Left on Paradise

by Kirk Adams

  “Was she drunk?”

  “Smell her breath.”

  “Don’t be a smart ass,” Brent said.

  “We both were. And high. I didn’t mean ...”

  Olivia sprang for him, her fists clenched. “She’s fifteen.”

  Lisa grabbed Olivia by the hair and jerked the frenzied mother to a stop. “Not that way,” she said. “The people will have their say in this.”

  Olivia shook herself free, slipped into the tent, and returned with her daughter—whose nakedness now was covered with rumpled shorts stinking of schnapps and smoke.

  “I’m sorry,” Olivia cried as she held her daughter fast. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”

  Ilyana and Olivia both wailed and sobbed as they slowly returned to camp while their neighbors turned away in shame-faced silence.

  Only after the two women were gone did Brent speak. “What do we do with him?” he asked.

  “He goes to trial,” Lisa answered. “I’ll call for a jury of his peers.”

  “I suppose,” Brent said, “that’ll do—though what we really need is a good old-fashioned lynch mob.”

  Lisa sprinted to camp and called for an emergency meeting while Brent pushed Jason toward camp.

  The hearing began shortly after Kit returned to the island in early afternoon. Ilyana remained in her tent, nursed by her mother—with Lisa speaking for the teenaged girl and Jason conducting his own defense. There was little debate regarding matters of fact. While both sides agreed the pair stumbled to the tent after partying and spent the night, Jason insisted the sex was consensual—claiming he laid down alone, but the girl had crawled to him after he blew out the candles. Too stoned to resist temptation, he slept with her. He wept as he testified and swore to make amends—including a promise of marriage if Ilyana and her mother would have him.

  Lisa testified otherwise. She said Ilyana admitted being too stoned to return home and remembered an erotic dream (possibly with Jason), but was shocked when she woke to find Jason undressed beside her. She claimed Ilyana didn’t realize she was partially naked until after she had been dragged outside the tent—clear evidence that the girl hadn’t willingly disrobed. Finally, Lisa testified that Olivia wished to charge Jason with sexual assault and intoxicating a minor with intent to seduce.

  After debating facts of law and intent, villagers indicted Jason on three counts of rape: statutory, date, and forcible. He was remanded to the General Will of the People for criminal trial and confined to the privacy tent and supervised work detail until his hearing. When Lisa was told to summon the rest of the island to New Plymouth for the coming Sunday, she stripped to olympiad essentials of running shoes and jogging shorts and sprinted toward the beach—returning only after notifying each of the other villages of the summons and successfully organizing a trial in New Plymouth for Sunday. By the time Lisa returned, it was nearly dark and most villagers already had retired: it proving too shameful to face each other around the campfire in light of the tragedy that had befallen Paradise. Residents simply wanted to put an early end to a day that had turned their dreams into nightmares. They wanted to start a new day as soon as possible.

  But though the villagers retired early, few slept well. The wailing despair of Ilyana’s persistent weeping unnerved everyone, her sobs and cries penetrating every nylon wall. Breakfast was served early and most islanders drank three or four cups of coffee to recover from sleeplessness and shock. Ursula served Ilyana breakfast in bed and Kit took all four children—the only ones to sleep well—for a day hike. Work details were completed with little chatter and supper served early. Jason faced grim remarks about hanging, especially by Tiffany and Ursula, and word came after supper that staff psychologist Dr. Erikson planned to visit the next morning. No one talked around the fire and lamps were extinguished early for a second night. And once again, neither the whispering of companionship nor the rustling of love was heard.

  Early morning shadows hadn’t yet dissipated when Heather opened her eyes. Though the day was just dawning, the pungent stench of burning marijuana already drifted into her tent. The air was so foul she coughed.

  “Doesn’t he ever learn?” Heather said as she pulled yesterday’s shirt over her bare shoulders and reached for shoes and socks set neatly beside her pillow. As the smoke grew thicker, she shouted out loud to Jason.

  “Put it out. That stuff makes me sick.”

  No one answered.

