Salt, Then Silence

The sea had quieted by the time they found her. She was a ghost against the dawn, lashed to the broken mast of a half-drowned sailboat, her body wrapped in the stiff embrace of soaked lines. The searchlight swept past once, then flicked back, steady on the tangle of girl and wreckage. A man shouted. The hull of the Coast Guard cutter groaned as it came about.

She did not stir.

The sky, a watercolor smear of gray and gold, stretched low over the Gulf. Gentle swells rocked what was left of the boat, an old Catalina 22, its mainsail long since stripped away by the storm. Only the jib clung, shredded and sodden. The name on the stern, Marigold, had nearly vanished beneath a crust of salt.

When they lifted her from the mast, her fingers left blood where they had clenched too long against the lines. Someone covered her with a blanket. Someone else pressed a hand to her forehead and said her name.

"Eliza."

She flinched at the sound. Her lips quivered. The first tear fell, then another, spilling silently into the salt-stiff fabric of the blanket draped over her shoulders.

"You're safe now," the medic said gently. "We've got you."

She shook her head, as if the words were wrong. Her tears came harder. She choked on them, shoulders trembling, grief ripping out of her in gasping, hiccupping sobs.

"Where’s your brother?" someone asked.

The crying stopped.

Just like that.

Her breath evened. Her face stilled. She blinked once, twice, as if she had just surfaced from something far away. When she spoke, her voice was quiet. Too quiet.

"The storm took him."

A silence settled over the cabin, thick as oil. No one spoke.

It had been a morning sail. A quick trip past the buoys, just beyond the sight of Treasure Island’s pale, crowded shore. The Gulf had stretched wide and blue, calm as glass. Sam had wanted to test the new rigging, to feel the wind pull them fast and free.

"It’s barely an hour out," he had said, rolling his eyes when she checked the forecast again. "We’ll be back before Mom even notices."

She remembered the snap of the sail as it caught the wind. The sharp scent of salt and sunscreen. The way the sun turned his hair the color of sand.

They had done this a hundred times before. This time had been no different—until it was.

The storm came from nowhere. One moment, the sky stretched unbroken, the next, it thickened into a boiling mass of steel and shadow. The water darkened. The wind shifted. A gust slammed into the mainsail, and the boom swung hard.

"Reef it! Now!" Sam’s voice cut through the rising wind.

Eliza scrambled for the lines, her hands slipping on the wet rope. Another gust, harder this time. The boat heeled sharply. She lost her footing, crashing against the gunwale. Sam fought for the rudder, his knuckles white.

The sea rolled beneath them. Then the first wave hit.

It swallowed the deck, knocking Eliza off balance. Cold salt filled her nose and mouth. She gasped, coughing, fighting to hold on as Marigold pitched like a toy in a bathtub.

Sam reached for her. She caught a glimpse of his eyes, wide and wild, before another wave crashed over them, wrenching them apart.

She went under.

The world dissolved into darkness and roaring water. Her lungs burned. Up. She needed to go up. But which way? The sea spun her, weightless, directionless. Her fingers clawed at the void, desperate for something solid.

Then—wood. The edge of the hull.

She surfaced with a gasp, blinking against the rain. Marigold lay on her side, her mast snapped, the jib whipping loose in the wind. The sky flashed white with lightning.

"Sam!" She barely heard herself over the storm.

No answer.

The rain lashed her face. The wind howled. She turned frantically, searching, squinting through the sheets of water.

Then, a voice—his voice—just once, barely a whisper over the wind.

"Eliza!"

And then she saw him. Sam clung to a piece of the mast, his face pale, his fingers slipping. The jagged remains of the mast floated between them, too small for them both.

She swam toward him, fighting the waves, her limbs screaming. He reached for her.

For one fleeting moment, they both had hold of the same piece of wood. But the sea pitched and rocked, dragging them under, wrenching them apart.

Sam coughed, his fingers slipping. "Eliza—"

She gripped tighter, her nails digging into the splintered wood. The current yanked at them both. There was no space, not enough room. And Eliza was bigger. Stronger.

Sam knew it too. She saw it in his eyes.

Then, as if he had made some silent decision, he let go.

Or maybe he hadn’t. Maybe she had shifted her weight, just slightly, just enough.

The ocean swallowed him before she could stop him. Before she could scream. Before she could do anything at all.

The storm raged for hours, battering her against the wreckage. Her hands ached from gripping the mast, her skin raw from salt and wind.

When dawn finally came, the world was empty. The sea, once raging and wild, had smoothed into eerie stillness, mirroring the hollow space inside her. The wind had died down, but its absence pressed against her as heavily as the storm itself.

She drifted for three days. The sun burned her skin. Her lips cracked. Hunger gnawed, but thirst was worse. She tried not to think. About the storm. About the moment before it all went wrong. About Sam.

Every time her mind wandered, the sea responded. When grief swallowed her, the waves rose as if to pull her under. When her guilt clawed at her chest, the wind howled again, whispering Sam’s name. When her heart went numb, the ocean fell to glass, silent and waiting.

She closed her eyes and let the waves carry her.

Outside the porthole, the sea stretched smooth and endless.

"Are you sure you don’t remember more?" The medic tried again.

Eliza turned to him, her face unreadable. She took another sip of tea.

"The storm took him," she said again, her voice flat.

She no longer cried.

Outside, the wind picked up, whispering over the water. Another storm was coming.