He could not say for sure, not for all the sun of the Sahara, whether he was conscious or unconscious, dead or alive. He didn’t feel a thing. He did not know whether he floated in the sea or in the ether. He could not pinch his arm to find out whether he was awake. He wasn’t even sure there was still a hand at the end of his arm, or whether he had arms at all. He was weightless and bodiless like a breath of air.
Then he heard a voice. It could have been the voice of the man on board or his own. It could have been a figment of his imagination.
‘If I had told you yesterday that you would die serene and in peace, you wouldn’t have believed me. You would have shouted and cursed and splashed and moaned. And why should you have believed me? Yesterday you were nothing but a spoilt brat who had never asked himself who he was. You’d never stood in front of a mirror and given an honest look at yourself. Now you do. Nobody needs to say now what you are and what your life has been. No heavenly judge, no eulogy from a saddened relative, no three-line obituary will define you or measure you. You define yourself. So tell me, now that the ocean has frozen and neutralised the animal impulse to survive for survival’s sake, what do you see? What’s left of you? Can you find the spark of the fire divine? Can you find a good person, a life that stands on its own? Or is there but a beast, a time more or less pleasurable, more or less honest, but apathic and absurd? If I took you know out of the water, and wrapped you in foil blankets, and inject you with whatever substances can bring your body out from the cold, if I gave you your life back, in short, what would you return to? Would you find the will within yourself to claim your place among the living, or after seeing you like you are, no instincts, no inertia, have you found out there is nothing worth claiming?’
‘But you had no right’ he said to the voice that could be that of the man on board or his own or nobody’s. ‘You had no right.’
‘When you crush an ant with the tip of your finger, do you ask permission? Do you ask forgiveness? I killed you because I could. But tell me now, man in the water, are you an insect after all, or are you a man?
When he was a child, his family had a very little boat, with the hull painted dark blue. It had a little cabin where it got really hot; his dad used to nap there after a sandwich lunch. They would drop the anchor off the shore of a little island less than half an hour away from the harbour, and spend the day there swimming and toasting under the beautifully scorching hot sun. If there was a south wind, they’d stay on the northern part, which was his favourite. It was rocky and full of hiding places, with some shallows where he’d stand, over the mossy-like seaweed that looked like a thick forest seen from the window of a plane. He’d dive six or nine feet deep and the world would explode to red, purple and green. Starfish and little anemone, sea urchins and creatures for which he had no name would waive and dance with the currents. If he was lucky, there would be octopusses. He’d get close enough to alarm them and then they would spread their tentacles and crawl gracefully away, flashing colours at him, white, maroon, purple. Shaols of little silver fish would dance away from him, exploding with a beam of gold when touched by a ray of sun. All those lidless, glass eyes watching him. He’d stay suspended under water for as long as he could hold his breath, and he felt part of it all.
When he emerged to breathe his parents would check how blue his lips were. He had to be sternly commanded before he agreed to get out. He’d climb the removable white ladders that the waves swinged and banged against the hull, sometimes trapping his fingers. His dad would get his snorkel and mask and then the flippers would come off. His feet would feel suddenly disabled and minuscule. He’d be welcome on board with a big, weathered towel that had been under the sun for hours. His mom or his dad would hold him as they wrapped him in it and keep holding him until they were sure he was out of the cold.
The man on board lifted him onto the stern platform with an groan of effort, and stripped him off his diving suit with the aid of his own knife. The blade scratched the skin here and there, even though it was handed with care, and yet no blood poured out. The snorkel, mask and flippers were tossed on deck but the knife was placed in his fist, which was clenched so tight that a couple of fingers had to be broken to allow the handle in. It was another little struggle to cross his arms on his chest. The man on board combed back the other man’s hair and examined his work. It looked like one of these sleeping figures that one sometimes finds on the sarcophagi of kings or rich merchants from olden times. He stroke his head. There was possession and intimacy in that gesture. He pushed him off the platform and into the westwards current. Had he been aware of it, the man in the water might have relished the idea of a Viking funeral.
The man on board didn’t stay to watch the body sink. I hate goodbyes, he would have said. The ocean extended in every direction and he would wander on it for hours, defying the endurance of his fuel tank, almost to the verge of being stranded for ever in the same current that was taking his victim west and then down, down, down, and then nowhere. Man and boat were so small, so insignificant lost in the boundless, indifferent ocean. Blink once and they’re gone.
THE END
Friday, May 22, 2009
Friday, May 1, 2009
Warm Waters, Chapter 8
‘You’ll love the third story. It’s about you.’
The man in the water hated the other man’s smirk. It was poisonous.
‘About ten years ago, this young girl went to college. In a party she was gang-banged by six or seven older students. She could never say exactly how many or who they were, because they drugged her with god knows what before they did what they wanted to her. The rapists were quite passed out themselves. She reported it but the couple of guys who she identified denied it was rape. The judge accepted their defense that it being a frat party she should have known what she was going there for. He didn’t even accept he had been drugged against her will. He didn’t demand the students to name the rest of the boys. In short, he blamed it all on her.
>>The girl went on to marry her boyfriend, a sailorman. For ten years she struggled with depression, anxiety, agoraphobia, and just plain nightmares. Then one night she drowned in her bath, after taking too many sleeping pills. The doctors could never say if it was an accident or suicide.’
The man in the water thought about the bath’s warm waters.
‘What does that have to do with me?’ he said, of course only managing to squeeze out one out of every three words, and that with painful difficulty.
‘You know what.’ Said the man on board. ‘Because you were there when it happened.’
The man in the water gasped.
‘Never.’ He said, struggling to go beyond the ‘n’.
‘How many mornings in college did you wake up and remembered absolutely nothing about the night before? How many nights were you so passed out you forgot even your name?’
Too many, thought to himself the man in the water, his face contorted, his eyes blank, his stomach upturned.
‘Your mates, I hunted them down, one by one. They told me your name. I made them believe they could get away if they named the other guys. Poor bastards. The look on their faces when they realised I had lied.’
The man in the water had no breath to retort with.
‘You lie’ he said, in a whisper, more a prayer than an assertion.
‘How did you first heard from me? How did you learned about my fishing trips?’
A leaflet under his door, every week for three months.
‘Have you heard of any of your old college mates these last couple of years?’
He hadn’t.
‘Never!’ he said. ‘I’d never! I couldn’t!’ he shouted, trying to shut up the shadow of a doubt that had started to grow deep inside him, too odious to be heeded.
‘Oh, but you did.’ Retorted the man on board, unassailable. ‘You did. You know you did.’
‘No!’ he bellowed, his eyes shut, his useless hands wagging on his ears.
So many things didn’t fit. So many things in his head screaming the story didn’t hold water. If only he could think clearly. If only he could go over the whole thing from the start. How did he get here, on that particular boat, on that particular weekend. How did he end up in the water –had he been induced to jump or had it been his decision all along. Hadn’t there been too many random actions the man on board couldn’t have possibly controlled? Wouldn’t he had heard about his mates if they started disappearing? But all these questions and many more had become a swarm of flies and bees inside his head. Thoughts started but didn’t conclude. They were left in the air and covered and clouded by the next, and the other, and the other. He wanted to grab just one of them and weigh it down it properly, but they all escaped him, slippery like eels. He simply couldn’t think straight. The confusion that announced his imminent death had settled in, at last.
‘What was her name?’ he clattered then.
The man on board smiled a huge grin of satisfaction and triumph.
‘Are you saying you choose the third story?’
The man in the water was puzzled. He had forgotten about their macabre game. He had thought he was finally hearing the truth of it all. So yes, you could say that he chose the third option.
‘Her name?’ he insisted, god knows why.
‘Is that a yes? The third story?’ The man on board refuse to let him get away without an answer, his will fixed upon his game.
The man in the water felt the torment of cold, his flesh like marble. His jaw was still clattering, but he realised the trembling in the rest of his body was subsiding. He was dying.
‘I’m so sorry’ he said then, very softly. He was not sure what he was apologising for. He was sorry about many other things, though. The fact is, he could have done something like that. What the fuck, most people can. If that was not a reason to be sorry, he didn’t know what was.
