The Lost Sailor

Aspen

The tavern was crowded that night. Loud Celtic music. A few drunk men singing a sea shanty. Someone dancing on a tabletop. Cheers to another year on Unna Island, another year of finding the lost sailor. This island and its stupid myths.

I stood there, cringing, hands buried deep in my jean pockets. Why did Jackie organize this, anyway? After what happened this year, I doubted anyone wanted to have a pub party. I mean, Jackie was her best friend.

“ASPEN!”

Shit. I should have left while I had the chance.

I saw Jackie waving maniacally inside the tavern, sitting in a booth against the wall. Ethan sat beside her, and Professor Wilde the Witch, her TA McClellan, and Professor Karasu across from her.

Jae Karasu, who started as my favorite TA. Then my favorite professor when I started my masters degree at uni. Then my secret that no one could know. Our secret.

My heart dropped like a stone.

“COME JOIN US,” Jackie shouted, waving. Ever since first year of university, Jackie was always the loudest of us. And even after her best friend’s death, she was still the loudest.

But they had all seen me. I sighed, having no other option but to join them. The door of the tavern creaked open, and the music and stomping and talking hit me all at once. My boots dragged along the wooden floor. I ignored all of the greetings from the bartender, the drunk men, and the other students.

Jackie pouted at me as I sank into a seat at the end of the table. I could tell she was already drunk. “Why the long face?”

“I’m tired.” End of conversation.

“McClellan was just telling us about her dissertation,” Ethan said, nodding towards our professor. “Biomaterial vaccination capabilities, right?”

Ethan, the peacemaker. Nobody wanted to talk about McClellan dissertation, not even her. Hell, especially not her. But Ethan probably knew that once I arrived, somebody might bring up—

“Nothing to drink, Mai?” Karasu interrupted, nodding at me.

I wanted to scowl, first for interrupting Ethan and second for calling me by my last name. Does this tavern look like a classroom? I wanted to snap.

Jackie pinched my arm, her way of saying calm the hell down. “I’ll order you a pint.”

Everyone knew I had the lowest alcohol tolerance out of anyone on the island, but I nodded anyway. “Thanks.”

Once the bartender had come back with another round, Professor Wilde took a sip of beer, sitting back in her chair. She took off her glasses and wiped them with the bottom of her sweater. We were all afraid of her at the beginning of uni, before we discovered her kinder side. “This year has been hard for all of us.”

I shifted uncomfortably, making unwanted eye contact with Karasu.

“Let us not talk about dissertations. For once,” she said, “I forbid any academic conversation.”

“Whoop whoop!” Jackie interjected, raising her beer.

I watched her under my long brown hair. Why was she purposely ignoring what happened, and why was Jackie going along with it?

“A toast to summer holidays,” said Ethan, raising his glass.

A toast to leaving the island for good, I silently, touching my glass to theirs.

McClellan frowned, not joining the toast. “What will I do now that you’re leaving, Professor?”

Wilde smiled at her, ruffling her hair. “You’ll be an excellent professor one day.”

I could see Jackie staring at McClellan. I knew she never liked her, because of how harshly she graded. The school year was over; was she still holding grudges?

Ethan turned to me. “Aspen, what are you up to this summer?”

I could feel Karasu’s eyes on me. I looked up, and he glanced away.

“Nothing.” I’m leaving this island as soon as we leave this tavern.

“You can keep me company,” Jackie said, wrapping her arm around my shoulders.

“You’ll need all the company you can get,” McClellan blurted. We all stared at her, and she took a tiny sip of beer. I watched her through narrowed eyes; she had never drunk before, had she?

“Another round, please!” Karasu shouted at the bartender.

I sank in my seat, shrugging out of Jackie’s arm.

Jackie

I huffed loudly, blowing a stray lock of black hair out of my eyes. Aspen had always been a mystery to me. There, but not.

As the night stretched on, we drank more and more. We talked about the island, about the myths attached to it. Ethan retold the story about the infamous sailor Unna Nichoali, who had discovered the island off the coast of Massachusetts seven hundred seventy seven years ago and had mysteriously vanished at sea.

“Legend has it that every full moon, he brings another person from the island to join him in death,” Ethan said, looking at me.

I made a face. Wasn’t that night a full moon?

McClellan leaned back in her chair, staring at me. “Jackie, you seem to be doing great.”

It sounded like a compliment, but I knew it was not. “What do you mean, Esther?”

She frowned, upset at me calling her by her first name. “I used to see you and Beth together all the time. I know you two were close.”

The table got quiet. Beth. The one thing we were not allowed to talk about tonight.

“She probably doesn’t want to talk about it,” Ethan said, running a hand through his hair.

