This one stopped us in our tracks when it came in over the submission email transom, a story about a very strange penal reform policy: A last cruise for the condemned. We hopped on the ship right away and have been thinking about it ever since.
-The Editors
Because my execution was finally scheduled, I was spending the next week, the last of my life, aboard the Milagro with my mother. The air was warm and salt-heavy. A pink sky so vivid I had the impulse to shut my eyes. But off in the distance dolphins flipped and flopped. I couldn’t look away. A dozen tiny silhouettes set against the sinking sun.
My mother gave her goblet a good shake, ice shards chinking to glass. I’m not sure this is about having a good time, she said. This is your funeral, isn’t it?
You always wanted to go on a cruise.
Not with one hundred convicts, she said. But with your dad.
My mother sucked down her second margarita when a man stood beside us and cleared his throat. He was small. Spaghetti arms dangled from his sides and elvish ears reached past the flat top of his head. He said there were no tables left. That the bar was out of standing room. He asked if he could join us for dinner. I won’t say a thing, he said. Won’t bother you none. He again cleared his throat, pressing his feet to the ground.
My mother smiled something thin and polite. There’s room, she said. No stragglers on my watch. She slid deeper into the pleather booth, my thighs stuck to the material, sweat gathering beneath me, and the man slipped in beside her. You’re Terrence Dolan, I said.
His hands shook as he popped out a Dramamine, his blister pack half gone. You a big movie person? he asked, tossing the pill back with a quick swallow of water.
You have no idea, my mother said.
Terrence directed that trilogy of films all shot underwater, I told my mother. The Water Chronicles. We saw the first one at the movies together.
But I haven’t been to the movies in nearly twenty years, she said.
Terrence gave a small snort. He said, Yes, each movie takes nearly a decade. I tried filming them back to back but no one wanted to fund that. Called it an extravagance.
The latest one was scheduled for later this summer, I said, eyeing Terrence as he unrolled his napkin over his thigh, patting away the wrinkles.
Then what happened? my mother asked, her lips sniffing at her margarita’s straw. She was slurping another drink as if her life depended on it. Maybe, in some way, it did. Terrence shifted in his seat before saying, Then I went to prison.
Oh, my mother said. Of course.
Terrence rubbed at his face. My mother knew better than to ask for the full story, but I could tell she was itching for the truth: her eyes drilled into the poor man. She wouldn’t look away. And she chewed her straw and sipped. Chewed and sipped. The goblets were so big, she still had a third left. I said, Is it true you got a nickname on set?
It’s not that exciting, he said. Terrence the Tank.
Because you only shot in tanks? I asked.
He blew air past his lips, reddened from nervous nibbling. He didn’t like being aboard the ship, I thought, being amongst criminals from death row. He was better than all that. He gnawed his lower lip before speaking. No one knew the film was being shot in a tank, he said. The idea to film underwater came later. When I arrived on set and asked for a tank, no one understood. We weren’t going to shoot it all in a tank. Terrence let out a drawn-out sigh, more for theatrics than anything else. He’d told this story plenty of times before, knew where to pause for emphasis, which words to spotlight. But each time we prepped for a scene, he said, I thought it would be better that way, better than just using green screen. Everyone was annoyed at first, especially the actors who hadn’t signed up to be underwater for ten cold hours a day. But eventually everyone got used to it. Had the tank ready all the time. So, Terrence the Tank. By the time the second movie prepped, we had created our own technology, advanced the tank. It’s a whole thing.
My mother’s eyes had glazed over. I too had expected something else. When I told Terrence this, he frowned. I had wanted the full story, the one that ended in bloody murder, he knew this. But a server came to our table and took our orders. The food came quickly after. Lobster tails Terrence suckled after dipping them in butter sauce. A shrimp cocktail glass my mother slugged down until not a drop was left. And I stared at my steak floating above a pool of blood. Had I asked for it rare? When we were done, Terrence swiped his mouth, bowed his head, then walked away. A famous director on board, my mother said, her voice low and thick. Who knew?
He reminded me of Dad, I said.
Both old, my mother said.
The people on this ship aren’t so bad, I said. Unless you feel unsafe. Do you?
She considered the room, the peace and quiet despite the circumstance, despite the many lives coming to some violent but inevitable end. Armed guards were posted up at the entrance, and a few patrolled the ship, though I didn’t expect they’d have to do much of anything the whole week. We were a calm crowd. Subdued by the facts of life. Actually, she said, I feel the safest I’ve ever felt. Like a sense of communion. Like, I’m family, we’re all family, and they’d never let anything happen to family.
I looked around. What she said rang true. Whether I liked it or not, these were my people. For one more week, these were my people.
