The Light
The intensive sailing was exhausting but invigorating as well. Jack and Bowie became quite adept at handling the vessel and were on the fast track to becoming old salts. But despite their sailing abilities, two weeks was nowhere near enough time to adequately train novice sailors to travel across open ocean. That fact alone should have been enough to keep Jack in a perpetual state of anxiety. Yet, to his own disbelief and credit, he also felt more comfortable in his own skin than he had ever felt before.
On the morning marking the end of their second week in Maine, Jack awoke later than usual and went out to the kitchen where Bowie was cooking up steak and eggs.
“Good mornin’, sleepy head,” said Bowie.
“Mornin’. Hey, is Gram up yet?” asked Jack.
“Haven’t seen her yet this morning.”
“Hmmm, that’s odd. She’s always up before we are. I’m going to check on her.” Jack headed upstairs to her room.
He knocked on her bedroom door. No response. “Gram?” he called out, then knocked again. After what happened to his mother, he feared the worse. Jack mustered up the nerve to open the door. What he saw was even more shocking. “Bowie, get up here!”
Hearing the distress is Jack’s voice, Bowie turned off the stove and ran upstairs to Devova’s room. “What is it?” Jack opened the door wider so Bowie could see.
Devova was lying on her double bed, surrounded by a chrysalis of gently pulsing white light. Jack and Bowie approached the bed cautiously. She was breathing shallowly and appeared to be sleeping. As if sensing their presence, she opened her eyes.
“Gram, are you okay? What’s happening?” asked Jack. “Should we pull you out?”
“No!” said Gram forcefully which immediately weakened her. “The transmutation has begun. It will take much longer though without the auroris to channel the energy.”
Jack was confused. “Auroris? What are you taking about?”
“Never mind,” she dismissed. “Are you both ready?”
“We’re as ready as we’ll ever be but we’re not leaving you like this!” asserted Jack.
“You have to!” she retorted.
“Gram, we need to get you to a hospital,” said Bowie. “Though I don’t think they’ll have a lot of experience with, um, whatever this is.”
“Boys, this is not something that needs to be cured. It has to be this way and it’s why I can’t go with you. You both have to get on the Atlantis Pearl and set sail for those coordinates. Time is of the essence and if you waste any more of it, all this will be for naught.”
“I’m not leaving you like this!” insisted Jack.
Gram softened her tone. “Jack, listen to me, what’s happening is necessary for what you and Bowie have to do. Please trust me.”
Jack cringed at the word “trust.” Trust had lead him to abandoning his home, traveling across the country and training to sail across the ocean to a destination given to him by a shell! But while he had some serious doubts about everything, instinct told him he was doing the right thing.
“Can we do anything for you before we leave?” asked Jack.
Gram smiled, “You’ve already done it.”
Bowie was deeply saddened by leaving her. He had grown quite fond of Gram Devova in the short time they had spent together. “Are you in any pain?” he asked.
Gram Devova smiled. “Not at all.”
Jack’s mind turned to the journey ahead. If they survived the trip, and the odds were highly against that happening, he had no idea what they would find once they arrived at the coordinates or what would happen next, if anything.
The only consolation was that he was doing it with Bowie. Fate had brought them together for better or worse. Whatever other thoughts or concerns he had, he’d have to bracket them off for a while because there was a task in front of him that required his total focus.
“We’ll go now,” said Jack. A look of great relief came over Gram’s face. “Good-bye, Gram.”
“Good-bye, Jack,” she said. She closed her eyes but opened them quickly remembering something. Take it,” she motioned toward the pea-coat draped over a rocking chair. Jack pulled the coat off the back of the chair and put it on. It was made from heavy wool and hung awkwardly on his small frame.
“Don’t worry,” she said. “You’ll quickly grow into it.”
“She turned to Bowie and spoke to him for the last time, “Cha d’dhùin doras nach d’fhosgail doras.”
“Aye!” replied Bowie. He bowed slightly then waited outside in the hallway for Jack.
