Happy Friday the 13th everyone. I don’t know about you but I always have a good day on the 13th. But good or ill, it is time to start the last prompt of the week. Are you ready? Good. Timers set and off we go.
Not sure what bad thing is going to happen on the lake, but something bad is going to happen on the lake.
Friday, September 13th: The lake seemed vast.
The lake seemed vast. From shore it looked more like the ocean, the distant shore a mere smudge on the horizon. I looked at the little boat. It was made of reeds bound together with a rope made from vines. When I sat in it, it sank low in the water, the lip of the small vessel only a few inches away from the lake’s surface.
The others did not think this a problem. They each climbed into their boats and set out across the water. Reluctantly I followed. The fact that the people who made these boats tended to use them for travel along the lakes edge rather than for crossing the lake didn’t seem to phase anyone but me either.
‘Maybe they are worried and just not showing it,’ I thought as I pushed away from shore. It wasn’t as though we had many options.
True my thoughts were to take the boats as close to the shore line as we could for as long as we could rather than crossing through the center. I had been outvoted. Everyone knew the shortest distance was across and not around the circumference. I argued that we didn’t have to go around the entire circumference. If we sailed north we could skirt the northern edge of the lake avoiding the deep water and needing to go only half of the circumference at best.
I was pretty sure that as the lake was not actually a perfect circle this would actually be a little shorter than sailing directly across. Safer too. My arguments were ignored. After all, what did I know? I was the only one who bothered to look at the map before we left, clearly that was not as good as the ‘straight across is always shorter’ plan.
I sighed to myself as I paddled after the others. I don’t know why I was letting this bother me now. No one on this trip paid attention to anything I had to say. I was there to take samples as I followed along behind them. They were the ones in charge.
I rolled my shoulders and felt the weight of my pack. I had all of the samples requested, now all we had to do was get back. ‘Maybe that’s why it is worse,’ I thought. My paddle dipped into the water, propelling me along nicely. There was nothing else for me to focus on except getting home. There was no longer the distraction of gathering the requested samples and I could focus on how little the others cared for my opinion.
Not for the first time since the trip started I cursed Baily for saddling me with this group. He knew what they were like and it was, I’m sure, why he opted out, sending me instead.
‘Almost over,’ I thought as I followed along.
The vast lake seemed even larger once the shoreline faded behind us. Periodically there would be small islands. They were more clusters of floating vegetation tangled in nots rather than actual points of land. They were no less more solid than the little reed canoes.
“We should reach the other side soon,” someone called back. I thought it was Sean. I had no idea why he thought that. I was fairly certain it was general optimism rather than a sign of the shore. Sean tended to be overly optimistic about most things. In fact the others seemed a trump of optimism over reality. It caused several close shaves before and I was beginning to get a bad feeling in my gut anytime one of them voiced anything optimistic. We continued on, the other side of the lake still out of sight. There was nothing but murky water. Even the floating vegetation grew less as the water grew deeper.
Ten til Midnight 