Lapis

For the record, this is NOT a complete work. This is only part of what will someday be a complete novel, and the first in a series of anywhere from four to ten novels.





Lapis

Noah Franz





For the struggles mankind faces every day – I pity you, though I am beside you.





I had never expected this to happen. It was all so perfect. So absolutely perfect. I had a family – My beautiful wife, Rosie, my son, only thirteen, Sam Jr., and my wonderful little daughter of seven, Bailey. I didn’t deserve them. But then, I didn’t deserve this either. I am Sam Thompson the First. I lived in France, in a little sea-side town called Fecamp. It was 1938, and it was the worst day of my life.

         Or so I thought.



         February 13th, 1938.          



Chapter 1

Brass Coin

         



I can’t believe it. Dad’s suspicions are true. It’s all true. The war, the Nazis, everything. Mom is still pretending that nothing is happening, but even Bailey is starting to see through her  assurance that all is well. If anyone finds this diary after what will soon, as I am sure, become a war, please make it public. It’s going to record some amazing events.

         Well, on a more normal note, I got beat up again. Stupid Carl. I hate him so much. I don’t care what Mom says about that - I hate them all. All his crazy little friends. I know I can never let that show, though that’s why I’m writing, isn’t it. Silly thing, writing to yourself in a diary… I just need to spout. Otherwise, I might explode. These teen hormones are really getting to me. One moment, I feel so oppressed, and the next, I’m free as a bird. But then, how much more normal can you get?

         Bailey is still blissfully unaware of everything, as usual, but I can sense that as her age ripens, her understanding does, too. But for now, her innocence will bless her. I on the other hand, though I am by no means all-knowing, do know too much. I understand too much. I wish I could be oblivious. I don’t belong here. Maybe that’s why I get beat up. I don’t belong.



         I got up from my shabby little wooden desk. Had I heard Mom calling? I don’t know. Better check it out. I crossed my pathetic excuse for a room. I seriously needed more space. But I understood that Dad was struggling to make ends meet. But somehow, it was always just enough. And Mom- I could never find anything to blame her for.

I paused to think, and caught myself staring at my peeling door. The paint had worn off years ago, so now it was to the rotting wood stage. But somehow, if it were any different, I wouldn’t have liked it. It was my door. I had always grown up with that door. It opened with the same creak-groan that I had always grown up with. Growing up…

         On my way to the kitchen, where I was sure Mom was, I passed the small bathroom on the right side of the hall. The door was open, and so I saw a grimy reflection in the mirror on the opposite wall. Sure, it had been cleaned with the classic sporadic washing that comes with living in a house, but it was always inevitably dirty.

         Wow. Five years ago, I would never have recognized the face that I now saw every day. The head with the black, shaggy hair streaming down at least four or five inches. I seriously needed to get it cut. And my face. My cheekbones were textbook normal. Lips full, but not overly so.  Eyes were the same shocking blue that they’d always been. My nose was buttoned, and as my mom always said, cuter than possible. My body was lanky, but had a fluid movement to it, as if I had practiced walking down that hall the night before. Other than that, I had all the clichéd features of a normal thirteen-year-old -zits and all.

          I passed the bathroom, and Bailey’s even-smaller room, and continued to pace down the hall. Down the stairs. Creak, creak, creak, creak. I memorized each creak years before, and so I vocally mimicked them as I stepped on them. If it weren’t so infantile, it would have almost been ungrateful, how well I knew those squeaks. I counted all thirteen. I could’ve navigated this entire house blind, deaf, and drunk. I knew every crevice, every hiding spot, every paint-peel, every smooth surface, every dust mote settled onto the stairs, every single grain of wheat that was dropped onto the floor from every meal I’ve ever eaten. It was the intimate knowledge that goes with growing up in the same house.

         “Junior!” Mom shouted, though not harshly. I definitely heard her this time.

         “Coming!” I shouted back. I didn’t even think about saying that. Just another natural response to years of the same thing. But it was nice repetition. Something that warmed your heart when you thought back on it. Some small, seemingly insignificant detail that kept you going during a war – a war that I could foresee...

