Way Down Deep

by Chere Taylor

        If you were to ask James McKinsey what he did for a living, he would probably tell you he was a sailor on the Bay-Houston towboat. He’d remove his jacket and undulate one of his powerful bicep muscles that defied the rest of his fat and flabby body. The skin there was taut and shiny, his bicep well rounded. He would beam with pride over the state of his arm muscles and then say something appropriately modest.

        But Jimmy wasn’t a sailor. He was the cook aboard the Bay-Houston and sometimes he did janitorial work as well.

        This set him apart from some of the other crewmen, even though all of them, including the captain, took part in cleaning duties from time to time. He thought some of his perceived separation might be because of his black skin. James was very dark, more so than many African Americans in America. His color was what his mother lovingly called purple-black. A blackness that shone with possibilities, she assured him.

        While James was grateful for his mother’s faith in him, he found his life was a little different from his siblings who were a medium-brown shade. African American girls of all colors were reluctant to date him. Many whites, and even some blacks assumed that he was African. When they learned otherwise, assumed that James grew up in a ghetto.

        Jimmy concluded that his deep, black skin color, along with his sizable weight was a deficit. He compensated for this by reserving his true self with only the people he loved and trusted. That included his Italian wife Doris (on the whole white women were more tolerant of his skin color, than black women) their three-year-old son and their soon-to-be-born daughter whom he would meet in two months. For them he laughed and joked and revealed the soft side of his personality. To everyone else he was simply Jim the cook, the Fat Albert clone with the somewhat decent biceps.

        He tightened those biceps when he saw Montgomery in the galley early Saturday morning. A thin and somewhat unpleasant man who nonetheless was closer to the loose definition of sailor, than James was. Monty had an intrusive parrot beak nose that he artfully minimized with his blonde beard and mustache.

        “Yo’ Negro, my man,” Monty said as he sat at the counter and raised one hand. Monty was constantly my-manning and demanding high-fives from Jimmy.

        Jimmy hesitated, then landed Monty a quick hand slap with the business end of his greasy spatula.

        “What the hell?” Monty wiped his hand angrily on his jacket even as the two other crewmen snickered.

        “You’re okay. You’re not burned.” Jimmy replied. At least he hoped Monty wasn’t burned. He had only a few moments ago used his spatula to dislodge four sunny-side eggs in a row. So it was certainly possible the spatula was still hot. One of these days you’re going to take your little jokes too far Jimmy, and then get your ass fired. Jimmy grimly smiled at the thought.

        “What’s breakfast this morning’?” Monty grunted. The my-man act was over for now.

        “Bacon, hash browns, eggs sunny-side up, and toast.”

        “I don’t want my eggs sunny.” He sounded as petulant as a small child. “Gimmie scrambled.”

        “You ate them sunny yesterday.”

        “But I don’t want them that way today. Now, I want scrambled.”

        Jimmy didn’t move knowing Monty was behaving this way to be an asshole. He constantly changed his meal orders to something Jimmy hadn’t prepared beforehand. If scrambled eggs were on today’s menu, then Monty would undoubtedly demand sunny side, or perhaps an omelet.

        “Is that going to be a problem,” Boy? He didn’t say the last part of that sentence and perhaps Jimmy was the only one who heard it. But he did hear it. Loud and clear.

        Jimmy turned around and reminded himself of the reasons why not to fuck this up. It was his life’s dream to work on a boat and now he was finally doing it. He had a daughter on the way and this job offered paid paternity leave. He didn’t want to behave like the stereotypical, angry black man which Monty would use as an excuse for all sorts of unpleasantness. So don’t fuck this up.

        He cracked the extra eggs onto the grill and listened to the men talk about their float plan. They were on the way to help a cruise ship dock in Galveston and then out into the deeper waters of the Atlantic to be one of three tow ships to guide an unwieldy barge. Sometimes they would include James in their conversations, invite his opinion, but he was usually ignored. This didn’t bother Jimmy. He liked it that way. Monty also remained silent, crumpling and unfolding his napkin as ceaselessly as the ocean waves that beat against the boat.

        After he cleared his coffee order with Monty. (Cream, no sugar. Even though he requested sugar in his coffee yesterday. On further thought, maybe one teaspoon of sugar, but don’t overdo it like you did last time. Almost gave me diabetes, last time.) Jimmy pushed a plate of scrambled eggs towards Monty and turned around to degrease the stove.

        “Whoops.” Laughter. The sound of broken pottery.

        There on the floor was a mixture of smashed porcelain and scrambled eggs. Now a Picasso painting.

        Immediate silence from the crewmen, and the heightened tension that occurs when everyone wonders if an ass-whupping was just around the corner.

        Jimmy didn’t allow himself to consider it. “Not a problem,” he said. He wiped the mess at Monty’s feet with a warm rag. He made two more trips with the rag then went to the business of scrambling another pair of eggs.

        James set the plate on the countertop and watched with satisfaction as Monty dived into his food.

        “You like my special eggs, Monty?”

        “They alright. What’s so special about ‘em?”

        “I added an unusual ingredient. Something to help them stay yellow.”

        All three crewmen stopped eating. Their eyes stared glared at Jimmy, accusingly even though the former two had finished their eggs long ago and were working on their toast and coffee. He might be risking his job after all. But he couldn’t stop himself.

        “That’s not funny, Jim.” There was murder in Monty’s eyes.

        “I’m playing with you, man. I would never do that.” Except, maybe I did. He hoped Monty heard the subliminal message the same way he had heard his boy, earlier.

        “Do what?”

        “Nothing.” Jimmy shrugged his boulder-sized shoulders and went back to scraping the stove.

        The chatter slowly returned to normal levels.

*  *  *

        He waited to be called in by Captain Thomas Muer. All that morning and afternoon, Jimmy waited as he scrubbed the stove, the pots and pans, mopped the floor, and then preheated the oven for lunch (oven-baked cheeseburgers and tater tots. Salad ingredients in the fridge.) He waited as he practiced his arm curls with the eighty-pound weights in the privacy of his own cabin. The ship was equipped with a gym, but Jimmy didn’t like the self-conscious feelings he had about his large, cumbersome body in the same room with the slimmer and more fit crew. He waited for the captain to invite him into his private office where he would explain that food contamination jokes were not funny, let alone burning a member of the crew and perhaps James’s planned paternity leave should become more permanent . . . and without pay.

        But nothing of the sort happened. He did endure various versions of his name during lunch and dinner. Hey Jim. Jimmy. Jimbo. No one ever called him by his preferred childhood nickname of Midnight. However he could see how that particular name could be a problem. Monty had skipped lunch, but for dinner he held his hand up for another of those stupid high fives, and because the captain happened to be watching, Jimmy thought it wise to comply.

        He called his wife a little after 9:30 p.m., and spoke to his son, Lil’ Dude, (his nickname for James Junior) through video chat. As was his custom with each phone call, Lil Dude rolled his shirt sleeves up revealing his almost nonexistent muscles. With a huge grin, he cried, “Hulk ‘em, Daddy! Hulk ‘em!”

        Jimmy laughed and happily acquiesced, bulging his own muscles for his young son to see. It was a silly way to bond, he supposed, but this absurd pride in manly muscles was bonding. He wanted a connection with his cinnamon-colored child who looked so different from himself, at least when it came to skin tone. The child whom he only got to see for one week after every three months. And now he thought with some guilt he was about to bring another one into the world under similar parenting circumstances.

