Drowning Lessons

by Rachel Neuburger Reynolds

  Once they got to the rougher waters on the eastern side of the island, Olivia named off all the beaches they sped by. Bluff Beach, not great but you might spot a leatherback turtle. La Curba, where the surf breaks both ways. Dumpers, named after the nearby garbage facilities.

  She finally cut the motor at the most dangerous beach on the island, Paunch Beach. Waves broke both right and left. The riptide was vicious, and at high tide the beach disappeared altogether.

  Olivia continued, “They had no idea what was coming. But I told them that, oh no, the hatchet was not being buried, but maybe they were about to be.”

  That’s a criminal mind if I ever heard one.

  “I pulled out their passports, which believe me were not easy to procure, and told them that they better meet me at the airport in the morning so I could escort them on the noon flight out. If they didn’t show, I’d take the passports, shred them, scatter them in the ocean, and wish them luck to ever getting off the island.”

  Great idea, if the airport wasn’t closed.

  “Come on,” she said. “We’ve got a bridesmaid meeting to get to, and I’m ripping everyone a new one.”

  Would I be able to have her committed this far from America?

  I grabbed my book and bag, wearing a terrible red eighties off the shoulder, sweat suit material mini-dress. As soon as we got on the boat, she launched into her recent mantra.

  “Don’t tell Walter about the frogs. Don’t tell Walter until he needs to know. Okay?” She seemed to compose herself. “This is really not what I need. I’ve got pages full of terrible things to be remedied already. Really not what I need…”

  She turned the key to the boat, turned to me, turned away. Repeat. “I’m going to say something really terrible. Really bad. Do you think that there’s going to be a problem with Nico paying for the wedding still? I think everything was paid up front, but I can’t cover what wasn’t. Oh god, that’s really terrible. Really terrible. Forget I said that. Please, forget I said that.”

  But you did.

  Then she took off, lurching out into the water. Thankfully, this boat had seatbelts I could wear over my safety vest.

  It wasn't in her nature to believe that she couldn't excel at something immediately. Sometimes this trait was annoying. Sometimes it was strangely and indefinably endearing. But that was Olivia. I'd seen twenty-five years of it, in various incarnations. The mold had been broken when she was born and, depending on the day and on her whimsical moods, I wasn’t always sure if that was a good or bad thing.

  She yelled for me to come up to sit with her, and cut the motor again, lurching off again as soon as I sat. She spelled out to me the latest crisis, nervously yelling over the running motor. “And you aren’t going to believe it. It gets even worse. It’s hair, teeth, and eyes all over the place,” Olivia cried out, quoting our favorite seventh-grade teacher.

  “I’m having what you might call an attack of the panic,” she said as we headed off to Coral Cay, hands down our favorite restaurant, on the coast of, well, Coral Cay. Since we’d arrived on Saturday, we’d eaten lunch there three days out of four. You’d order, snorkel, eat and then were encouraged to throw your leftovers to the fish clamoring around the dock.

  “Olivia. Just slow down. We can get through this together. We’ve gotten through worse.” Technically, we hadn’t, but… “Just slow down. Calmly tell me what is happening.”

  Olivia’s immediate crisis was merely about a woman named Elena, the hair stylist, who was due to be flying in from Panama City. She had disappeared the previous week into the depths of Southern Panama’s Darien jungle, from where fair ladies sometimes don’t return.

  As well as being one of the best wedding stylists in Panama, she was an adventurist hiker and didn’t heed the warnings to stay away from the Parque Nacional Darien, which shared a border with Colombia. Despite it all, despite the official warnings that the area had always been, and still was, thick with paramilitary groups, drug gangs and random kidnappers of both American tourists and super sexy gals of all nationalities, Elena decided to hike.

  The Darien jungle was the only gap in the Pan-American Highway which otherwise stretched from Prudhoe Bay, Alaska to Ushuaia, Argentina. No highway existed in the jungle between Colombia and Panama in both countries’ futile attempt to eliminate drug trafficking.

