The next day, Conner disappeared into the forest, returning with a stick half as thick as his arm and almost as long as he was. He and Galloway spent all day carving the end into a nasty spike and hardening it in the fire.
To his credit, Conner took it upon himself to hunt. Inspired by the sea snake, he waded into the ocean, his arm raised to strike, his spear deadly in the sun.
For two days, he attempted to spear anything that moved. No fish, manta ray, octopus, crab, or eel was safe. However, no amount of willingness or hours spent glaring for prey granted him luck.
All he earned for his troubles was sunburn and wrinkled extremities from spending all day in the sea.
Yesterday, he’d traipsed back, sopping wet and pissed off—unsuccessful again—but with an odd-shaped prey harpooned on his spear.
A starfish.
Poor thing.
Conner had dumped it by the fire with full intention of devouring it. However, Galloway had instantly forbidden it.
He was right to do so.
I’d actually tried starfish once at a sushi restaurant. Knowledgeable chefs with experience in culinary specialities like urchins and puffer fish had prepared the dish. A cook with expertise needed to prepare all three delicacies as some elements were toxic.
It hurt that he’d killed a creature we couldn’t eat. It hurt even more to throw away fresh food. But we didn’t know the repercussions of such a meal. It didn’t make sense to risk it...no matter how much we wanted diversity.
We’d survived this long by being smart; we wouldn’t let our stomachs lead us to an early grave.
While Conner turned into a spear-thrower—single-mindedly focused on his task—Pippa suffered a relapse with her grief. She lost interest in everything, preferring to spend the day beneath the umbrella tree, stroking her mother’s ring and bracelet, weeping herself to sleep.
I tried to be there for her.
I did my best to hold her and let her know she wasn’t alone. But that was the nature of death; the ones left behind had to continue living but occasionally the memories stole us, and no matter how much time passed, no matter how many hugs were given, it couldn’t stop sadness from winning.
As life crawled onward, I turned to my own activities. My hands became sore from plaiting flax rope as I focused on making as much as possible.
Once Galloway could move around without hopping (if that day ever came), we would have supplies ready to build. We could finally have shelter.
Not that we suffered too badly in the open-air home we’d become accustomed to. But a roof would be nice when the rain came.
A few weeks ago, I’d offered to build. I’d argued that Galloway could give Conner and me instructions and we would be his labour.
Fat lot of good that did.
Galloway vibrated with self-loathing, masking it with rage. He would’ve bowed to the idea if I’d pushed (I knew that), but I couldn’t do that to him. I couldn’t strip him of his worth.
I still didn’t know much about him. I didn’t know his likes or dislikes. I didn’t know why he carried such a curse around his shoulders. But whatever it was, it didn’t let him find peace and I couldn’t stress him further.
Hopefully, we would be rescued soon and shelter would be moot; and if we didn’t, well, we only had time.
Lots and lots of time.
We would make a house...eventually.
The island kept us both bored and never able to rest. Bored because hours stretched from dawn to dusk where the usual chaos of life wasn’t there to keep us occupied. There was no TV, no books (my e-reader and Conner’s hand-held gamer didn’t survive the crash), no bars or social media. My phone provided some entertainment with saved movies I’d loaded before my flight, but we learned how to relax in silence rather than commotion.
For four people living together, we remained strangers for the most part. Conner and Pippa clammed up whenever I asked about their old life because it hurt too much to talk about their parents. And Galloway had a perpetual sign warning personal questions were off-limits.
We didn’t take time to speak or chat or play games. We’d been here five weeks, yet we weren’t entirely comfortable with each other. Galloway suffocated in his secrets. The children alternated between being young and swimming happily to staring into space where nothing and no one could reach them. And I languished in fear over what had happened to my world. Was my cat being cared for? What about my recording contract? Was Madeline okay? I hadn’t sorted out a will and had no beneficiaries to make it easy on whoever annulled my life.
We each had demons, and unfortunately, we dealt with them alone.
We have to talk to one another.
It wasn’t enough to be island companions; we had to be what we were.
A family.
Orphaned.
Lost.
Forgotten.
I shook away my thoughts, my eyes flicking to the forest behind me. The sun had set, but it wasn’t late. Pippa and Conner had gone for a walk, and Galloway sat carving another spear. His hands flashed white in the darkness, his eyes narrowed with the small amount of illumination coming from the fire.
That was another thing I couldn’t get used to: the dark.
We had a torch from the cockpit, which never died thanks to a windable charge. The beam of light was handy when we used the latrine in pitch black.
I’d dug the facilities a week into our stay, doing my best to keep it downwind and far enough from the camp not to attract smells or insects. We kept a mound of sand beside it to act like a flush, and leaves functioned as another use rather than just a potential food source.