called out, giving Jeff a nudge on the shoulder. “There’s the Pulpit.”
“The what?” Jeff shouted so he could be heard above the roar of the engine.
“The Pulpit! Don’t tell me you don’t remember the Pulpit.”
Jeff thought about it and then shook his head. As far as he could remember, he had never heard about such a place.
“We used to come down here and fish,” Mike said. There was a distant, wistful look in his eyes as he stared at the chunk of gray granite that stood out on the end of the island. It was angled over the water and was squared off at the top. Jeff could see how it had come to be called “The Pulpit,” but he had never come fishing out here so far from camp. He and his friends used to catch “sunnies” and the occasional baby bass off the dock, but that was about it.
“When’d you ever come down here?” Fred asked, leaning close so he could be heard. He held his hand out to Jeff for the rum bottle. When Jeff gave it to him, he took a quick sip and passed it to Mike.
“Mark and I used to come out here,” Mike said.
A disturbing thought occurred to Jeff, but he didn’t voice it. In all his years at Camp Tapiola, he had never heard about going fishing at “The Pulpit.” It struck him as a bit odd that their counselor or any other staff member would take one of the campers out here … alone and unsupervised so far from the campgrounds. Jeff wondered if, even back then, Mike knew he was gay, but had Mark been gay, too?
Had coming out here been Mike’s initiation?
Was that why he remembered the place so fondly?
Jeff pushed such thoughts away, not wanting to speculate about anyone else’s personal life.
“Gonna be bitchly cold once we come around the point,” Fred said, nodding to where the waves were smashing against “The Pulpit.” The water was much rougher on the windward side of the island. Jeff was tempted to suggest they turn back, but he knew Evan well enough to know he would never turn back. It wasn’t his style. So Jeff tightened his collar around his neck and shrank into himself, bracing for the blast of cold that would hit once they got out of the shelter of the island.
But as they passed within fifty feet of “The Pulpit,” the engine made a funny clunking sound. It kicked once so hard it made the boat shiver and then sputtered.
“Fuck!” Evan shouted, loud enough to be heard by everyone. He revved the engine, but the sputtering only got worse. The engine chugged, and the boat lurched so hard everyone was knocked off balance. Jeff would have fallen overboard if he hadn’t been clinging to the gunwales.
“Shit! What’s the matter?” Fred shouted, but Evan ignored him as he worked the controls. The chugging sound got steadily louder and then, with one last, loud thunk, the engine ceased up and died. There was the sound of metal grinding against metal as a huge cloud of thick, black smoke shot out from under the engine cowling. Then all was silence except for the shrill wind and the steady slapping of waves against the side of the boat.
“What the fuck?” Mike said with a scowl.
Evan looked at them with a tight, worried expression. His lips were nearly bloodless, and his eyes were glistening and wide.
“Please don’t tell me the engine just died,” Tyler said, leaning close to Jeff.
“’Fraid so,” Jeff said. “I thought the way it was smoking the mix was off.”
His grip on the rum bottle tightened, and he watched as the boat, carried by the current, started drifting away from the island. Once it was back in the wind, it came around so the bow was heading into the wind.
“What the fuck are we gonna do?” Mike asked, sounding angry, but Evan ignored him as he flipped the ignition switch on the engine several times. The only result was a steady click-click-click that lasted as long as he held the ignition on.
“Are we fucked or what?” Fred asked as he looked at the shoreline, which was rapidly receding as the wind carried the boat further out onto the water. The frightened note in his voice made it easy for Jeff to imagine Fred had reverted to a terrified twelve-year-old boy.
Jeff took a quick glance over his shoulder at where they were headed. The mainland looked like it was at least