The Island of Dragons (Rockpools Book 4)

by Gregg Dunnett

  “I wouldn’t call it fun. But it’s important.”

  “Hmmm.” Amber nods her head.

  “I do like your hair color.” Eric says, a minute or two later, and he tries to smile at Amber, but he still seems off somehow.

  “Thank you Eric,” Amber replies. “I like yours…” But her words are drowned out by a huge roar of laughter from the other end of the table, and it’s followed by Jennifer giggling for ages, like she’s unable to stop. And I kind of get the feeling it’s fake somehow, from the way she glances at Lily at the end, to make sure she sees it.

  “They probably shouldn’t have lion fish in there,” I say, suddenly. I know it’s not the most appropriate thing to say, but I want to try to lighten the mood plus, it’s been bothering me since I sat down.

  “What?” Eric asks.

  I point at the fish tank, and the large lionfish – Pteriois – swimming slowly behind the glass.

  “Why not?” Eric replies. “Will they eat all the others?”

  “Yeah, but the problem isn’t in the fish tanks, it’s in the wild. People buy them because they think they’ll look good in their tanks, then when they eat everything else they dump them in the toilets, or release them into the ocean. And they’ve become one of the worst invasive species along the whole coastline of the Americas.”

  “No way?” Eric says.

  “Yeah. They’re incredibly efficient predators. They have very large mouths, and they drift up close to other fish, and then strike really quickly. But the real problem is how fast they reproduce. The females can produce 30,000 eggs every seven days. They just drive out native species.”

  “Really.”

  It gets better after that. At least, Eric gets a bit more talkative, and he and Amber seem to get on OK. But there’s still a divide on the table, and Lily still doesn’t say much. Meanwhile James, Oscar and Jennifer seem to be having a great time. They’re laughing, and they keep ordering more wine every time they finish a bottle, which seems to happen a lot, but when they do, they don’t even send the bottle down to our end. It’s like Eric and Amber and me are at a completely different dinner. But eventually it ends, and then I start to worry about the bill. Before – when we were at the beach – I think Lily paid for all the food, and I sort of hope the same happens here, even though that doesn’t seem fair on her, but I’m just worried about how much it’s all going to cost. But that’s not what happens. Instead James orders a round of what I think are brandies for himself and Oscar, and he asks for the check at the same time. But when it actually comes it gets given to him, because he’s the one who asks for it. And after he looks at it, he announces loudly that we should all just split it equally, since that’ll be easier. He looks at me as he says it. It’s pretty much the first thing he’s actually said to me all night. And right away Oscar and Jennifer agree equally loudly, and it’s like it’s settled when it isn’t. I turn to Amber, and I can tell she’s incandescent with rage, and I almost hope she’s going to say something, but I can tell she’s holding herself in. And so she and I just pay what we’re asked, I think just to get out of there.

  When we finally leave, James and Oscar and Jennifer say they’re going to go onto a club, and they ask if we’re coming, but I can tell they don’t really mean it. So there’s a painful five minutes, when they sort of pretend to be waiting to see if we’ll change our minds, but really they’re just waiting for a cab, and then they finally get in and disappear. Even then it still feels tense, because Eric and Lily are still here. Lily wants to go home, and Eric says he’ll take her, so they get into the next cab. And then it’s just me and Amber left.

  “What the hell Billy?” she says to me, the moment it’s just the two of us. “What the fucking hell was that all about?”

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  I can’t really pretend it was a success of an evening, so I don’t.

  “They’re your friends? The reason I haven’t seen you in weeks?”

  “They’re not always like that. I don’t know what was wrong with them.”

  “So what are they normally like? Just ordinary stuck-up rich assholes, instead of rich assholes intent on being as rude as fucking possible?”

  “No… I…” We’re still standing outside the restaurant, but there’s no more cabs. “Do you want to call an Uber?”

  “No Billy. I don’t want to call an Uber. I don’t have any money left.”

  I don’t have any money left either, so instead we start walking, but Amber doesn’t let up.

