Girl. Boy. Sea. Read online

  ‘It’s just a dream,’ I said.

  She saw me then and woke slowly. She wriggled her shoulders free of my hands.

  ‘Are you all right?’ I said.

  ‘Oui.’ She sighed. I gave her water. She pulled her cloak over her body and curled into a ball.

  *

  I was in a light sleep, listening to the wind. The boat rocked gently.

  I heard shuffling and opened my eyes a sliver. Aya was sitting, watching me.

  I kept breathing steadily so it would seem I was sleeping.

  She watched me a while, then, quiet as a cat in shadows, moved to the hold.

  She kept checking on me. I sneaked peeks through almost closed lids.

  Aya was kneeling, gazing at something in her lap. Beads of colour lit her face like tiny torches. Sea-blue, night-purple, sun-orange.

  She moved her hands and whatever she held clinked softly, white and twinkling, tiny between her finger and thumb. She held it to the moon and gazed. Then put it down and picked up another. The light shone waves of green onto her face.

  Eventually she wrapped them up, putting them back in the hold and lay down.

  I lay awake, watching wisps of clouds, listening to a faint, welcome wind. Thinking.

  Je m’appelle Aya. A mystery, all right. A keeper of secrets too.

  *

  I woke before her. I opened my notebook, using the shimmering eastern light to see.

  DAY 7

  What was Aya looking at?

  What’s her secret? Or does she have more than one?

  And whatever it is, what can it matter now?

  We’ve got a few tins left.

  ‘You were shouting in the night,’ I said when she woke. ‘A nightmare.’

  ‘Yes. I am okay. It is a new day.’

  We watched stars melt in the light.

  ‘They’re like tiny diamonds,’ I murmured.

  We carried on watching the sky. Because that’s what you do when you’re at sea with hours stretching ahead. You sit, counting stars, noticing the shades of light, as if you’ve never seen them before. The cold night becoming ruby red in the east, then the clean, calm, sky-filling blue of the day.

  ‘It’s beautiful,’ I said.

  ‘We thank Allah for every day.’

  We didn’t speak for a long time then. I was lost in my thoughts, looking at the endlessness above and below. The boat felt tiny. As if it was shrinking. And us with it.

  ‘Only the morning star now,’ said Aya.

  There was one star. Close to the rising sun. It hung stubbornly on the edge of the sky, not giving up its light.

  We sat waiting for planes and boats that didn’t come.

  She asked me about England and my life, things she wanted to know, like how cold it got in winter.

  Before it had been hard to mention those things. Now I did. Speaking made them real again.

  I told her about Christmas trees. She thought it was strange. I told her every detail of a roast dinner. Sweet torture.

  She asked the meaning of words. Or she described things and asked me what the English word was. She repeated them all carefully and wrote some down. Every day, every hour, her English was getting better. My Berber was still useless. She was quicker than me.

  ‘What will you do,’ I said, ‘when we’re rescued?’ It seemed a good way to get her to tell a bit more about where she was from, what she was doing on a boat in the middle of the Atlantic. She’d never said it in so many words, but I thought she had to be a refugee.

  ‘I do not know. Maybe…’ She chewed her lip, frowning. She looked at me sharp, trying to figure out what she could say, whether she could trust me. ‘Maybe I go home. I want to see Sakkina.’

  ‘But you came from home, didn’t you? Isn’t that why you were on your boat?’

  ‘Now it is diff-er-ent.’

  ‘Why?’

  She didn’t answer.

  After an hour of not-talking we got busy with our morning routine, setting up the aman-maker and the tent.

  ‘Before, we see morning star,’ she said, as she hung the cloak over the oar. ‘Thief of the light. Why the morning star shines. You know?’

  ‘Tell me.’

  ‘Later, yes. I will tell this story.’

  xii

  DAY 8

  4 tins.

  One a day from now on.

  I suppose I’d better write that letter.

  Dear Mum and Dad,

  This will seem crazy but the hardest thing is knowing that you are worried about me, when I’m actually okay.

  Well, maybe not okay.

  It’s been more than a week. I know you are out there, somewhere, and I know you’ll be looking. Waiting every day for news.