‘You have a big problem, man’ said the man on board, speaking very slowly, as if he wanted to make himself very clear. Words got to the man in the water as if through a veil. ‘If what I’ve told you is true, if this whole thing is a revenge for what you might have done to my wife, and if I’ve bothered so much to find you, and bring you here, and kill you, do you really think I’m going to let you go? Do you think I’ll let you live, just because you guessed right and you said you were sorry? Do you really think you’re saved?’
The man in the water closed his eyes. No, he didn’t. He didn’t. The sun was up. To him it appeared dimmed and white, and the blue of the sky looked pale and transparent like ice. He knew then. He just took full conscience of it, and accepted it. That was it.
‘Was it even the true story?’ the last will of the condemned man.
The man on board smiled.
‘You’ll never know.’
‘Any of them true?’ he rattled, not really expecting an answer.
‘You’ll never know. Does it really matter? Perhaps they all were. Perhaps none of them. It’s all part of the fun.’
The man in the water even smiled ever so slightly, as much as his stone cold face would allow.
‘The fun’ he whispered.
The man in the water hated the other man’s smirk. It was poisonous.
‘About ten years ago, this young girl went to college. In a party she was gang-banged by six or seven older students. She could never say exactly how many or who they were, because they drugged her with god knows what before they did what they wanted to her. The rapists were quite passed out themselves. She reported it but the couple of guys who she identified denied it was rape. The judge accepted their defense that it being a frat party she should have known what she was going there for. He didn’t even accept he had been drugged against her will. He didn’t demand the students to name the rest of the boys. In short, he blamed it all on her.
>>The girl went on to marry her boyfriend, a sailorman. For ten years she struggled with depression, anxiety, agoraphobia, and just plain nightmares. Then one night she drowned in her bath, after taking too many sleeping pills. The doctors could never say if it was an accident or suicide.’
The man in the water thought about the bath’s warm waters.
‘What does that have to do with me?’ he said, of course only managing to squeeze out one out of every three words, and that with painful difficulty.
‘You know what.’ Said the man on board. ‘Because you were there when it happened.’
The man in the water gasped.
‘Never.’ He said, struggling to go beyond the ‘n’.
‘How many mornings in college did you wake up and remembered absolutely nothing about the night before? How many nights were you so passed out you forgot even your name?’
Too many, thought to himself the man in the water, his face contorted, his eyes blank, his stomach upturned.
‘Your mates, I hunted them down, one by one. They told me your name. I made them believe they could get away if they named the other guys. Poor bastards. The look on their faces when they realised I had lied.’
The man in the water had no breath to retort with.
‘You lie’ he said, in a whisper, more a prayer than an assertion.
‘How did you first heard from me? How did you learned about my fishing trips?’
A leaflet under his door, every week for three months.
‘Have you heard of any of your old college mates these last couple of years?’
He hadn’t.
‘Never!’ he said. ‘I’d never! I couldn’t!’ he shouted, trying to shut up the shadow of a doubt that had started to grow deep inside him, too odious to be heeded.
‘Oh, but you did.’ Retorted the man on board, unassailable. ‘You did. You know you did.’
‘No!’ he bellowed, his eyes shut, his useless hands wagging on his ears.
So many things didn’t fit. So many things in his head screaming the story didn’t hold water. If only he could think clearly. If only he could go over the whole thing from the start. How did he get here, on that particular boat, on that particular weekend. How did he end up in the water –had he been induced to jump or had it been his decision all along. Hadn’t there been too many random actions the man on board couldn’t have possibly controlled? Wouldn’t he had heard about his mates if they started disappearing? But all these questions and many more had become a swarm of flies and bees inside his head. Thoughts started but didn’t conclude. They were left in the air and covered and clouded by the next, and the other, and the other. He wanted to grab just one of them and weigh it down it properly, but they all escaped him, slippery like eels. He simply couldn’t think straight. The confusion that announced his imminent death had settled in, at last.
‘What was her name?’ he clattered then.
The man on board smiled a huge grin of satisfaction and triumph.
‘Are you saying you choose the third story?’
The man in the water was puzzled. He had forgotten about their macabre game. He had thought he was finally hearing the truth of it all. So yes, you could say that he chose the third option.
‘Her name?’ he insisted, god knows why.
‘Is that a yes? The third story?’ The man on board refuse to let him get away without an answer, his will fixed upon his game.
The man in the water felt the torment of cold, his flesh like marble. His jaw was still clattering, but he realised the trembling in the rest of his body was subsiding. He was dying.
‘I’m so sorry’ he said then, very softly. He was not sure what he was apologising for. He was sorry about many other things, though. The fact is, he could have done something like that. What the fuck, most people can. If that was not a reason to be sorry, he didn’t know what was.
‘You have a big problem, man’ said the man on board, speaking very slowly, as if he wanted to make himself very clear. Words got to the man in the water as if through a veil. ‘If what I’ve told you is true, if this whole thing is a revenge for what you might have done to my wife, and if I’ve bothered so much to find you, and bring you here, and kill you, do you really think I’m going to let you go? Do you think I’ll let you live, just because you guessed right and you said you were sorry? Do you really think you’re saved?’
The man in the water closed his eyes. No, he didn’t. He didn’t. The sun was up. To him it appeared dimmed and white, and the blue of the sky looked pale and transparent like ice. He knew then. He just took full conscience of it, and accepted it. That was it.
‘Was it even the true story?’ the last will of the condemned man.
The man on board smiled.
‘You’ll never know.’
‘Any of them true?’ he rattled, not really expecting an answer.
‘You’ll never know. Does it really matter? Perhaps they all were. Perhaps none of them. It’s all part of the fun.’
The man in the water even smiled ever so slightly, as much as his stone cold face would allow.
‘The fun’ he whispered.
Friday, April 24, 2009
Warm Waters, Chapter 7
‘Very well, then, the second story. Yesterday you wanted to know how I got this scar.’ The captain rubbed his left calf, resting now over the gunwhale. One third of the flesh was gone, and a huge, dented, whiteish mark was left instead. ‘I told you it was a long story, but it really isn’t. The fact is, I was a greedy idiot and I got what I deserved.’ The man on board spoke in a matter-of-factly tone. ‘I used to work in a big cargo ship in the Red Sea. I found out soon enough they were smuggling arms into Somalia and Ethiopia. They were right twats, all of them, they acted as if they were transporting oranges. I was an idiot for staying, but the pay was good, so I did. One of them must have been smoking one of these disgusting little brown cigarettes they were so fond of where he shouldn’t have, and the fucking thing went off. The boat and its one hundred and fifty men went down. Guess how many lifeboats were there. Guess how many lifesavers. Guess how many of us were left floating in the water without any of these. The captain was scared he’d be prosecuted, so the bastard jumped on a boat and didn’t tell anyone about us. We were left there for almost three days.’
The captain didn’t seem particularly affected by any of it. He kept shrugging and shaking his head. The man in the water interrogated his inner alarm, but got no reply.
‘You’d say the worst was exhaustion and thirst.’ resumed the captain. ‘But nah, fear and terror keep your mind off these things. The worst were the sharks. Bulls and tigers, I think. I don’t know, I’m no expert. They came in hundreds, or so it felt. We had flares, spikes and debris from the shipwreck to try and scare them off. We formed circles and when one approached we’d scream and kick and try and whack them with sticks or whatever we could get our hands on. Sometimes it worked. Other times it didn’t. One thing about sharks is that when they come to you they don’t seem to have any life in them. They have dead eyes, black eyes, doll’s eyes. Until they bite. And then those dead eyes roll white, and the waters turn red, and you’d hear screaming like you never thought a human throat was capable of.’
The alarm had started to buzz madly. The man in the water didn’t know what it was yet. He kept listening. His heart had started to beat faster.
