The rest of the morning passes at a slow pace. Oh, the goat and vibrator jokes keep coming from all directions (that’s what she said?), but everyone is taking it easy, and seeming to be in good spirits, despite the excess spirit of last night.
I’m sitting in the sand, reading a book about a mafia princess. Lacey is beside me, scribbling something on a notepad. Tai and Richard are at Tai’s fishing spot, hoping to get lunch. Fred has gone back to his camp to get some more sardines for bait.
Wilson is still MIA.
Hope he didn’t choke on it.
“What are you writing?” I ask Lacey.
She sighs and puts her pen down. “Why?”
“Jeez, testy, testy. Just curious. Can’t a sister be curious?”
“If you must know, I’m documenting our peril.”
“Peril?” I repeat. I gesture to the paradise around us. “How is this peril?”
She frowns. “You know Daisy, sometimes I think you live in a different reality.”
My hackles raise. Here we go again with the whole ‘coasting by’ thing. “I don’t live in another reality. I’m trying to make the best of it.”
“Make the best of it, huh? We all know what that means.”
My brows shoot up. “What does that mean, then?”
“No wonder you don’t mind being stranded in the middle of the Pacific when you’ve got Tai to fuck whenever you want.”
“What!?” I exclaim. “What makes you think that?”
Oh god.
“Oh, come on,” she says. “We all know it.”
“All of you?”
“Yes, Fred told us.”
“What?”
“Well, the goat told him.”
The goat?
“Wilson,” I seethe, as if he’s Newman on Seinfeld.
“It’s so obvious you wanted him from the start. Guess he finally gave in.”
“Okay, fine. Fine.” I raise my palms in surrender. Cats out of the bag. “We’re together. But what difference is it to you?”
“You don’t know him like I know him.”
“Maybe not, maybe I don’t have years of friendship with him, but I know him in my own way and I’m getting to know more of him every single day.” My heart is drumming in my chest as I say this. “Besides, I don’t have to have been friends with him for a long time to know just what kind of man he is. He’s kind, he’s funny, he’s selfless, he’s protective, he’s broken and yet he keeps on going. He’s fucking amazing.”
“Which is why you should stay ten feet away from him,” she snaps. “You’re going to use him and break his heart, just like you’ve always done.”
“Always done?” I cry out.
“You dispose of guys when you’re done with them. Toss them away like they don’t exist. Then you move on like nothing has happened, because to you, nothing has happened.”
“How would you even know that? You’ve never taken any interest in my life!”
“Facebook tells me everything I need to know. In a relationship, single. In a relationship, single. You’re never single for more than a month, it’s like you’re afraid to be alone, you just go from guy to guy and I’ve never seen you once look heartbroken over it.”
“Maybe I’m not the type to profess my feelings all over social media.”
She gives me a steady look. “You’re right. I don’t think I’ve ever seen you post anything negative. Another reason why life is just one fucking lucky happenstance to the next. And why nearly losing your life in a shipwreck doesn’t seem to have any impact on you.”
“Doesn’t have an impact on me?” I repeat. “This has been hard for me, too. But maybe, just maybe, I’m looking on the bright side, which is that we are getting rescued tomorrow. There’s an end in sight to this. Maybe I’d lose my motherfucking mind if I stayed one more day here, but that’s not happening, okay? And maybe it wouldn’t hurt you to be happy about that, too.”
She stares at me for a moment and then nods. Goes back to scribbling about her peril.
Jeez Louise. I don’t know what it is about Lacey. Just when I think there’s no more excess baggage between us, she finds even more. There’s an endless supply of angst and resentment. Are all sibling relationships this complicated, or did I get handed a doozy?
“We are men,” Richard announces as he and Tai walk toward us. Richard has the rod and a peachy silver fish at the end of it. He pounds his chest with one hand. “We bring food for you women.”
I want to roll my eyes, but he is bringing food for us women, so I rein it in. Better this than his Star Trek talk.
“Right on time,” Tai says, shielding his eyes from the sun as he looks across the lagoon where Fred is coming back with his dinghy. “You’d swear that guy has a sixth sense for food and booze.”
But as Fred gets closer, his expression is grim.
Something in my stomach drops.
Shit.
I exchange a worried glance with Tai, not liking the look of this.
“Castaways,” Fred addresses us, getting out of the boat. Tai runs over to help him haul it up on the beach. “I’m afraid I have some bad news.”
I swallow hard. I knew it.
He looks off to the west. “Seems another weather system is moving in overnight. Things are going to get pretty rough for us.”
“What do you mean?” I ask. “Are we in danger?”
“Not really,” he says, and I relax slightly. “This is a fairly good location. I have to say mine is better though. It’s facing the east lagoon, more protected from the waves, less currents. I think it would be best if we all moved over there at some point today. Just till the storm passes.”
“Sure,” Lacey says. “I mean, that’s not the best news, but we’ll make it work.”
“Oh, beg ya pardon,” Fred says, taking off his ball cap and holding it between his hands. “That wasn’t the bad news. Though I suppose it was part of the bad news.”
“What’s the bad news, Fred?” Tai asks gravely.
