Page 12 of Shipwrecked

I tear my eyes away from the horror ahead to scowl at him. “I’m serious.”

“Careful, Jules. Don’t get tangled in the line,” Cillian says.

“Merde,” Mathieu curses. “Is that a tornado?”

“Everyone inside!” Seán cries from the cockpit. His warning reaches us at the same time as a wall of wind.

Several things happen at once. Mathieu falls into the sail, and a tie comes loose. I fall onto the other side of the sail, onto a mass of ropes. Cillian collides with the winch, walloping his hip but keeping his feet. Everyone else hits the deck.

The yacht rises sharply at the front, and everyone slides towards the railing. A tearing sound fills the air. I catch a split-second glimpse of the tarp on the top level being ripped away. People call out, but their voices are swallowed by the howling wind.

It goes dark.

The ship levels, then dips the other way. The huge wave washes past us. The wind dies.

“Everyone inside!” Cillian shouts. He lunges for Mary, who is precariously close to falling beneath the rail into the ocean. I scramble to Mathieu, helping him to his feet. We take a step, and I’m yanked back, as if someone snatched hold of my shirt.

“Ow.” I try to move forward again, but can’t.

“Jules?” Mathieu tugs on me.

“I’m stuck.” I twist. There’s a tangle of rope leading to my back. “There’s something caught on the harness.”

“Jules,” Cillian calls. Another wall of wind strikes us. The loosened sail catches and fills, then it rips free of the remaining straps, and shoots up, whistling.

When I was ten, I was in a car crash. My seat belt locked in the collision, winding me and leaving a band of bruises across my chest. Deep breaths pinched for a solid month.

It feels like I’m sitting in the car at the moment of impact, seat belt constricting. The harness pulls tight. My head whips forward with my limbs. I’m ripped off my feet. The boat disappears beneath me as I fly up with the sail, ascending at terrifying speed.

Winded, I can’t scream.

The winch line goes taut, jerking the sail and me to a stop. I whip around uncontrollably, dangling from where I’m caught on the back of my harness. I breathe through gaspy, panicked sobs. The air is thin and insubstantial. My neck is on fire.

Far below me, the yacht is advancing into a storm of dark clouds. The ocean is black. Large swells advance on the boat like rolling hills. The wind roars. Any second now, the sail is going to fold in. I’ll fall and die.

I twist, trying to get a hold of the lines. If I can reach them, I can hold on if the tangle comes loose. It’s impossible. Whether from panic or cold air, my hands are numb.

Weaponised rain strikes me. I cover my face and absorb the hits on my forearms. I think of my dead parents. Of my friends. Of how hard I worked in college and all the places where I’ve applied for jobs. And I think about Darren giving the eulogy at my funeral. He was bossy and annoying. He was always trying to be optimistic about everything, and it was such a huge pain.

I’ll be forgotten in a year, as if I never existed. And I know it’s true, because I rarely think about my parents. Even when I think about that car accident, it’s the way the belt felt against my chest that I remember.

Chapter Five

Cillian

Don’t come loose don’t come loose don’t come loose don’t come loose don’t come loose don’t come loose don’t come loose don’t come loose don’t come loose don’t come loose don’t come loose don’t come loose don’t come loose don’t come loose don’t come loose don’t come loose don’t come loose don’t come loose don’t come loose.

He’s fifty feet up. It feels like a mile. I promised I’d keep him lower than the others.

The winch creaks, the mount shaking as the machine struggles to pull the sail back in. One more powerful gust and the bolts will shear. The sail will fly loose, Jules with it. It’s either a miracle that the line hasn’t snapped already or a testament to good equipment—never have I been more grateful for Seán’s attention to detail.

Except when he misses an entire storm.

But I saw the weather report too. A tiny blip. A little cluster of winds at midday, and the rest of the day was predicted sunny, hot, and calm. We waited until well after lunch to be sure we were in the clear.

“What do we do?” Mathieu shouts to be heard over the storm. He clutches my arm as we climb a huge swell.

“Get inside!” The downpour has plastered Mathieu’s golden curls to his head. He wipes ineffectually at his bangs to clear his vision, feet failing to find steady purchase on the slick boards. Water washes over the deck, threatening to sweep our feet from under us. If someone goes overboard, Seán won’t be able to turn around. Swells this high could roll the yacht. “I need to focus on getting him down, not on keeping you from slipping. In. Now.”