I quickened my pace. I had long since passed the stairs, turned the corner past my parent’s room, and into the living room. My Dad’s chair was standing there, valiant as ever in its slightly squishy greened leather. His figure had lined it so many times that it had indented itself into the contour of the chair. That always made me smile. Now that I think about it, I really don’t know why. The fireplace was still the same red-bricked, washed-out color, blackened with all-too-familiar years of use, though it had recently fallen out of that use for some unknown reason. My mom’s chair, on the other hand, was an old wooden rocking chair with a small cushion tied on both back-corners to the posts on the back of the chair, its little frayed tassels clutching the posts for dear life. 

         Once again, I quickened my pace, though not overly so. Past the living room, into the hallway adjacent to the kitchen. I could see the glow of a light in the small kitchenette as I turned the next corner. It silhouetted everything onto the opposite wall. I saw a figure walk past, warmly projecting the graceful elegance of what could only be my mother onto the opposite wall.

         “Mom?”

         “Come on, honey. Are you gonna eat? You must be starved!” She said, sensing me creeping down the hall.

         “Yeah. I guess I am pretty hungry.” Huh, I guess I hadn’t eaten in a while…

         “That’s it.” She said, coaxing me into the kitchen. I had always been notoriously shy with the way I ate. I don’t know why, either. It was just one of those psychotic things that everyone has. I walked into the little kitchen, though not without ignoring the foreign over-cleanliness that had never been there before. Mom was beaming, and glanced upward as I sat down. Her mysteriously curly hair, red as a sunset over the perfectly straight horizon of the Atlantic, was short, and so she usually had it in an impossibly tight bun. But now, it was down, like it was sometimes when she was at home. Her thin form was the same as ever – the body frame I associated with one word – Mother. She was short, but in a sort of loving, classic mother way.

          Mystified, I looked up. There was a big copper coin on the counter by the refrigerator.

         “Happy Birthday, Sam,” She said. I gasped. It was my birthday already. Fourteen! Gulp. Another year completely gone.

         “Wow. Keep it up, and you’ll have to remind me to breathe in a few years,” I mumbled, referring to me forgetting that it was my own birthday. I had always been that way – seeing the big picture but ignoring all the details. She chuckled at my statement, though there was still the repressed undertone of the sadness that had settled in over the past year or so. “Thanks, Mom.”

         She shifted her weight uncomfortably. “Sorry I didn’t get you a cake, but you know how we need all the money we can get.”

         “Oh, no. I completely understand. Thanks, Mom. I know…” I started. That’s when the tears came. Not from me. “Hey… hey… Mom,” I cradled her as she sat down next to me. She did this every now and then, and I seemed to be the only person that could calm her. I had long ago grown taller than her, and so her head fell on my shoulders less awkwardly. In fact, it almost seemed as if my mother’s head belonged on my shoulders. But that was a place for my dad.

         She wept softly for the next few minutes, leaving a good-sized tear stain on my shirt. I liked that, though, for some odd reason. I loved this – being able to soothe my Mom. I guess I had that effect on most people. Except maybe Carl, my personal middle-school bully.

         “Hey… hey… it’s okay. What’s going on?” My words were sincere.

         “I’m so sorry, Sam. I’m so very sorry. I can’t do anything right. Ever since I stopped working to take care of you two, things have been so hard…”

         “Hey. If you wouldn’t have, then I’d have turned out a snotty, bratty kid. You’ve done nothing but right by me, Mom.” I said, calming her further. There was a slight pause, followed by several sniffles in quick succession.

         “Oh, Sam…” She started, tears renewed. “I keep fearing that your father’s been laid off from work. Everything’s going to get just that much harder if he has been. We might have to consider some terrible things just to make it through.”

         “It’ll be fine. If I need to do a little more around the house, that’s fine by me.” I said. I loved being chivalrous – the feeling it gave me was indescribable. “Love you, Mom.”

         “Love you, too, Sam. You always come through for me.”