  Heather sat up. She hadn’t noticed the stench of pot so thick before. Sometimes Jason’s smoke drifted her way but it was seldom more than a strong odor, like the burning of leaves in a neighbor’s yard. Something seemed wrong, so Heather unzipped her tent to take a look. When she stuck her head outside she saw smoke billowing from Jason’s tent.

  “Fire!”

  Heather’s scream was shrill and instinctive as she jumped outside and darted toward the burning tent before stopping to cry out a second time.

  “Tent fire! Tent fire!”

  Alerted neighbors scrambled from their tents. Within the minute, several villagers helped with the fire. Linh and Deidra evacuated their children while others raced toward the tool shed to get shovels and axes as Lisa took charge.

  “Pull the stakes up!” Lisa commanded.

  Ryan and Maria pulled stakes from one side while Hilary and Jose pulled them from the other. The tent collapsed inward: smoke and fire pouring through the nylon walls, opened vents, and front flap.

  “Drag it,” Lisa shouted, “by the lines.”

  Volunteer firepersons grabbed the four corners of the tent while Lisa seized the front flap. Heather stayed behind to deal with a grass fire as the others pulled the tent toward an open field. As flames blazed heavenward and smoke burned their eyes, the volunteers each held breath as long as able and moved as fast as possible. Still, by the time they reached the edge of camp, the tent and everything in it—Jason’s sleeping bag, clothing, personal effects, stash—were ablaze and all five volunteer firepersons had inhaled considerable amounts of smoke. A few yards more and the villagers dropped their corners to escape the burning heat and gasp for fresh air. All five emerged from the smoke coughing.

  Help arrived as Joan and Sean brought shovels and axes while John and Charles carried buckets of water. Brent and Viet brought bags of sand to the original tent site—where Heather had beat down burning grass with a worn blouse retrieved from her tent.

  “Jason’s tent caught fire,” Heather shouted as she pointed toward the tent now burning outside camp—still obscured by smoke that hung heavy and thick in the air.

  John scowled. “How much dope did he bring?”

  “Apparently not enough,” Brent said.

  Everyone smiled just a little. Viet and Brent used his shovel to stamp out burning bits of tent marking where the flaming tent had been dragged while John and Charles returned their buckets of water to the storage shed and Heather walked toward the smoke rising from the edge of camp. The laughter of the volunteer firepersons was growing more raucous, so Heather picked up her pace. By the time she reached the burned out tent, the five volunteers were standing around a pile of smoldering ashes. The gray smoke rolling from the ashes smelled of dope.

  Ryan stuck his face into the gray smoke and took a deep breath as the others watched. “Talk about the mother of all doobies,” he said. “The smoldering flames of hell.”

  “Jason’s hell,” Hilary said.

  “Jason’s heaven,” Lisa countered.

  “Now it’s just a big roach,” Jose said.

  “Anyone got a clip?” Maria said.

  “You look like one big roach yourself,” Hilary said, pointing at soot covering Ryan’s face.

  Ryan laughed and a series of inane jokes began—which grew more ridiculous by the word, even as laughter grew less restrained. Within minutes, Jose and Hilary rolled in the dirt holding their sides and Lisa wandered glassy-eyed into the forest while Ryan and Maria sprinted toward the bridge, peeling clothes as they ran.

  Heather looked
into the woods and took one step to follow them, but decided otherwise before returning to her tent. After inspecting it for damage, she retrieved a tent patching kit to plug several holes burned through the thin nylon of the tent by flying sparks and burning embers.

  Lunch consisted of chicken noodle soup with rice (made from freeze-dried reserves), flatbread, and fruit salad mixed with pineapple, kiwi, and mangos. Juice and coffee were served too. Sean was finishing his soup just as Heather approached.

  “Waitress,” Sean said, “I’d like to order a hamburger.”

  “Would you like that priority mail or express delivery?”

  “Which keeps the fries hotter?”

  “That would be priority,” Heather said and everyone laughed, “but express and dry ice work better for soft-serve ice cream.”

  “Tell me why,” Kit asked as she raised her hands in mock disgust, “we didn’t bring cattle.”

  “Ask your husband,” Jose said. “He’s the genius in charge of this enterprise.”

