by Daya Daniels
Brooks rolls his eyes, completely ignores me then looks around, eyes narrowed.
A roll of thunder brings my attention back to the sky.
“Fuck.” Brooks squeezes his temples with his thumb and forefinger. “It’s going to pour.”
Peni is still bouncing through the trees when the rain starts to fall.
We explore for a little while but when trickling of the water becomes heavier with the exchange of a look we know it’s time to leave.
“Peni!” I stare up into the trees, following the rustling, see all green and no monkey. “Peni.”
She doesn’t return.
“Peni!” Brooks arches his neck to get a good view above.
Peni’s excited cries catch my attention but when they grow louder, I’m more alarmed.
“Peni!” Brooks’ brows collide as he spins around sending his voice in every direction since we have no clue where she is.
Then, her head pops out, cries become louder. We tread over the lush grass and through the overgrown brush. I almost trip but Brooks’ fingers clutch my arm before I do.
“Thanks.” I can barely look at him as I say the words assured he’s getting very tired of saving my ass.
He doesn’t say “you’re welcome” or “no problem.” I only get a blank look and then he continues marching toward Peni’s cries. “Come down, Peni.” He gestures with an arm.
But she doesn’t, only blinks and I laugh unable to ignore how damn cute she is.
“This isn’t funny, Tenley. It’s going to be a fucking monsoon in a minute.” Brooks places a hand on the large tree’s twisted limbs and gives a nod. “It’s a rubber tree.”
“Oh.”
“It leaks latex.” He laughs. “It must be at least a few thousand years old.”
“Wow.” I examine the gargantuan forty-foot tree.
Peni is screaming, bouncing up and down, doing everything besides as we damn well ask.
“Peni, come on, please. We don’t have time for this.” He tosses me a look.
I send him one right back letting him know I’m not leaving here without Peni.
With a huff, he ascends the thick trunk, placing his beat-up dress shoes in each ridge and hole which will allow him to climb what appear to be steps…
I move closer, inspecting the tree.
My eyes flicker over to Brooks and soon he’s examining the tree in the same way as I am.
Cautious. Hesitant. No true desire in his eyes to scale its twisted structure.
Peni is screaming, her cries so shrill they echo and create a deafening noise.
“Good God, this monkey…” Slowly, Brooks ascends.
Peni climbs higher.
Brooks follows and soon he disappears into the curtain of vines and branches.
I wait where I stand.
More thunder follows.
Peni has quieted. Everything is quiet except for the soft tapping of the rain.
Another boom.
And then it’s pouring.
I lower my head accepting I’m getting quite used to being out in the rain. Our makeshift house leaks. It’s full of ants. It rests on the sand. And even when the tide comes up its location becomes quite iffy. But it’s the best we can do with what we have. Hopefully, we won’t have to live in it much longer because they’re coming for us. They must.
I can’t imagine Richard Cushing letting me die out here without dispatching a good search.
Lifting a hand, I run it through my hair and right when I lower it my dress shreds a little more.
I frown and capture the rain in my mouth.
It tastes of the sky.
Then, I stare at my feet.
I’ve been reduced to rags, barefoot in the sand, and currently, homeless.
My thoughts drift to home and what I’d likely be doing right now…maybe sitting in the den brainstorming and coming up with new ideas for Fennel. James usually calls me in the late afternoon to ask me about my day. We talk for about an hour. I tell him what I plan to make for dinner for us even though I know he won’t be arriving home any time soon to taste it. We say “I love you” before we hang up and then I spend the rest of the night alone usually. Until I wake when he slides into bed and wraps himself around me without saying a word, letting me know he’s there.
Then, I’m back, yanked into the current moment by my own shuddering.
I spin around, immediately wanting to hide my face, hating that I’m crying.
God, I want to go home.
I allow myself a moment to sob, sad, missing my husband and being in his arms.
My tears feel like they’ll never end.
“TENLEY!” Brooks’ voice causes me to flinch. “TENLEY!”
