Then the giant hands become fists that pound the ocean like a thirsty man calling for drinks. Water begins swirling around us, sucking us backward.
Jamie begins to kick again.
“I can’t... I can’t...” I gasp.
“Yes... can... a little farther.”
I move my legs, wondering if it’s possible to freeze mid-kick. I focus on counting—yut-yee-som, yut-yee-som—over and over again in my head.
The screams had tapered off, but they begin anew, as if everyone still aboard that doomed ship has taken a collective breath, filling their lungs for a fresh wave of torture.
I know I shouldn’t, but I peek.
Without her electric lights, theTitanicforms a black outline against the starlit sky. But everything’s gone pear-shaped, and for a moment, I wonder if my head is twisted on wrong.
The ship lies at a steep angle, her back half poking up like a duck that’s bobbed under the surface to snatch a fish. The last two smokestacks have broken off, gone like the others, committed to the sea. People brace themselves on whatever they can—benches, rails, even ventilator shafts. But that doomed elevator will only move in only one direction now. If they don’t step off in time, those riding it will be sucked under, the air squeezed out of them.
Jamie looks back, too, his kicking ceasing as well. “Bloody hell.” His voice is barely a whisper.
I say a prayer for the Johnnies. For the peaceful Tao and the stubborn Fong. For the cheerful Olly and the sweet and salty Wink. For the romantic Ming Lai and the faithful Drummer. And most of all, for the complicated Bo, who made a promise to me that I worry he cannot keep. Let this nightmare be oversoon, and may all wake in the finest first-class sheets, whether on this earth or in heaven.
TheTitanic, or what remains of her, begins to sink, her giant propellers putting me in mind of a windup toy. At first chugging down slowly, she picks up speed as she plunges. Final screams erupt and burst, as useless as the flares that were launched from the bow.
Then a black hood is slipped over the stern, and the outraged cries abruptly halt. The ocean roils and gurgles as it devours the ship. Four big explosions shake the water, and the unmistakable sounds of a boat being crushed breach the surface.
We feel ourselves being pulled back toward the wreck, like a saucer on a tablecloth.
As if by reflex, we begin to kick once more. We kick with all the jelly left in our jars, powering forward as if heaven is closing her gates right in front of us, and the flames of hell are licking our behinds.
I close my eyes, which are so full of salt, I wonder how they haven’t shriveled inside their sockets.
Bees are swarming Ba.
Jamie perches high on the oak.
It’s up to me.
I blow fire onto a tree branch, igniting a torch. I run, and the bees follow.
“Climb up,” Jamie says, sounding far away. “That’s enough.”
Enough.A soft, treacherous word. A word that means stop,rest. A word that means you’ve done everything, but makes you doubt it all the same.
Inch by inch, I heave myself aboard, as awkward as an injured seal on a thin floe of ice. Every wiggle and twitch fills me with dread. If I roll off, this tired old bucket isn’t hauling herself back up the well.
I center myself on the float, curled up so that my lifeless feet don’t hang in the water. Jamie scoots up after me, flopping over my side and waiting for our board to settle before moving again. Our raft squirms underneath us, but Jamie, through some last act of balance and strength, keeps us topside.
Ba is in a ditch that’s quickly filling with water.
Jamie’s shirt billows like a sail.
I lead a circus elephant—one with a golden tiara on its head and crimson velvet on its back—to the ditch. The elephant dips its trunk into the water and drains it.
I can feel Jamie cradling me, passing me whatever warmth remains in him, just as he did in the coal hole. Moving slowly, he drapes his left arm over my waist and closes his hand over mine. His ragged breaths warm my neck. His shoulder must be in agony.
“You were the right boot, going fore instead of aft with the dogs,” I tell him.
“And you were... right boot,” he stammers out the words, his teeth clattering loudly. He’s been in the water longer than me, and every second counts.
