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“I think they
just wanted to get on with their day,” Alan said. “I
played the good American tourist and offered them some beers.”

“Well, I’m
glad you all had a great time while I was hiding underwater,”
Chal said, pretending to pout.

Alan pulled her
close for another kiss, but Chal stopped him.

“What’s
the matter?” he asked.

“Look,”
she said, disentangling herself from his arms, “This isn’t
a good idea.”

“What?”Alan
said.

“Us,”
Chal said simply.

“I don’t
understand,” Alan said. He waited, but Chal didn’t
answer. “You don’t want this?”

“It’s
not about what I want,” Chal said.

“Then what?”
Alan said. “Because I want you, Chal. I care about you.
Tremendously.” He put his hand on her arm.

“Stop,”
she whispered faintly. His touch made her resolve melt, but she could
not let him sway her.

“I know
there’s something between us,” he said. His finger
brushed back a strand of damp hair from her face. “So what is
this about?”

“It’s
about what’s
right
,” she said, shaking her head to
try and sort out her thoughts.

He stepped back
suddenly, his face dropping into a hard frown. Chal swallowed.

“And you think
this is wrong,” he said, his voice flat. It wasn’t a
question.

“I just don’t
know if what you’re feeling toward me is real,” Chal
said.

“Real?”
Alan said. “That’s it, then. I’m not real to you.”

“No, Alan,
that’s not what I mean.”

“I couldn’t
expect to know what you mean, Chal. I’m not a real person,
after all. I can’t feel the way you feel, maybe.” He
gestured toward himself, his body. “This is all grown, fake!
Fake feelings!”

“No–”

“Just
manufactured emotions!”

“No!”
Chal cried out.

“What then?”
Alan said, seizing her suddenly by the shoulders. She felt his
strength, the power of his muscles, and the restraint that kept him
from crushing her between his hands.

“What is it,
Chal?”

“Your feelings
for me, how can you know that they’re genuine? This whole thing
started out with me as your captor!” Chal said. Alan was
shaking his head. “I manipulated you! I studied you like a lab
rat–”

“You saved me
from that,” Alan said. “You helped me escape.”

“I was saving
the research,” Chal said, her voice uncertain.

“You don’t
mean that,” Alan said, shaking his head. “I want to be
with you, Chal.”

“When we get
to Catalonia, you can decide what you want to do. If you want to
leave, you’ll be free to leave. If you want to stay, you’ll
be free to stay.” She pushed herself away.

“And you?”
Alan said, letting his arms drop to his side. “What do you
want, Chal?”

Chal looked at him.
She wanted to throw herself into him, to let herself be engulfed by
her overwhelming want for him. It wasn’t fair. She swallowed
her emotions and set her mouth in a hard line.

“I want to get
to shore,” she said. “I want to get home. That’s
all.”

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

They rigged the
sails in silence. Alan avoided Chal, keeping his focus on the knots
and lines in front of him. He took the helm without saying a word and
Chal went down into the cabin. It was hard to stay away from someone
on a twenty-foot boat, but she aimed to stay away from Alan until
they reached Catalonia.

She threw herself
onto the bedding, feeling her whole body crumple with sorrow. For a
moment she contemplated throwing caution to the wind and going back
out on deck to apologize to Alan. She could hug him, let him kiss her
and caress her body –

No
, she
thought. It was impossible. She turned over onto her side and tossed
her way into a fitful nap.

When she awoke, the
first thing she noticed was that the boat was rolling, big long rolls
that made her stomach queasy. She was not normally seasick on boats,
but this movement wasn’t normal. She checked the GPS, but the
reading was buggy, jumping from one cardinal direction to another.

She pulled aside the
curtain to be greeted by dark gray skies. The wind was gusting, the
jib sail flapping wildly. The fabric made a loud snapping noise as
the boat rolled first into, then away from the wind.

“Why didn’t
you wake me up?” Chal said. The boat tilted hard and she had to
grab onto a line to keep her balance.