        After his family had signed off, he connected his phone to the charger and tenderly laid the phone on its side. Almost as if he were tucking them in, keeping his family safe as he and he alone battled the dangers, the difficulties and the prejudices of the world. Even if at the moment that prejudice didn’t come in a more serious flavor than Monty. The point was, he would sacrifice himself for those he loved. He felt that made up for all of his faults. This was what a real man was supposed to do. Jimmy fell asleep sometime around 2200 hours . . .

        . . . Then woke up on the cold-ass floor at 0400 hours or to be more precise at 4:07 in the morning. It was as if a giant hand had shoved him into that position. He was completely alert. Lying on his front, large stomach bulging grotesquely at the sides, blanket twisted around his legs. Arm muscles taut and ready for battle.

        What the fuck? He had never rolled out of bed before. Not since he was a child and imagined he heard the nimble feet of Mr. Peebles, one of his brother’s goat man doll, tiptoeing around the room while they slept. He tried to recall a nightmare, anything to explain his prone position on the floor and came up with nothing. Except for a vague unsettling feeling that things were not quite right.

        Well, it was close enough to his usual wake-up time anyway. Might as well start the day with a shit and a shave, then get the batter going. Pancakes were on the menu this morning. He continued onward to the public restroom or hit the head as naval jargon went. He pissed into the bowl then sat down for business number two, when he noticed the water leaking underneath the main restroom door. Jim was in the first stall, and he could see it from his seated position. There was something slow and insidious about the forming puddle. Purposeful.

        Monty damnit! Monty getting his childish revenge. Monty pissing on the other side of the door.

        Rage burned into Jim, hot and furious. Didn’t Monty know how unsanitary that was? How nasty? With his own hypocrisy behavior forgotten, he removed the toilet paper roll from its hook, (it was about ten inches across and weighed a hefty five pounds) kicked open his stall and threw it at the door with all of his might. It made a mild thumping sound as it slammed against the door then fell squarely into the piss. Hardly the satisfying bang Jimmy wanted to express his fury with.

        “Damn you Montgomery!” he yelled. “You wanna get fucked up? I will fuck you up!” At that moment he no longer cared if he got fired. He waited for a response.

        How did Monty get his piss underneath the door? That was the hellish thing. The head also contained three public showers and for that reason the heavy entrance door was designed to prevent escaping water. Monty would have to have a pressure hose for a dick to get his piss through that door.

        And surely his urine wouldn’t be spraying through the side cracks of the doors as well as from underneath? Spurting as if from a cut vein?

        Because it’s not piss. That’s water. Sea water.

        Without flushing, Jimmy exited the stall, went to the door and tried pushing it open. It wouldn’t budge. There was too much counter pressure behind it. Water pressure. He stood there stupidly for a few moments wasting precious seconds. And then the world turned sideways.

        The boat listed horribly on its port side. Jimmy stumbled and slid towards the left wall now serving as a partial floor. He got up and his bare left foot crunched through one of the sink mirrors. He was distantly aware of pain.

        James made his way towards the door again which was now at a thirty-degree angle. He shoved himself against it, throwing his full 350-pound weight behind it. The door cracked open one, maybe two inches. Water gushed in at his knees from the temporary opening and then the door slammed back in place again as if an angry bouncer from a speakeasy was on the other side. Whuh’s da password?

        Jimmy pressed his ear against the door. Now he could hear the roaring of water and the distinctive emergency horn. Seven short blasts followed by one long one, endlessly repeated. The shouting of men.

        The password is, Git me off this muthafuckin boat!

        He slammed his body against the door again and again, pushing it a little further each time before it slammed back into place again. Hulk ’em Daddy. Hulk’em, he heard his small son whisper in his head. On the ninth shove he managed to force the door all the way open. A wall of water almost three feet high greeted him, rushing past his legs and nearly knocking him on his ass again. Jimmy braced himself against the door’s framework. What he saw was almost beyond credulity.

        Water pouring from everywhere. Gallons and gallons of water. It poured from the escape hatch in the ceiling. It rushed from the hallway traveling right to left in its attempt to invade every corner and every orifice. The ocean water moved like a living, vibrant thing, bubbling and joyful in its ability to invade and destroy.

        The captain’s deceptively calm voice through the intercom announced the unnecessary order to abandon ship. Then his voice stopped. No explanation, no sign of a commotion or the static disconnection of electricity. The captain stopped. The alarm did too.

        He saw Monty with another vaguely familiar deckhand, strapped into life jackets and stomping their way towards the ceiling exit which was now cocked at an extreme angle as was everything else on the ship. A rogue wave pushed them towards the exit window and just like that they disappeared through it.

        The first sailor had looked at Jim with a blank, shocked expression, but Monty never did. Monty’s face was firm and determined as if chiseled in stone. He pulled himself up after the first sailor then gently locked the hatch.

        Once Montgomery and the other sailor had disappeared, all hope seemed to have left with them. It was just desserts after all, wasn’t it? Him being left to die. Isn’t that what he did to his younger sister Alyssa those many years ago? Let her die in front of him without saying a word or signaling for help or even trying to rescue her himself? There was some justice in the world after all.

        Water rising rapidly now. Reaching the beginning slope of his bulbous belly. It was a comfortable temperature. Not surprising considering it was mid-August. He wondered what it would feel like? The actual act of drowning? He wondered how it had been like for Allysa who had drowned a mere three feet away from him when he was nine years old and she was eight.

        First, you held your breath. You held it for as long as you could. You held it longer than that time when you dived down to the deep end to pick up the plastic rings your stepfather threw into the pool. And longer than those times when you were being a stupid and dangerous jerk, dunking your brothers into the pool to prove how superior your lungs were. Quit it, Midnight! I’m telling Mama! You held your breath.

        Then when you’ve reached your endurance having held it longer than you’ve ever had before, longer than you have formerly thought humanly possible, then came that first involuntary gasp. Except instead of air, water flooded your trachea, your lungs and your body’s immediate response was to force this non-air out. The trachea spasms, slamming shut in a hopeless effort to protect itself from the incoming water. But with nothing else to breathe, your helpless compulsion was to allow the water back in. Cough it out and inhale it back in. Vomit it out and suck it back in, as your need for air betrayed you. The unbearable tightness in your chest. The feeling that something inside you was about to burst . . .

        Christ, that can’t happen to him.

        The thought broke his paralysis. He dove into the water now at chest level, hoping the current would guide him to the escape hatch, as it did for Monty and the other crewman. Instead, the world turned over yet again, even as he swam underneath the waves. Up became down and down turned into up. The trap door was completely underwater and part of the floor but more accessible. He yanked at the strap, knowing it would do no good, but unable to resist. Try all ironies first.

        When that didn’t work, he attempted to stand, and was dismayed to discover that the water was now an inch above his head. He could only reach air by jumping like a breaching whale, or dog paddling. And how long would he be able to manage that? How long before this hallway, hell the entire ship sank and there would be no oxygen left anywhere to breathe?

        Because it was his last point of safety, James instinctively back paddled into the Head and was stunned at how much the Atlantic had overtaken it. Not only were his surroundings still overturned (in the back of his mind Jimmy had assumed the restroom would somehow remain upright even though it was obvious the boat had capsized) the stern was undeniably pointed upwards at a slight angle. The result was the back of the room was completely flooded, while there was still some breathable air left towards the open doorway and the first two cubicles. Maybe two feet of cubic air before the water rose to the tiled floor that now acted as the ceiling.

        Jim swam clumsily to the outer wall of the first booth and clung to it, swinging his heavy arm over what was once the bottom panel of the stall. All the while he listened to the groaning and moaning of the ship. Why did a dying ship, Jimmy wondered, sound so much like a mortally wounded, prehistoric animal? Amazingly the lights were still on. They had been built to be water resistant, but that wasn’t the same thing as being submerged in water. Yet, they shone through the flood, turning the world beneath him into a mystical land of evil secrets. The porcelain sinks and toilets reminded him of drowned Roman statues as he kicked his legs in the depths.

