Yacht Short Story Mysteries - Christian Stahl - E-Book

Yacht Short Story Mysteries E-Book

Christian Stahl

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Beschreibung


Yacht Short Story Mysteries - High Drama on the High Seas: A Collection of mystery and suspense stories that happen on boats and exotic destinations.
Horrific things can happen on a boat, sea journeys not only attract characters a bit out of the ordinary but also violent and unpredictable forces of nature, often crazy and cruel things can and do happen at sea.
Spanning from a mediocre island in the Caribbean, new paradises in the South Pacific, to deadly open water storms, and cruel hijackings, this collection reveals boundless suspense in often small and isolated moments, offering startling twists in the most exotic surroundings, especially "from below". From a powerful response to hateful revenge to a fight for love, pride and recognition, these stories are equal parts shocking, devastating, and enthralling, revealing the tension pulsing through journeys at sea, and affirming that mystery and suspense writing is better than ever before.
These short stories of suspense and unsettling adventures embrace the reader into a realm of fantasy, where insane and evil souls with hidden agendas head out to sea on often never-ending voyages to exotic and unknown destinations.
Get your copy of this exemplary ebook today and add it to your library now!

 

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Yacht Short Story Mysteries

A Collection of Sailing Horror Stories

Christian Stahl

© Copyright 2021 by Christian Stahl - All rights reserved

License Notice

In no way is it legal to reproduce, duplicate, download, or transmit any part of this document in either electronic means or in printed format without the consent of the author or publisher. Recording of this publication is strictly prohibited and any storage of this document is not allowed unless with written permission from the publisher.

All rights reserved

The purpose of this book is for entertainment purposes solely, and is universal as so. Any name and content in this book is fiction and not related to any real events or persons. Under no circumstances will any legal responsibility or blame be held against the publisher or author for any reparation, damages, or monetary loss due to the information herein, either directly or indirectly. The presentation and content of this book is without contract or any type of guarantee assurance.

Christian Stahl

Details of all the author's available books and upcoming titles can be found at:

www.yachtshortstories.com

Table of Contents

 

The Unreachable Sea Wife

The Places to Flee

The Drowning

The Stowaway

Encounter in the South China Sea

The Breach

Neptune Strategy

The Haunting

Rescue From Devil’s Island

Marooned

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Unreachable Sea Wife

 

The whispers of the waves crept in through the netted curtains that covered the balcony doors that I’ve left open. The Spanish sea breeze still feels foreign and peculiar to me; I suppose it’s a reminder that I’m not where I’m supposed to be. The morning air I’m used to is full of fumes of foods being prepared for the Asian markets, I miss that warm, comforting smell. Even when you could hear market traders shouting to one another, their tone came across as friendly. Home seems further away than ever now that I know I can’t get there. And so does she. Our regular messages make things better temporarily, but once the day has gone, the bed feels empty and no message can fill that.

 

The little money I have doesn’t feel worth saving. There’s barely enough to cover the costs of transport to the nearest airport, so why bother even considering scraping together funds for a flight that costs nearly as much as a house deposit? Every time I come close to beginning to save up, I find myself back in the pub; repeating my ordeal to any regular who’s willing to listen again. Before long, I notice how my words seem to dribble out and my voice is just a whir of noise that I can’t properly concentrate on. When the football begins, anyone who was listening stops, apart from the occasional remark or frown when I accidentally criticise the wrong team or player.

Then the routine continues. I wake up to the churning of the ceiling fan, barely creating a single waft of air in the sticky, humid bedroom. The heat is usually what wakes me up, and that’s how I know it’s most likely early afternoon. That’s how I know I’ve wasted yet another day. I often find myself pondering over how my life has come to this, “So much life ahead of you, Tim” my grandma would always say, and I feel ashamed at the thought of her seeing me now. I then contemplate where my life will go from here. Sometimes it feels like I’m completely trapped and that one day someone will find me dead in this very bed, I’ll be Tim- the drunk from the football bars who drank himself to death. I don’t think I’m awake when I have these thoughts, because sometimes the scenes are too vivid to have been created by my imagination alone. There’s flies nibbling at my lifeless body as it rots—waiting for someone to come and find me. I wake up panting, relieved to be alive and then disappointed by having no need to wake up.

Other times as I drift in between a deep sleep and being conscious of my sore, hungover body and the accumulating damage I’m doing to it. The sound of the Spanish shore influences my mind and I dream of being rocked in a sailing boat.

 

I remember my lifelong dream of being an owner of something, a house or anything that really belongs to me, and now it is obvious that there is such a thing, a manageable sailboat they can sail off into the sunset to find my unreachable future wife who for that matter also belongs to me. And If I ever do a solo sailing half around the world I will call my boat Sea Wife.