I whirl around with wide eyes and gaze up at the tree, searching.
Brooks’ head pops out, blue eyes big and smile quite the same. “Tenley!” He pants wildly. “You’ve got to come up here!”
Brooks crawls down the tree, or should I rather say…he bounds down the stairs and extends a hand in my direction. He pauses for just a beat, observing me, then gestures once more urging me to come closer. This is the happiest I’ve seen him since we landed on this godforsaken island. The appearance of a genuine smile on his face—one that shows every single one of his white teeth is perplexing.
I place my hand in his and with one pull I’m ascending with him. “What is it?”
He glances over his shoulder. “You won’t fucking believe this, Tenley?”
After being hit by a rogue wave, practically eaten by sharks, and marooned on a deserted island in the middle of God knows where while somehow still managing to stay alive, I think I’ll believe anything.
So, I follow.
Brooks
THE BREATH THAT LEAVES my chest literally hurts.
It’s full of appreciation, pure joy, and frankly, disbelief.
“What is this place?” Tenley spins around, lips parted, but she can’t get any more words out.
We meet eyes.
I smile.
She’s still tongue-tied.
Peni perches on a branch, blue eyes beaming with pride as though she had just found the fucking Hope Diamond. And boy she had. She truly had. Reaching out a hand, I scrub her on the head. She giggles and twists around, wrapping herself around my arm.
“Good girl. You’re so amazing.” I tickle her tummy.
Tenley’s amber eyes regard me for a beat, watery and lost. “What is—”
“It’s a treehouse.” I laugh, taking a few more steps toward her.
It’s pouring outside and thunder roars, but we’re dry standing here, completely protected.
Tenley strolls about the large room touching things—an old table, an old bed, an old chair, an old desk—everything carved out of magnolia wood. “I thought this place was deserted.”
“So did I.” I bob my head nonstop. “So did I.” I scan the cozy surroundings which are nestled in this big tree, up so high and concealed by so many vines and branches we wouldn’t have known it was ever here if Peni hadn’t found this place. I touch the doors, admiring their construction, good edges, great angles—most definitely built by a carpenter or someone who took considerable pride in the trade in some way or another.
Tenley runs her fingers over everything. “It’s amazing.” She plucks up a shirt that’s probably older than the two of us, inspects it then places it back down.
There’s a bathroom that possibly has an operational toilet in it, a kitchen on the opposite side with a large dining table along with a rectangular table against the wall which is presumably used for food preparation, a den, and a bedroom which are open and shared, and a smaller space where an old desk rests. And beyond that there’s even a deck. The roof looks solid, built with a severe pitch to possibly catch water. I spot some cracks here and there, but they aren’t anything I can’t fix with the correct tools. Windows line the place here and there and the shutters affixed to the exterior can be closed if necessary.
This place was
once someone’s home.
I step onto the deck and fix my eyes on the beach in the distance and admire the view from where I stand. I spin around and exhale so big, I almost expel every last breath from me.
Holding on to the door and feeling the need to kiss the very wood this place is made of, I press my cheek to the jamb. I suck in the scent of the rain and do it over and over, accepting the semblance of calm in our very chaotic world.
Tenley steps outside and onto the deck. “Is this place safe?”
“Yeah.” I nod. “I think so. I’ll um, just check it out a bit more to make sure it’s structurally okay, you know. But um…” I touch all the wood. “This is pretty solid and so is this tree. I don’t think either of them are going anywhere for quite a while.”
Tenley takes a deep breath. “Do you think whoever lived here is coming back?”
I give her a good stare. “No, it’s just us here. I’m sure of it.”
Questions form in my tongue about the person who used to live here, who isn’t here any longer. Whoever they were, they had good taste judging by the old dusty books which line the bookshelf on the wall. They were also good at math judging by the way this place was built. And they were also a romantic in light of the heart shape carved into the wall at the opposite side of the room which the letters I&P float in the middle of.
