Sandbar Chapter 1

[Tobias Garrett]

Is the first chapter in need of more work?

Sandbar
Chapter 1

I lie with my face in the sand not because I am done for, but it is the only place to hide it from the sun. My new world is a sandbar no bigger than the ship that left me here not two days gone. I am madly thirsty yet surround by water as far as I can see. To drink it would only bring insanity and draw out my death. Or perhaps draw out insanity and hurry my death.
My eyes, dry and blurry, study the sand inches from my face, as white as a maids bottom. I grab a handful and let it slowly sift through my fingers. Each sparkling grain I imagine as a day of my existence and how it's also slipping away. A life starting in gloom and ending ablaze.
I entered this world innocent, but birthed to the worst of sorts – unfortunately she was my mother. A black speck of sand sticks to my thumb and I picture it as her. Not until now did I wonder how she had come to be so bad. Why was I chosen to be from her? She had told me when I was but a lad not to daydream, that gin was the stuff that brought the world to bare and dreaming was a waste of time. But it was all I had then – and now. I had all the time in the world. Well maybe only an hour, or till the end of the day.
I looked at the pistol lying by my head. Left to ease my suffering, but I decided I had not suffered enough. Something could happen, for was not hope born of the desperation of facing death?
My mothers blurry image reentered my mind, but I refused to let her memory be my last. She was not deserving of it though probably the root of why I am now here. I blew at the black grain and it stuck stubbornly to my palm.
As a child I remembered nothing good. Not a smile, not a laugh, nor a hug.
***
Batremius Trebey Weather is my God given name, though I bet God had nothing to do with it. My mother stuck me with that horrible tribulation. All three the names she saw on better bottles of gin that fed her. My father, whomever he might be, may have had one of those names. Such a fragile string of hope, that I was truly conceived by someone other than one doomed to be the marker on a bottle. I was born in a wild basket under a harbor moon. That exact day or month my dear mother forgot in her never ending stupor. I no doubt she was drunk when she conceived me. Drunk when she birthed me. And drunk the night I killed her. Strong if not terrible words I know. But its how it was, how I feel. For on that day, October1, 1715, a day more memorable than a birthday if I had one. She died. Not at my hands directly like could be supposed and I predicted. In fact I was not even present when she was murdered by me.
A cold day in hell it was. Even colder in the shack which was my home from birth until then. All twelve sad and filthy years of it. Living under the weight of the Liverpool Docks at Commons, it was a one room shack, a poor affair not bigger that a Danberry Carriage. From that age I became aware of how my mother earned her gin. The world she lived in. The sad hard world we both suffered in.
She made enough from humping to keep her drunk but never spent a penny on food. I never remember her cooking. In fact I never recalled seeing her eat a bite of food. A whore she was. It made me sick to watch her wallow like a pig under the seamen she brought home. I built a loft with scraps of wood to raise me above the squalor. But it did not drown out the squeals of the swine below. To this day I could not mate with a woman who was verbal in her pleasures. The slightest wimpier would soften me to lard.
One day I went a begging for food, for a new ship was docking, rumored many years at sea. They often threw out their old and rotted food. A feast for me. A little bit of runs and cramps was a small price to pay for staying alive. I toted a few sacks of particularly ripe victations and when I arrived home my mother lay at the foot of my loft by the ladder, her head unnaturally cocked against her shoulder. Her tongue, gin-fat, sticking out. A leg bent behind her back. No tear tempted my eyes. Even before I saw the coined filled kerchief in her clutched hand. The money I had saved to run away, since the day I knew what my mother was – always would be.
She stole from me, then died. Part my fault. The day before I was curious why she told me to mend my ladder, as 'I' might break 'my' neck. When it was all for her, to climb and steal my money.
I burned the shack that night. My mother with it. I did not think it would cook the whole of Liverpool and Commons Docks with it. It was a frightful sight on a frightful night. First the beggars shacks then the docks above and then the warehouses. Ashes rose and lit the air until they landed in the rigging of the ships and burned every one of them to the water.
It had been my plan someday – with enough money – to escape upon a ship, but I had burned that route. I had no choice but to walk to London, where by luck I was enslaved on Teache's ship and what a history we made.
***

