Before We Were Yours(112)

I lose the noise of splintering wood and yelling voices and far-off thunder.

The water’s cold, yet I’m warm. There’s a light, and inside it I see my mama. Queenie reaches for my hand, and I stretch for hers, and just before I can get to her, the river tugs me away, yanking me back by the waist.

I kick, and fight, and come to the surface. I see the Arcadia in the tug’s lights. I see a skiff coming our way. I hear whistles and yelling. My legs go stiff, and my skin’s icy cold.

The Arcadia hangs wedged against a huge drift pile. The Mississippi goes after her like the mouth of a giant dragon, slowly eating up her stern.

“Fern!” My voice gets lost in water and noise. I swim for all I’m worth, feel the swirl and the downward pull as I ram into the drift pile. The eddy tries to yank me back, but I fight against it, climb on top, and balance my way to the deck and scramble uphill to the door.

It falls inward with a crash when I open it.

“Fern! Fern!” I yell. “Fern! Answer me!” Smoke chokes my voice. The woodstove lays tipped over. Hot red coals roll across the floor. They sizzle on the wet deck and hiss under my feet.

Everything is turned around, and I can’t see. I go the wrong way first, end up at the table, not Fern’s bunk. The flour-sack quilt from Briny and Queenie’s bed swims by like a colorful whale, carrying a lick of flame. Nearby, fire flicks up the curtains.

“Fern!” Is she gone? Did she fall off into the river? Did Briny get her out already?

A wave rushes in, grabs the red coals, and sweeps them out the door. They pop and squeal as they die.

“Riiiiill! Get me! Get me!”

The searchlight sweeps over us, pressing through the window in a long, slow circle. I see my sister’s face, wide-eyed and terrified under her bunk. She reaches for me, and then the next second I’ve grabbed her hand, and I’m trying to pull her, but the water’s got us both. A chair skitters by and hits me hard in the back, knocking me onto the floor. Water flows over my face and ears. I cling to Fern for all I’m worth.

The chair tumbles on. I grab my sister, stumble and crawl across the cabin to the side door.

The searchlight goes through again. I see the picture of Briny and Queenie hanging on the wall with Queenie’s cross below it.

I shouldn’t, but I pin Fern there with my leg and grab the picture and my mama’s cross and shove them down the front of my nighty and into the top of my drawers. They bump against my skin and dig in as we climb out and shinny over the rail and make our way onto the drift pile, scrambling over the tangle of branches, plank wood, and trees. We’re quick as mice. We’ve done this all our lives.

But we both know enough to understand that a drift pile isn’t a safe place to be. Even when we get to the other end, I can feel the heat from the fire. I hold Fern’s hand, turn and look toward the Arcadia, and lift an arm to shield my eyes. Flames curl and stretch upward from the shanty, burning through the roof and the walls and the deck, skinning the Arcadia down to her bones, stripping her of her beauty. Pieces float on the air. Up, and up, and up they whirl until they fly overhead like a million new stars.

Cooled by the rain, they fall and settle over our skin. Fern yelps when one lands, still warm. I wrap a hand around the neck of her nighty, squat down, and push her into the water, tell her to hold real tight to the tangled branches. There’s too much current here for us to swim to shore. Her teeth chatter, and her face goes pale.

The drift pile is starting to burn. The fire’ll work its way to us soon enough.

“Briny!” The name rips from me. He’s here somewhere. Surely he’s gotten off the boat. He’ll save us.

Won’t he?

“Hold on!” somebody yells, but it’s not Briny’s voice. “Hold on. Don’t move!”

A tank explodes on the Arcadia. Cinders rocket out and fall everywhere. One lands on my foot, and the pain drives right through me. I scream and kick and stick my leg in the water and hang on to Fern.

The drift pile shifts. It’s smoldering in a dozen places now.

“Almost there!” the man’s voice calls out.

A small boat sifts out of the darkness, two rivermen with hoods pulled over their heads straining hard at the oars. “Don’t let go, now. Don’t let go!”

The branches crackle. Logs whine and whistle. The entire drift pile shifts downriver a foot or two. One of the men in the lifeboat warns the other that they’ll get swamped if the drift breaks loose.

They come on anyway, snatch us into the boat, and throw blankets over us and row hard.

“Was there anyone else on the boat? Anybody else?” they want to know.

“My daddy,” I cough out. “Briny. Briny Foss.”

Nothing feels quite so good as the shore when they drop us there and go back to look for Briny. I cuddle Fern close inside my blanket, the picture and Queenie’s cross between us. We shiver and shake and watch the Arcadia burn until finally the drift pile breaks loose and takes what’s left of her with it.

Fern and me stand up and move to the edge of the water and watch as Kingdom Arcadia disappears into the river bit by bit. Finally, it’s gone altogether. There’s not a trace. It’s like it never was.

Against the dawn gray to the east, I watch the men and boats. They search on, and on, and on. They call out, and their lights sweep, and they row.

I think I see somebody standing down shore. A slicker flaps around his knees. He doesn’t move, or call out, or wave at the lights. He just watches the river, where the life we knew has been swallowed away.