We climbed the gangway, and I saw a medium-sized, large old man with a big belly. He had a thick, bushy gray beard that covers most of his face with a black military baseball cap on top of his round head. On his upper body was a dark blue maritime sweater with Captain ranks on his shoulders. On his legs were black pants with black hiking or military boots. He had a military stance with his arms crossed behind his back.
Captain Graybeard shouted at the Ex-Chief, “What the fuck!! Who put you on the ship!”
The Ex-Chief said, “Your daughter.”
Captain Graybeard shouted, “That whore! Get the fuck out of my sight!” He looked at me and my father, then shouted, “For fuck’s sake, finally someone I asked for! The rest…just a bunch of cretins! Is this your son?”
My father said, “Yes. This is Jack.”
Captain Graybeard shouted, “I wanted to meet your boy to see if he is as good as you! Jack, I’ll keep my eye on you! Your father is a legend; make him proud and use your head! Unlike these cretins!” He moved his head and nodded at some portable VHF radios that were behind him on a small chair. “Sign the papers, and each of you take a radio and find some cabins. You are dismissed.” Captain Graybeard then looked at some shipyard workers dragging their bodies around the deck and shouted, “What the hell!? Hey, you there, what are you doing!?”
We signed the papers, and I saw my contract had the rank of AB. We took the radios, and I followed my father inside the superstructure while Captain Graybeard shouted all over the deck.
We went on top and settled in a Chief Engineer’s quarter. The furniture was brand new. It was a big space with a separate bedroom and a large bathroom.
As we unpacked, a shipyard worker stormed into our cabin and said, “Oh, this one is taken. Almost all cabins are full; can you believe it?”
My father asked, “The shipyard workers are also coming with us to the dry dock?”
The shipyard worker said, “Yes, some of us at least. The rest will arrive at the dry dock by bus and stay at local hotels.”
My father asked, “It is a different country. Won’t such a maneuver put a financial strain on the shipyard? They could just wait for fifteen days until the ship returns.”
The shipyard worker said, “The ship must be finished. It has a timetable, and if we break it, the shipyard will have to pay for not delivering a finished ship in the agreed time.”
My father said, “Ok, well, good luck then.”
Another shipyard worker passed and said, “This one is also full.”
The shipyard worker looked at the other one and closed the door. Some people mumbled outside the door. I locked the door. From time to time, someone would try to open the door.
I said to my father, “That Captain is quite a persona. You know him for a long time?”
My father said, “You could say that. On my first ship, he was driving me crazy, always yelling and parading around. One day, he just got me so rattled up I grabbed him by the neck and held him over the edge of the ship to dump him in the sea. I came to my senses and put him down on deck. He said nothing. Later, he came back to my cabin with a bottle of whiskey, and from then on, we respected each other. He is a good man once you get to really know him.”
A portable VHF radio shouted with an echo of irritating high-pitched noise, “To your stations!”
My father said, “Ugh, him with a radio, just a bad combination. He never uses them, just screams from the bridge, but when he uses a VHF, this happens.” My father picked up the portable VHF radio and said, “Understood, Captain, to your stations.”
I dressed quickly in work overalls and followed my father to the front end of the ship. Soon after we arrived, the old man from the minibus came with the Ex-Chief.
My father looked at the tug that approached us and said to the old man from the minibus, “Use that rope and throw it to the tug so he can give us the towing line.”
The Ex-Chief walked around the winches and everything like a small kid as he gazed at commands and tested them. Eventually, he said, “Nothing is working.”
My father said, “Of course nothing is working; they will tug the ship to a dry dock to check all machinery and axles.”
The Ex-Chief nodded his head.
Captain Graybeard screamed from the bridge far away, “Get that tug closer! Are you listening to me? Get that tug closer! What the fuck!”
His scream echoed over a loudspeaker, “For fuck’s sake, move that tug! Move it now.”
The pilot of the tug moved closer and waved his hands and head.
The scream echoed over a loudspeaker again, “The rear tug, at the stern! Not you!”
We attached the tug line to the ship’s bollard.
Captain Graybeard screamed from the bridge, “Let go of everything!”
My father said, “Come on, let’s loosen up all the ropes to the shore, and when they take them off, we’ll tighten them and pull one by one.”
We did it all manually as my father said.
Captain Graybeard screamed over the loudspeakers, “Drive! Drive already!!”
The tugs pulled us from the wharf, and we were on our way.
