Marie-Ange Saint-Jacques and her mother Venante Saint-Jacques board a boat to leave Haiti for America. Marie-Ange goes by her own desire to leave the difficulty and poor conditions of Haiti, but Venante, fearful that the boat will sink, only goes because her daughter desires her to do so. The two have paid Tony, a djaspora who left for America then returned to Haiti with money and American ideals, five hundred dollars apiece to take the journey on Tony's boat to Miami. As Venante enters the boat, she prays hysterically, then unties her scarf from her head and lays it on the ground. Marie-Ange can tell that others understand her mother's despair and fear, but no one is as hopeless as her mother, who thinks they are all going to die but prays that her daughter will survive. Tony had promised the journey would take "no time at all" and had allowed as many people as wanted to go and could pay onto the boat; as a result, the boat is overcrowded, and the passengers do not pack enough supplies for the long journey. The boat runs out of gas only a few miles from the island and continues on only by coasting along on the wind. The heat on the boat is unbearable, and the passengers lie side by side on the floor, sweating, tired, and wet from the water running into the boat. One night, some passengers begin screaming, and the wind picks up, crashing waves into the boat. One passenger jumps off the side of the boat into the water— everyone is in hysterics. Venante tells Marie-Ange that there are zombies, and she must close her eyes. Marie-Ange listens to her mother and, with no idea what is going on, keeps her eyes closed until she passes out. When daylight breaks and Marie-Ange wakes up, all the passengers have calmed down, though she cannot find her mother. She thinks about the stories she has heard of the dead traveling underwater. Finally, she sees Miami in the distance, or maybe it is Cuba, or maybe it is Ginen, and the Haitians have returned to Africa.