         “Thanks, Mom.”

         I got up once she did, which took another five minutes, or so. I forgot about eating, and about the small coin that she had gotten me, but it was all so inconsequential. I didn’t really care about that. All I cared about was my family at this point. I crept back down the dark hall, from the kitchen into the living room, which was now dark. I hadn’t realized it, but my mother had been sitting in my lap for longer than it felt. I had watched the sun settle into the horizon through the small, red-and-white chequered curtains, snuggling himself below the covers of the seemingly infinite ocean.

         Through the living room I stepped in the darkness. If I had not known my home so intimately, I would have tripped or run into something at least a dozen times trying to get to my room, but as it was, I knew it so perfectly well that I made it through the house in the pitch dark of what was 11:42 at night. My room beckoned me, its fingers seizing me, reaching for my consciousness.

         Had it not been for the darkness, though, I would have noticed a letter from my father that was on my desk. Sleep glistened on my eyes, and soon took hold, though not before the thoughts of the world consumed my mind with worry. I was only thirteen (or now, fourteen), but that didn’t stop me from perceiving much around me – most of which was beyond my immediate concern.



Chapter 2

Letters and Tears





His eyes were now deeper than the ocean floor, immeasurably blue, but sparkled like sunlight reflecting off the water. His skin was wet. So very wet. His hair was, too. His skin was blue, and very cold. But it felt very natural. His vision blurred, but before losing all sense of vision, he glimpsed blood, red and shining on that beach, staining its pale, white shores. Blood, everywhere.  Even his hands. But not his own blood... Gone. Gone. Gone. Down. Down. Down. Grey consumed all, including smell and sound. It was a curious feeling, being able to smell and hear grey. But it was possible, apparently. He could even feel the grey. It was very oppressive. And stifling. And tingly. He didn’t like it. Suddenly, all his hairs, from his head to his feet, stood up on end. Shivers of energy, most likely electricity, he guessed, were surging through him in immeasurable voltage. But it didn’t hurt. It simply happened. And he let it. Then it was done. He was spent. The ending of the Grey was surprising to him. All of a sudden, the clouds of what were now mist parted, and behind a shred of vapor, he saw his sister. She resembled him, now. But she was also impossibly different. Her eyes flashed with lightning, and her hair was blowing around her face, and was surging downward in waves of electricity, yet it looked very natural. She looked less like a six-year-old girl, though, and more like a goddess, or maybe a nightmare. But she was still his sister. She saw him, and instantly, an air-ripping scream tore through the vaporous air. Whether it came from her, or from him, or from some other throat, he never got the chance to know, because a force began pressing in on his chest, more and more by the second. The clouds receded further, until a dark, desolate landscape stretched before them, and so they were both now standing on solid ground, instead of floating on seemingly solidified storm cloud. Fire ravaged this new environment, and was spewed from its every orifice.  Storm-Bailey was now on the ground, unconscious, with blood spewing from her abdomen. But he couldn’t move! Couldn’t help her! Couldn’t hold her! He could only stare as her life-force seeped from her wound with increasing imminence. The heat from this landscape was almost deafening, for indeed, he could feel its heat in his ears, crushing them to a pulp. And the heat kept rising, as did the fires strewn throughout, in addition to the swelling, broiling fear that now gripped him in a vice.



~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~



         “AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!” was the only sound I could wrench from my lips as I woke. I knew it was a dream, but it just kept coming! I’m sure that if I hadn’t been screaming into my pillow, the dirty mirror in front of my desk would have shattered from the sound. However, my hard feather pillow still wasn’t soft enough to stifle my scream to the point that it didn’t wake everyone in the entire house. My mom was the first one through my paint-peeled doorframe, still in her nightgown. Immediately following was Dad, who had recently been on a business trip, so I hadn’t seen him in days. Following shortly was Bailey, still rubbing crust out of her wide eyes, of which I stared at most profusely. She gave me a weird look, so I forcibly shifted my vision to Mom, who still had an expression of shock on her face. My dad had already turned his countenance into one of calm and cool, though it still hinted at concern. I didn’t really know what to say, so I lay there in bed, mouth agape, staring at my mother. I knew what was coming. It happened every time. I didn’t have nightmares often, but when they did happen, it was the classic parental treatment. I didn’t want to this time, though. I couldn’t really explain why. This, right here, happened quite a lot, nowadays. Inexplicable feelings now seemed commonplace. I didn’t want to, but I knew it was coming.

