Red Sand

by Ronan Cray

  “We can’t offer you a resort, but I can extend to you an invitation. When it comes time for you to leave, you are welcome to stay. By then, you might want to. It isn’t easy, being a survivor. You spend as much time looking back as you do looking forward. Your old life did not die naturally, it was abducted. A part of you still believes you will find it someday, and that part of you prevents you from living a whole life. After you survive, life is only half lived. The other half we reserve for ghosts.

  “I leave you with this final thought: Life isn’t worth dying for.

  “I hope you enjoyed the meal.”

  Lauren did enjoy the meal. A terrible lethargy struck her. Here eyelids drooped, but just as they closed Tuk clapped his hands. “Good! You are fed! Now you must see the rest of our island.”

  They filed out the door back into the unrelenting sun. Lauren took Carter’s hand as her eyes adjusted to the bright sunlight. He did not pull away. She leaned on him slightly, still tired, but enlivened by the daylight.

  Tuk led the column of survivors along the Great Salt Wall, naming it such, and stopped them at the top of a small hill. Frozen lava billowed out below them across the Flow. The landscape looked wounded, dotted between the hill and the ocean with what could only be described as pools of blood. Multi-hued layers of plastic covered the pools like gauze. Lauren nearly threw up.

  “These are our salterns. We pump seawater into depressions in the lava flows to form saltwater pools. Throughout the day, the water evaporates. The evaporated water collects on the tarps and runs into collection barrels. From this we obtain our fresh water. We harvest the remaining salt to preserve our food in the absence of refrigeration.” He paused, noticing the sick coloration of his audience. “An algae called Dunaliella salina thrives in our salt ponds, providing a good source of beta carotene. The red coloration is caused by halobacterium. It is native to the island and harmless to humans.”

  He extended his arm beyond the pools. “Out there, we net our fish in a cove. Our diet is made up mostly of meat from the sea. The vegetables you enjoy come from there.” He pointed to the right where translucent sheds pushed off the mountain onto the Flow. Tiny huts of all different shapes huddled against one central shed made entirely of plastic sheeting. “That is our greenhouse. Without it, we might very well starve.

  “And finally, behind me,” he indicated the cone of the volcano, “is Mount Elvis, our King. The volcano has lain dormant for as many years as we’ve been here, so don’t worry about Pompeii as you sleep. And, no, we don’t make sacrifices to keep Elvis happy.” He meant it as a joke, but the very notion of sacrifice didn’t sit well with his audience.

  “Tonight you will retire to Departure Camp, outside the Great Wall. You may spend the rest of the day in rest to regain your strength. In the morning you will be assigned a work detail. Then you’ll get a first-hand look at our operations.”

  Two men with ominous looking spears appeared on either side of Tuk. Lauren recognized them as the guardians of the Gate. “These gentlemen will take you to your camp.” You are welcome to sleep and recover, and we will see you in the morning.” Lauren trudged silently, too tired to speak.

  They followed the trail that led away from the Gate directly into the dunes. The guards refused to escort them, only making rude comments and pointing down the trail. Someone from another boat volunteered to lead the way, following a well-worn path due East.

  Ten minutes into the dunes they reached what they hoped was not Departure Camp. A serious of twenty huts tumbled against one another in a semicircle, none of them assembled from the same materials. Plastic sheeting of every color and thickness held together sun bleached planks, styrofoam blocks, ravaged metal sheets, and bits and pieces of boats in an architect’s nightmare. The charred remains of a campfire glowered above a circle of black stones.

  “Look at all that rust!” said Emily. “I hope my tetanus shots are current.”

  Lauren checked the horizon for a timely rescue. No ships out there. She turned back to the hovels. “They look cozy. Rather… Shabby Chic,” She said, trying to be funny.

  Carter frowned. “They look like shabby shi…”

  “Hello!” interrupted a man coming out of one of the huts. He looked like Robinson Crusoe in Hilfiger, pushing sixty, skin tanned to the complexion of bookends, chinos shredded into shorts, white shirt unbuttoned exposing a paunch of flaccid skin. He had been fat, once, some time ago. Now only the excess skin remained, hanging like melted ice cream. A small but heavy looking bag hung from the loops of his shorts, stained red around the top. The only part of him that gleamed was his teeth – dentures. Unlike the rest of the natives, he had dark brown hair.