  “I mean, what was she like? That one in the white sweater, the miserable one. What was her name?”

  “Lily.”

  “Lily – what sort of a name is that?”

  I don’t answer.

  “I’m studying Law. It’s important.” Amber imitates Lily’s voice, but in a mocking way.

  “They’re not always like that.” I suddenly interrupt her. “They’re really not. Something must have happened.”

  Amber turns to look at me now. “You know I’m actually still hungry?”

  I frown.

  “I can’t believe I’ve paid two hundred dollars for dinner, and I’m still not full. And let’s not even talk about that wine.” Amber screws up her nose. At least Lily insisted on picking up the tab for that, otherwise our bill would have been much higher. “Do you want to go somewhere? Somewhere normal?”

  So we walk back towards her house, and after a while we come to another restaurant, which I think is Malaysian, so not exactly normal, but Amber tells me I should try it, so we do. We go inside, and eat noodles, and they’re good, and the whole thing feels normal – like it used to feel with Amber. She tells me more about how her life is going here in Boston, and what’s happening at her work, and how she’s dating a guy called Sean, who’s Irish and works in a gym – none of which I had any idea about. She had a tough time a while back did Amber, when her boyfriend was killed, so I’m glad to hear she’s seeing someone again. I tell her a bit about my housemates, and how they’re OK, but a bit dumb, and I then try to explain why it is I like Lily, and even her friends normally. And we talk about my course, and why that’s a bit annoying because it’s too basic, and Amber tells me it’ll get better, I just have to stick with it.

  And then my phone rings, and it’s Eric.

  “Hello,” I say. I don’t go away from Amber, because it’s not too loud in the noodle place.

  “Billy.” Eric replies, but he doesn’t say anything else.

  “Are you OK?”

  “I am.” He sighs. “But I’ve just spent an hour with Lily crying her eyes out on my shoulder. And I just thought I should let you know.”

  He sounds weary, and I’m kind of shocked – or just somehow reluctant to be pulled back to thinking about where we’ve just been, and what happened earlier. I was feeling good, enjoying it being just me and Amber again.

  “Know what?”

  “To know why you had to sit through the most excruciating night in the history of the world,” Eric replies.

  “Oh,” I say. “Why?”

  But then he doesn’t answer right away.

  “Look, I don’t know if I’m supposed to tell you this, Lily didn’t… Well I couldn’t get a straight answer out of her. But I thought…”

  “Just tell me.”

  “Alright, alright” Eric sounds put out. “Don’t you go getting all dominant on me. I don’t think I can take any more major upheavals in my life.”

  “Please just tell me Eric,” I soften my voice.

  “OK. Well the reason tonight was so awkward is that James broke up with Lily this evening. Literally just before they arrived at the restaurant.”

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  I don’t see Lily, or Amber, or Eric, or any of them, for a long time after that. And to be honest, I’m not sure I want to. My course still isn’t difficult, but there is a lot of work to do, and right now I’ve got a whole bunch of essays that I have to write, so for a while I’m able to lose myself in researching the
m. I actually got my grades back for my first essays, and while they were OK, I did get one B, and I don’t want that to happen again. So I go to all my classes and I actually pay attention for a change, and I spend most of my spare time in the library, reading up on all the books and journals I was supposed to read earlier. A lot of the time they’re books I’ve read before, but it’s nice to lose myself in that world again.

  On top of that I still have my law class over at Harvard University. I’ve figured out a new route now, which means I’m not in such a rush when I have to come back. But when I am there, I find myself keeping a look out for Lily. I don’t really mean to, it’s more like this automatic thing that I can’t control, it just happens. But it doesn’t matter anyway, since I don’t see her. I guess I’m a bit disappointed about that. But every now and then I think about her. I wonder if I should call, or send her a message and ask if she’s OK, and tell her I’m sorry about her and James – though obviously I’m not sorry, because I think he’s an asshole – but I don’t know if any of that is the right thing to do. So I don’t. And then I start to think that maybe that’s it, maybe I won’t ever see her again, or any of them.