         “Honey?” Mom crooned ever-softly.

         “It’s okay. Just a nightmare.” I said, holding back the tears that had been in their ducts since before I had even woken up. It was evident that this dream was a whammy, because by reading the expression on my mother’s face, I could read my own. “Really, Mom. I’m fine.” I said, trying to persuade them to go back to bed. My mind didn’t have enough energy in it to make up a dream that would explain my reaction without all the death and destruction. I just couldn’t. “Please. Just go back to bed.”

I didn’t want to tell them that I didn’t want to talk about it, because that would’ve just made the probability that they would force it out of me, in spite, even greater. To my utter disbelief, all I got from Mom was another soul-piercing stare before giving into the blur of sleep deprivation.          

“Goodnight, Sam.” was all that Dad said to me, which was weird, because he only called me by my first name on extremely rare occasions. As he turned to walk back to his room, he motioned ever-subtly to the letter on my desk with his muggy blue eyes. My own darted to it. He left the room, leaving Bailey. She gave me another confused look, and then drifted back to her own room as if she had become a zombie. The lights in the hallway went dark, and I saw no more of her or anyone until morning. I was still in bed, my mind racing, when I pried my body from it, my sweaty figure still clinging to the sheets. I walked on over to my oaken desk with purpose, and studied the document on it, though I refused to touch it. I flicked on the small lamp light, which cascaded shadows onto everything, making it seem as if light came from everywhere, and the lamp was actually what was emitting the darkness. I could see in plain cursive the return address, though I didn’t recognize it. I did, however, recognize who it was by. Ian Rase. My dad’s old business partner. I had only met him once, but he seemed like a decent man.













Ian Rase                                                                                                                                               

19845 St. Claire Blvd.

Paris, France 75008





Samuel Thompson the First

1609 Atlantique St.

Fecamp, France 75012



Dear Sam,

         I hope you are aware, as many of us, as citizens of France, are, that there is very soon to be a war. While I cannot save all of us, I can play a small role in saving some children. I have my own ship, a small but resourceful crew, and the ability to take three hundred forty-eight children to America. If you are concerned as I am, I hope you will send yours to safety as soon as time allows. Give Rosie my regards. I deeply apologize for this imminent future, and for however it may turn out. I have known for some time that something big was coming. Now it has. The children of France need me, as your children need you. If you wish to see them to safety, meet me at the harbor in Fecamp by the sixteenth of February, by five o’ clock in the morning. Discretion is of the essence, so tell no one unnecessarily. Jr. and Bailey are lucky to have a father like you.

My deepest condolences,

Ian Rase

         

“What?” was all I could manage. I stared at the letter forever, though not reading it again once. By the time forever was over, there were wet blotches on the fresh, white sheet of paper that had radically changed my life. I needed to go back to bed. I had school tomorrow. Actually, it was only a few hours away. I could already see the faint color difference between where the sun was going to come up and where it wasn’t outside my window. The mountain hiker was back to conquer the sky once more. People were already lighting their fireplaces to warm their homes, because when you looked out over the village, all you could see were billowing silhouettes painting the sky in vertical streaks. Most people up at this time were probably adults – mothers getting ready to wake their children so they could ready for school, and fathers who were getting ready to go to work, most of whom were fisherman, masons, and of other common jobs.

         After I had gotten back into bed, I lay there for another round of eternity. By the time it was over, the sun was already peaking behind the curtains, showering me in dazzling rays of balmy sunlight. For a moment, it looked familiar, as if it reminded me of someone, but I couldn’t recall ever seeing someone who looked like the sun.