She folds her arms across her chest. “Okay then.” Tenley’s eyes land on the marking but she doesn’t say anything about it. “Everything in this place is quite old.” Her worried eyes scan the treehouse.
“Yeah, I know.”
Then she walks over to the bed and sits on it, bouncing softly in place. “But it’ll do.” She smiles and I’m honestly happy to see it. “I can’t remember the last time I slept in a bed.”
Me either.
She lets out a dramatic sigh. Then she snatches up something from the foot of the bed and holds it up. My eyes are as perplexed as hers while we stare at the blue dress that looks less tattered than the one she’s currently wearing. Plus, it looks as though it would fit her.
“I wonder who it belonged to?” Tenley scrutinizes it. “It’s very old.”
“Does it matter?”
She folds her lips in. “No, I suppose it doesn’t.” She finds the tag. “And it’s tailored.”
I shrug.
Her eyes dart everywhere. “I suppose if this is here, maybe there’s some other clothes around here.” She scrambles across the room to the ornate trunk there and wrenches it open. “And there are…” She grins. “How amazing is that?” She plucks a few items out.
Laughing, my gaze drifts to my torn, stained, and filthy what-used-to-be-suit-pants. “Yeah, just maybe there’s something in there for me too.”
She holds a dress up to her chest then her eyes find mine when she makes a funny face. “I don’t think you’d care who the clothes used to belong to.”
I smile. “I wouldn’t.”
“Yeah, I figured that.”
We stare at each other for a while, half sad and half smiling but mostly grateful for this massive sliver of hope. We have shelter. We have food. We now have somewhere to lay our heads that doesn’t involve tons of beach sand.
The rain has eased to a soft trickle.
My hand glides over my pocket and the mystery there and my narrowed eyes stay fixed on the beach and that thing still bobbing in the water. “We have grouper for dinner.”
“And I pulled up some amaranth.”
“Okay then.” Her eyes find the clever little monkey who’s in this treehouse with us. “And Peni can have coconut.” She laughs.
Peni screeches.
I chuckle a bit myself.
“What do we do now?” Tenley smiles.
A loud breath slips from me. “I say let’s take a walk on the beach…”
Tenley
NO ONE HAD EVER asked me why I had named the line Fennel…
Not even James.
The waves wash up on the shore softly and the rain trickles from above.
Gray sky but still so spectacular.
Brooks sends me an unreadable look and places his hand on the crate. “You were so fucking upset about all the foam.”
I cover my mouth with my hands, eyes watering profusely and just breathe.
Brooks runs a hand through his hair. “But all the non-recyclable foam is what’s helped this goddamn thing to float.” His chest shakes with laughter and soon his eyes are shiny too but he doesn’t let a tear fall like how mine currently are.
“I can’t believe this.” I place a hand on the crate, feeling connected to a memory, laced to the past that seems so forever ago.
Walking around the large crate, Brooks bangs on it a few times with a hand then stills completely.
I wipe away my tears and crane my neck to the sky, silently saying a prayer.
The air has cooled. It isn’t cold by any means, but the temperature has definitely dropped a few degrees. Even the last few nights had been damp, too damp for Brooks and me to continue to share his deteriorating suit jacket.
“What’s in this crate, Tenley?”
I muster a smile, letting my last tear go. “Blankets, pillows, towels, sheets, washcloths, hand soap, shampoo, candles, matches, dry food and coffee samples, and lots and lots of tea…”
He bangs on the crate a few times then freezes.
“All made of 100% organic products…” I giggle.
Brooks takes the axe to the top of the crate and cuts through the binding holding it together. The stacks of foam hurt my eyes but now I’m so fucking grateful for it. Without it, this entire crate would be an anchor at the bottom of the sea and we’d be spending however many next nights shivering beneath that dirty suit jacket. It’s difficult to accept that somewhere out there in the big ocean there are more crates packed with Fennel merchandise in them. Perhaps they’d floated away to Asia or Antarctica or maybe even somewhere farther. I only pray they head this way because even though now we have a home, still, we’re short on supplies and need everything we can get our hands on.