My father said, “I’ll take the first watch, you, Jack, the second watch, and you, Lucky, the third watch.”
The old man, Lucky, nodded his head and left.
My father said to the Ex-Chief, “You too are not needed here until we enter the dry dock.”
The Ex-Chief just shrugged his shoulders and left.
During the evening, I climbed on the bridge and saw everything dismantled, wires everywhere, nothing worked.
Captain Graybeard’s voice shouted from the chartroom, “These cretins, nothing is working! They lack proper leadership, a bunch of squirrel nuts! Look at this! This isn’t rocket surgery 101! Cretins!”
I slowly backed off the bridge and escaped before the Captain saw me.
In a few days, we arrived at the dry dock. We removed the tug lines and placed dry dock lines on each side of the ship. I cut my right fist on a metal splinter in the rope. The wound wasn’t too deep, but it bled enough to be noticeable.
My father said, “Just pee on the wound; it’s a natural disinfectant.”
I looked at my father, and he showed me his thumb on his left hand. “See this scar below the thumb?” he said. “The cut was almost to the bone. I pissed on it and wrapped it with a clean rag. We were a long way from the shore. Eventually, the thing started to itch. Once I removed the rag, the wound was healed.”
The Ex-Chief said, “You pissed on your son’s hand!?”
My father looked at him and said, “Do you mind? Pissing on my son’s hand is a private matter.”
I laughed because my father used to twist sentences and situations or play along, but his posture represented that he was dead serious, although he laughed inside himself. The Ex-Chief raised his hands and turned around.
I smiled and said, “I remember when you told us the story when I was born and you were on the ship.”
My father looked at me and said, “The one with the tooth.”
I said, “Yes. When they wondered if I was born with a tooth, you said no, it was two. After a few days, some of the other crew asked you if I had two teeth, and you said no, he has four.”
My father sighed and said, “There was more. One of them asked if you learned to crawl. I said no, you already walked. Later, one of them asked me if you really walked, and I said no, he is already riding a bicycle.”
I laughed.
My father said, “People, my son, people, not even one of them connected the dots that you were just born, not a few years old.”
I said, “I remember when mom cooked lunch, and you winked at me and went into the kitchen. You grabbed a potato from a cooking pot and squashed it in your palm. You were dead serious and said, ‘What is this? You don’t know how to cook potatoes….’ The old woman went crazy and threw all the pots around the kitchen, and food flew in all directions. I had to intervene and tell her you were messing with her.”
My father winked at me and said, “Fun times.”
We watched the ship enter the dry dock as winches pulled the ship in and eventually centered it in the dock. Some divers went into the water.
I asked my father, “What are the divers for?”
My father replied, “They are probably checking if the blocks are in the correct position beneath the ship. When they start pumping out the water, the ship must rest perfectly.”
The Ex-Chief was near the back wall with his attention locked on some levers, and he asked, “What are these?”
I walked to him and read the instructions. I said, “It’s an emergency release for the anchors.”
The Ex-Chief’s eyes sparkled, and he got all excited. “Then this will work, even without power.”
I looked at him and said, “Yes, it’s an emergency release.”
In a second, the Ex-Chief grabbed one of the levers and tried to pull it.
I said, “What are you doing!”
My father quickly jumped and grabbed his hands.
The Ex-Chief mumbled like a spoiled brat, “It can’t move. It doesn’t work.”
I said, “No, because there is a safety pin.”
My father removed the Ex-Chief’s grip from the lever.
The Ex-Chief said, “Pin? Where is the pin?”
My father shouted in the Ex-Chief's face, “What is wrong with you? You would drop both anchors now in the dry dock? Are you insane? There are even divers below us. What is wrong with you!”
The Ex-Chief struggled with my father. He said, “The pin. Where is the pin? Remove it. I want to see it work.”
My father dragged him to the forward access door and locked him behind it. The Ex-Chief pounded on the door and said with a muffled voice, “The pin. The pin.”
My father said, “What a lunatic. Who let him back on a ship? That man belongs in a loony bin.”
I said, “I can’t believe he wanted to pull the lever. He is definitely missing a few bolts in his head.”
My father said, “I’ve seen so many injuries and deaths, and I can tell you this, son… Ships don’t kill people. People kill people.”
The dry dock started to drain the water, and I saw the divers who changed their clothes on the shore. My father said, “There was a Chief who maimed a lot of good men. They lost hands, fingers, legs.”
