He finished his lunch and went outside and sat in his father’s old chair. Memories of his old man reading the newspaper in this chair after a long day at work. Drinking his tea. Caleb playing footy in the backyard, trying not to punt the ball into the water.

He looked at the old shed, got up and walked over. He rounded the corner of the shed and behind it found his father’s boat missing. The trailer, too, was gone. He walked back inside and looked around the house. He checked in the garage on the shelf and found their old tent missing. He sat again in the chair outside and looked out at Snake Island. He knew they’d gone there. Knew it like he knew how to pull his pants up. He must have just missed them.

Leaning up against the back of the shed he found his father’s crappy old tinny. The hull rusty. The old man had sold the motor years ago but in Caleb’s memory he still used the boat sometimes for fun, putting it in down the embankment when the tide was in, just rowing around. Probably hoping to take his grandkids out in it one day. Some hope of that now. Caleb studied it and saw the oars and moved his bandaged forearm, flapping it like a wounded bird.

He hefted the tinny—tricky with his forearm in its cast—onto its base and shoved it on the grass over to the wall overlooking the water. He shoved it in. It landed with a thunk and immediately was pressed down into the mud beneath the boat. Caleb climbed down the wall and walked over to it, the mud caking his prison-issue boots, the water up his shins. He pushed the boat until it was free of muck and floating and then jumped in himself. He sat up, regarding his old house. He grabbed an oar and started rowing.

He started with his good arm and then tried once with his sore but found the forearm incapable of much force. So he kept on with the good arm, switching from side to side, until it was too fatigued to continue. The sun beat down and he knew he was getting burned, which made everything worse. Sweat soon stained all his clothes. He put his free hand over the side into the salty brine and splashed it over his head, wetting his hair. He kept rowing. Snake Island grew closer to him but it was slow going and by the end of the day he had barely made it over half the distance. He could still see his old home.

The tide was now up and he could not get out if he wanted to and so he laid down in the boat and studied the stars as they formed above him, resting his tired body. He wondered what his parents were doing. He had to get to them. Be with them. He soon somehow managed to fall asleep.