“Yes!” Andrew had hooked something. His rod was almost doubled over, and Mack could see the strain in his arm as he braced the pole and cranked the reel.
“Can you tell what you’ve got?”
“No, but it’s big.”
Mack hoped it was not a cow-nosed ray. They were prolific in the river and its tributaries, sometimes schooling so thick that you could almost cross the river striding along their backs. But they were not as tasty as other rays. Lots of meat, but it was both tough and bitter, not sweet like the faux scallops cut from stingrays or manta rays or shark. On the other hand, like many potential food sources that they had declined in the past, Mack knew they might need to find a way to tenderize and “sweeten” the meat. Anything edible in a time of shortage had to be reconsidered.
“Woohoo!” Andrew danced a soft jig on the bow. “Flounder! A huge flounder! Must be close to ten pounds.”
This Mack had to see. Andrew was stretching the flounder on the foredeck and had pulled his knife to sever the spinal cord and main artery, a quick way to dispatch the fish. What a monster. The fish was more than two feet long and looked to be more than four inches thick. He had never seen such a flounder.
“Well, son. That’ll make a fine meal to celebrate our first night at sea.”
“Mom! Look what I caught.” Andrew held the flounder at arm’s length, The muscular strain obvious and his grin irrepressible. He carried the fish aft where Matty waited with a broiling pan half the size she needed. No sooner had Andrew placed the fish in the pan than the flounder almost flapped its way out.
“What the…? I know I killed it. I’m positive.”
“Yep, you probably did, Andrew, but fish still have a nervous system that can make them jumpy even after they die. Surprised you, huh?” Susan and Mack chuckled as the kids nervously shook off their shock. Andrew’s defensive protest had been unnecessary. Almost every fish Mack had ever killed had flopped vigorously as if alive within the first ten minutes after they were “dead”.
“Let’s cut this monster into filets. We’ll put most in the freezer, bake what we’re eating tonight and grill the head and spine so we can extract the cheeks and the meat near the fins and along the bones. This one must have cheeks big enough for hamburger rolls.”
As the sun dropped below the horizon and invited a star-dusted night sky, the family sat in silence in the cockpit and enjoyed a glass of wine. The seventies slogan “Today is the first day of the rest of your life” rolled through Susan’s brain. It was a declaration of hope. But she found it hard to embrace hope fully. All of them had already given up so much to get to this day. They accepted the trade-off with a sense of contentment if not satisfaction. Their other options were less desirable.
Frogs sang a rousing cacophony on shore, invisible but noisy in a pleasant way. Not a melody or a symphony, but a chorus of species unity. Except for the Milky Way, there was not a single light in sight.
“What next Dad?”
“I don’t know. We have three simple but challenging objectives or guidelines, however you want to think of them. First and foremost will be safety. Much of the time this will mean keeping a low profile by finding places people are not. Second, we have a daily need for water whether from the sky or fresh water creeks, if we can find them. We will depend on the weather in large part since so few of the creeks that flow into the river are fresh. Most are brackish at best. Last, but certainly not least, food. We have ample stores, but we will need to supplement what we have with fresh food, fresh meat. Fish like tonight will be ideal, but we may tire of it. If we can find a secure anchorage like we have tonight, we might venture ashore to hunt or trap.”
“Think we can get a chicken sometime?”
“Sadly, maybe only if we steal it. Some may have gone feral, but I don’t count on it.”
“Seriously? Steal?”
“Folks, we have entered a new world unlike any that modern man has faced in nearly a hundred years, at least in America. When the potato famine struck Ireland, people died or emigrated in hope of finding work and food. We cannot emigrate anywhere since all countries closed their borders to try to block the spread of the virus. We must think in terms of self-sufficiency and survival. There are no rules any longer, and we must anticipate others are operating with the same expectation unless we can establish otherwise. But my first thought when we intersect with other people will always henceforth be that they are trying to survive just as we are.”
“What about collaborating with others? More heads, more hands, share the burden of providing for a community rather than tackle all of it on our own.”
“I wish I believed that others will embrace that ethic as we would like to. But it is dangerous for us to expect help or sharing, no matter what strangers might say. It will be a long time before we can let down our guard. A long time. Groups of people, even small groups, will be even more unpredictable and potentially dangerous since we will be outnumbered and will not know their honest intentions. Starvation can twist the best of people. Self-preservation may be humans’ most hardened trait. How preservation carries over to family is very close.
“Look, we are in a safe place with a beautiful night surrounding us. We had a fine meal and a chance to relax after a hard month of readying the boat. Let’s try to enjoy this respite. I’ll take the first watch and wake your mother if I get sleepy.”
“I didn’t know we’d have to keep watch. But I am exhausted. I’ll have no trouble sleeping.”
“Me either Andrew. Dad, you can wake any of us if you need us.”
“Don’t worry, I will if I need you, but I think this should be a quiet night. Get your sleep.”
As the others settled into their cabins, Mack reclined on the seat cushions in the cockpit, content to watch the night sky for passing planes (if any), satellites, and shooting stars. Because of the utter silence surrounding them, he knew he would hear the proverbial mouse fart if anything moved nearby. No lights were visible, no vehicles traveling the farm roads. Some of the frogs continued trilling ashore. Their silence would be warning enough. He tried to run lists of what they had and what they might need, what they had planned and what might need planning, but his mind was too fatigued to make the effort. He lay still and relaxed under the tranquility of infinite space lit by the distant dust of stars and galaxies, comforted by the gentle motion of the boat.
