You Are Free



  You are Free by Matthew Montague

  Copyright 2010 Matthew Montague

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, brands, media, and incidents are either the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. The author acknowledges the trademarked status and trademark owners of various products referenced in this work of fiction, which have been used without permission. The publication/use of these trademarks is not authorized, associated with, or sponsored by the trademark owners.

  Chapter One

  You are free-falling in the fo'c's'le[1] when the ship[2] goes up on a wave, a mound of water you can only feel in your knees as you stand in this windowless room at the front of the boat, a triangle with the huge black chain links running up from the chain locker[3], through the windlass[4] and the capstans[5] and then out through big black holes in the slanted rounding hull to the 25-ton anchors snugged against the hull but still swaying slightly.

  You crouch as you feel the deck rise under your feet, the power of the wave to lift the nose of the ship into the black night, with the whitecaps cracking and the hull creaking and the keel twisting[6] as the waves lift the ship from left to right and then.

  Just before the peak you push off and at the top, you feel the deck pause and then fall away from your feet and then you are free for just one moment, hanging in the air you breathe in deeply your feet dangling there and you float back to the deck and feel your stomach pull to the bottom of the sea as the ship rises again and you just happy to be free if only for those long seconds and only when the waves are really big and coming right at you.

  Then the Bos’un[7] bangs through the hatch[8] and chases all of you motherfuckers out of my goddamn fo'c's'le before one of you breaks your goddamn legs, and you scurry around the outside of the space[9] and behind his back before he can see it is you and then down the ladder[10] to the AIMD[11] passageway, past the sweating Marines working on helo engines and bos’un mates working knots out of line, out into the big black hangar bay with the blast doors shutting out the Atlantic with the spray coming through the cracks and shiny black puddles on the deck and the overhead lights glowing yellow, tracking back into the shadows.

  You cut past a bent back ’46[12] with the engine mounts open and the gears and the gears of the turbines gleaming oily in the hangar bay lights and the twin rotors folded to the center like broken dragonfly wings, and you sway as the ship takes a big one rolling to the left and hanging there as you hang with it way out waiting and waiting for the boat to come back and always wondering if it really is coming back this time.

  And it does and you reach the mess decks ladder and drop down it heels clicking ringing off the metal steps and as you fall as the deck drops away from your boots and you watch your ass for firefighting hoses and AFFF[13] cans and wireguides and waveguides and latches and hatches and angle iron sticking out from the walls and you can smell the musty smell of food kept too long in a freezer far below decks and then humped up four flights of steep ladder stairs and along cold metal passageways, dodging officers sorry sir and sailors coming through asswipe and Jarheads[14] get the fuck out of my way.

  Sweaty musty fuel oil smell, scratchy new denim shirts that smell like mothballs, and too much food in big vats and mixing bowls that no one will eat this morning since they laid all night in their racks with their stomachs swaying way to the left and hanging there and then back to the right, some of them groaning deep in their guts[15] as they hang their chests out over the toilets in the head and watch the water going up and down and waiting for the sweet release of puking so they can get their asses back in their racks and maybe get some goddamn sleep tonight or any night because they’ve got the balls to four watch in the boiler room again cause the goddamn first class hates their guts because they are smarter than them and that lifer[16] knows it.

  But you don’t give a shit because you never get seasick, unless you need to lay down on the cold deck for a little while and take a nap, a nooner, a little downtime, since you had the fucking balls to four last night, with the second class[17] rattling your rack at 2330 telling you to rise and fucking shine sweetie and to get your ass on the bridge in 15 minutes or the chief will have your balls for breakfast.

  So you got off watch at 0345, turning over course and speed to the next poor bastard to spend another four hours staring at the compass repeater, the rudder angle indicator, the lee helm[18], and the black shiny windows of the bridge, and then you couldn’t sleep so you and the rest of the watch, the five of you, worked your way down two decks from the bridge, poking your heads out the flight deck hatch to watch a Cobra[19] spinning up until the first class airdale[20] hollered at you to shut that fucking hatch, and then down another deck, forward carefully through officer country, down a ladder and then another, around the corner past the quarterdeck and then forward to the ladder to the fo'c's'le.

  Where the bo’sun chewed your ass and shagged you out and so now you are hitting the mess decks for some coffee and eggs and some bug juice.