My Last Continent: A Novel(49)
The passengers step gingerly over slick, dark rocks, over patches of moss and tiny frozen pools. Some are finished with the views after twenty minutes; others find rocks and settle down for a while. We have two hours scheduled for this landing, and because the first batch of tourists is ready to return to the Cormorant so soon, I take a roundabout way back to the ship. I steer the Zodiac through fields of icebergs, pointing out the Doyle Glacier, showing them a piece that has chipped away: a gigantic, flat-topped tabular iceberg in the distance. Closer to us is a newly flipped berg, its tall, wavy blue underside revealed, slick and deep indigo, as if lit from within. The passengers snap photos, and I wonder whether they feel the same change in temperature among the icebergs that I do, the sudden chill of being so close.
As the Zodiac chugs through the ice fields, I remember being here with Keller, after we found each other again, two years after McMurdo. Today I’m looking at an entirely new skyline—the icebergs have split and shifted, floated and collided and melted—not unlike Keller and me over the past two years. We’re all still here, only different.
I give each Zodiac full of passengers its own iceberg tour, glancing occasionally at my watch to see when I might be able to steal a few minutes to call Keller. As anxious as I am to get back to the ship, I’m careful not to rush as the afternoon wanes. The weather holds steady, with light winds and a wispy cloud cover that lets in the occasional glow of sun.
Finally we’re ready to get the last passengers on board, and as I’m helping them into Thom’s Zodiac, I notice a life preserver on the rocks, unclaimed. I motion for Thom to wait a moment, then take a step toward the hut.
There, sitting on a rock, facing away from the landing site, is Kate.
I turn back toward Thom and wave him on ahead. He understands and motions that he’ll come back for us.
I climb the rocks to where Kate is sitting. She seems to be expecting me; she stands, then spins slowly around, turning in a complete circle. “I thought it would feel different,” she says. “My seventh continent.”
She looks toward the left, where, on the rocks rimming the bay, a small group of Adélies keeps a watchful eye on us. “Richard didn’t come,” she says. “Not even to step on the continent—a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. I guess that’s why I stayed so long. I kept hoping he’d show up.”
“I’m sorry he didn’t,” I say, “but we need to get down to the landing. Thom will be right back.”
Kate keeps her eyes on the birds. “I was sitting here thinking of something you said the other night during dinner. About how the Adélies are in trouble, how the warmer weather has been interrupting their breeding cycles. It’s just so sad, you know? They do everything they’re supposed to do, and it’s still all for nothing.”
Then she turns to look at me. “I don’t know how I can justify bringing a child into a world that could allow these birds to go extinct.”
“I know the feeling,” I say without thinking.
“You do?” She’s staring at me.
“Sure.” I backtrack. “I’ve studied these birds for years. And you’re right, it’s depressing as hell. But it’s not all bad. The gentoos, for example—they’re doing well, adapting a lot better. And satellite imagery recently discovered a huge colony of emperors we didn’t even know about. That doubles the number we thought existed.”
“That doesn’t save the Adélies.”
I laugh but stop when I see her expression. “I’m sorry—it’s just that you sound so much like me right now.”
A tiny smile breaches her lips. “I don’t mean to sound so gloomy. I know I should be enjoying every minute.”
“Not everyone who comes down here leaves happy,” I say.
She frowns. “Why do you say that?”
“It seems like there are two kinds of people who come to Antarctica. Those who have run out of places to go, and those who have run out of places to hide.”
“This is my seventh continent, so I guess I’ve run out of places to go. Which one are you?”
“This is only my third continent. So you figure it out.”
“Are you ever going to leave here? I mean, stop coming back?”
“No. It may only be my third, but it’s probably my last.”
“It never gets old?”
“Never. Everything’s changing so quickly down here, I can’t know what awaits us from one season to the next.”
“How do you keep from getting depressed?”
“I’m actually more depressed when I’m not here. I may see the consequences of climate change here, but at least I don’t have to watch everyone going about their lives as if it’s not actually happening.”
“See, I get that,” she says. “I really do. Richard can’t wait to have a baby, but he doesn’t think about changing the world for the better instead of adding to its problems.”
Until a few days ago I would’ve agreed without a second thought. Yet I find myself saying, “But babies themselves -aren’t inherently problematic, are they?”
“You know what I mean. At the rate we’re reproducing, the planet will hit ten billion people by the middle of this century. That’s not sustainable.”