Raymond and Joe (Short Story DRAFT)

Can’t feel my left foot, I thought to myself. I squinted my eyes and took a look around. Nothing but empty water on all sides. I was suddenly aware of the presence of a soft, wet plank between my fingers. The rolling waves gently caressed my cheeks with an icy touch. Chipped, white paint crackled between my fingers as I shifted my weight onto my elbow. Nothing else distinguishable was around me to help me get my bearings, or expand upon where I could possibly be or how I had arrived there.

Can’t feel my right foot, I thought to myself. I opened heavy eyelids wider and looked straight up at the dark clouds that blanketed my little section of the sky. My plan of escape got in a car crash on its way to me. The water swirled and swirled in my vision, myself bobbing up and down rhythmically. My head turning in hypnotic circles, spinning, moving, floating, moving, sleepier with each seismic billow of liquid.

I could feel the ebb and flow of the water, the pull of different worldly forces beckoning me down into the abyss. First my chin became submerged, my upper lip desperately reaching for the diminishing pocket of air that it still had access to all the way. Then the water filled in the corners of my mouth, and wrapped it's way around my skull as if capturing me in a bubble of liquid. The last thing I saw before my eyes filled with blue was a small white dot.

After they had hoisted me aboard we sat around a little table drinking mugs of coffee. The boat was small and modest, but it presented a homely level of comfort that struck a nice chord with me after my near-death experience. The two men were rather large, one with a matted black beard.

“Cream or sugar? Or just cream? Or just sugar? I'm Raymond,” the bearded man rambled.

“Aw leave him alone for a little while there Ray, you'll scare him of the edge again won't ya?”

“That's Joe,” continued Raymond. “He' not much of a social type if you get my meaning.”

“Not much of a social type? Now what exactly is that supposed to mean there Ray?”

“I only meant you're not one to talk much is all.”

“Is that some sort of an insult there Ray? Is that. . . would you classify that as, ya know, an insult there Ray? Huh Ray? Would you? Because surely I would in your situation, that's the type of comment I would consider an insult if it were to be coming out of my mouth. Clear as day I'd consider it that. So I should hope you'd have the sense to as well Ray. Well Ray? Do you Ray? Do you there?”

I took a few timid sips of coffee in the silence that followed. A misty haze of exhaustion seemed to cloud my sight as I looked down at the brown substance. My vision began to swim before me. The mug slipped out of my hands and crashed onto the floor, spreading brown pockets of liquid across the deck.

“Now look what ya done now Joe! Look what ya gone and done!”

“Now wait a second there Ray, I don't see one morsel of event that would lead you to believe ME of all people caused this.”

“Well ya gone and scared the poor man with your rambling Joe. Ya scared the poor fellow.”

“If anyone's doing any scaring it's you, with your viciously flawed logic there Ray.”

“Now why do you always have to get all philosophical on me Joe, you know I can't keep them ideas straight in my head.”

“I warned ya I wouldn't stand for any disrespect there Ray. I warned ya. But you didn't listen there. I warned ya I wouldn't hesitate to get intellectual on your ass there Ray. Don't say I didn't warn ya. I warned ya.”

We mopped up the coffee with some wrinkled rags from a drawer inside the cabin. On my hands and knees I began to feel a strange sense of danger surrounding the unpredictability of these two men. They seemed nice enough, but they also seemed utterly insane.

“Who are you calling insane there Ray? You think it's insane that I won't degrade myself by cleaning up a mess I didn't make? Do you honestly think that Ray? Do you? Honestly think that?”

“It's insane ya won't help out, Joe. I do think that, yes I do.”

I tend to enjoy the idea of doing more than the actual doing. I like to become excited, become committed, become prepared for something huge, monumental. Then when the time comes to make it possible, to put forth the effort required and then some, the passion never lasts. Finding passion isn't hard, but finding a way to harness that passion and turn it into hard work is near impossible. But when you control the reins of your own mind, great things are suddenly achievable. Doors begin to open, awe and respect begin to surround your every move, and for one simple reason alone. The humble know that to say nothing is to say everything. Let yourself speak for itself, but not yourself, the projection of yourself created by yourself, ambassador to yourself. This alone says it all.

This is why I said nothing when Joe pulled out his harpoon gun and fired it directly into Raymond's chest with a sickening thunk, and Raymond ran towards the railing, blood streaming out of his ribcage, and flung himself over the edge, and Joe's foot got caught in the harpoon's rope, and Joe got dragged towards the railing, and Joe went under the railing, almost all of him, except for his foot which got caught in between the rails, and Joe's foot broke in half with an audible scream, and Joe went under the water along with Raymond, and Joe and Raymond died that day.

I searched the boat and found pictures of myself, and some other people I didn't recognize were with me too. I found papers with my name on them, the boat belonged to me. I sailed on to the nearest shore and headed for a hospital, where I would eventually wake up and remember everything.