Heavely Seas - Chapter Thirteen

Josephine treated Heath’s hands with her knitting needles. She smiled as the scars and bleeding ceased. Heath watched, stunned. From all the horrors he had seen in his life, little magic tricks made him forget the curse of the ship. He was surprised to see Sook-Jo and Lucas Fishman sitting together in Elodie’s cabin.

“How do you do it?” Heath asked Josephine. His hands trembled. He imagined the blood pouring from his knuckles seconds ago. The sharp tang had gone too.

“It’s a gift.”Josephine shrugged her shoulders, pulling a blue thread of wool out of her crystal ball.

“What are we doing here?” Lucas stood up, properly dressed with a silver tie. “I ain’t got no time to waste. I got cases to investigate.”

“Be patient,” Josephine hissed. “The modem I knitted is complete. You should all be able to connect to the wifi. The password is wool1234.”

“What a password,” Lucas howled, swaying his shoulders. “Now what’s taking so long? Where’s my whiskey?”

“You just drank it,” Sook-Jo replied, eyeing up the empty glass.

Lucas picked up the glass and examined it. “Okay,” he said. “But why is it taking so long? It didn’t have milk in it.”

Sook-Jo squinted. “You don’t put milk in whiskey.”

Lucas nodded. “Of course you do. It’s the British way. I like lots of milk and lots of sugar in my whiskey.”

“No point correcting him, lovey…” Josephine pulled more cotton wool out of her crystal ball and out came the modem she had spent all day knitting. “Oh…I could have made the antenna better, never mind. As long as it does the job…”

A cup of tea appeared in front of Lucas. Heath observed the man’s behaviour and how it mirrored his grandmother when she deteriorated. Lucas slammed the glass down and went for the teacup. He gulped the contents in disgust. “This whiskey is hot!”

“It’s supposed to be hot!” Josephine said. “Okay, Sook-Jo, ring your friend.”

“Where’s my cup of whiskey tea?” Lucas asked. “They need to hurry up. I got work to do.”

“It’s coming,” Heath said in an attempt to calm him. “5 minutes. Sook-Jo’s gonna call them and see what’s going on.”

“Hello? Sook-Jo!”

Heath recognised the voice. He had forgotten Sook-Jo was best friends with Japanese tech heiress, Yuzuko Shikumi. He despised her egocentric grandparents. He had never met them, but knew enough to warrant an opinion. Fingers crossed, Yuzuko was not like them.

“What are we doing here?” Lucas cried out. “Where’s my glass of whisky?”

“Sook-Jo?” Yuzuko’s voice echoed throughout the cabin. “Is that Bobby’s grandfather?”

“How do you know my boy?” Lucas bellowed. “And where’s the cup of tea I’ve been waiting for all day?”

“I was one of his best friends,” Yuzuko replied. “We used to play games together.”

“Ah! That’s what they all say. And you know his friend Todd, too.”

“Of course, Sook-Jo was married to him.”

Lucas leaned back and took another look at Sook-Jo with widened eyes. “So that’s where I know you from! And Bobby was the only relative I had left. All my family is gone. Just like that.”

“Bobby had a cousin!” Yuzuko reminded him. “What was her name? Annie? She had a son called Romeo, right?”

“Those backstabbers don’t count. Nor do my lovechildren. My boy Bobby was murdered, and I will find out who did it!”

“He wasn’t murdered…” Yuzuko insisted. “After he got struck by lightning, we did everything we could to keep him alive…”

“Rubbish!” Lucas yelled, tossing the table, shattering the whisky glass and tea cup. In the background of Lucas’ rant, Jospehine's knitting needles tidied up the mess. “Your family has the best technology in the world, but you chose profit over welfare.”

“Sir… no technology is powerful enough to bring people back from the dead.”

“He could have lived…”

“Mr Fishman…I’m sorry. I had to turn the machine off. He wouldn’t have wanted to waste his life chained to a bed. And he wasn’t living. He was existing… surrounded by tubes. The machine was the only thing that kept his heart beating.”