‘I remember looking into the sunset, just like you did last evening, and pissing my pants, pissing my pants with fear and looking down to the water, where my body disappeared halfway down as if I had been devoured already. I realised if they came from underneath I wouldn’t see them, I wouldn’t see my legs and waist being torn off in pieces, I wouldn’t see the blood. All I would see from my chest down would be inking blackness, and that would be it. My companions in the circle would swim away screaming, gather at a safe distance, if there was any, and look away, and even sing to cover the crying and shrieking. That is exactly what I did, again and again, that night, for a hundred of my mates. I can still remember some of the songs. They were all in their languages, so I only knew a few words or none, but still I sung them. I learned them when we loaded and unloaded that wretched cargo meant for arming children and slaughtering entire villages. Sometimes, in my nightmares, I still sing these songs while I am being devoured by things I cannot see.’
The man on board still appeared to be mysteriously placid. It made the alarm go insane.
‘The next morning, one third of the men had died. We went around checking the wounded, and pushing away the remains of the death, which were surrounded by shoals of little fish like a floating reef. You’d say it would have been a lot easier just to swim away from them, but we didn’t want to be apart from the flotsam, as if the open, desert see was scarier. A few of us tried to help the wounded. Some moaned, some were unconscious. Many others didn’t want us to bring bleeding men close to them, but we didn’t have the guts to do the smart thing and leave them to their own. Although tourniquets were applied liberally, tied with pieces of clothing and belts from the dead, who had also been stripped of their life vests when they wore one, bleeding was very rarely stopped. Soon we’d be pushing the bodies of these away with the others.
>>I remember the seabirds hounding the reefs of bodies. They flew over them and dived between them, for meat and for prey. I heard their crowing. If you closed your eyes you’d think you were in a harbour. I loved that sound, but to this day it still gives me the creeps sometimes.
Nobody in the world could have said at that time that the man on board was lying, making up thoughts and impressions as he went on. The alarm was appeased now, and the man in the water found it disturbing.
‘I went to wake up my friend, Hariq’ resumed the man on board. ‘He had his life vest lose and I though I’d wake him up and tell him to tie it back. He was floating like a buoy, his head hanging to one side. I shook his shoulder. He turned upside down. I saw he had been devoured from the waist down...’
The alarmed was deafening him. What was it? What was it!
‘The second night was worst than the first. Perhaps because there were fewer of us, the sharks seemed to be a lot more. There were only twenty of us left by the morning. There was so much dead meat floating around the sharks pretty much stopped bothering with the living. Although they took some bites now and then, perhaps because the living by that time reeked of blood and death.’
>>At midday, a fishing boat spotted us. I was never more afraid than in the last moments, waiting for my turn. I’ll never put on a life-jacket again...’
The alarm exploded. He got it.
‘Jaws! It’s Jaws!’ gasped the man in the water. ‘It’s from the movie!” he yelled, for once perfectly articulate.
‘Farewell and ado, you sweet Spanish ladies...’ mumbled the man on board with a smile.
‘Liar! Liar!’ he couldn’t tell whether he was mad with joy, because he had spotted the lie, or indignant because he was made to waste his time.
‘You don’t want to hear the rest of the story? You still haven’t found out when I lost my calf. Don’t you want to know how I almost die in St. Mary of the Flees and Ticks Hospital in Yemen because of the infection? How I needed four more operations when I returned to civilisation, only to be able to walk again? How I still wake up in pain because of what those Yemenite quacks did to me?’ The man on board was still smiling, but it was an expression that announced no good to the man in the water.
He didn’t care, he blocked his ears. It was a lie and he had spotted it.
‘Haven’t you thought I could have put this bits in to confuse you and send you off the track?’
The man in the water had considered it, yes, but he had immediately stumbled upon an inspiration that seemed to support his case that it was all baloney:
‘Where the trauma? He clattered.
The man on board kept smiling.
‘The human mind is a complicated thing.’
This is not an answer, babbled and rattled the man in the water. He is dodging the question, he thought. I’m right.
‘Third story!’ he shouted. He felt brave.
The man on board smiled and nodded as if he conceded defeat. That gesture was for the man in the water like a wedge between the solid brick wall of his cherished certainty. It’s been too easy, buzzed the alarm, too easy.
‘You’ll love the third story.’ said the man on board, smiling in a completely different way. The smile of a shark. ‘It’s about you.’
The captain didn’t seem particularly affected by any of it. He kept shrugging and shaking his head. The man in the water interrogated his inner alarm, but got no reply.
‘You’d say the worst was exhaustion and thirst.’ resumed the captain. ‘But nah, fear and terror keep your mind off these things. The worst were the sharks. Bulls and tigers, I think. I don’t know, I’m no expert. They came in hundreds, or so it felt. We had flares, spikes and debris from the shipwreck to try and scare them off. We formed circles and when one approached we’d scream and kick and try and whack them with sticks or whatever we could get our hands on. Sometimes it worked. Other times it didn’t. One thing about sharks is that when they come to you they don’t seem to have any life in them. They have dead eyes, black eyes, doll’s eyes. Until they bite. And then those dead eyes roll white, and the waters turn red, and you’d hear screaming like you never thought a human throat was capable of.’
The alarm had started to buzz madly. The man in the water didn’t know what it was yet. He kept listening. His heart had started to beat faster.
‘I remember looking into the sunset, just like you did last evening, and pissing my pants, pissing my pants with fear and looking down to the water, where my body disappeared halfway down as if I had been devoured already. I realised if they came from underneath I wouldn’t see them, I wouldn’t see my legs and waist being torn off in pieces, I wouldn’t see the blood. All I would see from my chest down would be inking blackness, and that would be it. My companions in the circle would swim away screaming, gather at a safe distance, if there was any, and look away, and even sing to cover the crying and shrieking. That is exactly what I did, again and again, that night, for a hundred of my mates. I can still remember some of the songs. They were all in their languages, so I only knew a few words or none, but still I sung them. I learned them when we loaded and unloaded that wretched cargo meant for arming children and slaughtering entire villages. Sometimes, in my nightmares, I still sing these songs while I am being devoured by things I cannot see.’
The man on board still appeared to be mysteriously placid. It made the alarm go insane.
‘The next morning, one third of the men had died. We went around checking the wounded, and pushing away the remains of the death, which were surrounded by shoals of little fish like a floating reef. You’d say it would have been a lot easier just to swim away from them, but we didn’t want to be apart from the flotsam, as if the open, desert see was scarier. A few of us tried to help the wounded. Some moaned, some were unconscious. Many others didn’t want us to bring bleeding men close to them, but we didn’t have the guts to do the smart thing and leave them to their own. Although tourniquets were applied liberally, tied with pieces of clothing and belts from the dead, who had also been stripped of their life vests when they wore one, bleeding was very rarely stopped. Soon we’d be pushing the bodies of these away with the others.
>>I remember the seabirds hounding the reefs of bodies. They flew over them and dived between them, for meat and for prey. I heard their crowing. If you closed your eyes you’d think you were in a harbour. I loved that sound, but to this day it still gives me the creeps sometimes.
Nobody in the world could have said at that time that the man on board was lying, making up thoughts and impressions as he went on. The alarm was appeased now, and the man in the water found it disturbing.
‘I went to wake up my friend, Hariq’ resumed the man on board. ‘He had his life vest lose and I though I’d wake him up and tell him to tie it back. He was floating like a buoy, his head hanging to one side. I shook his shoulder. He turned upside down. I saw he had been devoured from the waist down...’
The alarmed was deafening him. What was it? What was it!
‘The second night was worst than the first. Perhaps because there were fewer of us, the sharks seemed to be a lot more. There were only twenty of us left by the morning. There was so much dead meat floating around the sharks pretty much stopped bothering with the living. Although they took some bites now and then, perhaps because the living by that time reeked of blood and death.’
>>At midday, a fishing boat spotted us. I was never more afraid than in the last moments, waiting for my turn. I’ll never put on a life-jacket again...’
The alarm exploded. He got it.
‘Jaws! It’s Jaws!’ gasped the man in the water. ‘It’s from the movie!” he yelled, for once perfectly articulate.
‘Farewell and ado, you sweet Spanish ladies...’ mumbled the man on board with a smile.
‘Liar! Liar!’ he couldn’t tell whether he was mad with joy, because he had spotted the lie, or indignant because he was made to waste his time.
