Not Without Hope by Nick Schuyler and Jeré Longman

a lot of “Oh my Gods.” At first it was, “Oh my God, is this really happening?” Now it was, “Oh my God, is this it?”

 
    A bout midnight, Corey interrupted our silence, shouting, “I can’t believe the four of us can’t flip this boat!” He seemed angry and discouraged. Then he said, “There’s gotta be a way. What haven’t we tried? We gotta try again.”
    Will and I reminded him, “Dude, there’s no leverage. It’s not possible.”
    Maybe if it were a ten-foot boat in five-foot seas it would have been possible. Not out here.
    “Think how hard it was just to get the cooler out of the water,” Will said. It had taken two of us just to get the water out and flip it onto the boat.
    It got quiet. We were all freezing and exhausted. We began to huddle together, cuddling almost, trying to stay warm as the night went on. From the stern, I leaned forward until my ear and cheek were on Marquis’s back as he rested on the hull. Will also leaned forward, placing his chest on my back. Corey, too, leaned in from the stern, our three heads gathering in front of the motor, on Marquis’s torso. I thought for a moment that it was weird, four grown men clustered together like puppies or kittens, but it was necessaryif we were going to maintain any body heat. I could feel everybody shivering and hear their teeth chattering.
    Once, when it was quiet, knowing how desperate our situation was, I said, “I love you guys.” I just wanted to let them know how I felt. No one said anything back. It was a little awkward, but I knew from their reactions that everyone was thinking the same thing.
    Bunched up there like that, we talked sporadically, sometimes about our families, sometimes about the things we would do different with our lives. Different paths we might have chosen. In the middle of the Gulf, with our boat overturned and the four of us getting tossed about by waves in a storm, our priorities seemed to straighten. Little crap didn’t matter. Being stranded, facing the possibility that we would all die, left us almost with a guilty feeling about things we had left undone. Marquis and Corey talked about their hometowns, their parents, college football, playing in the NFL. Marquis, of course, mentioned his love for Rebekah and Goose. Corey, who wasn’t married, reflected on his mother and what she meant to him. At one point, he said, “The things I would change.” He didn’t say anything specific, but there was regret in his voice.
    Will said he wished he had been closer to his older brother, Blake. I had never met him. Will was single, a ladies’ man, an athlete. Blake had a steady girlfriend and would be married in eight months. Will lived in Tampa and had worked in finance until the economy went bad and his firm closed its office. Lately he had been splitting his time between Tampa and Crystal River, his hometown, where he and Blake helped out their parents at the family tire and auto shop that they had run for three decades. I think Will wished he had given a little more effort with his brother.
    I thought about my mom, Marcia, and how much I loved her and how upset she got when something happened to me or my sister, Kristen. She always put herself second—or third or fourth—so thatKristen and I could have a good life. My parents had had a rough marriage. The details are private, no one’s business but their own. My mom stuck it out until I had just about finished my senior year of high school. They would argue and she would always try to be the peacemaker. “Don’t worry, I’m fine,” she would always tell us. I know it was hard on her, but she always seemed more concerned about how we were doing.
    After I graduated, she took us on a vacation to Cancun. She was always doing something for me. When I was in elementary school in Ohio, she volunteered, helping take attendance, selling magazines for fund-raisers, chaperoning us on field trips. At night, I would lay on her lap to watch TV and when she told