Friday, September 24, 2010

Scritch-scratch

She awoke to the touch of rough wooden beams against her back. In the first moments of her wakefulness there was only darkness and the steady, ever present rocking. In a moment her fear subsided as her eyes adjusted to what little light filtered through the planks this far below deck, and she remembered. The memories were little better than her earlier disorientation, and she shook her head to fight them back, bringing her growing hunger into sharp focus. She was unsure of the time of day, here in the darkness, so she strained to listen for the telltale sounds of the men above. It was eerily quiet. Was it night, she wondered, or had she slept through them stopping at port. She had to be careful of her movements. She'd already almost been caught twice, betrayed by the rustle of her clothes or a slight shift of her body causing an aging board to creak. Luckily, she'd made her hiding place within the heavy planking of the hull, and the barely perceptible sounds had been attributed to rats. The comparison made her smile. As a stowaway she was a type of vermin. Being a girl, she was not only potentially a burden to the ship, but also a curse. There was no telling what the superstitious men aboard would do if she were careless and allowed herself to be caught. So she waited.

The rocking of the boat and her weakness made her drowsy again, but she struggled to keep herself awake. At one point, something brushed against her shin. It was one of her fellow stowaways, using the gaps made by the withered and splintered boards within the hull as a highway. It stopped momentarily to sniff the tips of her fingers, looking for a sign of her charity, before moving on. But she had nothing to share. It had been some time since she'd been able to leave her hiding place in search of food, although she couldn't be sure of how long it had been since she'd last eaten. The darkness prevented her from being able to track the days and the hours passed endlessly. She still couldn't make out any sounds from above. A sharp pang set her determination as she decided that the risk was worth the effort of not dying of starvation in that dank wooden tomb. She carefully eased forward, feeling over the boards in front of her for the panel that would free her from her confinement. The planks made a soft scraping sound as she pushed, and as they moved, the light they allowed into her hiding place seemed almost blinding compared to the gloom she'd become accustomed to.

She stepped down onto a large barrel and eased herself to the floor. As she walked slowly between the sacks and crates that crowded the hold, she started to feel that something wasn't quite right. It wasn't just the lack of the sounds of the men at work aboard the ship - even the motion of the vessel seemed wrong. Perhapse they had run aground. But she dismissed that as a possibility, thinking that the violence of a collision would have awakended her. She wondered again if they had taken to port. Two rats ran across her path, causing her to step back. It must be night, or else the rodents wouldn't be so active. Still, she was filled with doubt, and an increasing sense of forboding. There should have been the stomp of feet, voices calling out orders; she had quickly learned that even at night, the ship was alive with activity. All that came to her ears now was the gentle pulse of waves and the groan of ropes straining against the mainsail.

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