More of Us to the West (The Adrift Series Book 1), page 15
This was met by a barrage of “ME!” from all of us. He took a swig and passed the bottle along.
I twisted the flower in my fingers for a minute. ‘Left or right, Chris? Are you out there?’ As Magna took her seat, I hastily fastened it behind my left ear.
We’d sent Isobel on a task to gather large sea shells and twigs earlier in the day. Anna and I had then shaved the twigs down into chopsticks. We used the large sea shells as plates to hold our fish and algae dinner.
The first bite was glorious. I rolled my eyes back as the warm, salty fish touched my tongue. I held it there and savored it.
“Oh my Goooood.” Lilly groaned next to me as she did the same.
“Alaina,” Phil called across the fire, mouth full of fish, “If I thought I could get away with it, I’d come over there and kiss you right now.”
I smiled. I was actually proud of myself for the first time in as long as I could remember… I’d provided the fish and helped build the fire that cooked it. ‘Take that nature!’ I just wished Chris could’ve been there to see it. Then again, I thought, ‘I wouldn’t have done either of those things if Chris had been here. I would’ve relied on him to do them…’
“MMM MMMMM! Put that on top of your head and your tongue would beat your brains out trying to get to it,” Jim said between bites after Anna had placed a piece in his mouth with her own chopsticks. “Thank ye’ blondie.” He winked at her as she raised the sticks again.
Lilly furrowed her brow as she looked at Jim. She turned to me and Jack and leaned in scandalously. “Hey,” she whispered, “How’s he been… you know… going to the bathroom this whole time if he can’t use his arms?”
Next to me, Jack began to cough violently.
I bit my lip, handing him my water, and watched Lilly’s face as she put it together. Her eyes went wide after a moment. “Oooooh….. eeeeeew.”
He chugged the water as she stared at him, waiting for a response, his cheeks red with embarrassment.
“Oh, don’t look at me like that!” He hissed between us. “It was either I do it, or one of you. You’re welcome!”
She looked down and poked at her fish with a chopstick, lips twitching as she held back her laughter, then she looked back up at him, “That’s so sweet of you. Thank you, Jack.”
“Yes.” I held my own amusement, looking over at him and nodding. “Thank you, Jack.”
Her eyes met mine, and we both curled over in hysterical laughter.
“Ay! Ay!” Jim’s head lurched to one side. “What are you two over there carryin’ on about now?”
We both straightened. “Nothing, Jimmy.” Lilly said innocently, looking back to me and shaking with the chuckle she held in.
“Shut up.” Jack snarled as we both burst out again into uncontrollable laughter.
After a minute, we both straightened, and I wiped my eyes, catching my breath and avoiding eye contact with Lilly, who was adjusting her flower and taking deep breaths.
“Magna,” Lilly finally said softly as she wiped the mouth of the Dr Pepper bottle and took a drink, swallowing and exhaling hard, “Tell us more about Tahiti.”
“Oh,” Magna smiled, rocking back a little to think for a moment. “Well, you know they call it the friendliest place on earth.” She paused, carefully choosing the English words. “It’s much different than anywhere else. Not so busy. It’s simple. You go to the states and everyone’s busy with their phones and their computers and their jobs… No one talks to each other in the states except through their phones and their computers… even when they’re sitting next to each other. Tahiti is much simpler.”
She closed her eyes. “Not on the island though. Every morning Enoha, our local baker, makes baguettes and his son Metua comes round before dawn to deliver them fresh on our doorsteps. Haunui - that’s my husband - and I,” she smiled and touched her flower, “sit outside under our porch to share coffee and bread with our neighbors long before the sun comes up.”
She bit into a piece of fish and waited until she’d finished chewing to continue. “It’s a beautiful place. Everything is either green or blue, depending on which direction you look. And everyone knows you there. We talk to each other a lot. All day, everyone is always talking to someone. We have a lot of surfers who come. We often invite them to our homes for dinner. We show them the island. We make friends with our visitors.”
