The Rain

6.

6.

The next day, we tried not to take any breaks, because we had taken a lot of breaks the day before. It had been, in a sense, our "free day", which I firmly believe that we had earned. The Captain was grumbling about the lack of progress before we went to sleep, but I told him not to worry, because there was barely any wind, so we weren't very likely to drift. He calmed down and returned to being River (who he had been for most of the day), but did add in another comment about how we were going to only take food and restroom breaks the next day, which is what we did. You wouldn't believe how hard it is to get that one to just shut up and go to sleep.

When I woke up, the Captain was standing on the porch instead of sitting on the steps, with the dog standing proudly by his side (I was beginning to think that Raider liked River more than myself. I'm his master, for God's sake!). His hands were on his hips, and he was looking at the sunrise, like in the movies.

"This is the day," he said surely. "I know it." A look at the weather station confirmed that we were almost out of the storm. The storm, however, relentlessly persisted, though it was what you would think of as a "normal" rainfall, instead of torrential downpours.

"Want breakfast?" I asked, though I knew the answer was yes. River has the appetite of a teenager, whereas I only eat enough to keep me from shutting down and dying (taking time out of my day is such a pain; it dawned on me one day that I had wasted over one hundred hours of my life eating. If I eat at all, I usually multitask while I eat).

"Of course," the Captain replied, though there was a small hint of River in the answer. "What do you have planned?"

"Fruit and whatever cereal I've got in the pantry. I'm pretty sure most of my other food has either gotten nasty or gone bad," I said as I went back to go get us the feast of Frosted Flakes and strawberries and raspberries. We ate quickly, then let Raider drink all of the sugary milk (my favorite part, but the "puppy eyes" got the best of me this time).

We got to rowing, and everything went as planned. For awhile, at least. That was when Raider began barking loudly. I yelled at him to shut up, assuming that he was barking at the passing birds, which had been turning up in abundance lately. Then his barks turned into yelps, which, once again, wasn't bothering me all that much, because he made the same sort of sound at the vacuum cleaner. That's when I felt water pooling around me. A panic filled my throat as I turned to look at my dog, who was standing leg-deep in rain water, which was slowly coming towards me.

"Houston, we've got a problem!" I yelled, panic filling my voice.