As soon as I walked out of the house to go to school, my deprived body told my mind that I was tired. Throughout the entire day at school, my teacher was constantly hitting my slouching wrists with a stick because I was drifting off into sleep, mainly during Math. It was rather creepy, how she paced up and down the aisles of scrawled-upon desks, as if she were some sort of military drill-sergeant. As usual, Carl and his friends stuck around afterwards to throw my books onto the rain-soaked cobblestone street, as well as my body. I actually didn’t understand how he could govern the rest of his little “friend” the way he did – it puzzles me to this day. Most of them were fat, unhappy little kids who just sided with him because he was an athlete, and was “popular” with the girls, if you could call it that. He couldn’t see it, but everyone, including all his friends, despised him.

After I had gotten back on my feet, he started taunting me. Now usually, he just stuck to physically bullying, but today, it was social. It was intellectual. This is where I could compete.

He made the first move, and I countered beautifully. He didn’t appreciate a slur against his mother, though, so he took to beating my head against the side of a butcher’s shop. I took it vigilantly, but I still had the urge to sock him in the nose once I got the chance to get headed home.

My roughly worn shoes clopped through the rain of the previous night valiantly, of which I had completely ignored, making them awfully dirty and in need of a good scrubbing.

As I walked into the door – that portal into my home- my mother instantly commented on my black eye. She then went immediately to the freezer and got a frozen steak. She pressed it up against my purple-pink eye, as if I couldn’t hold it there myself. Her expression became one of shock and anger. I guess the maternal bond that linked her to me made it inevitable for her to want to kill someone who wanted to kill me.

“Those kids…” She uttered, rage consuming the rest of her sentence.

“Please, Mom. They don’t know any better.”

“Yes they do! If you did something like that to someone else, what do you think I would do? Yet their parents do nothing! I’m tempted to give Mrs. Fuehler a piece of my mind!”

“Mom, just please don’t make it anything more than that. I don’t want to wake up tomorrow with the realization that the kid-who-beats-me-up-every-day’s mom just got smacked upside the head with a frying pan by my own. I’d be a laughingstock. And besides, do you really think Carl would deliberately tell his mother that he beat someone up? Even he’s not that stupid.”

“Honey, if you were a mother, you would understand. As soon as you’re able, I’m taking you over to that brat Carlisle’s and I’m going to… I’m not sure yet. But it’ll be something fitting!”

I knew she wasn’t serious, but the thought of that still made me shudder. I started walking back to my room to do my homework, all of which I had no idea how to do, owing to the sleep that I had obtained eight hours late. Then I paused. “Hey Mom, did Dad show you a letter?”

All she did was look at me. It was the first time I had thought about it all day, except the morning. It was obvious she knew about it. That was why she was so sad yesterday. There was a pause, and then she exhaled.

“I don’t want to talk about it.”

I understood. I chose my words carefully.

“When were you planning on telling me?” It was a statement full of conviction. It wasn’t accusatory or scornful, just one of hurt and confusion. She didn’t respond. I assumed that she didn’t know how, so with a hurt expression, I slowly turned and trudged up to my bedroom. The letter was gone when I got there, and I was glad for it. But at the same time, a deep spring of sorrow started to bubble up from the pit of my stomach, and soon there was a lump in my throat, my eyes were blurring with tears, and my head was resting on a once-more tear-stained pillow. It started raining again, and kept on raining until I drifted off to sleep sometime around eight. I didn’t see Bailey, Dad, or even Mom at all during that time of in-between asleep and awake. Something about me didn’t want to, either. I woke up the next day at about eight o’ clock, but lacked the will to get out of bed. Thank God it was Saturday.

I went in-and-out of consciousness for the next few hours, and every dream was slurred into the next, until just a conglomerate story started to take shape between them all – they were too many to count. The first real thing I remember was the fact that today was the last day. Upon realizing that, I shook out of bed with shivers running down my spine. How could I have been so selfish?

