Green Flash

Geoffrey had a bucket list, like so many people do. The difference was that Geoffrey was always seeking to check things off his list. He didn't wait to be diagnosed with a terminal disease or to lose someone close to him that had missed out on some easily attainable dream in the hustle and bustle of everyday life. His list was a mile long, filled with everything from the extraordinary, like visiting mars, to the incredibly mundane, such as eating strawberries fresh from the bush on a hot summer’s day. It was in the pursuit of one such item, somewhere in between mundanity and extraordinarity, that he came to Richard and I towards the end of one of our spring semesters at college. The three of us had been roommates since our freshman year, assigned to the same room through the vagaries of some university bureaucratic decision making process. And far be it from me to second guess the bureaucracy, for, by the end of the first week, people were asking how long we'd known each other, assuming the answer would be many years and not mere days.

Geoffrey came to us with a proposal. One of the items on his bucket list was to see a green flash. A curious trick of the atmosphere where, just as the sun sinks below the horizon at sunset or just as it rises above it at dawn, a brilliant flash of green light stretches up from the golden dome of that fiery sphere, a lance of viridian brilliance that lasts for less than a full breath. The effect is mildly rare, but that exact combination of ephemerality and rarity was what would make seeing it all the sweeter to Geoffrey. So, before we got kicked off campus for the summer he proposed that we sail the Caribbean, keeping an eye on the horizon at daybreak and nightfall for that brief, spectacular flash of green. He’d worked a part time job and scrimped and saved just enough to buy a small sailboat, not in the best shape but seaworthy and easy enough to fix up on our own. Having nothing better to do, and not particularly wanting to spend another summer in the homes of our parents, we readily agreed. As soon as our last finals were completed we hit the road, all youthful exuberance as we joked over the sounds of the radio playing a playlist of songs we'd concocted for the road trip. The miles and hours flew by, and, before we knew it, we were aboard the little boat, wind tousling our hair and filling the sails.

Those first weeks on the boat were some of the best of my life. The salt air filling my lungs with every breath, crusting in my hair. Snorkeling around reefs to watch barracuda and lobster and manta rays putter around without any care for you. Mornings spent on the sandy beaches of tiny islands, no one else around, feeling like the last three men in the world. Afternoons swimming through blessedly cool water, cerulean brightening to an almost unnatural cyan around the edges, the light playing off the waves against the hull of the ship in mesmerizing patterns. Evenings turning our catch of the day into fish tacos, sipping on beer and listening to that same playlist. I still know the words to each and every song we put on there. And I tell you what, lukewarm beer has never tasted so good. About once a week we would sail back into port, pick up some more groceries, limes and tortillas and tomatoes and all the rest. We were, quite literally, in paradise. Each morning and each evening we would line up on the bow of the boat, looking out to the horizon just as the sun prepared to cross it. On one of those evenings, Geoffrey's hand slipped into mine, rough from handling rope. I leaned against him and we didn't say anything as we watched for that telltale flash. We shared a single quick kiss, his stubble scratching at my chin, his lips tasting of citrus and the sea. It never happened again, but sometimes I can still feel the warmth of him there, pressed against me as I wade in the waters of memory. As the sun would rise too high or slip below the curve of the planet we would sigh and turn away, starting or ending our day.

The later weeks were more difficult. The small boat didn't offer much privacy or chance to get away from the others. Geoffrey had a slight tendency to nag, expecting you to coil a rope just so, or store the knife in this drawer, not that one. That, and the continued lack of the flash began to weigh on Richard. He'd get snappish, sulking after saying something that he didn't really mean to Geoffrey or myself, until eventually he'd sheepishly apologize and we'd move on to the next activity. Endless games of cards, the deck swelling with the moist sea air, raggedy around the edges from poker and solitaire and rummy. Sailing, pushing the aged boat to its absolute limit, skimming across the water, free on the breeze. Fishing, feeling the tug of the line in your hand as you dozed, hoping to catch something big and tasty. Watching schools of iridescent fish swim between clusters of nearly neon coral. Cooking the bounty that we hauled from the sea, day after day, with fresh tropical fruit, grilled corn, rice and beans, each meal somehow better than the last. Then, one day, the wind simply stopped. We were near land, having just restocked, when the breeze dwindled down to non-existence. It didn't start again for a week. And that week felt like hell. The air was a sauna, the shallow water of the bay like tepid bathwater. There was no relief to be had. Not a single cloud in the sky, so the sun beat down, turning the cabin of the ship into an oven. The mosquitos covered us until we were all itching and crabby, making mean spirited comments after spending all night scratching at bug bites in unmentionable places. Finally, just after we'd restocked the ship again, having barely moved all week, the breeze began to blow as though it had never left. For Geoffrey and myself, that breeze blew away the miasma of the last week without a second thought. We were back on open water, free again. But Richard had truly stewed in those warm waters. He didn't bounce back so easily, every passing snarky comment we'd made burned into his brain by the summer heat. Those early days were forgotten, as I’ve found good days so often are across my lifetime. He felt he'd wasted his summer, spent it on a boat with two dudes, not a bikini in sight. That he’d eaten the same things, day after day, done nothing but play cards and swim in hot water beneath hotter air.

Those feelings, unbeknownst to Geoffrey or myself, built and built over the next few days. Each dawn or dusk vigil ratcheting him up tighter, the missed opportunities indicative of the whole experience in his eyes. One afternoon he drank a few more beers than normal. And as we stood on the bow of the boat, looking west, he turned to Geoffrey.

"It'll never happen." He sneered. "I guess you'll never mark this off your stupid list.”

"You don't know that." Was Geoffrey's simple reply. Something about that was enough to set Richard off. Perhaps he felt that Geoffrey was looking down on him, saying that he didn't know something. Or perhaps he'd just been wound so tight that anything could have set him off, I’ll never really know. But no sooner than the words were out of Geoffrey's mouth, Richard was swinging. A wild haymaker, the blow softened by the jolt of a wave lifting the bow of the boat higher than expected. The blow and the wave still sent Geoffrey tumbling, sliding along the damp white deck. Then, as he looked up at Richard, it finally happened. The sun was just about to sink below the horizon when a pillar of green shot into the air, flashing for a second before fading. Richard turned back to the west just in time to see it fade away. With his slack jawed expression, you'd have sworn it was him that had just gotten punched. Geoffrey leapt up, a whooping cry leaving his lips as he clasped both of us in a tight hug, the spat forgotten.

We returned to school just in time for the fall semester. You'd think the experience would have changed us, but it faded quickly before the monotony of classes. We were tanner, my hair bleached slightly blonder by the sun and the salt spray. And every Friday, we made fish tacos and drank warm beer. But those were the only real remainders of the experience, other than memories that still seem as vivid as if we'd just gotten back on shore. We accompanied Geoffrey on other quests to cross items off his bucket list, but those are stories for another day. Now, every summer, we try to get together, sail for a week or even just a weekend. The crew has grown and shrunk with girlfriends, wives, children coming and going as they head off to college, make their own families. And every dawn and every dusk we stand vigil, looking towards the sun as it crosses that distant blue horizon. We haven’t seen it since, and our families don’t seem to quite get it, but we watch all the same. Maybe if they see it someday, they’ll get it. But until then, we watch.