Naming the Stars

Matthew could not see, could not hear, could not breathe. The sea was the entire pitch-black world, eternal in every direction. It cared little for the petty strugglings of mortal lives. It strangled him with a vengeance.

He clawed at the crushing weight of the water helplessly—just a little further! When he gasped for want of air, liquid poured down his throat like lava, burning his lungs with its bitterness. He battled to push himself in the direction that he hoped was upwards, but his mind was too choked with seawater to tell. A surge threw him spinning upside-down, scraping past jagged debris, so forceful that he could do nothing but let himself be dragged downwards like some paper marionette.

A lash of cold whipped across Matthew’s face. He clenched shut his eyes. So this was what death was: frigid and black and unforgiving. He hadn’t made it to Paradise, to the place of crystal pools and golden roads. He would be doomed to an empty eternity, bleak and lifeless—

Air.

Matthew gasped, coughing and retching. Air! It was icy and clogged with mist, but he dragged in a breath desperately. Immediately afterwards he threw up a stream of water. His hand, flailing weakly, hit something solid. He latched onto it blindly. It was a piece of driftwood, small enough to wrap his arms around, but it kept himself afloat above the churning sea as he choked for a clear breath.

He felt himself being heaved upwards, downwards, tossed and wrenched like a mouse within the lion’s maw. Each wave was a great swelling cliff rising from the howling sea. Matthew could do nothing but hug the driftwood, mind too foggy for anything else. Exhausted, he finally let his eyes drop closed—this was not a hopeful battle. He could do nothing. His fate was in God’s hands now.

When the world tipped precariously into view, all was still.

The ocean was a grey glass mirror reflecting, in perfect detail, the stagnant sky above. A few reluctant clouds yet hovered—loath to leave—but they were soon dispersed before a pale sun, whose light glanced in silver slits on the waves. If there was any sound or cry of seagull, it was lost in the sheer vastness of the horizon. This was a different reality than the roaring beast from the night before; Matthew felt certain he had been thrust, spinning, into a separate world entirely, silent and built of crystal that would at any minute now shatter.

But no, he was still aloft on the bobbing piece of driftwood. What had happened? How was the sea so still now, when it had seemed the very wrath of the Almighty before?

Memories, flashing darkly, thundered back to him.

Captain, the storm is rising!

Let it come. We can weather it. 

He had been a fool. Matthew wanted to curse himself for his own foolishness. Was not pride Cain’s downfall? Was not hubris the bane of Babel?

But what had come next?

The roiling sky, a massive wave?

The sickening snap as the mast splintered, sails torn like sodden parchment?

Captain!

Charlotte! Matthew’s heart nearly stopped. Where was Charlotte, where was the rest of his crew? He spun around, kicking at the water as panic rose in his throat like bile. They must be there, simply unconscious, right behind him… they would be waking up soon, rejoicing at seeing their captain alive… yes, together they would find land and recover—

But no one was there. He saw only the wreckage of the C. M. Flight, the proud ship reduced to scraps of jagged wood and sad bits of sail like cream-coloured flower petals. Chest tight, Matthew swam through the debris, searching for his crew. Surely that was Jamie, right there, curly brown hair and boyish grin! Surely that was David, beside the broken oar, quiet but thoughtful! Was that not Annie’s favourite sailor’s hat, floating in the rubble? 

Matthew’s throat felt closed; he struggled to take in a breath. They were not dead. They were simply hidden, perhaps drifted out of sight, nothing more. Why was he shivering, now watching as a droplet fell from his eye and was lost—forever—in the ocean of a million salty tears? Why did he feel as if his heart had been savagely wrenched from his chest, beaten to the ground by last night’s waves? He was being unreasonable. 

Charlotte.

“Charlotte!” Matthew cried, strangled. “Charlotte!”

His voice thinned and scattered on the endless ocean surface. He called her name again and again, waiting for her to answer back in her lilting tone. He waited for her to appear before him, perched on a wooden raft, soaked as he was but as beautiful as ever. 

She did not come.

The sky further lightened and then darkened again, hours slipping by hazily. Matthew was heedless. He swam through the shipwreck calling the names of his crew countless times, combing apart the detritus until the answer was clear. His crew was gone.

His friends were gone.

Matthew was stranded in the middle of the Atlantic, but he could not bring himself to care. It was better he die anyway, he thought, than live a life without Jamie and Carter and William. Without Charlotte.