I almost literally ran out of my bed I got out so fast. I tore through the house, though why, I still can’t figure out. It was rainy again that day, but there seemed to be lots of activity in the house. Bailey was running down the hall adjacent to the kitchen, wailing and flailing her arms madly, Mom racing after her. Must’ve just told her…

I wondered where Dad was.

I was still running through the house for only God knows what reason when I saw Dad for the first time since the nightmare. I stopped immediately. He was sitting in his classic green recliner, facing away from me, probably reading the newspaper. It was remarkable how normal this last day seemed. I guess everyone just wanted to treat this like any other day, making the normal days last as long as possible. But this day should’ve been far from normal. I hadn’t even packed yet, and midnight was only half a day away. I didn’t know what to say, so I didn’t. I simply walked up the back of the chair, and paused. He was definitely awake, and I could tell by the way his eyes weren’t moving from left to right that he wasn’t reading the newspaper that he held in front of him like a prop. His eyes seemed a million miles away. Tears had also recently been in his eyes. I doubt he would have noticed me if I had ripped the newspaper out of his hands. But something else was being ripped out right now, too. Something he would never get back. I almost got his attention, but didn’t. Instead, I moseyed back over to my room, where I started packing. I took hours, not being able to decide what I wanted to take with me. I didn’t really have that many material possessions, but I was still at a loss. Blue or green corduroy pants? Red or white t-shirt? But I could only fit so much in that small suitcase. By the time it was eight o’clock, my mom slowly walked through my creaking door. So many tears…

“Sam? Hey…”

“Oh, hey.”

There were no words after that. She simply sat down next to me on the bed that I would never sleep in again – the bed I had slept in for so many years. I internally fought with myself over what to say. I decided that the best response was no response. Slowly, somberly, I put my arms around her, and, unlike yesterday, my head went on her shoulders. We stayed this way for a long time. Then dad walked through the door. Instead of commenting the way I thought he would, he simply added to the weight on the bed by sitting on the other side of mom and wrapping his arm around her. Bailey loped in, her expression confused. She had never seen any of us like this before, so like I knew she would, she asked why we were all gathered on my bed, crying. She gave me in particular a weird look, so Mom got up and went out with her, most likely to help her pack. It was just me and Dad then. We looked at each other, and then suddenly, inexplicably, I got angry.



         “Why Dad? Why? Why?! Why why why?”  I said, wanting to beat my arms against his shoulder like I was four years old again.

“Sam. You know why. I know you know…”

“I know why! But I don’t want to know why!”

There was another pause – one that had taken to settling over us recently. I hated those pauses. Hated them with a passion. They were tearing us apart.

He got up after a while. I took to watching my clock, sitting on my creaky, uncomfortable bed.

9:00

10:00

Sob

11:00

Bailey walked in, unexpectedly late. She was usually such an early-bird.

“Hey, Sammie. Whatcha doin’?”

“Oh, I dunno. Just sitting and thinking.”

“Well, that’s boring.”

“I don’t have anything better to do.”

“… Me neither.”

“Well, you could go to bed.”

“I did already. But I can’t sleep. Mom packed for me, but I still don’t get what we’re packing for. Are we visiting Gramma and Grampa?”

“Maybe. I don’t know.” I lied, not wanting to make her upset. “We haven’t seen them in a while.”

“Well, why is everyone crying?”

“Mom misses grandma and grandpa. We all do.”

“Oh. I guess that makes sense…” She said to me absently, pondering why we had such dramatic reactions to something that, in her eyes, at least, seemed rather unimportant. After being picturesquely contemplative for a few more moments, she got bored and nonchalantly flipped off the bed, warranting a cacophony of squeaks, and loped out of my room in proper six-year-old-girl fashion. My eyes drifted back to my clock.

12:00

1:00

Sleep

4:00

“Sam. It’s time.”

I immediately started sobbing.

   

Chapter 3

Goodbye Forever. Hello, Eternity.