‘You don’t want to hear the rest of the story? You still haven’t found out when I lost my calf. Don’t you want to know how I almost die in St. Mary of the Flees and Ticks Hospital in Yemen because of the infection? How I needed four more operations when I returned to civilisation, only to be able to walk again? How I still wake up in pain because of what those Yemenite quacks did to me?’ The man on board was still smiling, but it was an expression that announced no good to the man in the water.
He didn’t care, he blocked his ears. It was a lie and he had spotted it.
‘Haven’t you thought I could have put this bits in to confuse you and send you off the track?’
The man in the water had considered it, yes, but he had immediately stumbled upon an inspiration that seemed to support his case that it was all baloney:
‘Where the trauma? He clattered.
The man on board kept smiling.
‘The human mind is a complicated thing.’
This is not an answer, babbled and rattled the man in the water. He is dodging the question, he thought. I’m right.
‘Third story!’ he shouted. He felt brave.
The man on board smiled and nodded as if he conceded defeat. That gesture was for the man in the water like a wedge between the solid brick wall of his cherished certainty. It’s been too easy, buzzed the alarm, too easy.
‘You’ll love the third story.’ said the man on board, smiling in a completely different way. The smile of a shark. ‘It’s about you.’
Friday, April 17, 2009
Warm Waters, Chapter 6
‘Alright then. The first story.’ The man on board contemplated the horizon. ‘Once upon a time, in a land far far away, there was this man who had a great love for the ocean. He had two children, a boy and a little girl. The mom was out of the picture. They were divorced. No, ‘he corrected himself, ‘she had died. The dad bought a boat. He took the kids to sail on weekends. This is how the boy learned the basics of seamanship, but more than anything this is how he acquired a taste for the sea.’
The man in the water stared intently at his face, trying to spot any signs of lie or truth. The captain spoke with a tone that seemed deliberately light, but his eyes were empty. One would say it felt as if the man took refuge from painful memories in a safe distance. But the man in the water heard some sort of alert signal inside. A little but stubborn voice was telling him not to trust anything he heard or saw.
‘One memorably hot august’, resumed the man on board ‘they went out to sea for the weekend. They sailed themselves right into a typhoon. The dad was just a weekend sailor. We sunk.’
The man in the water detected the change of person. In the face of the man on board he thought he saw the facial equivalent of that change.
‘We only had two life-vests. No, one life-vest.’ The man on board was speaking like a robot now. ‘Don’t ask me why we didn’t have one each. Ask my imbecile of a father. Anyway, perhaps because he thought she was too small for the life-vest and she’d lose it, or perhaps because he thought it was easier to hold on to her than to hold on to me, or perhaps because he loved me more, god knows –whatever the reason, he gave me the life-vest and tied her to himself, and him to me, with a dozen clumsy knots.
>>The waves towered over our heads until it seemed there was nothing else in the world but water. Sometimes we were carried over their backs, and had a terrifying view of an endless scape of furious waves that made us choke with horror; sometimes they broke on our heads and we were submerged to a depth were light was dimmed. I remember the life-vest pulling me towards the surface, while they dragged me down to the deep. I remember, when my lungs were about to burst and I thought we’d never surface, I remember how I wished they would just stop pulling me down.
>>I remember her screaming and weeping and coughing and choking. She was so scared. Thunder sounded like buildings collapsing. Lightning shrieked like the world was torn apart. Except when we were at the valley between two waves, when the wind ceased and there was a silence like death. How she cried and begged for it to stop. Papa, make it stop, she sobbed. I can only imagine what she felt after a wave like a house plumetted on top of us, and the shitty knots my dad made were untied, and she emerged –or perhaps she never did- and she was alone in the middle of that horror. I hope she drowned there and then, but maybe she didn’t, maybe she stood in the surface for a bit longer, lost, alone, hopeless, and so fucking scared it enrages me still when I think about it. We never saw her again.’ His eyes were beads of black glass. ‘They found me many hours later. The waters were very warm too, that day.’
Silence meant the man in the water heard the first breathing of the morning sea. It was like a distant crowd was hiding behind the line of the horizon.
‘So,’ blurted the man on board, light as a feather again, ‘do you believe this one?’ just like a movie actor that seems to wake up from a trance after he hears “cut!”. ‘It makes a lot of sense, doesn’t it? It explains everything. A horrible sea-related trauma. This whole thing could be my attempt to understand my sister’s ordeal by having a stranger revive it. Or maybe I’m trying to sublimate my resentment against my father. What do you reckon?’
The man in the water was listening to his alarm, ringing madly after that playful speech. Don’t believe anything he says, said the alarm again. Find the notes of falsehood in the man's dettached, unaffected tone. Be suspicious, it buzzed. And nevertheless, he had felt compassion and empathised with the horrible story he had heard. He thought he had seen genuine suffering on his face, and guilt, and horror, in a complex blend that seemed just too convincing to ignore. He realised there and then the man was good. He realised there and then this could happen with each story he told him. He realised there and then he had agreed to a game of Russian Roulette, just as the man had said.
The man on board had been observing him all this time. Now he had the most hidious, malicious, homicidal smirk on his face. I know what you’re thinking, the smirk said, and it is exactly what I had always intended. You will not get out of this, said the smirk. We’ll have a nice time, telling stories and watching you hope and doubt, but in the end this will conclude precisely as I told you from the start it would conclude. You will die of cold in the middle of the ocean, you will never know why, and I will be here to see it happen.
‘Your father?’ rattled the man in the water. A sudden inspiration.
‘Oh, the old man.’ He . ‘I’ll give you two options’ he sounded cold as a razor blade. ‘The first one: My dad tied a rubbish knot for himself too. I’m an orfan, woe is me. Sometimes I toss and turn all night thinking that my dad did not want to survive my sister. I even wonder if he gave me the life-vest to tie her destiny to hers, because it was her he couldn’t bear to part with. She was lovely. I was not. My parents’ divorce, well, my mom’s death rather, caught me at a very bad age. I blamed him for everything. Just imagine how all that makes me feel. Do you still wonder why I do what I do?
>>Of course, it could all be bollocks. Imagine how many times I’ve recalled this. Every time you remember something, you alter that memory. It could be all my fucking imagination by now. Just don’t forget how sick I must be to be doing this to you.’ He paused. 'There is the second option, though. He did make it, we were both found. He became a drunk and we lost touch. Many years later, he became the first customer of this little game we’re playing right now. I thought I’d end that useless life. He was useless when my sister needed him, and he was useless when I needed him. But the old man’s death did nothing for me. There was not catharsis, no release. I felt the same fury and the same frustration and the same hatred and the same resentment. So I keep murdering strangers just to see if that will put an end to all this. Whenever I feel the urge, because you’re alone, or you piss me off, or just because you’re here, and I’m here, and the sea is here, I give it another go, and I hope that this time will be the one.’ The robotic, lifeless speech ended in a suspended note.
The man in the water felt an immense sadness. He was very cold, very cold. His head was aching, his muscles were exhausted. He couldn’t think straight. The man on board kept talking and talking and his hopes faltered, because everything that was said was deceitful and everything rang true. He was beginning no to care.
I am going mad, told the man in the water to himself. I am just going, he muttered.
‘What did you say?’ said the man on board.
‘Second story’ clattered the man in the water with painful difficulty and little conviction.
The man on board stared at him with empty black lifeless eyes.
‘Very well, then. The second story.’
The man in the water stared intently at his face, trying to spot any signs of lie or truth. The captain spoke with a tone that seemed deliberately light, but his eyes were empty. One would say it felt as if the man took refuge from painful memories in a safe distance. But the man in the water heard some sort of alert signal inside. A little but stubborn voice was telling him not to trust anything he heard or saw.
‘One memorably hot august’, resumed the man on board ‘they went out to sea for the weekend. They sailed themselves right into a typhoon. The dad was just a weekend sailor. We sunk.’
The man in the water detected the change of person. In the face of the man on board he thought he saw the facial equivalent of that change.