For a moment I expect him to tell me his goat died, but then I notice Wilson off in the distance. I have to admit, I’m kind of relieved, even though he still has the vibrator.
“They’re not coming,” Fred says.
Okay, that relief was short-lived.
“What do you mean they’re not coming?” Lacey asks. “You mean rescue?”
He nods. “The storm sure done and messed things up for us.”
“They’re coming after the storm passes, though,” I say. “Right?”
Right?
“Oh, for sure,” he says. “Don’t worry your pretty red head over that.” He hesitates. “It’ll just be in a few weeks from now.”
“A few weeks!” I exclaim.
“You’re kidding me!” Lacey cries out.
“Afraid not. The storm messed up their schedule and the availability of their planes. Believe me, I’m just as disappointed as you are.”
No you’re not, I can’t help but think. You have your goat, and now you have us.
I’m starting to feel like whatever hope and good thoughts I had lately were just an illusion. I kept telling myself it would be over soon, that I needed to make it through one more day. I focused on the positive because there was an end in sight. I didn’t let myself get too sucked in to anything negative because I had a feeling that’s where I’d stay.
Now I feel like the rug has been yanked out from under me and I’m falling. No happy hopeful feelings to keep me up anymore. No inner buoyancy to keep me afloat.
We’re really fucking stuck here.
And what if they don’t come in two weeks?
What if it gets pushed back and back?
What if something awful happens to us in the meantime? What if someone gets attacked by a shark? Or gets sick and can’t get medicine? What if I slipped on the rocks at the waterfall and split open my head? Who is going to help us?
I turn away from everyone, throw my head back to the sky and I scream.
�
�FUUUUUUUUUCK!!!!”
I mean, I am having an out-of-body experience right now, there’s no other way to describe it. All the feelings I’ve pushed aside, all to try and keep a positive frame of mind are now coming out of me like a rushing torrent of despair and rage.
“Fuck, fuck, FUCK!” The words just rip right out of me.
“Daisy,” I hear Tai whisper, and then feel his arms around me. “It’s okay.”
I yank myself out of his grasp, staring at him, staring at everyone else. They’re all in shock, maybe because of the situation, maybe because I am finally losing my mind.
“It’s not okay! You just heard what Fred said! We’re stuck here for another few weeks. And then what happens after that? Another few weeks more? And more?”
“It’s not going to be like that,” Fred says calmly. “I promise you.”
“You promise me!” I repeat. “You’ve been stranded here for three months! How long have they been promising you that someone else is coming?”
“We’ll call Suva again,” Tai says, raising his palms, trying to calm me. “We’ll explain what happened. They will come for us. It’s okay. You’re going to be okay.”
“I’m not okay, okay!” I yell. “None of this,” I gesture wildly to the beach and the island, “is okay.”
“You need to focus on the positive,” Lacey says.
I blink at her, stunned that she’s throwing that back in my face so soon, though her voice is a little shaky, like she doesn’t really believe it. “You literally just told me that,” she adds. “Remember? All your positive posts, the shit you say on Facebook?”
“Well, maybe that was shit! Maybe I put on that happy face on social media because that’s the kind of person I wanted to be. It’s the kind of person I wanted people to see me as. But I’m not okay, not now, and…” I trail off. “I’ve never really been okay.”
“I find that hard to believe,” she says. “You’ve—”
“If you tell me once more that I luck into everything, especially now, I’m going to find something really disgusting in that jungle and I’m going to put it on your head!” I snap at her. “Contrary to what you thought, I didn’t have a perfect life. I kept people at a distance. I didn’t get attached to my relationships. I stayed with a job because it was easy. I pretended that it was fine and lied to myself because admitting the truth, that I wasn’t happy, would have been too hard. I kept up the persona and I fooled myself into believing it’s who I was. But it wasn’t.”
I look around. Tai is watching me carefully. Richard seems to be hanging on my every word, while Fred wanders down the beach, head low, hands in his pockets. I feel for him, I do. I want him off this godforsaken place as much I want that for myself.
Amazing how things can turn from paradise to pain when your future is at risk.
“I don’t even know who I am,” I say softly, feeling tears well up inside my throat. “I don’t. I thought I did but it was just the lies I told myself. So here I am, figuring it all out, and the most I got out of this is that I’m not okay!”
“None of us are okay right now,” Richard says quietly.
“Right!” I yell. “We aren’t. We’re fucked! We’re screwed! We’re shipwrecked and we don’t know when we’re going to get rescued.”
“But you could focus on the positive, that they know where we are, that help will come,” Lacey points out, suddenly taking on my old persona.
“No. YOU focus on the positive,” I tell her. “I’m choosing not to. I’m choosing to be a realist. I’m choosing, for once in my life, to put my hand up and say, I am not okay. I’m not okay with this, I’m not okay with my life, I’m not okay with anything.”
“You could try a different adjective than okay,” Richard mumbles.
“Fuck you, Mr. Thesaurus,” I tell him, giving him the finger.
Lacey gasps.
“There’s nothing wrong with using the same word,” I tell him indignantly, “and there’s nothing wrong with admitting to the world that you could use some help. Why, even here, do we have to look on the bright side all the fucking time?”