I can hear the mast of the boat squeaking and the sails flapping as the wind carries me along the waves. I’m lying with my back flat against the deck, looking at the clouds as they tumble and twirl through the sky. The rhythmic swaying of the ship soothes me; it’s almost as comforting as the thought of the boat taking me away. Away from Spain and my spiral into some sort of catastrophe and maybe towards Asia. It continues to rock me until my mind has completely left the bedroom and the whirring ceiling fan, a deep sleep begins that I don’t want to wake up from.

 

Eventually I do wake up. Five hours I guess is how long I’ve slept for, there’s another message from her that I don’t remember seeing. She’s not even asking when I’ll be back now, but if. I can’t respond because I don’t know the answer. I wish I did. Things would be more bearable if I at least knew how much longer I’d have to endure this. I feel like I’ve lost my true self here, like I left myself behind when I left Asia. It’s not the same as when I left Britain for Asia; the rural areas that were coated in a rich green colour, blossom and tranquil waters combined with the cities that were packed with people and possibilities felt like my natural habitat. Whilst a part of me will always belong to Britain, another part will always long for Asia.

 

I sit up in my bed, the sheets crumpled in a pile by my feet. A fly swirls in from the balcony and heads towards me. He inspects me and then leaves. Perhaps he’s checking to see if I’m a rotting dead body yet, like the one I become in my dreams. I start to realise that will become a reality if I don’t do something now. Initially, my mind is full of useless ideas, so I open up my laptop and begin looking for answers. A couple of YouTube videos enforce what I am already starting to understand—I need to change things now. I check the costs of flights once more, but the prices have only gone up if anything. Some suggestions appear for taking a few ferries, however there’s no direct route so it would end up costing me as much as the plane tickets. As I start tracing the different courses the ferries and cargo ships would take, I remember my dream about the boat.

 

Whilst I’m no expert in sailing, I don’t remember it as being particularly challenging from what I can recall of the day my mother and I hired a boat when I was younger. That could be it, I could sail back to Asia! The trouble is I’d need a boat. I suppose I could hire one and then not return–but they would know who had taken it, it would be a risky move. I head out onto the small balcony where I can stare at the waves rolling in and the horizon: a place I could be crossing sometime soon. My eyes begin to wander to the ground and as they do, I notice what appears to be a headsail propped up against the fence in my neighbour’s front garden.

 

I see a sailboat on a trailer that apparently had been rerigged, repainted and has the motor mounted on the winch post for transport.

Then things begin to come back to me. I remember having a brief conversation with him a few weeks back and he’d mentioned that he was going out to sea for the weekend. I hadn’t properly understood what he meant by that until now. In fact, I hadn’t understood a lot of what he said; he’s German and his English is very limited. I would have perhaps taken a little more time to interpret what he was telling me, but he spoke mostly about himself in a very proud manner and it only made me feel more ashamed of my situation.

 

I spend the next few days taking my time leaving the apartment to run unimportant errands; the real goal of each trip out is to inspect my neighbour’s boat. It’s a reasonable size and sits on a trailer that I’m sure I’m capable of pulling. Fortunately, the lane my apartment resides on is quiet and goes directly to the port; the journey to it would be a struggle but, at least it would be short. I don’t pay as many visits to the pub, although sometimes I find myself back in there, numbing the harsh reality that, whilst I now have an opportunity to get out of here, the journey ahead isn’t going to be easy. Some days it feels easier to back out and stay here for a while. But I’ve spent time looking at maps, planning out a route and, with any luck, I could be out of here by Christmas and in Asia at some point in the New Year.

 

The boat is a humble size, a beautiful white 26 footerwith a long fin keel and what looked like an unusual large cockpit, certainly a German design probably built for the Baltic Sea; I can feel the excitementand curiosity in my body as I know it’s only me who would be using it. The sails are a rich, white fabric; they look as though they’ve not been out to sea yet. On one evening I get close enough to spot that the boat is called Helga, the dude’s dead wife I think.

I stumble back into my apartment. Occasionally I’ll pay attention to my reflection in the mirror. The heavy bags under my brown eyes have started to fade, but they’ll never completely vanish–like a deep scar. My dark, short hair is still receding more rapidly than I’d like and my thin, bony frame that carries a round tummy caused by beer seems to have plumped up a little. When I bother to shave off the stubble on my chin, my skin appears paler than I remember, although if I spend enough time in the sun, I collect freckles that warm it up.

 

I then start to pack up my things. I haven’t got much to take, just a couple of bags altogether. I look around my nearly empty apartment and realise I have no emotional connection to it–at least none that are positive. I’ve been here for a while now but almost everyday I hope it’ll be my last; that I’ll somehow be whisked back to Asia by the next morning. Now, that seems like less of a dream.

