Honey’s outlook on men was sinking to a point of abject revulsion. The day was new, yet already she’d been ridiculed by a soulless twit and kidnapped by a reeking pervert.
“You might even like it.” Louis Piejack winked over his shoulder. “I never had no complaints in the bedroom department.”
Honey no longer could stand it. “Know what? I need a potty break.”
Piejack stopped walking. “Well, hurry it up,” he said.
“Right here-in front of you? I can’t, Louis.”
“Okay, I won’t peek. But I ain’t undoin’ the damn rope.”
As soon as he turned away, Honey pretended to unzip her pants. After lowering herself into a credible squat she began searching the ground for something sharp, heavy or both.
“I don’t hear nuthin,” Piejack grumbled suspiciously.
Honey said, “It’s hard to do this while you’re standing there listening. Just give me a minute.”
She found a gnarly chunk of coral the size of a mango; the weight was perfect. Clutching it in her right hand, she rose slowly and took aim at the back of Piejack’s crusty head.
“You lied,” he was saying. “You don’t really gotta go.”
“Louis, would you please shut up so I can concentrate?”
“Concentrate on what? It ain’t a chess match, angel, it’s just pissin’ in the woods.”
Honey Santana raised the piece of coral to strike him, but Piejack was already half-turned, swinging the gumbo-limbo like a boom. The blow landed flush on the left side of her face, and she heard a bone break. Then the sun exploded into a million flaming pink raindrops.
Like flamingos, Honey thought as she fell.
Flying home.
Fry had been confident he could locate the clearing where his father had told him to wait, but the lay of the island looked different in the morning light. After twenty minutes of circular meandering he admitted he was lost.
“Let’s take a time-out,” said Eugenie Fonda, whose own navigational skills were better suited to the city.
Fry put down the metal camera case and leaned against a buttonwood. “I don’t feel so great.”
When he told Eugenie about the skateboard accident, she said, “Your old man should’ve left you in the hospital.”
“We were worried about Mom.”
“I’ve seen her in action, bucko. She can take care of herself.”
“What’s that shiny thing in your mouth?” Fry asked.
Eugenie smiled self-consciously. She’d never been asked about it by a boy his age. “A pearl,” she said.
“Is it real?”
“Yessir.”
“Can I see?”
She extended her tongue in a prim and clinical way, so as not to give the kid any wild ideas. Fry adjusted the football helmet to get a better look.
“Sweet.” He leaned close. “Did that hurt when they made the hole?”
“Like a mother,” she said.
“There’s this girl in eighth grade, she’s got a gold safety pin in her nose and a platinum screw through one eyebrow and an I-bolt in her right ear. They call her ‘Toolbox.’”
Genie said, “Kids can be awful.”
“I like your pearl.”
“Thank you, Fry, but I believe I’ve outgrown it.” She unfastened the stud, wiped it on the front of her pullover and dropped it in the palm of his hand.
“Ma’am, I really can’t take this,” he protested. “No way.”
Genie closed his fingers over the pearl and said, “It’s for when you meet that certain girl. But first you gotta make me a blood promise.”
“Like what?”
“Don’t ever change. By that I mean don’t grow up to be a jerkoff like ninety percent of the men I meet.”
“Mom always tells me the same thing. Except she says it’s more like ninety-five.”
“Best advice you’ll ever get: Stay a gentleman, and you’ll never be alone. Don’t lie, don’t bullshit, don’t fuck around-Christ, I can’t believe I said ‘fuck around’ to a fourteen-year-old boy! I’m sorry.”
Fry laughed. “I’ll be thirteen in June.”
Genie made a gun with her fingers and cocked it to her temple.
“Don’t worry,” he told her. “I hear worse stuff every day at school.”
“Now you’re depressing me. Let’s get movin’.”
Fry pocketed the pearl. Eugenie said it was her turn to be the bellhop, and reached for the Halliburton. They’d walked for only a few minutes when the boy began to lag. Eugenie went back and entwined her free arm in one of his.
“My dad’s gonna be so pissed,” he said dejectedly.
“Tell him it was my fault you ran off. You were rushing to the aid of a damsel in distress-what’s wrong, sweetie?”
“I dunno, all of a sudden it’s like I’m in a cave.” Fry blinked and started to weave. “I’m getting really cold again,” he said.
Genie dropped the metal case and grabbed for him, but he was already falling. His head struck first, the helmet making a hollow tonk as it bounced off the trunk of a strangler fig.
“Oh God, no,” Eugenie murmured.
Kneeling at his side, she lifted his head onto her lap. His eyes had rolled back, and his skin was damp and ashen. The pulse at his neck felt fluttery, and a burgundy trickle ran from his bitten lower lip to his chin. Genie rocked the boy, softly pleading with him to wake up and cursing the day she’d met Boyd Shreave.
Gillian said, “Let’s talk about what happened. The sex, I mean.”
“We already talked,” said Sammy Tigertail, “the whole time it was happening.”
“But you never told me what you thought. Am I worth all the hassle or not?” She stepped into her flip-flops. “My sister goes through, like, twenty boyfriends a year. I don’t say a word.”
The Indian felt another impulse to kiss her, which was unnerving. He was supposed to be done with it; that was the plan. He picked a red bay twig out of her hair and said, “It was real nice.”
Gillian slugged him in the arm. “Nice?”
“Wonderful,” he said. “I meant wonderful.”
“Right. Vundebar, as Ethan used to say.” She was steamed. “You’re quite the fucking poet, Thlocko.”
Sammy Tigertail tried to put his arms around her but she spun away. He opened his carry bag to look for some warm clothes. Nearby, the white man with the gunshot wound was making an odd flutish sound through his nose.
Gillian fumbled with the strings of her bikini top. “Know what my problem is? I want everything perfect, see, like at the end of a movie. I always want the damn dolphins to swim free. I always want to sing like Jewel when I’m playin’ the six-string. And I always want guys to fall totally in love with me after one night.”
The Indian handed her a sweatshirt and fleece pants. “It’s getting colder,” he said.
“No staring at the ta-ta’s allowed.”
“You’d be bored to death out here with me. Plus, you’re allergic to mosquitoes-that’s what you told me.”
Gillian said, “I’m not high-maintenance, okay? My sister, she’s high-maintenance. My mom, big-time. Compared to those two, I’m easy.” She plopped down beside him and rolled up the cuffs of the pants. “Hey, I know I talk when I shouldn’t. I’m workin’ on it.”
Sammy Tigertail wasn’t sure what steps to take if she refused to leave the island the next day. He wasn’t even sure he still wanted her to go.
He kissed her lightly and said, “Truth is, it was better than wonderful.”
“I thought so, too. Wanna do it again?”
“Mr. Skinner and his boy will be here soon.”
Gillian faked a pout. “Mean old man,” she said.
“Anyway, your buddy Lester’s gonna wake up any minute.”
She clucked and affected the proper accent of a British headmistress. “Well, goodness, we most definitely don’t wish to offend Lord Lester.”
As if on cue, the sleeping man snuffled and quaked.
Sammy Tigertail said, “There’s something I didn’t tell you. I’m only half Seminole.”
Gillian smiled devilishly. “Bet I know which half.”
“Seriously. My father was white.”
She pretended to look him over. “Wild guess-did he have fantastic blue eyes?”