“I’m sure she’d like to talk a little,” McClellan continued, leaning forward. “It must be hard, having your best friend die.”

I slammed my beer on the table, making everyone jump. Wilde shook her head at McClellan, giving her the signal to stop talking.

“Why don’t we talk about our favorite versions of the Nichoali myth?” Ethan suggested.

“Why don’t we talk about our favorite moments with Beth?” McClellan said, not taking her eyes off me.

My heart started speeding. She couldn’t possibly know, right?

“I’m going to the bathroom,” said Karasu, standing up.

“Esther, let’s talk about something else,” said Wilde, frowning at her.

“What makes you so eager, anyway?” I demanded.

“I’m curious, that’s all,” said McClellan, leaning back in her seat.

I turned to look at Aspen, to find some comfort despite her usually stiff expression, but her seat was empty.

McClellan

Almost immediately, Ethan launched into a story of the three sailors that had come to this tavern seven hundred years ago. I frowned; who invited him, anyway? Jackie was Wilde’s favorite graduate student and Aspen and Professor Karasu were somehow connected, but Ethan didn’t really fit in.

My eyes wandered over to Jackie. She was listening aptly, seemingly entranced by Ethan’s story. She probably invited him to be a peacemaker, I thought, scoffing.

I knew it was her. Not only by the fact that she seemed barely disturbed at all that her best friend had been killed. Not only because she was there on the cliffs when it happened. Not only because Beth had just been awarded the Unna Island University Fellow award, a position I knew Jackie was after.

I knew because of the way she looked at me, between glances at Ethan and Professor Wilde. The panic in her eyes when I mentioned Beth’s name.

By the end of the night, Jackie Lee was going to be arrested. I was going to do it.

“Wait, where did Aspen go?” Wilde asked, frowning.

“She spilled some beer and went to clean it up,” I said. “I watched her go.”

“I hope she’s not already wasted,” Jackie muttered to herself.

“Not wasted like you.” I crossed my arms, staring at her.

Jackie made a face at me. “What is your problem?”

“I’m not the one with a problem!”

“Hey!” Jackie stood up, fists clenched.

“Hey,” Professor Wilde shouted, giving us the famous Wilde death glare. Students used to call her Wilde the Witch. “Whatever is going on here, it needs to stop.”

Jackie and I stared at each other, her standing and me sitting.

Something in her eyes registered. They changed from fury to fear.

Yes. She knew.

Aspen

“Địt mẹ,” I muttered to myself, wiping the stain on my shirt.

“That looks bad.”

My arm stopped, and I looked up. Karasu was leaning against the wall, arms crossed.

I thought of many more swear words I wanted to say. “Shouldn’t you be with the others?”

“Shouldn’t you be with the others?” he said, taking the towel from my hands and wiping the stain. “Doesn’t it seem suspicious if we both run off?”

“I spilled my beer.”

“On purpose.” It wasn’t a question. He finished wiping the stain, offering the towel back to me.

“Thằng chó đẻ,” I whispered.

He made a face. “What does that mean?”

“You son of a bitch.”

He laughed. His great bark laughter that all the students knew so well. The laugh that started in the back of his eyes, his sunken dark eyes, a quip that tickled him down to the deepest chasms of his gut.

“You’ve always cursed like a sailor,” he said, his eyes shining.

Suddenly the nights flashed before my eyes, the nights of dancing and laughing and cursing with Jae. The first time he took me out for a drink, after I had finished grading his doctoral students’ papers. The morning he took me to the market fair. The night we danced in the pub, cursing the island and the university and toasting to another year of finding the lost sailor. For a second, Jae’s laugh spread to my face and we looked at each other, smiling. Remembering.

The towel was still heavy in my hands. My smile vanished, and I looked away. “I’m leaving the island.”

He was the first person I told, and he barely reacted at all. My heart slightly sank. “Where will you go?”

“I want to go to Vietnam,” I said, “to be with my mother.”

He peered closer at me. Our faces were inches apart. “Are you drunk yet?”

I wanted to curse again. Instead I frowned, not moving. “I’m not drunk.”

He straightened back up, smiling down at me. My fist clenched. “You should go back first.”

I threw the towel on the floor.

Ethan

I could tell McClellan was losing patience with me. Wilde remained neutral, but I knew the constant storytelling was going to raise suspicion soon enough. I wasn’t just distracting; I was hinting.

And then there was Jackie. I knew she was scared, because how could McClellan possibly know? None of it made sense to me.

Aspen slumped back into her seat next to me, her frown set in place. Karasu was still gone. McClellan was staring daggers into Jackie’s eyes.

Sensing that the dynamic was off again, I raised my glass. “Who knows the story of the mermaid who led the sailor off course?”