Jack looked at Gram Devova with conflicted feelings. He still didn’t know what to make of her or of everything that had happened since she appeared in his life. “Gram, I just want you to know that I don’t blame you for what happened to Mom. She lost faith in you and what you believed and she had every reason to be skeptical. But she didn’t have to take the path she did. It was her choice.”
Gram’s eyes teared up. “Thank you, Jack. I appreciate that more than you know.”
“It’s the truth,” said Jack. “But I still miss her.”
“I do, too,” said Gram. “Jack, be true to yourself. It seems obvious, but it is no small thing. To be yourself takes great courage. It’s in you.”
There were a million more things to say but no words left to say them. Gram Devova closed her eyes and gently chanted:
Ging-de-lot-dot-de-dig
Fung-hey-dey-lot-de-dot-dora
Shung-gonna-fot-te-zing
Fong-bay-te-le-dot-de-vova
Grare-te-lot-don-fu-te
Ang-wan-bay-la-taun-vay-fuega
Lom-gonna-zot-she-tang
Gome-ply-werti-som-sot-sora
Jack never got around to asking her the significance of the chant, but it stuck in his head like a dream. He closed the door behind himself as he exited the room, never to see Gram Devova again.
“I’ll start loading the supplies while you double-check the navigation charts,” said Bowie.
“Good idea,” said Jack as they headed down the stairs. “Hey Bowie, what did she say to you up there?”
“‘Cha d’dhùin doras nach d’fhosgail doras.’ It’s Gaelic for ‘No door ever closed, but another opened.’”
***
Mild seas and light winds graced the initial leg of their maritime journey. They each took four-hour shifts at the helm while the other performed routine maintenance, prepared food or slept. They saw incredible things at sea, a rich and diverse abundance of birds, turtles, whales, dolphins, sharks and other fish. It was an awesome experience being out in the middle of the ocean under the power of the wind on a relatively small boat. To entertain themselves, they sang songs, staged pirate battles and even made music videos with Jack’s iPad.
Using his great grandfather’s compass, Jack became an expert navigator, skillfully plotting their course and tracking their position. A week into their journey, he realized they’d be cutting it close per the time and date given by the shell. They had no Plan B, so Plan A had to work!
The seas were relatively calm at daybreak of June 21st but a light drizzle began to fall, hinting of tumultuous weather ahead. Within an hour, the wind picked up considerably. Jack had an uneasy feeling gnawing away at the pit of his stomach. “I don’t like the look of that sky.” He pointed to a vast expanse of billowing black clouds closing in at a brisk pace.
“How much further to our destination?” asked Bowie.
“At our current rate of speed, we have about three and a half hours to go. That only gives us a twenty-minute window to find whatever we’re supposed to find at the coordinates from the shell. The heading though is taking us right into the middle of that mess coming our way. Jack looked very concerned. “If we hit strong headwinds, we may fall behind.”
“What if we arrive late?” asked Bowie.
“The shell didn’t go into details,” said Jack. Doubt began to set in for him. Being stuck in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean with few provisions left, an ominous storm quickly approaching, the only directions coming from a shell and the only guidance coming from his estranged grandmother was starting to chip away at his beliefs. Even more burdensome was the fact that he was putting his best friend’s life in jeopardy. Yes, it was Bowie’s choice to come but it was still Jack’s responsibility. Jack could accept whatever his fate was but to drag Bowie into this? He couldn’t forgive himself if something tragic happened. Of course, he probably wouldn’t be around himself to lament it.
The impending doom looming didn’t appear to phase Bowie in the slightest. “Well, at least we haven’t been attacked by a giant squid yet.”
“It’s still early,” quipped Jack. “I suppose there’s no turning back now, giant squid or not.”
“That’s the spirit! Stuck in the middle of the ocean headin’ into who-knows-what, a huge storm ahead, little hope of being rescued and the likelihood of survival slim, there’s only one thing left to do.”
