My Last Continent (5 page)

FOUR YEARS BEFORE SHIPWRECK

McMurdo Station

M
cMurdo Station is a U.S. base on Ross Island, on the south side of the Antarctic continent and in the shadow of Mt. Erebus. The planes used to transport scientists and staff from Christchurch, New Zealand, are like large tin cans with rows of military-grade seating, cramped and cold. At this time of year, during the austral summer, when McMurdo is the Grand Central Station of Antarctica, with its maximum capacity of twelve hundred residents, the planes are as packed as commercial jets during the holidays.

I secure my bag in the middle of the fuselage, take a seat, and close my eyes for the eight-hour flight. I'm heading to McMurdo on a National Science Foundation grant to do a census of the emperor colony nearest the base. During the station's busiest period, the
LC
-130 cargo planes arrive regularly to bring people and supplies. Eventually the flights will taper off, and from February to October, except for the very rare fly-in, planes won't land at McMurdo at all.

I hear a voice above me. “Seat taken?”

I open my eyes and say, “Suit yourself.” A guy about my age is pulling down the metal bar of the jump seat next to mine. He's tall and thin, with overgrown dark hair that falls into his eyes and a red bandanna loose around his neck.

The guy leans his head back against the red nylon webbing that constitutes our seats, his head angled toward mine. “It's my first time here,” he says.

“Mmm.”

“And you? You look like an old-timer.”

I look over at him.

“I don't mean
old,
” he says. “Just—experienced. Like you know the drill.”

“Yeah, I get it. You here to do research?”

“To do dishes, actually,” he says. “I'm with maintenance. Just something to get me down here. What about you?”

“I'm studying the emperors at Garrard.”

He regards me with new interest. “Really? Is that the colony that was wrecked by that iceberg?”

I'm surprised, and pleased, that he knows of the colony; so many who come to McMurdo for the manual labor and maintenance jobs seem to know about the wildlife only on a superficial level.

“I'm Keller,” he offers. “Keller Sullivan.”

“I'm Deb.”

“Good to meet you,” he says.

“Likewise.”

“I'd love to hear more about the colony,” he says.

He's turned his head and is looking at me almost sideways. In the dim industrial lighting, the dark of his eyes deepens against his pale face.

“Maybe later? I'm a little tired,” I say. “Didn't sleep at all on the flight to Christchurch.”

“Me, neither,” he says.

I let my eyes fall shut again. It's not often anymore that my mind wanders toward Dennis, but right now, it goes straight back. I'm always surprised by how, even after all this time, it can feel like only days ago.

There'd been an investigation, of course, an autopsy, more questions than I knew how to handle. The worst was the media. News of the investigation had leaked out—everything from the fact that Dennis and I had spent the night together to details on his drowning. I think the family hoped, and I certainly did, that Dennis's death would've been kept as private as possible—but when something happens in Antarctica, it's newsworthy by default. Everyone knew, from my colleagues at the university to the tourists on the new season's trips south. The investigation ruled Dennis's death a suicide; the tour company and everyone involved, including me, were officially off the hook.

I still have his ring, the wedding band he'd tried so hard to lose. I've kept it hidden away in a small box at the top of my closet with a few other valuables. No one had ever asked about it. When I saw pictures of his wife in the news, I convinced myself that, by being there with him during his last hours, I had more right to keep it than she ever would, since she'd been off with someone else when he died.

I drift away to sleep, and the next thing I know, I'm awakened by an announcement from the pilot. I open my eyes and see Keller's confused face. When I hear the sighs and groans of everyone in the cabin, I know what the news is—the plane is turning around.

“What's a boomerang?” Keller asks.

“Bad weather at the station,” I explain. “If the plane can't land at McMurdo, the pilot has to turn around.”

He nods. We don't speak again, and we go our separate ways when we land back in Christchurch. When I arrive at the Antarctic Program passenger terminal the next day, I don't see him. But then, soon after I board, I feel someone sink into the seat next to mine, and there he is.

“We meet again,” he says.