  And that’s when she sends me the text.

  Can you do sailing?

  I’m in the library when it comes in, writing an essay on plankton ecology and food-web interactions, which between you and me isn’t as interesting as it might sound. So I don’t know what to make of the text, and I even wonder if she might have sent it to me by mistake, as in, she meant to send it to someone else. But then she sends another one:

  Sorry Billy, was a bit rushed just then, meant to ask if you’re any good at sailing? Might need to borrow you if so…

  I’m still not sure what to say, but this time I do text back.

  I guess I’m OK

  And then she doesn’t reply but phones, which is awkward, because – like I just said – I’m in the library, but I don’t want to put her off, so I quickly gather up my books and hurry outside, where I can talk more easily.

  “Are you still there?” Lily asks, when I get outside and can talk properly.

  “Yeah.”

  “It sounds like an earthquake.”

  “Sorry, I was just… No there isn’t.”

  “Good. It’s… The reason I’m calling. It’s just because you were so good at surfing that time, and I figured you might be able to sail as well… And well. We’re a little bit desperate, is all.”

  There’s a noise in the background, I can’t hear what.

  “I’ve done a bit,” I reply, a bit lost. And really what I want to say is how it’s so nice to hear her voice, and how good she sounds – bright, and fresh, and happy. “Erm, my dad taught me a few years back. We found this boat abandoned, so we rebuilt it, and sailed it around Lornea Island.”

  “You’re kidding?” She laughs. “My God, I knew it. That’s absolutely perfect.”

  “Perfect for what?” I ask, but she’s gone. In the background I hear her voice though.

  “Dad, he’s an expert.”

  “Are you busy Saturday?” She’s back talking to me.

  “No.” I hesitate. I’m definitely not an expert.

  There’s more voices in the background. It sounds like someone’s replying to her.

  “Sorry, I’m at home. That’s my dad. He’s got himself into a stupid argument with my uncle at the yacht club. It’s the final day of the season this Saturday, and…” She breaks off, and I hear her speak in the background again – “it is stupid, Dad.” Then she comes back to me.

  “They’re both ridiculously competitive, so Dad challenged him to a bet. Whoever finishes in front at the weekend wins, loser has to buy the winner – and crew – dinner.” She laughs again, but I just wait.

  “So… We need crew at short notice. Ideally someone who can sail well. So I thought of you.” There’s a funny change in her voice when she says the word ‘you’. Or maybe I think there is. Then I think about the little boat Dad and me fixed up and sailed around Lornea, and wonder what sort of boat Lily’s billionaire dad might have.

  “Um, you want me to come?” Is the only thing I can think to actually say.

  “Yes!” Again her voice sounds bright, and fresh, and filled with joy.

  “OK.”

  So then I’m committed to another social occasion when I’m going to be way out of my depth.

  That night I have a dream that Lily’s dad’s boat is one of those enormous, ridiculous gigantic superyachts, a hundred foot long, with a dozen crew members and a helicopter on the back, and for some reason I’m told I have to sail it, only it doesn’t even have sails, but it moves somehow anyway, because it’s a dream, and I end up steering it onto the rocks, and then I wake up with Lily’s dad – who looks like a pirate, only a pirate wearing one of Lily’s white wool sweaters, and for some reason with a monocle – shouting and swearing at me, and holding a huge hose out of which dangerous chemicals are flowing all over me and all into the ocean. And I see Lily gasping in horror, at what I’ve done not at what he’s doing.

  And when I wake up I know it’s just a stupid dream, yet I still can’t shake the thought that this is going to be a disaster. But on Saturday morning, early, because that’s when I’m told to get down there, I go to the marina where the boat is kept, and find a safe place to lock up my bike. I scan the basin of yachts, like a forest of masts, to see if there’s any billionaire superyachts. There aren’t, but there are still some enormous sailing yachts, and I wonder if Lily’s dad’s is one of these. So then I call Lily, like she told me, because there’s a locked gate to get down to where the boats are moored. She comes walking up the pontoon towards me, waving, and looking happy. She’s wearing a yachting jacket today, white and blue, with a fluorescent yellow hood. But I don’t see which boat she came from.

