"Hey, you two," Mirina said. "What are you conspiring about, this early in the morning? Wiggy, you're not about to sail off in your magical dinghy, are you?"

---

 

35. Coconuts, Maybe
 

The next day, Saturday, was the first day we could be rescued. We all got up early and took another shower. Then we all got dressed and waited.

Nobody left the camp except that every so often a couple of girls would go to the top of the hill to see whether there was anything to be seen.

There was nothing. No boat, no plane, no helicopter. Nothing.

The day passed slowly, but no one lost heart. Wiggy was a bit tense, but not more than usual.

"One more day," she whispered to me as we got ready for bed. "Tomorrow I'll gather all the supplies so we can be ready for first light Monday."

"Okay," I answered, and lay down on my bunk. We were still sleeping inside the cave. One reason was that it was so comfortable. There were beds, cool air, and it was clean. The other reason was that Mirina never got over the feeling that a man was wandering around the island, and she felt safer with all of us together in the cave.

Sunday passed in the same way, although we all began feeling restless. Since everyone wanted to be there when help arrived, no one left the camp. As a result, we were immensely bored.

We took turns trying to open the coconuts we'd gathered. Donkey smashed one violently against a pointed rock. The green skin crumpled and the white insides showed.

"What did you do that for?" Boogers demanded.

"I thought coconuts were supposed to be hard," Donkey replied. "I thought it would crack open, not smash like a pumpkin! And aren't coconuts supposed to be brown? Are the ones you see in stores toasted or dried or something?"

Nobody knew.

"I mean," Donkey went on, "these things are green. Doesn't that mean they aren't ripe yet?"

"Maybe they aren't coconuts," Ding-Dong offered.

"No," Boogers contradicted. "They came from the coconut trees, so they MUST be coconuts."

"Those are palm trees," Ding-Ding said. "Right? Do coconuts grow on palm trees? Why do they call them palm trees then?"

"Dates grow on palm trees, too," Cakey threw in, with a mischievous grin.

"Oh, you girls!" Boogers exclaimed in exasperation. "Let me see one of those things. I just thought it would be fun to try to open them. I didn't expect it to turn into a big federal case!"

Boogers selected one of the coconuts and balanced it atop one of the picnic tables. Then she took the biggest kitchen knife we had, and asked Donkey, "Will you hold this coconut still for me?"

At first she tried to slice it the way you'd slice an apple. Then she tried to cut it as if it was a loaf of bread. Athough she succeeded in making cuts into the skin, the knife kept slipping away from her. I could hardly bear to watch.

"Oh, Boogers, be careful!" I cried. "The way you two are standing, you could stab Donkey in the stomach!"

Boogers stopped and said, "This stupid knife isn't going to do it anyway. Stand back, Donkey, I'm going to try something different." She put down the knife and picked up a heavy meat cleaver. Twice she buried the cleaver deep in the fruit and needed Donkey's help to pull it out, but at last she managed to separate the coconut into two halves. All the coconut milk was lost as it flowed through the table onto the ground.

"Och!" Mirina cried out in an irritated voice. "You girls are making a mess! All that sticky sweet stuff is going to attract bugs!"

"We're leaving tomorrow anyway," Knickers retorted. "Nature will clean it up."

"No, I'll do it!" Mirina replied, and jumped to her feet. She took a small pot, dipped it in the ocean, and poured the salty water all over the table.

"It's not working," Knickers pointed out, putting her tongue in her cheek.

Mirina touched her hand to the mixture. She sighed. "It's too oily," she declared. "I need some..." She hesitated... "some cleaner..." She huffed distractedly. "... and something to wipe with..." Then at last she said, "Whatever! Just leave it!" and went to wash her hands with soap.

Boogers, undeterred, took a selection of knives and another coconut. With a great deal of difficulty, she managed to peel the green skin off half a coconut. Then she carefully carved away at the white meat until she created a tiny opening to the hollow center. "Aha!" she exclaimed, and put the opening to her lips.

After a few deep sips, she set it down. Her face was wet with the oily liquid. "It's good, girls! It's very good! It's like lemonade!"

Soon we were all at work, each girl with her coconut, carving, whittling, and at long last drinking.

I liked it, but it was so rich I couldn't drink much.
 

In the evening a light rain came up, so we retired early.
 

---

 

Wiggy shook me awake and beckoned me to follow. I heard the rain before we reached the mouth of the cave.

"It's still raining," she said.

I looked out, and (still half asleep) said, "It's not so bad. I think I see light over there. It's probably going to clear up." Then I kicked myself. Wiggy clearly didn't want to go in the rain. So what was I doing? Talking her into going? I wondered whether I could take back what I'd said. Turned out, I didn't need to.

"Yeah," Wiggy said, "it probably is clearing up, but there's no point in taking unnecessary chances. We're not going today. We'll go first thing tomorrow, weather permitting."

As quiet as we'd been, our exit had woken Mirina, and she emerged, still dressed in her pajamas. She joined us at the cave mouth. In an unexpectedly affectionate moment, she gathered Wiggy and me to her, putting her arms on our shoulders.

