How High We Go in the Dark(75)

Right before you were hospitalized, we agreed upon the final designs for your ice ship and memorial. A lightning branch of veins had appeared beneath your paper-thin skin, and I replaced your hair, so you no longer felt the need to wear a hat. I showed you a scale model of the sculpture for you to explore the details of the masts, sails, and of course, the kirin figurehead you would be poured into. And after you made your final requests, I asked if I could visit you at the hospital. After all, hadn’t we become friends? A long silence followed, and you said, No, that’s probably not for the best. And I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t hurt. You told me sometimes people and places serve a purpose for a finite amount of time to help you think and grow and love and then you move on. You hung up and texted: Thank you for everything. And signed off: Love, Mabel xoxo. I wish I could know for certain how I helped you and how you helped me. Maybe I was just really good at doing my job. Part of me wants to kiss you before I slide you into the chamber, though that’s probably not for the best, either.

Unalaska, Alaska, a gateway to the Aleutian chain, is the place you picked for the launch—partly because of the name and partly because these islands graze Siberia. Close but not quite, you said. Like I’m going back to the origins of the virus, this thing that did this to me. I walk the island today on a scouting trip for your memorial and imagine you there beside me, pointing out where you’d like to be set free. Everything feels charged, connected. Out here, it seems like the world has yet to be touched by the evils of man. Wild horses graze; a sea otter in the bay cracks a crab on a rock; eagle eggs perched on a narrow shelf of a cliff face begin to hatch. I can somehow feel it all. But I also know the fishing boats are returning half-empty and whales continue to beach themselves. We follow a stream until it empties out into a shallow bay surrounded by grassy hills. An abandoned jetty reaches out on one side to a rocky sandbar on the other, creating a narrow corridor to the Bering Sea. And then you run off, faster than I can keep up, until you’re gliding on the surface of the water. You spiral with your arms outstretched, head cocked back, mouth open to taste the salty air. So, this is it, I say. This is where we’ll do it. You smile and disappear beneath the black waves.

When I return to my workshop, I begin the long process of sculpting the sails, rigging and freezing everything into one piece. The vessel is almost fifteen feet long and nine feet high. Parts of you are frozen across the deck and bow, giving the vessel a natural oaky appearance, something that might last on the high seas. You give the figurehead life, with only a thin sheet of ice separating you from the abyss. I stare into your eyes and wonder if you are watching.

A few dozen people attend your memorial—your family and friends from Seattle and even your tattoo master, Wataru, who’s joined by a cadre of old Japanese men with wolfed-up orange hair. A neighborhood friend of your mother’s, Dan Paul, volunteered to help coordinate the event, leading people to their seats, handing out programs, talking to the local television station that plans to share the launch on the internet as part of a web series on how the plague has reinvented the way we die. I want to ask your mother about who you really were, if I was anybody to you, but today is not about me. Marijuana and incense piggyback on the misty air. A Hare Krishna monk invites others to chant with him. Your mother sits on a lawn chair, cradling a coffee she seems to have no interest in drinking. The schooner is docked at the jetty with you looking out into the bay. A podium stands nearby. One by one, people speak— She will be missed, she was one of a kind, she had the guts to live her life. I want to say something, too, though I know I probably won’t be able to stop myself from telling these strangers something that existed only for us, and maybe, quite possibly (probably) only for me. We watched some movies and listened to music and talked about Bigfoot and how coastal cities might turn into islands or underwater resorts. And I guess I had a crush on her is all I can think to say. And maybe that’s nothing, but it’s the most I’ve ever had. People admire the schooner, the detail and the obvious fact that it can indeed float. They take photos in front of it and run their hands across the bow, across you. Some shake my hand. Others ask for my card. Your mother and Wataru stand beside the ship for a long while, holding on to the deck, parts of you no doubt melting and mingling with their skin. When people return to their seats, I pull the schooner out into the bay with my inflatable raft. People are silent at first but then they begin to clap. They’re shouting I love you. I turn back to the shore and see a large banner that reads BON VOYAGE, fluttering in the wind.

When we’re out far enough, I cut the engine. I enclose my digital voice recorder in a waterproof sleeve, since you wanted every second of your last moments recorded just as your life had been tattooed on your skin. Back in my office, there’s a package waiting for me that your mother told me not to open until the service was over. I know it’s a part of you—a piece of skin, a memory in ink. I’m not certain how long it will take for you to melt into the sea, but I plan on staying here until you do. Cargo ships blow their horns in the distance. Seals, perhaps seeing an interesting place to rest, circle, nudging their noses at the bow. I scream a gibberish war cry to frighten them off.

A couple of hours have passed and already waves are washing over the sinking deck. Two of the masts have broken in half and a sail is dissolving quickly like cotton candy. Your figurehead is largely intact, but beads of water run down your face, your dragon-scaled chest. Your deer horns have become demonic nubs. The sun is high overhead and the seam where I froze you to the rest of the schooner is coming undone. Soon you’ll have no choice but to prove your mermaid and dragon skills. I pull on my fins and life jacket so that I may join you. My dry suit is tight and secure, my mask and snorkel ready. The schooner begins to crack again, the fractures sounding off like a multitude of tiny whips. And before I’m ready for it, you splash into the water, bobbing up and down, hitting what remains of the hull. I jump in and drag you away from danger.