Arik #2
I released my hand from her thigh and placed it upon the gleaming metal of the throttle, pulling down gently as the boat eased away from the dock and into the crash of the waves.
We sat in silence as I felt her emptions drift from anxiety and fear to longing and back again.
As the boat met resistance from the sea, Claire grasped my arm.
“You okay over there?” I asked as my eyes locked in hers. What could have passed as the look of seasickness was just an illusion hiding her real emption—fear. Cold, unrelenting fear that seemed to vibrate into her bones, to her fingertips, and into my skin.
“Fine,” she stated, her lips barely parting as the response cut through the air like a knife.
After all this time, she still had her guard up.
She still did not trust me, that was for sure, and it hurt.
Out of all the things in my life that could have hurt me, broke me, shattered my soul—seeing her walls up like this was the one thing that would do me in.
The boat sped forward past the last of the waves and into the stillness of the sea as the sun lowered in the sky ahead of us. Hints of orange, yellow, and red seeped into the blue of the water as if the sea were breathing in fire from below the surface.
Claire’s voice cut through the silence as she yelled over the roar of the engine. “What are we looking for, Arik?” she questioned, never taking her eyes off the horizon.
“Well, last time I did this…many, many moons ago…I just sailed straight ahead. After a while, it was there,” I yelled back, trying my best to sound reassuring through the noise bouncing around in her mind.
“Was there anything that happened before you saw it? Anything that gave you an indication you weren’t just drifting to nowhere?” she asked as I turned to face her, noticing the furrow of her brow.
My eyes shifted just behind her as the feeling of relief and fear settled into my veins. “Fog…” I whispered, as if it could hear me. As if that would change anything that was happening.
Claire’s head tilted as the sun reflecting against her porcelain skin disappeared.
Her eyes widened as they looked past me, focusing on the distance.
In mere seconds, we became surrounded in every direction.
The once beautiful sunset was replaced with dense gray fog that filled the air like smoke from a raging fire.
The water below us, once deep navy blue, now appeared so black its surface reflected like a mirror, surrounding us in the depths of a void.
And then it came. Soundless. As if the air had gone still.
Claire’s gasped cut through the silence like a knife with a sharpness that echoed through the void.
“It is okay. We are fine. This is…good. This means we are almost there,” I whispered as my hand rested upon her cheek, gripping her softly to steady her.
Her mouth was open, and eyes filled with terror in a way that coiled my insides like a snake around its victim.
I ran my hand down toward her chin, letting my fingers wrap gently across her neck as the pressure brought her lips back to a close.
A single tear slipped from her eye as she nodded softly.
I saw her swallow whatever fear, sadness, or anxiety had been resting in the back of her throat. Claire’s body slid closer to mine as she wrapped her arm across my back and dug her cheek into my shoulder.
“You stay right there. I will keep you posted. Just breathe, baby,” I whispered into her ear before resting my cheekbone against the softness of her skin.
I pulled the throttle down to slow the boat, the density of the fog making it impossible to see more than fifteen yards in front of the bow.
The metal throttle, once warm from the sun, was cold.
We rocked gently, pushing foot by foot forward through the gray-hued darkness.
Where we once were surrounded by the sounds and smells of the sea, now all that surrounded us was darkness and silence.
The minutes dragged forward, feeling like hours as we crept along the mirrored water, until finally, the fog broke. I pulled the throttle down firmly until the engine returned to a slow hum that echoed around us.
“Claire,” I whispered.
One part of me wanted to just let her rest against my shoulder for an eternity.
Now that her anxiety had calmed and her mind was not racing, she stopped practically vibrating against my skin.
However, the other part of me wanted answers—answers that were inevitable and may be painful—like death for most creatures aside from myself.
Claire’s head lifted as my chest groaned, missing the weight of her already. “Is this it?” she asked, surprisingly composed and certain.
“Yes. It is,” I said, nodding my head as I looked toward her, studying her face for any signs of emotions that I could fix.
Her eyes were fixed just ahead of us as she scanned the black sand and slate cliffs that sat before us like inevitable fate. “I’ve been here before, Arik,” she said, raising her chin with a sense of bravery that bewildered me.
“What are you talking about?” I asked, my brows stitching together with confusion as I looked deeper into her stoic expression.
“The day I got here. In the hotel. I took a nap before dinner, and I…I dreamed of this island.”
She turned her head to me swiftly, her eyes scanning mine for any sign of acceptance, or disbelief.
I shifted in my seat, turning my body toward her to give her my full attention.
I gently took her hands, now cold to the touch, into my own.
My shoulders slumped down as I stared at our hands, laced together like magnets.
“What happened in the dream, Claire?”
“I was on the beach, up against the cliffs. The water was rushing in, flooding the beach, and pressing me up against the slate. Second by second it got higher until I was underwater. It’s like it was pulling me down.
I tried to swim but it wouldn’t let go. Everything went to black and then I woke up,” Claire replied as her hand fell limp within mine.
I held her hand tighter, pulling her attention from the island back to me.
“One thing is different, though…” She paused, as if she were reconfirming her thoughts before she spoke.
“Yes, Claire. Please tell me,” I whispered as my hands shook in hers, and my chest heaved with panic.
“That path, right there, in the middle,” she said as her hand pulled from mine and pointed toward the island.
In the center of the slate cliffs was a narrow path, dense with deep emerald shrubbery.
Ivy wildly climbed the slate walls that seemed to hover above like they were just waiting for someone to enter.
Beyond the first few feet, darkness settled in, giving no glimmer of what lay just beyond.
This was the same path I had taken hundreds of years ago.
The path I entered as a man, only to never leave from which way I came.
“That path wasn’t there,” she whispered to me as her face broke with sorrow I struggled to understand.