Island Read online

  “Getting chubby, you … Dancing, yousay?”

  She laughed. “Yes, dancing.” She put her hands on Donald’s shoulders and turned him around, toward the door. He climbed the steps slowly, leaning back slightly and smiling to himself Carole released one of his shoulders long enough to pull the screen door open. Then, holding the door back with her foot, she steered him inside, down the long dim hall toward the light in the kitchen.

  “Well, well,” Belinda said, stubbing out her cigarette.

  Donald pointed a curled finger toward the ceiling. “I foundher,” he exclaimed.

  Carole laughed. “I found you, is more like it.”

  “His own picture,” Meredith said to Roscoe.

  Roscoe shook his head.

  “What’s going on?” Carole asked.

  “I asked Meredith a very simple question and she hasn’t come up with the answer yet.”

  Donald mumbled something inaudible and turned back toward the hall, but Carole grabbed him. She pulled out his chair and pressed him down into it. Then she sat down beside him. “What was the question?”

  “Why encourage him?” Belinda asked.

  “A man was looking at a portrait, see? And someone asked him whose portrait it was. And he said, ‘I don’t have any siblings. This man’s father’—meaning the guy in the portrait—‘is my father’s son.’ So the question is, Whose portrait is he looking at?”

  Carole cocked her head. “Himself!”

  Roscoe shook his head. “That’s what Meredith said. You’re both wrong. Shall I tell you? Or do you want to, Donald?”

  Everyone looked at Donald. He lifted an eyebrow and said nothing.

  “Come on, Roscoe,” Belinda said. “We’re all assembled. Let’s get on with the stories. Carole’s planning to get up early tomorrow to go … Where’d you say you were going?”

  “To the harbor, to sketch the shrimp boats coming in. But don’t worry about me. I’m not tired at all. The breeze woke me up.”

  “Well, I’m tired.”

  “Hey,” cried Roscoe. “I saw your sketches in the spare bedroom! I hope you don’t mind that I looked at them. Belinda did too. They’re damn good. Especially the lighthouse.”

  “Thanks, Roscoe.”

  “Maybe you should try selling—”

  “Okay,” interrupted Belinda. “Let’s get on with the stories. We’ll be here all night! And look at Donald.”

  Everyone looked at Donald again. He was sitting rigidly in his chair, staring at nothing.

  “He’s looking at his son,” Roscoe said.

  “His son?” asked Carole, following Donald’s gaze to the wall.

  “Yeah. See, this man’s father is himself if it’s his son.”

  “What?”

  Belinda lit a cigarette and threw her lighter across the table.

  “Never mind. I’ll explain tomorrow. Belinda’s hair is heating up. So. Who wants to go first?”

  “I’ll go first,” Carole said. “Just to get it over with.”

  “Good. A volunteer. Carole will go first, then Donald, then Belinda, then me, and Meredith wants to go last. How’s that? And if we run out of time, we’ll just finish tomorrow. We’re on vacation after all.”

  “I told you, Roscoe. I’m not telling my story.” Belinda passed the potato chip bag to Meredith. Meredith pushed it to the center of the table. Donald bent his head abruptly and stared, wide-eyed, into the mouth of the bag.

  “You have to. Everybody has to.”

  “Well, I’m not.”

  “Maybe she’ll change her mind when she sees how bad mine is,” Carole said.

  “Yeah, maybe,” Belinda said, reaching for the chips. “Go ahead. Start.”

  “Okay, but I have one request. I don’t want anybody analyzing mine when it’s done. You can analyze it on your own if you want, but I don’t want a group discussion. I was thinking about before, about Belinda’s story about your friends, the Bradbury’s.”

  “Yeah, that’s right. I forgot about that. I already told a story, didn’t I?”

  “Mine’s a parable,” Carole said. “Is that okay?”

  “Sure,” Roscoe replied.

  “You want some wine to get you through it?” Belinda asked.

  “No thanks. It’s not very long. Okay then, here goes. A woman goes—” Carole stopped short. Meredith had taken her Walkman from her lap and was putting her earphones in place on her head. “Meredith, do you want me to listen when it’s your turn?” Meredith made a face and removed the earphones. Roscoe and Belinda exchanged a glance. Carole took a deep breath and released it. Donald belched. Everyone looked at him. “Donald,” Carole said, nudging him. “Pull yourself together. You’re next.”

