Chapter 1 - The storm

 

As the water lapped rhythmically against the hull of the boat, John Armstrong’s gaze drifted out to the horizon, his green eyes holding hope, but there was nothing.  His head dropped and his red hair flopped down in front of his face, hiding any possible emotion, as he held a crudely bandaged hand.

A few meters away sat an older man, who also had red hair but he had hazel eyes.  This man was also searching the horizon for any possible sign of hope, but he too, found nothing.  The man sighed heavily, while rubbing a large bump on his head, and then gave John a worried glance.  The man was deep in thought, with clouds of regret floating through his mind like the boat floated through the water.

Nobody said a word.  The only sounds were that of the water and the wind, playing carelessly against the small boat.  John’s head bobbed slowly like the boat bobbed in the water.  John’s eyes weren’t focusing properly due to the lack of sleep and the intense light radiating from the sun and reflecting off the water.

His head began to droop as sleep began to inevitably wind its powerful essence around John’s heavy eyelids.  The last thing he remembers before the world around him faded was that of his father standing up and searching the horizon again, before heavily sighing and sitting back down.

 

Suddenly it was dark and large, grey clouds swirled into existence right above the boat.  The water, which minutes ago had been so smooth it had a mirror finish, suddenly churned with the sudden existence of the gales, which hit the side of the small boat with a ferocious howl.

John’s father had been in the front section of the boat, the bow, fishing, but with the existence of the sudden storm, the rod had been pulled from his grasp by the waves of the sea, and had gone under the water, disappearing so suddenly, John’s father hadn’t even had time to react.

“What in the blazes is going on?” John’s father tried to scream at John, but the brutal winds blew the question away, along side the hat that had been sitting upon John’s father’s head seconds before

John had been sitting on the floor, trying to put more bait on his rod.  When the first wave had hit, he had slipped and put the hook through the side of his right hand, pain screamed through his mind, but he managed to subdue it.  When his father had attempted to scream at him, he had been trying to open the first aid kit, which he had found in a compartment under a seat.

The boat lurched backwards as it began to climb up a large wave that was easily large enough to bring a large boat down to the depths of the ocean.  John’s father spun around to find himself staring at a sheer wall of water, which the boat began to steadily climb.  The boat was almost vertical, going straight up a wave about twenty meters high.  John’s father’s eyes filled with dread as he saw the peak of the wave slowly curl and he realised they wouldn’t make it unless the boat picked up speed a little.

He had been holding on to the side of the boat so gravity wouldn’t pull him back towards earth.  John’s father let go and he began to fall back.  Using his body weight he spun around to see the back of the boat racing towards him, the only thing between him and the water was a ski pole that protruded out just before the large motor. He had been in the bow riding section of the boat, but now he was flying through the gap in the windscreen.  John’s father’s arm shot out and grabbed the drivers seat as he flew past, instantly jolting him to a halt but shooting pain through his arm.  The pain was ignored as he tried to climb into the seat, the climax of the wave was getting closer, but the curl was getting larger with each passing second.

John’s father finally made it into the seat, he keyed the ignition and hit the throttle.  The large, two-hundred horse power engine roared into life and the propeller churned the water below the boat.  The force of the acceleration pushed John’s father further back in his seat.  The boat sped up the side of the wave.  The peak of the wave had fully curled over and was now crashing down towards the boat.  John’s father shut his eyes and drew in what could be his last breath.  John was on the floor of the boat, holding onto the first aid kit with one hand and trying to get a good handhold with the other.  The boat hit the curl of the large wave.  All hell broke loose.

The boat shuddered with the force of the wave, sending John into the air, spiraling back to earth, but luckily grabbing the ski pole, but unluckily with the hand that had a fishing hook through it.  John screamed in pain, but did not let go as the boat’s hull sliced through the remainder of the wave.

John’s father had remained in the chair, and his eyes had remained shut until he heard John’s scream.  He shot a glance back to see John hanging onto the ski pole and then looked around to see the boat run out of wave.

The other side of the wave just disappeared beneath the boat and the small ship, with both crewmembers on board, went air born.

The boat seemed to fly for a few seconds before the inevitable grasp of gravity began to pull them back to Earth.  John’s injured hand couldn’t handle the pain anymore, John’s willpower couldn’t fight it and he let go.  John’s father eyes widened as he realised the size of the drop beneath them.  The boat fell.

Twenty meters is a long way to fall, for any object, but for a two ton boat, it seems like an eternity.  John’s father still hadn’t let his breath go as he shot a glance back to John.  Or where John had been.