Nobody even tried to hide it this time. McClellan sighed loudly, Wilde narrowed her eyes, and Aspen’s face didn’t move. Jackie was the only one who looked relieved.

“I’m sure you’ll tell us, Webster,” McClellan said, taking a sip of beer.

Aspen stared at her. “You’re going to get drunk.”

Jackie gave her a strange look.

“What happened, Ethan?” Wilde asked, humoring me.

Karasu sat down beside her, running a hand through his hair. “I think I know that one,” he said. “The siren at the shore, right?”

“Tell us the story, professor,” Jackie begged.

“How about you tell us your story,” McClellan muttered.

Jackie gave me a panicked look.

I took off my glasses to wipe with the edge of my shirt, as if that would clear things up. Jackie invited me as a peacemaking neutral, as one of the few people on the island who didn’t know anything about Beth’s death. What she didn’t know is that I knew more than she did. I knew McClellan was wrong; Jackie didn’t kill Beth.

She didn’t mean to, anyway.

Jackie

I desperately waved down the bartender, signaling another round.

“Whose tab is this going on?” Karasu joked lightly, eyes shining.

“Yours,” Aspen said without hesitation.

Ethan and I exchanged a brief look. Since when did Aspen hate Karasu so much?

“I’m getting tired,” Wilde said, glancing at her wristwatch. “I need to start packing in the morning.”

McClellan frowned. “Let’s stay a little longer.”

Seriously, what was with her? Every time she looked at me, I felt my heart racing. Somehow, she knew about what happened that night. Somehow she knew I was on the cliffs with Beth when she died. But did she know that it was an accident?

“Jackie, I know Beth was your best friend,” McClellan said suddenly. “Wy don’t we close out the night by sharing our favorite Beth stories?”

Aspen made a face. “You weren’t even close with her.”

“But Jackie was.”

My mind flashed back to that night. Beth’s voice on the cliffs. Why don’t we check it out, Jackie? It’s an island tradition, Jackie!

I should have stopped her. Instead I crouched behind the trees, frozen with fear, as I watched Beth plummet to her death.

“They were always together,” McClellan continued, staring me down. “Just like that night on the cliffs, they were—”

“I don’t want to talk about Beth!” I yelled suddenly, making everyone jump. “Shut up, Esther!”

“No! She can’t get away with this!” Standing up, McClellan pointed at me, her face red with fury. “I know you killed her, Jackie! You killed Beth Winger!”

The table got deadly quiet. A hush fell over the pub, stopping the music and the laughing and the stomping.

Everyone was watching me.

Wilde

Jackie’s face resembled a deer caught in the middle of the street, staring at the engine. In all of my years on the island, I had never seen her with such pale fear.

“Esther.” I looked at my TA, who usually never had a single hair out of place, with her messy bun and beer-stained clothes. “You’re making an untrue accusation.”

“What?” She glanced from Jackie to me and back. “I saw her on the cliffs that night. I know that Beth had just gotten the fellowship. The setting, the motive, the alibi, it’s all there!”

“Not everyone gives a shit about academic awards, Esther!” Jackie shouted, her face turning red. “You seriously think I killed my best friend over a fellowship?”

“I don’t think, I know!”

“You lying piece of—”

“That’s enough,” I said right as Ethan said, “Beth’s death wasn’t her fault.”

Everyone looked at him, surprised.

“It was a full moon that night,” he said. “Of course she died.”

I leaned back in my chair, processing. All of the stories he told tonight weren’t just a distraction. The full moon, the cliffs, the lost sailor. Ethan believed that Beth’s death wasn’t an accident, it was an island tradition.

Jackie made a face. “But…she didn’t mean to die. She slipped on the rocks; it was an accident.” Angry tears welled up in her eyes.

“She probably didn’t believe in the myth,” Aspen said bluntly. “She probably didn’t really believe that being on the cliffs on a full moon was a guaranteed death.”

Ethan nodded. McClellan gave Jackie another disgusted look before slumping back into her seat. Slowly, everyone in the pub started to resume talking and laughing, and the violinist began to play again.

It all made sense. Beth had died accidentally, Jackie hadn’t been able to save her. Ethan knew everything about the island myths, and pieced it all together.

The only thing not sitting right with me was Aspen.

My eyes drifted over to where she sat, staring forward expressionless. Staring directly at Karasu.

The hateful looks. The planned trip to the bathroom. The lingering eye contact. A secret, taken too far.

And that’s when I realized Beth’s death had been a case of the wrong place at the wrong time. A miscalculated murder. A way to cover the evidence of a forbidden relationship. A guaranteed death.

She had wanted Karasu to die.

At that moment her eyes met mine. Nobody else saw it, but there was a glimmer of something. Shame? Guilt?

She nodded slightly. Took one more sip of beer, and then she was gone.