The Iceman Cometh

Once, when I was fourteen, Dad took me out sailing in Kingfisher Bay. It was the twilight end of summer, and the wind brought back the same smells that it had all those years ago when his father had brought him. Dad loved sailing. There were those months earlier in the year when he would work into all hours of the night, I wouldn't see him for almost a week at a stretch, so he could save up enough money to take this trip; but it was all worth it for him. You shoulda seen how his face would light up when he'd talk about it, for weeks in advance. It was his one escape; the one dream he had ever indulged himself in.

Dad loved sailing, and I hated it.

I hated the smell, a cross between fish and metal cleaners; even when Dad would stand on the docks and make me take that big whiff with him, and he would get that dreamy look and all I ever got was nauseous.

I hated the people, too. Every year, I would loiter in our rooms, pretending to have lost this and that, or to need this or that before going anywhere, in order to put off the inevitable trip to the Kingfisher Den. The Kingfisher Den was the meeting hall for all the other fathers bringing their sons to the past, sacrificing them on fish and metal cleaner-smelling slabs to the spirits of their own fathers. Cowering along, listening to Dad make proud conversation with his fellow pilgrims, it was like one of those carnival Hall of Mirrors, in every line of view a twisted reflection of me and Dad, each father full-chested and nervous in that classic overcompensating way, and each son displayed and tightlipped. I hated the Den.

There was so much I hated about it; the politics, the pretentious competition, the mounted fish in all the restaurants, the forced nostalgia, the fiberglass . . .

But what I always hated most about going sailing year after year with Dad was the silence. There was no talking when we went out there on the water, and that's the way he wanted it. He always made sure I knew ahead of time what I needed to do, because he sure as hell wasn't going to explain it to me when we got there. If he needed me to do something extra, something unexpected, he'd stare at me, willing me to know; and if I had been the perfect son, the son that would have lived for Kingfisher Bay the way his father did, I would have. But I never was, and his eyes would narrow as he brushed past me to do it himself, never saying a word. To this day, I cannot abide the quiet.

I remember when I dared to break the silence.

It was hot, and there was the taste of Banana Boat in my mouth. The winds had gotten us beyond shore-view and then abandoned us, so there hadn't been much to do but rock in the waves and wipe sweat and listen to the deep, dark quiet. Dad sat across from me, eyes half-lidded, swaying to that personal symphony he found there. I watched him, and I wanted so much for him to look at me, for him to sense my terror, to know; but I knew that that desire was no more rational than his expectations of me, and so I resorted to what he never had.

"Dad?"

He looked up, startled, ripped out of his music.

"What?"

"I wanted to talk to you about something."

His eyes narrowed, a familiar dance step, and he hesitated for a moment, as though he would refuse me, and then acquiesced.

"What is it, son?"

"I . . I was wondering if maybe I could stay in tonight. Not go to the Den. There's this thing on TV that I need to watch. It's educational. I need to watch it for school. For a project. For school."

"What's it about?"

Um.

"Bugs. Those big, poisonous ones in Africa. It's for school."

"Well, you're in luck, son; The Malloys are going to be there tonight, and Mr. Malloy is an entomologist. I'm sure he'll be able to answer all of your questions."

Dammit.

"Actually, Dad, I'd rather stay in anyway. I'm feelin' kinda sick. I think maybe I got too much sun."

"Don't be silly; you're not red at all."

"Well, not ye-"

"We'll go, and if you're still feeling sick after an hour, you can back to the room," his voice lowers an octave, "with your mother."

I lower my eyes, wanting to just take him on that offer- Jesus, just don't look at me like that- but it's not good enough. I can't go to the Den tonight. I can't face those people.

I can't remember why . . .

But I look back anyway, and say, "No, Dad, I just don't want to go. I- I really don't."

"Why not?" gruffly, a challenge. At least he's not looking at me anymore.

I go with a half-truth.

"There are some people there I don't want to see. I got into a, uh, fight with a boy today when you were at lunch with those people, and I don't want to see him at the Den."

A fight, huh? He can look at me for that.

"Who was it?"

"You don't know him Dad. He and his folks just got here; it's their first year."

"I might recognize the name."

"Oh, it's, uh-"

Makeupaname, Makeupaname.

"Jimmy Crabtree."

Dammit! I never was very creative . .

"Crabtree? They're not new here."

"Oh yeah? I musta been thinking about someone else."

"Well, if it's a fight we're talking about, then staying away is the worst thing you can do. You have to show this young man that you're not afraid of him."

"But what if-"

"No, no. You're going and that's it. You don't want all the other boys to think you're a sissy, do you?"

No, Dad, anywhere but that. I shake my head.

"So it's settled. You'll go, and you'll show this Crabtree boy you're no one to be messed with."

"Oka-"

And then a flash of Jimmy's father's eyes as he ripped him away from me; that same silent stare, screaming, You. You did this to my son.

And the terror hits me. I cannot abide the quiet.

Suddenly, I'm in front of my father, hands clutching his pant legs, and the thing blurring my vision in not sweat.

"No! Please, Daddy, I don't want to go! I can't! I can't!!"

My father's narrowed eyes widen in shock, moments before the look of disgust he cannot hide passes quickly into one of fury. He stands up violently, knocking me backwards.

"That's ENOUGH! Look at you, you BABY! Get up!! Act like a man! It's no wonder you got beat up by this boy, acting like a fag!!"

He suprises himself with that one, and immediately quiets down, falling silent.

But it's too late.

The wind changes, bringing cold. It blows, and the trees bend to it. It catches the sails and they billow upward, outward, in this frenzy of frigid air, freezing the sun in its place. The water follows the wind, swirling upward in giant waves, only to freeze in their zenith.

Everything around them is freezing; there is nothing but the solid, stark ice.

I look around in terror, disbelieving; and I glance at my father who is wearing a face similarly fearful, and is strangely now resting in a wheelchair. He has less hair . . .

And then the ice tilts, like someone shaking up a snowglobe; and a thundering CRACK shatters the ice in the water some distance off. From within the hole comes a roar of fury, and through the ice bursts a creature covered with ice, or else made of the ice itself, in great jagged spikes. It howls again, and then spots our sailboat. I open my mouth to scream, prepare myself to run, but neither happens; I too am frozen. It comes towards us, and then turns decidedly to one end of the boat, my father's end. His great frozen eyes fixate on the man who, for some reason, is now bald; and as it comes nearer, my father tries to scream just as I did, and, like me, he fails. The creature reaches out with an icy claw and draws my father out of the wheelchair; I struggle, but I can't help him. I can't help him. Even now, I'm failing him.

The creature opens his great gaping maw, bringing my father closer to it; and I realize what's happening; and I try again to scream, but I can't; and it's the same all over again. My father wants to scream, too; I can see it in his frenzied eyes. He regrets the silence. All that time that he could've been screaming wasted. And now it's gone.

His eyes fixate on me as he is lowered into the jagged icy depths, staring at me, willing me to hear his screams, to know, just as he had always done with the things we wanted to tell me but never could; but I could never hear it then, and I can't do it now, for I hear nothing.

I cannot abide the quiet.

***