Captivation

35: Sirens

Sirens (noun): each of a number of women or winged creatures whose singing lured unwary sailors onto rocks.

The upper deck is packed with supplies that were bought at our last stop. I have made it my hiding spot and I sit on a crate and fold myself up, making myself as small as I possibly can. I have my legs pulled in with my arms wrapped around them and my chin is rested on my knees. Evening is falling, and I realize that around this time yesterday I was crying in Henry’s room.

I hear laughter and a stringed instrument being plucked haphazardly, and I’m assuming its Henry’s instrument, and the same instrument I remember him having on the first day I saw him. I listen to their jumbled conversations and then after a while I hear some words being slurred and I know that some of them are definitely intoxicated. I’m betting Henry isn’t, and that he’s acting the same as he always does.

Someone picks up the instrument again and the sound is much more fluid. I sit up tall, dropping my legs back down to a normal position and trying to hear the chords played. I stand up, and walk slightly closer, but I stay on the upper deck, trying to hear him better.

“I’m holding on to the hope that one day this could be made right…” It’s Henry, singing low, and soft, but the crew’s discordant talking has quieted, making Henry’s voice distinguishable. “Because I’ve been ship wrecked and left for dead and I’ve seen the darkest sights…” A brief pause, but I still hear the instrument being played, “Everyone I’ve loved seems like a stranger in the night. But oh my heart still burns and tells me to return and search the fading light.” He misses a cord, “I’m sailing home to you, I won’t be long…by the light of moon, I will press on, until, I find my love.”

I feel like I could cry again, I tell myself not to. Henry keeps on with his song, something soothing about his voice, although the words are haunting. I know this song, and I’ve played it before, but one the piano, not on anything with strings.

“Sirens call my name, they say they’ll ease my pain then break me on the stones.” I listen to Henry, and I think of all the women that Henry has been with. “But true love is the burden that will carry me back home…I’m sailing home to you, I won’t be long…by the light of moon, I will press on, so tie me to the mast of this old ship and point me home, before I lose the one I love before my chance is gone. I want to hold her in my arms.”

I stand in silence as he finishes. I almost walk down to where Henry is but I stop myself, because I don’t know if I’m ready to face the look in his eyes. The chatter builds back up to its prior height and I still sit alone, wondering what to make of his song, and if he knew I was up here. If it could have been for me.

I watch the sun disappear, dropping down, eaten by the waves. “I’m sailing home to you.” I say, not a hint of song in my voice. I open one of the crates just to distract myself. I see potatoes, and in another there is a large amount of pickles, and in another there are carrots.

“It’s like wishing for rain as I stand in the desert.” I sing out now, quietly. I close all the crates and stand on one of them, trying to get a better view of the enormous sky as it loses its tinges of purple and pink, trading them in for the deep hues of night.

“It’s a cold and it’s a broken hallelujah!” I shout out to the sky and the colors that leave me with nothing but night.

Someone clears their throat behind me and I turn quickly, startled, to see Henry.

“I had no idea you were up here, that you could hear me.” He says.

I nod my head simply, his eyes have a slightly glazed over look, I can tell he’s been drinking, but he doesn’t seem at all drunk. I wonder how he manages to do that.

“What are you doing?” He asks, motioning to me, standing on the crate.

“I was watching the sun set…” I trail off, “What are you all celebrating?” I ask.

“Formally?” Henry says, “Nothing. Informally, my birthday.”

“Today’s your birthday?” I ask, never having bothered ask when it was.

“Yes, it is.” He tells me, and he looks reserved.

“Happy birthday.” I tell him, “How old are you?” I ask.

“Twenty – five.” He says.

“Go back to your party,” I say, knowing he wants to be released from the obligation of talking to me.

He nods his head and walks down the stairs away from me. I sigh, sitting down on the crate and wondering what in the world I am going to do with my life.

***

I am walking around on the busy deck the next morning, and finally it occurs to me to ask the name of the small town we were at just a couple days ago. “Bradley!” I call out after him as he walks toward the upper deck with purpose.

He stops for me anyway, “Yes?” He asks.

“Where were we, the other day?” I ask, “That town?”

“Maywater, why?” He asks. I stop moving.

“No reason. I just wanted to know.” I tell him, he nods, too busy to question me, and he moves away, off to whatever he was doing.

Maywater, my mother told me to use a fake name there, and for no other reason that dumb luck I did. I wonder what exact that town has to do with anything, but hopefully that town will never be looking for Madelyn Mercer.

***

I am stuck in my room because I feel out of place with everyone else. I get so frustrated that I start jumping on my bed, just to feel like I’m doing something.

“This is stupid.” I murmur to myself, but I keep jumping like a lunatic. I remember doing this when I was younger, and always getting yelled at for it. I was told I would fall, or break the bed, or something equally stupid, because at seven I really didn’t care about any of that.

Avaline was always more cautious, afraid of getting in trouble, and at that time Cora was just too young. So it was always me who got in trouble for trying to fly off of my mattress.

Eventually I flop down on my back, smiling at the memory. I blow some hair out of my face and lay on my bed, spread out like a star. I close my eyes and I wish that I was young again, that I met Henry through another circumstance, that things were different, but also exactly the same.

There is a knock at my door and I sit up. “Yes? Come in?”

Jamison opens the door and doesn’t look like he’s in a good mood, although I can tell that his displeasure is not aimed toward me. “We’re going to Cavanaugh.”

“Haven’t we been there?” I ask, remembering Genevieve and Mary and Jane.

“Yes.” Jamison says, his tone clipped and I think that this is part of what upsets him. I wonder why he would be so angry about this, and I think that it must be because Henry wants to go there and Jamison thinks it a bad idea. I try to imagine why this would be somewhere Henry wanted to go, and then it hits me. Catherine.

Sirens call my name; they say they’ll ease my pain.

I try to pretend that I didn’t think this, but I did, and I have a feeling that I’m right, and if it’s not Catherine it will be a Natalie or an Amy or a Cassidy.

It occurs to me that I can’t even be upset with him for this, because I ruined everything first.