***
Another drawing of my father sketched. His raw-boned frame in a half-filled tub. What I’d thought then was the height of the disease; I had no idea it would get worse. Beside me, my mother dozed now in bed. Over the years she had grown into a lightweight: the last margarita she had during our dinner with Terrence the Tank had knocked her out. I’d spread myself across the sofa, the sketchbook my mother had gifted me for the cruise on my thighs, while reading about Terrence in the online tabloids. His marriage to a pop star was on the rocks, rumors swirled of a looming split. Between the two of them, an accumulation of various awards over a stretch of years. A Grammy. An Oscar. I exited the browser and focused on what played in the background: The Water Chronicles.
It all came back to me. The kingdom tucked in Earth’s deepest trenches. The statuesque, underwater species framed vaguely by racist stereotypes. The special effects, too, remained immaculate, and still so far ahead of their time. In one scene, a character escapes an underwater attack by an enemy tribe. I watched the actress, enraptured. How her face twisted into something frightening. Something in pain. She looked as if she was actually fighting for her life, and it occurred to me that she was. I closed the laptop.
A soft snore slipped from my mother’s mouth. Her lips were two red lines. Mascara wrapped her eyes. I unbuckled her short heels and settled a blanket over her sleeping figure. Her tawny skin textured like an orange peel. From the sofa, I considered the room. The prints of sea paintings that hung from the walls wallpapered in a pattern of tiny anchors. There was a TV and a mini-fridge and a microwave and a coffee table and two beds. Tiny portholes looked out into the black water. But the air was hot and still. I felt trapped, just as trapped as I did behind those bars. This was no different. The ship just a floating prison. Whatever special government program that landed us here just an excuse to execute more people. I emptied out my lungs before swallowing more air. The feeling persisted.
***
I drained a gin and tonic at the piano bar. The bartender’s eyes rested over me after he introduced himself as Perry. He said he had some party favors if I was interested. Before I could say anything he pressed a colorful shape into my palm and I shut my fist.
What’d you do to land this job? I asked.
They give me danger pay, he said. I only need to work a few of these a year. Besides, the folks are pretty pleasant. Just want to cherish those final moments with their loved ones rather than cause trouble.
Bet you’ve heard some wild stories, I said.
Perry wiped a wet glass with a rag. He had oily, pockmarked skin that made me feel a smidge better about mine. What I mostly see is a lot of regret, he said. It never seems like it was worth all the trouble. Do you regret what you did?
I did what I did to save my father. It didn’t work. And now my mother’s losing me too. I think luck was never on our side.
I’m sorry, Perry said, wiping another glass dry.
Then: It’s an orange Tesla.
I felt it in my fist before I scanned the room. The slow twinkle and hum from the piano. The people who spoke softly, sipped slowly. Nodding to the music. I was surprised by the decorum. We had one week left on Earth, why was everyone acting so proper? I threw the orange Tesla back with the final dregs from my glass. Perry grinned, and when he laughed, it was something hard and fiendish. My skin rose with small bumps. I’m in the wrong place, I said.
Down a flight of stairs, and I pounded into the more clubby bar next, where the dancefloor lit up in colors and a disco ball spun from the mirrored ceiling. Sweat sprung from my forehead and spilled down my spine. Beams of light passed and passed, my fingers prodding the air, pinching at the traces of color, there one second, gone the next. I glittered, I danced. It was the most free I’d felt in years. And I only stopped once I saw I was alone in the center of the dance floor. That no one wanted to dance up against me anymore. That I was too obviously on drugs. But wasn’t that the point? I suddenly felt young and stupid, a feeling I’d missed out on in my youth, when my father’s circumstances made me grow up too fast, skipping all the years of silliness and play.
Then, a cup of water crammed to my chest, someone maneuvering me to the side of the bar. Are you okay? It was Terrence. I shook off his grip. Drank the water. Let’s take it outside, he said.
The sea was endless, dark. Stars strung across the sky behind a low haze. Leaning against a cool railing, I felt vaguely embarrassed for my behavior on the dance floor, whatever Terrence might have seen. He offered me a sip from his vape pen, unbothered. Did you once work in the business? he asked. Or just a big movie-goer?
How much time had passed? My teeth no longer chattered. My hair had dried itself into some brushy masterpiece. I told him I loved movies. That’s all.
You’re missing a finger, he said, gesturing at my hand. How’d that happen?
Just a casualty of trying to do the right thing.
And what’s that?
I prodded at my water with a tiny cocktail straw, still thoroughly thirsty. I said, One day, you wake up and you see how slim your choices are, by which I mean, there are no choices, and you’re desperate, you’re so desperate, you want to save a loved one, so you pick the only choice. I don’t miss the finger. What I miss is my dad.
