Archive of Our Own ^beta

I must go down to the seas again, to the lonely sea and the sky,

And all I ask is a tall ship and a star to steer her by;

And the wheel’s kick and the wind’s song and the white sail’s shaking,

And a grey mist on the sea’s face, and a grey dawn breaking.

sea-fever by john masefield

She tastes the salt spray of the ocean on her tongue as she turns her face into the wind and howls. The wind answers, sweeping away the sound of her voice as it mingles with the cry of gulls overhead. The sky hangs low, brooding over an indistinct horizon. 

She is alone. 

She prefers it that way.

Walking for what feels like miles, she picks her way across the top of salt-slick boulders rising above the choppy gray water rippling out into the mist. The tide is low - the barnacles and sea kelp cling tenaciously to the rough granite above the waterline. She walks until the narrow seawall vanishes into the fog in both directions, and only the wan light of a veiled sun beckons her back to shore as it sinks low on the western horizon.

Every so often, she scrambles down off the breakwater into the shallows, feeling the lap of the frigid sea through the thick rubber of her waders. Trawling a dented wire basket through the tide, she lets the saltwater cleanse the bruises on her wrists, the blood beneath her fingernails. 

In the ebb between the waves, she reaches down into the swell, combing the sea floor, searching for the texture of ridged shell against her fingertips. When she finds it, she digs deep to claim her prize, the tips of her hair soaked by the sea as it falls past her shoulder. Finally, triumphantly, she withdraws a white clam.

She runs her finger along the closed rim of the shell, weighing it in her palm before tossing it into her basket. A quahog the size of her hand might get her a quarter at the market; a cherrystone small enough to fit comfortably in her palm will fetch ten cents. This one is just small enough to hide in her closed fist as her fingers curl tightly around the treasure.

She’s just hoping for enough to get a packet of Oreos and a lemonade from the corner store on her way back. Now that she’s been skipping school lunches too, her stomach has been wrenching her awake in the early hours of the dawn.

Her basket is only half full by the time the tide begins to rise once more, so that she can no longer reach the sea floor without the waves lapping at her chin. She scrambles back atop the breakwater and settles down on a rock, pulling a stolen scrap of sandwich from her pack. Drawing her knees to her chest, she braces against the bitter wind.

&&&

“You about ready?” Tommy’s voice breaks Joel’s concentration as he fiddles with the latch on one of his lobster traps, trying to fold the rusted metal back into place without snapping it.

“About,” Joel replies testily, gritting his teeth as the sharp edge sinks into his thumb, deep enough to draw blood. 

Tommy sidles up with a chipper grin, and it’s more than Joel can tolerate on the afternoon of a terrible catch; they didn’t pull enough from the traps to cover even half of their bait and fuel costs. Just as he’s about to growl a warning to back the hell off and let him finish this, two boots land with a thud on the pier behind him. He startles at the sound, turning to see a girl standing there with a triumphant look on her face, swinging a wire basket that’s seen better days. He eyes the four foot distance between the floating pier and the boardwalk above, from where she’d obviously leapt. 

“There’s a ramp,” Joel grits out before he really thinks better of it, jutting his head in the direction of the floating walkway.

“Boring.” The girl grins cheekily, swinging her basket of clams up onto the counter for Herman to sort and weigh.

“Afternoon, Ellie.” Herman greets her with a warm smile, but there’s a furrow in his brow that gives Joel pause. The girl can’t be more than about thirteen, and there aren't many good reasons why she shouldn’t be in school right now. Could be one of the kids of the out-of-towners, but they’re well ahead of tourist season, the coast of Maine still shaking off New England’s winter chill. And she doesn’t have that look about her, the polish of some Boston brat or New York city slicker. No, Joel recognizes the frayed hem of her too-short jeans, sneakers threadbare and muddy, as the signs of a kid having to look out for themselves. Even as he’s thinking it, he catches a glimpse of dark bruises encircling her wrist, and something stirs in his gut as she tugs her sleeve down to cover them.

He wipes the blood still seeping from his thumb onto the sleeve of his flannel, catching Herman’s eyes over the top of the girl’s head for the briefest of moments. The older man’s weathered skin tightens at the corners of his eyes, and he offers Joel a shrug as he sorts the girl’s catch onto the scale.