"Hey, you two," she said. "What are you conspiring about, this early in the morning? Wiggy, you're not about to sail off in your magical dinghy, are you?"

Wiggy stiffened for a moment, and I thought (gratefully) that the game was up, but Mirina was only joking. She never thought for a moment that Wiggy would be mad enough to take such a tiny boat into the world's largest sea.

"It's a dory, not a dinghy," Wiggy told her, "and I'd be rowing, not sailing."

"Oh, Hedwig, I'm only teasing you. Lighten up. Listen. The girls need us to be calm." Her eyes drifted to me. "You too, Miss Action Hero. Today, especially if it rains, we'll all be bouncing off the walls. The three of us need to keep a lid on things." When Mirina finished speaking, a shudder ran through her, and she let go of us, taking a few steps back.

"What is it?" I asked.

"Oh," she said. "I had the weirdest dream last night. That's what woke me up, really. Otherwise I wouldn't have seen the two of you sneaking out." She drew one deep breath, then another. "It was really disturbing. And the worst part was that it seemed so real."

"Do you want to tell us about it?" I offered.

Before going on, Mirina looked around her, as if someone might be listening. Then she went to the table, took a flashlight and turned its beam outside, using it to look in every spot that we could see.

"Okay," she said. "In my dream, we were all here on island, all us girls. Except that Romy was here instead of you, Marcie." (Romy is the girl who gave up her place for me.)

"So what was the scary part?" Wiggy asked.

"There was a boy on the island," Mirina answered.

"A boy?" Wiggy echoed in a questioning tone. "Not the man..." she gestured to the cloakroom "... they guy who left his coat and boats here?"

"No, it was a boy, our age, and he was on the island too."

"Was he bad?" I asked.

"No, he just didn't belong here," she replied. When she said that, a chill ran through me.

"So what else happened?" I asked.

She shrugged. "Nothing, I guess."

"That doesn't sound scary at all," Wiggy scoffed. "A boy? And what — did he have cooties?" she laughed a little.

"You laugh, Hedwig, you laugh," Mirina said. "I can't explain why it was frightening; that's the way dreams are." She shook her head. "It was very disturbing." She closed her eyes for a moment. "Oh, girls, I'm so tired! I'm going back to bed. It's still too early."

"Good night," I said, and Wiggy wished her "Sweet dreams," with a smirk that Mirina didn't see.

After Her Manliness was gone, I said to Wiggy, "You didn't tell her, did you?"

"Tell her what?" she replied.

"About me!"

"About you?" She furrowed her brow, not understanding. Then she got it: "Oh! About you! About you being a boy? The boy of her dreams?" She cackled and grabbed my arm, gently waggling it. "Of course not! Why would I do that? Oh, Marcie! You're my best friend here! I could never do that!"

"Okay," I said.

She scoffed at me. "Your secret's safe. Nobody's going to guess, and I'm not going to tell!"

"You said you would, if I told about the dory..."

She scoffed again. "As if! I just wanted you to know how serious my secret was!"

"Okay," I said, not entirely reassured.

Wiggy looked into the light rain outside. "Let's go back to bed," she said. "Mirina's right: it is too early."
 

By breakfast time the rain had gone and the sky was clear. The air had a wonderful freshness. Ding-Dong made real coffee, and it was pretty good.

"I made it cowboy style," she explained. "You boil the water, dump in the coffee, return to a boil, then take it off the heat. When the grounds settle, it's ready to drink."

"I like it," I said. "I never thought I'd ever drink black coffee."

She smiled and sipped her own. As I sat next to Ding-Dong, I thought how much I'd miss them all, but particularly Ding-Dong, when this was all over.

"We can write," she said. "We can email and phone and chat."

"How did you know what I was thinking?" I asked, astonished.

"I was thinking it too," she replied, her eyes twinkling.
 

---

 

Of course, Monday passed and still we weren't rescued. The realization that we could be on the island for a very long time began to sink in.

Spontaneously the girls gathered an enormous quantity of wood, and once the sun went down, they lit a bonfire. No one said so, but it was obviously a signal. It probably would have been more effective if it were up on top of the hill, but I didn't say so. It seemed more of an emotional signal than a physical one.

We sat at a distance (it was a VERY hot fire) and discussed the rescue. Everyone kept dancing around the obvious conclusion — that no one knew where we were — but no one said it out loud. Not yet.

Maybe someone would come to rescue us tomorrow. But tomorrow Wiggy and I would be gone, off in the crazy dory, out on the open sea.

I wanted to go; I didn't want to go. But one thing was sure: I couldn't tell anyone. Still, what if it worked? You've done crazier things, Marcie, and you've always come through, I told myself. Could I trust in my uncanny luck? Did I have some sort of indestructible karma? Who knows? I thought about the kidnapping... being a prisoner... confronting Officer Strange... I came through all that. I didn't just survive, either. I got out.

That experience left a black, bitter mark on my soul, but at the same time it gave me courage. I knew I could come through again, and again. In some crazy way (and I knew it was crazy, even at the time) I knew I'd come through now. If I went with Wiggy, we'd come through. We'd get help, and we'd all be rescued.

