“How the fuck are we supposed to find Poseidon here? This place is huge!” Scroat said. He imagined walking up and down docks for the entire morning, hoping Hep would spot a familiar face.
“He said he’d meet you guys up here when we arrived, don’t worry.” Ares said. He pulled in to a parking space and turned off the engine. “Well, we’d better get you guys on your boat!”
The three of them got out of Ares’s car. Ares’s opened the the back door and Hep and Scroat grabbed their bags.
“So where’s he going to meet us, exactly?” Hep asked.
“Right about here,” a voice behind them said. They turned, and saw a man with a deep, deep tan, a thick shock of bright white hair, and a bright white beard to match. His blue eyes sparkled with a hint of mischief. He wore a raw silk shirt, cargo shorts and a pair of well broken in topsiders.
“Hey, Poseidon, been a while,” Hep said, and shook his said. “Have you met Scroat?”
“I can’t say that I have,” he reached to shake Scroat’s hand. “Good to meet you.”
“Are you sure about that?” Scroat asked, and shook his hand.
“Well, I guess not,” Poseidon said, and laughed. “But I hope for your sake it is. Otherwise you might be in for a long swim.”
“Well, I’ve got a lot to do today, so I’d better get rolling. Places to go, people to kill, you know. Good to see you Poseidon. Take care, you two,” Ares said.
“See ya Ares. Thanks,” Hep said.
“No sweat.”
Ares got into his car again and started the engine. Then he turned around and looked at the three of them, waiting for them to get out of the way so he could back up.
“Well, I guess we’d better get moving,” Poseidon said. He looked down at Hep and Scroat’s boots. “Say, do you guys have some shoes that don’t have black soles?”
“Uh, no. Do we need them?” Hep said.
“Yeah, you’re not getting on my boat in those things. I don’t have time to scrub scuff marks off the deck. That’s OK, there’s a store with boat shoes just across the way. Let’s go.” He started walking away.
Hep and Scroat looked at each other. Hep shrugged, “I guess. Who knew boots weren’t appropriate for every occasion?”
They picked up their bags and hustled to catch up with Poseidon.
They had to wait outside the store until it opened at eight o’clock before they could buy shoes. The shopping trip was otherwise uneventful. Freshly shod in shiny new topsiders, with no socks, Hep and Scroat followed Poseidon through the marina and to his dock. It seemed they’d been walking for miles already, and it wasn’t even nine o’clock yet.
As they walked, Poseidon pointed out boats and told them a bit about the vessels and their owners.
“This boat has sailed around the world twice now. Her new owner is kind of a dipshit, but he’s trying his best,” then, “This boat is one of three built, and the only one in the United States.”
After what felt like four miles of walking, they reached Poseidon’s boat. It was a 56 foot sloop, with green paint down to the waterline. The teak deck gleamed as though it had just been varnished. Across the stern in gold lettering was the boat’s name, Oceanid II.
Classy, Hep thought. What he said, however, was “Nice boat.”
“What happened to Oceanid I?” Scroat asked.
“I wore her out at the submarine races,” Poseidon said. “So, toss your bags in the cockpit and climb aboard.”
“I like this guy already, Hep,” Scroat said.
They threw their bags into the cockpit, and then stood looking at the boat, unsure of what to do next. The deck was nearly three feet above the dock, and there weren’t any stairs or a ladder to be found.
“You guys have sailed before, right?”
“Fuck no,” Scroat said.
“Yeah, not really,” Hephaistos said.
“Well, there’s nothing to it, you’ll know enough to sail the boat in a couple of hours, no sweat.”
Poseidon paused for a minute, then said, “So you need me to explain how to get on the boat to you, huh?”
Hep and Scroat nodded.
“OK, you see the stanchions without a lifeline between them?”
Hep and Scroat looked at Poseidon, entirely lost.
“Stanchions are those posts sticking up. Lifelines are the cables that go between them in order to keep you from falling out of the boat.”
“OK,” Hep said.
“OK, so, grab on to the stanchions, put one foot up on the deck, and pull yourself up there. Be careful not to fall in.”
Scroat scrambled up on to the boat with no trouble, but just geting one leg up on to the deck was a struggled for Hep. He pulled himself aboard with little grace, but at least he stayed dry and didn’t injure himself.
Poseidon hopped up on to the boat as though it was nothing. “OK. Scroat, you’re in charge of untying the boat from the dock, since you can get on and off the boat reasonably quickly.”
“OK,” Scroat said.
“So, uh, untie the boat, Scroat.”
“Oh, right,” He went to the edge of the deck and looked down.
“How do I get off this fucking thing?”
“Do the opposite of what you did getting on.”
“Sure,” Scroat said. He grabbed on to a stanchion and tried not to break himself stepping down to the dock. Then he hustled to the bow of the boat, untied the dock line, threw it aboard, and did the same at the stern. He scrambled back on to the boat, as though they might leave without him.
Poseidon started the engine, which rumbled to life somewhere below them.
“Go ahead and pick a berth in the cabin and leave your bags there,” Poseidon told them. “I can get us out of the marina by myself.”
He shifted the boat into reverse, and increased the throttle a bit, steering the boat backwards out of its slip with complete confidence.
Hep and Scroat looked at the companionway with complete doubt.
“How do we get down there?” Scroat asked.
“I don’t know. You go first.”
Scroat peered in, and saw a ladder doing down into the cabin. “Oh, more climbing. Good.”
He climbed down into the cabin and took a look around. “Wow, this is fucking awesome!”
Every visible surface was either gleaming teak, brass or steel. He walked forward, and discovered there was stateroom with a bunk bed in the bow of the boat. He tossed his bag on the top bunk. Behind him, he could hear Hep struggling down the ladder.
“Well, that sucked,” Hep said as he walked into the stateroom Scroat was in. He tossed his bag onto the lower bunk. “I sure hope I get the hang of this quickly, or this might be a bummer of a trip.”
“I hear that,” Scroat said.
They heard a clunk, and felt the boat change from moving backwards to forwards. Hep found standing in a moving room, with no visual reference to see how they were moving, somewhat unnerving.
“I think this is going to be a strange trip,” he said.
“Are you guys going to stay down there all day?” Poseidon said. “Get up here already, this isn’t a free ride.”
“Oh, fuck, we’ve been shanghaied by Poseidon,” Scroat said.
Hep laughed, and the two of them climbed back out of the cabin and stood in the cockpit. They were slowly motoring past boat after boat. The sun was bright and it looked like it was going to be a cloudless day.
“OK, go forward and take the cover off the mains’l, and untie it,” Poseidon said.
Hep and Scroat looked at each other again.
“What?” Hep said.
“Go up there and take the big green canvas thingy off the big sail thingy, then untie the sail so we can raise it,” Poseidon said.
They were finally past the boats, and cruising down the channel toward the ocean. Hep and Scroat were able to remove the sail cover without too much difficulty, and untied the mainsail.
“What should we do with this cover?” Scroat asked.
“Throw it below,” Poseidon said. He was looking far ahead, and smiling slightly as his hair blew in the wind..
Scroat shrugged, mumbled “You’re the boss,” and threw the cover overboard.
Poseidon sputtered. His eyebrows worked up and down. He grabbed at his beard, then the top of his head.
“Why on Earth did you do that?”
“Uh, because you fucking told me to.”
“I said below. Below. Not overboard, below, in the cabin. Damn it, that was a three hundred dollar hunk of canvas.”
“Oh. My bad,” Scroat said.
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