What can you do? his expression seems to say, as he counts out four dollar bills and a handful of coins from the register, handing them over to Ellie.

Not much, Joel thinks, still fighting the unsettling churn in the pit of his stomach as he turns his back on them and follows Tommy down the pier.

&&&

The second time Joel sees her, he’s out on the water with Tommy, trying to beat the weather to safe harbor. They’re a mile off shore, heading south, skirting the breakwaters as The Drifter is buffeted by the rough sea. It’s only two in the afternoon, but a wicked storm brews on the horizon, the sun obscured by ominous clouds. Took longer than either of them anticipated to reset the traps, and Joel still had to leave five whole trawls out on the water until tomorrow. But they’ve got a decent catch in the hull, enough to turn a profit if they can get it home and sold before the end of the day. As if in answer to this unspoken plea, the first few raindrops hit the deck, mingling with the salt and grime, and thunder rolls overhead.

Joel reads the waves cautiously, watching them break against the rock. Tide’s coming in fast, white caps spouting high above the breakwaters. As they approach the final rampart from the north, he catches sight of a figure walking along the top of the seawall, bracing against the wind and the spray. 

He grimaces. Damn tourists, can’t read a fucking weather app, much less the ocean, gonna get themselves killed— 

He draws his binoculars to take a closer look. They’re small, and alone. Who in the hell is letting their kid— 

Then he sees the basket, and instantly, he recognizes the worn green sweatshirt, the dark, sea-soaked hair. 

“Damn it.”

She’s obscured from view by the spout of the next breaker, and Joel waits with baited breath for the ebb, releasing it when he sees her still standing upon the rocky bulwark.

“Tommy,” he barks to the front of the boat, and his brother turns at the helm, squinting against the wind.

Joel gestures off the starboard side. “There’s a kid. Come around.”

Tommy’s brow knits with confusion as he surveys the breakwater, his eyes finally settling on the small figure.

“What the hell they doing out in this?” He shakes his head, already cranking the wheel, the hull catching the next wave broadside with a lurch that has even Joel reaching for the rail to steady himself. 

“Are we gonna be able to get close enough?” Tommy doesn’t wait for the answer, his frown deepening as he eases the throttle forward, maneuvering the boat through the vicious waters.

The breakwater is still doing its job, cutting the waves as they sweep down from the north so that the sea is calmer on the south side, but it’s still plenty choppy even as The Drifter finds shelter in rampart's shadow, and Joel knows they won’t be able to get closer than twenty feet without ripping their hull open on the rock. 

The girl catches sight of them as they come up alongside the bulwark, still a couple hundred yards further out to sea. She has the sense to stay put instead of trying to close the distance between them. By the time they’re close enough for Joel to see the fear written on her face, the wind is howling loud enough to wake the dead.

“The hell you doin’ out here?” Joel shouts over the roar, already snatching a life-jacket from the bow and readying the rescue rope. He thinks better of his tone when he sees her shrink back against the rock, crouching in a gully between two large boulders. 

“You know how to swim?” he tries again, though any attempt at a reassuring tone is thwarted by the cacophony of the sea. 

She shakes her head.

Damn it.

Even a strong swimmer would be hard-pressed to get away from those rocks without taking a beating, especially one as small as her. There’s nothing else for it. He steps out of his waders, keeping an eye on her as the spout of another breaker erupts, raining down salt spray in a vicious arc over the top of the rampart.

She picks her way down towards the waterline, having apparently decided that he poses less of a risk than the raging sea on the other side. The white-caps reach for her ankles, and Joel sees her falter on the rock, slick as it is with brine.

“Wait!” he shouts. He’s too far out still - she’ll slip and go under before he can get to her.

“Joel!” Tommy’s voice carries a warning as Joel tucks the life jacket under his arm and climbs over the starboard coaming. 

“Just keep her away from the rock,” he shouts over her shoulder as he leaps into the sea. 

The swell is brutally cold; his lungs seize for an agonizing few seconds as he claws his way back to the surface, but he manages one breath before the next wave sweeps over his head. When he comes up again, he orients towards the rock and fights against the ocean’s surge.

He manages to catch himself against the foot of the breakwater, and realizes that he shoulda grabbed gloves - the rough barnacles cut into his palms as he finds purchase on the rock, and he's forced to tighten his grip as the sea tries to cast him off. Just as he manages to haul himself up, a wave catches him and slams him hard into the sharp granite. Pain splinters through his ribs, and he grits his teeth as he manages to finally pull himself up out of the treacherous swell.

