I close my eyes, which are so full of salt, I wonder how they haven’t shriveled inside their sockets.
Bees are swarming Ba.
Jamie perches high on the oak.
It’s up to me.
I blow fire onto a tree branch, igniting a torch. I run, and the bees follow.
“Climb up,” Jamie says, sounding far away. “That’s enough.”
Enough. A soft, treacherous word. A word that means stop, rest. A word that means you’ve done everything, but makes you doubt it all the same.
Inch by inch, I heave myself aboard, as awkward as an injured seal on a thin floe of ice. Every wiggle and twitch fills me with dread. If I roll off, this tired old bucket isn’t hauling herself back up the well.
I center myself on the float, curled up so that my lifeless feet don’t hang in the water. Jamie scoots up after me, flopping over my side and waiting for our board to settle before moving again. Our raft squirms underneath us, but Jamie, through some last act of balance and strength, keeps us topside.
Ba is in a ditch that’s quickly filling with water.
Jamie’s shirt billows like a sail.
I lead a circus elephant—one with a golden tiara on its head and crimson velvet on its back—to the ditch. The elephant dips its trunk into the water and drains it.
I can feel Jamie cradling me, passing me whatever warmth remains in him, just as he did in the coal hole. Moving slowly, he drapes his left arm over my waist and closes his hand over mine. His ragged breaths warm my neck. His shoulder must be in agony.
“You were the right boot, going fore instead of aft with the dogs,” I tell him.
“And you were . . . right boot,” he stammers out the words, his teeth clattering loudly. He’s been in the water longer than me, and every second counts.
“About what?”
“Built it up in my head . . . how much I hated it. But you reminded me that . . . it wasn’t so bad. When we flew together.”
A half sob, half laugh bursts from my frozen lips. “We’re going to make it, Jamie. This is a tough line. But we’ll cross it.”
A soft grunt reaches my ears.
I must keep him talking. “That Charlotte sure thinks you’re the stuff.”
“Wh . . . ?” Somehow, even with only half a word, he still manages to sound annoyed. But he doesn’t say anything else. Even the chattering of his teeth has lessened.
“Jamie! Don’t nod off, you sod!” Angrily, I flex my spine and feel him stir.
“Tired, Sis,” he whispers.
“What were you two arguing about?” I ask, trying to keep him from falling asleep. He can’t fight if he’s sleeping.
“Told her . . . I could never fit . . . into her life.”
“And what did she say?” My words slur.
“Said . . . she could fit . . . into mine.”
My thoughts move as slowly as feet through heavy snow. What were we talking about? “You love her. She loves you. Why don’t you see?”
“You’re always . . . sticking your nose in.”
Ba lies in a cage.
Jamie gazes up at the sky.
I lead an old man with an icicle beard to the cage. With a turn of his hairpin, he unlocks it.
Icy water splashes my face, rousing me.
“Jamie? I remembered how all of my dreams ended. I saved him. I knew what to do.”
At least a minute passes before he answers. “Your dreams weren’t about Ba . . . or me. They were about you. But I always knew . . . you could fly on your own.”
“What made you so sure?”
His words are too quiet, despite being spoken only a few inches from my ear. “They’re close.”
“Wake up, Jamie,” I say hoarsely. “Don’t leave me. What made you so sure?”
“Your last name’s Luck.”
And then he goes still.
“Jamie? Jamie!” My tears flow freely, and a sob chokes my throat.
But my cries go unanswered. There’s only the ghostly sounds of the breeze whistling across my ear, and the ocean slurping at our raft, its appetite sated but still craving a taste.
I search for the words of our old sea shanty. Singing warms the body, and the more heat I can give Jamie, the less he’ll have to give me. Maybe he’ll stay longer.
The captain paced his weathered deck,
A-talkin’ to his boots.
They were his pride and joy, you see,
Anchored him like roots.
The right one he named Valor;
It always steered his course.
The left one he called Virtue;
’Twas steady as a horse.
I sing, willing my warmth to flow backward into my brother’s quiet limbs. I sing until the notes peter out, and my song passes through my lips like dry air through a flue. He doesn’t move. In my heart, I know he’s nearly gone. But I sing a song to keep him near.
Ba’s spirit had long flown away by the time I found him, but Jamie’s lingers. As tears blur my vision, I feel him hover, shielding me from the cold for as long as he can.
Long minutes pass, and hope rises and fades. Still, Jamie’s spirit flickers like a candle, as if to sear the memory of him into my waxen body. As if I could ever forget.
A book opens in some dusty corner of my mind, the best in Ba’s collection, a tender ode to lives barely lived. In the beginning, two babes take their first breaths together, their first shaky steps across a threadbare floor. As each page turns, the years pass, and their steps become steadier. Steady enough to cross railways, fences, and ropes as thin as clotheslines. Steady enough to walk through fire and ice—until a storm blows one away.
I thought you knew we’d always be together, even when we’re not.
But without you, Brother, I am a beat without a heart.
A lady calls my name, her voice like the soft lap of waves against a hull. She presses her warm lips to my forehead.
We call that a kiss from Tin Hau, the goddess of shipwrecks and sailors. It means good luck is on the way. Maybe for you.
The lady smiles down at me, her fair face glowing like a paper lantern.
Jamie, wake up! Tin Hau has come. Our rescue is at hand.
The dip and gurgle of oars reach my ears. But then the lady fades, and a lamp intrudes on my face.
“Help,” I whimper.