I took a drink of the warm Dr. Pepper and passed it over to Jack, enthralled in the story as it fizzed down my throat, leaving a trail of sweet cherry flavor in its wake.
“And we have one road that goes across the whole island. You never really see cars on it - well, except for the surfers… the rest of us all ride our bicycles or walk. Many of us work the resort or the charters so we all go together down to the water as the sun comes up, and we wait for each other to return home as the sun goes down.”
“It’s very beautiful. You see children outside playing all day and all night and if you want to close your store and go swim with the dolphins, no one complains - it’s a simple life and a very happy place.”
“Dolphins?” Lilly hopped in her seat. “Do you often see the dolphins?”
“Oh yes. All year we have dolphins, and so many different beautiful fish and turtles. If you stand at the water and look down, you could get lost for days in the life below you... Oh, I wish you could all come see it with me. I would show you all the best places.”
“That sounds wonderful, Magna.” Lilly smiled.
Magna looked beyond us to the water, “I will see it again.” Her dark eyes shifted back to us. “But until then, we should be grateful for this place. It’s just as beautiful. We found our own private paradise right here. We are here for a reason. We should learn from it… enjoy it… while we have the opportunity… before we are all pulled back to our busy lives.”
I think we all collectively sighed when she’d finished her story to return to her meal. She was right. The island we’d found was very beautiful - all green or blue depending on the direction you looked… still... my heart ached for Chris. Had he been sitting there next to me, I might never want to leave. I might hide away with him and stay here forever. As it was, I was anxious to leave paradise, anxious to know if he was truly gone forever.
I reached down to the small wooden box between myself and Lilly and pulled out the telescope, pressing it to my eye and looking up at the stars. Through the magnified lens, the sky was picturesque.
“Jim,” Anna said sweetly as I scanned the sky for the movement of a satellite. “What about you? Tell us where you’re from… what brought you out here.”
“And we wanna hear all about those lottery winnings.” Lilly added dramatically.
Jim sighed bashfully. “Oh well… they’s not much to tell really…”
‘Where are all the satellites?’ I frowned, lowering the telescope and rejoining the conversation.
“Don’t be shy now,” Bertie laid her hand softly on his shoulder, her shaking voice warm with affection, “We’ve all been sharing our stories since we met dear. Good and bad. You’ve been the loudest among us and yet we know the least about you.”
“Oh… Well…” he started, clearing his throat, “Where to start…”
“Why don’t you start by telling us where you’re from dear.” Bertie smiled warmly, “With an accent like that, I’ve been curious to know.”
“Well, you wouldn’t of heard of it, small town in Oklahoma. If you blinked you’d miss it.” He bit into the fish Anna offered, continuing on with his mouth full. “All poor folk, mostly. My daddy run off when I was ten, left me to hunt and fish if I didn’t want to live off government cheese. I ain’t sore about it. Made me into a good man and I didn’t like him much, anyway. Always comin’ in drunk and beatin’ on my mama.”
“Anyways,” he stretched his legs out, straightening his back as he took a deep breath in, “mama used to buy a lottery ticket - same numbers evra few days. Well, when she passed, I kept on playin’ those same numbers - evra few days. Then one day, BOOM. I won me some money.”
“How much money did you win?” Lilly asked, eyes wide.
He looked over the fire at her, “Now don’t go eyeballin’ me now sweetheart, I ain’t no go-zillionaire or nothin, but I won some money, ‘nuff to pay for a trip and come back and buy my own rig. Maybe start my own truckin’ business and buy some land. Mama always talked about goin’ to Bora Bora if she ever won.” He frowned, “She never did make it… she never made it anywhere outside Oklahoma... so I thought I’d come see it fer myself straight away. Hoped maybe she might somehow be able to see it through me.”
He paused in thought and blew out, “Ain’t it a bitch though, I went my whole life being poor as old Job’s turkey, finally come into some money and the Good Lordt strikes my plane out the sky so I cain’t spend a damn penny. Me and him’s gonna have words when I get up there.”