The girl’s eyes are wide as she picks her way across the rock to meet him, and when they’ve both found a foothold, he hands her the life jacket. She fumbles with the buckles, visibly shaking, and he gingerly closes the remaining distance between them to help her.

She’s so damn small, next wave coulda taken her feet right out from under her. Joel glances over his shoulder, clocking the distance between their perch and the ring buoy at the end of the safety line. It’s not much of a jump, but he guesses it’s still further than she’ll be able to talk herself into. 

He offers her his hand, guiding them along the rock back towards the buoy, and she slips twice, clinging to his arm as the ocean surges up to meet her. “Slower,” he cautions, pulling her closer to his side, wincing as her shoulder digs into his ribs. She’s shaking like a leaf. 

“We’re gonna jump.” He motions to the buoy, and her eyes widen as she tracks his gesture, shaking her head and pulling back against his grip. He can admit this is a hell of a lot scarier than the edge of the pool, and that sure took some convincing with—

“Come on,” he barks, sharper than he intended. “I’ll go with you.” 

She curls her fists tightly into the fabric of his sleeve, and finally, nods. 

Together, they leap into the swell. Joel tries to keep her head above water, but the surge is too high, and a wave catches the both, washing over their heads. By the time he manages to get them back to the surface, she’s whimpering, and he hauls her up out of the water by the back of her life jacket like a drowned kitten, shoving them away from the rock with as much force as he can manage. 

It’s a short distance to the ring buoy, but by the time he catches it, he’s winded, muscles aching with cold and exertion. She clings to him, and he does what he can to shield her from the swell as Tommy hauls them in. At least she has the good sense not to claw at him as the waves continue to buffet them. Joel sends her up the rope ladder first, and Tommy catches hold of the shoulder-strap of her life jacket, hauling her most of the way up. 

Once on sure footing, Joel leans heavily on the rail, catching his breath, wary of the searing pain that crackles through his ribs. He closes his eyes against the sting of the sea, feeling the boat swing towards harbor, opening them just in time to see lightning splinter the dark sky, followed immediately by a searing boom. 

Forcing himself to straighten, he turns his attention to the girl, wincing as she leans over the coaming, clearing her lungs of the ocean. He tries to steady her, but she jumps, shying away from his touch, and he raises his hands in surrender. Her gaze catches on his palms, eyes wide and dark, and that’s when he realizes how much damage the rocks managed to do. He spares a glance at the gaping, bloody slashes, and grimaces, wiping them on his soaked trousers, which is worse than useless. He doesn’t like the way her knees buckle as she clings to the railing, white-knuckled, soaked and shivering. 

“C’mon.” He ushers her under the captain’s awning out of the rain, and they retreat together, joining Tommy at the helm. The fiberglass shelter only serves to amplify the downpour. She backs up all the way into the bulkhead, and slides to the floor in a way that Joel isn’t at all convinced was voluntary, drawing her knees to her chest. 

He lowers himself gingerly to the deck in front of her, keeping his distance this time. 

“Are you hurt?” he asks, giving her a quick once over. No obvious cuts or scrapes. She shakes her head, and he releases a breath he didn’t know he was holding. Unlatching the bulkhead storage door, he digs through the compartment, withdrawing the wool blanket nestled beneath their first aid kit, and hands it over before he has a chance to bleed all over it. To his relief, she takes it without protest, wrapping it around her shoulders, still trembling.

She eyes him warily, and Joel takes his cue to force himself to his feet, bracing against the grating pain. Tommy gives him a look, one eyebrow raised, tongue worrying his teeth like he always does when he’s trying to get a handle on a situation. Joel just shakes his head, hunkering down under the awning, breathing against the ache in his chest.

Tommy guides The Drifter through the swell, and they make it safely to harbor as the storm hits in earnest. Ellie is silent as they approach the dock, but as soon as they turn their attention to mooring the boat, Joel hears her scrambling to her feet, whirls to see her make a run for it.

“Nuh-uh,” Joel catches her as she tries to scramble over the rail onto the dock. “Where you going with my life jacket?”

She stops fighting, sheepish, though he can tell she’s still scared as hell. He grimaces, releasing his grip slightly as she reaches for the buckles.