  Kit looked around. “Where,” she asked, “is the genius? I haven’t seen him all morning.”

  “He helped extinguish the fire,” John said. “I’d guess he went to clean up afterwards.”

  Kit turned toward Heather. “Have you seen him?”

  “Not since the fire,” the young woman said, looking to the ground.

  “You’re acting,” Sean said, “like a wife.”

  “I am ...” Kit stopped herself. “Well, an actress acts and we’re not exactly divorced.”

  Now there was a lull in the conversation as Kit looked away and Sean said nothing more.

  “Anyway,” Jose said after a moment, “even I’d wage war for a glass of milk.”

  “I’d sell myself into slavery for a bite of cheese,” Ursula said and Charles added he’d vote with the bourgeoisie for a bagel. The jokes opened a floodgate and a dozen different acts of self-abnegation were tied to a dozen different meals. Linh and Viet agreed to trade future children for Chinese takeout, though Tiffany and Brent disagreed between themselves which boy to trade for filet mignon—and their boys seemed eager to exchange both parents for sodas and fries. John offered a toe for a leg of lamb and Hilary said she’d trade her next boyfriend for a cola. Ursula offered to serve Sean for dinner.

  “He’s gamey,” Ursula declared, “but if we spit roast him with plenty of sauce and stuff a pineapple up his ... into his mouth, we’d all get our fill.”

  Everyone laughed except Sean and Deidra whose groans brought an end to the laughter. Indeed, there was a long pause until wild shrieks of laughter punctured the silence. Olivia had returned to the public square and now threw uprooted plants into the fire, dancing and shouting as she fed the flames. When Linh asked what she was doing, Olivia laughed out loud. Other arrived only after the last plant was aflame.

  “That’s the end of it,” Olivia announced.

  Kit asked if she was okay.

  “I’m better now that this village is drug free. That is his last dope plant. Correction. Was his last dope plant.”

  Everyone looked as a plant—perhaps a foot high with roots—burning as its smoke spiraled toward the sky and Deidra grabbed Olivia by the arm and asked if she’d set the tent on fire. Olivia said it was the first time she had ever lit dope and thought her effort good for a beginner. When Sean observed that someone might have been hurt, Olivia retorted someone already had been.

  “We could’ve,” Sean said, “lost everything if the winds were stronger.”

  “They weren’t,” Olivia said, “and you didn’t. Ilyana lost more than a few possessions.”

  “What you did was dangerous.”

  “Tolerating his bad habits was dangerous.”

  “It’s his life.”

  “And Ilyana’s too.” Olivia turned deep red and stared at Sean—who continued to dispute with her.

  “No one knew he was capable of such things.”

  “Really?” Olivia said as she scanned the village’s women. “How many of you would kiss him? Or a man like him before you married?”

  None of the women stirred.

  “I didn’t think so. One look is enough to tell.”

  “You’re her mother and we ...”

  Deidra began to speak, but Olivia turned her back and walked away just as Lisa emerged from the woods and hurried to the mess hall. After filling her face with handfuls of food, she staggered back into the forest announcing she needed a nap. Jose and Hilary followed on her heels and also took naps after eating. Neither Ryan nor Maria returned for lunch.

  24

  The Way of All Flesh

  Nearly an hour after lunch, Heather returned the tent repair kit to the supply shed and was proceeding to the mess hall to prepare food for dry storage in the barn when a petite blonde in her mid-thirties, dripping wet from the waist down and carrying an armful of clothes, headed straight to her—though the visitor didn’t speak a word until she stood only a few feet from Heather.

  “What in heaven’s name is going on here?” the woman whispered. Her face was flush and voice somber. She didn’t smile.

  “We had a fire.”

  “These,” the woman said as she thrust the pile of clothes toward Heather’s face, “aren’t burned—and I’d advise you to save them for the lunatics running naked through the woods.”

  Heather looked puzzled. “I don’t understand.”

  “First,” the woman said, “I ran across a woman hugging a tree. Mind you, embracing the thing, her legs wrapped tight around it. And not wearing a shirt as far as I could see from the back. Then I encountered a couple making love on a bridge. They were so hot and heavy they didn’t even notice me and I had to wade through the creek to pass around them.”