You fell into organized crime, he said.
I started small, I said. Craigslist for cash quick. There was this woman who’d have me shoot into her bulletproof vest. I think she wanted me to miss.
Did you?
Just once, I said. But is it falling when that’s the only way out?
A sharp whistle from his mouth. You’re not like the others on this ship.
No, I said. They have dignity. It seems to me they’re less selfish too. They’re doing everything they can to please their families before the end of the week.
And you? You don’t want to please your mom?
It’s too late for that. Besides, I never got to live. They stole my youth. This is my one week to be me.
I said all this and a buttery silence fell over us. Together we watched the sky and sea. Terrence tipped his chest against the rail; he was so small, I worried what little wind there was could blow him away.
Are you here all alone? I asked. I thought about his pop star wife. Wanted to know the truth. Terrence nodded slowly, solemnly. A darkness now over him as he drew from his vape. She hates that I smoke, he said. But my life is over, who cares about holes in lungs? She iced me out, anyway. I don’t blame her. Wouldn’t you?
It wasn’t real love if she couldn’t see you through this, I said.
A murderer is a murderer, he said.
Is that what you are?
According to the courts.
And according to you?
Terrence sucked on his vape, the spumes drifting up in loose curls. They needed to blame someone, he said. I should have been more responsible.
His voice met the sound of waves crashing into the ship’s metal down below, the ship breaking the surface of the ocean, it was a miracle ships existed, it was a miracle we all did.
Tell me the story, I said. I want your version. I want the truth.
The truth falls somewhere in the middle. But I can tell you what I know. Suppose someone died in the tank. A mechanic working off-hours. Suppose it got covered up. Not because I wanted it to. Suppose it was the studio and the union that buried it. A coffin, not a tank. That’s what they called it. A moment passed before he said, Is that better?
But it happened again, I said. Isn’t that it?
It can only happen so many times before it becomes something else.
Serial murders. Conspiracy.
They needed a scapegoat.
Then: I’m sorry, I said.
I’m sorry for both of us, Terrence said, and he looked it: Sagging lines flanked his mouth and his forehead puckered. You know, I said, he hit me once.
Who did?
My father. It was no big thing. I wouldn’t have remembered if it hadn’t been for his gold ring. Thick and wrapped around his fat finger. His ring that drew my blood, and then he was off.
Terrence said his father beat him all the time. It wasn’t so unusual.
But it was so unusual for us, I said. I wish he knew how much it affected me.
I have a feeling he knew exactly how much you were helping him in the end.
I was hardly home. I was doing everything to save him and I wasn’t even there. You’re wrong, he had no idea. I said this and the silence between us returned. This time it felt strained.
You know, Terrence said. I can’t even swim.
He slipped his vape into his chest pocket and walked away.
***
I was feeling restless now that I was alone. Slumped beside the pool, I connected to the Wi-Fi and browsed the anonymous Grindr profiles of those aboard the Milagro using my old phone, the one with all the old pictures, the one my mother had saved for me when I went in. After a few scrolls, the naked torsos belonged to men from the coast hundreds of miles away.
Hi handsome :)
Hi handsome :)
Hi handsome :)
The first to respond told me what he wanted might be too scary, and I remembered I was on a ship with some allegedly dangerous people, though none of us seemed so bad, and wasn’t I one of them? He asked me how rough I could be, and could I kick him? I sent him pictures of my feet.
Damnnnnn very nice yeah I’d like to feel those up against me
They certainly rank very highly
Would like to see how they feel up against me in places
I stretched across a pool chair, reading his responses.
I want you to kick me quite a lot
Can you kick hard?
I wrote back. I gained some strength in prison so maybe I can be a little rough, I said before asking if we fuck after or if it’s just that, the thing with the feet.
Feet as foreplay. I like all the normal stuff too.
Good.
He was hunky in person. His arms were large cylinders of steel, his skin the bright color of wheat fields. He had a boxy face and plump lips. Hair shaved down close to his skin. We stretched out across his couch, where I tucked my feet beneath me. Self-conscious now that I knew what he liked. When a noise came from the bathroom, alarm bells dinged in my head, and I asked if we were alone.
Yeah, he said, we’re alone. His voice was so soft and full, any suspicions I had waned. He asked what I did for a living before I went in. I told him I was a scientist. I worked in a lab, I said, researching the relationship between circadian rhythms and metabolism. It came easy, this lie. In some ways, it was what had killed my father. A security guard with awful hours and even worse habits.
I used to work the graveyard shift, the man said. It sucked.
