Amanda didn’t get a lot done on her first day of working on the Rag Doll, mostly because she had to figure out where to start. She’d seen any number of things that needed attention over the course of the day before, but she’d been a little too busy to stop and note them down every time she found one. Now she had no choice but to stop and note them down while the impressions of the day before were at least partly fresh in her mind.

The list in her notebook grew quickly. She tried to note everything down, big and little alike, since she knew that little things added up into big things, and there were a lot of little things to go along with the big things.

As she went on with her detailed survey, she was finding one thing that she didn’t like very well: there were soft spots on the deck, and lots of them, more than she’d fully realized on first inspection of the boat. Most of the soft spots were near deck fittings, some of which she couldn’t imagine why they’d been installed in the first place. As Ron had noted, hardly any of them had been installed with even a drop of bedding compound involved, and several of the fittings or their fasteners had rusted, to boot. Just about everything was going to have to come up and be replaced, although some of the fittings seemed like they might possibly be salvaged. A little bit here, a little bit there, and it was going to add up to a lot of money.

Even worse, the loose and rusted fittings had allowed water to leak into the deck core, which she knew was a layer of balsa wood between the inner and outer fiberglass layers. This made the deck loose and sloppy, feeling soft to the touch, although it took a bit of practice to understand just how bad it had been. She’d run into this before when doing boat work with her father, so it was nothing new to her. Still, it had to be fixed.

There were two ways to do it. In small spots it would be possible to drill holes through the outer layer, inject epoxy glue with a large hypodermic needle, let it set up, then fill the hole with epoxy filler, and sand it off before repainting. The hell of it was that the technique was only good for about a square inch at a time, maybe less in some areas, and there were a lot of square inches that needed treatment. It would be an extremely tedious procedure, and could take days, if not weeks.

The other way to deal with the problem was to peel off the outer layer of fiberglass entirely, glue in a new core, then glue the fiberglass outer layer back on. That would be a long, tedious, and exacting job as well; too much of it would make it not worth the effort. There was, as Ron had said, quite a bit of scrap in the keel, and that might be the only viable long-range solution.

After she’d been over the deck very thoroughly, noting bad spots and detailing them in her notebook she came to the conclusion that the boat wasn’t bad enough to scrap it, but she was going to be spending a lot of time working on that deck. But she also came to the conclusion that she wouldn’t start on that job just yet; she’d wait for her father to come down so she could get his opinion of the best way to go about the project.

There were other issues and plenty of them. There was no doubt the deck, and the whole outer hull, was going to need plenty of sanding and refinishing, most of it coming, of course, after the soft spots in the deck had been dealt with.

The list went on and on, and that was just on the outside. The inside was just as bad, if not worse. She’d pretty well figured out the day before that most of the wood was going to have to be replaced. Some of it might be salvageable, but most obviously wasn’t. Again, just going ahead and tearing it out right away might not be the smartest move; she realized she needed to wait for her father to come down to see what he thought. That would also give her time to think about revisions to the outer layout.

On top of that, she could see that the whole electrical system of the boat – at least what there was of it – was pretty well shot. The boat was going to need a complete rewiring from one end to the other, and to do it right was going to involve a much more complicated system. Plumbing was pretty much the same thing; what little might remain after she wound up stripping woodwork from the cabin would probably need to be replaced anyway. There was no getting around it – she might as well do it right while she had things apart. It would be more expensive that way but simpler in the long run and likely save her from hassles with those systems in the future.

She knew that there was still some time left in the fishing season up in Winchester Harbor, but that her father would have work to do once the season was over with. She made a mental note to see what she could do about getting him down here as soon as he had the boats on the hard up there, even if it was just for a short trip. By the end of the day she had realized that there were a lot of things she needed to talk to him about.

Just doing a thorough listing of what the boat needed didn’t eat up her whole day. Along toward the middle of the day, when she was thinking about lunch, she decided to do it right, knock off and go get some groceries. It had dried out adequately inside the boat for her to sleep there that evening, which she’d already more or less planned on doing anyway. That meant she had to stop at the storage shed on her way back from the grocery store to get her sleeping bag, air mattress, and some of the clothes, cleaning supplies, and tools she’d left there.

When she got back to the boat, she noticed Cordy coming across the boat yard, covered in paint chips and generally looking like hell. She stopped the car and asked, “So did you get it done?”

“Yeah, finally,” Cordy huffed. “It’s absolutely a pain in the ass, too. I guess we’re gonna let the whole damn works dry out for a day, then paint it. That’ll at least get the damn thing ready to go back in the water. So how’s your day been going?”