“Just, hang on a minute,” he tries again, softer.

Her gaze flickers to Tommy, and she must find something more reassuring in his expression than she found in Joel’s, because she huffs out a breath and jerks out of his grasp, but stays put for the time being.

Joel keeps a wary eye on her as they finish tying off, and they leave the catch in the hull, retreating to shelter from the downpour beneath Herman’s awning. 

“You sure you’re alright?” Joel asks again, eyes narrowing as he catches sight of a shadowy bruise at her temple. It’s yellow at the edges, not new, but that’s hardly comforting.

“Yeah." She catches her tongue between her teeth, jaw jutting as she appraises him with steely eyes. Got a whole lotta attitude for someone who just got their ass hauled out of the ocean.

Her gaze flickers down to his hands, them back up to his face. “Are you?” she asks bluntly.

The question catches Joel off guard. “Yeah,” he clears his throat, swiping his bloodied palms on his trousers once more. “Fine.”

“Can I go?”

“No,” Joel shakes his head. “I mean—“ he huffs out a breath. “Where’s home?”

“Why?” Her eyes narrow.

“Just wanna make sure you’re gonna get there okay.”

“I will.” 

“Will you?” Joel says pointedly. “Cause it sure as hell didn’t look that way back there.”

She doesn’t reply to this, just glares at him. Tommy gauges the tension between them warily, but remains silent.

The last thing Joel wants to do is get caught up in something like this, somebody who needs him. He isn’t good at being needed, he isn’t—

But she sure as hell needs something. A decent meal, he’d guess. Probably more than that.

“How old are you?” Tommy interjects, his voice a hell of a lot gentler than what Joel can manage.

“Thirteen,” she admits sullenly, her gaze flickering to him.

“What about school?” he prods.

“I’m from away.”

“Uh-huh.” Joel fails to withhold a dry snort of laughter at her usage of the most characteristic term that folks around here have to offer in description of outsiders. “Where about? Ketterly County?” 

It’s nothing more than a guess, but he knows instantly he’s right on the money. Her face falls, and she fixes her eyes on her worn sneakers. Tommy gives him a sharp look, and Joel realizes then how mean that probably sounded to her. 

“Us too,” he offers, catching the edge of his tongue between his teeth. God knows he’s familiar enough with what it means to grow up on the forgotten fringes of the affluent costal towns. “Where about?” he tries again, softer this time.

“Forest Hills.” She scuffs the toe of her sneakers against the worn pier. A trailer park, twenty minutes north, and not one of the nice ones.

“You got a ride back there?” Joel asks neutrally.

She shakes her head, but he sees tears gathering beneath her dark lashes once more.

“Alright. It’s on the way home. We’ll take ya," Joel says, more a demand than an offer.

“No,” Ellie shakes her head vehemently.

“It’s fine. We got friends there.” Which is true enough. Bill and Frank got property up that way. Frank is the county sheriff, and Bill is captain of Lapin, a friend of The Drifter. The vessels have plenty of shared history, hauling in each other’s trawls when illness or emergency grounds one of the boats.

She lifts her gaze to meet his, and he can tell she’s still jumpy - has every right to be, getting caught up with two strange men. But he’s not about to send her walking home in a storm like this.

An hour later, the brine is soaking into the torn seats of his ancient pickup as the windshield wipers judder across the glass, fending off the downpour. He really needs to fix those. The pain in his ribs has caught up with him if it hadn't already, grating with every breath.

Tommy watches Ellie in the rear view mirror, and Joel joins him, but her gaze is fixed stubbornly out the passenger-side window. The bruise at her temple is even more visible in the waning light, and he and Joel exchange a wordless look.

She makes them drop her at the edge of the trailer park, her demand only rising in intensity when Joel offers to drive in. Before the truck is even fully stopped, she’s scrambling out of the cab.

“Hey,” Tommy leans out the passenger side door, calling her attention, and she stops, whirls, braced. “You need anything, you know where to find us. Boat’s The Drifter , we’re mooring twenty-two.”

Her shoulders drop a fraction of an inch, and she glances past Tommy, her dark eyes latching on Joel’s. He gives a nod.

“I’m Joel, this is Tommy."

“Ellie,” she replies, catching her bottom lip nervously between her teeth.