It’s so bad for you. It literally is a carcinogen.
A carci-what?
Gives you cancer.
Oh I’ve had that.
You’ve had cancer?
Sure.
He slid down my socks. Pressed his thumbs deep into my soles. Massaged one foot then the other. He licked my toes. Moaning all the time. Minutes passed before he removed them from his mouth, pressed my feet against his chest. He asked if I was ready. If I could kick him now.
When I thrust my leg at him, a vicious bark came from the bathroom. The door flung open and a dog bounded forward. I cried out, startled and in fear.
The dog lunged at me, and I kicked it, I kicked it good, harder than I had kicked the man, and, for a moment, I felt pleased by my strength. I hadn’t lied, I could kick hard. The dog rolled across the floor before scrambling back to its feet, its claws scraping the hardwood, and I yelled at the man: Do something!
He’s not so good with strangers, he said. His voice panic-laden now, any comfort I’d once had in it all gone. The dog stared at me, licking its snout with bloodshed, until it leapt. My leg flailed in the air—the dog was on my face, biting my lip.
The stranger screamed while blood spurted. Rivers of it down my neck. He gathered me into his arms, his hot breath on my face. Before I knew it, he was taking me to the ship’s medic. Apologizing the entire way. It was so hard, he said, convincing them to let me invite my dog and only my dog. I’m going to be in so much trouble.
We’re both dying in a week, I said. Does it matter? I pressed gauze to my lip.
He protects me, he said. I didn’t know if you’d be a creep or not.
Me? The creep!
Somehow, through this all, we laughed. Then the medic came in and examined me. He said he could give me butterfly stitches. There will be a scar, he said. His eyes flitted to my hand, the missing finger. Assuming that won’t be a problem? he said.
In some ways, I said, the scar will be all gone next week. Up in flames.
You’re getting cremated? the man asked.
Why? Do you want some of my ashes already?
The medic made a face and when he finished the man walked me to my room. He kissed my cheek, and I knew that would be it, that nothing else would ever happen, that it was too complicated, that I had my one night of freedom, that I had other wounds besides the surface ones to heal, and then he was down the hall and I was sinking into sleep, a good mattress for once. Yes, I thought, that was the point of this week. To sleep well before sleeping forever.
***
At breakfast, I scooped oatmeal into a bowl. I couldn’t imagine eating anything else with the bandage stuck to my upper-lip. Specks of blood ran through the gauze. I’d told my mother a loose dog bit my lip poolside the evening before; I didn’t tell her about the man and the feet.
Who would bring their dog? she’d said as if it were the biggest tragedy, bigger than any execution.
In the dining hall, she’d found a spot overlooking the ship’s bow. A mimosa in her hands she tossed back. I sank into the seat opposite her and asked if she planned on being drunk the entirety of the trip.
Do you think this is easy for me? She said this and sucked down her flute.
Then, leering at my lip: You’ll look like a cleft baby, she said.
I stirred my spoon, oatmeal and peanut butter swirl. You and Dad were always so vain, I said. It made me too self-conscious at too young of an age.
My mother sighed something loud and long. She said, One minute you love us, one minute you hate us. If you hate us so much, why did you risk your life to help?
I ask myself that question every day.
My mother’s face twisted for a flash before it settled into something unnervingly neutral. She remained that way until the end of the meal. I’m sorry, I said.
I wish we could just have a nice time, she said. But the circumstances. I can’t forget why we’re here. You can’t make me forget.
I’m not asking you to, I said. Her eyes were red-rimmed now. She crossed her arms to her chest, and her hands rubbed at the spot above her elbows, almost as if she was giving herself a hug, tiny rubs of comfort. She was consoling herself and the image made me catch my breath. It was devastating to watch, and it filled me up with a kind of regret over everything I’d done to land us here. Even if I felt I had no choice, I shouldn’t have done anything at all. I should have let my father waste away without my attempts at intervention. At least then my mother would still have a son by week’s end.
We’ll have a beach day soon, I said. You love the beach.
Tears built at the corners of her eyes. I love the beach, she said.
***
On our third day, the ship tossed us onto the sandy banks of a Mexican village. The jungle crept into the water. It was tangled and fetid, soggy and hostile. The local police had orders to shoot us if we attempted escape, though I expected none of us would. We were here with our families, and didn’t a small part of us think we deserved it just a bit? Besides, we were chipped, they’d track us down eventually. My mother and I spread ourselves along the beach. We took in the sun. The air was a wall and the palm trees stood still.
I hobbled towards a man with a cooler and bought two water bottles. Terrence came up from behind and bought one too. He looked at my lip and I saw judgment cross his face.