The Captain looked me square and put his hand on my shoulder. “You been a good first mate, and I no qualms with what you did, but I can't be showing favorites, for I be the Captain. Pieter pushed you a lot the wrong way, but he had friends. Old friends who have served on this ship since she was taken from the Spanish in 1687. And loyalty counts a lot over later mis-deeds.”
I simply nodded, knowing I had already given my best defense and any more would be begging. The ship had spoken and voted. I had been accused of stealing doubloons. And sure enough when Pieter suggested they look in my stow bag, there they were. He planted them to get my position. There was only one course for my sentence, marooned on the island of sand they had found. Left to starve, rot and scream for mercy. In that particular order I presume.
I looked up at the Captain, for I was on my knees bound for my last trip. “I fault you not Captain Teach. You done what you thought right and you will do what you got to do.”
I spent the night in the brig with nothing but a bucket of water, a polished mirror and a straight blade – either to shave and make myself presentable for my punishment – or to cut my wrists and save them trouble. Looking in the mirror I barely recognized myself. It had been probably a year since I saw the man before me. My eyes were deep and serious, as they always were. My long black had hair fallen to my shoulders, my beard long and matted, I decided I was good as I could get. The blade would fit nicely down my boot, but they had taken them and I'm sure they would search anyway. I wanted to hide it deep into Pieter Tate's neck.
At first light the next morning, Scags the cook brought me a handful of bacon fat and beans. With little appetite I manged to gag it all down. Then he led me to the deck where the 'new' first mate, Pieter Tate lifted me roughly to my feet and threw me into the long boat. I lay in the keel as we were lowered to the water. We were not far from a sandbar that stuck out of the sea like an old crabs last claw.
A funny feeling tickled my innards as I saw that the drawn faces of the crew that maned the oars were my best mates. To see me off? Make escape? To where? What did they have in mind? I asked myself, for it would be foolish to speak those thoughts out loud. For the steersman, Peiter that had brought charges against me, a crabid and dark oaf, he was heavily armed, not to mention the two pistols sticking from his fat belt. I lay most awkwardly between his legs so I could see that the frizen pans of both pistols were empty. No more useful than a club and a good one at that.
It was 176 oar strokes I counted before we hit sand. Numbers a peccadillo to me. I was carefully lifted off the boat. I stood on the beach facing my friends, thankfully, the man I hated most sat with his back to us in the bow. All too ready to take his leave of me.
It was a slumly lot of faces that met mine. All thoughts of escape and rescue dimmed. The sun was dead up at noon and blazing, hungry for my murder. Mago cut my ropes and then handed me a small sack. The handle of a pistol peeking out expectantly. I knew what it was for.
Mago nodded at the sack. “It's the best the Capt' would let me do.”
A crazed thought swept over me as I stood before the men who had been my friends for almost a decade. I could club Pieter with the hard end of the pistol, push the boat out with my foot while I blew a hole in her. My mates would be stuck with me. Fitting justice for my revenge. But alas, I didn't have it in me to doom them to my fate. Twas the law of the sea and if it had been the other way around, I would be standing there silently paying my respect to another poor soul.
The lap of the waves and distant noise of the gulls was again interrupted by Pete. “I double charge the pistol. So ya won't be...well I wish you the best Batre.”
I thought, the best?. You wishing me to cleanly blow my brains out. A true friend. A pirates friend. What should I expect. The urge to enact my previous inclinations swept over me, but was gone just as fast. Pats on the back as they left was my farewell salute. I watched them row away, not a man, nor a friend looking back one last time. Words bottled up in me and I fought the urge to yell. It would have ruined my name, my courage and when they spoke of me that night and next week until my name was forgotten. I realized that’s all I was right now, a memory fading before my eyes and it seemed wrong to tarnish what little of it was left.
For the first day I explored my small piece of hell. To say it was the first piece of property I could call my own was true perhaps until I die, letting the crabs re-inherit it. It paced to ship size. Solid but wet at both ends, forty-eight paces north to south and sixteen east to west. Bout the size of the ship. Save it had no food, water, hammock, or the ability to sail anywhere.

[Lawrence Tabak]

Holy block of text -- the formatting alone would drive me away if the prose didn't. Seems to me you've painted yourself into a narrative corner here, putting your protagonist in an environment where his only option is back story, and more back story, and some more back story. With Caruso we got the classic survival story and Friday, Gulliver discovered amazing worlds, the Swiss Family Robinson built a really cool tree house and fought pirates. If you're taking us back to 1715, we better be getting at least as much for the effort.

See if this formatting works better:


I lie with my face in the sand not because I am done for, but it is the only place to hide it from the sun. My new world is a sandbar no bigger than the ship that left me here not two days gone. I am madly thirsty yet surround by water as far as I can see. To drink it would only bring insanity and draw out my death. Or perhaps draw out insanity and hurry my death.

My eyes, dry and blurry, study the sand inches from my face, as white as a maids bottom. I grab a handful and let it slowly sift through my fingers. Each sparkling grain I imagine as a day of my existence and how it's also slipping away. A life starting in gloom and ending ablaze.