“Be safe,” Joel says, that familiar phrase slipping out of his mouth like it used to every damn day—

She watches him for a moment, then turns tail and disappears quicker than Joel can blink.

&&&

The next time Joel can take a deep breath without feeling a twinge in his ribs, it’s the first week of summer break, and the sky is bright and clear over the harbor. They’re getting a late start to another day of hauling traps: it’s nearly eight in the morning as they prepare to cast-off, and Joel looks up at the sound of footsteps on the pier to meet a familiar, sullen face.

“Mornin’,” he straightens, appraising the girl – Ellie. Her brow is knit, jaw set with a familiar feigned contention that tells him she’s closer to tears than anything. 

“Can I come with you?” she demands.

“You don’t have better things to do the first week of summer break?” Joel asks. 

She shakes her head, chewing her lip, which is marked by a thin white scar he doesn’t quite remember seeing before. He glances behind her, scans the pier for a sign of someone on her tail. Immediately, she whips around to see what he’s looking at, which does nothing to assuage his concern, and when she turns back to him, her eyes are wide.

“You in trouble?” he asks.

“No,” she nearly shouts, but even as the word leaves her mouth, tears spring to her eyes, and her gaze falls to the salt-scoured wood beneath her feet.

Damn it.  

“Alright, c’mon.” He extends a hand to her, and she looks up in surprise; the ache of relief in her eyes tightens the knot in Joel’s stomach. In a moment, she’s clambering over the rail onto the deck.

“You got anybody you need to call, tell ‘em where you are?” Joel dares to ask, and she just shakes her head.

“Okay,” he acquiesces gruffly, deciding that’s the last answer he’s gonna force outta her for a bit. He grabs a life jacket and hands it to her. “Put this on.”

She does, catching his eye in an acknowledgment of the history of the request. Her gaze flickers to his hands, which are long-since healed, and he shows her as much with open palms. She gives him a nod.

A few minutes later, they’re idling through the harbor, the summer sun reflecting off the water, bathing the hull of The Drifter in sharp, scintillating light. Joel appraises her out of the corner of his eye as he readies a trawl, watching some of the tension slip from her shoulders as she leans over the helm, face turned into the wind, squinting against the salt spray as the ocean breeze whips locks of hair loose from her ponytail.

“Ellie,” Tommy motions her under the captain’s awning with a grin, and though the smile she offers in return is thin, she pushes off the rail and follows him. 

“You wanna steer?” He steps aside, offering her the helm.

“For real?” She glances up at Tommy nervously, wrapping her fingers around the polished wood of the wheel like it’s a living thing about to slip out of her grasp.

Tommy nods, keeping one hand on the throttle. “Right between those two buoys.” He points ahead, and her brow furrows with concentration as she guides the boat dead center. 

When they get past the edge of the no-wake zone, Tommy pushes the throttle forward a little, and the engine begins to growl. Ellie’s eyes widen, and Joel sees a real smile start to tug at the corner of her mouth.

“Just like that,” Tommy says when she tries to offer the wheel back to him. “Just keep her going straight.” 

Joel crosses his arms, leaning heavily against the coaming. He and Tommy had done some digging with Frank’s help, after the incident in March. The folks she’s staying with, Mel and James, have been around for a while. Ellie is a more recent arrival, her presence the byproduct of a court case from further up the coast, supposedly a worse situation than the one she’s in now. 

Joel remains unconvinced. Frank apparently spotted her trying to hitchhike up Route 1 a couple times before he handed over his number and a promise to give her a lift any time of day, as long as she never pulled that stunt again. The litany of potential outcomes thusfar thwarted hasn’t really stopped running through Joel’s head since he received that piece of information.

As Tommy pushes the throttle up to cruising speed, The Drifter rises out of the water to meet the rhythmic slap of the waves against its hull. The warm sunlight over the sparkling water loosens the knot in Joel’s stomach, and he thinks it does the same for Ellie too, because by the time they reach their first trawl, she’s eagerly following Joel and Tommy around the boat, watching with rapt attention as they haul up the first trap. 

“How long do you leave them out for?” she asks.

“Day or two. These went down yesterday morning. Put on some gloves.” He nods towards the tool chest behind them. She does, and her grin spreads wide as Joel springs the lid on the trap and pulls out a lobster.

