Drift

Chapter 10

After several minutes (that seemed like hours) of trying to get him up onto the driftwood, we were finally able to rest. We both had our questions about the dinosaur, but we were also both speechless and any conversation about it would be pretty much useless. It's not like either of us had answers.

Each of us was upright in the fetal position, side by side; quite uncomfortably snug for two strangers. I was once again wet, from not only having helped him on board, but now from having to sit in direct contact with his sopping clothes, as well. The driftwood was only so big, and it certainly wasn't big enough for either of us to have any personal space.

We were so close that if I had looked directly at him, it would have been a little bit awkward, with my nose pretty much tickling his ear. He had a very mature, lived-in face, appearing not old by any means, but not too young, either. From what I could see in the terrible lighting, his eyes appeared to be a light green, almost blue, with the surrounding whites reddened from the salt water. Gelid beads of water dropped from his short curly hair onto his coarse cheeks, looking like tears as they trickled their way down to his neck and jacket collar.

I could feel him shivering fiercely, nearly convulsing, while his teeth chattered to the point that I was shocked they hadn't broken. I wondered why I hadn't been shivering that bad when I got out of the water, but then I realized that he had been in the water a great deal longer than I, and through a great deal more, as well. And we were only off of the Florida coast, (at least it seems that we were,) so the water couldn't have been that cold in the first place. A little chilly, sure, but when you're in shock, it seems a lot colder than it is. We were both in such shock that it only felt that cold in the moment.

The stranger's cocoa colored bomber jacket that he had yelled about previously was absolutely drenched. It had a small leather patch sewn on the chest that said "LT. C.TAYLOR-" a clear indicator that he was more than just another dude that liked to wear bomber jackets for fashion. This guy was a legit Lieutenant in the US. Air Force. There were many large dents in the soaked matte chocolatey leather, from where the monster's teeth had been. Beads of gelid water gently dribbled from dark blonde, intensely short and curly hair and down a somewhat handsome- yet lived-in- face.

"Lia," I said firmly, extending a shaky blood soaked hand to formally and properly introduce myself. He unwedged his jittery arm from from it's resting place, reaching out so as to reciprocate the gesture, barely able to close his fingers or move his hand. "Charles."

"Mind if I call you Charlie?" I asked, skeptical as to what he'd say.

His eyes seemed to redden, slightly accentuating the prior redness from salt water. His lips tightened. He seemed almost sad, yet at the same time, enraged that I would even think to ask.

"Had I'a not minded thatcha call me Charlie, I'd'a said 'Charlie,'" he said with a gruff and cracking voice whilst avoiding eye contact.

Ooooookay then, I thought. I hope I'm not stuck here for who knows how long with the ultimate jerkface of the century, I complained to myself.

Voices flooded into my head yet again, right when I thought that they were letting up. I couldn't make any of them out. I just accepted the fact that I was probably suddenly schizophrenic somehow and decided to ignore it- or at least attempt to- even when it hurt.

Charles' eyes darted around, searching for words to redeem what he just realized to be a little bit rude.  "I-I'd offer ya my jacket," he stammered, "but it's current condition ain't the most preferable," he continued,  still avoiding eye contact. His violent shivering seemed to be dying down a little bit, and his teeth weren't chattering as much or as hard as before.

"Well that's mighty kind of ya, and I truly appreciate it, but even if it was dry, you'd need it a lot more than I would right now. I've been drifting on this thing for quite a while now, so I'm pretty well adjusted to the temperature thus far," I smiled warmly, hoping to maybe cheer him up. I had no idea what I was trying to cheer him up from, (aside from the whole "stuck-on-a-piece-of-wood-in-the-middle-of-a-dark-foggy-ocean-with-dinosaurs" thing,) but it did seem that there was something underlying that had been picking at him way before he got here.

"Okay," he muttered, not knowing what to say. He didn't seem to be very comfortable socially. I totally don't blame him. What was he supposed to say, "So do you come to these dinosaur infested waters often?"

"So how did you get here?" I asked, figuring that to be a good and productive question to break the silence.

He seemed to perk up a bit, still looking a little frazzled.

"I'm from Texas, but I've been livin' in Florida for years now. As for what happened? I have no idea. I was flyin'- I'm a commander at the Naval Air Station in Fort Lauderdale- and I was directin' some trainees. We were just doing the routine trainin' flights in the torpedo bombers, like we do every week. We were just doin' a loop- go out over the ocean, practice, and then head back to the other base in Miami. It was all goin' pretty well, but on the way back, it started gettin' real foggy, and our compasses were goin' nuts. I was headin' north, but all of the trainees kept sayin' to go west. But their compassas were messin' up like mine was, and they couldn't see in the fog, either." He shook his head and sighed through his nose, letting fly a lingering drop of water that had previously hung on to the tip of his nose. "I just don't know what happened. Aside from the fog and the compasses, the plane seemed to be flyin' normally. But outta no where, all of my students started freakin' out, and they kept sayin' that their planes just quit and that they were nosedivin'. I couldn't figure out what was goin' on. Then I heard four explosions... there's no way any of em lived." Tears began to gently trickle down his face from his distraught eyes, disguised by the salt water droplets that were already present on his skin. "I just don't know what happened to them. And then right after their planes went down, mine did the same thing. The prop sputtered and then everything just died. Next thing I knew, I was nosedivin' straight to my death like the rest of em' was. I hit the water and then everything went black. I've not the slightest idea how I ended up outta the plane, or how I'm not injured."

"Hopefully you're not internally injured," I pointed out.

"I don't think that there's anythin' more than bruising," he said hopefully.

"I just find it odd though..." I began, pausing for thought. "I mean I have no idea if it'd make a difference, but you'd think that there'd be digital or GPS compasses or something like that in the planes instead, so that it relies on your global position and course to tell your direction, rather than get messed up in magnetic field mix-ups like that. I mean it is 2017, it seems that it'd only be fair to have upgrades like that in our aircraft. But I don't fully understand how all that works. Have you flown planes with digital compasses or anything like that before?"

Charles looked at me, so puzzled and even pitying for some reason.

"Darlin, you musta been hit upside the head somewhere along this rodeo, talkin' about..." He shook his head and waved his hand in the air, "PMS compasses and digital compasses and what not... I got no idea what yer talkin' about but you really musta been brain damaged somewhere, thinkin we're in the next century like that."

"What are you talking about, 'next century?'"
This guy's off the rails, I said to myself.

"Lady, it's 1945, and I got no idea how some random year like '2017' came poppin' into yer head."