  “’Cuseme,” Donald said, chuckling.

  “Okay. A woman wanted to buy a house. So she goes into a real estate office and sits down with a broker. The broker says, ‘I need to know what kind of house, what price range, etc.’ The woman tells him that she’s looking for a split-level with three bedrooms and two baths and a finished basement. So the broker goes through his listings. But he finds that he doesn’t have any splits. And then he sees that there’s a new listing in his pile. He asks his secretary about it and she says it just came in. It’s a ranch, and it’s got everything the woman wanted, except that it’s not a split. It sounds like a great house though. He’s dying to see it himself and asks the woman if she’d like to take a ride out there with him. ‘It’s not a split,’ he says, ‘but it’s got three bedrooms, two baths, etc. There’s nothing to lose. It’s a sunny day and it will be a beautiful ride.’ Well, the woman thinks about it, but she decides to turn down his offer. She had her heart set on a split. She can’t imagine herself living in a ranch. She gives the broker her number and tells him to give her a call when a split comes in in her price range.

  “Later that day a second woman comes in and sits down with the same broker. Now this woman wants an older colonial with three or four bedrooms, an eat-in kitchen, and a formal dining room. She wants a house with charm, or at least with the potential for charm—she and her husband are pretty handy. The broker snaps his fingers, because, darn, he just sold something she would have loved. He knows he doesn’t have any more colonials in his files. But he remembers the ranch, and he tells her about it. It’s right in her price range, and he’s dying to get out there and see it himself. The woman thinks about it, but a ranch just isn’t what she wanted. It’s not rustic enough. She can see the house she wants right inside her head. And it’s definitely not a ranch. But heck! It’s a pretty day and she’s got dinner going in a crockpot, and the kids won’t be home from school for a while yet. If he’s planning to go out and have a look at the ranch, she’ll come along, too, if he doesn’t mind, for the ride.

  “And so they ride out there and it turns out to be a great place! It’s an older ranch, and although it doesn’t look like much on the outside, the inside is terrific. It’s got wide-planked floors, a big country kitchen, a dining room with French doors leading out onto a deck which overlooks a wooded yard. It’s got window seats in the bedrooms, two brick fire pits, one in the living room and one in the master bedroom … and there’s a room in the basement that could easily be converted. It’s great! And the woman can’t believe the price! She can picture the house a year from now with a fresh coat of paint and some shutters and flower boxes around the windows. And right away that picture supersedes the picture of the colonial she’d been carrying around in her head.

  “She’s so excited she can’t wait to get back to the Realtor’s office and call her husband. When she gets him, she tells him she wants to make an offer right away so they don’t risk losing the house. He can’t get there. He’s at work. But he tells her to go ahead and make an offer contingent on his seeing it later in the evening—and of course soil, water and termite tests, etc. She says, ‘What shall I offer?’ And he says, ‘Whatever you think is right. I trust your judgment.’ So she makes an offer very close to the asking price, because it’s a grea
t house and she doesn’t want to insult the owners.” Carole took a deep breath and folded her hands in front of her.

  “That’s it?” Meredith asked.

  Carole nodded.

  Roscoe clapped. “Bravo,” he cried. “That’s a terrific parable. Really thought-provoking.”

  “It really is,” Belinda agreed.

  Meredith replaced her earphones on her head and tuned in a station on her radio.

  “Hey,” Roscoe cried. “Does Meredith’s thing have a microphone? We could be recording these stories. And then we could make copies so that we’ll all have something to remember this vacation by.”

  “It doesn’t have a mike.” Carole turned to look at Donald.

  “Goodstory,” he mumbled. Then he widened his eyes and wiped his hand across his mouth as if his comment surprised him.

  “Is there anything else to snack on?” Belinda asked.

  “Cookies,” Carole said.

  Belinda got out of her seat. “Yeah, I know. In the fridge, right?”

