The Only Passenger Awake

Passengers weren’t allowed in the galley, but at three in the morning nobody was checking. Marisol ran water into a pot and put it on to boil. On the night crossing from Naples to Palermo none of the others were awake — only the man in the wet coat, out at the rail with a cigarette.

“Come in, you’ll freeze,” she said. “Sit.”

He sat. She brushed the counter and put bread and cheese in front of him.

“You feed everyone at this hour?”

“There’s nobody else to feed,” Marisol said.

They talked a bit. She told him water boils faster in bad weather, which isn’t true. He told her the moon looks bigger from a ship, which is.

“I suppose you know every wave out here,” he said.

“After eleven years the view’s ordinary,” Marisol said. “Water, going in one direction. We sail back at eight.”

“I wish I could sleep on boats.”

She suggested he take the wet coat off. He did.

She didn’t ask why he was crossing with no bag. He didn’t ask why she worked nights.

“Shall I put more water on?” she said, and he seemed pleased that was the only question.