Wrecked (30 page)

Jonathan and Kevin worked harder than they’d ever worked in their lives, that day.  They made a good team, choosing the right materials together and easily agreeing how everything should fit together.  With Jonathan’s added muscle, it got easier and easier to transport the materials and get them in place.

“What do you think, Jon?  Is she going to be ready?”

“Yeah.  We just need to finish that part of the floor and that one wall, and that’ll be good enough for temporary living space.  What do you think?”

“Yes, definitely.  Let’s get this mother done.”

***

“Wow, I’m totally impressed with the progress you’ve made.”  She walked through Sarah’s workshop.  “Cots!”  She laid down on one.  “Oooh, comfy.  Is there one for me?”

“Of course.  You’re laying on it right now.”

Candi sat up and looked around.  “I love the table.  How cool is that?  It’s like a Japanese restaurant table.  We’re going to sit on the floor around it, right?”

“Yes.  I made cushions to sit on by weaving a big pocket out of palm fronds and then stuffing it with crumbled up palm frond leaves and palm canvas.”  The canvas was a material that naturally came off the palms around the coconut bunches.  It was pliable and thick and made good cushion innards.

“What else?  I feel like I’m at Pier One Imports, shopping for my new house.”

Sarah smiled.  

“I made shutters to go over the window holes that will eventually be in all the treehouse walls.  Right now since we only have one wall, I have only one set of shutters.  I need you to help me finish that project.”

“Sure, no problem.  What do we need the shutters for?”

“The rainy season.  I think the rain is going to come in at an angle.  That’s how it was when we took a vacation to Miami one year, anyway – the rain came down and the wind blew it sideways.”

Candi held up a rectangular-shaped woven mat.  “What’s this?”

“It’s a placemat.”

“Why do we need placemats?” 

“We don’t
need
them.  It’s just … I don’t know.  To make our little treehouse more like home.”  She flipped one back and forth, flicking the edge with her fingers.  “My mom was always a placemat fanatic.  She loved a formal dining table setting.  I miss her.  This is kind of my way of having her here with me, even though I know she can’t be.”  Sarah looked at the ground, hiding her face.

Candi reached over and stroked her arm.  “I’m sorry.  I didn’t mean to sound critical.  I think it’s nice how you’re making everything so comfortable for us.  It’s going to make a big difference in our lives.   Seriously.  Thank you.”

Sarah nodded, fighting the sadness and pushing thoughts of missing her mom to the back of her mind.

Candi walked over to admire one of Sarah’s roof panels.  It was several layers thick, secured with a complicated weaving technique that looked like it would last a long time.

“Man, Sarah, you are seriously good at homemaking.”

Sarah shot Candi a suspicious look.

“No, I mean it.  I know in this day and age that sounds like an insult – but here on Peanut Island, it’s a major compliment.  If it wasn’t for you, we’d still be sleeping on a dirty sheet in a swarm of bugs.”

“Thanks, Candi, that’s very sweet of you.  It was a team effort.”  She looked around at her handiwork.  “I am good at this, though, aren’t I?  I think if we were back home, I would never have appreciated what it meant to make a home.  Now I do, I really do.  I’m not ashamed of that.  Even when we get back, I’m sure I’ll still feel the same way.  This is important.”  She stopped for a moment to consider what she had just said.  “Holy shit.  Shoot me now, would you please?  I sound just like my mother.”

Candi laughed.  

The girls both went quiet then, thinking about home, wondering what their mothers were doing.  Neither wanted to consider what it might be like for them, home alone, thinking they had lost all of their children.  Or worse – that their parents wouldn’t be home at all.

CHAPTER TEN

Moving In

Finally the end of the afternoon came.  The guys announced that the floors were totally done.  Under Kevin’s direction, all four of them formed an assembly line to get their new furnishings into the treehouse.   They used a ladder they’d made of bamboo and rope; it was designed to lean against an opening on the edge of the treehouse and could be pulled up and stored above, making it impossible for anyone below to come up if they didn’t want them to.

