“That’s terrible.”
“It’s just the way it is,” said Hawley.
On the port side, there was something riding on the water, bobbing on the waves. A ghost that dove and rose and shook its beak until she saw that it was a seagull. Catching the starlight on its feathers. Another gull circled past and then landed close to the first, leaving a crest on the surface of the water.
“What are the birds doing out this far?” Loo asked.
“They must be following something,” said Hawley. “A trawler, maybe.”
Loo stood on top of the bench. She scanned the dark horizon. But there was nothing. No lights. No land.
Hawley coughed again. He tried to sit up. “I got us into such a mess.”
“It’s all right.”
“It’s not,” said Hawley.
The cigarette she’d just rolled was still in her hand. She put it between his lips. She took his lighter and lit the end. The tip glowed red. He blew smoke then glanced over at Jove, hidden beneath the blanket.
“I don’t want you to feel responsible if something goes wrong.”
“You’re my father,” said Loo.
“I know,” Hawley said. “But I’ve been in your place before. And you can’t save everyone.”
The motor rumbled beneath the deck. She could feel the gears turning. Each piece working together to make the engine run.
“Watch me,” said Loo.
She used her fist to measure the sky. She counted to Polaris. She pushed the tiller until the boat jibed, the wind whipping around hard and snapping the sail.
“What are you doing?” said Hawley.
“Heading to the Banks. It’s closer than the shore. The Athena will be there and they should have doctors on board. Scientists, at least. And a radio.”
“Your boyfriend, too,” said Hawley.
“He’s not,” said Loo. “Not that. Not anymore.”
Hawley threw the end of his cigarette overboard. “Well, I hope you’ll keep trying.”
“Trying for what?”
“To be with someone.”
It was as if he’d been listening to her inner thoughts. As if he knew Loo was afraid that no one would ever love her.
“You told me you weren’t going to die.”
“I’m not,” he said.
“Then shut up.” Loo clicked on the flashlight again. She checked his bandages. They weren’t holding. She opened another roll of gauze and wrapped it around and around his shoulder. She dug through the med kit searching for anything else that could help. She tried not to look at Jove’s body, stretched out beside Hawley on the deck, turning stiff and cold beneath the blanket.
“Roll me another cigarette.”
“You shouldn’t be smoking,” Loo said, but grabbed the pouch anyway. She lifted one of the thin pieces of paper and stuffed it with tobacco, her fingers shaking, just as they had when Hawley first put a gun in her hands.
“There’s a list of my deposit boxes in the licorice jars. I put the keys in there, too.”
Loo flicked the lighter, cupped it with her hand, and for a moment her father’s face was lit with dancing shadows across his jaw and circling his eyes, so that his features looked like parts of a broken mask, and then the flame went out and there was nothing but his cigarette. She watched the ember glow and fade and she inhaled her father’s smoke and she was back in the woods behind their house five years ago. She felt the rifle in her arms. She turned her head and listened. Hawley was leaning against a rock in the sun. He was telling Loo to name her target.
“The rest of the money is in a trust. You’ll get it when you turn eighteen. The lawyer has all the instructions.”
“Shut up, shut up, shut up!” Loo cried.
The motor dropped out and the world went quiet. Loo checked the gasoline. They were low. She decided to save it. The wind was picking up and the sails were taut. When the boat heeled, Loo pressed her own weight against the starboard side. She kept the bow pointed north.
“We should have bought a boat like this,” said Hawley. “We could have had picnics. It would have been nice.”
“We have one now,” said Loo.
“I guess you’re right.”
There were more birds gathering, gray phantoms bobbing in the water and circling above, riding the air currents, then darting up toward the stars and spiraling downward. The wind was different and the air had changed. It smelled like an island. Seaweed and barnacles. The Banks, Loo thought. They must be getting closer.
“I’m glad you threw away the watch,” said Hawley.
“How much was it worth?”
“Too much.”
His words were starting to slur. Hawley pulled on his cigarette, then lifted it from his mouth. Released the smoke like he was releasing years of his own life. Then the ash was falling, the paper tip crackling and curling, and the birds all rose from the ocean at once, flapping and calling to one another. Ahead, Loo saw the waves flatten into a slick pool, and then something rose out of that flatness, a crusted, pale hump of earth that split open and discharged a mist of ancient, pressurized air.
“Dad.” Loo pushed hard against the tiller. “There’s something out there.”
Hawley turned to face the water. Whatever the creature was, it had fallen back under the surface. Loo swallowed hard. She had spent so much time focused on the stars overhead that she had ignored what might be below them. Now she imagined the deep distance beneath the hull, miles upon miles of water, and all the life that was living there in the dark. Animals that had no need for light, no need for air, no need to come to the surface except to feed.
A rush of bubbles surrounded the boat. There was a sucking noise, of water being displaced, and a whale broke surface right next to the sailboat, sending a blast of spray directly off the port side. A rush of brackish water fell down over their heads. Loo threw her arms across her father, and when the shower ended she reeked of algae and slippery rocks and Hawley’s waders and the powerful joints of mussels and clams that kept the halves of their shells snapped tight together. It was the scent of water meeting land. It was the whale that smelled like an island.
She could tell from the glow of fins beneath the waves that it was a humpback. The rest of its body was nothing but a giant silhouette, a shadow circling the boat and nudging the hull. Loo gripped the tiller. She knew that whales could dive for forty minutes. Live whole lives between each inhale and exhale. But this whale stayed close. As if it were making up its mind about Hawley and Loo.
She took a breath. She let half of it out. She waited. And waited. And then she remembered the whale’s heart. The one made of red and pink molded plastic that she had climbed into at the museum long ago. Each chamber had been a separate room where Loo had felt safe and protected, the aorta a tunnel leading to a whole new world. How small everything else must seem, she thought, when your heart is big enough for someone else to crawl through. She put her hand on her own chest. Felt the life inside her pushing back against her own skin.