The Swells by Will Aitken

Author:Will Aitken
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: House of Anansi Press Inc
Published: 2021-11-01T15:45:07+00:00

Silly hat. She unties it and watches as it sweeps down from deck to deck. Rain lashes her face, soaks her hair. The glorious wildness of it all as the far-off sea digs canyons, forms mountains, then tears them down to build them up again. Promising the worst, great cliff waves flatten at the last second before splatting harmlessly against the hull. Low quiet ones prove more treacherous as they slide under and lift the Emerald Tranquility high into the liquid air, poise it there for a millisecond of weightlessness before smashing it down again.

Trying to catch up with this raucous gravity, she bends her knees to lessen the lurch, but her timing’s off: before she can sink to it, the deck rises up to rap her kneecaps. Her teeth clack shut on the tip of her tongue — the taste of pennies, scarlet expectoration.

Assorted crew members, also in banana gear, attempt to race past her on whatever mission has brought them to Pucci Promenade Deck. They stagger-fall, zigzagging from rail to slippery handrail. One shouts out, “Better go back to your stateroom, miss!”

Like hell. Back inside with Luis, the typhoon was a terrifying unknown, but now she’s in it — in at the edges — clobbered by wind, splattered by rain and seawater, it seems the most intoxicating thing ever. She wants to go above to have the full 360 Hyper-IMAX Dolby Atmos catastrophic experience. The stairs to Lido Deck wrestle her to the top. Where one wave clobbers her spine, another splats her face flat — they’re coming from both directions now. But the wave in her face is salt-free and smacks of chlorine, clearly arising from the Poseidon Pool, where the water billows and bucks end to end, nervy stallion trying to kick his way out of the stall.

Water encircles her. A high wall has built itself up off starboard, yet its hastening toward her causes more exhilaration than panic, the world’s tallest dance partner coming to sweep her away. This buoyant poppy-dream of engulfment keeps her teetering in place far longer than she ought to be. Not for nothing do they speak of an irresistible force.

As she clings to the rail, a figure swathed in white streaming towels emerges from behind the flapping cabanas — Winged Victory of Samothrace catches an epic wave. The gale shifts, terry wings swing forward, obstructing the figure’s vision, and it smashes to the deck. Briony slips and slides in that direction, overshooting her destination several times before arriving at the writhing mass of waffle-weave.

“Are you all right?” she shouts into the towels.

Mrs. Moore’s long face struggles to surface, red and laughing. “I’m fantastic!” she gasps. “Have you ever felt anything so sublime?”

Wind knocks Briony sideways, but the older woman catches her wrist in her strong grip.

“How did you ever make it up here?” Briony says.

“It’s so bad below, the Gummis failed to maintain lockdown. I slipped past several at the rail spewing windward only to seconds later re-devour their own dinners.

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