  And I wish you knew. That I could send you some kind of message. Not even to find me, just to know I’m here.

  I’m alive! Breathing, eating, drinking, burning in the sun. Thinking of you and home. Listening to Aya tell me stories. Perhaps you’ll meet her one day.

  I had to stop. The only way they’d meet Aya is if we were rescued. But this letter was supposed to be in case they didn’t find us. Not when we were alive, anyway.

  And I couldn’t go on.

  I closed the notebook and sat, bracing myself for the heat.

  I wanted to swim. We both did. We looked for the shadow, many times.

  We convinced ourselves it wasn’t there, got ready to swim, then convinced ourselves it was there and sat, suffering, longing for the cool of the water.

  But after many hours I asked myself: what had I seen anyway? Probably a rock, or a large fish. And it had been in the distance, I hadn’t been able to make out any features.

  ‘It could have been anything,’ I said.

  So I pulled myself together and went for a swim. It was precious. Moments of freedom in the quartz-clean sea.

  I stayed close to the boat, treading water. I was weak. It was hard to climb back in.

  Aya did the same.

  When she was in the water I searched the hold, pretending I was fiddling with bottles and tins.

  There was no parcel. No jewels.

  Had they even been jewels? Perhaps I’d dreamed it. Perhaps I imagined it like I’d imagined the shark. I reckoned my mind could easily be playing tricks.

  No, I told myself, I hadn’t. So where were the things I’d seen?

  We ate the last of the fruit, apart from the lemons. I saw a tiny waspy thing flying about. Thin, striped black and yellow. It must have been in the fruit.

  It found the top of a water bottle. It hovered, then settled on the neck.

  I went to swat it. I didn’t want to get stung, or have a bite that might go septic. But then I noticed it was swaying gently. The tiniest movement. It was drinking from a droplet of water.

  I examined it up close, so my eye was right by it. It stayed put.

  Its wings had veins. It had bug eyes and tiny feelers on its head.

  It was beautiful. I didn’t want to kill it.

  xiii

  It was as big as the boat, winding beneath us in slow S shapes.

  ‘What is it?’ I gasped. Fear ran through my skull like an electric current.

  It stopped dead still. It waited as if knowing we’d seen it. Then it moved again. The wind ruffled the sea, the shadow wobbled and stretched. It was blurred, but it was there.

  ‘Shark?’ I said. ‘Whale?’

  Whatever it was, it was big enough to smash the boat.

  I picked up the oar and carefully paddled, hardly dipping the flat end into the water in case the thing rose and took it off me.

  ‘What is?’ Aya whispered.

  ‘If it’s a shark it will move further or faster,’ I panted. ‘If it’s a whale it’ll come up to breathe. All I can see is a shadow moving at the same pace as us and in the same direction…’ I looked up at the sun, down to where it lurked, then back at the sun. I dropped the oar and sat back, laughing.

  ‘What?’ said Aya, alarmed.

  ‘It�
��s our shadow. Maybe we’re in shallow water. We’re spooked by our own shadow.’

  Aya had a good long look in the water.

  ‘Oui. Yes. Ha.’

  Relief washed over me. I laughed some more, I couldn’t stop. Aya joined in.

  But when our laughter melted away I felt empty. Because – weirdly – I was disappointed. Even gutted. Whatever it might have been, it would have been alive. It would have been life.

  ‘Not a shadow,’ Aya shouted. ‘See.’

  It was rising quickly. My gut lurched. I picked up the oar and held it like a club.

  It broke the surface.

  Aya put her hand to her mouth and gasped. ‘Hah.’

  It took seconds for me to see it, to get over the shock.

  A turtle, a metre long. But not as big as the boat after all.

  Its dinosaur head bobbed up and down. Its beaky mouth gaped open and clacked shut. Its shell was mottled; smudged green and black. In the deep it had been a shadow. It had evolved like that. To look like the sea.

  I put the oar down and we watched it swim beside us. I hardly dared move in case it went away. After days of the blue desert, it felt like a miracle.

