He didn’t know. And there was no one else out there.
He stood up, set his feet shoulder-width apart and pulled his sleeves down over his hands. He moved his hands slowly and kept the rest of his body very still, as if trying to steady himself against the motion of sea and sky. His legs were planted almost a metre apart and his sleeves barely covered his wide, calloused palms. Of course, the boy was not really a boy, any more than the old man was all that old; but names are relative, and out in the grey some kind of distinction was necessary.
He took hold of the line and, using the rail as a fulcrum, began to haul it up out of the water. As soon as the load broke the surface the line tightened and rasped through his sleeves. He stopped for a moment and let the wind smooth the edges of the pain, then carried on pulling until the fourth hook was level with the platform. He looked down over the rail.
It was a load of junk as usual – a greasy mass of netting and plastic, streaming and reeking. The whole thing was tangled into a dense lump, along with an oilcan, some polystyrene, and what looked like a burnt-out panel from a door.
The boy tied off the line, straightened his back and blew lightly on his palms. ‘Good catch,’ he said.
Beside him, the thick steel support rose twenty metres to the rig. Above the rig’s squat rectangular housing, the blades of the nearest turbine turned slowly in the washed-out sky. All around, to every horizon, the blades of the wind farm turned.
The line spun slowly – ten turns one way, then a pause, then ten turns back. The boy lay down on his stomach, reached out and held the netting until it stilled.
The fields stretched out around him – row after row of turbines, like strange crops. From a distance, they all looked identical, but up close each tower was marked with dark blooms and scabs of rust. There were seepages of oil and grease creeping downward, streaks of salt corrosion reaching up, forming intricate patterns of stalactites and stalagmites. Some of the turbines had slumped down at an angle, their foundations crumbling like silt. Some had damaged blades and threw their remaining limbs around in jolting arcs. Others were missing their blades and nacelle entirely, leaving only the towers standing, like fingerposts marking the steady progression of malfunction and storm.
He tried to feel his way down to where his hook was caught. The net had floats and some kind of weights threaded through it, and it was twisted up with what could have been strips of weed but the boy knew were actually sheets of black plastic – he’d been finding them all over the farm recently. He worked his hand in and found the hook, then took a knife out of his pocket and began to cut away at the netting, strand by strand, until it slumped down into the water, leaving just the hook and the object it was stuck in.
It was a boot – black, Company issue, the same as the boy’s. Except, where his were dark and supple from regular cleaning and waterproofing, this one was salt-stiffened, bleached and cracked, making it look like it was cut from some kind of rough stone.
He reached out slowly, tilted it and looked inside. The laces had come undone and it was empty, which was a relief. He’d found a boot once before, floating through the farm, still laced up tight. When was that? It had been down in the south fields. That boot had been brown, pointed at the toe. The leather and its contents had been scratched and picked apart. There must have been birds around then. And fish.
The boy put the knife away in his pocket and took out a battered digital watch. It was missing its strap and one button, and when he touched the display, bubbles of moisture spread inside the casing. It read quarter past five. He looked up at the sky and saw, perhaps, a paler patch of cloud in the west. When he closed his eyes the same patch appeared on the backs of his eyelids.
The wind dragged across the rig. Sometimes it sounded thin and hollow, sometimes it thudded as if it were a solid wall, impossible to move past. The line rocked. The turbines groaned and thrummed. The boy held the boot still. The sole was smooth and washed clean: the sea already cleaning things up, making things anonymous.
‘Where have you come from?’ he said. His voice was barely audible above the wind and the blades. Which was probably for the best, because it was a stupid question. And he was talking to a boot.
The currents that came through the farm swept in from the oceans and cycled round the whole North Sea, hauling waste and cast-offs out from every coastline. Some days there would be swathes of shining fluid that coated the surface of the water. Other days, shoals of plastic bags and bottles would rise from the depths like bulbous light-seeking creatures. The boy would find tidal barrages and bleached clothing, the brittle shells of electrical appliances. He’d seen furniture and timbers tangled together so they looked like makeshift rafts; and once, a whole house torn loose from its moorings, drifting through the farm, slumped and tilting on its flotation tanks.
Days, months and seasons passed through untethered and indistinct among the flotsam. Sometimes it felt colder and there were more storms, and sometimes a big spring tide would raise the water level up closer to the platform. But it was always cold, and there were always storms. It was spring now, according to the rig’s computer. He looked down at his watch – it still read quarter past five.
He put it away and unhooked the boot carefully from his line. Then he got up off his stomach and sat on the platform, drawing his knees up against the wind and holding the boot in front of him. It could have come from anywhere. It could even have come from the farm. It could have been lost and then got stuck in one of the gyres that looped through the fields, catching anything that was adrift inside and not letting go. It could have been cycling round the turbines, round the edge of the rig, for years.
The boot was the same size as his own. Whoever it had belonged to would have been about his height, his build. The wind pressed in and the skin on his back tightened. What if …? But he didn’t let himself finish the thought. There was no point going over all that.
He held the boot out over the water. If he let go, it could be gone in under a minute. In a day it could be out of the farm. In a few weeks it could wash up on the coast or, if it kept going, it could be pushed out north, up and over the pole.
Or maybe it wouldn’t go anywhere. Maybe it would stay circling the fields. Maybe one day he would check his line and there it would be again – a bit more cracked, a bit more bleached, but the same old boot. And he would pull it up, unhook it and think the same old thoughts, ask the same old questions. And they would still be stupid questions. And he would still be talking to a boot.
He looked out at the water and twisted the boot’s lace around his fingers. It was crusted with salt and had kinks from where it had been knotted. Slowly, he unpicked it from the stiff eyelets, coiled it and put it in his pocket. Then he reached out and dropped the boot over the edge of the platform. He watched as it dipped in the swell, pausing for a moment as if remembering its route, before drifting off east and into the grey.
‘Ahoy there, Cap’n Cod.’ The old man, Greil, spoke from where he was slumped in his chair. He had his feet up next to the bank of monitors and didn’t bother turning round. The boy had been trying to walk quietly past the control room, but now stopped in the doorway. ‘Why are you sneaking about?’ the old man said.
The boy didn’t answer.
‘I saw you.’ The old man inclined a foot towards one of the monitors. ‘I see all from my eyrie. I am omniscient.’ A hand appeared in emphasis, holding an enamel mug, in which sloshed a brutal-smelling ichor.
‘What’s that?’ the boy said, stepping into the room.
‘My finest. Not for your unrefined palate. Not since your last criticisms.’ The old man swivelled his chair round. His cheeks were flushed purplish grey, like metal discoloured by a flame. His hands,