They spent an hour putting the cots away, laying down woven sleeping mats for the guys, working on securing the roofing materials better, and attaching the one set of shutters.  The guys put the table in place, and Sarah carefully placed the cushions around it.  

The last item Sarah put up was a small mirror that had come from her makeup case.  She had framed it with a palm frond border.  This she hung by its plant rope loop on a splinter of bamboo that had been implanted into the side of one of the poles of the treehouse in the area she had designated as the bathroom.  They couldn’t actually use this area as a toilet – that place was still deep in the woods as far as they could reasonably make it from their water source.  This bathroom was for brushing teeth and doing hair.  Not that there was a lot of hair doing going on these days, but maybe in the future, when all the building was over, there would be time for beauty again.  Sarah sighed.  What she really needed was running water.

“What are the chances you guys could get some running water up here?” Sarah asked of no one in particular.

“I don’t know about running water, but we could probably rig some sort of water in a pulley system kind of thing,” suggested Jonathan.

“Yeah, but not until we get everything else done,” said Kevin.  “We still have walls that need to go up, platforms to build, extensions to add.  The water pulley thing comes after that stuff.”  He stared at Jonathan, giving him one of those looks that said, ‘Don’t even think about it.’  He knew how easily Jonathan was influenced by Sarah these days.  If Kevin let her have her way, Jonathan would build her a fully functioning bathroom with a spa tub before they had the damn walls up. 
How and when did Jonathan get so wrapped up in my sister, anyway?

When they were finally done and the sun was lower on the horizon, they gathered around the south side of the treehouse, in what was the guys’ bedroom, looking out over their rock to the treetops, beach, and water below.  There were a lot of branches and leaves hanging down in front of the wall, providing an effective screen against the sunlight and the intruding eyes of anyone approaching the island from the south – but there was enough space between the branches and leaves to see out over the water.  The view was simply magical.

Candi stood next to Kevin.  He reached out, putting his arm around her.  She didn’t resist.  It was nice to stand there and feel the breeze on his face and the warmth of Candi’s body next to his.

***

Jonathan watched Kevin and his sister out of the corner of his eye.  He wasn’t surprised to see them getting closer.  He turned the other way and saw Sarah standing off by herself.  She didn’t seem to be aware of what was going on.  He wondered if she would approve of her brother and his sister together.  

Jonathan stepped over to stand next to Sarah and began speaking quietly with her, at a volume only she could hear.

“What are you thinking about?”

“I was just wondering if we’re ever going to get off the island.”

“What do you think?”

“I’m not sure.  I don’t even know how badly I want to be rescued right now.”

“Why do you say that?”

“I don’t know.  I’m conflicted.  I do miss my old life – but not as much as I probably should.”

“I don’t get it.”

Sarah sighed.  “School’s always been so easy for me, you know?  I had lots of friends, a boyfriend, lots of things to do on weekends … but there are a lot of things I don’t miss, too.”

“Like what?”

“I feel guilty saying it.”

“It’s just us here.  I’m not going to judge you.”

“My parents for one,” she said, looking down at the bamboo floor.  “I should miss them more, but I don’t.  I miss my mom a little.  But shouldn’t a girl miss her mom more than that?”

Jonathan shrugged.  “I guess it depends on the mom.”

“And my dad.  I really don’t miss him at all.  Whenever he was home, I tried not to be.  Now I don’t have to work at avoiding him.”

“So being on this island is easier.”

“Yeah.  I guess.  It’s almost like a relief, not to have to deal with all that negativity.  At home and at school.  The drama got old.”

“You do seem happier here.”

Sarah gave him a narrow-eyed look.  “That sounds like a nice way of saying something else.”

Jonathan held his hands up in surrender.  “No, not at all.  I mean it.  You’re more relaxed.  Just less … stressed.”

She stared out at the water again. 
“Water, water everywhere, nor any drop to drink.”

“That’s weird.  That’s exactly what I was thinking when we were on that lifeboat.”

“Thank you, Language Arts class.  I can’t get that stupid poem out of my head.  At least here there
is
a drop to drink.”

“That reminds me, wanna go check the water catchers with me?  We had some good rain last night, so they might be full.”