         Unbelievably, those first few minutes seemed to stretch into the next year. I wiped the gristly sand from my eyes in one technical swipe, but my fingers lingered on my incandescently blue eyes for eternity, their residue leaking onto my pillow. I looked up using only my eyes – my body wouldn’t move. It knew that it would never touch these sheets, this bed, these floorboards, these stairs, these stair railings, this carpet, this fireplace, this leather chair, this laminate flooring, these floors, this doorframe, these cobblestone streets, ever again. And yet they did. And then they were gone.

I found myself looking at a harbor. It wasn’t scary or malevolent in anyway, and yet I was scared of it. But mostly, I was scared of the ship, bigger than any other I had ever seen before. I was scared of this girl, stepping onto it. This boy, my own age, saying goodbye to his mother. That family, waving their hands. And then I found myself heading it the boat’s direction. I knew I had already said goodbye when I had previously thought that it was just an awkward silence in between sentences. When I had nothing else to say. When they sat on my bed and cried. Yes, I had already said goodbye. But I hadn’t said it. Not really.

“Mom?”

Silence. She had such a nothing expression on her face. I knew she was blocking it out. Because if she weren’t, the entire city would know. It was still moderately dark outside, but the hinting sun have just enough light for me to see my father’s expression. I had never seen him cry before.

“Daddy? Why are you crying? Mommy?!”

By this time, I was holding Bailey’s hand. She was squeezing so hard. I was, too.

“Daddy?” Her voice started breaking. Then mom exploded. In a rain of kisses, I barely managed to breathe. But then, I was hugging her so hard, I doubt she could breathe either. She held us forever. We spun. We danced by the ship to take us away. When she let go, I embraced my father. We had been distanced lately, mostly because he was working 24/7. But that didn’t matter. It was short. But it meant so much. Bailey came scurrying up and hugged her daddy one last time. We found ourselves with our backs to the ship, our parents facing us. We were holding each other, arms wrapped around each other’s shoulders. Realistically, Bailey’s hand only came up to my wait, and I had to stoop a bit to reach her shoulder, but this was the stance that we took afterwards.

With my eyes, I memorized each line, each soon-to-be-wrinkle, every grey hair, every black one, every red one, and every other thing. I’m sure they were, too. I wanted to say so much, and my lips were moving, or rather, trembling, as was my body, but I let nothing come out. This was a time for silence.

When our eyes had finally said goodbye, we turned, and making our first steps together, Bailey and I set foot on the ramp. The first was the hardest. The second was almost as hard. The third wasn’t much better. Ever so gradually, they came easier, but certainly not faster. We didn’t hold up the line to get on, though, because there were hundreds of other kids doing exactly the same thing. So much tragedy. We stepped through the big metal frame, hands still choking each other, and were greeted with unpleasantly cool air and dark, dampness. We walked further, and it began to be illuminated by artificial-blue fluorescent lights. The cool air lessened, or we got used to it, and our shoes rang out light church bells on the hollow iron of the Nightingale. Immediately, we passes dozens of rooms, all crammed with children, most still tearing, unpacking their crammed suitcases. There weren’t going to be enough beds.

We kept walking, and deck by deck we crept, looking for any vacancy whatsoever. When we had gotten to the third deck, we scored a room with only two other kids in it. One was my age, and he was a sight to behold. He must’ve been in miserable condition before being on the boat, because he looked as if he hadn’t bathed in months, though that was the case for the average child on this boat, so it made no difference to me. He glanced at me and Bailey with a look of, at first, disgust, which changed into awkwardness, and then almost politeness. He would be hard work.

The next was a girl about Bailey’s age, maybe a little older. She was so dainty, so clean, so proper, it made my eyes water. It was a sicky-sweet combination of pink frill and a curly mess of golden-brown curls. She looked at me with more passive rebellion and snobby rich-kid glare than hearty welcome. Then she glanced at Bailey, and her glare intensified.

I said nothing. Instead, we unpacked, and thankfully, we each brought a blanket and pillow. Looked like we’d be sleeping on rock solid metal. Great.

It was still pretty early in the morning, and I had just stirred from fitful sleep, when I had the most insane craving for scrambled eggs.