“Still trying to figure out what comes first,” Amanda told her. “I’ll manage to find something. It’s getting to the point where I need to actually do something, not just think about it.”

“That tells me you sure as hell have a lot of work,” Cordy shook her head. “I took a look at it while you were gone, and it looks like a hell of a job to me.”

“The heck of it is that everything I can see to do really needs to have something else done first,” Amanda sighed. “The trick is to find that first thing to do.”

“I guess I’m just glad it’s you and not me,” Cordy said. “Catch you later. I’m going to get cleaned up a little and see if I can find something clean to do.”

By the time the sun was getting low in the late October sky, Amanda had at least found a few things to do, mostly involving cleaning up in the bilges under the cabin floorboards. It had to be done, although it would probably have to be done again before she was done working on the boat. By now it was time to be knocking off and having some dinner.

She brought in some camping gear from the car and some of the groceries she’d purchased earlier, along with a cooler full of pop. Once again, a beer would have tasted nice, and there was some left over from Ron and the guys from the day before, but it was warm. The best she could do was stick a couple cans in the cooler and look forward to having it tomorrow night.

Dinner, she decided, would have to be a can of canned spaghetti and meatballs, cooked in one of her camping pots on her bottled gas camp stove. There had been an alcohol stove on Rag Doll up to the day before, but Amanda didn’t like the darn things – they were finicky and hard to light. Besides, she had doubts about the one that had been there, and wouldn’t have wanted to bet it would work even if she had stove alcohol, which she didn’t. At least it made for an adequate evening meal.

Once she’d finished her dinner and had the pot soaking, she decided to get set up for the night. Earlier in the day she’d run a power cord from the outlet on the dock into the cabin; now she plugged a hooded shop light into it. That would at least give her some light in the cabin for now; figuring out how she wanted to do the final cabin lighting was another of those things that she needed to work out. She did have water on board since she’d run a hose into the cockpit, but she wasn’t about to use the Rag Doll’s water system until it had been thoroughly cleaned, and perhaps replaced. Her bathroom was going to have to involve a bucket, for much the same reason. It would do for now, and probably would have to do for a few months.

In spite of the fact that she hadn’t done a great deal of dirty work this day, she felt grubby. A shower would feel good, but that was something else she didn’t have; it made her really miss the motel room she’d stayed in the last couple nights. But it was something she was going to have to get used to doing without.

She pulled off her clothes, dug in one of her duffel bags, and pulled out one of several bikinis she’d brought. She had had hopes of doing a little beach time somewhere in the next few months – it would be a treat to think of doing it while everything was frozen up in Winchester Harbor. Once she had it on, she grabbed some liquid soap, a towel, and a washcloth, then went out to the cockpit, figuring she could wet down, soap down, then rinse off; at least she knew the cockpit drain worked.

She’d soaked herself down good and was just getting soaped down when she heard Cordy’s voice: “Girl, what do you think you’re doing?”

“Getting cleaned up,” Amanda replied casually. “This is about the only way I can do it right now.”

“You gotta be crazy,” Cordy replied in the low light of near sunset. “It’s potlicking cold out here!”

“I didn’t think it was very bad,” Amanda replied with a grin; she glanced over to see that Cordy was wearing a jacket, and not a light one, either. “It’s a hell of a lot colder back home right now, I’ll tell you that.”

“Well, I’ll be damned,” Cordy said as she stood there and watched. “You gonna stay on board tonight?”

“Yeah, it’s a little primitive, but I think I can handle it. There’s no way in hell I can afford to stay in a motel every night. That’s money I can be putting into the boat.”

“Well, I guess. Hey, I don’t know if Pa told you, but if you go out at night, keep your eyes open for gators. They like to lay on the warmth of the parking lot at night.”

“He said that, and he said to take a flashlight if I go out after dark. I don’t plan on going out after dark unless I really have to. I don’t know much about those damn things and I think I’d just as soon keep it that way.”

“That probably ain’t a bad idea,” Cordy told her. “Another month or six weeks or so we won’t be seeing much of them. It’ll be getting too cold for them; they’ll be digging themselves holes and laying in them until it warms up.”

“That’s a relief. They scare me more than a little.”

“For the most part they don’t cause much problem, so long as you stay away from them,” Cordy told her. “’Course, I guess it helps if you grow up with them around.”

“I suppose,” Amanda replied, finishing up with soaping down, and taking the hose to rinse off. It was going to be a quick cleanup and a lousy one, but it beat the hell out of nothing.