“If you get there before I do,” Phil teased, “You tell him I’ve got some words for him as well… not so much about this as it would be about my second wife and whether or not she really was the devil incarnate.”
Jim laughed loudly. “Ay, ye’ know I believe I might’ve met yer second wife, myself?”
Jack cleared his throat. “Me too. Got real bad breath…”
The three of them laughed thunderously, a peaceful quiet coming over us all when they’d settled.
“Bruce,” Anna looked toward him, offering Jim another bite of fish. “What about you? Tell us about your wife.” She glanced at the wedding band.
Bruce frowned. “No, no.” He pushed a piece of algae around the shell with his chopsticks. “I don’t want to spoil the mood.”
“Don’t be silly,” she insisted.
“Oh… Well…” he started, setting his shell down and clearing his throat, “She, ah…” he looked down, “We ah…. Well… I always knew she was too pretty for me. Everyone said so too… She’s thin and fit… Beautiful blue eyes… the cutest dimples right here,” He pointed to each side of his own cheeks, “no idea how she ended up with someone like me…” He looked down at his belly.
He blinked. “For whatever reason, she married me. I made her laugh, she said. We bought a house… and things were good for a year or so… Anyways, a few weeks ago, she asked me for a divorce… said she met someone else... I knew she had. Could tell by the way she was acting… She stopped laughing at my jokes… stopped looking at me altogether. I couldn’t blame her… I mean look at me… So, I… well, I hopped on a flight to Tahiti… and I imagine she thinks I’m dead now.”
Phil made a noise, “Sounds like my second wife.” He raised the Dr. Pepper toward Bruce. “Count your blessings buddy, sounds like you dodged a bullet.”
Bruce turned his hand over in front of him, letting the light from the fire dance across the gold band. “Tried to take the ring off…” He laughed then, “it won’t budge though.”
Anna hastily set her shell on the ground, leaving Jim, who’d been sitting with his mouth open for another bite, with a disappointed look on his face.
“Let me see that.” She snatched his hand and inspected the finger. “I can get this off.” She rubbed his fingers for a moment, then quickly rose and turned.
As she disappeared into the shelter behind us, Bertie laid her hand on Bruce’s. “All part of a bigger plan dear.” She shifted her eyes toward the shelter and back, “Better days are coming to you, you just gotta have faith.”
Anna reappeared with a coconut and dental floss. “You know,” she knelt in front of him, “You could’ve lost your finger like this.”
As she covered the finger in coconut oil and began to wrap it with floss, Jack mumbled behind me.
“What’d you say?” I leaned over to him.
“I said,” he leaned toward me, “Women are heartless.”
I pursed my lips. “Lots of them, yes.” I agreed, talking in a whisper as we looked over to Bruce while he watched Anna pull at the floss. “Not all.” I smiled as she pulled, and I watched the ring as it slid with ease up and off the finger.
“There! See! You should’ve mentioned it sooner!” She smiled at him.
He sat, rubbing his finger, looking at her. “Oh, that’s so much better. Thank you!”
“It’s no problem.” She smiled, holding the floss out as the ring dangled between them. “I had to do it for myself just two years ago… What should we do with this?”
“Oh,” he inspected it, touching it lightly with one finger, “Idunno… I’d throw it in the ocean but I’m sure we could make something out of it.”
“Alright,” Anna stood, “do you want to hold on to it until we do?”
He shook his head. “Nah. You keep it. Good riddance.”
She tucked it into her pocket and bent to whisper something in his ear and as she came back, they both laughed loudly.
Lilly nudged my shoulder, whispering close in my ear, “Oh Bruce,” she giggled, doing her best impression of Anna, “I’d be happy to keep your ring… Oh, take me now… take me now!” And she laid her head on my shoulder dramatically and sighed.
I smirked. “You’re terrible.”
She curled her arm around me, looking back at them, “You have no idea.” She pulled me closer, grinning. “They’ll be madly in love by the end of the week once I’m done here.”