  ‘It’s not overtaking us,’ I said. ‘That means we must be drifting.’

  The turtle was cruising steadily beside us. We were riding a current we hadn’t known was there.

  I checked the sun. Dead above.

  ‘Well,’ I said, ‘wherever we’re going, we’ve got Mr Turtle with us. Hey, Mr Turtle!’ I dared put a hand out to try to touch it. But with one gentle flip it swam out of reach.

  Aya watched it with beady eyes and an intense frown.

  ‘Amazing, isn’t it?’ I said.

  She nodded. Then she went to the hold and took out the fishing line. She got the knife off the aman-maker. She cut the hook off the line and handed it to me. I wrapped its barbed head in a rip of paper from my notebook and put it in my pocket.

  ‘What are you doing?’ I said.

  ‘You see.’

  She unreeled a good length of line from the spool, tied a loop in it, and threaded the spool through, so she had a lasso. She gave me the lasso, then tied the spool end round the oar. Then we swapped. Sitting on the bench she put her legs over the side, and slid into the water. The turtle vanished.

  ‘You scared it,’ I said. But after a few seconds it surfaced off the bow.

  Aya swam to it. It dived again. Then came up on the other side of the boat.

  This game went on a while, Aya trying to get close, the turtle slipping away.

  ‘What are you doing?’ I said. She put a finger to her lips.

  It came up behind and beneath, and swam beside Aya. It was beautiful to see. Aya’s arms and legs flowing, the turtle’s flippers propelling it slowly along. The two of them in rhythm.

  Minute by minute, Aya was gaining its trust.

  ‘You going to catch it?’ I said. She swam right beside the turtle, putting her hand ahead of it, then dashed away, yanking the loop tight. The line snagged round the turtle’s head and under its flipper.

  The turtle’s head lurched to get free. It dived.

  ‘Pull,’ she said.

  ‘No. It doesn’t like it.’ A good length of line unreeled and slipped steadily off the boat. I grabbed the oar so it wouldn’t get pulled over.

  Aya came to the boat and I helped her climb in, still holding the oar. The line was taut with the turtle trying to escape.

  ‘We should let it go,’ I said.

  ‘No.’

  ‘Why?’

  She took the oar off me and pulled the line back, spun it over and over till the line was tight, then bent forward, reeled in the slack, and sat back. She did it again and again, panting.

  ‘Why?’ I said again.

  ‘Eat.’

  It took a few seconds to take in what she was saying.

  ‘What?’

  ‘I say eat.’

  ‘Aya, we’re not going to kill it!’ I grabbed the oar, holding on so she couldn’t reel in any more.

  We glared at each other. Aya yanked at the oar. I pulled back. She grimaced. She was stubborn, but I was stronger. The turtle was strong too, pulling the oar to the sea. It was a three-way tug of war.

  ‘No,’ I said.

  ‘Oui.’

  Every time she pulled I gripped harder. A total standoff.

  She bent down and dug her teeth into my wrist.

  ‘Ouch!’ I let go. She pulled the line in further. I picked up the knife, and got the line in my other hand.

  ‘Ha!’ I said. ‘Watch this!’ I pushed the blade against the line, ready to cut.

  ‘You want to die?’ she said. ‘You want to die because we have no food?’

  I wanted to cut the line. I tried to, but my hand refused to obey.

  ‘We will eat,’ she said. ‘Like a goat, like a sheep.’ The line was alive with the power of the turtle. It cut into my hand. I pushed the blade to the line again. It would cut easily. I just had to do it.

  ‘We have food,’ I said. ‘A little. And we’ll be rescued soon.’

  ‘We are close to finish the food. You want to die?’ she whispered.

  ‘I am NOT. Going. To kill. A turtle and eat it raw. Do you understand? We’ll be rescued soon… and…’ My voice was hoarse and strained. My hands shook.

  ‘No,’ said Aya. ‘No rescue. Eat or Die. Choose. Allah has given us.’

  I dropped the knife and the line. I crumpled to the floor, my head in my hands, suddenly, massively exhausted.

  I hated myself for dropping the knife. I hated Aya too. For being right.

