A necessary voyage

Dawn

It looked anything other than what it was. The clock on the wall, the sound of gulls crying out with their never-ending search for food, and the ache in his legs announced its arrival.

But you couldn’t tell it by looking out the window.

Outside, the sky was the color of a pelaling, an Indian mackerel, Bluish-green with long dark golden color waves of worm shape clouds sliced the foggy sunrise. Already the dampness from the jungle smothered the small fishing village like a wet blanket. It was a small place, which suddenly appears and is just thrown together based on how the fish are biting, along the banks of small inlets that populated the jungle coastline. Like migrating animals or their ancestors, these fishermen grew up depending on the sea and have learned to respect and fear its hold on them.

Daylight was just breaking when Jamal pulled away from the wharf, the bow of his old creaking fishing trawler splitting the waters of the Gulf of Martaban, leaving a V shape ripple in the otherwise calm bay behind him. He stood by the helm in the pilothouse, steering past the moored boats whose captains were still sleeping off their nightly consumption of Myanmar Rum, Toddy juice, and Shwe le maw.

There was no hurry to get to see it today. The remnants of last night’s torrid downpour left a slight chill in the air. Ahead of the sea beckon behind a wall of grayest fog Jamal had ever seen. He felt it in his bones and hunker down within the worn and faded thick coat that hung on his narrow frame.

The typhoon had lasted for days, and the lack of fishing was already being felt by Jamal and his family financially. With six kids and a wife to feed, he had no choice but to attempt to bring in a good catch today. Still, his eyes darted the horizon, feeling and listening with growing uneasiness, what the sky, air, and the sea were telling.

He took in a deep breath savoring the smell of the sea before letting it out slowly. No, he muttered to himself. He was in no hurry to get to see today, and yet he had no choice.

Reaching the open sea, he steered Northwest. The fog began lifting slowly, and patches of the blue-sky peak through just long enough for his boat to reach the area only to vanish as the dark grey bank of whispering smoke-like fog rush in to fill in the promising opening.

Jamal cursed the weather and adjusted his course. His eyes burned from the strain of trying to look through the fog. Earlier, he thought he saw a ship on the horizon, but the fog closed back in, and now he wasn’t sure if he actually saw one or not.

Like a fighter pilot, his head was in constant motion.

People in the village knew the sound of his engine. His departure this morning may have forced others to put to sea. The chances of running into another ship were slim, but there was a chance, and not being able to see was making him tired.

The change of direction brought a slight breeze that blew through the open doorway of the pilothouse. Jarmal shivered. Pouring more coffee from a thermos, he welcomes the warmth the liquid provided.

Taking another sip, he stared out the window watching the swirls of fog drift along the water. It was hypnotically mesmerizing despite the mist, the cold, and the hardships which came with his life. Being out at sea brought with it a peacefulness which was like a drug for him. He loved the ocean and talked to it like it was an old friend,

Looking back at the stern of his boat. He cursed his brother-in-law. His only deckhand was back in the village, sleeping it off.

Still, the patch of fog the boat was cutting through was so thick he couldn’t see the stern let along the wake his boat was making. Even the gulls had given following him as they always did.

Jamal stared at the sea in front and then looked down at the old wind-up clock taped down on the shelve below. Three hours have gone and not a clear area to stop and fish. He changes course. The engine chugging in protest as he adjusted the speed. The bow of the ship knifed into the fog and burst into the clearing of bright sunshine.

The sudden brightness blinded him. It took him a moment to understand what had happened.

“Finally,” he exclaimed, reaching for the pair of sunglasses that were on the console in front of him. Experience eyes surveyed the clearing, pleased that it must have been five miles wide in every direction. A thick gray wall surrounded it on all sides as if something kept it from moving into the open area.

“Finally,” he muttered again, his hand pushes the throttle down, slowing his boat before bringing it to a stop. Being one man short at a time like this just made everything more complicated. Jamal left the pilothouse, stopping briefly to savor the stillness. The wind had eased up some in the past hour. Waves lapped in rhythm against the side of his boat. He could actually hear the clouds of fog float along the top of the waves in the distance.

He found himself capitulated by the illusion. The lack of sleep and the role of the waves was sapping his energy. His eyes yielded, and he let them close…just for a minute, he told himself.

Jamal lost all track of time. He was just one with the sea. Just a few more minutes, he told himself, and then he would get to work.

It was a clanking sound that filtered through his consciousness. Jamal stirred, taking a moment to fight off his slumber. The sound was a bit louder now. At the far end of the clearing, an extensive vertical line sliced through the outer edges of the fogbank.

Jamel stared…his eyes budge in horror at the aberration.

Like the opening of a book, the patch of fog parted; baring down on him was a large freighter. Its long pointed bow loomed menacingly over his tiny trawler.

Icy tentacles of fear clutch at his heart; Jamal jerked the wheel to port, his hand slamming the throttle to full speed. Sweat leaped out of every pour, desperate to escape the inevitable. Centering the wheel, his fingers latch down on its worn wood-tightening his grip to almost vise-like intensity.

The old motor shriek and shook-pushing the trawler with infuriating slowness.

He knew it was hopeless. It was not a contest his old boat was going to win.

Damn it, Jamal yells!

His eyes darting between the bow of the freighter and the gauge mounted above the wheel. It was a race between life and death.

His fist pounded the steering wheel, “It’s your own fault,”’ he shouted, looking out at the sea and the looming tomb-like mountain of steel. More curses filled the air while deep down, he knew he was cursing himself for not paying attention to what the sea had been telling him.

Desperation pushed him. There was no time to think…only to act.

A sense of death engulfed his narrow frame. Thoughts of his wife and family flashed across his mind. The freighter loomed larger through his windshield, dwarfing the slower boat. A collision out here was certain death.

A tooth-shattering screeching noise filled the air as his old boat scrapped along the side of the freighter. Jamal stared up at rust-covered walls of gray. A scream pierces through the noise, and it took a moment or two for Jamal to realize it was coming from him.

Rational thought was gone. Jamel’s eyes were transfixed on the towering grey wall. Yet, somehow, subconsciously, his hands adjusting the helm, held on as his boat shook like a fish out of water.

It felt like a lifetime before the freighter was astern of them.

But the old trawler was not ready to die.

Reality crawled.

The chugging rhythm of his old worn engine worked its way into his consciousness. Jamal’s head shook in disbelief. It was a miracle.