        He watched with dull amazement as one of his own turds floated idly by his face. He followed it with his eyes, hypnotized by the exquisite obscenity of it all, until it exited the door. The result was like a visual slap. He now realized how foolish he’d been to return to the Head, allowing fear to dictate what to do instead of logic. A wiser decision would be to go back to his cabin and get his life jacket. Then he would . . .

        Without warning, the lights went out. He was in complete and utter darkness.

        Jimmy screamed. He thought he had been a real trooper so far. Putting up with all the horror, Monty attempting to murder him as discreetly as one uses a napkin to remove an inedible morsel from one’s mouth. Watching his own turds float by, inches away from his lips and nose. But damn it, now was the perfect time for screaming. He made great baritone yelps. An opera singer belting out his own requiem. After a while, he realized there was a word within all that howling. The same word repeated over and over again.

        “Jesus! Jesus! Jesus!”

        The atheist’s prayer. That along with Oh my God, and For Christ’s sake, came naturally to the lips of all who were mildly irritated and to the deeply distressed. A subconscious appeal to God until the problem was solved and the idea of God could be put back into the proper perspective again. Jimmy stuck his tongue between his teeth and bit down, concentrating on the pain. He tasted blood, but he stopped screaming.

        Still, he impressed himself with the deep tones of his own voice. He wished desperately that someone could have heard him scream. Not only because it would mean rescue, but the other more shameful reason was that person could then report to his family what a man he had been. Strong, stoic, solid. James George McKinsey had died a man.

        Jimmy laughed, snorting like a chained bull waiting for the killing blow. He remembered how tenderly he had laid the phone on his bedside table last night. Tucking his family in . . . was that how he put it? While he alone fought the monsters of the world? What a joke. What romanticized bullshit. He wished he could join his family right now. Jump through the phone and be back home safe with his wife on the couch while watching Lil’ Dude make endless twirls with his plastic tug boat. Because who was there to tuck Jimmy in? Who would fight the monsters on Jimmy’s behalf? How the hell does anyone fight shit like this?

        Another shudder from the boat. Descending. He could feel gravity pull at him, like an out of control elevator plunging towards its inevitable crash at the bottom. Yes, this was the perfect punishment for someone who allowed their sister to drown right in front of them.

        Quit it. I didn’t murder her.

        The words were meaningless, unimportant. A refrain he told himself over and over again through the years. The priority at this moment was the level of water. It was rising yet again. He felt it under his chin, like ticklish, knowing fingers. Something dank, evil smelling and cold. Jimmy shivered.

        How long did he hang there, teeth chattering, eyes closed, and waiting to die? He had no idea. Time was meaningless in the dark. But eventually he heard a soft boom and he felt the vibrations of that boom shudder throughout the entire boat. Then silence, stillness.

        Am I sitting on the bottom of the ocean? Christ, I think I am.

        He peered into the blackness. But the dark was so deep that there was no difference between opening and closing his eyes.

        How long before the ocean completely fills the ship, and I drown? Do I have minutes or hours?

        James stared again into the incomprehensible dark.

*  *  *

        A pair of steely hands wrapped around his throat. They were as efficient as a professional killer’s and Jimmy was amazed at the strength in those fingers. But he dare not turn around, because he didn’t want to see that it was eight year old Alyssa who was strangling him. Didn’t want to see the hate in her eyes, or that she had never forgiven him. You let me drown!

        He woke up, splashing and spluttering in the icy water. Then quickly clung to the side of the stall again, breathing heavily. It took him a moment to remember all that had occurred. When he did, his despair became so great, he thought that alone would kill him. He wanted to weep.

        But he also realized two rather remarkable things. They were . . .

        Number One: The water wasn’t rising anymore.

        And number Two: He was alive. Miraculously, inexplicably he was still alive.

        But you won’t be for long if you don’t get your ass out of this freezing water.

        If he thought he’d been cold before, it was nothing compared to the bone numbingly chill invading his body now. He had gone to bed wearing only his tighty-whities, and he was paying for it. The cold was a disease that stiffened his limbs, making it harder to move, to breathe. And he was dreadfully tired. How easy it would be to go back to sleep and separate himself from these horrors for a while. Go to sleep . . . and wake up dead.

        He took a deep breath, then submerged himself entirely into the freezing depths. If nothing else, swimming might warm his core temperature. Maybe he could find another air pocket like this one. A plan was forming in Jim’s head, a way to get his body out of the water. But he dare not put much thought into it beyond that. He was frightened of hope.

        As he sidestroked through the corridor, he moved his other hand along the wall in a parody of the pool game Marco Polo. No one called back to him of course, but the darkness left him completely blind. Even so, he had a vague map in his head. He knew he was on the main deck of the ship, with the staterooms located in a L shape leading to the galley at one end and the head at the other. As luck would have it, his cabin was closest to the head. He was only a few breaststrokes away from his quarters.

        Towards the end of the L, his hand encountered open water where his instinct told him there should have been another cabin door. He eagerly swam forward and in his excitement, knocked his head painfully on the upside-down frame. His head buzzed and there was a high pitch ringing in his ears.

        Don’t pass out. Pass out and it’s over.

        He gripped the side of the door until the dizziness passed, eyes squeezed tight against the wooziness that threatened to overtake him. When Jimmy felt better, he tentatively swam inside the cabin. There was at least two feet of air and glory be to God, he believed this had to be the captain’s quarters. The captain’s room was sure to have all sorts of goodies, like a VHF radio . . .

        Useless, if it were soaking wet. And even if it weren’t, have you heard of a VHF working a hundred meters underwater? How about two hundred meters?

        . . . A PDF perhaps in the form of an inner tube.

        Yep, you can float your ass to Heaven. Say ‘hi’ to Alyssa while you’re there.

        . . . Flares.

        Useless when wet, Midnight. Just like the radio.

        . . . A handgun.

        He waited for a smart-ass response to that. When there was none, and the full implications of what the gun could mean, he shuddered deep within himself.

        Nonetheless, he immediately went to work. Now instead of Marco Polo, the game was, What is This? A task he used to perform in kindergarten where he was required to stretch his hand into a large, felt bag and guess whatever the object inside might be. He moved his hands gingerly through the numbing water and came up with something that felt like an overturned desk. Good, he could use that for the foundation of his new base. Next, he discovered a drowned and swollen swivel chair. He swam-dragged this item and then positioned it on top of the desk. Then he found empty file cabinets, a video screen, and several unidentified somethings that were cumbersome, sharp and pointy. He added all these items to the growing pile, creating a small mountain that protruded out of the water.

        At last, best of all, he encountered a floating mattress. He would put that on top.

        He found other items, too. Three cans of something, food or drink. Good. Save it for later. At least he’d die with something in his too-large stomach.

        Eventually, he felt a feathery stroke against his cheek. What was that? A pencil floating by? A map? Curious, he reached out and grasped it.

        The item was heavily wrinkled and fleshy. It reminded him of a giant prune. There was something oddly repulsive and familiar about that texture, the shape. Then it hit him.

        Goddamnit, that’s a person. You’re holding the hand of a dead man.

        Now that his brain made the connection he couldn’t undo it. And he couldn’t let go of the hand, either. After all, a man who could watch his own turd float under his nose, could handle the presence of a few human corpses, couldn’t he?

        Who is this?

