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.’