Okay, I realize now that I sound like a total hypocrite from what I was telling Lacey earlier but maybe I am a fucking hypocrite. Maybe I’ve always been one.
“Can’t we just for a minute take in the reality as it is and say, you know what? This is some fucked up shit and I’m scared and I don’t know how the hell we’re going to get out of it.”
“But we will get out of it,” Tai says.
I exhale loudly and sink to my knees, putting my head in my hands. “I know,” I mumble. “I know. We will. Because we’re humans and that’s what we’ll do. We’ll get out of this. But for once I would love to just admit that I’m scared and I’m worried and, at this moment, I’m weak. I don’t want to be that person that smiles for the selfies and puts up some bullshit inspirational caption when inside I feel broken. I want to be that person that admits, Hey! I’m Daisy and I’m broken and yet I’m still worthy too.”
Everyone is silent.
But my tears don’t come. I want them to. I want the release, especially as it feels like the greatest weight on my chest has been lifted, like I’ve had an anvil placed there my whole life. A weight that kept me carefully controlled, a weight that prevented me from opening up and taking a risk and becoming who I want to become.
I don’t even know who I want to become.
I just know, as I’m on my knees in the sand, that I’m ready to become someone else. Get through this shit and come out the other side better.
To become is better than being.
But will anyone love what I become?
Will I?
I get to my feet, feeling those tears now starting to come up again.
So I turn toward the jungle and run.
Eighteen
Tai
One minute Daisy is on her knees, face in her hands, the next she’s springing to her feet and running into the jungle.
I’m about to run after her, but Lacey grabs my arm.
“Don’t,” she says.
“Why not? She’s having a nervous breakdown.”
“I think we’re all about to have nervous breakdowns,” Richard says. He sighs and peers at the fish he still has on his line. “Tai, can you clean this?”
“Can’t you man-up and do it yourself?” I snipe at him.
“Tai,” Lacey admonishes me.
“Oh come off it,” I tell her, in no mood for these dynamics. “Richard doesn’t need you to keep sticking up for him.”
“What’s gotten into you?” Lacey says.
“Your sister just admitted to you that she’s not okay. That she’s having a hard time processing this. That she doesn’t even know who she is anymore. And yet I’m the one about to run after her and comfort her, not you.”
Her mouth opens and shuts, taken aback. “She doesn’t need anyone’s comfort,” she says.
“How could you say such a thing? Everyone needs that at some point. I don’t care how strong you are.” Or how much you keep it inside.
“Look, you don’t know Daisy like I do,” she begins.
“Apparently, you never knew her at all,” Richard says quietly.
Lacey’s blue eyes go wide. She turns to her husband in shock. “I know my sister.”
“She doesn’t even know herself,” Richard explains. “Maybe you should stop being so hard on her for a minute, and just give her a break.”
Lacey looks like he’s just slapped her, skin paling. “Give her a break? She’s only been given breaks her whole life! You know that!”
“I know what you’ve told me, and only that,” Richard says. “Perhaps Daisy was born with a silver spoon in her mouth, perhaps not. What does it matter?”
“My parents were hard on me, and easy on her. That’s why it matters.”
“That happens, Lacey loo. It’s very common. What should matter is whether your parents love the both of you, and they do.”
“Well, why s
hould I work so hard for everything, and she gets everything handed to her?”
“Because life isn’t fair? Because it doesn’t work that way? Because Daisy took the opportunities presented to her, just as you took yours? Yes, I’ll be the first one to say that yours have been more challenging, but you fought for the life you chose. You fought for me. Daisy is only now admitting that she wants more for herself. Put yourself in her shoes for a moment, and just imagine working a job for ten years that you didn’t even like all that much.” He pauses. “And she failed at it. Isn’t it better to fail at something you love than something you hate?”
“And you shouldn’t be rooting for her to fail, at any rate,” I tell Lacey. “Which tells me that whatever issues you have with your sister, it’s all to do with you, and nothing to do with her.”
I glance over at the west where Fred is standing on the beach and staring off into the distance.
Dark, angry-looking clouds are building on the horizon.
Storm’s coming.
And moving fast.
“Now you can think about the fact that I’m right, or you can continue harboring resentment, but I’m going to get Daisy,” I tell her.
I turn and run off into the forest, the deep musty smell of earth and foliage filling my lungs.
“Daisy!” I yell, leaping over fallen logs, dodging tangled roots. The canopy above makes the world dimmer, harder to see.
I pause and listen. I hear the stream burbling nearby, the constant birdsong, but beyond that, nothing.
I head toward the flowing water and then follow it, knowing this is probably what Daisy did.
I’m worried about her. I wasn’t expecting for her to melt down like that, even though it was obviously a long time coming. I knew from the moment I first met her that she was wearing a mask, that beneath the makeup and the trendy clothes and that bright smile, was a little lost girl who was trying to be what the world wanted her to be. It definitely didn’t help that she had someone like Lacey drilling those things in her head. If you hear something enough, you believe it.
You become it.
And now Daisy wants to become something else.
Lovewrecked Page 21