“Whoa.” She leans in closer as Joel holds it out for her to examine. “They’re so fucking weird looking.” 

He scoffs, grabs a pair of calipers from the tool kit, holds it up against the spine. “See this? We call it a short. It’s gotta be over four inches for us to keep.”

“What do you do if it’s not?” Ellie lifts an eyebrow, seeing how it doesn’t yet reach three inches. 

“Send ‘em back,” Joel says as he unceremoniously tosses the animal overboard, and it plunks into the water with a splash. Ellie giggles, and Joel feels something cut loose in chest at the sound of her laughter over the water. 

“Can I do the next one?” She asks, already reaching into the trap.

“Careful of the claws,” Joel warns as she withdraws it proudly. “That’s a nice one. Turn it over.”

Ellie does, her eyes widening as she examines its underbelly. “What the fuck man. How many legs does this thing have?”

“Eight,” Joel says, “plus the pinchers. See here?” He points to the underside of the tail. “This one’s a female. We check ‘em for eggs, leave a notch in her tail if she’s got any. No notch and no eggs is a keeper.” Joel motions to the wash stand behind them, where a bucket of rubber bands and pliers hangs off a hook.

“Hold her still,” he instructs Ellie as he bands the lobster’s claws, demonstrating how to use the pliers instead of getting her fingers in the way. “Then we drop her in.” He points to the hole in the deck that leads down to their catch basin in the hull.

“So fucking cool.” Her grin widens as she sends the lobster for a swim, peering down the hatch after it. 

&&&

By the time August rolls around, Ellie’s earned her sea legs, hauling traps and sorting the catch like it’s all she’s ever known. Joel doesn’t let her do everything - he sends her up to the helm when they’re laying trawls, having decided she’s far too small to play roulette with the ropes when there’s two-hundred pounds of steel plummeting to the sea floor on the other end of it. 

He’s worked it out with Frank to make sure she has a ride to the docks every morning; him and Tommy drop her back each night. Even on the days she doesn’t come out on the water with them, she’s waiting at mooring twenty-two when they come into harbor. 

Things seem to get easier for her, now that she’s out of the house and got more folks looking out for her. Joel keeps a careful eye out for fresh bruises, any hint of hurt in the way she carries herself, but he doesn’t find new signs of trouble. Frank does a little digging on the injuries Joel saw on her during the school year, but the explanations she offers, tales of fist fights with Bethany or Carlos, are corroborated by her guidance counselor and the school’s disciplinary records. She swears up and down that nobody at home is hurting her, and the few times that Frank drops by, he’s met with forced smiles and apologies from both Mel and James. Ellie smoothly corroborates their explanations, offering “I forgot to call ” or “my phone died ” anytime her guardians’ knowledge of her whereabouts is called into question. The one time Frank presses her on the matter, she vanishes for nearly a week. It does nothing to assuage their concerns, but it is enough to convince them to let matters lie for the time being, in the hopes that if she is in trouble, she’ll decide to trust one of them enough to loop them in. 

While Joel has tried his own tactics to get a straight answer from her, he’s not willing to jeopardize the opportunity to set eyes on her every day, make sure she’s in one piece. He pays her under the table on the days she comes out with them, and on the days she doesn’t, too.“Market prices jumped, made more off the catch than we thought we would, ” he explains, and she buys it— the first few times. 

As the summer days begin to shorten into fall and the school buses resume their routes, Joel and Tommy see less of her, but she’s still waiting at the moorings most Saturday mornings, sometimes weekdays too. Joel allows about one skip a week, but he makes sure to swing back into the harbor thirty minutes after school gets out, picks her up on the way to bring in their final few trawls of the day. It’s fuel he can’t afford, but it gives him a chance to make sure she’s fed before she heads home.

It’s September when she sees her first whale, a blow off the port side of The Drifter startling all three of them - it’s close enough to shower the deck.

“Is that a fucking whale?” Ellie shrieks, nearly tripping over an empty trap in her attempt to scramble across the deck for a better view. Tommy cuts the engine as the massive animal breaches the surface of the water just yards off their port side, and they lean over the railing, watching its smooth skin glisten against the dark water. 

“Humpback,” Joel nods. “Just watch.” 

