by Nicki Chen
And now there was this story about inmates sitting on the prison roof to watch a soccer match. Who knew whether Port Vila was in fact a safe place, but people here definitely preferred looking on the bright side—and having a good laugh.
Diana and Abby rode past the university and a row of houses and kept going until they reached the turn.
Once on Montmartre Road, they were alone in a world of trees and green fields. If they drove all the way up to the school, they’d have a view of the whole south end of Efate Island. But Diana had promised simple subjects for their sketches.
“How about this spot?” she asked, pulling over when they were a couple miles up the road.
“You’re the artist.”
Diana gave her head a little shake. She wasn’t an artist. True, she’d always loved to sketch things, to find the beauty and humor in what she saw. But that didn’t make her an artist, did it? Her mom was the artist in the family. She painted and sold marvelous unique pictures. There were times growing up, though, when Diana had thought of an artist’s work as silly. Her mom didn’t go to the office each day like Daddy did; she just fooled around at home in a room she called her studio. To Diana in those days, art didn’t seem like a serious job. Besides, she wasn’t that talented. She just liked to play around with art. She was an accountant.
“We can sit right there,” Diana said, indicating a patch of weeds at the side of the road.
They set up folding stools in the patchy shade of some spindly trees. Then Diana handed Abby a sketchbook and a variety of graphite artist’s pencils and demonstrated how to use them to achieve different effects.
“Okay. But what do I do now?” Abby stared at the scene—at the tall green grass and spindly fence directly in front of her and beyond that, the abandoned field leading to a jumble of trees and bushes in the fields going all the way back to a row of hills. “What am I supposed to draw?”
Diana understood her perplexity. On first sight, there was no traditional scene here. And yet, on closer look, the scene was impossibly complex. “You don’t have to draw everything. Just look for something that takes your fancy.”
Following her own advice, Diana focused in on the fence. Ever since her first day in Vanuatu, she’d been intrigued by the fence posts made from beach hibiscus that were allowed to keep growing, branches and leaves sprouting from the tops and sides of the posts.
She moved her stool closer and fingered a heart-shaped leaf. And though she was tempted to touch the large coral-colored blossom above it, she refrained. It was the only flower on the fence. Its ruffled petals, delicate as butterfly wings, spread out around the long red stamen. She cupped her hand over the flower, and it lifted in an invisible current of air and left a smudge of pollen on her palm.
They were silent for a while, both of them concentrating on their drawings, the only sounds the scratch of their pencils and the occasional rustle of leaves high in the trees.
The heart-shaped leaves growing out of the fence posts had been eaten away, and yet their form remained. Diana tried several times before finding a technique to capture the delicate lacey look.
A cloud passed over, and for a moment it seemed that they’d have to fold up and go. Luckily the rain, which pattered on the leaves over their heads, barely touched their sketchpads before moving on.
They made small talk while they sketched, but they were too focused on their drawing to say much. At one point, Abby stopped drawing. She looked around as though maybe she’d heard something. Then she frowned at Diana.
“They have witchdoctors in Vanuatu,” she said. “In the villages.”
“What made you think about witchdoctors?”
“This morning Lourdes told me about a woman who hired one to put a spell on her husband’s mistress. The poor girl developed a disgusting rash that no one was able to cure.” Abby shivered. “Lourdes says the best witchdoctors are from Ambrim. Clevas, they call them. Their power comes from fire and brimstone. The island of Ambrim has more than its share of Vanuatu’s active volcanoes.” She laughed and tossed her head as though to dismiss the craziness of witchdoctors and spells. Then she stood up and stretched. She held her sketch at arm’s length and smiled.
“Let’s see,” Diana said.
Abby had every right to smile. It was a brilliant drawing. She’d chosen to sketch the huge banyan tree to the right of them. The banyan was a tangle of branches and air roots and leaves. But somehow Abby had found a pattern in all the confusion. And then, making use of the different grades of pencils, she’d highlighted the chosen patterns and allowed the rest to sink into the shadows.