  “Hey Billy, beautiful weather. Perfect breeze!” She punches in a code and the gate swings open. I wonder if she’s going to kiss me, or if I should kiss her, but in the end we both hesitate, and don’t do anything.

  “Come on then. I’ll introduce you to everyone.” She turns and leads me back down the pontoon.

  “So which one’s your Dad’s boat?” I ask, as we walk out. The way marinas work, the smaller boats are always moored closer in, where there’s less water and less space. So the further we go, the bigger her dad’s boat is. She turns to look at me.

  “Just out here.” She points casually, but it’s towards the one with the very tallest mast, an absolute monster of a yacht. It must be a hundred foot long, painted dark blue and towering over everything else.

  “That one?” I stop. It’s like my nightmare is coming true already.

  Lily turns to look at me, a curious expression on her face.

  “Are you OK?” She follows my gaze, and laughs. “No, not that one Billy. Who do you think we are? Internet billionaires? It’s there.”

  She points instead to a much more modest yacht, the sort you might find in the harbor in Holport on Lornea Island, and at once I feel some sense of relief.

  But as we get closer I see it is actually quite a bit bigger than the average Lornea Island yachts, perhaps forty foot long, with two wheels for steering, one either side in the cockpit. A man is bending over on the foredeck, struggling to move a coil of ropes.

  “Wow.” I say. “She’s beautiful.”

  “Yes. She is. But she’s not particularly fast, unfortunately. Least not the way Dad sails her. Come on.”

  She grabs hold of one of the stays, the metal wires coming down from the mast, as she swings herself aboard. I do the same.

  “Hey Dad,” she calls out. “This is Billy. I told you about him.”

  The man stops what he’s doing and straightens up. He’s quite slight, and he’s wearing a blue knitted sweater with holes in it. He looks more like a fisherman from Holport than a billionaire. There’s no monocle either.

  “Hello,” I say.

  “Hello there!” He replies, and he walks back down the side deck, stepp
ing carefully, until he’s level with me. “Nice of you to join us.” He shakes my hand.

  “Billy’s my expert sailor friend,” Lily tells him.

  “Really? Well, I certainly hope so. We’re going to need every advantage we can get. I trust Lillian has explained the mission for the day?”

  “Um, yeah, sort of. You have to beat her uncle, in a race?”

  “Best of three races actually, but that’s the general idea. Her uncle, my brother, he can be – over competitive, and I don’t want to spend the entire winter listening to him bragging. So yes. Consider it a matter of life and death.” He says this with a grin, so I know he isn’t serious, but at the same time, I can sort of sense he is as well.

  “First start is at ten, so I want to get out there. Do you want to go stow your gear?”

  Lily takes me down below, and it’s beautiful down here. Bigger than any yacht I’ve been in before, and fitted out in wood that’s so well polished it glows like gold. There’s a man and a woman, a bit older than me sitting at the navigation table, fiddling with the chart plotter. Another woman, older but elegant, walks in from a stern cabin, she smiles in expectation.

  “Mum, David, Emily, this is Billy, I told you he was coming.”

  “Hello” I say, to Lillian’s mom, because it seems most polite to greet her first. She takes my hand and tells me to call her Clara.

  “David’s my brother.” Lily goes on, “and Emily’s his girlfriend.” I shake more hands. It didn’t occur to me that the entire family was going to be here.

  “Hi Billy, Lill’s told us about you. You’re going to be our secret weapon huh?” David’s has a voice like a drawl, I can’t tell if he’s serious or not.

  “Erm.”

  “I sure hope so, because Dad gets so mad when he loses. He’ll probably throw you overboard.”

  “David,” Lily’s mom says. “Don’t scare the poor boy. It must be frightening enough meeting the whole family like this.”