I felt suddenly at ease with this group. Despite our circumstances, I was beginning to care about them, even growing comfortable with them. I’d never had close friends before - just family and Chris, but I felt connected to these people like I’d never felt connected to anyone outside my family. We’d gone through hell together and come out alive… come out still able to laugh together somehow…
“Ay Hoss,” Jim tilted his head to one side, peering through the fire in our direction, “Let’s me and you take a walk. I got somethin’ I need to talk to ye ‘bout.”
At that, Lilly curled into me, and we burst into uncontrollable laughter again.
Chapter Sixteen
“Marry me.” Chris said, his chin rested on my chest. We were lying in my bed in my small apartment, only a thin sheet between our naked bodies as the morning sun spilled in from the tiny corner window.
“What?” I laughed back at him, running my fingers through his dark hair. He was grinning at me. His knees were bent behind him, and I could see his feet dancing back and forth in my peripherals.
“Marry me,” he repeated simply. His big green eyes stared into mine.
“Are you serious right now?” I asked, breathless.
“Well…” he lifted his chin and laid a soft kiss where it had rested, then looked back up at me, “Yeah.” He bent his arms on each side of me to prop himself up a little higher and I let my hands fall from his hair down his back.
We’d been dating for only six months, but I’d fallen so madly in love with him in those six months, it felt like I’d known him for years.
I paused, searching his eyes. “Chris… You’re serious?” I laughed.
“Yes, ma’am.”
“You want to marry me?”
“Yes, I want to marry you. Right now.” His hand slid back from under my pillow and came up holding a small black box.
My face lit up. “Right now?” I ran a finger down the velvet box and he popped it open to reveal the most beautiful diamond ring I’d ever seen.
“It was my grandmother’s ring,” he said, watching as my finger ran delicately along the center diamond. It was a stunning princess cut, one enormous diamond housed among a circle of smaller, all surrounded by an intricate swirling silver braid that wrapped seamlessly into the band.
My mouth dropped open, and I looked back to him, tears in my eyes. “Of course I’ll marry you!” And I pulled him to me and kissed his lips.
He broke away, grinning, and rose to sit back on his calves, straddling me, carefully pulling the ring from its box to place it on my finger. He looked down at me then as I turned my hand to examine its brilliance on my hand.
“This means you belong to me now.” His voice was low and thick.
My eyes fixated on the ring, I smiled, “I’ve always belonged to you, love.”
He lowered himself, arms on each side of my face, and hovered just beyond where my lips could reach. His eyes possessively scanned my face. “All mine.”
“All yours, love..” I smiled at him and wrapped my arms around his neck, but raised an eyebrow when he continued to study my face.
“Tell me what I can give you, Ally. What should our life look like ten years from now?”
I ran a finger down one arm, observing the shine of the diamond as the light from the window danced off it. “Well,” I smiled, looking back at him. “We live out in the country - small town, but not so country that we can’t still come to the city easily…” I pondered, shifting my gaze back to the ring and using my nails softly as my fingers ran back up to his shoulders, “And we have a little white house with black shutters… and a porch that wraps around the front, with an old-fashioned swing like gramma’s have, with big tall trees that circle the whole property.”
My hands smoothed over his shoulders, working up to his cheeks, and he turned his head softly to one side to kiss my palm. “Mmm, what else?”
I smiled, picturing it. “And three kids. Two boys and a girl - the girl is the youngest so the boys will watch out for her… Obviously.”
“Obviously,” He echoed, “What else?” He kept his eyes concentrated on me as his lips worked down the side of my hand along my wrist.
“and…” I breathed out in a sigh as his mouth came to my shoulder, his breath near enough to my neck to send a shiver through my body, “a big fluffy dog…”
“And?” He breathed against my ear, lowering his mouth to my neck.
“And,” I breathed heavier, tangling my fingers in his hair to pull him further up my throat, “and we sit at a table to eat dinner as a family every night… no matter how busy we are…”
His lips, now wet, worked downward, pulling the thin sheet between us with him as he worked his way along my collarbone. “What else?”