“I thought it
would let up,” Alan said. “It wasn’t this bad even
a few minutes ago.” He was struggling to keep the tiller
straight as the big swells tossed the boat from side to side. The
wind was beginning to whistle above their heads, the ominous clouds
turning blacker and blacker.

“We should
take down the main sail at least,” Chal said. “Or at
least reef it.” She remembered that shortening the sails was
something you should do in a storm.

“We should
take down everything,” Alan said, eyeing the storm clouds which
were rolling in faster than either of them could have expected. Small
mists of rain stung their cheeks, and Chal had to keep her eyes
half-closed.

“No, not
everything,” Chal said, unlooping the line from the mast.
“We’ll have better control if we keep a sail up.”

“Control?”
Alan said.

“Otherwise the
waves will just roll us sideways,” Chal said. She tugged at the
main sail. “You’ll be sick in two minutes under deck if
that happens.” She tugged again. The sail slipped down another
foot and stuck.

“Better sick
than dead,” Alan said. A wave came through, slapping the side
of the boat. The water whipped over the deck, drenching Alan’s
right side.

“Angle us into
the waves,” Chal said. She reached over and put her hand on
his, moving the tiller where it needed to be.

Suddenly she stood
up and looked around.

“The coast.”
The familiar black line that had guided them for the past few days
was gone. Gray sheets of rain obscured the horizon. She turned around
and around, looking for any hint of guidance, but the boat continued
to rock on into a dark mist. Panic crept into her voice. “Where
are we?”

She bent down and
checked, knowing already that it would be futile. The GPS was
completely screwy, reading negative numbers for their position. Her
stomach churned with nerves.

“We can’t
keep sailing,” Chal said. “We could be headed the wrong
way.”

“There’s
a compass in the first aid kit,” Alan said.

Chal scrambled to
get the compass, stumbling on one of the stairs and banging her knee.

“Goddammit!”
she said. Her fingers scrambled to unclasp the kit. The compass was
rudimentary, but it would work. They were headed north-north-east.

“That’s
fine,” Chal said, looping the compass around Alan’s
wrist. She had to talk louder to be heard over the wind and rain.
“Just keep us on that heading. Worst case we’ll end up
far from the coast.”

“Why?”

“The shore,”
Chal said. She was tying off the lines as quickly as she could.
“Rocks. We don’t want to head towards the shore.”

The boat was rocking
faster, surging forward and back on the waves, and as Chal reached
the mast the sky opened up above her.

The thunderstorm was
upon them before they had a chance to react. Chal was clinging to the
mast for dear life, the jib flapping wildly in the air right next to
her, as booms of thunder echoed through the air. The main sail was
stuck. Water poured down, chilling her to the bone as she jerked the
line, trying to lower the sail. It looked like the line had gone off
of the pulley track.

“Into the
wind!” she cried to Alan. The sail picked up a heavy wind and
suddenly they were sideways, the boat tearing through the water.
Every wave picked them up and dropped them sharply with a loud crack
into the next. Chal hung onto the mast with her legs, trying with all
her might to heave down the sail that was pulled tight in the wind.

“Be careful!”
Alan shouted. Chal looked forward just in time to see a huge swell
coming at the boat. She let go of the sail, clutching the mast for
dear life. The boat rolled hard sideways, tipping Chal toward the
roiling sea. She felt her fingers slip on the metal mast, scrabbling
for purchase. The next second they were sliding down the back side of
the swell and she had her hand around the lines. The wires cut into
her hands, but at least she was more stable.

There was no way
they could continue in this weather; the sails had to come down. Chal
was not strong enough to do it, though, and she wondered how long the
sails would hold before something disastrous happened.

As if in answer to
her thoughts, the jib flapped again in the air, snapping back with
such force that the rope broke. Chal shied away from the line that
was whipping the air just above her head, making her way back to the
helm. The broken sail flapped ferociously, its cracks like lightning.

The waves were
coming over the side of the boat with regularity, drenching the deck
with cold washes of water.

“I can’t
get the sail down!” Chal shouted. “We need to pull it!”
She slipped and fell with a jolt next to Alan, a shock of pain
running up her back. “Pull it down!”