I asked, “How did they lose their limbs exactly?”
My father replied, “Well, one time the AB was changing the lines on the lifeboat, and the Chief just walked by and pulled the lever to lower the boat. The AB’s fist just flew away with the boat. Another time, he closed an elevator ramp while the OS was painting, and he cut off his leg below the knee…” My father went silent for a while. I could see these memories tormented him.
Eventually, my father said, “In the end, that imbecile was awarded for his crimes and promoted to Captain.”
I wondered how he covered up his mistakes, but I didn’t want to push this topic since my father was deeply troubled by these memories. We looked at the dry dock area that was all fenced with gates and patrols with dogs, even a few SUVs parked. Inside the dock was equipped with cranes, storage spaces, and workshops.
In a few hours, the dry dock was empty, and the dock workers set a catwalk[1] for access. Captain Graybeard screamed from the bridge, “Everyone muster at the catwalk!”
My father escorted the Ex-Chief to the catwalk. We all gathered at the catwalk. Captain Graybeard was there and shouted, “Bosun and Jack are staying here with me to guard the ship! The rest of you, get the FUCK off my ship! I don’t want to see you ever again!”
The crew disbanded. Captain Graybeard shouted, “Twelve-hour shifts and do not leave your post!” Captain Graybeard walked away.
My father said, “You take the morning shift from six to twelve, and I’ll take the afternoon one.”
I said, “But why the shifts? There is a gate at the entrance to the dock and gate security, with a car and dogs.”
My father said, “Don’t ask. It’s just the way it is. If anything gets past that armed security, what are we going to do anyway?” He walked away but was halted by the Captain. I watched as they dragged a table and placed it in the room across the superstructure entrance. Eventually, my father came back and said, “I helped him set up a temporary office across the door so he can see anyone who passes in front of the door.”
I smiled and went back to the catwalk as three persons in inspector uniforms were coming on board. I said, “Hello. How can I help you?”
The older inspector at the front of the group said, “We are here from the company to check the progress of the work. This is my colleague behind me and an apprentice in the back.”
Captain Graybeard shouted, “Send them to me, private!”
The older inspector looked at me and said, “Private!?”
I said, “He meant AB. Please just go through that door, and you’ll find the Captain straight away.”
The old man walked inside, and his colleague stopped in front of the door. They looked at some deck lights, and the colleague said, “These lights are old.”
The apprentice had a youthful face with fair, smooth skin. His hair was a vibrant shade of blond, falling naturally in a slightly tousled style that caught the light, giving it a sun-kissed appearance. He had piercing blue eyes, framed by well-defined eyebrows that added to his expressive look. His features were balanced and symmetrical, with a straight nose and high cheekbones. His lips were naturally pink and often curved into a friendly smile, radiating warmth and openness. He said, “It looks new.”
The colleague said, “There’s been a change in regulations, and these lights are not explosion-resistant. They will need to change all the exterior lights. Who knows what else we will find outdated?”
The blond apprentice said, “I heard in the office, this ship is waaay over the schedule. No wonder regulations changed. It’s been a few years.”
Captain Graybeard shouted, “Come on in!”
They walked in, and I turned around to monitor the catwalk. I noticed local dockworkers cleaning the hull and a few buses full of people at the gate, probably shipyard workers who had followed the ship. Soon, a whole bunch of shipyard workers, possibly hundreds, came on board along with their supervisors. After a while, the supervisors left, and soon after, all those workers disappeared, hidden in various spaces on the ship with alcohol and cards. Some of them probably even slept. The only people who continued to work were from a private company building refrigeration rooms for the ship’s kitchen.
My father replaced me at the catwalk and said, “There is a local restaurant where we will have lunch. All paid by the company.”
I said, “What about you?”
My father said, “I’ll eat tomorrow, before your shift. There will be so many shipyard workers that there will probably be half-hour shifts at the restaurant to accommodate everyone. I thought they were already here.”
I said, “Yes, they are here.”
My father said, “But where? It’s almost a ghost ship.”
I said, “They just crawled into every hole there is, I guess.”
My father said, “Later on, I’ll check out where they are hiding.”
I said, “What about the Captain and his order to guard the catwalk?”
My father said, “Don’t mind him.”
I went to our cabin and slept until my shift started. After I came down to replace my father, I saw Captain Graybeard yelling at him.
[1] Catwalk - narrow, raised platform or pathway used for passage to otherwise inaccessible areas
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