The Third Hold

A ladder takes you down into the third hold of a ship, and the hold is a street market. It runs the length of the ship, and stalls stand along both sides on the bare steel. A seed seller's cloth, paper twists in rows. A hand press with a bucket of ink under it, thumping. Print while you wait, says a boy at the lever. Two cooks with a stove apiece, one lid ringing. Crates of Strawbactus cuttings in wet burlap, flat green pads with a soft fur on them.

A woman in a long coat is going down the middle, touching each stall pole as she passes. One of the cooks calls to her: Paloma. Her right hand stays in her coat pocket.

At the far end, under a lamp, a woman at a plank is mending a radio. A dozen more sit beside her, each with a work order tied on by a string, and one of them is turned up, a voice counting hands: For. For. Against.