        Reason dictated that it had to be Captain Thomas. But something inside whispered, it’s Monty. Yes, even though he had seen Montgomery escape with his own eyes and lock the goddamned door, Jimmy was convinced that this floating body was him. Logic be damned. And if he moved his hand over the corpse’s face would he feel Monty’s bearded grin? Touch his sharp beak like nose and the moist and staring eyeballs straining at him through the dark? Eyes full of malicious glee?

        Enough. He had enough horror for the day. (Night? Afternoon? Who knew?) He let go of the corpse’s hand and blindly climbed into his homemade island bed. The chilled air bit at his exposed skin, causing Jimmy to feel colder than ever. He was no longer shivering, and he wasn’t sure if that was a good thing. Did the cessation of his shivering mean hypothermia was coming on?

        The mattress was sopping wet and because his ass was so big, it dipped in the middle so that the first three inches of his Jockey encased buttocks still remained in the icy water, but the rest of his body could dry. Hopefully, that would be enough to keep hypothermia away . . . if he wasn’t suffering from its effects already.

        Now that he was safe from freezing (possibly), he wanted nothing other than to shut down, to sleep, but his thoughts returned irrevocably to his dead sister. He wasn’t even sure if he deserved to sleep. Again, he experienced the unshakable conviction that God had found him out and was punishing him. That each of his sufferings were well deserved.

        Her name was Alyssa but everyone called her Sissy, the only girl in a gaggle of boy children and second in age to him. His mama and Daddy Clemens treated her as the princess of the family. A delicate child who could easily break. But Midnight knew her from her tomboy side. They would play Call of Duty on their Xbox together. Sometimes they arm-wrestled, and she would often win. He remembered the mischievous grin she would give him before dumping all the blame for whatever trouble they had gotten into that day squarely on him. (He did it, mama! No, she did!) Her hair was always done up in two large puff balls on either side of her head. She used to complain to their mother about her childish hair style, but to Jimmy this was a part of who she was, as much as his purple black skin was who he was. Something strong, beautiful and to be admired.

        During the summer weekends his family would visit Surfside Beach. The twins were under strict orders to play in the sand by their mother’s and Daddy Clemens’ side. Five-year old Jacob had permission to cavort along the shoreline. Only he and Sissy alone were allowed to wade into the ocean. They could go as far they wanted as long as their mother was in sight. (Remember If you can’t see me, that means I can’t see you. Yes, mama.)

        Both of them were excellent swimmers, but they never went deep, understanding the limits of their strengths and the dangers of the currents. They only traveled as far as their outstretched toes could reach the sand, and then they would stand and talk, letting the ocean carry some of their weight leaving behind a blissful feeling of floating.

        They talked about their idle hopes and dreams. Midnight told her how he was going to be a Hollywood actor when he grew up, handsome and admired. Sissy replied she wanted to be Wonder Woman. Neither of them were sure if Wonder Woman was an actual occupation or even if the original one was willing to retire, but Sissy said she was up to the job of saving the world if the first one quit. Midnight smiled and pointed his face towards the warming sun.

        The lifeguard comes splashing towards them, Baywatch handsome and as forceful as a speed boat. He knocks Midnight to the side in his effort to pick up Sissy, and as he carries her limp body in his well-defined arms, Midnight is reminded of a still from one of his favorite action movies.

        Baywatch lays her body on the sand and the other beach patrons begin to crowd the scene, but not before Midnight could see from the rubbery texture of her skin and the floppies of her limbs that Alyssa is dead.

        Baywatch puts his lips on her mouth and the crowd moves in even tighter, creating an impenetrable wall, but Midnight understands that she is still dead on the other side of that wall. When the ambulance arrives and the orderlies load Sissy’s unconscious body into the van, Midnight perceives that nothing has changed. Three days later, when Daddy Clemens with distant eyes gathers the four of them and explains that Alyssa will never return home from the hospital, Midnight is not surprised by this news despite the outcry from his brothers. It is only that their reality had caught up to what he understood to be true all along.

        No one blamed him of course. Not his mother, who from that point on literally clung to him for the rest of the years he stayed at home. Her ragged fingernails constantly touched his shoulder, his arm, his sleeve, as if afraid that he too would unexpectedly disappear unless she guarded him tightly.

        His brothers didn’t blame him, either. They were so young when Sissy died, that they could only faintly remember their beautiful and defiant sister. As they grew into their teen years and then adulthood, Sissy became more like a myth to them then a one time, living, breathing individual. Once upon a time they had a sister, but she drowned long ago. End of story.

        Perhaps Daddy Clemens blamed him. He and his mother ended their relationship shortly after Sissy’s death (Jimmy wasn’t even sure if they were ever married) and he didn’t think the timing of their breakup was a coincidence.

        Sometimes he blamed Sissy. After all, she didn’t scream. She didn’t splash about or act the way a drowning person was supposed to act. She just stood there quietly . . . and drowned.

        He attempted to join the Navy, but they didn’t want him. Come back, the recruiter told him, when you’ve lost fifty pounds. Jimmy swore that he would. He began an exercise regimen that was so full of bicep curls and push-ups that his arm muscles toned up immediately. They even rivaled those of Baywatch who tried to save Sissy so many years ago.

        Ultimately his love of both cooking and consuming food, was too great for him to reduce any significant weight. When one of his brothers told him the Bay-Houston Towing company was looking for a short-order cook, he jumped at the chance. Finally, he would be confronting his old enemy, the ocean that swallowed his sister. The Atlantic had taken her, but it wouldn’t destroy him.

        Except, now with the hindsight that comes with too much time spent alone in the dark, he wondered if he had engineered his suffering all along. Not to conquer the sea, but to be conquered by it. A perverse need for punishment. All those lifeguarding jobs he took as a teen, so that the ocean would have a chance to drown him. Giving up on his dream of acting, because that would interfere with his destiny with the sea. Even swimming in their home pool which had become neglected and filthy after Sissy’s death, all so that he would be prepared to be properly drowned in the Atlantic some day. He saw it all now, as wispy and undeniable as the thumbprint on a crime scene.

        And perhaps that was why he was so quick to forgive Monty for his clumsy attempt at murdering him. If Monty’s actions were forgivable, then maybe . . .

        Splashing. Something splashing and spluttering rudely in the water.

        For a moment Jimmy was stunned at the unexpected disturbance. Then his lips split into a trembling smile as his whole being flooded with joy. It was a rescue team. He would be saved. “Hey!” he shouted at the approximate spot he thought the disturbance was coming from, perhaps two feet away. “Hey, hey!”

        The splashing stopped. In the immediate silence, cold reasoning crowded back in. Of course this wasn’t a rescue team you idjit, he scolded himself, but some animal sampling the delicacy that was once Captain Thomas (Who was really Monty). A squid perhaps? Maybe a dolphin? But more than likely the creature was that dreaded killer from the deep, a shark. Perhaps even a Great White. Alone in the dark with a Great White.

        Jimmy groaned and pulled his raw feet away from the mattress’s edge. In his haste he overbalanced and the mattress tipped backwards with his head and shoulders sliding towards the water. His heart stopped.

        This is it! This is it! This is it! His mind screamed. My guts will be all gory as I ascend up into glory.

        He sat up clutching both sides of the mattress in a death grip. He held his breath and again exhaled the atheist prayer. Jesus please! Jesus please!

        The mattress teetered on edge as if it were a scale weighing an important decision and then reluctantly settled back into its horizontal position.

        Jimmy forced himself to take slow, even breaths to help calm the galloping thunder that was his heart. Meanwhile, the splashing sounds returned, and more deliberate this time. As if the eater wanted the listener to understand it was going nowhere before it finished its meal. Strange, exaggerated smacking sounds pierced the dark. It reminded Jimmy of his son’s favorite television character, Cookie Monster enjoying a snack. Nom, nom, nom, nom.