  “Hello, hello, hello. You must be the new recruits! I’ve been expecting you!”

  He walked up and down the line of survivors, shaking hands like a tour guide. As he shook each hand, he reached up with his left hand and squeezed the recipients’ bicep. “Making them a bit soft in America now, eh?” he said, now and then.

  “I’m Paul and I’ll be with you until your ship comes in. I’m sorry I can’t offer you any games or local tours, but I can keep you company. I know you must all be anxious to get on your way, but I have to tell you it could be a week, a month, or even longer before a ship comes by. No need to grumble or kick sand at me. I don’t make the schedules. But I can make you feel at home while you wait.

  “And home is right behind me. They’re not much to look at, I know, but each one will keep you dry when it rains, cool when it shines, and safe when the wind blows.” Behind him, a gust of wind opened the door of one hut and slammed it into the other. “They’re pretty sturdy, most of them.”

  “Before I go on, do any of you need to use the restroom? It’s the hut over there on the left.”

  He pointed at what appeared to be a pile of car hoods stuck in the sand over a large pot. All around the structure was some kind of red powder.

  Emily covered her mouth. “Oh my god, I think I just threw up in my mouth a little.”

  “I know, it’s not pretty, and smells worse. I should warn you, though. Don’t even think about going over the hill and doing your business out in the sand. Bad idea.” The dentures disappeared under a frown. “We have a little problem with the local vegetation. It’s like… poison ivy, only one hundred times worse. You can’t see it, but it’s inside the sand right now. It’s not something you want to be near with your pants down.”

  “What’s that on the ground? “

  “It’s salt. We replenish it every three days. There’s something you may have noticed by now – we have to conserve everything on this island. You see that bucket underneath? Solids go in there, liquids go in a bag inside. We take the liquids down to the ponds to distill and irrigate the crops. The solids are composted and used as fertilizer and fuel.

  “Tomorrow you’ll see that operation in person. As long as you’re here, you’ll keep busy on a work detail. It’s like a day on the farm, chores and all. Maybe you want this to be like a little vacation, sitting on the beach, hunting seashells, getting a tan. Well, we don’t have time for that here. If you’re eating, you’re working. If you’re not working, we’ll eat you.”

  The groaning and muffled complaints died into silence. Wind whistled up the dunes, spitting grains against the back of the huts like rain.

  “I’m kidding! C’mon! Where’s your sense of humor? What, are you on an accountant’s retreat? Anyway, who wants to pick their own hut?” He turned and waved a wrinkled arm over his shoulder.

  There were more huts than people, and everyone seemed to have an immediate preference. Emily made a beeline for the hut furthest from the outhouse. Lauren picked the one beside her, not for the company but because it was the only structure that had white paint on the outside. It appeared to be half of a fiberglass hull, next to a dented silver sheet of some kind of metal, all tied together by plastic bags knotted end to end. She tried very hard to imagine she was in Greece. It wasn’t working.

  Befo
re ducking in, she gave Carter an encouraging look. He took the cabin beside her.

  Inside, it took a moment for her eyes to adjust. Enough light seeped through the seams of the walls to illuminate three cockroaches scuttling away. Those same seams left tiny piles of sand on the wood planks lining the floor. They were smooth beneath her feet, worn clean by years of wave action before being salvaged. An egg crate foam mat lay in one corner, inviting her. A full stomach and the hot sun drew her to the mattress, but her eyes went wide when she made out the décor.

  Was someone else living here?

  A few books and a flashlight lay next to the bed. Wallet photos of children plastered the fiberglass walls. A rosary hung from a nail. Two pairs of flip flops crisscrossed beside the door. There were even a few bits of dirty clothing heaped in one corner.

  She backed out into the light.

  “Emily!” she whispered as loudly as she could.

