Bogart the Boat Salesman's Arc

Chapter 3 of 5

Bogart jumped onto the deck of the Offshore Rig Runner and grabbed the wheel. The boat bucked hard against the fenders. Rain hammered the windshield. He turned the key and the twin engines coughed, caught, roared. He looked at the empty co-pilot seat and knew the truth. The Rig Runner threw eighty knots on flat water. In this chop, alone, he would flip her before he cleared the breakwater. He killed the throttle and stared at the drifting shape on the black water half a mile out. He needed a second pair of hands, and he needed them now. He ran back down the dock toward the weathered boathouse at the end of the row. The peaked roof shed sheets of rain. He pounded on the dockside doors. Diane Harborson pulled one open, work gloves already on, a wrench in her other hand. She ran the repair slip and owed him for a winter of stored fuel he never billed. "Third boat is out there," Bogart said. "I can't run the Rig Runner alone." Diane looked past him at the water. Her jaw set. She dropped the wrench in a bucket, grabbed a life jacket off a hook inside the boathouse, and buckled it across her chest before she stepped out. "Then quit standing in the rain," she said. They ran back together. Bogart buckled his own jacket tight and pulled a spare over Diane's shoulders as backup. She took the co-pilot seat and braced her boots against the console. Bogart cut the lines. He eased the throttle forward, then pushed harder as the bow lifted. Diane called the swells before they hit. "Left. Left. Big one, straight." He carved the wheel with her voice. The Rig Runner climbed a wall of water, dropped, climbed again. Twice the hull slammed sideways and Diane's hand shot to the throttle beside his, easing them down before he could roll. They cleared the breakwater. The drifting boat came into view, low in the water, one figure hunched at the stern waving both arms. Bogart brought the Rig Runner alongside and held her steady against the wind while Diane threw the line. It caught. The figure lashed it to the cleat. Bogart exhaled once, then looked at the hull of the drifting boat. Water sloshed inside past the man's knees. She was sinking, and the tow back would be slower than the storm coming down on top of them.