Drift

by Meghan Rose Allen

About the Author: Bio: Meghan Rose Allen has a PhD in Mathematics from Dalhousie University. In a previous life, she was a cog in the military-industrial complex. Now she lives in New Brunswick and writes. Her work has appeared in The Fieldstone Review, FoundPress, The Puritan, and The Rusty Toque, amongst others. One can find her online at www.reluctantm.com.

Excerpt

Day

By the time I could remember anything, there were four of us, Mr Quancy, me, Stephen, and Miss Fanny. I’d thought there were others, recalled there were others, but Stephen said no, I’d been knocked in the head, and these memories were of double-vision. That was all.

“Are you sure?” I asked Stephen. “Your accent is strange.”

“I’m from the wilds of Africa,” Stephen said, then looked down at his shoes, which he still had. I’d lost mine, apparently. I only had woollen socks covering my toes, tops hanging down lower than my ankles. “Not really though. Pretoria. You know about the Boers?” he asked me.

I must have given him a look that suggested I did, because he shrugged his shoulders and muttered “Just asking” to himself in that queer accent of his.

I lifted up my arms, but they were tied to my ankles, so I could just about sit up, provided I put my elbows on my knees and rested my chin in my hands. The ends of my ropes had been tied fast to a ring bolted to the floor of the boat and under my bench.

“How necessary is this?” I asked to none of the others in particular. As no one but Stephen could hear me over the wind, he was the one who answered.

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