Sarah shrugged.  “Sure, why not.”

Jonathan and Sarah moved away from the back room and climbed down to the ground. They strolled toward the rainwater catching basins that Kevin and Jonathan had rigged out of banana leaves and bamboo cups they had made.

It turned out that each bamboo pole had several cups in it.  Each one of the rings that was visible on the outside was actually an internal divider that ran completely through the cane.  All they had to do was make a cut just below each ring, and they instantly had a sturdy cup that would hold water.  Not only were they using these cups to store water around the treehouse, they were also using the cups at mealtimes.  

They arrived at the water-gathering site a couple minutes later.  

“Looks like we’re full.  Here – take some of these water bottles and fill them up from the cups.”

Sarah took three bottles from Jonathan and started emptying the cups into them.

“Do you think we’ll ever get off this island?” asked Sarah.

“Yes, I think so.  I don’t know that it’ll be soon, but eventually humans will move in this direction.  The planet is already suffering from overcrowding.”

“Have you thought about what life will be like when we get back?”

“Not really, have you?”

“I have been lately.”

“You don’t sound very happy about it.”

“I guess I’m not.”

“That’s strange.”

“Why?”  Sarah stopped filling up her bottle and looked at Jonathan.

“I don’t know.  I heard what you said earlier, and I get it; but I still can’t discount how popular you were in school.  You had lots of friends, a nice car, a nice house.  You’re beautiful.  I guess, what I’m saying is, you had it all there.  Why wouldn’t you want to go back to having it all?  Even if there’s drama and stuff – it’s got to beat being here with just three other people and not a lot to do other than survive.”

“Well, I could say the same about you.”

Jonathan smiled.  “That’s really nice of you to say that, but you know it isn’t true.”

“Well, sure it is.  You had friends in school.  You had your own transportation, a decent house.  Your parents seem pretty nice.  What’s not to miss?”

“First of all, comparing our lives is like comparing apples to oranges.  I was invisible in that school.  You were the homecoming queen.  You’re a supermodel, and I’m – well – I’m me.  My friends were just as invisible as I was.  Your friends are the who’s who of our town.  You live in a mansion, I live in a saltbox.”  Jonathan shook his head, not agreeing with her assessment.  “There’s no comparison, really.”

Sarah walked over to where Jonathan was standing, filling up a water bottle.

“I’ve had some time to reflect on my life back at school, and I’ve decided after hearing you say this stuff that our lives back there were seriously effed up.”

Jonathan chuckled.  “In what way?”

“Well, every way really.  I mean, you defined us and our positions in school by our looks and the status of our friends.  It’s like who we are, deep inside, really didn’t matter at all.  That’s just … bullshit.”

Jonathan nodded his head.  Logically, what she was saying made sense, even though he knew high school life wasn’t necessarily based on logic.  “Go on, I’m listening.”

“And your assessment of my home life is so far off – I mean you have no idea.  My father is a complete douchebag, and my mother is a drugged-out airhead who can’t even open her mouth to protect her own children.”

Jonathan stopped what he was doing and looked at her.  She was staring at him intently.

“Why do you hate your father so much, and what do you mean your mother’s drugged out?”

Sarah walked over and sat down on a nearby log.  “My father and I have a long history of mutual loathing.  When I was a little girl, I thought he was awesome; he was my dad, you know?  But then, when I was about thirteen or so, he just turned into this monster.  One day I was getting ready to go to school, and he didn’t like what I was wearing, so he just tore into me.  He actually told me I looked like a slut.  It, like, totally came out of the blue.”

“Wow.  That’s pretty harsh.”

“I know, right?  No matter what I did after that day, he just wouldn’t let up.  Every day it was like he had a new insult – for my hair, my clothes, my brains or lack of them.  He used to say that someday my personality was going to get me into a lot of trouble, that no one liked people like me.”

“God, what a jerk.”

“No, the word is ‘douchebag’.  I decided after hearing his insults for years and trying unsuccessfully to change his attitude towards me, that I might as well just be full-on me.  When I was sixteen I told him to go suck it.  That kind of sealed the deal between us.”