  Irrelevant but interesting, this darkest of dark places was also home to the Tropic Star Resort on the Pacific Coast. It was the number one deep sea fishing resort in the world, host to the rich and famous. I hoped that Elena had been whisked away by love, onto the movie-star-of-the-moment’s vessel and was trapping prize Giant Cubera Snappers, not falling prey to the horrifying alternative.

  Lovely Elena, hairdresser to the Panamanian stars, should have known better.

  “This is so terrible. Not just about the hair. I mean she was an amazing woman. She won’t be forgotten.” Olivia was already referring to her in past tense. Six weeks before, the bride-to-be had spent three days down in Panama City having her hair done by anyone with a comb and a blow dryer. Now her best of the best was gone.

  “Olivia,” I offered, trying to mitigate the possibility of her tears. “You look beautiful with your hair in a ponytail. We’ll find someone else. It will be okay.

  “Lexie,” she said, clearly now past the point of no emotional return, “you’ve seen the pictures. You know that not just anyone could begin to attempt that.”

  True. I had seen the pictures of the proposed hair-do, and it might have been for the best that Elena had gone missing.

  “You must have kept all the ratings of the other stylists you saw. See if you can get number two.”

  Olivia softly said, “I don’t want number two. As somebody I can’t remember at all once said, there is first place and then there is losing.”

  And Nico was certainly the loser in this one.

  At Coral Cay, sitting five around a table was a tight fit, we were ready for the onslaught of Olivia’s dictation, with binders out and pens poised. Marianna and Amanda had already been there for a bit, giggling over watered-down fruity drinks in scratched plastic cocktail glasses.

  Olivia slammed her binder on the table and immediately apologized, quietly whispering some mantra under her breath. She put on her Buddy Holly glasses, which I hadn’t seen since she had pretended to need them as a writer.

  She was about to take everything out on her bridesmaids. To be honest, we had started to get used to it.

  The hair issue was just the tip of the iceberg, it seemed.

  “So it’s crazy down here, I know, and there are a million moving pieces and I can’t thank you enough. I mean really, what would I do without you except curl up and die. Just so you know,” she sweetly said, “I’m not mad at any of you. We just have situations that are through the roof nuts. Marianna.” Olivia said, smiling.

  “Okay, yeah. Okay?” Marianna answered like she’d been caught out stealing.

  “So, travel arrangements? I thought you’d checked all travel arrangements for personality conflicts, et al?”

  “Yes,” Marianna apologetically answered.

  “Well, it turns out that my parents, who haven’t spoken for 20 years, and their respective spouses ended up on the same flight.”

  “I just got confused with your mom’s new name. But they weren’t on the same flights from Boston, just from Panama City, and the seats were as far apart as possible.”

  “It’s a 30-seat plane.”

  “Sorry,” Marianna looked into her drink, ready to cry.

  “It’s okay. I know I’m getting crazy, but it’s like oil and water. Or oil and vinegar. I don’t know. Really more like gasoline and a lit cigarette. Toads on toast.”

  She checked something off in her book. “So then, Amanda, there is another little issue with my mother. I’m not mad, but you switched things around and now have my mother where I’m staying. I can’t be running around naked with my mother sitting on the deck. So, change it around and you switch with
my mom.”

  She was determined to be without the hint of a tan line and had booked herself into the luxury clothing optional resort.

  “Can’t I switch her with someone else? I don’t want to be naked.” Amanda clearly thought she was being punished, and maybe she was.

  “You don’t have to be naked. You have to be convenient!”

  “I don’t want to see naked people. There are almost three dozen people who can move there….”

  “Fine,” Olivia snapped, pursing her lips.

  Phil, who hadn’t screwed up, was just enjoying the show, with a wry smile on his face. Olivia triple checked everyone’s plan for the day, but the last screw up was mine.

  Though she had snapped repeatedly at everyone through this process, she had somehow been able to not lash out at me. Never a snarky word, an evil look, a passive-aggressive email. But that was about to change.

  “Lexie,” she said softly, contemplating if she was going to treat me as she’d been treating others. The answer became obvious. “Really, not smooth hosting last night. I’m taking you off running this morning’s bird watching. Phil, start memorizing birds. I know that there’s a bare neck umbrella bird and like twenty others. I just cannot chance it.” Olivia said, peering at me over the top of her thick black frames. “I’m sure you understand.”

