I stood up and made my way up to Anand, my blanket flying behind me like a superhero’s cape. Anand turned as I laid my hand on his shoulder.
I leaned in close and said, “Head east. We’re not going to Lohifushi. I need to go to Eriyadoo.”
“What? Why?”
“I just need to go there. Please.”
He looked into my eyes and I could tell that he was trying to decide if I had blown another circuit. Finally, Anand nodded and wheeled the boat hard to starboard. I grabbed the railing to keep from falling over. After straightening out the wheel, he pointed to a worn, brown leather bag on the empty seat next to him. “I have some clothes in there. Grab a pair of pants. They will be a little small for you, but you cannot walk around Eriyadoo like that.”
I followed his gaze and looked down. I was still in my underwear. I opened the bag and found a pair of khaki pants. Funny, but I didn’t realize how cold I was until I put the pants on. I began to warm up a little, but I still couldn’t stop shaking. The news about Jin must have triggered another release of adrenaline into my bloodstream. I wouldn’t be surprised if I was overdosing on the shit.
I shielded my eyes from the glare of the rising sun, but its reflection off the water blinded me. I wondered how Anand could see. I guessed that after twelve years of running supplies around the atoll Anand could probably navigate these waters blindfolded. An hour later, we arrived at Eriyadoo.
Two bare-chested, middle-aged Chinese men met me on the pier. They wore traditional Maldivian sarongs and sandals. Their faces were vaguely familiar, but in my current frame of mind I couldn’t remember where or when I had met them. They seemed to know me.
The shorter of the two said, “Li Jing said that you would come. She asked that you wait for her at her hut. We will show you the way.”
I knew the way, but I didn’t argue. From their somber expressions, I knew they were as upset about the news as I was.
Before I stepped off the boat, Anand asked, “Shall I wait here for you?”
“No. Go home. I don’t know how long I’ll be.”
“Are you sure? I can wait.”
I shook my head. “Go home to your family. They need you more than I do.” He studied me for a moment and then nodded.
“And thanks,” I said. It didn’t come close to expressing how I felt. I couldn’t figure out why he would risk everything, his wife and six children, for someone he barely knew. Whatever his reason, I owed him.
“Okay,” he said. “Stay safe, my friend.”
I stepped onto the pier and followed the men to Jin’s hut.
Li Jing was Jin’s wife. She wasn’t there when I arrived, but his oldest son, Bohai, was. He sat in front of their hut with his back against a coconut tree. He was systematically peeling fibers off a coconut shell. He looked up, studied me for a second, and returned his attention to the coconut without saying a word. I wondered if it had been a mistake to come here.
Bohai had been five years old when Jin and Li Jing came to the island. Rambunctious and always eager to help, Jin used to bring him along on our work trips. Bohai had been a great little assistant. He climbed the scaffolding and brought us tools, food, and anything else we needed, always with a big smile on his face. But that smile was nowhere to be seen now.
Now he was seventeen years old and stood a good four inches taller than his dad. His hair must have driven Jin crazy. It was short and spiky all around except for the back where he maintained a long, single braid. He had the braid draped over his right shoulder and it was almost long enough to reach the ground. His face was stuck somewhere between a boy and a man. It didn’t look like he was shaving yet, but I could make out a whisper of a mustache.
“Bohai,” I said. “I just heard about…” I cleared my throat, “I’m sorry about your father. I’m sure they’ll find him.”
Bohai peeled another fiber off the shell and dropped it on to the pile next to him.
“Did you hear from him recently? I mean, did you get a message or…”
He finished peeling another fiber before he said, “No. He didn’t have his data mat with him.”
That was odd. Jin always had his data mat with him.
Bohai threw the coconut hard against the hut. It bounced and rolled back to his feet. He kicked it away and then looked up at me. There were tears in his eyes. He said, “You know my father. You know how cautious he is. He would never go out on a boat at night.”
“Is that what they told you?”
He nodded. “The MDF sent a message to my mom.”
Bohai was right. Jin was a stickler for safety. I felt sick to my stomach and struggled for something to say. “So it happened last night?”
“That’s what they said.”
It didn’t make sense. There wasn’t a single time in the twelve years that we worked together that Jin travelled at night. He always insisted that we leave in the morning. There was no way he would do it… not unless he was running from someone or… going to North Point to find me. The ball in my stomach seemed to explode.
I didn’t know what to say. “Your father was a good man, Bohai.”
“He is a good man!”
“I’m sorry. That’s what I meant.”
I started to turn away.
“Wait.” He got up, reached into his back pocket, and pulled out a data mat and handed to me. “This is my father’s. Before leaving for Male, he gave it to me and told me that if anything should happen to him, I was to give this to you.”
I stared at it, afraid to touch it. Unlike my data mat, Jin’s was folded neatly. It even had the original elastic band that held it closed. My hand shook. I reached out and took it.
I waited for the helojumper on a small beach at the northern end of the island. Surrounded by a wall of soaring palm trees that reached out towards the ocean, the beach was only fifty feet wide, but it stretched nearly a hundred feet out into the water. It had probably once been a great beach back when this place was a resort, but now it was littered with dried seaweed and swarming with sand fleas and cracked crab shells.
My conversation with Li Jing had been brief, hardly a conversation at all. When I saw her approach the hut supported by two elderly Chinese women, I knew she wasn’t in any condition to accept visitors, much less answer questions. So I didn’t ask any. I just told her that I was sorry and that I would pray for Jin’s safe return. Her response was a deep, mournful sob.
A glint of light in the sky caught my attention and pushed the memory from my mind. It was the helojumper and it was coming in for a landing.
I couldn’t believe that I was actually going to get inside one of those contraptions. Helojumpers scared the shit out of me, but I had to get back to Male and this was the fastest way.
Twelve years ago when I had arrived at the Male airport, I was offered a seat in one of those flying, glass-bottomed boats. I had considered it, but politely refused when I saw one up close. It resembled a giant food processor with seats inside.
The fuselage was round except for a small beak-like protrusion in the front where the pilots sat. Everything except for the column in the center of the fuselage that housed the engine were made out of transparent carbon fibers. Even the damned passenger seats were transparent.
Turbine blades sat inside two stacked airfoil rings perched directly above the fuselage. It was an accident waiting to happen.
I remembered looking at that thing and thinking that one hard landing was all that it would take to send those turbines crashing through the roof and into the fuselage. Those blades would chop up the passengers into salsa.
There had been several dozen helojumpers in the MDF fleet before the storm. Now there were only two. The carcasses of the others sat in a pile on the end of the runway, cannibalized to keep the remaining helojumpers in the air.