  Meredith smiled and removed her earphones. She put them down in front of her and waited until Belinda sat down with the cookie bag. “Roscoe,” she said then. “Did I hear you say you wanted something to remember this vacation by?”

  Roscoe nodded and made a sign for Belinda to slide him the cookie bag.

  “Well, I’ve got something. There’s a hurricane coming this way. I just heard it. And it’s name is—Carole, you won’t like this—Charlie!”

  “Charlie,” Donald muttered.

  “Winds are ninety miles an hour and building. It’s heading right for us.” She put the earphones back in place on her head.

  Roscoe slid the cookie bag back to Belinda who caught it in both hands and sank back into her chair. “Is she serious?” she asked weakly. “We’d have known about it, wouldn’t we?”

  “I heard there was a depression yesterday,” Roscoe said. “But that was only a depression and it was a good ways away, west of the Leeward Islands.”

  “Why didn’t you tell me about it?” Belinda cried.

  “Because you would have glued yourself to the radio for the rest of the vacation and worried over it, probably unnecessarily. That’s why.”

  “It could be here in two days time,” Meredith said. “Its coordinates are 28 degrees north, 62 west. It’s just southeast of Bermuda.” She spoke loudly, over her earphones.

  “The Leewards,” Carole said. “They’re not too far from Florida, are they? Oh my God! Charlie’s in Miami.”

  “Charlie’s okay,” Meredith said as she removed her earphones. “It’s heading in a northwesterly direction. It would have to change course and head west, southwest in fact, to hit Miami now. If you knew anything about hurricanes you would know that—”

  “I know plenty about hurricanes,” Carole snapped.

  “She’s right though,” Roscoe said, stretching his hand across the table in Carole’s direction. “It’s a million to one that it hits Miami, if Meredith got the coordinates right. Your kid’s safe. And we probably are, too. Look what happened with the season’s first two. They both came up this way and then fizzled out before they got anywhere near the coast.”

  “I don’t like storms,” Carole said to Donald.

  Donald’s eyes widened suddenly. He did not reply.

  “You don’t like storms!” Belinda exclaimed. “I’m freaking out over here. I knew this would happen. I knew it!”

  “Jeez,” Roscoe said, covering his eyes with his palm.

  “You see,” Belinda began excitedly. “I’ve got a connection in Key West. Roscoe’s got a friend who has his own plane. And this guy promised that he’d fly me out in an emergency. And despite the fact that this guy and his wife are the two most boring people in the world, I invite them to dinner every year just before the hurricane season and—”

  “That’s nice, Belinda,” Roscoe interrupted.

  “Shut up. And I get the guy to renew his promise. So it’s no surprise to me that we haven’t had a serious hurricane threat since I’ve been living there. But now here I am, away from home and without my airplane connection, on an island even smaller than Key West, and—”

  “Belinda,” Roscoe said. “We don’t know for sure that it’s coming. Certainly it’s not coming tonight. So cool it with the dramatics.”

  “You know how these things go,” Belinda said to Carole. “Your fears catch up with you sooner or later. I’ve seen it happen a million times. Like this friend of mine who’s afraid of snakes. I mean, there’s no one in the whole world who’s as afraid of snakes as she is. And so a long time ago we went together—me, her, and Roscoe—to see this magic show, right? And she says to me before the show, ‘Belinda, I know there’s going to be a snake charmer, and I know his snake is going to get loose.’ Living with Roscoe, I’d been to lots of magic shows. I said, ‘There’s always a snake charmer, and the snake always gets loose in the audience—but it’s a ruse. Really the charmer’s got control of the snake the whole time. He just makes it look like he doesn’t. And then he finds his snake at some poor soul’s expense.’ Her eyes got big and round. I said, ‘Look at this place. It’s huge. There’s a full house. You know what the chances are that the snake charmer does his trick at your expense? Oh, he’ll get someone all right, but five thousand to one it won’t be you.’ Because, I mean, this was a huge place! So the show starts. And right after intermission, sure enough, here comes the snake charmer. And he gets his cobra to come up out of the basket, and I can feel Betty beside me getting as stiff as a corpse. And I turn to her to say something consoling and she doesn’t even acknowledge me, because her attention is riveted on the stage. The snake charmer gets the snake back into the basket, closes it, then opens it again to make sure it’s in there, and sure enough, poof, it’s gone! So the snake charmer and his assistant feign panic and start running up and down the aisles looking for their snake. And everybody in the audience is screaming, and my friend is practically dead, she’s so still. But I know she’s not dead because I see her legs moving, very slowly. She’s bringing her knees up to her chest and putting her feet up on the chair, kind of making herself into a ball in preparation for what she thinks is going to happen. And then the charmer comes running down our aisle, and I’ll be damned if he doesn’t pull that friggin’ snake right out from under Betty’s seat.”