  Emily popped her head out of the adjacent hut, pushed the door open and closed with her sleeve, and stood next to Lauren. “What?”

  “Somebody’s stuff is in my hut.”

  “I know. Mine, too. Come see.”

  The inside of Emily’s hut wasn’t any more inviting. Instead of a foam mattress, she had a bare rope net suspended from the walls. Like Lauren’s, the walls were filled with little photos of smiling families, obviously not related. There were some ID cards, a pair of car keys, even a lock of hair tied in a ribbon.

  “This is creepy,” she said.

  “I know. You want to switch rooms?”

  Lauren pictured her foam mattress waiting for her. “No. Mine’s just as bad.”

  They heard a door bang open and some shouting outside. They ducked out to see the commotion.

  It was Carter. “Hell, no. What is this? Do I have to share my room with somebody?”

  Paul ran up. “No, no. There’s no one else here. Why?”

  “Someone’s stuff is in there.”

  “Oh, sure. You thought we built these just for you? You’re not the first survivors to wash up here, just as we weren’t. Ships crash all the time. We’ve had many, many people stay at Departure Camp over the years.”

  Lauren asked the obvious question. “Well, if they departed, why didn’t they take their stuff?”

  “There wasn’t time to pack! When we spot a ship, we get in the boat and get out there as fast as possible. A split second could make all the difference. I’ve seen people run for the boats without pants on. One couple had to stop in the middle of, well, they were in a hurry.”

  “But there are pictures in my hut!”

  “It’s like being at the office. Survivors like to put up pictures of their family, whatever they had on them in their wallets and purses. It keeps them going, at least until the boat comes.”

  The camp settled as everyone dozed through the afternoon. That evening, more vegetables and water waited for them near the campfire. There were no trees on the island that they could see. The fire smelled poorly, apparently made of reeds, seaweed, and dried human dung. It provided warmth, though, as the sun set and a cool breeze blew on shore.

  Lauren woke from her afternoon nap even more exhausted than before. The weight of the last twenty-four hours settled on her. Reality grew starkly apparent. Eating that lamb back in the village, she almost bought Mason’s “adventure” theory. Now she wanted out of the theme park. She ate her vegetables quietly, deliberately, and then retreated back to her hut.

  Later that night, when Lauren woke from a sweating nightmare, her first thought was of the wall. Why are there so many pictures?

  Lauren woke earlier than most of the others. She hadn’t slept well. Her dreams were punctuated by screams and wet noises, darkness and confusion. She pushed her head out of the door. Night still hovered over the island. On the horizon, the newborn sun struggled in a caul of clouds. She was on a beach, looking at a sunrise, just as she had always wanted. But this beach was empty of people, her cabana threatened to fall in, the sand fleas attacked without mercy, the air smelt of shit, and she had no hope of escape.

  Paul tended the fire. When she approached, he apologized, “I’m sorry we don’t have any coffee.”

  “That’s all right.” She took stock of her companions. No one else had risen. She thought of Max. “How’s our friend, Max?”

  “He’s in the hut at the furthest end. He’s awake. I heard him moaning. You can visit him, if you like.”

  Lauren stood up, slightly chilled, and moved that way. The last hut, closest to the latrine, consisted of five wooden timbers pushed against half an iron canister. It didn’t look comfortable. The door creaked when she entered, and she heard Max roll over as her eyes adjusted to the darkness.

  The hut smelled like something diseased. He had stopped vomiting because there was nothing left to come out.

  She reached for his hand. “Max? How are you doing?”

  His voice was a whisper. “It’s penance.”

  “What?”

  “I deserved this. I’ve done bad things.”

  “They couldn’t have been that bad.”

  “They were. They were. I cheated children.”

  She shrank back but held his hand.

  “I need to confess. Listen, please.”

  “I’m not a priest. I just came to see how you were.” She wanted to leave. Honestly, she’d expected him to be asleep. He hadn’t been this talkative in the boat. She remembered hearing that terminal patients experience a surge of energy before death. She shuddered, started to turn away, but then she remembered Mason’s pledge. “But… if you have something to say, I’ll listen.”