  She smiled, but Olivia was gone.

  Chapter 10: Mad About Max

  The biggest lesson of my trip so far, besides not to ever go snorkeling, was never say that things can’t get worse because they can. Olivia floundered off in her boat with the other bridesmaids to the bird watching event and left me to take a water taxi back home.

  Logistically I couldn’t care less, but I was hurt that I was taken off bird watch duty. They truly were astounding peaceful creatures of which I had memorized every name and fact. The purple throated mountain gem, white-tailed emerald, and black guan were among my favorite.

  All I had to do was wait in my cabin for the police or Olivia to beckon. More than likely, both.

  It would be virtually empty when I got back to Mariposa del Mar, everyone having been shuttled off to the unbelievable San San-Pond Sak Wetlands of the La Amistad UNESCO Biosphere Reserve. It just didn’t get better than there.

  Completely disenfranchised, I trudged up the dock to find that the restaurant was not empty; one solitary soul was sitting facing the sea. She was wearing the kind of enormous hat that you only see in 1930’s movies or silly couture runway shows. The items of the gift baskets I’d work so hard to put together were scattered around her like Christmas.

  Boy, was putting together those baskets a pain in the patootie. Snorkel gear, pre-sized jelly shoes, both a flashlight and an oil torch, a bottle of Krug champagne, suntan lotion and an abundance of condoms. Incorrectly sized fins. Water, maps, floppy hats, cover-ups, etc. Red Ray Ban Wayfarer sunglasses, a six-pack of Panama beer, bath oil. A flash drive with music to remember the couple by. Nothing except the beach tote was monogrammed, as statistics said any other monogrammed items get chucked within six weeks post-event.

  She was reading the schedule of events for the wedding while drinking a glass of champagne topped with a sweet Panamanian fruit called the mamon chino. The unbelievably silky red hair and porcelain skin of Max, Nico’s estranged wife.

  Is God playing a joke on me?

  Is it something I did in another life?

  If so, please believe I’m sorry. For whatever it was.

  When I reached the table, she apathetically smiled, saying, “Hey, you.”

  I’d had a good half dozen conversations with her over the past few years, but she usually pretended to forget my name, as if she was too good to remember. She did make me incredibly insecure.

  “I’m Olivia’s friend, Lexie.”

  “Of course you are.” Her aristocratic British accent was intimidating in itself.

  She snapped her fingers like only the incredibly rude posh population of English do. Flozzie, the bartendress/owner made her way over, as Max asked in perfect Spanish, “Una copita de champán, por favor?” As Flozzie left, Max explained, “I just ordered you a glass of champagne.”

  Yes, I’m not stupid.

  You are truly horrid.

  But how and why are you here?

  “When did you get here, Max? I thought the airport was closed…because of weather…” There was not a cloud in the sky.

  “Separate rules for private jets, of course, for incoming traffic. Maybe two hours ago? I can’t do commercial anymore. Don’t you find it tedious?”

  No, I love flying coach, shuffling through first class with all the people who are pretending they don’t see those of us in cattle class.

  Don’t let her get to you.

  I didn’t answer, nor did she expect me to. She continued, “I see that Nico’s luggage isn’t here. Is he somewhere else?”

  I hated lying but it had become a necessity since the day before. “I don’t think he liked it. I think he moved to the La Lapisita resort.”

  That hotel didn’t exist, but what could I say? I hadn’t lied since I was 14 and was caught forging notes to school asking to be dismissed from class after lunch. Now I was turning into a two-faced so and so.

  “We didn’t know you were coming, Max. Nico didn’t mention.”

  “He never does. Like everyone’s supposed to know his mind and bend to his beck and call. We are trying to reconcile once again, for the sake of our son. He asked me to come. I thought about it, and why not? I’ve never been to this strange island before. And this place is…quaint…in its way…”

  I looked at her plate. She’d picked a bit at my favorite Panamanian breakfast tamale: cornmeal, seasoned chicken, and raisins, presented in banana leaves. Not up to snuff, obviously.