“God, that looks cold,” Cordy said as she watched Amanda go over herself with the hose. “Guess I’ll head back to the house and turn on the TV, or read a book or something. You goin’ to Earlene’s in the morning?”

“Probably,” Amanda told her as she finished with the hose. “I’ll see how I feel in the morning.”

“Well, might see you there, then. You sleep tight, now.”

“Yeah, you too, Cordy.”

Amanda shut off the hose, dried herself off as best she could, and headed down into the cabin, feeling a lot more chilly than she had before she’d taken her so-called shower. She thought she ought to try to remember to do it a little earlier in the day, when it might be a bit warmer. When it got colder – and from hearing the guys talk the day before, it seemed like that would happen – she might have to just stick to washbasin baths in the cabin, and forego the shower entirely. It probably would get to be pretty grubby that way.

Back inside the Rag Doll’s cabin with the hatch closed, she stripped off the bikini and pulled on some warm, fuzzy sweats. It was pretty likely to get cool in there this evening, and could be expected to be worse in the future. All she had for heat was the sixty-watt bulb in the shop light; maybe a small electric heater might not be a bad idea in the future, she thought. Still, she figured she’d be all right for this evening; the sleeping bag was pretty warm, after all.

It was still pretty early to be thinking about going to bed, although the sun was going down now and it was starting to get dark outside. There really wasn’t a lot to do for the next couple hours until she got in the sleeping bag for the night. The best she could think of was to pile her duffel bags and some other gear up so she could lean back against them. She got out her notebook once again, and worked on her lists for a while, and while she was at it made some notes about what she wanted to do inside the cabin.

That really didn’t fill her time very well, and she felt dissatisfied. The list in the notebook was very disheartening – it was getting longer by the minute, and some of the progress to whittle it down was going to take a lot of time. It seemed almost impossible; had she set herself too big a project?

It wouldn’t be quite as bad if she were at home – she’d have her father to help her with the boat and some of the decisions that had to be made, and more importantly, to encourage her and keep her going. Besides, she’d be at home, in her own bed, eating in familiar places, rather than camping out aboard this boat. Even with the help of Ron and his buddies, with the beginnings of a friendship with Cordy, she felt very alone and bored right now.

For a moment she thought about calling home, just to talk with the folks so they could buck her up a little, but she’d called the night before and didn’t want to get too dependent on calling them every night. After all, part of the point of this whole exercise was to be on her own. No, an occasional call home to keep the folks updated and get advice would be all right, but she didn’t want to get into the habit of doing it every night.

Maybe, she thought, she might get a little radio or an MP3 player to listen to on long evenings like this, or maybe a paperback book or two. That was something to think about the next time she went out shopping. Maybe tomorrow, she thought.

Finally there wasn’t anything to do but call it a night. It was still on the early side, but she blew up her air mattress, unrolled her sleeping bag, worked one of the clothes bags around to use as a pillow, and hoped that would be good enough. She expected, well, hoped, that the sleeping bag would be warm enough without her sweats, so stripped down to her panties and slid into the bag and turned out the shop light.

It felt comfortable in there, if a little strange – it wasn’t like sleeping in a bed, after all, and it had been a while since she’d used the bag. She snuggled down into it, trying to get comfortable, but sleep wasn’t coming. Mostly she was thinking about the Rag Doll and the list, which already seemed impossibly long and looked to get longer before it got shorter. Maybe this wasn’t such a great idea after all. The Knick-Knack had worked out well, but Rag Doll was a lot bigger and a lot more complicated – and needed a hell of a lot more work. She could see it taking years of desperately scrabbling to knock down the list and not getting much of anywhere.

On the other hand, what else did she have to do this winter? After all, it ought to be warm, or at least warmer, and there really wasn’t anything to do up at home until the boats went back into the water in the spring. There didn’t seem to be anything better to do. Maybe by spring she’d be seeing some progress on the Rag Doll, or she might decide it really was a lost cause. It was nothing to be decided tonight, after all.

She had no idea how long she lay there, and may have been falling asleep, when she heard a thump somewhere outside the boat, followed by an animal scream, a small splash, and a few seconds later a larger splash. Then she heard some thumping against the hull, along with some desperate animal cries. What the hell was going on out there?

For whatever reason she threw back the sleeping bag – it had been warm enough that she hadn’t zipped it up – grabbed the shop light, threw the hatch cover back and opened the companionway. The desperate-sounding thumping was still going on beside the hull, along with some pleading-sounded yowling. More curious than scared, she headed out onto the deck, shop light in hand, and could see the glowing eyes of an alligator not far away. He didn’t seem to be getting closer – perhaps the bright light in her hand had something to do with it – but whatever was thumping against the hull and howling sure knew the gator was there and was trying to get away.

