4. Cole
FOUR
Cole
Day bleeds into night. The lights illuminating the deck barely scratch at the endless ocean surrounding us before they’re devoured by pitch black. Briar rocks side to side despite Seb’s best efforts to steer into the waves.
We can’t trust the ocean on a normal day, but with an arctic typhoon brewing, we might as well be circling the drain of a vortex. If the Bering Sea wants us, she’ll get her way.
Frozen sea spray clings to the fifty-odd crab pots we’ve stacked on the deck. Ice is heavy, especially when it fills the gaps of the crab traps. Boats sink because of ice like that. We’ve had to break every few hours to attack the ice with sledgehammers. Morgan’s about to start a mutiny.
“Okay. After this pot, you’re done for the day,” Seb says over the PA, barely audible against the ocean’s rage.
“Fucking finally,” Morgan mutters, breath crystallizing.
“You sure, babe? You always have another round in you.”
Lawrence groans. “Oh my god, Morgan. Go jerk off your husband. If I have to hear him make one more bad sex joke, I’m going to do it myself.”
“Try it and you won’t have hands to jerk anyone off with.”
Lawrence lobs an untethered buoy at Morgan. Taking full advantage of the slippery deck, I skid to intercept it, and pitch it back to Lawrence, nailing him in the chest.
“Don’t throw balls at my husband,” I say. “Trust me, his are bigger than yours.”
“That’s it!” Lawrence tosses the buoy aside. “Drop your pants. Now.”
Javi laughs. “Lawless, you are weird as hell.”
“I’m not weird. I’m delirious. There’s a difference.” He pretends to push the sleeves of his orange rain gear up to his elbows. “Either you’re doing it, Morgan, or I am.”
“No one is jacking anyone off,” Morgan says.
Lawrence rounds the sorting table. “I wasn’t joking.”
“Neither was I,” Morgan says. “Sorry, Javi. You’re going to have a lot of work on your hands when I remove his.”
I’m laughing so hard my stomach hurts. “Stop. I can’t breathe.”
The PA clicks on. “I can’t believe I have to say this, but keep your pants on and your hands to yourselves,” Seb says. “The marker’s right off the bow, Cole.”
“Roger.” I grab the hook and return to the rail.
Facing the ocean feels like standing in front of a pressure washer thanks to forty-knot winds, but I live for the high of throwing the hook, the uncertainty of whether I’ll hit my mark, even though I never miss.
When the orange buoy floats into view, I toss the hook, snag the line, and feed the rope into the ice-coated block.
We finish strong with a trap stuffed with crab.
“Woo!” Lawrence shouts.
While Lawrence and Wes use the crane to stack the empty pot on top of the others, the rest of us crowd around the table, sorting crab in a hurry.
Static scratches over the two-way PA. I look up at the wheelhouse, but it’s impossible to make out Seb.
“False alarm?” Javi suggests.
Morgan, tight-lipped and sullen, shouts into the two-way, “Everything okay up there, Seb?”
I push the plastic tote of rejected crab to the rail and dump them back in. “Until next year, crab brethren.” I salute them, because at this point I’m just as delirious as Lawrence.
The PA crackles again. This time, Seb shouts, “RUN!”
A giant wall of water slams into my back and pins me to the deck, the crushing weight impossible to breathe against. The boat rights. The water recedes. I suck in a deep breath, and scramble to my feet, scanning the deck with mounting panic.
Where’s Morgan?
“Cole, watch out!” Morgan yells from my left, abject horror dashing his features as he runs toward me, arms outstretched.
I follow his gaze to the sorting table barreling toward me. Well, fuck. If I get hurt, I’ll have to listen to the most annoying I-told-you-so in history. Morgan grabs a fistful of my jacket and pulls me toward him, but not fast enough.
The sorting table slams into my side. Pain explodes through my center like I’ve been cut in half. My entire existence tunnels down to one thing—agony.
“Cole!” Morgan shoves the table out of the way, and gravity yanks me to the unforgiving deck.
Footsteps vibrate beneath me, rippling pain through my bloodstream. I try to curl into the fetal position, but can’t. Blades of pain pierce my chest with every inhaled breath.
It takes a lot to scare a Bering Sea fisherman, so when Morgan drops to his knees beside me, eyes wide in panic, I start to panic too.
“Hey, you’re okay.” He cups my cheek and hushes me soothingly. “I’m sorry I didn’t catch you, but I’ve got you now. I’ll take care of you.”
Javi appears on my other side. “Cole, where does it hurt?”
“Everywhere,” I rasp.
Morgan’s face crumples. He probably wishes he could feel my pain for me. I’d feel the same. Thank god it’s me who’s hurt and not him.
Javi unbuckles my life vest and unzips my jacket. “I’m going to check you for injuries.”
He starts with my neck and works his way southward, poking and prodding while my vision blurs on Morgan’s anguished face. When Javi reaches my ribs, I gasp and arch in agony. Blood roars in my ears, and stars explode across my view of Morgan.
“These feel like they’re broken.” Javi takes my wrist and checks my pulse.
“I’m so sorry,” Morgan says.
“You saved me.” If the table had hit me head on, I’d be dead by now.
Javi’s hands descend to my diaphragm. I flinch hard.
