Chapter Thirteen #3
When everyone’s sandwich is gone, I drink a quarter of the water left in the bottle, swishing it around the inside of my mouth. I hand it to Jackson, who does the same. Emmy drinks her quarter and pours the rest into Ben’s mouth.
We have two full water bottles left, which won’t go far, but at least there’s some food and water in us.
Jackson brushes the crumbs off his shorts. “How do we get this boat moving, Ben?”
He grimaces. “That’s a complicated question.
Without a sail or a working start motor, we’re at the mercy of the tides and the wind, with little to no way to get us moving in a specific direction.
” He adds, “Even if we could get the engine going, it’s unlikely we’d make progress with the water in the cabin weighing us down. ”
They all turn to me.
“There wasn’t a pump, as far as I could tell, but I figured out a way to drain it with a hose. It won’t get all of it out though. The hose isn’t long enough to reach all the way to the cabin floor and still drain overboard at the same time.”
Ben raises his eyebrows. “You made a siphon out of a spare hose?”
They’re still staring, and I shift uncomfortably under their attention. “Yeah?”
“Hannah’s always been the smart one,” Emmy says, and absolutely no part of that sounds like a compliment. She grins at her brother. “Wouldn’t you agree, Jackson?”
Oh, for the love of—
“I’m…going to go check how much drinking water we have,” Jackson says.
And he flees, like a coward, and I’m left to stare down Emmy’s smug face all on my own. I’m going to have to tell her about winter break. She’s like a dog with a bone; she’ll never let this go. I’m just not ready to talk about it yet.
So I deflect.
“Is the water from the sink safe to drink?” I ask Ben.
I can feel Emmy’s glare. I ignore it.
He shrugs. “Depends on how long it’s been in the holding tank.
If it’s been sitting for a long time, probably not.
But Keith lived on board and frequently sailed long stretches at sea, so he probably wasn’t drinking only bottled water.
He’d have to refill the tank often and change the filters, or he’d be sick as a dog. ”
So as long as the tank has enough water—and the storm doesn’t kill us—we might be okay until we’re rescued. The thought is oddly comforting. Dying of dehydration is slow and ugly.
A gust of wind blows the sail off the top of the broken mast. When Emmy doesn’t get up to fix it, despite having shoulders almost the same color as her bathing suit, I get up to do it.
She watches me cross the deck with a scowl.
I fling the sail back over them like a tent, dragging it to one side so that their legs are fully shaded, but when I’m done, I stay on the bow of the boat rather than rejoining them.
The wind seems to have spun us in a half circle. The mass of angry storm clouds is ahead of the boat now. It seems like it creeps closer every time I blink, dragging the higher winds along with it, which in turn blow the weather in faster.
I have a bad feeling about this second storm.
Ben’s voice carries to me through the other side of the sail.
“…could really do a lot more to help if I wasn’t tied up,” he says.
“I think I could get a secondary sail strung up, with a little help. But I doubt I could talk the three of you through it. You don’t know what anything is called, and I’d have to spend half a day teaching you how the boat works before you’d understand my instructions. ”
I roll my eyes. How does he expect to get this miraculous secondary sail up without a mast? He’s so full of shit. He’s been tied up for a half hour, and already he’s trying to weasel his way to freedom. Figures he’d go the “I’m the only one who knows how to sail” route.
“Is there a place an emergency sail would normally be stored?” Emmy asks.
“Depends on the boat. I could help you look, but Hannah and Jackson don’t trust me anymore. I really want to help get us home, but my hands are quite literally tied behind my back.”
Emmy laughs. “Maybe I can change their minds. We can’t leave you up here in the storm anyway. If we can get the boat moving, I think they’d be a lot more open to it.”
Ben’s answer is barely above a whisper. “You’re the only reasonable one on this boat.”
Emmy laughs again. “I’m going to catch Hannah now, while Jackson is down below.”
Ah, FML.
“Divide and conquer?” Ben asks.
“Exactly.”
I move away from the sail. I know my friend, and there’s absolutely no chance she’s getting up to talk to me about Ben. I cross all the way to the bow so Ben won’t overhear us.
I wait until Emmy has a good grip on the lifelines beside me before I say, “I know it’s killing you, so get it off your chest.”
Her lips purse together like she’s trying to hold back. I can practically see everything she wants to say spinning behind her eyes. “It’s probably not the time.”
“It’s definitely not the time, but I don’t see a better one showing up anytime soon.”
“I just…” And the dam breaks. “I don’t understand why you’d tell me you were over him if you’re not. He’s not telling me anything either. It makes no sense. If something happened, if you two have feelings for each other—”
I shake my head to stop her. “Jackson does not have feelings for me.”
“What’s going on then? Because there are weird vibes between the two of you. It’s like the awkward six months after a couple in the friend group breaks up.”
I scrub a hand down my face. I don’t want to lie, but I don’t have it in me to explain either.
“Em, I’m not ready to talk about this yet, okay?
It’s embarrassing enough having a crush on someone for a decade, and then piling what happened on top of it?
It makes me want to fling myself into the ocean. ”
“But something did happen between you two?”
“Yes.”
That much, I can give her.
“But you won’t tell me what it was?” she asks, sounding hurt. “Since when do we not talk about things like this?”
“I don’t know, Em. I guess since now.”
Emmy’s silent, and when I look over at her, she’s glaring at the storm. “It’s been different between us since you got your Linfield acceptance. You’re distant and critical of my travel choices. Now you’re keeping secrets too.”
“Whoa, I am not critical. I’m worried about you and your personal safety. I just want you to be more careful.”
Emmy turns her glare on me. “You’ve never supported my travel dreams. You or my parents. Nobody takes what I want to do seriously. I’m sorry I don’t want to settle down and be a nurse or teacher—”
“Nobody’s asking you to become a different person! I’m asking you to not take strange men with you overseas. I’m asking you to travel with a friend. I’m asking you to be a little more wary of your surroundings, so you don’t die in a ditch in the Maldives!”
“Like I said, critical.”
Someone clears their throat, and we both spin toward the sound.
Jackson’s standing behind us. A half-filled gallon jug dangles from the tips of his fingers, and his mouth is set in a grim line. “Sorry to interrupt, but tiny problem: The boat’s out of water.”