“Hey, James.” I whispered, though I really don’t know why.  “Do you know if there’s anything to eat around here?”

“Why’re you asking me? Do I LOOK like I know where food is?”

He did look pretty skinny. And uncommunicative. Not to mention grumpy.

“Sheesh. I was just asking.”

Silence. I envied him for his bed, but I got up and left the room, anyway. I figured on a ship full of other sleeping children, Bailey was safe enough asleep.

I started my trek through the ship, and ended in the same place I began. There were no crew to speak of in any place within sight. Taking the rusted metal stairs to a higher level, I reached another long-ago painted-white deck consisting of two adjacent aisles of rooms, much like the setup of a hotel, though it wasn’t even anything close to the grandeur of one. I went up another level on a nearby flight. Sunlight. Finally.

Wow. LOTS of sunlight. More than any I had ever seen. Yet it was so cold. I had always grown up in a very grey, rainy town, and was used to the ocean being on one side of me. Now, everywhere I looked off of the side of the ship, was the familiar water. From here, France was just a strip a millimeter high. On this deck, all there was were incompetent-looking seamen, with a single thing on their minds. They didn’t know what I was looking for. And even if they did, they were somehow intimidating, and I probably wouldn’t have asked them anyway. Other than the crew, there were only a handful of younger kids, all huddled together in another part of what I now realized was the poop deck. I looked around again, just to be sure. The sea breeze caught me off guard, as well as the subtle rocking of the boat, as if shaken by a lethargic sea monster. I wrapped my arms around my body unconsciously, and started walking back down below deck.

That’s when I spotted James. He was running as if he had just robbed a jewelry store. But there was no theatrical toothy-grin smile that I had always imagined robbers to have after they had just stolen something. No. It was serious. I started running, too. I ran back down two decks, my breath catching up with me, by them, making my lungs crush inward painfully. Oh, jeez. I forgot which room I was in. And I could’ve sworn someone was chasing me. I started frantically opening and closing previously shut doors, disturbing sleeping children, though luckily, all were asleep, and so my face wasn’t seen as they rubbed sand from their eyes. This must’ve been around 9:00. I could tell by the direction the sun was at in the sky back above deck. They needed to get up, anyways. I fancied myself as their hotel wake-up call. I searched door by door until at last I found my own room. Shutting it conspicuously inconspicuously dramatically, I walked into the room nonchalantly.

“Work on your ‘quiet’ skills, retard.”

“Excuse me?”

“Do you want to get caught above decks?”

“What are you talking about?”

“Everyone knows we’re not supposed to draw any attention. Gah”

“…What?...”

“Oh my God! Of all the idiots on this ship, why did fate decide to sick you on me?!”

I was so confused… Soooo, I got a little defensive. “Okay. First of all, I have NO idea what you’re talking about. Second, this is so STUPID! And third, if you’re just gonna bash me, then stuff it, because I really don’t feel like hearing your voice if all that comes out of it is goo goo ga ga!”

He just glared. And I shrunk. Why did I get the feeling that this guy, despite the fact that he was a twig, could be the living crap out of me?

“Seriously. If you guys have all this pent-up anger, just skip the noise and get straight onto beating each other up somewhere I can’t hear. Gah!”

We both turned, and I felt myself glaring. I had never been this angry before. The sicky-sweet pink frilly girl stood her ground valiantly, and though I wasn’t about to hit her or anything, a desire to remained.

“Look who’s talking, sugar queen. Forget to brush your hair after getting up from your beauty sleep?”

Her hair did look like she had slept on it wet. She immediately blushed, and started glaring at herself in the makeshift vanity she had created from a massive collection of small mirrors she had somehow attached to the wall, madly trying to tame her mop of wild curls. I smirked, despite my attempts not to. So did he. Then he looked at me, and underneath the anger, there was a feeling of understood camaraderie.  He shook his head an unceremoniously flung himself onto his (probably flea- ridden) bed.

All there was in that room was a circular window and a fluorescent- blue light that looked like it would give out any second.