The Raft (short story)

For the Marvel comic book prison of the same name, see The Raft (comics).

"The Raft"
Author	Stephen King
Country	United States
Language	English
Genre(s)	Horror short story
Published in	Gallery (1st release), Skeleton Crew
Publication type	Magazine
Media type	Print (Periodical & Paperback)
Publication date	1982

The Raft is a horror short story by Stephen King first published as a booklet included with Gallery in November 1982, and collected in King's 1985 collection Skeleton Crew.

Plot summary

"The Raft" is about four college students, two young men (Randy and Deke) and two young women (Rachel and LaVerne), who go out to swim on a remote Pennsylvania lake during the autumn, when nobody is around. After they swim out to the raft in the middle of the lake, a mysterious oil slick-like creature appears in the water beneath them. Deke ridicules Randy's suspicions that the "oil slick" was chasing the girls, refusing to take the situation seriously until Rachel touches it. The creature instantly wraps around her arm, pulls her into itself, and dissolves and absorbs her.

After the initial panic, the group contemplates their next course of action. Swimming past the creature is not an option, as it moves with lightning speed. The group has driven eight miles off the nearest back road without having told anyone where they were going, making rescue impossible. The group assumes that the creature may leave them alone after some time, and attempt to quietly wait, but it does not leave. After some time passes, the creature squeezes under the raft. Deke decides he could make a swim to the shore, but as he prepares to jump into the lake he steps on a crack on the raft and the creature grabs him by his foot. Unable to free their friend, Randy and LaVerne watch as Deke is slowly consumed by the creature through the crack. Randy later realizes with horror that he and LaVerne could have swum to shore while the creature was busy eating Deke.

Now unwilling to risk swimming for shore, Randy and LaVerne take turns watching the creature (which changes positions every now and then and produces colors on its surface that hypnotizes and disorients them into almost falling off the raft). One stands while the other one sits. During the course of the night, LaVerne convinces Randy that they should sit together and keep each other warm. He eventually touches one of LaVerne's breasts and they end up having sex. During intercourse, LaVerne's hair falls over the side of the raft, allowing the creature to pull her into the water by her hair and devour her.

A day passes, and Randy fantasizes about rescue. The creature begins to flow under the raft every time Randy tries to sit down, forcing him to remain standing. After nightfall, Randy finally gives up, acknowledging the hopelessness of the situation. He turns to the creature and begins to think that the colors the creature produces will take the pain out of being consumed. Randy does not look away as the creature begins to produce its colors, and the story ends.

Film adaptation

"The Raft" was adapted to film as a segment of the 1987 horror anthology movie Creepshow 2, directed by Michael Gornick with a screenplay by George A. Romero.

The ending was changed for the film. As soon as the creature eats LaVerne, Randy makes a swim for shore and is quickly pursued. Crawling a few feet from the water's edge in apparent safety, he yells "I beat you!" but the creature becomes a wave and engulfs him. As the creature quietly returns to the lake, the screen pans over a no-swimming sign near the now-abandoned Camaro which was hidden in overgrown reeds.

This segment of the movie was filmed at Granite Basin Lake in Prescott, Arizona.

Background

In the intro to the story in The Twilight Zone Magazine and in afterword to the book Skeleton Crew, King relates an anecdote about the story's possible 1969 publication in Adam magazine in different form, under the title "The Float". He explains that the story was accepted for publication by Adam magazine. A short time after that King was arrested in the town of Orono, Maine for removing a number of traffic cones from the street after one of them had damaged his car. He was unable to pay the two hundred and fifty dollar fine handed down by the court and was about to be jailed for thirty days when the payment check for "The Float" arrived in the mail, an event King referred to as akin to "having someone send you a real Get Out of Jail Free card." Despite the fact that King received payment for the story he has never been able to locate a copy of the magazine with the published story in it.