‘We only had two life-vests. No, one life-vest.’ The man on board was speaking like a robot now. ‘Don’t ask me why we didn’t have one each. Ask my imbecile of a father. Anyway, perhaps because he thought she was too small for the life-vest and she’d lose it, or perhaps because he thought it was easier to hold on to her than to hold on to me, or perhaps because he loved me more, god knows –whatever the reason, he gave me the life-vest and tied her to himself, and him to me, with a dozen clumsy knots.
>>The waves towered over our heads until it seemed there was nothing else in the world but water. Sometimes we were carried over their backs, and had a terrifying view of an endless scape of furious waves that made us choke with horror; sometimes they broke on our heads and we were submerged to a depth were light was dimmed. I remember the life-vest pulling me towards the surface, while they dragged me down to the deep. I remember, when my lungs were about to burst and I thought we’d never surface, I remember how I wished they would just stop pulling me down.
>>I remember her screaming and weeping and coughing and choking. She was so scared. Thunder sounded like buildings collapsing. Lightning shrieked like the world was torn apart. Except when we were at the valley between two waves, when the wind ceased and there was a silence like death. How she cried and begged for it to stop. Papa, make it stop, she sobbed. I can only imagine what she felt after a wave like a house plumetted on top of us, and the shitty knots my dad made were untied, and she emerged –or perhaps she never did- and she was alone in the middle of that horror. I hope she drowned there and then, but maybe she didn’t, maybe she stood in the surface for a bit longer, lost, alone, hopeless, and so fucking scared it enrages me still when I think about it. We never saw her again.’ His eyes were beads of black glass. ‘They found me many hours later. The waters were very warm too, that day.’
Silence meant the man in the water heard the first breathing of the morning sea. It was like a distant crowd was hiding behind the line of the horizon.
‘So,’ blurted the man on board, light as a feather again, ‘do you believe this one?’ just like a movie actor that seems to wake up from a trance after he hears “cut!”. ‘It makes a lot of sense, doesn’t it? It explains everything. A horrible sea-related trauma. This whole thing could be my attempt to understand my sister’s ordeal by having a stranger revive it. Or maybe I’m trying to sublimate my resentment against my father. What do you reckon?’
The man in the water was listening to his alarm, ringing madly after that playful speech. Don’t believe anything he says, said the alarm again. Find the notes of falsehood in the man's dettached, unaffected tone. Be suspicious, it buzzed. And nevertheless, he had felt compassion and empathised with the horrible story he had heard. He thought he had seen genuine suffering on his face, and guilt, and horror, in a complex blend that seemed just too convincing to ignore. He realised there and then the man was good. He realised there and then this could happen with each story he told him. He realised there and then he had agreed to a game of Russian Roulette, just as the man had said.
The man on board had been observing him all this time. Now he had the most hidious, malicious, homicidal smirk on his face. I know what you’re thinking, the smirk said, and it is exactly what I had always intended. You will not get out of this, said the smirk. We’ll have a nice time, telling stories and watching you hope and doubt, but in the end this will conclude precisely as I told you from the start it would conclude. You will die of cold in the middle of the ocean, you will never know why, and I will be here to see it happen.
‘Your father?’ rattled the man in the water. A sudden inspiration.
‘Oh, the old man.’ He . ‘I’ll give you two options’ he sounded cold as a razor blade. ‘The first one: My dad tied a rubbish knot for himself too. I’m an orfan, woe is me. Sometimes I toss and turn all night thinking that my dad did not want to survive my sister. I even wonder if he gave me the life-vest to tie her destiny to hers, because it was her he couldn’t bear to part with. She was lovely. I was not. My parents’ divorce, well, my mom’s death rather, caught me at a very bad age. I blamed him for everything. Just imagine how all that makes me feel. Do you still wonder why I do what I do?
>>Of course, it could all be bollocks. Imagine how many times I’ve recalled this. Every time you remember something, you alter that memory. It could be all my fucking imagination by now. Just don’t forget how sick I must be to be doing this to you.’ He paused. 'There is the second option, though. He did make it, we were both found. He became a drunk and we lost touch. Many years later, he became the first customer of this little game we’re playing right now. I thought I’d end that useless life. He was useless when my sister needed him, and he was useless when I needed him. But the old man’s death did nothing for me. There was not catharsis, no release. I felt the same fury and the same frustration and the same hatred and the same resentment. So I keep murdering strangers just to see if that will put an end to all this. Whenever I feel the urge, because you’re alone, or you piss me off, or just because you’re here, and I’m here, and the sea is here, I give it another go, and I hope that this time will be the one.’ The robotic, lifeless speech ended in a suspended note.
The man in the water felt an immense sadness. He was very cold, very cold. His head was aching, his muscles were exhausted. He couldn’t think straight. The man on board kept talking and talking and his hopes faltered, because everything that was said was deceitful and everything rang true. He was beginning no to care.
I am going mad, told the man in the water to himself. I am just going, he muttered.
‘What did you say?’ said the man on board.
‘Second story’ clattered the man in the water with painful difficulty and little conviction.
The man on board stared at him with empty black lifeless eyes.
‘Very well, then. The second story.’
Friday, April 10, 2009
Warm Waters, Chapter 5
He realised he had fallen asleep. It might have been no more than a minute. He woke with a start and a splash. Had he not been wearing the rubber suit, he might have gone down. How long had he slept? The sky was still black. A silver glimmer had been persistently lining the hem of the night to the east. It wasn’t much, but it was painting every contour in a paler shade than the background. He could see the silhouette of the boat almost as if it was traced in chalk.
‘I thought you were gone then’ said the man on board.
The man in the water was still recovering from the rush of blood of his deadly fright. He looked towards the face of the man on board with an odd expression. He realised that, for a moment, he hadn’t remembered where he was.
‘You look lost.’ said the man on board. ‘I think it’s started.’
The man in the water felt the stab of cold like a punch. He was ravenous and fiercely thirsty. He had his arms around himself and had to force them to stay close, or else they waived and wagged wildly. The muscles in his legs contracted painfully. He wanted to reply to the man on board. He wanted to say “no it hasn’t started. The trembling hasn’t stopped. My body hasn’t given up already”. But he doubted he could articulate more than a few words. And it was such a wretched shame. He had so many things to say. This is a miserable way to die, he wanted to say. And so absurd.
‘Why... you... doing this.’ he said instead. His jaw shook and sounded like the machines they use to drill the streets. His chest was aching.
‘If I haven’t told you yet, what makes you think I will now.’
Because this is the end, he thought. Because there’s nowhere to hide.
‘You... want... to.’ he dared him instead.
‘What if this is a hit?’ suggested the man on board. ‘What if somebody paid for this?’
He shook his head vehemently. He realised he only had to think about the movement and the inertia from trembling did the rest.
‘Personal. You. Me’ he said. This is personal, he meant.
The man on board smiled. It’s already clear enought to see him smiling, thought the man in the water.
‘So what have you done to me to deserve this.’ The man on water had a soft tone, almost gentle.
‘You... tell... me!’ The man in the water realised he was gargling rather than speaking. He could almost feel the sounds forming deep within his throat.
The man on board took that air about him, pondering, peripathetic, that the man in the water had begun to identify and crave. It made him think of an all professor wandering around the cloisters of an old building, his head down, deep inside some complex and beautiful thought. You can talk to an old professor. You can reason with him. An old professor has a soul.
‘Wouldn’t it be great if I had a reason. A childhood trauma, perhaps. Something I haven’t managed to overcome. Something you could perhaps try and help me with, help me get some kind of closure. Wouldn’t it be great that you and me could talk now, man to man, and resolve this.’ His rugged seaman’s hand rubbed his chin, his short, curly beard producing a sound crisp as a razor in the absolute silence of dawn.
The man in the water shook his head up and down. It would be great, he was saying. You can’t covey sarcasm with forceful nods, but even if he could, he wasn’t sure he’d wanted to.
The man on board looked towards the growing silver stripe on the horizon, still rubbing his chin.
‘I’ll tell you what we’ll do.’ He said at last. ‘Let’s play spot the trauma.’
The man in the water must have looked puzzled. The man on board elaborated.