“I love it,” Diana said, handing it back.
Abby smiled at her drawing. Then, remembering, she looked at her watch. “Lordy,” she shouted. “It’s almost time to pick up the twins.” She folded her stool and started toward the car. “I can’t believe how late it is. The time just fl—”
She stopped, and without another word dropped beside the wheel, waving both her arms at Diana and pointing frantically.
He was like a gigantic attack bird, swooping down on her, leaves flapping from his dreadlocks and around his neck and arms.
42
If a wolf or a tiger had jumped out at her, Diana would have turned on a dime. Fight or flight. Get the hell out of here. But he wasn’t a wolf: he was a man, and so she hesitated. Gave herself a split second to override the prejudice one might feel against a black man who leaps out from somewhere behind your car. A man who’s nearly naked, though? Leaves in his hair? A string around his waist holding up—she didn’t want to look down—some kind of woven straw thing around his penis? She dropped her stool, but it was too late. He already had her by the arm.
“Mi wantem trak blong yu,” he demanded, his tone immediately comprehensible even if his words weren’t. “Kwicktaem.”
Quick-time? Truck? He wants my what? Diana struggled to yank her arm away. Quick-time what? How could she reason with this man when she didn’t know what he wanted? “I don’t understand.”
He flexed his arm, and as he drew her closer, she saw a glint of something in his other hand and felt the rough edge of his penis wrapper against her stomach.
“Ki blong trak wea?” He snatched the sketchbook out of her hand and threw it in the weeds. “Mi wantem ki.”
Her car key. That’s what he wanted. “Oh,” she said, edging away as she reached into her pocket. “The key.”
She didn’t look directly at her friend, but she saw her. Abby had crept around the passenger side of the car, and now she was out in the open, behind the man. Suddenly she ran forward, carrying a fat branch. She swung it over her shoulder like a baseball bat. “Knee him!” she shouted. “Now!”
With the branch already in motion heading for the man’s back, there was no time to think. Diana did exactly as she was told. Fast and tight as a piston she swung her knee back and then forward, plunging it hard into the man’s crotch—through the softness of his testicles and the thin layer of scratchy woven straw and into the bone and muscle of his body.
He released his grip on her arm, dropped something—a knife?—and fell forward, howling and clutching his genitals.
“Let’s get outa here,” Abby said.
Diana ran to the car and threw open the door. The man was right behind her. She tried to climb into the driver’s seat, but he grabbed her wrist.
“Start the car,” Abby screamed.
“I can’t.” The more she struggled, the deeper his fingers dug into her flesh.
“Throw me the keys.” Abby shoved the branch at her. “Here, use this. I’ll start the bloody car.”
In the cramped space between the car door and the steering wheel, Diana could only jab at the man.
“Woman,” he said, frightening her with the intensity of his scowl and the crazy glint in his bloodshot eyes. “Yu nogud woman. Yu kilim me tumas.” He dropped her wrist, caught hold of the branch and yanked so hard he almost pulled her arm out of the socket before she let go.
&nb
sp; “Ready?” Abby slid into the crevice between the driver’s and the passenger’s seats. She wrapped her arm around Diana’s waist and jammed her left foot down on the accelerator. “Hold on.” She shifted into drive, and the car jerked forward. Not fast enough, though. As the wheels spun and spit gravel, the man ran alongside.
Diana kicked, and he grabbed her ankle. “Damn it!” she shouted. “Let go.” No matter what she did, this crazy wild man would not give up. He was stronger than she was, and he knew how to fight. Why hadn’t she just given him the car? Suddenly she felt her hips sliding. “Abby,” she screamed, “hold onto me.” She twisted and kicked, using her last ounce of strength in an effort to free herself.
The man stumbled, and she reached for the steering wheel . . . for anything.
“Got you.” Abby grunted, and with an enormous heave she pulled Diana back into the car. “Now,” she said, “let’s get the hell outa here. Kwiktaem.”