Twenty meters also seems like an eternity for a falling person.  John was hurtling above the boat and the distance between them was increasing.  His instincts kicked into gear and he knew that if he wanted to survive, he had to miss the boat.  He tried to lean forwards like skydivers do, but twenty meters wasn’t enough for him to move from above the boat.

The boat slammed into the water with such ferocity, John’s father shot forwards and his head slammed into the steering wheel, knocking him unconscious instantly.

John crashed into the canopy of the boat, tearing a large hole in it, before falling to the floor.  John slowly raised his head.  His vision slowly began to fade as unconsciousness took hold, before he too, lost awareness of his surroundings and the world died away.

 

John slowly awoke to the sun beating down on his face.  His mind seemed foggy at first, but slowly his mind pieced itself back together.  The freak storm had been a dream, but it wasn’t really a dream.  It was the memories of two nights ago replaying through his head like a video.

John moved to a shadier spot on the boat, trying to avoid his father, before falling back to sleep.  The video continued to play.

 

John walked in through the front door, dropping his bag by the door, before making his way to the kitchen.  His father, Greg, was home already, which was a rare occasion. Very rare.

John entered from the hallway to the kitchen to find his father chopping up vegetables.

“You making dinner?” John asked.

“Yeah?” his father answered in the form of a question.

“Well, you just haven’t ever made dinner before,” John commented, “Ever.”

“Yeah. Well, I haven’t been spending as much time as I should have since…well…since she died.  I’ve been so busy with work and trying to keep a roof above our heads and today I realised that you’re turning fifteen next week.  I haven’t spent one whole day with you since you were five.  That’s a whole decade I’ve missed of you and…” tears started to form in Greg’s eyes as he spoke.  Greg couldn’t think of what to say next.  The unfinished sentence seemed to seep into John’s mind uneasily.  It was true, he hadn’t seen much of his father in the past ten years, but why was it suddenly different?

 

John woke up again, this time it was because his father had yelled out in pain because he had moved his arm in the wrong direction.  It was still sore from when he had grabbed onto the chair.  John looked grumpily at his father and his father looked apologetically at John.  John closed his eyes and a minute later he was asleep again.

 

“I’ve won a boat,” Greg confessed.

“So…you want to spend a day with me now, for the first time in a decade, because you’ve won a boat?”  John asked.

“Well, I thought it was a good opportunity to get out, just you and me. So how ‘bout it? A fishing trip?” asked Greg, while he continued to chop up capsicum.

“I’ve never fished before,” John said.

“Now’s the perfect opportunity.  I’ve already cancelled work for this weekend,” Greg mentioned.

“Okay…?” John queried.

“Good, it’s settled then.”

“Wha…?”

“You better start packing now, if you want to be ready in time for this weekend.”

“It’s Tuesday…”

“Weren’t you the slowest packer ever?”

“I was…about seven years ago,” John finished.  He turned on his heals and walked out of the kitchen, leaving his father speechless behind him.

 

John was having the most restless sleep ever, he kept on waking up.  This time it was because the wind had blown on the torn canopy a little too hard.

What frustrated John even more was that his father had nodded off and he was now snoring.  John stood up and moved to the other end of the boat, the bow, grabbing a towel on the way there.  He then sat down in the sun and tossed the towel over him so he wouldn’t get hot or sun burnt.  He closed his eyes underneath the towel and was asleep almost instantly.

 

John slowly came to consciousness.  His hand was throbbing.  His eyes slowly opened while he turned his head to look at his hand.  The hook in his hand had turned for the worst during the storm and it had been slowly bleeding for what seemed like hours, judging by the puddle of blood on the carpeted boat floor from which John slowly rose.

The storm had blown over as though it had never existed.  The only signs of it ever existing were a torn canopy, an unconscious father and an injured hand.  Something didn’t seem right.  John couldn’t quite figure out what it was, but it was like a thorn in the side of his mind, slowly digging deeper, becoming more painful to those who can not find it.

John’s eyes scanned the environment, looking for the first-aid kit.  His eyes did not find the first-aid kit, but landed on the smashed remains of a small electronic device.

 

A gust suddenly blew the towel off John, who woke with a start. He was getting frustrated, he’d been woken up so many times now.  He picked up the towel and tossed it over him again.  Sleep didn’t seem as interested in him.  John lay strewn across the seat, trying to get to sleep again. A long time passed before he fell back to the unreal world.

 

John was in his room, gathering items and placing them on his unmade bed.  He left his room to return a few minutes holding a towel, which he chucked onto his small pile.  He was upset with his father because he had to cancel his plans this weekend with Jennifer, his girlfriend.