Morgan palms my cheek, and takes my hand. “Shh. Stay still. Focus on me.”
Nausea and pain swell inside me as Javi palpates my abdomen. I try to squeeze Morgan’s hand, but I’m too weak. I can’t breathe, let alone scream. I can’t even gnash my teeth. All I can do is cry silently as my vision dims.
“Stop. You’re hurting him,” Morgan says. “Cole, eyes on me. Don’t go to sleep.”
I try. I really try, but darkness drowns me in the ocean’s inky depths.
“Do something!” Morgan’s words slosh around inside my brain from somewhere far away.
He sounds so scared. I have to find him. My eyelids are so heavy, but I manage to open them.
“Thanks for coming back to me, sweetheart.” He cradles my cheeks, tears shimmering in his turquoise gaze as he arches over me, shielding my face from the raindrops pelting the rest of my body.
My teeth chatter. Cold seeps into my back from the deck. Each fractured breath rains a fresh torrent of pain. I’m scared. I don’t want to die.
“Hurts,” I say. One word saps all of my energy, and I slip into the sanctuary of nothingness again.
A sharp slap stings my cheek, and my eyes snap open.
“Lawrence, what the hell?” Morgan brushes my hair back from my brow. Each blade of shifting hair feels like another broken bone. “Sorry, sweetheart.”
“It worked, didn’t it?” Lawrence says.
“We’re going to move you inside and warm you up,” Morgan says.
“No,” I whine.
“Hey, Cole.” Javi materializes in my peripheral vision. “Morgan will keep your head supported, while Lawrence and I lift you. Here we go. One, two, thr—”
It feels like all of my bones rip out of my body at once. My eyes roll back, connected to a string that death keeps pulling on. A curtain of black descends.
“Cole! No. Please,” Morgan pleads, muffled and sob-stricken. “Wake up.”
Wake up.
Wake up.
Wake up!
I force my eyes open. My head rests on a pillow. No, not a pillow. Morgan’s lap. His tears sizzle as they splash onto my cheeks.
“There you are, Sunshine.”
Javi squeezes my wrist, checking my pulse again, and frowns. “Cole, your heart is beating too fast, and I can’t give you the medical care you need out here. I know it hurts, but we have to take you inside.”
“But what if he tries to die again?” Lawrence asks.
“The Coast Guard is only an hour away,” Seb says. “Maybe we should leave him here?”
“No, it’s not safe,” Morgan says.
Seb’s here? Why isn’t he talking to me? Is he mad at me? “Seb?”
Seb squats beside me. “Hey, baby brother.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Don’t apologize. This is on me. Not you.” He looks away and back. “I’m sorry.”
“I’m scared.”
He takes my hand, and squeezes. “Look at me. Do I look scared?”
“No.” He looks determined, but calm, quietly strong.
“Right. I’ll take care of you, just like I always do.”
“Thank you,” I say, but I don’t think he hears me, so I thank him inside my head. I thank him for sacrificing his childhood to raise me, for loving me when our dad didn’t. I wish I had enough words left to tell him all the ways he took care of me.
“Seb, the Coast Guard is on the phone,” Wes says over the PA.
“I have to go,” Seb says. “Be strong for me. I love you.” He squeezes my hand again, and stands. Then he’s gone.
Tears blur my vision. That felt like a goodbye.
Morgan strokes my hair.
“I’m so c-c-cold.”
“I know. I’ll carry you inside and warm you up. Ready?”
I don’t want to, but I trust my husband.
The ship shudders. The hull groans. Morgan’s arms tighten around me. I brace for pain, but it’s a dull ache. Calm lucidity simmers through me, a last burst of adrenaline, maybe?
“It doesn’t hurt that much anymore. I can’t f-f-f-feel…”
“Javi?” Morgan yells, voice breaking.
“I think I’m dying,” I remark in blunted wonder. Death feels inevitable, a reprieve just beyond my reach, but I don’t want to lose Morgan. I don’t want to hurt him. “Please don’t let me die.”
“I won’t. I promise.” He’s crying.
My lids fall shut slowly, so slowly. They’re too heavy.
I don’t want to die without seeing his face, so I remember what he looked like on the day I met him, and every day after, fast-forwarding through the boring days and making pit stops at our first kiss, the day of our wedding… I guess this is that life-flashing-before-your-eyes thing.
Distantly, Morgan wails. It’s an inhuman sound. Maybe it’s the wind. Briar breaking in two. My heart races. Wait. We have to do something. We can’t let Briar sink.
Something heavy sits on my chest. Is that the ocean? I force my eyes open.
No, it’s Morgan draped over me. He’s sobbing, so devastated, I feel his pain inside me. I try to catch his attention, but I can’t move. I can barely breathe.
Morgan stills, then sits up. “Cole? I thought you d—”
A loud crash tilts my world off its axis. Morgan throws himself back over me. The ocean swirls all around us. Morgan tries to hold on to me, but the Bering Sea wrenches me from his grip.
The ocean’s embrace doesn’t hurt. She cradles my body as she drags me overboard, holding me while I fall and fall and fall and fall. The halo of light surrounding the Briar Anteros dims as I descend. The bubbles from my mouth slow, then stop. Darkness swallows me.