My Diary from the Edge of the World
February 16th
Today I, Gracie Lockwood, sit at the edge of the earth, and I’m going to try to record what I see. I’m writing this down for whoever may read it one day. I hope it doesn’t show up buried in the ice.
Four days ago, when we left camp, Dad made us leave everything we didn’t absolutely need in a pile, saying we could come back to it if things didn’t go the way we hoped. And then he and Mom dug in their packs and attached special metal spikes to all our shoes, and put us all in special belts with metal loops. They examined a bag full of ropes and ran along each rope carefully with their hands, checking the little pulleys and levers and clips attached to the ends. All this preparation got our hearts racing, and Millie and Oliver and I kept looking at each other with a combination of fear and excitement (whatever amount of fear and excitement you can communicate through goggles).
Mom went through our packs one by one to make sure we weren’t carrying any extra weight (“You’ll regret anything even slightly heavy when we’re halfway up the mountain,” she said), and when she came across my diaries, she looked at me uncertainly.
I didn’t know how to explain that if she made me leave them, it would be like asking me to leave an arm behind. But maybe Mom understood without my saying it, because she nodded at me slightly, then closed my pack as if she hadn’t seen anything.
Finally, it was time to go. We all wrapped our scarves tighter around our hoods, readjusted our goggles and our mittens, and began the slow trek upward.
The snow began to blow against us within an hour of our climb. We went up the first mountain tied in a long single-file line, Dad at the front with Sam on his back, and Mom behind the rest of us. Our progress was shockingly slow. “At this rate, we’ll be over the mountains by next year,” Millie said during a quick rest. My legs burned, and I know it must have been hardest of all on my Dad, carrying Sam, but we all pressed on.
Reaching the pass between two ridges before nightfall, we felt like we’d accomplished something special—until we saw all the mountaintops ahead.
“Shark’s teeth,” Millie repeated, holding her hands on her knees to catch her breath.
Still, that first night, as exhausted as we were, we were proud that we’d come so far, and a little more animated than we had been the night before as we settled into our tents to eat our cold dinners (beef jerky and freeze-dried peas). Millie even dabbed a tiny patch of freeze-dried peas under her nose to look like boogers, which made Sam laugh so hard we thought he might pass out.
The second day was harder. There was less snow and more ice. We had to navigate through crevices—ice tunnels as big as cathedrals, slick and glossy on all sides—Dad going first to see if he could find a way through. The tunnels made me feel like I was in the belly of the earth, like the earth was a big animal swallowing me up. We turned back several times from dead ends, and at one point Oliver lost his footing and slid down the slope behind us for about a hundred feet. But with all of us tied together, he merely came to a stop like a puppet on a string, then started to climb back up.
By halfway through the day, my muscles felt like jelly. When the sun started going down, we camped in one of the tunnels, again without even lighting the stove. We were all very quiet. I think we must have all been thinking the same thing. What if it wasn’t there, waiting for us? What would we do? As much as I wanted to reach the end of this slog through the mountains, I feared it too.
Yesterday morning the snow blew on us so hard we could barely see in front of us. I got so tired, just before we stopped for lunch, that I cried into my goggles a little bit and my tears froze to my face. In front of me Millie trudged ahead, and I think the only thing that kept me going was thinking that if she could do it, I could too.
Just as it seemed we’d never reach the end of the up-and-down climb, the land began to slope and taper downward, toward the flatlands. We couldn’t see very far because of the snow, but we knew without a doubt we’d finally reached the end of the range.
I could have cried again, in relief. The snow began to let up, and within a couple of hours we reached a wide flat valley and came to a stop, untying ourselves, but not saying anything. Looking ahead, it was hard to tell where the ground ended and the gray sky began. The dim, shrouded sun was low but not yet setting. It had taken us three days to cross the mountains, but we’d done it.
“Let’s set up camp here,” Millie said. “I can’t move another foot.” She began to slip out of her backpack. I did the same. Looking up, I couldn’t see the Cloud, and wondered if it was hanging back on the other side of the ridge.
“It can’t be much longer,” Dad said, his hands on his hips. Sam had slid off his back and now moved to hold Mom’s hand. “I think we can reach it before dark,” he went on, gesturing forward, his eyes bright behind his goggles.
We all looked at each other, unsure we had it in us. And then Mom nodded. “Let’s try it. Another hour.”
I don’t know how we found the strength to start again. I think it was that the thought of being so close to the end spread among us all like wildfire. We gathered our packs, caught our breath, and spurred ourselves forward. The snow continued to let up, and soon stopped altogether.
* * *
I’m not sure how long we were walking—the light stayed the same dim gray, and our steps were so rhythmic it was hypnotizing. Up ahead, a solitary mountain tumbled down onto the horizon, where it met what looked like the southernmost corner of the frozen Southern Sea.
Dad stopped for a moment, staring.
“That’s it,” he breathed. “That’s the edge, right where that mountain meets the water.” I don’t know how he knew. He started jogging, unable to hold himself back. We all followed.