        Laughter bubbled up inside him threatening to spill out in the form of madness. He clapped his hands over his ears, not so much to block out the eating noises but so that he wouldn’t have to hear his own, mad giggling. God, if only he had found Thomas’s gun. What if the shark leaped up on top of the mattress? He saw something like that happen in a movie once.

        There are plenty of fish in the sea, as the old adage goes. It doesn’t necessarily have to be a Great White. An octopus could be munching on ol’ Thomas right now. Okay? Or some other large, nonlethal, sea creature. Hell, it could even be a school of small fish. Don’t let your imagination push you into insanity. There’s no shark. Okay, Midnight?

        Okay. You’re right. Yes.

        The very next moment.

        Does the shark know I’m up here? Can it smell me? Jesus, just take me now.

        He tried to will his own death, a quick, painless demise compared to the blood soaked terror that swam only two feet away. In his mind he pictured his heart slowing down. The quivering mass of muscle and tissue beating slower and slower until it stopped and he would sail off into oblivion. Nothing dramatic. Nothing painful. Jimmy entertained these thoughts as he stared at the approximate spot where the intruder (not a shark, Not a Shark, NOT A SHARK) was enjoying its meal.

*  *  *

        The intruder was gone.

        Correction, the intruder was most likely gone. The splashing had continued on and off at odd intervals. At one point he became convinced that it was not a shark or a school of them, but the semi-alive corpse of Monty, half-eaten, bloodied and screaming for his help. Jimmy was distressed over how much effort it took to shove that one thought out of his mind and strangle it into oblivion. Surely madness was just around the corner.

        Then the silence arrived as swiftly and complete as the disruption had before. The boat itself seemed to be holding its breath. Unsettling, but at least it meant the shark (or sharks) were at long last gone.

        Unless he’s lying there silently in the water just waiting for me to slip and fall so he could finish his meal with some Midnight Fudge Cake.

        No, sharks don’t behave that way. I’m telling you, it’s gone.

        Oh really? Are you a marine biologist? Did you study shark behavior in college? Did you even go to college?

        This interior debate wore him out even more than all of his fears and irrational guilt. Shark or no shark, Jimmy decided now was a good time for a snack. He had found three cans earlier, most likely a carbonated beverage of some sort. He would sample one.

        He moved his hand to the three o’clock position, found the container and yelped at the hiss of the can opening. All noises frightened him now. Before he allowed himself to think too much about it . . .

        What are you going to do when you drink all your cokes up? Is dying of thirst less agonizing than drowning?

        . . . he brought the can to his lips and took a good, healthy swallow.

        Diet Cola. He could taste the artificial sweeteners that screamed, I’m sugar, damnit! Normally, he detested diet sodas. But today? Today it was the pure water that dripped from the leaves of plants in the rain forest and into his waiting mouth. It was the ambrosia of the gods. Or to be more specific, the sweat from the goddess Aphrodite, dripping off the nipples of her naked tits and into this can for his pure enjoyment. Jimmy giggled, his laughter sounding as mad as he had earlier feared. He drank some more, then burped.

        Must be getting high off the sugar. Massive endorphins bouncin’ about my head.

        Yes possibly, or perhaps something more sinister. He remembered while studying for his Ship Cook’s Certificate, reading about a condition called nitrogen narcosis, a plight that affected deep sea divers. After the diver descended around seventy feet or so, the heavy water pressure from above would compress the air inside his or her oxygen tank. Breathing this compressed air would produce feelings of mild euphoria, disorientation and cause impaired judgment. The further you dove down, the more severe these symptoms became until paranoia, and hallucinations took over, swiftly followed by that old standby, death.

        Could such a thing happen to the trapped air on a boat? He had to be at least a hundred meters down. Jimmy contemplated the idea and was amused at the little worry it caused him. Nitrogen narcosis also known as the Martini effect was just something else to heap on that old pile titled Causes of Death. There were so many interesting ways to die down here. Death from drowning. Death from suffocation. Death from thirst. Death from starvation. And let’s not forget, death from shark attack and the recently realized death by nitrogen poisoning. Was he forgetting one?

        Jimmy drained the rest of the soda and crushed the aluminum can in his fist. Doing so made him feel momentarily powerful. He giggled again, and just like that his outlook brightened considerably. As if the sun had risen somehow in this eternal dark and he could feel the rays warming his goose-pimpled flesh. There would be a rescue team. He was sure of it.

        You think Monty and his pal are going to tell the coast guard about the man they left behind to die?

        Monty wouldn’t have to say a muthafuckin word. That was the beauty of it. The coast guard would have an obligation to hunt for the remaining crew of the Bay-Houston towboat no matter how unlikely the outcome. Yes, they would search for survivors . . .

        . . . On the surface of the ocean.

        He waited for depression to sink into him again, and again it seemed to float away from him. Like a child’s dirty balloon string slipping from his grip.

        Oh God, I’m drunk. Sugar, or the Martini effect, I am fucking drunk. Perhaps that was the kindest way to go. The most painless at least. He could dream of happier times, then drift off to death.

        Jimmy took another can and drained it, knowing it was unwise. Knowing that he was cutting into his precious hydration supply and not giving a shit. He was going to die down here anyway. Might as well get as comfortable as he could.

        He laid down on his cold soggy mattress and slept.

*  *  *

        He was sitting on a picnic blanket in a beautiful clearing with grassy fields and a gentle, midday sun. Doris sat beside him and their son Lil’ Dude ran circles around them, arms outstretched, making a buzzing noise with his lips.

        In Doris’s arms was their newly born daughter Alyssa, named after his dead sister. He was fascinated by the presence of his infant daughter and wanted to hold her, but Doris wouldn’t allow it. You’ll ruin the moment James, Doris exclaimed. Jimmy was surprised by her words. What moment? But he recognized the fear in her gray eyes, like dark clouds promising a storm. There was a deadly truth creeping around the edges of this happy, sunlit picnic. Something that could break this fragile reality.

        He backed off.

        Besides, there was another Alyssa he could talk to. His sister, now long gone, the original Alyssa ‘Sissy’ Clemens. She laid on her stomach on the blanket, chin resting on her arms while her legs kicked lazily in the air. Eternally eight, with her hair still dressed in that flamboyant pom-pom style. Nothing seemed bizarre about her presence. As if she had always been there with him through all of his successes and failures, hidden carefully in the background.

        You’ve carried me with you for a long time. Her voice was ageless. Eternal and youthful at the same time.

        “Cause I don’t know how to drop you.” Jimmy replied. “You’re all I’ve ever known.” Sissy nodded and sat up. She stretched out her palm towards him, facing upwards. You owe me.

        Startled, his eyes jumped guiltily towards his enormous stomach. This was exactly where he didn’t want the conversation to go. Why can’t you just let me go Sissy, he thought bitterly. And immediately afterwards. Why should she? After all, you never let her go.

        “Shit, I’m sorry. You have no idea how much I wish I had drowned that day too.” No. You owe me getting off this boat.

        “Huh? What boat?” If Jimmy didn’t like where the conversation was heading before, he especially detested it now. She always destroys my best dreams, Jimmy thought bitterly. Both figuratively and literally. His hatred of her which had always laid in the bottom of his heart, hatred because of her refusal not to drown the way a normal person would, rose in him like an overflowing, scummy pond. And she wouldn’t even allow him this brief escape from his own private terror on the . . .