When the crate is cracked open, we pull everything out and one by one we unpack the essentials we need which are vacuum wrapped in plastic. My eyes fix on a pillow—white, soft, presumably still cozy—and I smile.
“We have pillows.” Brooks does a dance.
I giggle and feel the need to celebrate with him but still can’t bring myself to.
Could a person ever feel so grateful for something as simple as a pillow?
Or a blanket?
Or a roof over their head?
Brooks’ laughter grows high-pitched and I chuckle at his excitement. He kicks around the wet sand and looks more like a kid right now who’d just received the best Christmas present ever rather than a grown man.
The thunder booms in the sky.
Peni had darted off for the trees long ago.
Maybe she’d headed home?
Home.
We have a home.
Small mercies we can only be thankful for right now. And I am. I-so-fucking-am.
We have food.
We’re in one piece.
And Brooks is laughing, because now, we have blankets…
The rain falls harder. And even then, we simply stand in it and gather up our supplies.
He examines the green writing embossed on everything. “Why’d you call it Fennel? It’s odd.”
I’m odd.
“It’s silly, you don’t want to know why.”
He steps closer. “I do, tell me, please. I want to know.”
I’m not sure if the interest in his eyes is genuine or if he’s humoring me right now. So, I tilt my head and observe him for just a second before I decide to speak. “It always made me feel better.”
His top lip curls up. “Fennel?”
I laugh softly. “Yeah, it’s silly…I mean, I don’t know. The soup. Whenever I felt rotten, I always made the soup, especially while in college. As a girl my nana often made it. And when I didn’t have time to ma
ke it myself, I’d simply buy it.” I’m suddenly fixated on the particles of sand feeling silly. “But the soup always made me feel better. I don’t know why,” I lie.
“It’s connected to a memory.” His voice tugs my gaze to his. “It’s likely less about the soup and more about the memory.” He smiles. “You know…how it made you feel…”
I press my lips together hating that he’d just dismantled everything I hadn’t said as if I'd truly said it.
He looks away from me and then his eyes are on me again. “You were always about that soup back in college, I remember.” He smiles. “James always had it in his fridge. It was overflowing with the stuff.”
I giggle.
“So often he’d pass it off to Joy and me since he was so sick of eating it.”
I crack up laughing. “I guess I thought maybe the soup would’ve made him feel better whenever he was ill the same way it had always made me perk up.”
Brooks’ head moves from side to side slowly. “It didn’t, Tenley. It didn’t. If anything, it just gave everyone the shits.” He grins.
It takes effort for me to stop smiling.
Brooks gazes up at the sky then back at the crate. “Fennel.” Nodding, he hums. “I like it.”
“Thanks, I like it too.”
The water falling from the sky beats against the sand and the briny scent of the sea is kicked up with the wind, filling my nostrils with it and soothing my spirit after this very long and exciting day.
“We should get out of this rain.” My arms are strained with everything I’m holding with them.
Brooks’ expression morphs into one of seriousness and his head lowers so that I can’t see his eyes now concealed by his messy brown hair. “Honestly, Tenley, I think I could stand in this rain all flippin’ day.” When he lifts his head, he sends a beaming smile my way as he holds up a package that I’d vacuum sealed myself what seems like forever ago. “Because we have blankets.”
Brooks
THE LAST THING YOU need in a house completely made of wood is fire. But tonight, we used it anyways on a small scale, out on the deck, cautiously, to grill fish over shards of cedar.
Tenley said the wood would make the fish taste better. I’m still up in the air about that. I guess only the taste will tell me if she’s right. I’m more of a steak and potatoes type of guy. Less enthused about eating creatures of the sea. Then Tenley went on and on about the benefits of a meatless diet—less sodium in the blood, strain on the digestive system, and cleaner and unclogged heart valves.