The sorrow expressed on everyone’s face was an image Heath would never forget. He knew nothing about Bobby other than what was said in the room. He wondered if Lucas would remember any of it ten minutes later.

Lucas nodded. “Well, thank you very much for the tea. I need to go to the next job now.” Lucas stormed off, and as the man slammed the door, Heath noticed Lucas had odd shoes on: one blue slipper and one red trainer.

“I’m sorry to say this,” Yuzuko said. “You’re all in danger.”

“We know!” Sook-Jo said, nodding. It was a bit too late for that warning. “We’ve had vampires, werewolves, dead bodies and all sorts on the cruise. Hopefully, there will be a port where we can all get off soon.”

“That’s what I’m worried about!” Yuzuko shrieked. “Terrorists have bombarded the ports that cancelled on you. We all heard about the murders that have happened on Heavenly Seas and all the regulations they’ve broken…They’ve been involved in so many scandals. It’s history repeating itself. I knew it was a bad idea for you and Gong-Gi to go on the cruise, but I never thought it would end like this.”

“I’ll be fine,” Sook-Jo insisted. “I’ve made friends with Heath Figgs, and a witch has knitted us a jumper. We’ll both be safe. Everyone who wears a jumper that Josephine knits is safe from the curse. Gong-Gi refused one; he thinks it’s stupid.”

“You still need to be a good friend to Gong-Gi.”

“I know, but he still lied to me about so many things.”

“He’s just protecting his private life. He’s entitled to one.”

“I know, but he’s got more lovers than you’ve had matcha lattes.”

“Just be kind to him; he processes things differently. Just remember, whatever happens…we all love you here: me, Sakura and Koichi.”

“Thanks, Yuzuko.”

“I have to go now, I have some work to do. Just be careful of Elodie Figgs… my grandfather said she’s a killer.”

Yuzuko ended the call before Heath had a chance to react. He knew his mother had done things many considered unethical. He thought his mother’s relationship with his brother, Theo to be strange. Theo was always the perfect one in her eyes.

Calvin was his father’s pride and joy; his mother envied him. And then there was him, Heath, the youngest and least exciting. Theo had always told him that he was different from the rest of them. Heath remembered the day he came back after a stint with relatives. Theo told him he wasn’t the same boy he used to build LEGO houses with. Although Heath hadn’t touched LEGO in years, Theo’s statement stayed with him. Theo always got the warmest hugs from their mum. Calvin always had the sharp edge of her tongue. What did Heath get? A pat on the back and nothing else.

Beneath the cake-eating alcoholic Elodie Magnolia Figgs was an enigma. At that point, he had started to put all the pieces together. He glared at Josephine and crossed his arms. “Why didn’t you just say so?” Heath asked, tilting his head. Had all his life been one fat lie? “You couldn’t see it in your crystal ball?”

“How could I?” Josephine knew what he was on about as she pushed up her glasses. “There was too much wool in the way! The younger I get, the less control I get over it.”

“What are you two talking about?” Sook-Jo asked.

“I’ve been breaking every mirror to find Apollo Jinx,” Heath said, grasping for air. He pointed at Jospephine. “I remember what you said about Elaine’s son being trapped in the mirror. Elaine’s hatred towards my mother and her outburst at one of the parties. All the things she wrote about Gong-Gi, my parents, every politician in the world…”

“It wasn’t just them,” Sook-Jo shouted. “She made my brother look bad, too.”

Heath acknowledged that Elaine had written some vile things. Then he remembered reading her vegan blog and how much he enjoyed it. She had a way with words that could bring out the best or the worst in you. He was always the odd one out: now he knew why. Screaming, he slapped his ears and curled into a ball. “He’s trapped in the mirror!”

“What does it mean?” Sook-Jo asked.

Apollo ran to Josephine’s bathroom and leaned towards the mirror. A hologram of Elaine flashed in front of him before he pressed his hand on the mirror. He was expecting to slip into another dimension. He froze when his entire hand pressed the mirror. He was not dreaming. “I’m not Heath. I’m Apollo!”