        Sissy touched his arm, her eyes were gentle, non-accusing.

        Don’t sacrifice yourself for a debt you do not owe. You owe me by living your own life. It’s time for you to lay it down, Midnight. You understand me? Lay it all down.

*  *  *

        It took a while for Jimmy to realize that he was awake with his eyes open. The darkness was so complete. Then his memories huddled back into him. He touched his face and felt wetness. He had cried in his sleep.

        He sat up, and the cold air attacked him with renewed vigor, like wolves with icicle teeth. He began to rub his face, trying to regain feeling in the cold, rubbery skin. What an unusually vivid dream, Jimmy thought, undoubtedly aided by the martini effect. But he wanted to believe in it. Did Sissy forgive him? Was she in some sort of existential existence right now, loving and laughing with no accusations against him?

        His mother believed in God. Especially following the months after Sissy’s death. James, however, was more skeptical. As the oldest and darkest child in the Clemens Household, James felt those two characteristics meant that he must take on more responsibility than any of his siblings. (Especially considering that Daddy Clemens had run away at this point.) His deep, dark skin was a symbol of his masculinity, and wisdom. It meant that he couldn’t afford to lean on the crutch of God.

        As these thoughts swirled in his mind, he continued to rub his face. As if he were patting his brow in an effort to remove any excess sweat.

        He was dying. A slow and colorful demise that would deserve to be written about in the Tomes of Exotic Deaths, that was if anyone ever found his body. But none of that seemed important at the moment. Did Alyssa forgive him? Could she? Would she? He would bow down to this God if it meant that Sissy really was okay. He would then have the ability to give his ego permission to forgive himself.

        “Ow!”

        With a shock, Jimmy realized that he was no longer massaging his face, but actually slapping himself, as if attempting to wake up a punch-drunk fighter. And the reason for that was simple enough. There was no more oxygen left to breathe.

        This sudden realization forced him to take in an involuntary whooping gasp, and while he did inhale air, the sting of salt and that wretched moistness which was like breathing through a cold washcloth, his lungs were not satisfied. Hungrily they reported back to him that he was in the process of suffocating.

        Jesus, I might have been better off eaten by the shark!

        He took in another trembling gasp and then another. Everything forgotten now, except the necessity to breathe. He pictured himself flailing then knocking his head against the wooden edge of his desk island. His skull cracking open like an egg, spilling his brains into the water and that would take care of the whole messy business of breathing entirely . . . and of course living. Instead, he forced his head upward and stretched his lips open as wide as he could. He was no longer James McKinsey, Cook of the Bay-Houston towboat, father of James Junior McKinsey and the soon-to-be-born, Alyssa Sandra McKinsey, but a set of bodiless lungs who’s only function in life was to take in air and push it out again.

        And somehow, somehow he continued to inhale and exhale, his consciousness retained. Soon he was even able to catch his mind drifting to other topics. What were Lil’ Dude and Doris doing now in the world of warmth and safety that he had so stupidly taken for granted? Would his job provide survival benefits to Doris once it was discovered that he was deceased? And what would Doris tell their son? What would she say to his new baby daughter about the father she would never meet? Your father was a stupid, stupid man. He forced the Atlantic to kill him for a debt he didn’t owe.

        The air hadn’t changed, but if he ignored the tightening sensation in his chest, he could forget that the oxygen was thinning out (Was that the proper word?) And if he was lucky, he would be rescued by unconsciousness before suffocation occurred. That would be a good way to die. It was painless at least.

        With these thoughts he shifted his head back towards his feet and saw a long thin arm stretch out from the water and grope its way towards him on his soggy, mattress island.

*  *  *

        He initially had no reaction. No fear. Because the impossibility of the thing, enthralled him, hypnotized him. How did one escape from the impossible? From one’s own insanity? That in itself was an impossibility.

        The owner of the arm hauled itself onto the mattress and Jimmy coldly recognized (but again with no real surprise) Monty’s blood-streaked face and baldly, staring eyes. Pieces of him were missing in almost comical silhouette of a chomp mark. There were bite wounds on his face and along the arms and legs of his nifty sailor suit. The shark had a good time with Monty, and now Monty wanted to share the fun.

        Piss in my food, asshole?

        James didn’t struggle when Monty wrapped his moist fingers around his throat. It was almost as if he was watching a character in a movie. Someone only distantly connected to himself. He watched as Monty dragged a paralyzed James McKinsey by the neck and crawdaddied himself and James back into the ocean water.

        The water was frighteningly cold. It was the Arctic, the North Pole. But it brought him back to his sense of self. He once again inhabited the body of James George McKinsey. Monty was still choking the life out of him. His parrot beak nose within kissing distance of his own. His expression as soulless as any zombie he had seen on TV.

        Wait a minute. How can you see him at all in this darkness?

        Something stuttered in his brain, a mental hiccup that was like a reboot of the mind.

        Monty was gone, a wicked wisp of smoke conjured by his infected imagination. James was splashing about in the icy waters of the Atlantic in complete darkness and utterly alone.

        He cautiously felt his way back to his mattress island and hauled himself onto its reassuring palette. His brain was as numb and frozen as the rest of his body. When he tried to push his thoughts forward, all he could come up with was the same cycle.

        Monty was never there. Fucking mind movie. Fucking nitrogen poisoning. Never there. Fucking mind movie. Fucking . . .

        He forced a smile on his face as a way of reassuring himself, and when he used his left hand to confirm that smile, his lips were as stiff and inflexible as the grin carved into a stone statue. The smile remained on his face, when he pissed into the ocean and later as he prayed to God. And as he drained his third and final soda can, the smile was still there as remote and disconnected from him as the stars were in the sky.

*  *  *

        Two bright lights, gleaming on the surface of the water, shining through the darkness. He watched this phenomenon, waiting to see if they would come closer or if perhaps he would. He remembered reading somewhere that when you die, your soul approached a light of unfathomable brightness that enveloped you in love and warmth. The light was God, the Ultimate Maker.

        Jimmy didn’t move, but the lights did. They were the size of two small dining plates and they bobbed almost playfully, one following the other. Then one abruptly disappeared, perhaps entering another room in the ship. He heard something strike the metal hide of the boat. The other light still lingered, illuminating bubbles that broke to the surface.

        But James could no longer be fooled. Once upon a time, maybe an hour ago, maybe a day, he would have been elated at their appearance. He would have dived into the water and eagerly pursued those twin suns to see what was propelling them forward.

        But now he understood that these things were just illusions. He had endured many illusions between Monty’s attack, his on and off struggle to breathe, and this horrendous now that stretched into eternity. He imagined conversing with Alyssa and also with Monty’s corpse. There was no animosity between the three of them, even though Monty’s carcass had attempted to choke the life out of him earlier.

        Nonetheless he had forgiven Monty, the same way Alyssa claimed to have forgiven him. This feeling of absolution was like trying out a bicycle for the first time. It began as a shaky experience though he grew more and more confident as time went by. He was loved and accepted, and Jimmy didn’t think that was an illusion. Therefore, he could excuse himself. Of course, if Jimmy pushed his memory even further back, then he would have to concede that the real Monty had escaped to the topside world completely unharmed. Jimmy had a vague recollection of watching him and a colleague slip through the hatch door. But that image was the ultimate illusion of them all, the idea that he or anyone else had any existence outside of this dank, salt-tinged darkness. That was the dream. The fantasy.

        The truth was that the James McKinsey that laughed during a farting contest between himself and Lil’ Dude amid a toilet training session (much to the foot tapping, hands-on-hips disgust of Doris) the James McKinsey who knocked out the Refuse-to-Accept-the-Answer-No date of a sexy girl during a drunken teen party, thereby earning a kiss from said girl, that James McKinsey was the product of a dream.

