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Dipper’s handle,” Dylan was telling Gerry. “That really bright one is called Arcturus. It’s not even forty light-years away.”
    Dad climbed back up into the cockpit and stood, looking forward into the dark.
    â€œWhat’s a light-year?” Gerry asked.
    â€œSix million million miles.”
    â€œWhy is it miles if it’s years?”
    â€œIt’s too complicated, Gerry,” I said. “You wouldn’t understand.”
    â€œBecause that’s how far a ray of light can travel in one year,” Dylan explained.
    â€œOh.” Gerry was quiet a moment. “How many light-years is it to heaven?”
    I felt heat wash over me and flashed a look at Dad.
    He turned and spoke. “Ben, why don’t you take Gerry and go on to bed.”
    â€œBut I’m not sleepy.”
    â€œYou have to be wide awake for your watch. You need to learn to sleep when you can. Go.”
    I started to say something, but then I stood and led Gerry down below. When I crawled into my tunnel, I could hear Dad and Dylan quietly talking above me and the water gurgling at my ear. Less than an inch of fiberglass stood between the ocean and me. Below me were fathoms of darkness and strange, goggle-eyed fish. Above me were the stars and the expanding universe. How was I supposed to go to sleep?
    I punched the pillow and sweated. Gerry whimpered and tossed. Eventually, Dad’s and Dylan’s voices stopped. Hours passed, and then Dylan moved quietly through the boat to bed. The rudder creaked in its housing. The boat’s braces groaned. A line thumped against the cockpit floor. I felt I had just slipped into sleep when Dad shook my foot to wake me.
    â€œYour turn,” he said. “I’ll show you how we’ve been tracking ourselves.”
    I barely heard Dad’s explanation. I stood holding the companionway ladder and sorting through the facts. I am fifteen now. I used to be five. I am hungry. Mom is not here. Dad is talking. A red light is glowing on a map. I mean a chart. A chart. This is a boat. Chrysalis . A boat. We live on a boat.
    â€œBen!” Dad spoke sharply. “Wake up. Listen. It’s your watch now.”
    I turned slowly to take my position at the helm.
    â€œBen,” Dad snarled. He was tired. “Life jacket and safety harness. Always. When you’re alone on deck at night, we’d never know if you fell off. You’d be left behind. We’d never find you.”
    â€œDoesn’t sound so bad,” I said, and shrugged into the hot, heavy gear. The safety harness was like a leash that moms put on two-year-olds at the mall, except you were hooked to a boat, not a mom. If I fell off it would be a pretty wild ride until somebody dragged me out.
    As I sat down at the helm, I searched for the horizon I had been watching before dinner, but it had disappeared in the darkness. The stars were brilliant in the black sky, but I didn’t remember any of their names. When Dad was finally quiet down below, I heard no sounds except the slap of the waves against the hull and the whine of the autopilot. There was nothing for me to do, and I felt sleep creeping over me again.
    Suddenly a splash right beside the boat set my heart pounding. I sat up and looked, but if there had been a monster, I couldn’t have seen it in the black night. Then I heard a cry. A voice called out. One hail from the darkness. Did it say “help”? Was it “ahoy”? Why not a second shout? I sat tense on the seat as my ears filled with the sound of my own blood. Then while I thought I was listening for the voice, I fell into a dream—running and falling, running and falling—until I shook myself awake, only to fall asleep once more. An hour later, when we were miles away from where we had been before, I heard the call again. I wanted to scream back, “Who are you? Where are you?” But there was only a single cry and then silence.
    Then heat