I entered this world innocent, but birthed to the worst of sorts – unfortunately she was my mother. A black speck of sand sticks to my thumb and I picture it as her. Not until now did I wonder how she had come to be so bad. Why was I chosen to be from her? She had told me when I was but a lad not to daydream, that gin was the stuff that brought the world to bare and dreaming was a waste of time. But it was all I had then – and now. I had all the time in the world. Well maybe only an hour, or till the end of the day.

I looked at the pistol lying by my head. Left to ease my suffering, but I decided I had not suffered enough. Something could happen, for was not hope born of the desperation of facing death?

My mother's blurry image reentered my mind, but I refused to let her memory be my last. She was not deserving of it though probably the root of why I am now here. I blew at the black grain and it stuck stubbornly to my palm.

As a child I remembered nothing good. Not a smile, not a laugh, nor a hug.

***

Ahh, quite a relief, non?

[Lea Zalas]

Tobias, a formatting request - put an extra line between paragraphs. This is too run-on to be easy to read.

[Tobias Garrett]

I can't find the actions to delete and repost properly?
Any help?

[Lea Zalas]

Tobias, you can't delete an entire thread. You can edit your post, but it has to be done within at least 15 minutes, maybe 30, but I'm not sure. Just make sure that going forward, you make it easier for us to read your posts. Don't worry, this happens to most new members at least once.

[Tobias Garrett]

Sandbar

Chapter 1




I lie with my face in the sand because it is the only place to hide it from the sun. My new world is a sandbar no bigger than the ship that left me here not two days gone. I am madly thirsty yet surrounded by water I cannot drink.



My eyes, dry and blurry, study the sand inches from my face, as white as a maids bottom. I grab a handful and let it sift through my fingers. I imagine each grain as a day of my dwindling existence. A life started in gloom, ending ablaze.



I entered this world innocent, but birthed to the worst of sorts – unfortunately she was my mother. A black speck of sand sticks to my thumb and I picture it as her. Not until now did I wonder how she had come to be so bad. Why was I chosen to be from her? She told me when I was a lad that gin was the stuff that brought the world to bear and dreaming of better was a waste of time. But it was all I had then – and now. I had all the time in the world. Well maybe only an hour, or till the end of the day.



I looked at the pistol lying by my head. Left to ease my suffering, but I decided I had not suffered enough. Something could happen, for was not hope born of the desperation of facing death?



My mother's image reentered my mind, but I refused to let her memory be my last. She was not deserving of it. I blew at the black grain and it stuck stubbornly to my palm.



As a child I remembered nothing good. Not a smile, not a laugh, nor a hug.



***



Batremius Trebey Weather is my God-given name, though I bet God had nothing to do with it. My mother stuck me with that horrible tribulation, the names she saw on the bottles of gin. My father, whomever he might be, may have had one of those names. Such a fragile string of hope, that I was truly conceived by someone other than one known as the marker on a bottle.



I was born in a wild basket under a harbor moon. That exact day or month my dear mother forgot in her never ending stupor. I no doubt she was drunk when she conceived me, drunk when she birthed me, and drunk the night I killed her. Strong if not terrible words I know. But its how it was, how I feel. For on that day, October1, 1715, a day more memorable than a birthday if I had one. She died. Not at my hands directly like could be supposed and I predicted. In fact I was not even present when she was murdered by me.



A cold day in hell it was. Even colder in the shack which was my home from birth until then. All twelve sad and filthy years of it. Living under the weight of the Liverpool Docks at Commons, it was a one room shack, a poor affair not bigger that a Danberry Carriage. From that age I became aware of how my mother earned her gin. The world she lived in. The sad hard world we both suffered in.



She made enough from humping to keep her drunk but never spent a penny on food. A whore she was. It made me sick to watch her wallow like a pig under the seamen she brought home. I built a loft with scraps of wood to raise me above the squalor. But it did not drown out the squeals of the swine below. To this day I could not mate with a woman who was verbal in her pleasures. The slightest wimpier would soften me to lard.



One day I went a begging for food, for a new ship was docking, rumored many years at sea. They often threw out their old and rotted food. A feast for me. A little bit of runs and cramps was a small price to pay for staying alive. I toted a few sacks of particularly ripe victations and when I arrived home my mother lay at the foot of my loft by the ladder, her head unnaturally cocked against her shoulder. Her tongue, gin-fat, sticking out. A leg bent behind her back. No tear tempted my eyes. Even before I saw the coined filled kerchief in her clutched hand. The money I had saved to run away, since the day I knew what my mother was – always would be.



She stole from me, then died. Part my fault. The day before I was curious why she told me to mend my ladder, as 'I' might break 'my' neck. When it was all for her, to climb and steal my money.



