Read Online Nora & Kettle by Lauren Nicolle Taylor - Free Book Online

land on the metal roof with a clang, sweeping and dragging like a giant, teasing necklace as I try to catch the hooks and attach them to the anchors. I screw the replacement hook in, tighten it, and couple it to the last anchor point. My eyes scan the oil-streaked ground for Kin, but there’s no proud head amongst all the others that count the cracks running like dried-up veins along the floor. I shrug. He must be working in another area, and he’s probably sulking.
    No one looks at me as the container lurches from the ground; their heads are down or on the next job.
    I clamp my hand around one of the thick chains. It’s instantly stained orange, but my skin has always been copper colored so you’d barely notice. I center myself and hold tight as we lift into the air.
    Metal makes a strange sound when it’s fighting against gravity. It protests, it whines, and groans. I rise past the levels of colored containers stacked on the docks. Piled high like giant sugar cubes, full of things I’ll never see, nor have. Things I don’t really want either. I know how precious my freedom is, my independence. It’s enough.
    I keep to my knees as the crane swings over the water, one hand holding the chain, the other keeping my hat on my head as the cold blast of wind coming off the water hits me in the chest. I don’t hold the hat to my head for my own safety, though. If I lose it, it gets docked from my pay. If I fell from up here the only part of me that would survive, ironically, would be the hat.
    I puff out my chest, breathing in deeply. This is the part I love—this small window of time between leaving the ground and setting down on the ship. Through that window, I can fly. My hair flares back from my face, my cheeks sting with cold, brackish air. Fear leaves me, and I am free .
    I crow like a rooster as the container lifts higher, wanting to crook my elbows and spread my wings, but it’s too dangerous to let go. It swings in the wind, seeming like a feather and not tons of steel. A few men glance up to find the source of the noise, shielding their eyes with their hands. Their confused faces make me grin, my lips basted with salt, my eyes fighting to stay open against the wind.
    I spread my toes in my shoes, trying to act like glue as the floating metal box bears down on the ship. I’ve seen men tossed, like foam from the waves, from their container at landing. That’s why this job pays more. It’s the most hazardous.
    The top of the container I’m supposed to set down on approaches fast. I plant every part of me to the roof as the crane driver angles, adjusts, and finally drops me with a loud, metallic bang. My whole body springs up at impact and I am thrown to the side, my legs swinging over the edge momentarily. I dig in, my fingernails scratching into the paint, sending up flecks of red and manage to pull myself back up. My heart jams for a second, and then beats wildly, jumping all over the place at another near death.
    Kin has complained to the bosses about the lack of harnesses and safety gear, but he forgets who he’s talking to. He has this sense of entitlement that I don’t have. Maybe that comes from having a family and parents who valued you, I don’t know. I don’t know anything about what that might feel like.
    I’m still planted to the roof of the container, thinking about the small hole in my life that can’t be filled, when I hear the groan of the next container getting closer. I blink, jolt up, and remember we’re getting paid cash, no questions asked. They cut corners, but we’re not supposed to exist. Our welfare is a low priority as there are so many others begging to take our place. These feelings are ones I better understand. They are the patches of fabric that make up my orphan skin.
    A horn sounds, which is my cue to unhook the chains and clamber down the giant steps made of metal boxes. I do it swiftly, jumping down as I see the shadow of the next container bearing down on me from above.