  “Anyway,” she said, observing me as if I were help. “I think I’ll pass on this bird watching trip. Not my scene, lovely. Check out the island. There must be some staff who can take me around. I’ll find Nico later. I always do. Being soul mates is rarely easy.”

  She walked away towards what should have been Nico’s cabin without looking back even to wave goodbye.

  Chapter 11: Don’t Lick the Frogs

  I felt like a doorman at a five-star hotel. We’d called a water taxi for Max, but she wouldn’t wait outside, so I had to fetch her when it arrived, and then still wait ten minutes for her to appear, looking like a model out of a REI catalog.

  “Thanks, you!” she said as she left in the boat.

  She must have remembered my name, right?

  Soon I saw that I wasn’t going to get the afternoon rest I’d so coveted, as Detectives LaGuardia and McDonough walked into the restaurant and over to me. McDonough simply said, “This isn’t looking good. Do you want to come with us, Tall Girl?”

  No.

  I want Nico to magically sit up and say, “God damn third-world medicine. Now I’ve missed the party.”

  “Yes,” I weakly said. “But can you remember my name is Lexie?”

  LaGuardia chuckled, “Of course we know your name is Lexie. Lexie Milano, with an Italian last name. We give everyone we’re fond of a nickname. Which is why Dr. Nolan doesn’t have one.”

  They’d got the bad news about the poison while they were surfing, so they came right to get me, of course not being able to get through on my phone. They were both wearing board shorts and tank tops, two surfboards in the back of what must have been one of their personal boats.

  I said yes. I don’t think that I meant it, but it was now my duty.

  LaGuardia sat down next to me on the boat, curiously commenting, “This wedding you are part of, it’s really packing a punch on this island. The whole town knows about it. I guess there’s a lot of, well, it’s not my place to say. I’ve seen plenty of ridiculous things on this island, but having limos ferried in from Costa Rica to get messed up on these off roads… silly doesn’t begin to describe.”

  I never passed on a chance to apologize for things that weren’t close to my fault. “It
’s starting out a little crazy, but it will settle. We aren’t all so high maintenance. I didn’t even know about the limos. But I’m sorry…” It was true that I didn’t know about the limos.

  “You should be a little more decent to the island that’s hosting you. It’s not my place to say. It’s not… though tourism is here to serve you, you’ve gone a little bit to the extreme in your treatment of people on the island. I’m not blaming you.”

  Who was taking care of these mystery limos?

  I worried, concentrating on the scenery for the rest of the ride, cruising by rainforests and mangroves, capuchin monkeys watching you watch them. They knew something we didn’t.

  Paulo the herpetologist met us on the dock. I was told he was a slightly sleazy scientist, no stranger to the local prostitutes, who spent his days off with them, tanning in the open-air brothels.

  “They call him Crabby Paolo,” McDonough said, “and that’s not because of a surly disposition or because he’s a carcinologist….”

  LaGuardia added, “Carcinologist is a snobby way to say crab scientist.”

  The research station was right off the beach, looking like a very long ranch house at the end of the widest and longest dock I’d seen on the island. We walked into the cool lobby and waited; the only air-conditioned building I’d been in so far.

  The detectives spoke to each other down the hall from me, giving me time to take out the slam book. I didn’t know who knew Nico and who didn’t. No one liked him, but it didn’t seem like anyone in the book would have any reason to get rid of him.

  The only motive I could think of was general disdain of a man who was rotten to the core. Up until yesterday, people seemed to forget about his dark side, seeing they were getting an all-expense paid vacation to paradise. Generous on the surface, but ultimately about control. It was always about control with the very wealthy. Money meant nothing to him, so he used it, and people, like a game.

  After a short wait, Paolo emerged from the labs, inviting the detectives and me in with gusto. Paolo ushered us into the laboratory, letting me pass before him, not hiding the fact that he was checking out my butt in surly and lecherous ways. He had gorgeous blue eyes that were so intense I immediately felt dirty, as if he had a layer of smarm covering him and it had rubbed off on me. He was way too many steps beyond bad boy. He was something you’d want to wash off.