I burned the shack that night. My mother with it. I did not think it would cook the whole of Liverpool and Commons Docks with it. It was a frightful sight on a frightful night. First the beggars shacks, then the docks above and then the warehouses. Ashes rose and lit the air until they landed in the rigging of the ships and burned every one of them to the water. It was a night of horror that still haunts my dreams.



It had been my plan someday – with enough money – to escape upon a ship, but I had burned that route. I had no choice but to walk to London, where by luck I was hired upon Teach's ship and what a history we made.



***




Before I was marooned upon that desolate sandbar, I was given a fair trial, such that it was.



The Captain looked me square and put his hand on my shoulder. “You been a good first mate, and I no qualms with what you did, but I can't be showing favorites. Pieter pushed you a lot the wrong way, but he had friends. Old friends who have served on this ship since she was taken from the Spanish in 1687. And loyalty counts a lot over later mis-deeds.”



I nodded, knowing I had already given my best defense and any more would be begging. The ship had spoken and voted. I had been accused of stealing doubloons. And sure enough when Pieter suggested they look in my stow bag, there they were. He planted them to get the first mate position. There was only one course for my sentence, marooned on the island of sand they had found. Left to starve, rot and scream for mercy. In that particular order I presume.



I looked up at the Captain, for I was on my knees bound for my last trip. “I fault you not Captain Teach. You done what you thought right and you will do what you got to do.”



I spent that night in the brig with nothing but a bucket of water, a polished mirror and a straight blade – either to shave and make myself presentable for my punishment – or to cut my wrists and save them trouble. Looking in the mirror I barely recognized myself. It had been probably a year since I saw the man before me. My eyes were deep and serious, as they always were. My long black had hair fallen to my shoulders, my beard long and matted, I decided I was good as I could get. The blade would fit nicely down my boot, but they had taken them and I'm sure they would search anyway. I wanted to hide it deep into Pieter Tate's neck.



At first light the next morning, Scags the cook brought me a handful of bacon fat and beans. With little appetite I manged to gag it all down. Then he led me to the deck where the 'new' first mate, Pieter Tate lifted me roughly to my feet and threw me into the long boat. I lay in the keel as we were lowered to the water. We were not far from a sandbar that stuck out of the sea like an old crab's last claw.



The crew manning the oars were my best mates. To see me off? Make escape? To where? What did they have in mind? It would be foolish to ask. For the steersman, Peiter that had brought charges against me, a crabid and dark oaf, was heavily armed, not to mention the two pistols sticking from his fat belt. I lay most awkwardly between his legs so I could see that the frizen pans of both pistols were empty. No more useful than a club.



It was 176 oar strokes I counted before we hit sand. Numbers a peccadillo to me. Carefully they lifted me from the boat. I stood on the beach facing my friends. The man I hated most sat with his back to us in the bow. All too ready to take his leave of me.



It was a slumly lot of faces that met mine. All thoughts of escape and rescue dimmed. The sun was dead up at noon and blazing, hungry for my murder. Mago cut my ropes and then handed me a small sack. The handle of a pistol peeked out. I knew what it was for.



Mago nodded at the sack. “It's the best the Capt' would let me do.”



A crazed thought swept over me as I stood before the men who had been my friends for almost a decade. I could club Pieter with the hard end of the pistol, push the boat out with my foot while I blew a hole in her. My mates would be stuck with me. Fitting justice for my revenge. But alas, I didn't have it in me to doom them to my fate. Twas the law of the sea and if it had been the other way around, I would be standing there silently paying my respect to another poor soul.



The lap of the waves and distant noise of the gulls was again interrupted by Mago. “I double charged the pistol. So ya won't be...well I wish you the best Batre.”



The best? Wishing me to cleanly blow my brains out? A true friend. A pirate's friend. What should I expect? The urge to enact my previous inclinations swept over me, but disappeared just as fast. Pats on the back served as my farewell salute. I watched them row away, not a man looking back one last time. Words bottled up in me and I fought the urge to yell – to plead for my life. But for some reason I now had more pride than at any time in my life. It would have ruined my name when they spoke of me that night – next week until Batremius Trebey Weather was forgotten. I realized that’s all I was now, a memory fading and it seemed wrong to tarnish what little of it was left.



When the sail and my hope disappeared over the horizon and I was sure they had no change of heart, I explored my small piece of hell. It was the first piece of land I could call my own until the crabs re-inherited it. Solid but wet at both ends, I paced out the sandbar at forty-eight paces north to south and sixteen east to west. It was ship-shaped, but lacked food, water, hammock, and sail. It was open and breezy but as stifling as what it was – my tomb.