 

Eventually the day I’ve planned to leave on arrives. I wait until the sky has become dark enough to cover the crime I am about to commit, and I sit listening for movement from my neighbour through the walls although I have a hunch he is not at home.The prospect of what is ahead of me is difficult to comprehend. As I begin to consider the problems that could arise, such as being caught by my neighbour, getting lost at sea, capsizing. I check my phone for messages; it’s been a while since I last heard from my girlfriend, once I get back to Asia, I’ll look for her. I find that my fingertips are pulsating, and my hands are trembling. I take out the cheap bottle of liquor I had left in the kitchen and begin to swig from it, at first to calm the physical shaking and then to stop my thoughts from persuading me to not go ahead with my endeavours. Perhaps I drink a little too much as I notice the walls around me begin to spin, under my breath, I tell myself to get a grip.

 

After about half an hour of no noise from the neighbour, it’s time for me to begin my journey. The liquor sits at the top of my stomach, but I know this is because I’m nervous. I contemplate sitting for another fifteen minutes, listening out for anything other than silence and then I talk myself out of it; I could sit here all night, building up the courage to leave.

With my bag slumped over my shoulder, I lock up the apartment for the final time. The air feels particularly still tonight, barely any breeze and the only thing I can hear is the occasional insect of some kind chirping in the bushes. I try to tread as lightly as I approach my neighbour’s garden, the liquor causes me to sway more than I’d like. The moonlight reflects off of the white hull of the sailing boat. I inspect the windows that overlook the garden; it seems to be lifeless for now. I drop my bags into the boat and release the handbrake of the trailer slowly, the creaking of it interrupts the silence of the night and I wince, looking up at the windows again.

 

My old but fat-ass pick up truck will do the job to tow it down the road to the docks which I think is about an hour drive. I work as quick as I can to set up a line from the back of the towing boat to the front of the towed boat, trying what is supposed to be a stern tow. That German idiot will be surprised so badly and his face would be worth watching when he finds out his baby is gone.

 

The journey to the port is much longer than I expected, I’d thought that the lane was relatively downhill but there was a lot more heaving of the trailer and negotiating corners compared to what I had anticipated. I don’t remember ever having to do such strenuous physical activity, but there’s a survival instinct within me now that urges me to carry on. By the time I arrive at the port, morning has broken, and a few people have started their day near the dock. I am relieved to discover that no one seems to be confused or interested in my behaviour, despite, in my opinion, it being quite bizarre. I take a long rest by the port, facing the sea. For the first time, I pay attention to just how vast it is. If I were to go missing, no one would ever find me.

 

I let the day creep away as I sip on a bottle of water I have packed, I feel completely sober by now and the magnitude of what I have already done catches up with me, if my neighbour finds me here, how will I explain myself? The thought of that motivates me to continue with my journey, I get up and start tugging the trailer down the shore ramp. Without the alcohol in my system, the work seems even more difficult. I notice sweat trickling down my forehead almost instantly and the skin on my hands is raw from all of the tugging.

 

My boat is a pig to get off the trailer but with the help of a non-English speaking Spaniard, I finally got the boat into the water and climb in.

 

The six-horsepower Johnson outboard starts on the first pull and I smuggle the boat out of the marina. I am able to work out the direction of the wind and trim the sails, the lift perhaps could be better, but I keep reefing the mainsail until I am satisfied with my speed. I am hardly out of the port, but between yanking lines and checking the instruments, I look at the sea. Especially now in the morning hours it seems to be more mesmerising than it was in my dreams, I watch the waves coil up and engulf one another, they make a sloshing noise as they do.

 

As I get further out to the Mediterranean Sea the waters begin to get choppier. By mid day the wind freshens into the south and Sea Wife’s heavy bows are chopping with a perceptible shudder into each new wave. Each of the waves seem to be bigger and more violent than the last and, as the boat just about manages to recover from the impact from the last, I wonder whether the next wave will be the one to capsize me. Every one smacks into the boat, almost knocking me off my feet and I get sprayed by the salty seawater until I’m completely soaked. I can’t pinpoint the exact moment, but the waters eventually begin to calm.

I further shorten the headsail to reduce the strain on the helm, andonce I have recovered from the choppy waters and adjusted my sails again, I put Sea Wife on autopilot. Over the next few days, I sleep and rest only disturbed by the radar alarm which I ignore. On the fourth day I spot land in the distance. As I begin to approach it, I grow more certain that my directions and predictions are correct: it’s Sardinia. I waste no time in collecting supplies from the local shops and then I sit and reflect on how far away my little Spanish apartment seems now. For the first time, I’m not thinking about the distance I have left to travel, although it is in the back of my mind, I’m proud and excited by the fact that I have managed to negotiate a sailing boat all the way to Sardinia. I have a new energy within me and I’m ready for the adventures, and perhaps risks, that are ahead of me.