At the foot of the mountain, coming around the bend that blocked the view beyond it, he came to a sudden stop, his arms shooting out to the sides just as we caught up with him to stop us from running past him.
He gestured for us to stay still. We stared ahead of us, gaping.
We were perched just on the edge of a thin sliver of frozen ocean. And beyond it . . .
Nothing.
Well, not nothing.
There was space. Endless, open space. A black sky full of stars as deep as forever, clusters of galaxies, exploding stars far in the distance.
From where we stood, we could see that our frozen ocean was pouring right off the earth—hanging from the edge of the planet like an enormous icicle. There was no telling how far down the frozen waterfall went.
Beyond it the stars stretched on endlessly. I clutched Mouse’s hand, stricken silent with shock and wonder. Because amid all the emptiness and vastness, there was one thing that commanded all our attention. And we all knew what it was without having to ask or wonder.
There were two things I knew about it right away, just by sight.
The Extraordinary World existed.
And we were not going to reach it.
February 17th
I had to take a break from writing for the night, because I didn’t know quite what to write or how. I’ll try to pick up where I left off, now that I’ve gathered my thoughts.
* * *
We could see it was an enormous planet—blue and lush and surrounded by white clouds just like ours, but round instead of flat—floating out in space and revolving around its own fiery sun that was also just like ours.
It wasn’t just a different planet. I could see it was our planet, but a different version of it. The shapes of its continents were identical to ours. Its sky was the same shade of blue. It seemed so close that I felt as if I could reach out and touch it—I even stretched my arm toward it. But it was, in reality, far far away.
Again, tears were freezing to my face beneath my goggles. I saw the others were crying too. But I don’t think it was just because of sadness. I think in that moment, we were heartbroken and overjoyed at the same time.
“We can’t get there,” Millie said, as if she was accepting something she’d suspected all along. But
she blinked in amazement at the sight. We all did.
After all the endless lectures and mutterings, we knew what it meant. It meant that Dad had been right, and that we were looking at one version of our world and that there might be a million or a billion more. Just like he had said all along. It meant everything was different than what we’d thought. It meant quantum jitters and alternative universes and endless possible Millies and Gracies and Sams. It meant endless possibilities.
We stared at the round planet, so seemingly peaceful and safe, so far away. I wrapped my arms around Mouse and held him close to me. And we all gathered together in a knot, wrapping our arms around each other.
Do the people who live in the Extraordinary World realize how lucky they are? Do they feel constantly surprised by the wonders that surround them? Do they ever get used to it?
* * *
There was one more thing, another surprise waiting for us right there at the edge of the frozen sea. Something stuck out of the ice in front of us that didn’t belong to the natural shapes around us. Dad noticed it first, walked over to it, and squatted down beside it. We all followed. It was an ice pick, dug into the ice and holding a colorful piece of cloth in place—archaic looking, like an antique, but perfectly preserved. The colors were red and green, and Dad ran a hand along it carefully before saying, “It’s a very old Portuguese flag.” He looked up at all of us. “The kind of flag Ferdinand Magellan would have flown.”
* * *
Does the flag prove that hundreds of years ago, Ferdinand Magellan was here? Did he hike off the edge of the earth? Did he find a way to journey across the galaxy to the place he’d come to find?
All I know is that the most eye opening, amazing thing that has ever happened to the Lockwood family is right here in front of us. And it’s wonderful. And I’m so glad I saw it. And it can’t save my brother.
February 19th
I woke this morning with a feeling of such heaviness, as if the black holes in outer space had crawled into my chest, making me empty inside. Before I’d even remembered where I was, or the reason for the way I felt, the feeling was there.
We’ve crossed back through the mountains and are resting before we make the long, rolling hike back toward the sea. With no ship to get back to, and nothing really to look forward to, we’re taking our time. We’re making our way back to where we left the Alexa, for no reason any of us can really say. What else can we do but go back to where we started from? Where else do we have to go?
* * *
Millie was sitting on her pack, looking up at the clouds when I climbed out of the tent early this morning. (Our Cloud is still strangely absent, and I wonder where it’s gone and what it means.) I shivered into my boots and walked over and sat down beside her. Mom was stirring breakfast over a pot, hiding her face in her hood. I knew she couldn’t have slept.
Millie, too, looked exhausted. She was dry-eyed and pale. I sat down right next to her and she linked her arm through mine, and we stared at the fire for a while.
I was trying to get the courage to ask something, but I didn’t know if I could say it, because saying it made it real, like I’d given up. And I didn’t want to give up. But I was thinking that, deep down, we all knew the truth—that at last, we had run out of places to run.
Finally, I turned to look at her. “Millie, what do you think it will be like? When the Cloud takes Mouse?”
She turned to me with a look that reminded me of something, but it’s hard to describe. She looked the way I feel whenever I try to explain to Mouse about the day he was born—the bigness and fullness and worry all at once.
She opened her mouth, closed it again. And then she picked at a spot on her boots, looked at me, rubbed her lips, and said, “It’s not Mouse that the Cloud came for.”
And I don’t think I can write any more today.