  Max coughed, a dry rattle like gas through a sewer pipe in an old home. “It’s the cavities,” he started. “No one gets them anymore. Damn fluoride! I couldn’t make a dime. My only profits came from cosmetic dentistry.” He paused, wheezing. His putrid breath filled the tiny room. It smelled like his core had already died while the surface fought on. “I could have just told people, ‘You need braces.’ Life… would have been comfortable, but, no, I was too smart for that. Graduated… with honors.” His swollen tongue licked his lips. It was a grotesque movement in one so dry.

  “Max, you look terrible. Let me get you some water.” She stood to leave.

  “I went after the children.”

  She turned back to hear him.

  “The children. I would get them into the chair, alone. I asked the parents to wait outside. When I had their mouths propped open, and they couldn’t talk, I told them they needed braces now, today. I told them, if they didn’t get braces, all their teeth would fall out. Horribly disfigured, they wouldn’t have any friends. They’d wear dentures and leave them in cups like grandmothers.

  “Then I let them go. They pestered their mothers with fears. They blew it out of proportion. Kids… they have a persistence no parent can withstand. When the inevitable frantic call came, I would tell the mother, ‘Yes, I just took a look at the x-rays, and Junior’s teeth are in bad shape. If we don’t act right away, these teeth will erupt in freakish proportions.’ Vanity always appealed to my clientele. Most of the mothers already had plastic surgery themselves.

  “That could have been enough, but I got greedy. I drew them in. ‘Your child needs braces right away,’ I told them ‘but I’m afraid I can’t help. I’m leaving tomorrow for vacation, and I won’t be around. But I can refer you to another dentist.’ It was a small town. The only other dentist got his degree from the Bahamas. He didn’t use Invisalign. I told the mothers what kind of results they could expect from him.

  “’No!’ they begged. ‘Please, I’ll bring my child in today.’ ‘I’m so sorry,’ I said, ‘But I’m booked up today, and I already have my flight reserved in the morning.’ ‘Please, we’ll pay you double. We’ll make it worth your while. Delay the trip for one more day! Please!’

  “I didn’t take a vacation for four years. I made a fortune… until…” He wheezed. It seemed to go on forever. “Some of my patients banded together to s
ue me. What could I do? I ran. We have a house in Paris anyway. We were going to… we…”

  His voice broke. His eyes went tight, crow’s feet on the edge, lips pushed up in a grimace. He had no more moisture for tears. “I lost everything. My wife, my daughter, my life. I’m not going to make it.”

  “Of course you are.” She felt awkward. She didn’t know this man, wasn’t a priest. She didn’t want to hear his story. She didn’t want to think someone who cheated the system deserved a bad end. “You’ll be fine.” Lauren gritted her teeth and patted his hand. “We’ll get you through this. You just hold tight.”

  A terrible raucous erupted outside. Paul must have been hitting every hut with an iron bar. She heard him shouting for everyone to wake up. It was time to start the day. “I have to go now. Paul will take good care of you, Max.”

  He gripped her. He had a surprisingly strong grip for a sick man. “Don’t go. Don’t leave me alone. I don’t want to be alone when I die.”

  She slipped free. “You won’t die, Max. I’ll come talk to you when I get back tonight. You hang tight.”

  She stepped into the bright sunlight. His dry, chapped hands reminded her of her boyfriend. She felt sorry for Max. He didn’t deserve to die for what he’d done.

  She had to believe that.

  She resolved to see him that night, but she would see him sooner.

  After a breakfast of hard, dried, salted fish and a cold potato, Paul separated the survivors into four groups and assigned work details. They were given small meals of fish to take with them throughout the day. Mason, Emily, Carter, and Lauren were allowed to stick together. “Today you’ll be working in our agriculture sheds,” Paul explained. “But first, we need to make the delivery. Carter, what did you do back in the real world?”

  Carter didn’t like being on the spot. “Steward on the late ship Princess Anne.”

  “Great! You’re used to carrying things. You’re hired. Now I need a volunteer to be your partner. Lauren, I saw you raise your hand.”

  “I didn’t…”