  Carole gasped. “What did she do?”

  “Nothing. I’m telling you, she was frozen from the moment the snake made his first appearance. And she stayed like that for the rest of the show. She had a good cry on the way home and then after that she recovered. Isn’t that right, Roscoe?”

  “It’s true, but—”

  “And then I’ve got this other friend, Charlene. Charlene’s got a serious germ phobia. She has nightmares all the time about germs sneaking into her house. She’s petrified of bugs, because of course they carry germs. She must have an exterminator coming to her house every couple of days. And she cleans all the time. Every time you call her she’s cleaning. She lives in a completely sterile environment. I mean, this girl’s Catholic and she won’t receive communion because who knows if the priest washed his hands the last time he took a leak? She won’t let her husband use her bar of soap because once she caught him soaping up without a wash cloth. Now Roscoe thinks she’s plain crazy. But I disagree. I say everybody’s born with an innate knowledge of what’s going to do them in—or at least what’s going to plague them all their lives. That’s where people’s seemingly irrational fears come from. They’re born with them. Take Betty. How’d she know that snake was going to wind up under her chair? I say she knew it a long time ago. I say she was born knowing it. And Charlene. Those germs are really after her, because here she is, the cleanest person in the world, and I swear, the things that happen to her … I mean, she had a little kissing session with the mailman once. They didn’t go to bed or anything like that. And she got crabs! Can you believe it? And her kid came home from school twice—not once, mind you—with scabies. And ever
y single virus that goes around, you can be certain someone in that house is going to catch it.”

  “Belinda, we’re supposed to be telling fictitious stories—not gossiping.”

  Belinda looked at Roscoe for a moment before answering. “Hey, I’m just trying to explain to Carole how I know the storm is going to hit here. It’s me that it’s coming for, because it’s my fate to spend my life dodging storms. Now I made my point and I’m not going to mention the storm again for the rest of the night, because I’m not a complete fool and I do realize that we have plenty of time to get away. You get a little more warning with hurricanes than you do with snakes and germs, thank God. So go ahead. On with the festivities. And one more thing, Mr. Creedmoor. Some of the best stories in the world start off as gossip. You ask Donald if you don’t believe me.”

  “Itsnotcoming tonight,” Donald mumbled.

  “I don’t like storms either,” Carole said. “How about tomorrow we go over to the Coast Guard station and find out just what the storm is doing and what the evacuation procedures are? Would that make you feel better?”

  “Yeah, I’ll go with you. Let’s go early, okay? Roscoe, pass me the wine bottle and let’s forget about this hurricane business for now. I don’t want to have nightmares tonight.”

  “I guess that means it’s your turn,” Carole said to Donald.

  Donald looked at the table. “I forget,” he mumbled. He looked up at the others, one at a time. His eyes were red and there were dark circles beneath them. “Ihad one. I forgotit.”

  Carole laughed. “You drank too much,” she said. “We’ll let you off the hook this time, but—”

  “Ah Jeez,” Roscoe declared. “Belinda refuses to tell her story. Donald forgets his … Come on, Donald. Think. Or improvise. I had as much wine as you did.”

  Donald studied Roscoe’s features. Then he yawned, patting his mouth with his hand.

  “He can’t improvise now,” Carole said. “Why don’t you go and let him off the hook until tomorrow—if we’re still here.”

  Roscoe rolled his eyes and was about to acquiesce when Meredith interrupted. “My father wrote a poem today. He could read that. That would be better than nothing.” She shrugged.