  *

  I watched Aya struggle.

  Ten minutes? Twenty? Time was nothing in that place.

  If I wanted the turtle to go free all I had to do was wait. Aya didn’t have enough strength. But watching her struggle felt almost as cruel as what she was doing to the turtle.

  Her eyes bulged. Her arms trembled. Every inch she reeled in, she grunted and panted.

  I got myself together. I took the oar from her.

  She collapsed in the bow, taking huge breaths. Sweat ran off her face like rain.

  I copied what Aya had done, pulling the oar tight back, then leaning over so the line slacked, and reeling the oar over and over to take up the line.

  Bit by bit I brought it up, till I saw the shadow, then the turtle.

  When it was next to the boat I gave the oar to Aya and leaped into the water. I got underneath it and pushed up, careful to avoid its rolling claws. Aya got a hand either side of its shell and lifted.

  We huffed and grunted with the effort. The turtle landed in the boat with a thudding clunk.

  Aya helped me climb back in. It was on its back with its flippers swivelling. We knelt either side of it.

  It had been a curious creature. A friend, I’d thought. Now it was something else.

  ‘I wish it was just a fish,’ I said.

  Aya held the blade of the knife and offered me the handle.

  ‘I’ve never killed anything bigger than a fly,’ I said, ‘I can’t do it.’

  ‘I see goat killed,’ she said. ‘Many.’

  She took an empty tin from the hold. She offered the edge to the turtle’s mouth. It bit hard, clamping onto it. She pulled the tin so the turtle’s neck stretched, then put the knife against the flesh.

  I turned away. I heard a soft grating. The exact sound Aya made when she’d acted the execution of the bride.

  I heard a plup in the water.

  ‘Sorry, turtle,’ I said, then retched.

  I heard clunking, and Aya breathing heavily. I looked. She was balancing it on the gunnel, tipping it so blood streamed out of the carcass like a tap. It made red clouds in the water.

  ‘Help now,’ she said.

  And I did.

  We put offal in tins, for bait.

  We put cubes of meat in tins with lemon juice.

  We put meat in tins with salt.

  We put thin strips on the seat to dry.
>
  *

  When we’d done being butchers, she cut some cloth off her cloak. I soaked it in seawater, and we set to mopping up the blood. It had got everywhere. We were murderers covering up our crime.

  I didn’t want to put the blood in the water. But we had no choice.

  I paddled us away.

  Aya took the hook back off me, rethreaded it, and using the knife – being careful not to cut herself – folded over and scrunched up a tin lid. She tied the line round it, near the end.

  ‘The fish will think it is another fish and will chase,’ Aya said. It was a weight too.

  She spooled the other end to the oar. Then took a small piece of turtle meat, and put it on the hook.

  ‘For fish,’ she said, and put it over the side.

  I took the seat plank and used it as a paddle. As we moved, the tin-lid lure spun around. Slowly Aya let out the line… She pulled then released, pulled then released, doing it over and over again, so the line was never still.

  We waited. But nothing happened. Eventually we let it hang in the water.

  ‘Evening is better,’ Aya said.

  We used the knife to clean the shell, scraping the drying threads of turtle from it. It took a lot of effort to clean it totally, but we knew we could store water in it.

  *

  Evening came.

  Aya went to the hold and came back with one of the tins filled with chopped up turtle, doused in lemon juice. She picked out a piece and offered it to me.

  I took it. Something magic had happened. The meat was grey and brown, as if it had been cooked. Aya put a chunk in her mouth. Then another. Meaty juice trickled down her chin. She wiped it off and licked her fingers.

  It seemed horrible. But my mouth was watering.

  I ate the piece she’d given me. Tasted salt and lemon, and chewed the meat. It was like tuna and beef and veal. It was tough to bite at first, but melted quickly.

  It was the most delicious thing I’d ever tasted. Iron juice squeezed from the turtle’s flesh.

  I sucked life out of it, into my flesh and bones.

  We ate more. We ate a lot.

  *

  As it grew dark a fish took the bait.

  We used the oar again. Working fast and pulling it up. The fish was fat and silver, longer than my foot.