Against the Current

You turn your back on the lantern and push. The pole bites the riverbed and you lean into it with everything you have, muscles burning, the barge groaning as if the water itself is gripping the hull. The trees along both banks tilt inward like curious mourners, their roots lifting from the black earth.

Voices curl through the air — your father's among them, patient and familiar, asking you to stay. You don't answer. You pole again. The faint smear of ordinary light at the tributary's mouth is still there, distant but real, and you fix your eyes on it like a compass that finally holds still.