‘I will tell you three stories.’ He explained. ‘And if you guess which one is true...’ he waivered for a second. ‘Yeah, why not,’ he told himself. ‘If you guess which one is true, I’ll get you out. I’ll reheat you and take you to land safe and sound. I’ll let you live.’
The man in the water must have looked positively suspicious, but nothing could deny his blood was rushing through his veins and something warm and cozy had started to bring a sort of life to his exhausted limbs. You could call it adrenaline, or even hope.
‘Do you accept?’ said the man on board, rather unnecessarily.
The man in the water was looking for the catch, until he realised it was absurd. What do I have to lose?, he told himself. He nodded forcefully again.
The man on board smiled broadly and warmly. Bathed in that bone-white light of dawn, he looked like a spectre.
‘Alright then. The first story.’
‘I thought you were gone then’ said the man on board.
The man in the water was still recovering from the rush of blood of his deadly fright. He looked towards the face of the man on board with an odd expression. He realised that, for a moment, he hadn’t remembered where he was.
‘You look lost.’ said the man on board. ‘I think it’s started.’
The man in the water felt the stab of cold like a punch. He was ravenous and fiercely thirsty. He had his arms around himself and had to force them to stay close, or else they waived and wagged wildly. The muscles in his legs contracted painfully. He wanted to reply to the man on board. He wanted to say “no it hasn’t started. The trembling hasn’t stopped. My body hasn’t given up already”. But he doubted he could articulate more than a few words. And it was such a wretched shame. He had so many things to say. This is a miserable way to die, he wanted to say. And so absurd.
‘Why... you... doing this.’ he said instead. His jaw shook and sounded like the machines they use to drill the streets. His chest was aching.
‘If I haven’t told you yet, what makes you think I will now.’
Because this is the end, he thought. Because there’s nowhere to hide.
‘You... want... to.’ he dared him instead.
‘What if this is a hit?’ suggested the man on board. ‘What if somebody paid for this?’
He shook his head vehemently. He realised he only had to think about the movement and the inertia from trembling did the rest.
‘Personal. You. Me’ he said. This is personal, he meant.
The man on board smiled. It’s already clear enought to see him smiling, thought the man in the water.
‘So what have you done to me to deserve this.’ The man on water had a soft tone, almost gentle.
‘You... tell... me!’ The man in the water realised he was gargling rather than speaking. He could almost feel the sounds forming deep within his throat.
The man on board took that air about him, pondering, peripathetic, that the man in the water had begun to identify and crave. It made him think of an all professor wandering around the cloisters of an old building, his head down, deep inside some complex and beautiful thought. You can talk to an old professor. You can reason with him. An old professor has a soul.
‘Wouldn’t it be great if I had a reason. A childhood trauma, perhaps. Something I haven’t managed to overcome. Something you could perhaps try and help me with, help me get some kind of closure. Wouldn’t it be great that you and me could talk now, man to man, and resolve this.’ His rugged seaman’s hand rubbed his chin, his short, curly beard producing a sound crisp as a razor in the absolute silence of dawn.
The man in the water shook his head up and down. It would be great, he was saying. You can’t covey sarcasm with forceful nods, but even if he could, he wasn’t sure he’d wanted to.
The man on board looked towards the growing silver stripe on the horizon, still rubbing his chin.
‘I’ll tell you what we’ll do.’ He said at last. ‘Let’s play spot the trauma.’
The man in the water must have looked puzzled. The man on board elaborated.
‘I will tell you three stories.’ He explained. ‘And if you guess which one is true...’ he waivered for a second. ‘Yeah, why not,’ he told himself. ‘If you guess which one is true, I’ll get you out. I’ll reheat you and take you to land safe and sound. I’ll let you live.’
The man in the water must have looked positively suspicious, but nothing could deny his blood was rushing through his veins and something warm and cozy had started to bring a sort of life to his exhausted limbs. You could call it adrenaline, or even hope.
‘Do you accept?’ said the man on board, rather unnecessarily.
The man in the water was looking for the catch, until he realised it was absurd. What do I have to lose?, he told himself. He nodded forcefully again.
The man on board smiled broadly and warmly. Bathed in that bone-white light of dawn, he looked like a spectre.
‘Alright then. The first story.’
Thursday, April 9, 2009
Warm Waters, Chapter 4
Perhaps he rushed it. It was dark as if there was no morrow. It was almost impossible to make out the contours of the boat against the black sky. He hadn’t heard a human noise coming from the boat in ages. And if all of that wasn’t reassuring enough, he realised his strength was deserting him fast, and his will power, like rats off a sinking boat. He couldn’t wait any longer. He’d had to take his chances now.
He took the knife out of the sheath attached to his leg. His bare hand glowed under the water with a ghostly, greenish radiance. The knife was black as a tear in the fabric of reality. His movements were slow, careful, self-conscious. He didn’t trust his hands. He stuck the knife between his jaws to stop the clatter. He stuck the snorkel in the waist of his rubber suit, so that it wouldn’t be in the way. He left the mask dangling from the rubber band around his neck. He couldn’t do with having his vision impaired. Perhaps he made a mistake not attempting to approach under water. He told himself he needed to keep his head above water, literally, and be able to see and hear as much as he could. He told himself he’d produce a big splash as he dived and that would not do. What he didn’t dare to admit to himself is that the reason why he wouldn’t dive is because he was scared to death of the black waters. He couldn’t stuff his head, much less hiw whole body in them. He feared he’d lose sight of where the surface was. He’d feared the fear he knew would clamp him if he looked into the water and see nothing. So he thrusted himself forward with the flippers, very slowly, his arms stretched out in front of him, breaking the waves like a ship’s bow. He covered the dozen braces between him and the boat faster than he had expected, as if the currents had changed to help him. His heart was pounding so hard he thought the booming of the beating would travel through the water easily and reach the ears of the man on board. One last impulse and he’d touch the metal frame of the wooden platform at the stern. He wavered for the briefest of seconds. Once he gained that length he’d have to fight for his life. He’d have to drive his knife in another man’s flesh. He could see in his mind the blood pouring on his hands. That warm blood. Warmth. He paddled forcefully. His hand reached not for a boat, not for revenge, but for warmth. He grabbed the platform.
BANG!
An explosion like a cannon and a splash one inch to his right. The man in the water was shaken so hard his hand had let go. The knife fell from his mouth. It got entangled in the rubber band of the mask and he held it.
So it was a gun after all.
The engine coughed and stuttered. His hand made a last loyal stand and clutched the platform again without him having to will it, just as the engine started. The boat started forward like water pouring from a dam. He felt the sea closing around him like a tomb and pulling him back. He struggled to keep hold of the boat that moved away as inevitably as a continent. For a second he thought he would make it. Then the strength deserted his hand and he saw in despair his fingers loosening their grip, no matter how hard he willed them to endure. He heard a groan emerging from his throat as if it was from somebody else’s. The hand let go and stayed in front of him like a dead thing. The sea released him like an evil force had been conjured. The boat got further and further away. For a second he thought it would keep going and he’d be left completely alone in the middle of the ocean, and he almost felt yearning. The engine quieted down and the boat stopped. The silhouette of the man on board appeared leaning on the push pit.
The man in the water felt the cold in his body returning like a curtain had been lifted. All his willpower and his drive deserted him. He was stunned, no feeling and no thought left in him. The ring in his ear from the gunshot rised and rised and then quieted.
With his hands trembling with absurdly wide and comparatively slow movements, like a Parkinson patient, he struggled to fit the knife back in the sheath and just about succeeded. It took him what felt like an hour. He had to plan and execute each gesture with deliberation. He didn’t ask himself what he needed the knife for anymore. Nor did he ask himself why did he need anything else at all, why not get out of that ice cold rubber suit, and float on his back, and forget about that story and every story, for ever.
Instead, he pulled the rubber so that it would cover as much of his body as possible (his hands like rubber as well, with very little grip), and embraced himself. He stared into that narrow, silver stripe of clarity on the eastern horizon.