The curve of its spine narrows, its dorsal fin rising from the swell and arching smoothly back down, and finally, the twin flukes of its tail emerge, flinging droplets of water in a smooth, glittering arc. As quickly as it appeared, it slips once more beneath the surface of the sea. Ellie clings to the railing, silent and agape, even as the steady lap of the waves returns, leaving no trace of their visitor.

&&&

As the winter deepens, Tommy heads south for warmer waters, picking up seasonal work on a buddy’s deep-sea schooner in the Gulf of Mexico. He’ll be back in the spring. It’s a repeated refrain, Joel staying behind to pick up the tail end of the season while Tommy goes gallivanting off to greener pastures. Just as well with Joel. He prefers the coast that’s been his home since long before he earned his sea legs.

But it’s a harsh winter, and it comes early. By mid-December, the weather’s keeping him off the water more often than he’d like, and The Drifter’s rendezvous with Ellie become increasingly tenuous. Gradually, she stops coming out to haul traps with him, hesitant for a reason Joel is unable to discern, but it leaves a gnawing ache in his gut. He can hardly blame her, though. The icy spray cuts through every layer Joel has to offer her, and if the harbormaster hadn’t raised the price on their mooring again this year, he’d be taking a break too. Still, whenever he catches sight of her around town or at the docks, he slips her a couple of bucks for a hot chocolate at the corner cafe, makes sure she’s looking fed and rested, reminds her to call him if she needs anything.

Then, at holidays, the flu catches Joel with all the force of a wave broadside, has him laid up for a fortnight - it’s the sickest he’s been in years. It isn’t until he finally drags himself back out to the docks that he realizes no-one’s seen or heard from Ellie in over a week. He could kick himself for not getting her number, though he isn’t at all convinced that he coulda figured out how to work his cell phone well enough to get in touch with her. He knows kids text instead of call these days, and Tommy already gives him shit for how hard he struggles to pick up the damn thing when it’s buzzing, much less figure out how to hit all those tiny little buttons.

He lays his trawls in record time, and spends most of the rest of the day canvassing town in his pickup, hoping to catch a glimpse of her. By five o’clock, he’s calling up Frank, who listens with a fair measure of concern and promises to swing by Forest Hills at the end of patrol for a wellness check. Joel has half a mind to head over there himself, but Ellie’s given him hell more than once for daring to roll even an inch past the entrance to the trailer park. He’s done a piss-poor job trying to reassure her, tell her that what he grew up in was hardly any better than whatever she’s having to deal with. He still remembers what it was like at that age, how hard he fought to hide the details of their living situation so nobody at school could use it against him (or worse, Tommy).

So, reluctantly, he turns the old pickup east at the edge of town as the heavy sky fast-darkening begins to shed its burden, laying a soft blanket of snow over the pine boughs and the old gravel roads carving deep into the wilderness. 

It takes him over an hour to get home in nearly white-out conditions. His mind races as he squints past the searing brightness of his headlights, reflected back by the flurries against the gathering night. With school out, is there anyone to keep an eye on her? A week is far too long to be alone, to be taking care of herself. 

By the time he pulls into his driveway, a deep silence has settled over the woods. The wind has died down, and the drifts are silently gathering, the air itself seeming to whisper a hush over the sound of his own footsteps in the deep, glittering white. It does nothing to silence the fear raging in his chest.

Then, the stillness is broken by the harsh sound of coughing, and his heart leaps into his throat as he searches for the origin of the sound. He almost misses the huddled form of a small figure curled up on his front porch, knees to her chest, the green sweatshirt just barely distinguishable by the light spilling from his living room window through the snow.

“Ellie!” 

She struggles to his feet as he closes the distance between the driveway and his front door quicker than he has in years. 

“What the hell are you doing out here?” he asks, so much sharper than he means for it to be.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t—“ Her voice is desperate, grating, and it catches in her throat before she can get the words out. She folds forward with another hacking cough, and something twists violently in his chest as he steadies her, feels the shudder of her small frame against his hands. She clings to him, fingers curling into his sleeve as she tries to catch her breath - she doesn’t even have gloves on.

“Easy, babygirl.” He soothes her, shrugging out of his coat, wrapping it around her shoulders, pulling her close as he fumbles with the lock. She leans on him as they stumble across the threshold, and Joel thanks heaven above that he stoked the wood stove up before he left that morning - the cabin’s warmth envelops them, driving back the bitter chill of the night.