She took the helm as
Alan stood up and began to tug at the sail, which was nearly
sideways. He managed to pull it down a few feet, then a few more.
Chal could feel the power of the boat easing, the tilt less severe.

Then the gray sky in
front of the boat was replaced, a black wall of water rushing toward
them. Chal had only an instant to react to the swell, and as she
swung the boat to the side the swell came up under them, pushing the
boat up to the crest. A gust of wind hit the boat with a force that
felt to Chal as though a huge invisible hand had slapped them aside.

The boat tipped over
completely and then righted itself, the keel flashing up from the
underbelly of the boat for only a moment. Chal hung onto the side
cleat, forgetting the tiller amid the chaos. Alan, who had been
holding to the mast while pulling down the sail, fell to the side.

Help
. She
could see his lips form the words as he scrambled to hold onto the
slick side of the boat, his eyes fixing onto hers for a split second.
The boat was still moving, skimming the water, and as the waves
rolled them again he lost his grip and fell over with a splash.

Chal yelled out and
reached for him but was knocked down by the next wave. She clung to
the tiller and looked back over. The boat rocked over again so much
that Chal thought they would be upended, but it swung upright, the
metal boom slicing through the air violently.

“Alan! Alan!”
Chal screamed. Her eyes flashed to the ocean, trying to find him in
the waves. There was only dark water, nothing visible past ten feet.

“Alan!”
Chal yelled again. Her heart pounded with a fear that she had never
known. She had to stop herself from throwing her body into the water
to swim blindly anywhere in the hope of finding him. “ALAN!”
She had a sudden mental image of his body sinking down into the black
water, and she bent over suddenly, retching air. Rain pelted her from
above and ocean spray billowed up from below.

She blindly realized
the uselessness of trying to find Alan while the waves continued to
pour in over the side of the boat. She clutched the tiller and knelt
down, keeping the boat tilted at the right angle into the waves. Her
knees scraped roughly against the gritted deck, but she didn’t
care. Alan was gone, and the numbness that now fastened itself to her
bones was not due to any kind of chill.

The main sail tore
with a sickening ripping sound. Chal looked up, eyes slitted against
the rain, and felt the boat slow dramatically. With the sail torn,
the tiller was not as useful, and the boat began to drift to one
side. She stumbled to the mast and pulled at the main sail line.

“Come on!”
she yelled, pulling at the sail. The wind was whipping the crests of
the waves sideways even as the swells began to subside, and she
squinted her eyes tight against the stinging saltwater.

“Come...on!”
Her arms felt as though they would fall out of their sockets. She
jerked once, then again at the sail, her body straining to use every
muscle against the jammed line. The sail came down halfway, and she
almost fell when it loosened, jamming again a few feet lower.

Chal was readying
herself for the third attempt when a wave crashed against the side of
the boat and caused her to slip. She lost hold of the mast and fell
to her knees, banging her head against the boom. Off-balance, she
felt herself slide to the side of the deck, just barely managing to
grab ahold of the slippery metal cleat with one hand as the rest of
her body slid overboard. She held on for dear life.

You have to do
this. If you don’t, you’ll die, so you have to.

The ocean was
surprisingly warm after the chill of the rain, and for a moment Chal
had the insane thought that she should just push off and let herself
float wherever the waves would take her. The physical struggle had
worn her to the edge of her willpower, and death was beginning to
look like a more peaceful alternative than continuing on her current
course.

Then she thought of
her mother. What she would do when she learned of Chal’s
disappearance? The worry and sorrow of another lost child.
No. I
can’t let that happen.
Chal kicked her feet and drove
herself up out of the water.

She pulled herself
up, her legs shaking as they balanced her weak figure on the deck.
She wrapped her arms tightly around the mast and closed her eyes,
blocking out the world. Sobs racked her body and she curled herself
against the metal of the boat. It was a shield against the softening
wind, though it could not ease the ache of self-pity and loss that
now swept through her. She gave herself a moment to grieve, but only
a moment – she could not spare more if she wanted to survive.