Diana slammed the door shut and stomped on the gas. She imagined him chasing after them, making up ground. But when she looked in the rearview mirror, he was standing still. Her Toyota was new and powerful, and even though the wheels spun in the loose gravel, he couldn’t keep up. He shook his fist and grimaced, clutching his crotch.
“Oh, Lord.” She tried to catch her breath. “What . . .?” Her heart was pounding so loudly she couldn’t think. “I mean, where in blazes did he come from?”
Abby fanned her face with her fingers, her cheeks almost as red as her hair. “Don’t ask me.”
“Unbelievable.” Diana looked in the mirror again. All she could see now was the road and a cloud of dust. “I guess he gave up.”
Abby snickered. “Poor pathetic bugger.”
Diana took a deep breath and let it out in a giggle that was half-wail. “Pathetic. Leaves in his hair and the crazy . . .”
“. . . penis wrapper. The sorriest example of one I’ve ever seen.”
“Oh, so you’re an expert on fashionable . . .”
“. . . penis wrappers.”
They exploded in laughter. Penis wrapper. “And,” Diana sputtered, wiping her eyes, “he forgot his gun. What kind of carjacker shows up without a gun?”
“Sadly,” Abby affected a mock frown, “the poor man lacked pockets.”
It was hilarious. “No pants, no pockets.”
“No gun . . .” Abby pounded the dashboard. “No car.”
“Darn right.” Diana fell over on the steering wheel choking with laughter and sending the car into a rut. They were headed up the hill toward the mission school at Montmartre. It was the wrong direction if they wanted to get back home, but they kept going anyway. Give the man time to slink off into the bush before they turned around.
Diana’s car was the only one on the road, and there were no turnoffs, only a couple of gated driveways leading into messy fields of grass and overgrown coconut palms where a few cattle grazed.
The entrance to Montmartre was at the top of the hill. Through its open gate you could see a large expanse of parched grass and packed dirt surrounded by dormitories and classrooms in low wood-framed buildings. Skinny ni-Vanuatu boys in white shirts and long pants lounged on the steps while teenage girls in navy blue jumpers held hands and giggled as they paraded past.
Diana backed up and parked under a tree. Her appetite for laughter was gone now. Her shoulder ached, and as she climbed out of the car, her legs felt as wobbly as the lianas that hung from the trees. They walked a few steps to the edge of the hill and gazed out over a coconut plantation and the second lagoon.
“Who do you think he was?” she asked. She remembered a picture she’d seen of people from a village on another island performing a ritual dance before they jumped off a rickety tower with nothing but a vine tied around one ankle. The original bungee jumpers. “He looked like a villager from one of the outer islands, don’t you think?”
Abby nodded. “Exactly. From Tanna or Pentecost, not here near the capital. It doesn’t make sense.” She pursed her lips and considered. “And why would he want to steal a car in the first place? He wouldn’t be able to drive it anywhere on this little island without getting caught.” She looked at her watch. “Good Lord. I should have picked the twins up ten minutes ago.” She clicked her tongue against the roof of her mouth as they piled back into the car. “Their poor dear teacher. She’s the one I worry about.”
Diana started the car and turned it around. Her mind was as tired as her legs and arms. “Who?”
“The twins’ kindergarten teacher. I dare say, my laddies manufacture their most spectacular mischief when I’m late. It’s Simon who starts it every time. Causes trouble just to punish me.” She threw her hands in the air and frowned. “Tell me, what’s so important in a six-year-old’s life that he can’t wait a few minutes for his old mum?”
Diana smiled. Did mothers know how loving and proud their complaints about their children sounded to the rest of the world?
You couldn’t miss the section of the road where they’d struggled with the man. Skid marks and thrown gravel, a discarded branch. Diana had been planning on driving right on past until she remembered the drawings. “Looks like our carjacker’s gone,” she said, pulling to the side of the road.
“No, keep going. He might still be nearby.”
“I want to get our things.” She was starting to shift into park when Abby clamped her hand around her arm.
“Are you insane?! If we have to tangle with him a second time, we may not be so lucky.”
