Baby Not On Board! by Chris Troiano

"Caaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaawwww". The sound of a dying eagle filled the air as we were whizzing along in our Grady-White. I tasted the salty water hit my tongue. the it smelled of fish and crab guys, and seagull poop in the air. On the boat was my dad, his friend, his son that was the same age as me, my brother, and me. But soon did we realize on of those people were missing. Obviously, it wasn't me or my friend because we were in the under cabin eating sandwiches. My dad was driving, and his friend was near the back looking to the opposite side of where my brother fell of. My brother fell of because we later found his shoe had mud on it and he slipped under the metal bars designed to keep his three year old body from falling through. I was 5 or 6 at the time, and he was 2 or 3 years younger than me. He was screaming like a hawk caught in a fishing net choking to death. We discovered this was how he slipped when we got home and he told us the story and there was a big footprint in mud that went off the side of the boat on the starboard side. I said we heard the sounds of a dying bird, but that wasn't really true. We heard him screaming like a little girl that sounded like a bird so we didn't know he was gone for about 45 seconds until my dads friend, who's name is Jeff, said "Where's Mike?" To my dad. Me and my friend heard the sound and just looked at each other. His name was Evan. My dad came rushing towards the door to where we were siting and said "Have you guys seen Mike?" And we both just shrugged our shoulders and came outside. Now the scream was more prominent and I mentioned it to my dad saying "that bird screaming is really freaking me out," and then he must have heard it and looked behind us where the sound was coming from. All we could see was this little orange speck floating on a river of blue and green.my dad quickly jumped to the wheel and turned the boat around. He speed to Michael and almost drive by him. Jeff and he lifted him out of the water and took his wet clothes off and gave him a towel to prevent hypothermia. All this time he was bawling his eyes out making it really funny, yet terrible. You couldn't even imagine the look on my moms face when we told her what happened that night at dinner.