Go over plan with Doodle. Loooooong step to shower shelf. Cross shower shelf to sink top. (DON’T pull on showerhead thingy.) Boing down to toilet seat from sink. Jump from there back into saloon.
END OF COURSE.
Hug Brother no matter what. Be kind. Snap off piece of chocolate from Sin Bin. Hand on shoulder. Tell him he won’t always be such a spasm. Someday he’ll be a sparkle, like his sister.
A nautical mile is
Slice the world in half. Pick up one half.
Divide the circle into 360 degrees
Divide each degree into 60 parts
A nautical mile is one minute of arc on the planet Earth.
I invented that. I also invented
I also invented Cartesian mathematics. The lightbulb.
The transistor radio
But that wasn’t enough, no.
You wanted my soul
My submission
Well, I choose death.
America, you are going to have to let me go
Throw my stiffening body overboard.
Let my flesh be useful.
A nautical mile is
I also invented insurance
When London went up like matchsticks in the Great Fire of
What do I think of technological innovation, you ask?
Guess what. Technology doesn’t give a fuck what I think
I finally invented the invention that would start
inventing without me
Democracy, damn it
I invented democracy too
I invented all these things
Can’t you see I loved you
With everything I did?
I guess
It’s time to wind this up
March off the gangplank while the mutineers
Death of the white man
I can’t bear to
Honey?
Juliet, honey?
JULIET
Don’t you feel that Juliet?
Smart as a whip and you can’t feel
the rails in the water?
Juliet
JULIET DAMN IT
EASE THE SHEETS
* * *
—
I should have heard it earlier, the wind rising.
The falsetto in the rigging.
But weather came up so fast out there. Especially at night, when you couldn’t see it coming. The clouds would just come marching down the horizon. This great orchestra of rain.
If I hadn’t been single-handing the boat and putting the children to bed, I would have sensed the changing weather. I didn’t even have time for Michael, all afternoon without a second to check and see if he was alive or dead. Until I heard him roaring from the aft berth, while I was tucking in the children:
Juliet damn it, ease the sheets!
Sybil and I exchanged a glance. Then we both felt the roll.
You have to understand how hard it is to move around a boat when it is under way. Even in fair weather, the motion presses the sailor down. Movement is resistance. So when I tried to cross the cabin, the tilted cabin of the yawing boat, I could only move with nightmarish slowness, swimming from handhold to handhold against the downward pressure. I wrenched open the wet locker and grabbed the first rain slicker I touched, kickstanding against the bulwark in order to use my hands to zip it. Holyshitholyshit. I secured my PDF and tether.
Sybil stood braced in the doorframe, the skirt of her nightgown swinging.
For the very first time, she looked scared.
You, I said. You will take care of your brother. You always do.
She nodded imperceptibly.
Can you put up the lee cloth by yourself?
She nodded.
Well, go on then, I said. Stay with him.
When she didn’t move, I said, You can do it. You know you can.