Free Titanic 2020 t2-1 by Colin Bateman

'sort' at all, and she certainly didn't know him. He nodded at her painting. 'Have you been painting for long?'
    'All of my life, child, all of my life.'
    'Well, you'd think with all that practice you'd be a bit better at it.'
    Jimmy hurriedly removed himself from the cabin.
    ***
    He found Claire twenty minutes later, standing on the very top deck, staring out to sea. Her camera sat on a sunbed beside her. He came up behind her and snapped: 'What are you playing at, you lazy cow?'
    Just like her mother, she hadn't heard him approach — but instead of looking mildly annoyed Claire looked absolutely terrified. Her eyes were red-rimmed from crying. There was obviously something going on with her. But it was none of his business. She pointed at the camera. 'There it is, take it.'
    'You took the photos, right?'
    'Yes, I took your stupid photos.'
    'Then you have to come down and put them on to the computer and help pick out the right one.'
    'I don't
have
to do anything. You take it if you want. It's only a silly pretend newspaper.'
    'Right.' Jimmy lifted the camera and was about to walk off. But then he decided he wasn't going to let her off so easily. He stood with his hands on his hips. 'Can't stick with anything for more than five minutes before you go crying to Daddy, can you? You're a complete waste of space.'
    He turned away — but he hadn't gone more than a few steps before she let out a cry, threw herself down on to one of the sunbeds and buried her face in her hands. This only made Jimmy angrier. He stomped back to the sunbed. 'What's wrong? Did your gold credit card fall overboard? Did you chip your nail polish?'
    'Go away!'
    'OK.' He turned again.
    'No, wait!'
    Jimmy sighed loudly. '
What?'
    Claire's face was still pressed against the sunbed's wooden slats. 'Why do you hate me?' she asked weakly.
    Jimmy didn't even have to think about that one. 'It's a mix of your appearance and personality.'
    She was quiet for a moment, then slowly turned and wiped at her eyes. 'I hate you too,' she said, 'but I'm scared and I have to tell someone.'
    'Scared of what?'
    'Do you swear to God you won't tell anyone?'
    'No.'
    'Please!
She said it with so much feeling that Jimmy was forced to deliver one of his better shrugs. Then he sat down on a sunbed. Not beside her, but three removed.
    'What, then?'
    Claire took a deep breath and held her hand against her chest while she tried to settle herself. When she spoke she didn't look at Jimmy but at the deck, and her voice was kind of vague, as if she was describing a dream she only half remembered.
    'I . . . went down to take the photos . . . to the kitchens . . . but there was no one about so I walked straight through to the freezers. Have you seen them? They're huge and there's about a dozen of them . . . and I heard voices coming from inside one of them . . . and the door was open just a fraction . . . All I wanted was the stupid photo, you know? Anyway, I looked in and there were . . . like . . . these
people
in there . . . and they weren't crew they were like a family, men and women and children . . . just sitting there talking . . . The fridge wasn't even switched on so it wasn't cold, there were sunbeds on the floor and clothes scattered all over the place and it smelled terrible . . . and one of them looked up and saw me and I just froze . . . then he shouted something and I moved backwards . . . but straight into Pedroza, and he started screaming at me . . . but not even in Portuguese or English — in some . . . I don't know, African tongue or something. I told him I just wanted to take his picture again, and he calmed down and smiled and . . . that was even scarier. He led me back to the kitchen and he took out this huge knife and stood holding it up and I took my picture and just as I took it he said: "If you tell anyone what you saw in there I will use this knife to cut your head off. And after that I will cut your mother's head off. And then your father's. Do you understand?" And