He took the knife out of the sheath attached to his leg. His bare hand glowed under the water with a ghostly, greenish radiance. The knife was black as a tear in the fabric of reality. His movements were slow, careful, self-conscious. He didn’t trust his hands. He stuck the knife between his jaws to stop the clatter. He stuck the snorkel in the waist of his rubber suit, so that it wouldn’t be in the way. He left the mask dangling from the rubber band around his neck. He couldn’t do with having his vision impaired. Perhaps he made a mistake not attempting to approach under water. He told himself he needed to keep his head above water, literally, and be able to see and hear as much as he could. He told himself he’d produce a big splash as he dived and that would not do. What he didn’t dare to admit to himself is that the reason why he wouldn’t dive is because he was scared to death of the black waters. He couldn’t stuff his head, much less hiw whole body in them. He feared he’d lose sight of where the surface was. He’d feared the fear he knew would clamp him if he looked into the water and see nothing. So he thrusted himself forward with the flippers, very slowly, his arms stretched out in front of him, breaking the waves like a ship’s bow. He covered the dozen braces between him and the boat faster than he had expected, as if the currents had changed to help him. His heart was pounding so hard he thought the booming of the beating would travel through the water easily and reach the ears of the man on board. One last impulse and he’d touch the metal frame of the wooden platform at the stern. He wavered for the briefest of seconds. Once he gained that length he’d have to fight for his life. He’d have to drive his knife in another man’s flesh. He could see in his mind the blood pouring on his hands. That warm blood. Warmth. He paddled forcefully. His hand reached not for a boat, not for revenge, but for warmth. He grabbed the platform.
BANG!
An explosion like a cannon and a splash one inch to his right. The man in the water was shaken so hard his hand had let go. The knife fell from his mouth. It got entangled in the rubber band of the mask and he held it.
So it was a gun after all.
The engine coughed and stuttered. His hand made a last loyal stand and clutched the platform again without him having to will it, just as the engine started. The boat started forward like water pouring from a dam. He felt the sea closing around him like a tomb and pulling him back. He struggled to keep hold of the boat that moved away as inevitably as a continent. For a second he thought he would make it. Then the strength deserted his hand and he saw in despair his fingers loosening their grip, no matter how hard he willed them to endure. He heard a groan emerging from his throat as if it was from somebody else’s. The hand let go and stayed in front of him like a dead thing. The sea released him like an evil force had been conjured. The boat got further and further away. For a second he thought it would keep going and he’d be left completely alone in the middle of the ocean, and he almost felt yearning. The engine quieted down and the boat stopped. The silhouette of the man on board appeared leaning on the push pit.
The man in the water felt the cold in his body returning like a curtain had been lifted. All his willpower and his drive deserted him. He was stunned, no feeling and no thought left in him. The ring in his ear from the gunshot rised and rised and then quieted.
With his hands trembling with absurdly wide and comparatively slow movements, like a Parkinson patient, he struggled to fit the knife back in the sheath and just about succeeded. It took him what felt like an hour. He had to plan and execute each gesture with deliberation. He didn’t ask himself what he needed the knife for anymore. Nor did he ask himself why did he need anything else at all, why not get out of that ice cold rubber suit, and float on his back, and forget about that story and every story, for ever.
Instead, he pulled the rubber so that it would cover as much of his body as possible (his hands like rubber as well, with very little grip), and embraced himself. He stared into that narrow, silver stripe of clarity on the eastern horizon.
Friday, April 3, 2009
Warm Waters, Chapter 3
When your eyes are so close to the water’s surface you can’t distinguish the path of light the setting sun burns on the horizon. If you look towards the west, all you see is light. The man in the water had his face in the sea, with his glasses and snorkel, pointing to where the sun fired up the ocean. The water in that direction was a jadish green, as if the bottom was close and made out of golden sands. White particles swam and flew all around him in a timeless dance that took his mind away. It was comforting. The man in the water wanted to keep soothing his eyes and his thoughts in that gorgeous green world that wrapped him and felt almost warm.
To the east, the water was already inking blue, reflecting the night that was already rising. Over his head, a nail-thin moon was suspended in a sky that was still pale. The evening star was already shining. Just where the night sky met the sea, there was a mysterious silver stripe made out of the spectral light of the stars reflected on the ocean. The man in the water feared that sight, and he feared the lead-grey sea underneath it, which was advancing from the night he feared to devour him. Once the sun had set, sea and sky would appear as one single nothingness, and then the nightmares of ravenous beasts emerging from the unthinkable abyss beneath him would turn from ridiculous to horrific.
He had been trying to ignore the atrocious trembling of his limbs for quite a while now. He knew they announced something he just could not bear to face. He was very cold. His teeth rattled with a mechanical constancy, completely oblivious to his will. It was as if his body was starting to abandon him. That’s how he felt: abandoned, unable to trust his own flesh, something he had always taken for granted. He had been going over the years of the French Revolution, matching names of countries with their capital cities. He checked the state of his mind. He realised that, once the confusion set in, it would mean that the countdown had began. But would he notice the first signs of his mind fleeting. Does the madman know he is going mad.
The sun had set. He took his face off the water. There was still clarity but the sea was dark. It was fearsome to look at. The man in the water looked to the boat. He met the eyes of the man on board. A strange greenish, silvery light surrounded them.
‘It must be scary out there’, said the man on board. ‘Are you scared?’
‘I’m dead scared.’ The man in the water struggled with his teeth that brattled like a shotgun.
‘I thought you might be. And are you cold?’ inquired clinically the captain.
‘I’m dead cold’ clattered the man in the water.
‘Not yet.’ said the man on board. ‘Is your mind going yet?’
‘No.’
‘It will soon. Not long now. I don’t think you’ll survive the night, even though this water is still stupidly warm.’
‘Stupidly.’ Clackety-clack.
‘You’ve got the word “scheme” written across your face.’ declared the captain.
‘What?’
‘A scheme, a plan, a strategy. You haven’t made your peace yet. You still think this cannot be the end of you. You’re waiting for your chance. Let me guess: you’ll wait until it’s pitch black. You’ll wait until no sounds have come from the boat for a while. You’ll put on your mask and snorkel, and you’ll swim as quietly as you can over here. You’ll climb up the platform and you’ll jump on top of me with your knife. Isn’t that exactly what you’re planning?’
The silence of the man in the water spoke volumes.
‘Not that I’m a mentalist, mind you. It’s just that, what else is there for you to try?’ The man on board sipped his can of soda carelessly. ‘I bet you think it’s a stupid question, but do yourself a favour and consider it for a second: have you though this through? I’m sure you’ve been tossing and turning it in your brain for hours, with your face in the water staring into oblivion, but, is it smart? Think about it. What are your chances? What are the chances of me really allowing that to happen? Do you reckon I will get tired and sloppy?’
The man in the water saw the man on board as a silhouette, a cut out in the dim yellow light on the cockpit. That small lamp cast more shadows than light. He couldn’t see the face of the man on board; he couldn’t read his serene, monotone voice.
‘Having said that, once you lay down on the bench and start gazing at the stars, and your brain tunes into the beating swoosh of the waves against the keel, your attention does slip off, your will waivers. Isn’t that what you found so interesting in the bottom of the sea a while ago? How it sucks you into a place where this situation, you and me and this petty murder, just stops being a matter of any importance? Is it then so senseless to think that I might be distracted when you try to approach? Or that I will hear you and ignore you? That my impulse will falter? Why not make it more interesting then.’
GRRANNNG! A peel and a splash. The man in the water jumped.
‘There you go. I lowered the ladder. Do you think you can make it that far? Even if I did hear you coming, I might not manage to start this old thing quickly enough. You heard it struggle this morning, an age of the world ago. And it is so dark out there. If you dived, I might just lose you completely. You could take me by surprise, appear where I don’t expect you. You might even have enough strength left in you to jump on the boat and on to my neck. Adrenaline works miracles. And motivation. Because this is true: this might be your last chance. If you think you’re cold now, imagine how cold you will be by dawn. If you are alive by then, that is.’
The man in the water shook violently in his alien, trembling flesh. A voice inside of him screamed, “of course I’ll be alive!”
‘Motivation, then, is something to take into account.’ continued the man on board. ‘But I had thought of that already.’
CRRRC! A rattle with a metallic echo, sharp as a blade. The man in the water gave a start.
