Page 52 of Swept Away

“Let me make us some food,” Zeke says, opening the door.

His classic coping mechanism. As he heads inside, I stare out at the water, this new sea, as unfamiliar to me as a new town. The sunis low in the sky, only a few minutes from setting, and it’s right in front of me here on the back deck, which presumably means we’re heading east.

I close my eyes and imagine a map of the UK. We were in the northeast of England when we were first carried out to sea, so if we wanted to go home, we’d need to head west. Right now we’re presumably being carried toward Denmark or Norway, depending on how far we’ve traveled north or south while we’ve been drifting.

Surely we’ll cross paths with some ships now that we’re on the move.Surely. We just have to—we can’t keep going like this.

Once I’ve put the sail down, I notice how much safer the deck feels than the roof of the boat—ridiculous, really, when there’s nothing remotely safe about any of this. I put away the deck chair we pulled out for Zeke to rest on, and brush a droplet absently from the back of my neck. The waves are leaving a steady spray on my shins, so I assume it’s seawater until the second drop lands on my shoulder, and then a third and fourth and fifth hit my arms.

“Zeke!” I scream, stumbling to the door.

He comes, wide-eyed, hopeful. “What? What?”

“Zeke,” I say, gripping the doorframe. I beam down at him where he stands below deck. “It’sraining.”

We collect the water in everything we can think of—even Zeke’s stolen trilby.

The issue is securing things with the boat moving. We lose one cereal bowl over the side, and I almost cry as I watch it bob away behind us, spilling its two precious inches of rainwater into the sea. We have to wedge everything in or tie it down. My brain goesLeaks, leaks, what if there are leaks in our hull, what if the water is coming back up the drain, but I’m too busy to look—it’ll have to wait. If we start sinking, I guess that will be my answer.

Zeke sets up an amazing system with the leftover tarpaulin and a makeshift funnel he creates from cardboard toilet-roll tubes. It gets soggy pretty quickly, but it fills the bucket within a few hours; I carry it to the kitchen sink the way I’d carry Mae to her Moses basket when she was tiny, taking every step with the utmost care.

“To your left,” I say, spotting a bowl that’s beginning to overflow.

We’re out on the deck, and darkness is drawing in now; it’s becoming difficult to see what we’re doing. The rain patters sloppily on the deck and beads on the railings, shining in the moonlight. I’m less queasy out here, but I’ve vomited overboard twice since we messed around with the sail, and every time it scares me. I’m losing calories and nutrients, and I really don’t have a lot of those to spare.

“On it,” Zeke says, bending down to lift it to his lips.

At first, we were careful not to gorge ourselves on our new water—we don’t know how long this will last. But since we’ve got the sink as full as it can be without overflowing when the boat moves, we’ve allowed ourselves a whole pint each, sipping slowly and licking our lips, a trick that we’ve learned makes it easier to take the water steadily.

I stumble into the steering wheel as I try to move between water bowls in the darkness.The Merry Dormouseseems to be doing us proud—she’s bobbing along, taking each wave in her stride—but all the same, whenever a larger wash of spray reaches up to the railings, my stomach lurches and my faith wobbles.

We make it inside and collapse on the sofa in the darkness. Zeke’s arm brushes mine and I wince—we’re both soaking wet, but I don’t have the energy to get up again and change clothes.

“We’re doing really well, you know,” Zeke says, pushing his wet curls back from his face. “It’s been over a week. We’re still here.”

“Lost at sea foreight days,” I say, with genuine wonderment.

“And barely a scratch to show for it,” Zeke says.

I glance at his stomach. I hope he’s not put it under too muchstrain with all this activity. His lip quirks; he knows I’m fretting about him. He nudges my shoulder, like,Stop it, and I cut him a sidelong look in the darkness, like,You really think I’m ever going to quit worrying about you?His shoulder stays resting against mine for a few moments, his eyes liquid in the darkness, and then—as always—he shifts away.

“I’ll get dry towels,” I say, pushing myself up to stand, trying not to feel disappointed.

I’m tired. My fingers are still too numb from the cold. I’m distracted and emotional and sick to my stomach, so I do something stupid, the way you do when you’re so drained you can hardly function, like when Mae was three weeks old and I poured milk over Penny’s toast instead of over my cereal. My mind is kidding itself that it’s working, but really, it’s barely got anything to give.

As the boat bobs beneath me, I reach to steady myself on the bathroom door. The concertina folds back on itself, the way it always does—Iknowit does that, and I should know it isn’t a steady handhold.

I lose my grip.

It’s not a straightforward fall. First, I whack my shoulder against the wall, then the boat rocks me the other way and I go tumbling backward toward the kitchen counter. I think my head hits the fridge door before it hits the floor, but it’s hard to tell for sure, because everything goes blurry—and then it goesblack.

Daynine

Zeke

Two in themorning. She’s curled on her side on the bathroom floor. She keeps saying,I’m fine.It’s just the seasickness. But she hit her head so hard. I’m sure she wasn’t vomiting this much before the fall. I wish I knew how to tell if she’s concussed or bleeding in her brain or…or…any of the thousands of bad things streaking through my mind right now.

I play the fall over and over. I was too slow. So stupid. I didn’t get to her side in time. By the time I was there, she was unconscious. It was just a few seconds, but she was definitely out. I shook her shoulder, and she didn’t respond, and I thought,You can’t die,I’m not sure I can live if you die. I look down at her now—eyes closed, cheek lying on the tiles—and this great balloon of emotion expands inside me. So big it hardly fits in my chest.

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