The Ferryman's Tale

The vessel that bobbed in the inky-black ocean was a cross between a pirate ship and a cruise liner. It was traditional in its makeup: masses of planking and billowing sails, but large enough to comfortably hold two hundred souls. There was an on-board casino, hot-spring jacuzzis, a theatre that could hold productions of all the great Greek plays, games for children, and far more besides.

Painted in white on both sides was: The Crossing.

It’d taken more than two thousand years for Charon to save up for this and it was worth every penny. For the first time since his death, Charon fizzed with happiness. Like the champagne bottle clutched in his boney fingers.

His old wooden raft floated pathetically at the grand ship’s side. Like those tiny fish that follow whales around and feast on their scraps.

Charon turned to the crowd of souls lined behind him.

“Welcome to the grand launch,” he said. “There’s never been a better time for you to die. Truly.”

The crowd murmured excitedly as Charon swung the champagne bottle against the boat’s prow, striking just below the Gorgon figurehead.

The glass splintered, the crowd roared. If Charon had skin on his skull, he would have smiled. As it was, he remembered what it felt like to smile — and in itself that was wonderful.

***

Charon had taken the wheel and steered the passengers East — away from where they needed to reach. He wasn’t taking the souls across yet. Before judgement, they would have two nights of celebration.

He steered the ship through a series of dark caves, his vision attuned to the blackness, until they came out into a vast cavern. The water glittered red on the left side of the cavern, blue on the right — both patches bright, radiating enough light to glint on the diamond-studded rocks far above them.

The souls, those looking over the side, gasped at the sudden and unexpected beauty. Of the red and blue seas swirling into each other like ying and yang.

Passengers came up one by one to thank him.

“We couldn’t have asked for a more pleasant start to the afterlife,” said one lady, a cocktail in her hand.

”I thought I’d be scared,” said a guy. “Frightened as all hell. But you’ve made this experience so much fun.”

”Thank you,” they said.

Charon wasn’t such a sociable type. He preferred to hear the happiness of his passengers rather than be involved in it. He listened to the joyful or mildly annoyed cries from the casino. The laughter as someone told jokes on the theatre stage.

He lay the anchor in the middle of this cavern-ocean, where the two seas met and swirled, and sat on the deck, looking up at the crystal roof as if the glints of light were stars — as if everyone on board was free beneath the sky.​

***

​The little girl had worn two coins in her eyes. Charon had peeled them off and pocketed them in his cloak. Behind them, her eyes were moss-green, moss-soft. They ran with tears as she stared at him, then at his little boat, and at the dark, scary cavern.

”Come,” he said, gesturing towards his raft. “I will take you across.”

”Where’s Mommy?” said the girl.

He held out a boney hand. “Come. I will take you across.”

The girl fell onto her knees and wept into the dirt.

He hated this. He despised being a figure of fear. And this child, she didn’t deserve to be here. To feel any of this fright.

“It’s not so bad,” he attempted. “There’s no more pain across the water. You will be judged, yes, but children are rarely guilty.”

It didn’t comfort her, of course.

He left the girl for a while, walking to one of the black trees that grew beneath the ground. With a knife, he carved out a palm-sized chunk. He held it and slowly whittled it into a familiar shape.

The girl had followed him. She wiped her eyes and watched as he worked.

Finally, he tore fabric from his cloak and dressed the doll in it. “For you,” he said, presenting the finished work.

The girl gingerly took it from him.

She played with the doll after they boarded the raft. It distracted her all the way across. She took it with her as she left, turning back only for a moment to wave goodbye.

He weakly returned the wave. Once she was out of sight, he looked at the patch of missing fabric. If he had tear ducts, he was certain he’d be crying.

He placed his hands in his pockets and counted the coins.

Charon sat on deck and listened to the party.

He’d been a fisherman once, with his own family. That was until he’d displeased a god and gotten the eternal job of ferryman.

He knew fear and sadness and hope, and all other human emotions. Or at least he remembered them.

But he didn’t feel as many of those emotions now as he’d hoped for. Already the lustre of the new ship was failing him.

Yes, he was making it easier for others, and that was good. But in the end, he’d have to take them across still. In the end, they were dead and he was nothing more than the person who delivered them to their fate.

What he really wanted — needed — was a way out of this cave system. Was to be break through the rock wall and sail these souls back up into daylight.

To sail his soul back to daylight.

To his family.

Was that the truth of it, then? Had he done all this for himself, not for the passengers? Had the last two thousand years been for his own selfishness? A type of personal redemption, rather than wanting to help others. Was the fact that the lines crossed only coincidental?

There was no escape from his misery. That was clear. All around him, even in this great cavern, were walls. And the biggest, thickest wall of all was time. That was a wall he could never pass.

He’d been so scared of admitting that truth that he’d buried it as he’d saved his coins. Ignored the fact that he was deeply and truly terrified. That he’d never get to return. To see his family.

He thought of those fish again, the ones who followed whales and fed on their scraps. Was that all he did now? Fed on the scraps of joy these souls left for him? Taking them out to feed then feeding on the leftovers.

He let out a long, empty sigh and lay back against the wood and wished for time to swallow him.

***

A long while later, two children came sprinting past him — one chasing the other, but both giggling. They were playing some kind of game. They might have been brother and sister, he wasn’t sure, but they looked similar.

They must have been near in age to his own children, back when he’d been forced to leave them.

He thought of the girl from years ago that he’d carved the doll for. Of how sad she’d been.

But these two children weren’t sad.

They weren’t in the least bit scared.

And he found strangely that — for now, at least — he wasn’t either.

Scraps or not, what mattered to the fish was that it filled them.

*****

THE END

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