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.