A page taped into the middle of Mrs. Lockwood’s lesson plan book
Captain’s log, March 5th
Today at approximately fifteen hundred hours, five people were found drifting in a small vessel just northeast of Cape Horn, two adults and three minors. All were brought aboard safely and in good health. They will disembark in New York when we make port in May.
April 2nd
When I was little, and something made me sad, my family could always fix it. Mom would come in and make a funny face or tell me she was going to take me to the hospital. “You need your feelings amputated!” she’d yell with pretend urgency. Or my dad would rub my face with his whiskers until I’d squirm and laugh. Or Millie would annoy me into forgetting what I was sad about.
I never knew what it was like to feel something unfixable, or to have something hurt that will never stop hurting. It feels like entering a different world. It’s not that it’s not a happy world, or just as beautiful of a world as the one it was before. But there’s a piece of me now that feels like it’s chipped off and floating around somewhere else, and I don’t think I’ll ever be able to reattach it. The good thing is that it hasn’t disappeared. I know that floating piece is out there somewhere, even if I don’t get to keep it.
It’s been over a month since we left the Southern Edge, and I’ve finally decided I’m willing to write again, just for a little bit.
* * *
The SS Labrador picked us up off the eastern coast of the Crozet Islands after we’d spent almost eight days sailing our way north. (I’ll get to how we were sailing in a moment.) The Labrador was such a shocking sight, it nearly blew us over, and even as we were being hauled aboard, it was hard to believe it was actually happening. (I suppose we only made it as far as we did without being bothered by sea monsters because our boat was so small and flimsy we just weren’t noticed.)
They’ve treated us like royalty ever since. The ship is by far the most luxurious thing we’ve experienced since leaving home. It’s taken weeks to feel comfortable sitting at the fancy captain’s table and dining off his fine china. But try as they might to get us to talk, to tell them about what’s happened to us, we’ve been a limp, lost crew.
* * *
I think now that some time has passed I can write a little bit about Millie. I’ll try at least, and see where I end up, even if it’s just not being able to write anything much at all.
I think I’d suspected longer than I’d admitted to myself what Millie’s middle of the night talks with the Cloud had meant. I even imagine I knew why, that night, she kissed Virgil up in the topmast, and why she’d started changing toward all of us. That morning, after I last wrote, she told the others. Mom kept insisting that nothing was going to happen to anyone. The boys walked off together and huddled a ways away in the snow, their heads down. Dad had taken off his glasses and was staring out at the ocean.
A few days later, arriving at the shore where we’d originally disembarked, I don’t think any of us were surprised to see that there was nothing but empty horizon where the Alexa had once been.
What did surprise us was that when we got right up close to the water, we discovered something we hadn’t seen from farther back. Butting up against the land’s edge, anchored by a metal hook in the ice, was the skiff—the small boat that had always been attached to the Alexa’s side—filled with provisions, and a note nailed to the bow.
I apologize for my dramatic exit, and for behaving in a way so unfit for a ship’s captain. I believe that maybe I thought life owed me something for what I’d lost. I’ve come back to my senses, and remembered things don’t work that way. I’m sorry it didn’t happen sooner.
We returned the day after we left you, and waited here for the agreed upon amount of time. But you haven’t come back, and I can only assume this means you’ve made it to the other side. For that, I’m so thankful.
In case you haven’t, I’m leaving this skiff here for you. She’s not fancy or big, but she’s all I have, and better than nothing.
I hope you won’t need her. You all deserve for your dreams to come true. You are a beautiful family, and I wish you the best.
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Sincerely,
Captain Bill MacDonald
I think we all felt a momentary surge of hope. But it didn’t last for very long. Because along with the boat, there was also the Cloud, hovering low about a hundred feet away.
It was just starting to snow—not driving, windy, sideways snow, but gentle, with drifty big flakes. Everyone had gone silent, but finally Mom spoke. “We’ll keep going,” she said. “We’ll get on this boat and sail northeast and see where we end up. Surely we can get somewhere worth getting to.”
Everyone turned to look at Millie, who was shaking her head softly. “No,” she said. “No, Mom, it’s time. I’m sorry, but I don’t want to run anymore.” She had her determined face on, the one no one can ever talk her out of.
I was standing closest to her, and I slipped my hand into hers. I thought she might push it away, but she held it tight and smiled at me gratefully.
“I can’t let you go,” I said.
She smiled at me sadly. “You have to, Gracie.”
I felt my face fill up with pulsing blood. The feelings inside me were too big and wanted to burst out, needed to explode. “Then I’ll go with you,” I said, my voice cracking. But she shook her head again.
“No.” She squeezed my hand tight. She stared up at the Cloud. “I am scared though, Gracie,” she said. The Cloud was moving now, drifting lower toward us, so that it was now at our height and about fifteen feet behind Millie. I stared into the black hole in the center of it that Millie and Sam said was a mouth, and shook my head.
“We let you down,” I whispered.
“Gracie,” she put her hands on both my shoulders, “remember what I said, when we were looking down at the mermaid city. I’m so glad we came. Remember that.”