Rapture of the Deep, Chapter 5
For an aimless nomad of the sea, the three-hundred square feet worth of studio apartment in South Padre was not only the right place to live, but it often felt as if it were the only place. Steps away from the beach and seemingly always facing the sun, Charlie’s leased space overlooking the western Gulf coast was a projection of his very soul. If this property was perfect for someone, it was him. Shangri-La, perched upon eroding land. Faced by an orange eye. Toes of sand licked by warm waves.
Charlie was attempting to clean when the phone rang. He had accumulated quite the piles of not-quite-but-almost-garbage over the last few weeks of joblessness. Stacks of magazines slipped off of tables on either side of a couch that was covered in dirty swimwear. Take-out boxes of all ethnicities adorned the counters of the kitchenette like a sculpted field of cardboard and styrofoam. His surfboard was propped up against the always open bathroom door, another pair of swim trunks hanging from its rudders. As fragmented and messy as his nightmarishly over-priced space was, Charlie failed to see the correlation to his actual state of mind. Failing to see correlations was just who he was.
He saw that it was Tina and answered quickly, excited to irritate his sister right off the bat. Even today, he never stopped being the thorn in one’s side that is the younger brother.
“Sup, pizza?” He chuckled. His big sister hadn’t had an acne problem in over ten years, but Charlie made damned sure the nickname stuck, if for nothing else other than her hatred for it. Hatred that was evident upon her volley of his greeting.
“You sure know how to make a girl want to hang up the phone.”
“So I’ve been told.” He shook a wrinkled cigarette out of a crumpled pack on the kitchen table. “Its how I win the ladies over. What’s happening’?”
“Not much.” Her voice came through crystal clear, despite the lack of signal strength for most in the area. One of the perks of being on the government’s cell network. “Just got back from a meeting with Doctor Harris at Powell.” Charlie could hear road noise in the background, per usual. Tina was always on the move.
“Yeah?” He lit his cigarette and tossed the lighter back onto the table amid a quickly accumulating pile of past due notices. A fleeting thought to get around to paying them was quashed by indifference. “That’s big time, sis. What’s on the docket for you?”
There was a pause. Charlie could already sense she needed to ask him something. She always spaced out when she needed a favor from him.
“Well, there’s a project they want me to start on. A big project.” Tina stopped to sneeze before carrying on. “Something that’s going to put me out to sea again for at least a month.”
Charlie strode out onto his tiny patio that overlooked the beach. He didn’t bother closing the door. Never had to when the weather was always as perfect as it was in Padre. “What’s the scoop? You just finished a run on the New York, right?”
“Nevada. But yeah, it looks like I won’t even have time to get my feet dry.” More sniffles. Tina must have been coming down with something. “This one’s big, Charlie.”
She paused again, and he cracked a smile. Here it comes, he thought.
“I need a diver. Someone with experience. Someone that I can trust.”
“Why the Hell you callin’ me?” Charlie could hear the smile on his sun-baked face and was sure she could too.
“Fuck off, you know why I’m calling you. You have the experience they need. And I’d like to think I could trust you on this one. Its a really good opportunity for me and maybe you too. The pay’s good Charlie. Dad’s money has to be running dry soon.”
Funny, he thought. Hearing “dad” and “dry” in the same sentence.
“I get by.” He took a prolonged drag, exhaled, and leaned against the railing of the patio. Silently and sarcastically, he thanked his sister for putting thoughts of his dwindling fortune in his head. “What’s the job?”
He listened while she explained the research project over the Sigsbee. Tina would skate over the surface of the specifics, but not plunge into explicit detail. Charlie thought it to be a combination of her own apprehension and nerves at asking him this favor. He also knew that she held little respect for his intellect. Tina was always the bookworm, and through life he accepted that. Fact was, Charlie hid a fierce intelligence, and would likely understand even the most complex of quandaries before most. Especially with the topic at hand. He was an informational sponge when it came to the sea.
He let Tina vent her knowledge for a few more seconds before butting in. “Wait, wait…sis? I got ya. I follow. No need to show off.” Tina hushed, and Charlie could almost feel her roll her eyes. “The folks at Powell have to know those BP idiots don’t know what the Hell they’re looking at. Why all the espionage?”
“I don’t know, Charlie.” Tina was inflecting her words, slower and more forcefully. She was losing her patience. “They want us to figure it out. You take the samples, I study them with a lab partner. This isn’t a complicated question. Do you….”
“I’ll bite, sis. I’m with you. It sounds like fun.” Charlie flicked the butt of his smoke and watched it helicopter through the air until it skipped off of the sand below. “Let’s skim some oil. When do we start?”
“I’ll pick you up tomorrow, a little before noon.”
Looks like the cleaning will have to wait, he thought. I’ll have to get my drinking in tonight.
“I’ll be here with bells on.”