A shudder ran through his spine. He found himself slipping from the driftwood, arms no longer willing to hold him afloat. His legs stopped pedaling. He felt the ocean water, cold and clear, lap at his chin. Now his mouth. Now his nose.

A shape appeared in the distance, a blot of ink on the otherwise flawless horizon.

Matthew felt a tingle of familiarity. He watched as it grew closer, shadows taking the form of a row of oars, a fluttering mast, a curving prow.

Did he not know that prow?

Had he not helped carve it with Charlotte by his side, meticulously and lovingly as a luthier scraping out the polished scroll of his violin? Was it not his prow?

Matthew kicked back up to the surface.

As the ship approached, he felt a billowing hope flare inside of him. The faded gold letters, painted flawlessly in Charlotte’s curving script—there they were! And the helm that Jamie steered—surely that was the one!

Jamie. “Jamie!”

His first mate grinned and saluted, roguish and effervescent as ever. “Aye, aye, Cap’n.” His voice came across perfectly clear, although he seemed too far away to be heard. 

Matthew swam towards the ship with renewed purpose. “Where’s David? Annie? Carter? William?”

Where’s Charlotte? He wanted to ask, but was not brave enough to dare.

“Right here, Captain.” Annie saluted him from the deck, the others right behind her. “Missed us, have you? It hasn’t been too long!”

It has been too long. It has been far too long. Matthew laughed in delight and kept paddling towards them. Here were his friends. Here was his home.

“Matthew!”

And then there was Charlotte, leaning against the railing with a rope in her hands, a celestial smile lighting up her face. 

Matthew had no words. She was dressed, as always, in a plain white dress and thin overcoat that fluttered behind her in the wind. The fading sunlight lit the edges of her loose curls in gold and made her limpid grey eyes dance like crystal. She might have been an angel, might have been a fairy, for her sheer beauty; had Matthew been closer, he would have longed to place a crown upon her head. 

“Matthew,” she said, and the rope trailed into the water in front of him.

He grasped it, hoisting himself upwards. He did not feel the threads chafing at his fingers, nor the burn in his arms as he climbed; there was nothing but himself and Charlotte, Charlotte who grew closer now with every great pull.

She was close enough now that he could see her faint dimples, her slender figure, her high cheekbones. Between her fingers—encircling one!—glinted a small diamond stone, brighter than the North Star. A rush of joy filled Matthew’s head and left him beaming. She was his, would soon be his bride, and he loved her overwhelmingly.

“Matthew,” whispered Charlotte, and there was longing in her gaze. “I wish you could come with us.”

But I’m right here! thought Matthew. I am coming with you! Just a minute longer!

He pushed himself further up the rope.

“You’re not ready yet. You cannot come with us. Let go, Matthew.”

His vision blurred. The sunlight shifted momentarily through Charlotte’s petticoats, as if she had lost substance and now ghosted weightlessly above the deck of the ship. 

“What do you mean?” he gritted out, climbing faster, but his hands were suddenly slick with sweat and they shifted downwards. He clenched them harder. “I’m almost there. Wait for me!”

Charlotte shook her head. “It is not yet time. You have to keep going.”

And then Matthew saw the blade in her hand, felt dread settle in his stomach as he realised what she was about to do. “No, don’t. I’m almost there.”

“This is not farewell,” she said softly. “You will join us, someday. I promise to wait for you; you must promise to find me.”

Matthew clung to the rope. “I promise. Wait!”

“Remember.” Charlotte’s steel-like eyes shone suddenly. “I love you always.”

The knife flashed silver. The rope slackened. And then Matthew felt himself dropping, falling far below as he yelled in protest; the crew’s farewells echoing faintly, he hit the ocean and knew no more.

Matthew was drifting like a severed kite, slowly, aimlessly. Something cool brushed against his ankle. The wind?

Slowly, he opened his eyes. The sky was dark.

The ship! He sat up, gasping. The ship was gone. He heard a splashing sound and looked down; he was at the edge of a beach, half-submerged in shallow waters. He must have been washed ashore.

Matthew lay back down. The stars glittered frostily, sprawled like cold jewels upon their velvet display. How far away they were! And yet it seemed as though he had only to reach out and they would fall, one by one dropping like crystal into his outstretched hand. Each a memory, each an unspoken word, each an echo of Charlotte’s laugh. And that one—the sharply shining one, brighter than its brothers—that was the gem plucked for her hand, the adornment for her slender finger. A promise, cut in glimmering facets. A promise to return.

Home lay above him, in the ghost of a ship that sailed the heavens. But behind him life called, and so home could wait.

Finis.