Mack woke to the dim gray of dawn well before the sun peaked over the horizon. The stars had begun to thin as if smothered by haze while accenting Mars, Venus, and Jupiter. Something woke me? He listened and heard nothing, waited and still heard no interruption to the hush of the river. He eased onto his elbows to search the perimeter of their new world. A fragile veil of fog screened the shore and floated above the river, but Mack could still see the spartina grass and pines sharply reflected in the unmoving water. Still, he worried that it had been a specific sound that stirred him. Yet, he could see nothing amiss.
He stood up and searched the area again. A couple of ducks winged upstream, no doubt heading for the cornfields ashore. Their wings whispered as they flew past, an ephemeral, almost mystical sound. Suddenly, forward of the bow, he heard a distinct “whoosh’, the sound of air forcibly expelled. Looking where he thought the noise originated, Mack saw a faint line of ripples on the slick surface. “Whoosh.” And he zeroed in quickly enough to see the dolphin’s fin slip under the river. He smiled, tempted to wake the others, but the sun had yet to rise, and everyone needed whatever sleep they could enjoy. Another long day lay ahead of them. By the time the sound was abreast of the boat, Mack could see a pod of dolphins lazily swimming back out to the Neuse, a bigger river with more fish. He did not believe in omens but liked the notion that there might be good omens, and dolphins were at the top of his list along with hawks and owls. Whales made the list too, but he had only seen one in his lifetime, in the Windward Passage off the west coast of Haiti.
Easing down the companionway steps, Mack slipped into the galley, clicked on the propane safety switch and lit a burner for tea. Unfortunately, the fresh water pump is mounted under the saloon settee and makes a racket when it pressurizes as it did when he filled the kettle. With the sun below the horizon, the cabin remained dark, and no one stirred. Having poured his tea, Mack climbed back into the cockpit, pulled on a sweatshirt and settled against the cushions to enjoy the waking of the wild. Kingfishers, with their oversized heads and beaks and perky crests, darted excitedly up and down the shore screaming their high-pitched rattle. They always seem alarmed. Seagulls began to swirl overhead, white wings capturing the glimmer of the rising sun, looking for schools of baitfish to flash in the dark river water below. A lone screech owl swooped from the top of a pine, silent as still air. A fish broke water nearby. Tarpon, drum, seatrout?
Mack noted their position and weather conditions in the ship’s log. Just the facts. No poetic commentary. He kept a separate journal for personal thoughts and notes.
From upriver, a droning hum of an outboard engine approached. Mack pulled the binoculars from where they hung beside the wheel. A solitary man in jeans, jacket, and a stained ragged ballcap stood at the stern of a large skiff speeding down the calm river. He had to have noticed Requiem, but he did not alter course or speed. Probably just a hardworking fisherman heading out to set his gill nets. He seemed to ignore Requiem, but Mack’s view of who was a potential threat and when had changed. As a small crew alone on a boat, the family could not afford to assume other people would be well-intentioned. Too many people had exhausted their resources. Hunger had spread much the way the virus had, from the few to the many. As he closed on their boat, Mack gave a terse wave more neutral acknowledgement than friendly invitation. No response.
“Andrew. Wake up. Grab the shotgun, and be sure it’s loaded,” Mack hissed more than spoke into the saloon.
He could hear Andrew scrambling around the cabin, pulling on a shirt and retrieving the shotgun from its locker. Then Mack heard the sequential clicks as Andrew pushed shells into the magazine. Five. Good. He looked up from the companionway ready to pass the gun up.
“Just stand by a second. I want to see what this guy does. If anything.” Andrew rubbed his eyes, blinking them to focus, the barrel pointed down.
As the skiff came past, Mack made a small nod and lifted his mug to which the fisherman returned a two finger salute without lifting his hand from his wheel. All was good. No threat. But this was going to be hard. Friend or foe? How would they know before it was too late to defend themselves? Mack knew they would learn to read people, but this was a novel skill and one that might come dearly if any of the four dropped their guard at the wrong time.
“No worries. Sorry to wake you so abruptly.”
“Should I unload the gun now?”
“Yeah, for sure. We will need to rehearse our readiness, but not today.”
Everyone in the family had handled guns before, mostly the twenty gauge and a few rounds with the pistol. So all knew the basics of firearm safety. What none of them had learned were the tactics of personal defense with a firearm. Target shooting is not an effective substitute for knowing how to use a gun to defend yourself. Better move that up the priority list before we needed to be proficient, Mack thought to himself.
Susan joined Mack topside. “You okay?”
“Fine.” His reply was terse.
“Did seeing a stranger on the river make you nervous?”
“Only as much as it should. We cannot take other people for granted. If we do not know them, we cannot know their intentions, and we have to be vigilant until we can assess the risk, if any.”
“Seems to me that, if we are friendly and not a threat, they will reciprocate.”
“Good people will. But we can’t expect to encounter only good people. The government has left too many people with too few resources to care for their families. No jobs, limited food on the grocery shelves, and what is there is expensive, out of the reach of a family only collecting a meager unemployment check or no check at all. Hard to create a greater threat than forcing a man to watch his family with hunger. I agree we should avoid treating others as a threat unless we have reason to be defensive. But we will never have unlimited time to make that judgment. We’ll discuss all of this as a family to be sure we are unified. It would be awful to hurt an innocent person, but it would be just as tragic to lose one of you because one of us hesitated when we needed to act.”
To himself he thought, many people may see us as a floating food barge. Why else would we have the confidence to live on a boat independent of land-based stores and resources? One answer is that we were fearful and desperate, but the suspicious would assume we had goods they wanted. They would not need evidence. Simply board our boat and demand that we provide.