Besides, I knew that Wiggy would go with or without me. If I made her go alone, I could never forgive myself. And if I told the others and stopped her from going, she'd never forgive me.

With all the back and forth inside my head, I knew I had to delay Wiggy as long as I could... my rational brain knew I had to keep her on the island.

But another part of me was ready to go. As insane, desperate, and frightening as her idea was — that two teenage girls could go to sea in a dory and find help on another island — somehow, in spite of all my mental reservations, I knew deep down inside of me... I *knew* it would work. I don't know why.

Probably I felt that way because of Wiggy herself. I knew she was half-crazed with the fear of being stuck here forever. Plus, she was riddled with guilt. She truly believed it was her fault that no one knew where were were.

At the same time, I'd seen Wiggy in action. I remembered how she parted the sea of journalists at my house, and the way she shepherded us through the journey here.

Of course, I'd seen her other side as well: the little lost girl. I'd seen her that way on the ship before it sank.

In fact, I saw that little lost girl the very first time I met her, right after she'd pushed back the journalists. She'd fallen down the icy steps, and I had to fight my way though the crowd to help her up.

Maybe that was a model or a metaphor for how things would go in the dory. She had the plan, the drive, the power. I was the one who could step up to protect the little lost girl in her. That much, I could handle. I couldn't help her with the boat, or the rowing, or with knowing the way. All I had to do — all that I could do — was hold her hand, bring her down to earth. If we worked together, we'd be fine.

I looked at the girls around the fire, and saw Wiggy sitting next to Mirina. I smiled at her and she smiled back. I guess she was comforted by knowing we were leaving the next day.
 

Since I was lost in my musings, I hadn't noticed when it began, but Ding-Dong was telling the story of Journey To The Center of the Earth. Surprisingly, the other girls seemed quite interested. She told the story from a peculiar angle, though. Right now she was spending a lot of time on the love story between a boy named Axel and a girl named Grauben.

"He didn't want to go on the expedition because he wanted to stay and marry Grauben," Ding-Dong was saying.

"Didn't Grauben go along?" Cakey asked.

"No," Ding-Dong replied. "She stayed behind. I think she had some job in another town or something."

"Are you sure her name was Grauben?" Donkey asked. "I thought her name was Gertrude."

"Gertrude was the duck!" Boogers replied. "Everybody knows that!"

"There was no duck," Ding-Dong contradicted. "And nobody in the book is named Gertrude."

Everyone began speaking at once, but in the end it was established that Gertrude the duck was a later addition to a cartoon version of the story.

Once that point was settled, Ding-Dong went on to describe the guide, a man named Hans. "He was tall and strong, and very still. He almost never spoke, but he had these dreamy sea-blue eyes, and long red hair that fell all the way down to his shoulders."

"Hmmph!" snorted Knickers. "Blue eyes and long red hair? I don't know whether I'd like that! Long red hair? On a boy?"

"On a *man*," Cakey corrected.

"Oh, but you would like it," Ding-Dong went on. "Hans was quiet, and masterful, and strong. He was always calm and tranquil, and he always knew what to do. Oh! And I almost forgot! He had broad shoulders."

I won't bore you with the whole of Ding-Dong's recitation. She concentrated heavily on the relationships between the characters and very little on the plot, yet in the end she managed to convey the basic idea: that the travelers went underground in Iceland and emerged in Italy.

Even though her narrative was emotionally biased, continually interrupted, and almost completely without a story line, it was pretty easy to understand. What I found difficult to understand was the attention that all the girls gave her. It was beyond polite; they seemed genuinely interested.

At last the clue came when Donkey asked, "But Ding-Dong, I don't understand how this helps us. We're not in Iceland."

"No," Ding-Dong replied, "but we have a volcano!"

And then I understood: Ding-Dong was proposing the volcano as a way off the island. In her book, there was a path underground that led from a dead volcano all the way to Sicily. She imagined that if we descended into the earth the same way the characters in her book had done, we would likewise come to a happy exit in some civilized country.

"Oh, no, Belle, no," Donkey objected. "You never said we'd have to go into the volcano."

Other objections followed. Ding-Dong tried to answer them all, but it was pretty clear that none of the girls were ready to climb underground for any reason. Ding-Dong rose to her feet to argue better, and I slipped over to Wiggy's side.

"I'm surprised you're not saying anything," I told her in a teasing tone.

"I don't need to," she answered. "We have our own way out."

"Right," I said. "Is everything ready?"

"Yes," she replied. There's just one thing we'll have to do on the water, and that's to rig a canopy so we don't get sunburnt. Still, that's not a big deal."

I nodded.

The girls were still arguing over Ding-Dong's radical plan. Boogers, rolling her eyes incredulously, separated herself and came over.

"Do you two want to open a couple of coconuts with me?" she asked.

Wiggy shook her head no, but I said, "Sure, let's do it."

© 2008 by Kaleigh Way

[OTHER STORIES]

---

Thanks once again to Annette MacGregor for help with the tropical background
(though we disagreed on the topic of coconuts!).
Any inaccuracies or impossibilities are the fault of the girls themselves.