I pull the black box up, untie it.
BANG. I duck the evil boom. I haul myself back on to the ladder. My tears do nothing to put the fire out in my ribs. I climb the slippery rungs in searing agony. I bite on my Samsung, hang onto my black box, the only two things that make my life worth living.
Thank you, thank you for the book about the albatross. I might have been swimming in circles until Romano blasted the yacht to smithereens with Trobancubane. Is that the name of it?
Climb, Malachi. Stop with your loquaciousness.
I clamber from the steel column with my torch switched off. The sea is no longer my enemy. The smashing waves in the shark pit are white signs of welcome erupting for me. I smile at the stars swimming in the purple water. The pain in my rib separates from my body and suspends next to me as I walk along the narrow ledge.
I shut the heavy door behind me. I wipe my cell phone on my trousers, try the menu button. The screen responds beautifully. Thank you.
* * *
I climb up, up the spine with the solo sailor’s treasure chest. What will I say if someone catches me? Can you believe, I stumbled on this black box while strolling around on a sky-facing yacht?
The stairs lighten gradually. I switch off my torch, pass the maintenance door. I climb twelve more stairs, searching. At the foot of the next flight I drop to my haunches, fit the black box into a shadow that seems specially made for it.
I let out a long sigh. Now my rib hurts.
I wind slowly back down.
I open the maintenance door. The rogue cat screams a call to war. I have no choice but to let it scream twice, shut the damn door. Listen.
My heart starts again at the soft, soft sound of tired ping-pong.
I creep along the corridor, let my feet take my dead weight on their pillowy flesh. There is a long pause in the collisions of plastic bat and plastic ball.
The tapping starts again, desultory. The fire in my ribs takes me down the passage to my bedroom. I enter in darkness.
‘Aaaagh.’ I lay myself down on my feather duvet.
I set my alarm in the dark. Double-check. Yes. Beethoven will play at fifteen minutes to midnight. I need to rest my broken bones for what might be the last sleeping hour of my life. I sink into the middle of the smouldering flames. Sleep immediately.
* * *
Who comes to me? Not Cecilia, not Hamri. Not even Vicki to bring me a blessed wet dream. It is Romano’s daughter who visits me. She looks like she did in the photo. Her eyes are torch lights, but they are laughing, not pleading for oxygen. Milja is sprinkling salt onto a woman’s head, creating a streak of white from her forehead to her crown. The moon strokes the path with a golden beam, lights it like Midas. The woman smiles at me.
‘Tell Eulalie to marry him.’
The salt forms a moon path across the sea.
‘Who?’ I ask the moonbeam sleepily.
‘The man with the wife in ashes,’ the moon answers me. I try to follow it with my dreamy eyes, but a loud bang cuts off my pathway to heaven.
‘Shit!’ someone says.
The first feeling comes from my burning rib. I am not in heaven yet.
Tamba switches on his lamp, rubs his head. ‘Fuck it.’
Well, if that is his bedtime prayer, I wish him good luck.
Tamba wrestles out of his clothes, kicks them to the floor. He lies down on his bed, ill tempered. I check the time. 11.26.
I lie stiff like a corpse, pray that Tamba stops cursing and goes to sleep. He pulls the covers up, tosses towards the wall. He flips to the other side.
‘Malachi?’ he whispers.
Sleep, I urge him fiercely.
He says louder, ‘Malachi.’
I fake deep, slow breathing. Tamba breathes deeper, slower in sympathy. After eleven minutes he makes a funny little rattle in the pit of his throat. I watch his body ease. His dreadlocks fall away from his face, show a finer, more breakable jaw than the one I stare up at from the factory floor. His ear is almost without an earlobe. Delicate.
* * *
I hang my feet off the bed. The pain attacks me viciously. Get thee hence.
Help me, Hamri.
It separates again, floats next to me as I sit up slowly. My mattress creaks. One knee makes a tiny crack as I stand up. It is the same knee Hamri flung himself onto to try and silence me. I switch off the alarm before Beethoven sabotages me. Slide my hand into my pillow, steal the plastic sacs of medicine one by one. I pull my stomach in and pack them beneath my belt. The rig is cool at almost midnight, but I begin to sweat under the plastic.
Who is the woman with the silver streak? I begin to feel feverish. Why did my ancestors not come to guide me?
11.41.
If I can open the door because of a stupid sachet of salt, I will take this as a sign that heaven is on our side.
I unravel the lanyard in slow motion. Tamba rubs his nose with the back of his hand. I practise my deep, peaceful breathing. Tamba breathes slower, falls back to sleep. I want to kiss his forehead. He is sweet, this man, especially when his wicked green streak is covered by his eyelids.
I pick up my sneakers with my fingertips. This time I will take them for better grip. My thighs are more prepared than me. They know the word ‘escape’, they have been waiting. The door creaks like it has a horrible sense of humour.
‘Malachi?’
My heart bangs like a bird flying into glass.
Tamba sits up, stares blindly at me. ‘Oh.’ He lies back heavily. ‘Midnight shift.’
I am