All around us, passengers are pulling their parka hoods over their heads and faces, preparing to sleep, and I offer Keller a brief smile and then do the same, closing my eyes quickly so I don't have to look at him, so he won't keep talking to me.

The only problem is, I can see his face even with my eyes closed.

I remain awake, aware of Keller beside me, of his arm lightly brushing mine as he reaches into one of his bags, as he opens a book to read. I don't know how much time passes until I feel movement next to me again, what I think is the motion of Keller leaning his head back against the netting behind us.

Finally I succumb to sleep—there is little else to do on these flights—and wake to a dull pain in my neck. I've slouched over in my seat, my head resting on Keller's shoulder.

I straighten up, mumbling an apology. Then I notice that he looks very pale. The
LC
-130 is heaving and pitching in the sky. “I don't remember it being this bad the last time,” he says.

“We didn't make it this far last time. It's often like this when we get close.”

I watch his face, just a hint of tension under the stubble of
his jaw, and when he gives me a sheepish grin, I notice that his brown eyes are streaked through with a color that reminds me of the algae veining the snow on the peninsula islands—a muted, cloudy green.

There are no armrests on an
LC
-130, nowhere to put your hands during a stressful landing. Keller is gripping his knees, his knuckles white. Biting back a smile, I reach over to pat his hand in a
there, there
sort of gesture, and I'm surprised when he turns his palm upward to clasp mine.

There's not really any such thing as a routine landing at McMurdo, and by the time we approach the ice-hardened runway, the storm has whipped up whiteout conditions. The pilot circles several times in an attempt to wait out the weather, but eventually he must descend. When the plane touches its skis down on the ice, a sudden gust of wind seems to take hold of its tail, spinning it across the runway and nose-first into a fresh bank of snow.

But the plane holds together, as do Keller and I, our hands still clasped. After the plane stops moving, we let go at the same time. I try to ignore the fact that I hadn't been ready to let go. That a man's hand in mine, after so long, had felt good.

With Keller behind me, I step through the hatch, down the half dozen steps to the ice. The air hitting my face is so cold it stings, the whirling snow a blinding white. As I put my hand up to shield my eyes, I see the Terra Bus that will transport us to the station from the runway. The bus is even more cramped than the plane, and after boarding I don't see Keller among the parkas, hats, and luggage stuffed inside. Fifteen minutes later, the station comes into view through the bus's small, square windows.

With its bare industrial buildings, McMurdo looks like an ugly desert town whose landscape is drab and brown at the height of the austral summer and so white in the winter that you don't know which way is up. On clear days, Mt. Erebus is visible in the distance, steam rising from its volcanic top, and later in the season, when the sun finally begins to set, the mountain looks as if it's on fire.

I'm stretching my legs, taking it all in, when I notice Keller watching me.

“I was thinking,” he says. “Maybe I could shadow you out there one day? See the colony firsthand.”

I tell him, “Maybe,” both charmed by his interest and a bit wary of it.

We've been assigned to different dorms and say quick good-byes before going our separate ways. We don't make plans to see each other, but I know I'll eventually bump into him around the station, in the cafeteria. At McMurdo, during the busy season, you can't avoid people even if you want to.

Yet I don't see him again until two days later, when I'm heading out for my fieldwork and find him standing outside the Mechanical Equipment Center, wearing a jacket that looks too light for the temperature and that same red bandanna tied around his neck like a scarf.

“Hey,” Keller says in greeting as I approach the building. “Are you heading to the Garrard colony?”

“That's right.”

“Is this a good time for me to tag along?” he asks.

I look at him, wondering how serious he really is about learning about the penguins. “Don't you have dishes to wash?”

“Not until tonight,” he says.

“Why don't you spend some time getting the lay of the land?” I suggest. “You could visit Scott's hut—it's a nice walk from here.”

“Already tried,” he says. “It's closed for renovations. Indefinitely, they told me. What are they doing in there, anyway? Adding indoor plumbing? Central heating?”

I can't help but smile.

“I promise I won't get in your way,” he says.