“What’s that?” asked Jack.
“Make nachos.”
Jack straightened up like a soldier. “Commence making of nachos.”
“Aye, Captain!” Bowie about-faced to go below deck and make nachos.
“Bowie?” Jack called out. Bowie turned to face his friend. Jack’s eyes were serious and filled with fear, but mixed in was a steely determination and courage. “Better grab the wet-weather gear while you’re down there.” Bowie knew from Jack’s expression they were in serious trouble, but he also believed if anyone could get them through this, it was his best friend. He trusted Jack as much as he trusted himself, maybe more. He believed in Jack and sometimes that belief in someone can move mountains. Whether it could navigate treacherous seas was another matter.
Two hours passed and the light drizzle graduated into a veritable downpour. The wind picked up significantly and the swells with it, but nothing they hadn’t been through before sailing with Gram Devova off the coast of Maine. Into the third hour, things got ugly.
The fifty-five-foot vessel suddenly felt minuscule to the junior seamen. Being tossed up and down twenty-foot sea-sick-inducing swells, the nachos didn’t seem like such a good idea in retrospect but the impending threat of the storm took their minds off the potential threat of making chum for the fish. Wearing his grandfather’s pea-coat with the cuffs rolled up, Jack held the wheel steady while Bowie battened down the hatches and adjusted the sails. They did their best but there was no substitute for experience—experience neither of them had.
A thirty-foot wave nearly crashed full-force onto the starboard bow of the Atlantis Pearl. Jack’s quick-thinking of turning straight into the wave saved the vessel from getting capsized, though the force of the impact broke the front mass clean off the bow and into the water.
Bowie yelled over the deafening wind, “Easy, cowboy! We’ve only got one sail left!”
“You think?” Jack shot back.
Another wave broke quicker than Jack anticipated, pounding him and Bowie hard into the deck. The chart table was swept overboard, along with the charts which bore their course.
“GPS is offline and those charts were our only other means of pinpointing our destination!” exclaimed Jack.
“You took a heading five minutes ago,” said Bowie. “Just head into the wind a bit. Eyeball it. We can’t be that far from the destination and we’ve only got fifteen minutes to go.”
“That’s actually a good idea,” said Jack.
“I’ve been known to have those from time to time,” retorted Bowie.
“And your timing couldn’t be better.” Jack smiled as a blast of salty wash filled his mouth.
“Hey, no water breaks until we’re out of this,” jested Bowie. Jack spit out the salt water and adjusted their course three degrees northeast.
The Atlantis Pearl took pounding after pounding. Jack held the course as steady as possible, timing the waves as best he could to minimize the impact. With a little over ten minutes to go, Bowie caught a flash of something in the distance. Was it another ship or a ray of sunlight that found its way through a pinpoint opening in the clouds? He couldn’t be sure. “Jack! Look over there! I see something!” Bowie pointed toward the source.
Jack momentarily took his hands of the wheel to foil his eyes from the piercing ocean spray. It was no illusion. There was something there, a light or beacon of some sort gently pulsating amidst the storm. Without the charts, Jack couldn’t tell if the light was emanating from their destination but intuition told him it was. “We’re heading to it. If that’s what we’re supposed to find, then we have seven minutes to get there. We should be good. Just a few—” before Jack could finish his thought, the wind shifted abruptly pushing the vessel sideways. The wheel spun out of control. Jack couldn’t figure out how to stop it without ripping his arms off.
Bowie grabbed the gaff hook and rammed it between the spokes. The pole handle bent hard but stopped the wheel, toppling Bowie over in a summersault. “Are you alright?” yelled Jack.
“Never better!” replied Bowie.
Jack struggled to remove the bent pole from the wheel. It was jammed solid. A large wave hovered ominously. Their starboard side was totally exposed. If they couldn’t turn into the wave, they were finished.
