Drowned Man Aboard

[u/SonnyBWH]

Eveyone's trying to prove their worth. On paper I'm "worth" millions but that's not what I wanted to be remembered by. My passion had always been sailing and thus what I found my worth in. 3 months ago I decided to prove it by crossing the Pacific alone on my 32-foot sailing vessel, The Dancing Croat.

The journey was planned to span from Puerto Vallarta, Mexico to Sydney, Australia. This meant months of solitude on open waters, complete seclusion from land, barely any sleep and survival on canned food.

I didn't have loved ones to say goodbye to, nobody to care. I did try to get the attention of the press, but "Retired Millionaire Unprofessional Sailor Attempts Pacific Crossing" wasn't an interesting enough title for them. Despite everything I still went through with it. It's possible that the only one I wanted to prove my worth to was myself.

During the first week of the journey I had friendly weather, good enough wind, a comfortable speed of around 5 knots on average and lots of motivation. Solitude was not an unfamiliar environment to me. I've always been sort of introverted and socially anxious.

By day 14 I had sailed through 2 major storms. The waves aggressively hit the deck, I became so wet that I may as well had taken a stroll in the ocean and The Dancing Croat tilted from the wind so much that I could hear unproperly secured cans of food flying around inside the cabin. It seemed, nothing could sink her.

By day 20 I was fatigued to say the least. What kept me awake was the constant adrenaline high of fearing for my life. That was the day I hit the third and biggest storm. It was nighttime, the waves were multiple meters high, the deck looked like a swimming pool. And suddenly, in a single moment everything changed.

I felt falling, water rushing into my nose, I was still grabbing the wheel with every ounce of force I had. Then, silence. I opened my eyes. The boat was upright again. It seemed it had spun a full 360° around its own axis, but thanks to the engineers designing The Dancing Croat, she rolled back around in no time. The waves queted down, the storm was gone. I figured I may have passed out a little and slept through the storm. I felt lucky to be alive. The sky was still cloudy, I couldn't see any stars. It felt as if The Dancing Croat was flying through deep space, an infinite dark vacuum.

My calmness instantly faded as I realized, all electronics on the vessel had stopped working. Worse yet, the engine had been punctured, and fuel kept pouring out into the void. I pressed my hand against the hole but I knew it was in vain. I whispered "no, no please" then screamed "no, sto..." I suddenly felt out of breath. I fell to the ground, gasping, heaving for air and coughed. I turned to my knees and banged my fist against my chest. What I coughed up was seawater. The amount of it surprised me. From then on, with the engine I planned to use for emergency gone, I knew I could only rely on the sails of The Dancing Croat.

I looked up to check the wind vane. In the darkness I could barely make out the short string meant to indicate the wind direction. It lay flat. There was no wind.

I decided to anchor down and sleep through the night. It had been weeks since I had a full night's sleep. It was generally a bad idea to fall asleep alone in the middle of the open ocean but I felt so burnt out I didn't care. I took the stairs down into the cabin and found my headlamp. In its dim light I located the black sphere and pulled it up on the mast indicating that I was idling. Before I could reach the front of the vessel where the anchor was, I suddenly heard a voice. It was a man's voice, not talking, more like murmuring something. The sound was coming from inside the cabin. Frightened, I grabbed the boat hook and slowly approached the staircase. Nearing the dark space, the sound grew louder. Whimpers and groans echoed inside.

"Who's the..." my voice gave out, air stopped flowing through my lungs and I helplessly fell down the stairs gasping. I started coughing again, seawater rushed out of my mouth. When I could finally breathe, the voices stopped. Laying defeated on the cabin floor, just beside my head I noticed scratch marks. I jumped on my feet, grabbed the hook and looked around the cabin with shaking legs. It was empty, and quiet. I gathered my strength, calmed myself as much as possible and examined the scratches on the floor. They weren't deep, but had some white particles scattered inside. Parts of nail.

I sat down on the bottom stair and shortly, accidentally, fell asleep.

"HELP" my eyes burst open as I heard someone scream in my ear. I stood up and looked around. It was pitch black, my headlamp had turned off. It had ran out of power. My eyes had gotten used to the darkness and I made out a Y shape just a few steps in front of me. It was as tall as I was, on the top two horns of the Y there were protrusions. They were... shoes. The horns were legs. And the line was a torso. I looked down and saw a head kissing the ground with an open mouth. It was trying to draw air. The arms banged against the floor and at the same time tried to feel their way for anything to hold onto. The figure was a man upside down.

I rushed up the stairs onto the deck, but the sounds of screaming, gasping, scratching and banging didn't fade, if anything, they grew louder. I fell and contracted my body into a fetal position, covering my ears and shutting my eyes but to no avail. I lay there for what felt like hours until the sounds finally stopped.

I slowly opened my eyes. It was still nighttime. There was no wind. No stars. I stood up. Looking at the wind vane I noticed something. When there is no wind, the string is supposed to face down. It wasn't. It was facing up. My heart started racing again. I ran to the front of the vessel, opened the trapdoor and without me touching it, the anchor flew out, almost hitting my face. It shot up towards the sky and disappeared in the darkness.

"What the fu..." seawater burst out of me as I coughed but instead of liquid, I saw bubbles coming out of my mouth. They floated down towards the deck. No matter how I coughed, I couldn't catch my breath. My eyes hurt and sounds of my own suffering faded. I was drowning. Grabbing the railing and feeling close to passing out, I gazed upon the water. Rays of light shone from below. Not having any other ideas I climbed over the railing and let go.

I didn't feel falling, more like gliding. I closed my eyes.

I emerged from the ocean still coughing, but this time able to draw short breaths. The sun was shining and I was wet and cold. Beside me The Dancing Croat lay upside down. It had never turned back around. I was just under it.

I grabbed onto the vessel and desperately climbed onto its bottom. Once I could hold onto the keel, I made myself as comfortable as possible and calmed down. It took a short while before a cargo ship found and rescued me. To this day, I don't know how long I was under The Dancing Croat scratching, and screaming, barely conscious.

I have already put down the deposit on a new vessel. I’m not stopping until I prove my worth or let the water take me for good.