        All along the real James McKinsey lay dreaming in this private pit of darkness that was reserved for him. Not just him. This was the truth for everybody. You sampled it when you blinked your eyes. A tiny taste of the inevitable darkness to come. Or the times you were lonely, or afraid. Buried in those emotions was the promise that you would one day return to this state of permanent solitude. Jimmy saw this as clearly as a map to Hades.

        And now it was here. The awakened darkness. This living death. But at least he didn’t have to go through it alone. The madness which he recognized within himself permitted Alyssa and Monty to be with him.

        Plus those two friendly lights, that became just one, dancing underneath the water.

        Then it too disappeared.

        Jimmy felt a strange emptiness at its disappearance. As if those lights were an ally, now gone from his life forever. Gone like everyone else who deserted him to this sunken, watery hell hole.

        Go after it.

        Monty’s husky, whispering voice. Like the urging from a stage mother towards her shy, performing child. Monty, who if Jimmy could see him in this darkness would be greeted by a wide eyed, waterlogged and decomposing corpse.

        Still, he considered Monty’s advice for a moment.

        Aw, what the fuck.

        James McKinsey lifted his heavy body from the mattress pallet island for the very last time.

*  *  *

        As always the cold water was a slap to his senses. He was reawakened to his old enemies, tiredness, weakness, and the eternal salt water that burned like battery acid, stinging his lips and eyes. He forced his eyes open despite the pain, and saw that the light left enough of a trail for him to follow into the completely submerged hallway.

        Jimmy swam down the corridor, still holding his breath and became momentarily distracted with the shock of seeing. The twin lights illuminated the particles in the water, glistening like tiny snowflakes. He saw a blue and purple fish swim towards him then dart away before reaching his face. What a beautiful thing, this act of seeing. Even if the water made everything a blur.

        Two scuba divers were handling a bloated corpse only a few feet ahead of him. It was here the source of light was coming from. It beamed from their head mounts. Jimmy watched as one of the divers tied a line of nylon to the midriff of the floating body, while the other diver who had long, flowing hair held the corpse in place. They worked together using broad physical gestures. Jimmy was oddly reminded of white-faced mimes.

        It took a moment for the significance of this to hit him. When it finally did, when he realized that rescue, Jesus Christ, actual rescue was within reach, he opened his mouth to scream for their attention.

        Immediately, the salt water came flooding in, attacking his tongue and rushing towards his lungs. In his excitement, he’d forgotten he was under water, and now the long denied drowning, like the constantly put off date with the funeral morgue was upon him. He flailed his arms about and floated helplessly towards the ceiling as the pain in his lungs doubled then tripled. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw that the scuba divers had gotten into some sort of disagreement. One was making exaggerated hand signals while the long haired diver shook its head, completely unaware that there was a man drowning a mere ten feet away.

        Just like me and Sissy, he thought in the back of his mind. The other ninety percent of his brain was concentrating on NOT inhaling with his need to cough up the briny ocean water from his lungs. This new perspective from the viewpoint of the drowner did little to comfort Jimmy. Alyssa’s ghost no longer haunted him. Christ, I’m so sorry about past shit. I want to live.

        He burped once, twice, bubbles erupting from his lips as rudely as farting noises and then it was okay. He no longer needed to inhale, despite the heartbeat pounding loudly in his ears. However his physical struggles had cost him at least thirty seconds in breath holding time. That meant he might have another minute before having to battle the Atlantic again, this time with the Atlantic as the winner.

        He swam forward towards the long-haired diver and grabbed a limb. Any limb. It didn’t matter which one. The divers only needed to know he was there. His hand curved around a flippered ankle and he waited for an acknowledgement.

        The long-haired diver turned towards him and Jim could tell from her slender form and mascara eyes that she was a woman. She kicked her leg, vigorously back and forth trying to shake his hold. What the hell? He saw shock in her eyes. That was to be expected. But there were other emotions too. Disgust? Fear?

        What’s wrong with you, lady? I’m not attacking you. I just need some help, please. Just a little help. But deep down Jimmy knew what was wrong. It was the same, old, dangerous-Negro shit, that caused mothers to subconsciously take their children’s hand and white women to cling a little tighter to their boyfriends when he approached. The same too large and too dark bullshit that he dealt with most of his life. Except, now it was killing him.

        No, that’s not it. She thinks you’re a corpse. A rotting, stinking corpse that somehow managed to attach itself to her leg. Because that makes much more sense than finding a living, breathing human here without any source of oxygen and at least a hundred meters under water.

        Yes, that sounded logical, but how to signal to her? The struggle of clinging to her ankle joint was eating into his breath holding skills again. He blinked rapidly at her, even though it increased the stinging pain in his eyes. Have you ever seen a dead body do that, lady? But she was no longer looking at him in her efforts to shake his hold. In a way he supposed he had become her Monty.

        And then he was free. Floating away from the two divers, from his concerns, from his life. His large, bulky body, spiraling blissfully away. He was shocked at the feelings of calmness that enveloped him. This must be what dying is like. It didn’t have to be a painful experience. All that was necessary was the letting go of memories, of people. Alyssa, Dorris, even Lil’ Dude seemed like shadows he invented during a fever dream. His own sense of self no longer seemed important.

        Something pinched his nostrils close, harsh and unforgiving.

        He opened his mouth and immediately tasted hard, sharp plastic. It grated sorely on his tongue, but something else was going on too. Oxygen. Beautiful, clean tasting, oxygen was flowing through the plastic. And the angels rejoiced, Jimmy thought which made no sense whatsoever. He inhaled deeply.

        The gloved hand instantly released his nostrils, and Jimmy saw the face of the woman diver, hovering only a few inches from his own. She was no longer wearing her breathing tube. It was inserted into his mouth instead. The other diver floated beside her. Both of them wore expressions of awe, but what was even more wonderful was their look of compassion. Compassion that the pre-buried-at-sea James McKinsey would have found irritating. Compassion, in his mind, was next of kin to pity. But at this moment their shared sympathy was proof that the world outside of the untamed Atlantic wasn’t an illusion. There was such a thing as sunshine and warmth and there was God. It broke his preconceptions the way a tossed egg breaks on the pavement.

        And the angels rejoiced.

*  *  *

        Jimmy led them back to his mattress and the three of them emerged from the water climbing up his miniaturized version of Mount Everest. The diver’s head mounts illuminated his dingy, little hell hole and for the first time James saw how battered and decayed his surroundings really were. There was all sorts of crap floating in the water, including the body of what was now most certainly Captain Thomas Muer. Jim recognized the signature part in his brown hair, even with his face decomposing in the water.

        Once they were back inside Muer’s cabin the female diver no longer offered her oxygen tube, though Jimmy continued to gesture for it. Both of the divers ignored him, perhaps believing their oxygen supply was unnecessary now that the three of them were in open air. So Jimmy was yet again forced to breathe the harsh, salt-tinged air. Only now that he experienced true oxygen for comparison, the air was nastier than ever before, with evil notes of rotting fish that was thick and almost unbearable. It felt as if he were inhaling the interior of his own moist lungs. Later he would learn that with the high levels of carbon dioxide he had created with every exhale, this was most likely the case.

        The divers spoke to him in squeaky, high pitched voices. Jimmy thought this might be another symptom of his delirium. Their message was comforting enough. He was safe. The horror of struggling to survive on the capsized Bay-Houston towboat was over. They would bring him home.