The gator scared her, but whatever was down there was scared, too, and Amanda didn’t blame it one bit. It was only a couple steps over to where the commotion was coming from; she shined the light down over the side and saw a tiny kitten, trying to claw its way up the slick fiberglass hull and not making any progress.

There was no decision on Amanda’s part; she was aware the kitten had to have claws, but it was scared of the gator, and with good reason – it had probably escaped an earlier attempt by the gator and jumped into the water to escape. Even Amanda realized that might not be the brightest move but maybe it was the only one the little cat had. She bent over, reached down, and grabbed the kitten by the scruff of the neck. “Come on, little cat,” she said in what she hoped was a soothing voice. “You’re going to be all right now.”

The kitten was still excited, but at least realized it had been saved. “Get out of here, shitface,” Amanda yelled at the gator, wishing she had something she could throw at it. Then she gathered the little cat up in the crook of her arm, and took it below.

She set the cat on what there was of the galley counter – not much, it was one of the things Amanda had in mind to change – and took a moment to close the companionway slide and the hatchway. If the gator was that close she didn’t want to give it the chance to get into the cabin. Once she had that done, she grabbed the towel she’d used to dry off with earlier, and wrapped the little cat up in it, trying to dry it off.

“It’s all right, little cat,” she said softly as she sopped at the wet fur. “You’re going to be all right now. I didn’t let the big old gator get you and I’m not going to let it happen.”

In the light from the single bulb she could see a little more of the cat. It was still very young, six, perhaps eight weeks, maybe a little more although not much; it still had the “triangle tail” of a very young cat. In trying to dry the cat off she could see it was a female; it was a gray and black striped tiger, with white boots on its paws and a white chest. “You know,” she smiled, “You’re a pretty good looking little cat.”

She could hear the kitten putting out a very rewarding purr; apparently it knew it was in safe hands now. Amanda continued to try to pat the cat dry, although there was a limit to what she could accomplish, and in doing it realized that the kitten was very light and very thin. In the back of her mind she realized that someone must have dropped the cat off to let it try to make its own way, and obviously without too much success. If Amanda had to guess, she’d have said that the cat had been without food for several days. It was probably ravenously hungry.

Amanda thought for a moment. She didn’t have much in the way of what could be considered cat food, but there was a small can of tuna fish she’d bought earlier in the day with the idea of making a sandwich with it sometime. Whatever else happened, the little kitten deserved a good meal. It only took her a moment to dig out the can of tuna and peel back the lid. Just a little, she said to herself. If this kitty is really starved she shouldn’t eat a lot at one time. She found one of the plates from her camping dishes, set a spoonful of tuna onto it, and set the little cat down beside it.

The cat took about one second flat to realize that she had just had some food set down before her, and in an instant was eating it, her little triangle tail held high in the air. As Amanda looked on she realized that the cat really was hungry. “Eat that up, little girl,” she said softly to the cat. “I’ll give you some more later.”

As Amanda watched the cat tie into the tuna, she realized she didn’t know what to do next. But she’d rescued the kitten from the alligator, and she sure wasn’t going to turn it back out on deck with the gator probably still around hoping for a feline snack. “Well, shit,” Amanda said to herself. “I guess you’re going to have to stay with me tonight. Maybe in the morning Cordy or Sid will have some idea of what to do with you. Or maybe your momma will come looking for you,” she added, knowing there wasn’t a chance in hell that would happen.

In only a couple minutes the little cat had finished the tuna Amanda had put out for her. She looked up at Amanda and said, “Meep?” which Amanda took to mean, “Please, ma’am, may I have some more?”

“Not now, little girl,” Amanda replied. “You don’t want too much in your stomach at once.” Just to remove the temptation, she put the rest of the can of tuna into the icebox on the cabin floor. “Maybe you’d better settle down and get some rest.” After a moment’s thought, Amanda opened up a bag of rags she’d brought for cleaning, made a little nest of them, then set the kitten down into the middle of it. Immediately it started to groom itself, probably to dry its fur a little more. After a while it just curled up and looked to be sleeping.

“That’s not a bad idea,” Amanda said softly, then slid into her sleeping bag and turned out the light. In a few minutes she was asleep, but sometime later she became aware of something near her head. She reached up, felt a warm if still damp little cat. The touch started the kitten to purring, and all of a sudden Amanda didn’t feel quite as alone any longer.

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