He was considering what else he should bring when his father entered the room holding a small gadget in his hand.

“Hey kid, look what I got for the boat trip,” said Greg.

“What is it?” John unenthusiastically asked.

“It’s a GPS system,” Greg answered.

“Ah…that’s…good,” John murmured halfheartedly.  Greg continued to stand in the doorway, nodding slowly. “Is that all you wanted?” John queried.

“Oh, yes,” Greg replied before shuffling out the door.

There was suddenly a loud thud.  The world started spiraling out of control before John was pulled out of his room, into reality.

 

John’s eyes shot open.  His was breathing heavily and his face was covered in cold sweat.  He looked around him.  He was trying to work out where the thud had materialized from, it hadn’t been apart of his dream.  Greg was still snoring in the driver’s seat and there was no movement other than the boat floating through the water aimlessly.  John decided it must’ve been part of his dream and tried to go back to sleep again.

 

The small electronic device had been the GPS and it had been smashed during the storm when John had landed on it when he fell out of the sky.

When John had seen it, he realised what the thorn was.  His father sat unconscious in the driver seat, with a large bump on his forehead.  So who did that leave to navigate the boat?  John bolted upright, shooting glances in every direction.  There was nothing.

Another thud echoed through his mind and was pulled, yet again, into the real world.

 

Now John knew there was something wrong. He rose from his seat wearily.  About three hours of sleep was all he had gotten and he was tempted to sit down again and go back to the video of his troubled reminiscences.  John prowled around the boat looking for the possible source of the commotion.  He found nothing.

John slowly made his way back to the front of the boat, trying to keep his father slumbering.  John picked the towel off the ground once again, sat down and tossed it over him.  Sleep was almost instant.

 

The gauge read empty.  Greg sat in the corner, hands over his head, silently weeping to himself.  John had argued with him about the whole trip.  John had screamed about his plans with Jennifer, Greg not planning well enough and anything else that had come to mind at the time.  Greg had said that they would’ve been dead already if it weren’t for him.  He then bragged how he had fallen a few meters into the drivers seat, gunned the engine and beat the twenty meter wave.  John then mentioned slyly that him gunning the engine was the reason they now floated out in the middle of the ocean without any fuel.

“Well, how was I supposed to know we were about to both be knocked unconscious?!” Greg had retaliated.

“You should have put some containers of fuel in the compartment under the floor!”

“You shouldn’t have landed on the GPS, we would’ve known exactly where we are right now if it weren’t for you!”

“Like I could’ve helped that!”

“Like I could’ve helped being knocked unconscious!” Greg finished.  Silence.  Nobody spoke.  The only noise was the water lapping rhythmically against the hull of the small boat.  John’s gaze drifted out to the horizon, his green eyes holding hope, but there was nothing.  His head dropped down and his red hair flopped down in front of his face, hiding any possible emotion, as he held a crudely bandaged hand.

 

John bolted upright yet again.  The sound of the thud still fresh in his ears.  He knew where the noise had come from now, but he didn’t understand how it had happened.  John stood up from his seat and vigilantly made his way to the far front of the boat and leaned over the side, where the noise had come from.  The boat continued to float into something.

John couldn’t make out anything in the water.  All he could see was dark, salty water.  The boat thudded again and suddenly John could see the cause.  His eyes widened in shock.  Greg slowly began to come round.  John turned around, took two steps, and grabbed his father by the arm.

Greg’s eyes shot open and he was suddenly alert.  He looked up into John’s eyes questioningly.  John just looked back with eyes filled with shock, before John pulled his father up to the front boat.

“What’s going on?” Greg questioned.  John opened his mouth to talk, but found himself speechless.  Greg didn’t make a sound.

Silence.

Thud.

“What was that?” Greg asked.  John just stood there, mouth open, eyes wide, slowly shaking his head.

He then jumped off the boat.

Author's Note

I am going to rewrite this entirely, so any grammatical or spelling errors will be void, it's just the idea i want to get out there.

Reviews

[Rhayne]

Awsome! I was there. All kinds of thoughts going through my head, considering the title and events thus far. Very interested to know what the 'thud' is that enticed him to jump off the boat. I'll definitely stayed tuned.

[Xhia-mora]

that was just beautiful...I love how to set up the mood...that was a really nice hook...keep it up!

[nostal]

Nice.

[Andromeda]

youre very talented at setting the mood in your writing, pulling the reader in. keep up the good work!