        The first step would be to get him to a device called the Diving Bell, a chamber used to aid in the treatment of decompression sickness. Because of the compressed air he had been breathing, Jimmy’s blood was similar to that of a carbonated soda, filled with tiny nitrogen bubbles that would cause excruciating pain and possibly even death if they were to burst. The Diving Bell would aid in dissolving those bubbles by ascending in stages. Jim nodded wearily to all of this.

        A third diver arrived with a harness and a breathing helmet. The rescue team were unable to provide him with a proper diving suit due to his enormous size. Jimmy dressed himself feeling as self-conscious as he did when his mother aided him with his clothing when he was five years old.

        “Come on, Jim.”

        Two of the divers had already sunk beneath the waves. The third one stood on Saint James, Mountain of Crap, gesturing for Jim to follow them back into the water. He still spoke with the voice of a cartoon character, a clown’s horn squeak.

        Yet Jimmy hesitated. Despite all the terror he went through, the freezing cold, the oxygen starved air, struggling with madness, he couldn’t quite accept that he was about to depart for a happily ever after. The world in his estimation didn’t work that way. What would happen was that his helmet would malfunction and then he would asphyxiate . . . perhaps only moments away from the so called Diving Bell.

        The world might not work that way, a small voice spoke inside him. But maybe, sometimes . . . God does.

        He sank beneath the waters and the helmet didn’t break. He could breathe. He swam clumsily with the others marveling at his new ability to see underwater, though his surroundings were still dark and murky. In an amazingly short time the divers led him through open water to a large, oval shaped cage. The bottom of the cage contained sea water, but the top interior was completely dry. The other divers had already removed their helmets and were sitting on benches. They smiled at James with encouragement.

        And the angels rejoiced.

*  *  *

        While on the Bell, the other three continued to observe him with interest. Almost as if he were their prize Chrysanthemum, or perhaps a rare and precious jewel. Jimmy was too tired and relieved to care much.

        “How long was I . . . I—I on the boat?” Jimmy stuttered with surprise. His voice also came out as a rodent’s squeak, high pitched and silly sounding.

        The female diver laid a reassuring hand on his shoulder. “It’s the helium,” she squeaked. “That’s what’s giving us chipmunk voices. We’re all breathing a tri-mixture of helium, nitrogen and oxygen. Pure oxygen is too dangerous at a depth of 600 feet. It would compress inside our tanks, and we’d get nitrogen poisoning.”

        “Martini effect.” Another diver’s falsetto voice chimed in. He had a thin, bearded face with a bald head. “But to answer your question, the Houston-Bay sunk three days ago. There was a collision with the CS Angel, a cargo vessel.”

        This news didn’t surprise Jimmy or soothe him. Three days, he thought. Like Jonah in the whale.

        “When all the bodies are accounted for . . .” the woman continued. “We would like you to assist us with the identification.”

        “Couldn’t Monty help you with that? I remember him and another guy escaping through the emergency hatch.” Jimmy wouldn’t tell his rescuers that Monty had locked the hatch door after making their escape. At the moment he didn’t feel anger. To be warm, to be able to breathe, to be among real people that weren’t the product of hallucinations . . . that was enough. It was difficult to believe that at one time he had felt differently.

        Despite Jim’s overall feelings of tolerance towards Monty, a small, grimy part of himself was looking forward to seeing him again. Not that he would ever physically hurt Monty, Oh no. But wouldn’t it be fun to see the fear on Monty’s face when they made eye contact? The acknowledgment? The guilt? Wouldn’t that feel just fine? Wouldn’t that—

        “Montgomery Slongo?” The bearded diver asked.

        “That’s right.”

        “No sir. Montgomery Slongo and Brett Freeman were the first two bodies we’ve found floating miles away from the ship. Most likely they were both swept overboard when the Bay Houston capsized.”

        But Jimmy didn’t hear this last bit. He had already passed out.

*  *  *

        The office room was large, gray and nondescript. Good. What was not so good were those tiny desk-chair combinations that Jimmy hadn’t been able to fit into since high school . . . and even then it had been a challenge. As it was now, it would be like squeezing a watermelon into a wine glass.

        Jimmy sighed. Maybe he could take the Coast Guard test standing up. He picked up one of the forms from the table, along with a number two pencil.

        The examiner who was busy assisting a woman at the back of the room, reacted as if James had picked up a knife. He almost leaped over the heads of the other attendees in his attempt to get to Jimmy’s side.

        “May I help you, Sir?”

        He was youthful in appearance and wore a smile, but his eyes were cautious. Jimmy wondered how many other people he greeted this morning with that same suspicious stare and a, May I help you, Sir?

        “Yeah. I want to take the Coast Guard exam.”

        “Yes sir,” the instructor replied as if there hadn’t been a doubt in his mind. “Any electronic devices on you such as cellphones, tablets or smartwatches?”

        Jimmy shook his head. “I left all that in the car.”

        He led Jimmy to one of those detested desk-chairs.

        “There’s no way I can fit into that.” James struggled to sound patient. It was true that he lost at least fifty pounds since the incident as he referred to it in his mind. Lost it, despite his constant overindulging in food for nearly three straight days. Eating was a painful experience. The skin on his tongue had sloughed off from all the exposure to the salt water despite the fact that he never drank any of it. But he still was a big man. The navy had turned him away yet again due to his weight.

        The instructor studied Jimmy’s face for the first time. “Hey, I know you. Aren’t you that actor guy?”

        “That actor guy?” Jimmy couldn’t help but grin. Once upon a time he thought about a career in acting. But the in-home interview on Good Morning America with his newborn’s insistent wailing that could be heard throughout the entire house, and Lil’ Dude’s sudden on camera announcement that he needed to pee “. . . because my wiener is too full!” changed James’ mind completely. He no longer craved the spotlight.

        “Nah, man. You probably saw me on TV. I’m James McKinsey, the survivor of the Bay-Houston incident.”

        The only survivor of a fourteen man crew. Since the incident four months ago, Jimmy had been amazed at life’s onlys. There had only been enough oxygen for him to survive, just before his rescuers arrived. Another hour and he would have suffocated. There had only been three cans of soda. Just enough to prevent him from dying of dehydration. Even the amount of time he spent buried in the belly of the ship, three days, had a biblical feel to it. Jimmy had never been a church going man, but now he made sure he and his family attended every Sunday service and sometimes on Thursdays for Bible study too.

        The examiner’s expression which had been a forced smile turned into a genuine grin, his gunslinger look now gone. “Goddamn, that’s right! I knew I knew you! How on earth did you survive? I never would have made it. I can tell you that right now.”

        Jimmy continued to smile, but didn’t reply. He’d been asked too many times by too many people to relive the horror of his life for their entertainment. Most, are only interested if I succumbed to cannibalism anyway, he muttered to himself. Instead, he gestured towards the desk-chair.

        “Yeah man, of course.”

        The young man disappeared and came back with an armless, plastic chair. He placed it in front of a long wooden table in the most solemn fashion and almost seemed to bow afterwards. Jimmy was suddenly royalty.

        “So you’re going to join the Coast Guard?”

        “Actually, I was thinking of a captain position for a charter boat,” James said as he sat down. It was a position he now realized he had wanted all along. His love of the sea had not diminished since the incident, the way he feared it just might. And he was grateful for that. Extremely grateful.

        “Wow. A captain? Well good for you Mr. McKinsey. Good for you.”

        The young man scurried away, perhaps aware of his temptation to engage in more frivolous conversation with the examinee. Jimmy was left sitting at his private desk and throne among a sea of desk-chair combos.

        Then he whispered into the open air, to his heart and to his God. “Yep, I think so too.” He bent his head towards the test papers.

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