Mary was sitting next to the engine console, her arms around her knees, her face hidden in her arms. Edward crawled across the deck toward her. Behind him, the go-fast motors roared. The sound quickly diminished, becoming a buzz after a few seconds.
Mary was shivering. The dried blood on her collar was just the largest blot. There were smaller spots down the front of her shirt. Her hands looked dirty and encrusted with it.
“Mary? God. Are you OK?”
Her hair was in disarray and held sand particles among the long tangled fibers. He reached out to touch her, but her shaking made him fear it. His hand edged toward her. The tips of his fingers touched the side of her head, and he slowly lifted her face.
Her chin was dirty with dried blood. One of her eyes was swollen, half-closed, both eyes watery and red. Two wide lines on both her cheeks – he didn’t want to believe what they were. They started under her cheekbones and ran viciously straight across to the edge of her mouth. The lines – the scars were deep. The top layer of her skin had been split apart with a blade. Small dark clumps, frozen in coagulation, hung at the bottom edge of the cut near her mouth. At the center, the skin peeled away from raw fatty tissue underneath like overripe fruit.
“Mary. Oh, God, Mary.” Edward unconsciously shook his head from side to side. “Mary, baby…” He moved his hand gently to the side of her neck, and dipped his head closer to her. “Mary, Mary, Mary. Oh, baby, it’ll be ok. Everything will be ok—”
“Get away from me.” Her voice was frighteningly steady.
“Mary—”
“You took their drugs.” Her arm came up with force, pushing his hand off her. “Get away from me!” Her cuts glistened wet.
“Mary. Please.” Edward moved his face closer to hers. She swung her arm, striking his face with her open hand. The slap was worse than a gunshot in his ears, but he felt nothing.
“Don’t touch me!” Blood formed and dripped from the gashes on her cheek.
“Mary, please—”
The dark red drops fell onto her ruined shirt.
“DON’T TOUCH ME! DON’T TOUCH ME! DON’T TOUCH ME!”
She pushed him away. If she could have backed away from him, she would have. He felt nothing, but her screams wrenched his insides. Her screams – her rejection of him – was the razor slashing, the tool used on her face. Her screams sliced into whatever had made him, gave him the force to walk, to talk, to breathe. He was on his hands and knees and needed her to stop. Her wounds were reforming, opening. So he pulled away. He pulled away like a beaten animal, begging her to stop screaming. He slid back until he pressed himself against the rotten wood of the gunwale. He hadn’t sliced open her face, but it was now his presence making her bleed. He held up one hand in front of him to plead for her to stop screaming. When she did, her head fell back into her knees.
Mr. Bones and his men worked in silence. No one looked at him. The three men put away their guns, back in the hiding place under the engine console. They looked down at Mary with a sad curiosity, like people passing a car wreck. Mr. Bones spoke gently to Mary before lifting her. He took her by the arm and guided her inside the wheelhouse.
Edward stayed where he was, staring at the spot where Mary had been. The three other men found a partially shaded spot near the back deck and sat. They talked excitedly about what had just happened, laughing and boasting about what they would have done if needed. The three showed no interest in Edward. He was not part of their team. He was, after all, just an outsider.
Mr. Bones had been right.
~~26~~
Where was Mary? Edward looked around at every opportunity. As if the girl with her cheeks slit open had been someone else. Not Mary. She could not have been Mary. Mary would be by at any minute in her blue boat. He would run over to her. She would pull out a lobster from her bucket. They would cook it for dinner. Mary and he would escape to a remote beach where they would lie together, becoming covered in sand as they played. Then they would jump in the water to clean themselves off, then lie in the sun to dry, then walk together for an hour simply searching for seashells. Mary would be sleeping in his bed when he woke. Mary would be cooking dinner in his kitchen while he performed his duties, oiling door hinges and sweeping sand off the decks. If people passing on a boat saw them, they would think they were a regular married couple. He would go see Mary at the library. She would be sitting behind the checkout desk, would smile at him when he walked in. Mary would model for him. She was his inspiration after all. Mary would breathe in his scent when she thought he wasn’t looking. The girl with her face cut up was not the real Mary. The real Mary still loved him.
He wanted to pretend that she had not been taken to the hospital, that she had not demanded that he leave her. But she had said those murderous words, I never want to see you again. Her wounds had appeared to spread, her agony explode when he tried to follow her into the waiting room. It was Mr. Bones who had stopped him, holding him back and telling him that he couldn’t help, telling him to go home. But where was home? Mr. Bones, the island drug dealer, the gardener knew when a plant needed to be uprooted.
Edward stared off at the entrance to the bay and pretended to care about what he was doing. He took out a bottle of beer from a large Igloo chest, popped the cap off and handed the drink to one of the six men standing around the deck of the 60-foot charter boat. Above him, an array of fishing rods rose up past the flybridge, sticking into the air like battlefield pennants. The six men each held a bottle now, laughing, joking, chatting excitedly about the adventure they were about to embark on. Occasionally, they’d speak about work, using jargon he couldn’t understand. Cross-sourcing. Stakeholder messaging. Reorganization. Functional dualities.
The captain, a local from St. John, was hunched over another chest, frantically jabbing a blade into it to break up ice. Inside the ice was bait. He apologized to anyone and everyone for not being ready, but his son, who was his only deckhand, was sick.
“What’s the God-damned hold up?” Murrell demanded. “Let’s get this tub going!” They would still have at least a half hour’s ride south to the other side of Norman Island, where the captain promised them Mahi Mahi and Blue Marlin.
John Murrell’s five business partners all dressed as if it was their first time being outside. Their clothes were brand-new and unworn. Silk Hawaiian shirts, plaid Bermudas and loafers. One of the men, Henry, made the mistake of forgetting his beachwear and forced to borrow a pair of shorts the color of pink bubble gum. This won him the teases of the other men. “Henry, when are you going to start juggling?” “I always wondered whose team Henry played for!” “Henry, for Christ sake, didn’t disco die in the ‘seventies?”
“Henry, I hope you don’t scare away the fish in those things!” John Murrell had a cigar in his mouth – a massive, unlit Cuban. He slapped Henry on his backside and laughed into the air, and then finished off his beer.
Edward hadn’t moved from where he stood over the drink chest. He uncapped another beer for Mr. Murrell, looking over the owner’s shoulder as he handed him the drink, thinking he saw someone walking behind the line of palms on the bay’s eastern bank. But it was only the swaying shadow of a banana tree.
“Dammit, Vance, you said we’d be on our way.” Mr. Murrell tapped his foot against the captain’s thigh. “I know you islanders don’t like to rush things, but hell you’re slow.” He turned to Edward. “Eddy, you look like shit. Everything OK?” John didn’t wait for an answer. “Thanks for helping out by the way. I know you don’t have to go with us, but with the captain’s kid sick and all, we really need you. Don’t worry – I’ll make it worth your while. And if you want a beer, hell, don’t be shy. We got no work rules today – except one, no sad faces.” John patted Edward’s chin two times in a mock slap and laughed.