Bowie jumped up, stumbled a bit and then worked with Jack to remove the pole handle. They yanked it out of the wheel but it was too late. The thirty-five-foot wave pummeled the yacht’s flank hurling Jack and Bowie overboard and capsizing the vessel. They plunged into the frigid ocean but the buoyancy of their life jackets propelled them to the surface. The yacht was about ten feet away and sinking fast. Exhausted beyond belief and coughing up sea water, the boys were at their ropes’ end. “Rope!” Jack suddenly remembered. “We’re tied to the yacht!”
“What do you mean?” Bowie could barely focus.
“We’re tethered to the boat! The safety line!” Jack’s fingers were numb from the bitterly cold water but he went to work on Bowie’s line first. He felt the carabiner connector but couldn’t close his fingers around it to release the clasp.
“Get yours off first!” insisted Bowie, but Jack ignored him. The boat started to go under and dragged the two boys down with it. Three feet, five feet, his ears were screaming from the pressure but Jack wouldn’t give up. He mustered all of his strength and whatever remaining heat he could find in his body and mentally channeled it to his hands. He pulled on the clasp and released Bowie from the watery grave. Jack looked up at his friend rose toward the surface. He suddenly felt warm inside as if every worry had suddenly dissolved. Bowie would survive, he just knew it. And he could die knowing that he hadn’t let his friend down. Jack closed his eyes and waited for the abyss to consume him.
A strong grip caught hold of Jack’s wrist. It was Bowie, sans lift jacket, holding Jack with one hand and reaching for Jack’s ankle with the other to grab the knife he had given him for his birthday. He unsheathed the blade and sliced at the rope cinched around Jack’s waist. On the first swipe, he cut a few threads—the second swipe, a few more. On the third swipe, he caught the rope just right and severed the line completely. Jack was out of air but kicked as hard as he could for the surface. Bowie followed. Jack blacked out for a moment then broke the surface and started coughing up sea water. Bowie broke the surface a few seconds later but was having a hard time staying afloat.
“Put your arm around me,” insisted Jack.
It gave Bowie the much-needed buoyancy he needed without compromising Jack. They both took in some deep breaths to replenish their muscles with oxygen. In spite of everything, Bowie was smiling. “I forgot all about your knife when we started going down! As soon as you released me, I remembered you had it!”
“Like I said before, you have great timing.” Jack smiled as much as his frozen face would allow. He looked down at his watch. “Bowie, we’ve only got three minutes left and the light looks like it’s fading. We’ve got to swim for it.”
“Seeing as how we don’t have a lot of options, let’s do it!” Bowie kept one arm around Jack and they literally swam for their lives. They expended what little energy—what little life they had left. Slowly, they made headway. The light was another chrysalis about ten feet across, domed over the surface of the water. Jack and Bowie swam into the middle of it. It felt warm but nothing else happened.
“Now what?” questioned Bowie.
“Beats me!” Jack looked down at his watch. Twenty seconds left.
A large wave rolled toward them. Jack noticed it first. “Bowie, I don’t like the look of that one.”
Bowie’s eyes widened. “Holly Mother!”
The wave reached a height of fifty feet and hovered a moment before crashing thousands of pounds of ocean water down on them. They closed their eyes, anticipating the full force of the impact. The sound was deafening and they could feel the initial weight of the water press down on them. The rumble reached a crescendo but before being knocked into oblivion, they found themselves pressed against a hard, rocky surface, some residual of the wave splaying them flat.
Jack opened his eyes slowly and peered up at a clean, blue sky, not a trace of rain or storm clouds to be seen. They were in a mountainous area of some sort. He looked over at Bowie who was lying on his back smiling.
“It got a little dodgy at the end there,” said Bowie, “but you have to admit, we’re the luckiest people in the world right now!”
Two long spears appeared an inch from each of their chests. They looked up at a pair of mounted soldiers holding the weapons. “Get on your knees and put your hands behind your back!” said one of the horseman.
Bowie turned to Jack. “I guess I spoke too soon.”