I glance toward the
MEC
building, then back at Keller. “Have you been trained on the snowmobiles?”

He shakes his head. “Not yet.”

Which means if he comes along, he'll need to ride with me. There's just enough room for two on the Ski-Doo, and I don't carry many supplies for day trips: a counter, field notebook, water, pee bottle and plastic bags, and a survival kit, all tucked into a compartment of the snowmobile.

“I'm not on a schedule,” I warn him. “I can't drive you all the way back here so you can be on time for your shift.”

He grins. “You scientists. No respect for the workingman.”

I give him a look, but he's still smiling. “What're they going to do, fire me?”

“Probably.”

He only shrugs. “Look, I may not know a lot about penguins yet,” he says, “but I could be a great assistant.”

I'm not sure I need an assistant, but I consider it anyway. There's a lot of data to collect, and he could be helpful—as long as I don't have to spend my time picking up after him or fixing his mistakes. At least he knows about the colony, which is something. A decade earlier, a gigantic iceberg calved off the Ross Ice Shelf and blocked the penguins' access to the
ocean, their only source of food. They had to find a new path, which was more than twice as long. None of the chicks survived that season, and most of the adults starved. Once a fairly healthy colony, with thousands of breeding pairs, it had to start over—but it's been recovering, growing slowly, and thanks to our five-year grant from the
NSF
, someone from the Antarctic Penguins Project travels down here to do the annual census. This year, it's me.

“I guess I could use an extra hand,” I say. Keller's smile is so genuine I can't resist smiling back.

It's a clear day, with lucent vanilla ice sandwiched between blue ocean and bluer sky. When we arrive at the colony, I set about my work, instructing Keller to either stay put and watch or follow my footsteps exactly so as not to disturb the molting birds.

“It's called a catastrophic molt for a reason,” I tell him. Unlike most other birds, penguins molt their feathers all at once, rather than shed them gradually. The emperors' molt happens over a month, a physically exhausting feat that uses up all their energy. The penguins, fattened up in preparation, look as though they've gotten bad haircuts, their brownish feathers sloughing off in a patchwork of fluff, the beautiful, sleek new feathers coming in underneath.

“Don't do anything to cause them to move,” I say. “They need every bit of energy they've got.”

Keller nods and follows me, just as slowly and carefully as I've instructed. In addition to counting the birds—a job made easier by the fact that they're molting and standing still—I slip quietly among them to inspect carcasses on the ground. The dead are mostly chicks, killed by starvation or skuas—the
mean-beaked predators that feed off penguin eggs and dead chicks—but this means that at least the adults are making it back out to the ocean to feed.

It isn't until later that afternoon, when I press my hand into an ache in my back, that Keller suggests we take a break. “You haven't stopped once,” he says.

I look at my watch—it's been five hours since we left the station. And it occurs to me that Keller hasn't stopped either; he hasn't gotten cold or tired or hungry.

“I always lose track of time out here,” I say, almost to myself.

He swings his slim backpack off his shoulder. “I brought lunch.”

“You go ahead,” I say.

“You forgot to bring food, didn't you?”

“I don't usually eat when I'm in the field.”

“I have enough for both of us,” he says. “Sit down.”

He shakes out a small, waterproof blanket, and we settle down about thirty yards away from the birds. I don't bother looking at Keller's food—vegans become accustomed to not sharing meals. It can be rare even to meet garden-variety vegetarians down here.

But Keller's pack is filled with fruit and bread, with containers of leftover rice and beans and salad. “Seriously?” I ask.

“Rabbit food, I know,” he says, as if he's had to defend his food a hundred times before. “It's all I've got. Take it or leave it.”

I almost laugh with the sudden pleasure of this strange, simple thing—sitting with Keller on the ice, sharing a meal among the molting emperors, on a blindingly bright Antarctic day. It's been so long since I've made a connection with
someone else. I haven't been with anyone since Dennis, and even after a year, it hasn't been difficult; in fact, life's been a lot simpler. Or maybe I've just managed to convince myself of that.