim was silently studying me as I checked the nav lights were all on, then looked over the other equipment, including the VHF radio, the chart plotter, and the radar. We had to top off our fuel at the next stop. Motor sailing consumed a lot of power. Worrying about the fuel levels, I almost missed his question.