  “Who was it?” Heather asked as she looked toward the woods.

  “I tried hard not to look, but these are probably their clothes. You know the owners?”

  “Those’re Ryan’s shorts,” Heather said, “and Maria’s shirt.”

  “Ryan our founding father?”

  Heather nodded.

  “Who’s this Maria?” the woman asked.

  “A village girl.”

  “Well, store these in your tent and I’ll talk to Ryan later. He’s still married to Kit, isn’t he?”

  “They missed the deadline.”

  The woman thought about Heather’s words for a moment, then extended her hand. “Dr. Janine Erikson,” she said. “I’m not sure we’ve met.”

  “Heather Marks-Ingalls.”

  “Nice to meet you, Heather.”

  Heather started to speak, but the woman’s face grew concerned and she turned around.

  “That smell in your camp,” the psychologist said, “is that marijuana?”

  “We had a fire, but only one tent burned—with pounds of dope, which they tell me is a lot. Several neighbors got stoned putting it out. Those were the lunatics you referred to.”

  “Very dangerous. Very dangerous.”

  “It could’ve been.”

  “How’d it start?”

  “Arson. Olivia burned Jason’s tent to the ground.”

  “Jason the rapist? I mean, the alleged rapist.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Curious,” Dr. Erikson said with a frown. “But he’s not my first problem. I need to find the girl. Where’s her tent?”

  “Ilyana’s in the blue one,” Heather said as she pointed down the row of tents.

  Dr. Erikson thanked Heather for her assistance and started for the blue tent as Heather tucked Ryan and Maria’s clothing inside Maria’s tent before walking to the mess tent to finish the day’s work. Only when she’d set fifty peeled lemons out to dry and sealed another fifty in glass jars did she retrieve a canvas bag filled with dirty laundry and walk toward the stream.

  Their love spent, Maria and Ryan embraced one last time before falling apart. The rush of the dope and sex exhausted their bodies and they soon slept, waking only when the afternoon sun warmed their unclothed flesh. Ryan woke sweating, t
hen touched Maria on the cheek.

  “That was good,” Maria said as she opened her eyes. “Even better than before.”

  “It was good dope too,” Ryan said with a nod. “We should remember to thank Jason.”

  When Ryan asked where his clothes were, Maria giggled and pointed toward the bridge. Ryan stood and yawned—and so did Maria. Ryan watched as the young woman stretched her arms and arched her back, then desire stirred and he fell on her again. This time they didn’t sleep afterwards, but immediately rose to find their clothes. When they found none on the bridge, they walked east and looked on the trail, but found nothing on the trail either. Only when they neared the glade of trees close to the village did they stop.

  “They’re gone,” Ryan said.

  Maria laughed. “Let’s go get more.”

  Ryan didn’t laugh.

  “Stand back,” he said, “here comes Heather.”

  Maria and Ryan retreated across the bridge and sprinted barefoot and bareback along the stream until they reached a ford. There, they crossed through the water into an old growth forest and slipped through the woods until they came to several citrus trees along the north edge of the village—within twenty treeless yards of Maria’s tent—where Ryan crawled through bushes as Maria followed. They were especially careful to avoid thorns and nettles.

  “Damn,” Ryan whispered. “Look.”

  Maria looked and saw that Kit sat between the trees and the village, threading vine through half-dried fruit. Near her stood two poles with twine strung between them: from which hung several sliced mangos. Beside one of the poles sat a two-foot heap of mangos, limes, and kiwi. Kit evidently planned to be at the spot for a long while. Maria backed up as Ryan followed, though she waited until she was beyond earshot before laughing.

  “We could tell her,” Maria said, “our clothes washed to sea while we were skinny-dipping.”

  Ryan forced a smile before noting he had an idea and circled west toward the privacy tent—which stood empty. Ryan and Maria ignored the stench of stale dope and hurried inside, where Maria draped herself with a grass skirt and its matching top while Ryan put on a pair of Jason’s dirty shorts. After dressing, Ryan stepped away to eye the grass skirt.