‘You recognised this sound, didn’t you? You’ve heard it before in a million films. But wait a minute!’ The man on board took a theatrical tone. ‘Wait a minute! Did you hear it right? Is it a gun? How do you know what a gun sounds like in real life? I could be teasing you. Haven’t I been toying with you all day? Couldn’t it be some nautical shit? Or a rattle? Or a fucking nutcracker? Hell, for all you know, it could be fucking anything! Do you know the only way you have to find out what this is? Well, come closer and I’ll shoot you. I dare you. Perhaps it’s worth it though. People have been known to survive even a shot in the brain. I don’t know anybody who survived long enough to lead a boat back to port and get himself to a hospital, but who knows. And I might not even get your head. I might miss you altogether. And I may not want to shoot you anyway. Am I not obsessed with seeing you freeze to death after all? You’ve got a lot going for you, my friend. It might just be worth a try after all. So the question remains the same.’ A dramatic pause. ‘How insane am I. What am I doing. Why am I doing it. Why am I doing it to you. If only you knew more about all this, you might be able to take an informed decision. But you don’t. So as it is, whatever you decide is like taking a shot at a Russian Roulette. And all I have to do is watch.’
The words of the man on board circled round his head like a swarm of bees. He could almost see them, hear them buzz. He had an overpowering impulse to shake his hand in the air to disperse them. Instead, he let the white hot flow of hatred and fury warm him up, and bring life and strength to his wrinkly, cadaverous limbs. On that beautiful moment, he believed that hatred had made him invincible. He had absolutely no doubt at all he would survive to break the gloating in that man’s voice.
‘You want to kill me’ said the man on board, slowly, as if he was deciphering the waves of anger emanating from the man in the water through the salty darkness. ‘You might even think you would be able to do it, if you could have the chance. But it’s not easy, you know?, to kill a human being. You have to mean it. You have to mean it a lot.’
To the east, the water was already inking blue, reflecting the night that was already rising. Over his head, a nail-thin moon was suspended in a sky that was still pale. The evening star was already shining. Just where the night sky met the sea, there was a mysterious silver stripe made out of the spectral light of the stars reflected on the ocean. The man in the water feared that sight, and he feared the lead-grey sea underneath it, which was advancing from the night he feared to devour him. Once the sun had set, sea and sky would appear as one single nothingness, and then the nightmares of ravenous beasts emerging from the unthinkable abyss beneath him would turn from ridiculous to horrific.
He had been trying to ignore the atrocious trembling of his limbs for quite a while now. He knew they announced something he just could not bear to face. He was very cold. His teeth rattled with a mechanical constancy, completely oblivious to his will. It was as if his body was starting to abandon him. That’s how he felt: abandoned, unable to trust his own flesh, something he had always taken for granted. He had been going over the years of the French Revolution, matching names of countries with their capital cities. He checked the state of his mind. He realised that, once the confusion set in, it would mean that the countdown had began. But would he notice the first signs of his mind fleeting. Does the madman know he is going mad.
The sun had set. He took his face off the water. There was still clarity but the sea was dark. It was fearsome to look at. The man in the water looked to the boat. He met the eyes of the man on board. A strange greenish, silvery light surrounded them.
‘It must be scary out there’, said the man on board. ‘Are you scared?’
‘I’m dead scared.’ The man in the water struggled with his teeth that brattled like a shotgun.
‘I thought you might be. And are you cold?’ inquired clinically the captain.
‘I’m dead cold’ clattered the man in the water.
‘Not yet.’ said the man on board. ‘Is your mind going yet?’
‘No.’
‘It will soon. Not long now. I don’t think you’ll survive the night, even though this water is still stupidly warm.’
‘Stupidly.’ Clackety-clack.
‘You’ve got the word “scheme” written across your face.’ declared the captain.
‘What?’
‘A scheme, a plan, a strategy. You haven’t made your peace yet. You still think this cannot be the end of you. You’re waiting for your chance. Let me guess: you’ll wait until it’s pitch black. You’ll wait until no sounds have come from the boat for a while. You’ll put on your mask and snorkel, and you’ll swim as quietly as you can over here. You’ll climb up the platform and you’ll jump on top of me with your knife. Isn’t that exactly what you’re planning?’
The silence of the man in the water spoke volumes.
‘Not that I’m a mentalist, mind you. It’s just that, what else is there for you to try?’ The man on board sipped his can of soda carelessly. ‘I bet you think it’s a stupid question, but do yourself a favour and consider it for a second: have you though this through? I’m sure you’ve been tossing and turning it in your brain for hours, with your face in the water staring into oblivion, but, is it smart? Think about it. What are your chances? What are the chances of me really allowing that to happen? Do you reckon I will get tired and sloppy?’
The man in the water saw the man on board as a silhouette, a cut out in the dim yellow light on the cockpit. That small lamp cast more shadows than light. He couldn’t see the face of the man on board; he couldn’t read his serene, monotone voice.
‘Having said that, once you lay down on the bench and start gazing at the stars, and your brain tunes into the beating swoosh of the waves against the keel, your attention does slip off, your will waivers. Isn’t that what you found so interesting in the bottom of the sea a while ago? How it sucks you into a place where this situation, you and me and this petty murder, just stops being a matter of any importance? Is it then so senseless to think that I might be distracted when you try to approach? Or that I will hear you and ignore you? That my impulse will falter? Why not make it more interesting then.’
GRRANNNG! A peel and a splash. The man in the water jumped.
‘There you go. I lowered the ladder. Do you think you can make it that far? Even if I did hear you coming, I might not manage to start this old thing quickly enough. You heard it struggle this morning, an age of the world ago. And it is so dark out there. If you dived, I might just lose you completely. You could take me by surprise, appear where I don’t expect you. You might even have enough strength left in you to jump on the boat and on to my neck. Adrenaline works miracles. And motivation. Because this is true: this might be your last chance. If you think you’re cold now, imagine how cold you will be by dawn. If you are alive by then, that is.’
The man in the water shook violently in his alien, trembling flesh. A voice inside of him screamed, “of course I’ll be alive!”
‘Motivation, then, is something to take into account.’ continued the man on board. ‘But I had thought of that already.’
CRRRC! A rattle with a metallic echo, sharp as a blade. The man in the water gave a start.
‘You recognised this sound, didn’t you? You’ve heard it before in a million films. But wait a minute!’ The man on board took a theatrical tone. ‘Wait a minute! Did you hear it right? Is it a gun? How do you know what a gun sounds like in real life? I could be teasing you. Haven’t I been toying with you all day? Couldn’t it be some nautical shit? Or a rattle? Or a fucking nutcracker? Hell, for all you know, it could be fucking anything! Do you know the only way you have to find out what this is? Well, come closer and I’ll shoot you. I dare you. Perhaps it’s worth it though. People have been known to survive even a shot in the brain. I don’t know anybody who survived long enough to lead a boat back to port and get himself to a hospital, but who knows. And I might not even get your head. I might miss you altogether. And I may not want to shoot you anyway. Am I not obsessed with seeing you freeze to death after all? You’ve got a lot going for you, my friend. It might just be worth a try after all. So the question remains the same.’ A dramatic pause. ‘How insane am I. What am I doing. Why am I doing it. Why am I doing it to you. If only you knew more about all this, you might be able to take an informed decision. But you don’t. So as it is, whatever you decide is like taking a shot at a Russian Roulette. And all I have to do is watch.’
The words of the man on board circled round his head like a swarm of bees. He could almost see them, hear them buzz. He had an overpowering impulse to shake his hand in the air to disperse them. Instead, he let the white hot flow of hatred and fury warm him up, and bring life and strength to his wrinkly, cadaverous limbs. On that beautiful moment, he believed that hatred had made him invincible. He had absolutely no doubt at all he would survive to break the gloating in that man’s voice.
‘You want to kill me’ said the man on board, slowly, as if he was deciphering the waves of anger emanating from the man in the water through the salty darkness. ‘You might even think you would be able to do it, if you could have the chance. But it’s not easy, you know?, to kill a human being. You have to mean it. You have to mean it a lot.’
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)