Glancing across the road, Diana winced at the thought of leaving the sketches behind. They were good, both of them.
“Come on, Diana. Let’s go. Kwicktaem. Simon and Jeremy are waiting.”
She took a deep breath and nodded. “Okay.” She put the car in gear and started down the hill.
There were more shadows in the banyan tree now, more hiding places in its air roots for the spirits that would inhabit it after dark. Nabanga they called the tree here in Vanuatu. If it didn’t rain, she thought, she’d come back tomorrow for their sketch books.
After picking up the twins and dropping them all back home, Diana headed back to her own house in Tassiriki. Just as she was turning onto the little side road that led to her driveway, another car pulled out.
“Hey, Diana.” Alexi leaned out the window and waved. “I brought your hubby home to you.” He waved again and drove off.
What? She looked at her watch. It was later than she thought. She’d expected to have time to shower before picking Jay up. She drove up their steep driveway and parked. Wondering if she looked like someone who’d just been in a fight, she glanced in the rearview mirror. Not too bad. She took a moment to straighten her hair and went on in. She was still tucking one last stray lock behind her ear when Jay stepped out of the kitchen.
“You’re home,” she said feigning surprise.
“Yeah. Alexi gave me a ride. He wanted to talk privately about the Fiji project.”
They walked side-by-side through the shadowy entry and into the sunlight that flooded the dining room.
“Oh, my god!” He lifted her arm. “What the hell is this?”
The bruises on her forearm were already turning purple and red, blue on the inside where the man’s thumb had pressed. She touched one of the bruises lightly. It seemed that she shouldn’t have focused her concern on her messy hair. “It doesn’t hurt,” she said, moving away. A little sympathy would have been nice . . . “Abby and I were sketching on Montmartre Road, and a ni-Vanuatu man jumped out of the bush. He tried to steal our car. But don’t worry, honey. The car is fine. Abby and I fought him off.”
“You what? The car’s insured, you know.”
“I know.”
“Wait.” He knelt on one knee beside her and examined the scratches and bruises on her ankle, his back rising and falling with the expansion of his anger. “What kind of man does this to a woman?” He looked up, his nostrils flaring. “And what the hell were you thinking, going out there alone?”
; “I wasn’t alone. Abby was with me.”
“I just don’t understand why you would put yourself at risk. You’re pregnant, for god’s sake. And then you go out and do this.”
“I do this?” An angry flood of tears burst loose. “I didn’t ask to be attacked.”
“And yet, you and Abby went out there alone on a deserted road. You must have known that wasn’t safe.”
She pressed her lips together. No one could have guessed that a man dressed in leaves and a penis-wrapper would jump out of the bush and try to steal her car. No one!
“Don’t you understand, sweetheart?” he said, hugging her as though she might suddenly disappear. “That man could have been carrying a knife or a machete. He could have wanted something else from you besides the car.”
She shook free of him. “He wanted the car,” she said. “That’s all. He called it a truck,” she added with the hint of a smile. She didn’t dare tell Jay what she thought she’d seen in the man’s other hand. It may not even have been a knife. Besides, he’d dropped it.
He stood looking at her. Then he hugged her again. “I’m sorry,” he said. “It’s just . . . It’s just that . . .” He choked out the words. “I worry about you, honey, you and our . . . Oh, my god, Diana. You’re so pale. Let me feel your forehead.”
“I don’t have a fever.”
“Of course not. You’re in shock.” He wiped her forehead. “Cold sweat.”
“I’m not in shock. I mean, this guy pops out of nowhere and demands my car keys.” She tried to laugh. “He surprised me. That’s all.” Suddenly she remembered they had a dinner invitation for that evening. “I’ve gotta go. I want to wash up and then rest for a while before we go to the party.”
“I’ll get some ice and some disinfectant for those wounds.”
“Scratches.”
43
It was dark when they arrived at Harbour View Restaurant. Diana took a deep breath and swung the car door open. She would have preferred staying home, but she didn’t want Jay to think she wasn’t up to it. And really, she was just fine. A little shaky, that was all.