“Ellie, why didn’t you call me?” He takes his first good look at her, tries to choke down a surge of panic at the blue tint of her lips, the feverish haze in her eyes. How long had she been out here, sick, alone? 

“They took it— They told me to leave—“ And then she’s sobbing, arms around his waist, clinging to him like he’s the only thing keeping her on her feet. He holds her tight and tries desperately to tamp down the rage building in his chest.

He’s never seen her cry like this before, and her sobs tear at an old wound, each one of them reawakening a dimension of pain long buried, carefully numbed. Her knees buckle as another round of coughs rake through her, and he sweeps her up into his arms, cradling her to his chest as he walks her over to the fire. He sinks down in the old recliner, freeing one hand just long enough to grab the wool blanket and get it around her shoulders, massaging her cold fingers between his hands as she drops her head to his shoulder and cries, tears coursing down flushed cheeks.

“You’re okay, baby. I got you.” He rocks them gently, breathing through the ache in his chest, feeling the last of the scar tissue give way in a rending, violent surrender. After a long few minutes, her sobs give way to soft sniffles, the edges of her breath grow less ragged, and she pushes away from his shoulder wearing a slightly stricken expression.

“I’m sorry—“ Her voice is shattered, and Joel’s gut wrenches at the sudden surge of anxiety and guilt that clouds her eyes. “I shouldn’t have come—“

“Don’t.” He shakes his head sharply, catching her fingers, still cold, between his. “You come here anytime, alright?” 

He’s not sure he’s ever gonna let her leave, after this. 

She releases a shaky sigh, acquiescing with a nod.

In the end, he gets a couple Tylenol and a little food in her before she knocks out on the couch in front of the fire. The meds and a cool washcloth are enough to bring the fever down to something manageable. He checks each finger, now flushed red, and breathes a sigh of relief that she apparently wasn’t out there long enough to do any permanent damage. 

As soon as he’s sure she’s comfortable, he steps into the kitchen and calls up Frank.

“I found her. She’s not going back there.” The words are out of Joel’s mouth before he’s even sure Frank’s on the other end of the line.

“Okay,” Frank says, and Joel can hear the relief, the ache, in the other man’s voice. “Okay. She’s alright?”

He walks to the end of the cord, watches the rise and fall of her chest in the liminal firelight. “She will be. I— Found her on my front porch, half frozen to death, no coat, no gloves—” Joel clenches his jaw so hard it aches. 

Frank swears under his breath. “I’ll stop by in the morning. You’re okay with her spending the night?”

Every night, Joel thinks. She won't ever walk out his door back to whatever situation she’s resolved herself to, not if he has anything to say about it.

“I got her,” he says, the silent night bearing witness to his promise.

“Good.”

&&&

 &&&

By the time summer rolls around, there’s a yellow envelope on Joel’s kitchen table, bulging with documents he barely understands; but Frank’s got a buddy who’s a lawyer, and James and Mel didn’t put up much of a fight, especially when Joel offered to take financial responsibility. 

The dark blue wash of ink across each page reminds Ellie of the ocean, the promise of the tide, the way it returns what it has taken. She imagines each stroke as one of the current vectors on Joel’s nautical maps, carrying her out to sea as the sun casts its glittering rays across the bow of The Drifter , and she follows the pull of the deep out into the wide expanse, letting it take her anywhere she wants to go. For the first time in her life, she tastes the salt brine on her lips as something a part of her, not stolen or borrowed, but home.

But today is The Drifter’s final voyage. When she’s safely moored at harbor and the catch sold off, Joel and Ellie walk to the hardware store, fetch a bucket of sanding supplies and marine paint: emerald and gold, the colors of Joel’s buoys, and his father’s, and his grandfather’s, and his daughters’ too. 

Together, they scrape the letters one by one, until The Drifter is a nameless hull adrift on an endless ocean. They sit on the docks above the sparkling water, eating sandwiches and fending off seagulls, and when they’re finished, Joel lists the hull up out of the water so Ellie can place each new letter with a careful hand. As they stand on the edge of the pier to survey her work, she presses into his side and closes her eyes, breathing the salt air, listening to the lap of the swell against the pier, the cry of the gulls overhead. 

When she opens them, The Ellie greets her by name, beckoning her aboard, and she steps onto the deck with the weight of Joel’s arm around her as her anchor, forever her port in the storm.