It’s not what you think, I said.
And what do I think?
That I did something criminal, or got into some fight. That I did something to deserve it. Though, in some ways, it could be karma.
I hate the beach, Terrence said. He guzzled from his bottle and looked out at the stretch of sand. I told him I understood he felt he didn’t deserve to be here, but that he had to stop acting like we were so different. He and I and the others on the ship.
What’s changed? he asked.
Nothing’s changed, I said. But don’t you think we should be less delusional about how this week will end? We’re going to die and there’s nothing we can do about it. Same with everyone else onboard. We’re all the same.
That ship? It’s a ship filled with no goods, he said. Bastards. He looked frustrated. It would be a shame if they never release the next film, he said. I wasn’t the only one who worked on it. We had a crew of hundreds. Hundreds of people were my responsibility.
This is what was really bothering him—and a piece of me softened all over again. I said, Have you always been such a worrier?
Neither of us would be here if we weren’t.
I took a sip then said: Do you believe in reincarnation?
Terrence laughed. And he balked at me when he saw I was serious. No, he said. When I die, I hope it’s nothing. Absolutely nothing. I don’t want to return to this Earth, where life is unfair and someone can get executed for something other people were just as responsible for.
Do you understand that’s why I’m here too? I took the fall just like you. Your studio system, how is that any different than the kind of organized crime I was a part of?
I don’t want to be here at all, he said. People don’t change. There’s cruelty everywhere I look. Even if I got a last-minute pardon, I wouldn’t want to spend another second on this Earth. Actually, he said, I’m glad I’m being executed. I hate I have to wait four more days. He said this, took another sip, and disappeared into the thin crowd of people entering town.
I stretched out beside my mother. Pearls of sweat sprouted from my chest and temples. I considered my sketchbook but the heat’s lethargy was contagious. Several hours passed before we rose and stumbled into the packed corridors of the open-air market. Both of us were splotchy red. We bought little trinkets. Bottles of smoky mezcal. Your father would have loved these, she said, pointing at the wall of joke t-shirts. Tequila Por Favor. Taco Emergency. I Survived La Chancla.
We should buy one for him, I said. In his honor. My mother’s face scrunched up as she rubbed the cheap material with her fingers. He’s been with us all this time, almost, I said. Don’t you feel that way?
Her mouth made a brief buckle. Your father is not here.
I walked on. The small hands of a young pickpocket slipped through my fanny pack at one point. I let him. A gift from one criminal to another. My passport, my cards, my cash. Let him have it all, I said to myself.
My mother and I returned to the shore. A plastic bag hung from her wrist—she’d bought the shirt. Mi Casa Es Su Casa, But Mi Taco Es Mi Taco. She set it on the sand beside us, a spot for my father, and the three of us roasted for several more hours. We heard screams at one point. I looked up, and through my sunglasses I saw a local officer dragging a young boy by the ears. He asked if I was the one in the passport. He broke the little book open, unfolding a portrait from several years back. I was an ugly boy, with juicy pimples that rimmed my cheeks and a bowl cut to top it all off. I nodded.
The officer returned my things. Looking at the young boy, he said, Don’t you understand these are murderers? With nothing to lose? My mother thanked him before sending her eyes to the same position as before: shut so tight I feared she’d break them.
Later, back on the ship, the intercom shot with sound. The captain was speaking. He said a passenger had still not re-boarded. Terrence the Tank. If we had any information on his whereabouts, we should notify a crew member. It doesn’t surprise me one bit, my mother said. He seemed done to me.
Done? I said.
With life, what else?
We left the room. Walked towards the railing that faced out into the beach town. We spent hours there, watching the people shuffling below like ants. The police showed. Sirens wailed. The man from the evening before passed behind us with his dog. My mother looked at him, sized him up. You should sue, she said.
I hope Terrence is okay, I said, knowing it didn’t really matter, what was the difference between one day and four days?
Nothing surprises me anymore, she said. Especially when it comes to men and their feelings. She snorted. It was an ugly sound.
Can we try to have a nice time now? I said.
Today was good, she said. I searched for her eyes behind her sunglasses and found nothing. I love the beach, she said.
Will you miss me when I go?
You’d think this would be my first time being alone, but I’ve been alone this whole time.
That doesn’t answer my question, I said, though she didn’t hear me—her sunglasses pointed towards the bar, where a row of fresh champagne glasses shimmered.
-30-
Joshua Vigil is a writer and educator living in the Pioneer Valley. His writing has appeared in Hobart, Joyland, The Rumpus, and elsewhere. His chapbook, Shapeshifter, is out now from Bottlecap Press.