Left on Paradise

by Kirk Adams

  “Dance a little,” Ryan said.

  Maria rotated her hips and the grass swung from thigh to thigh.

  “That’s paradise,” Ryan said. “That’s what I dreamed of when I came here. Not a lot of talk about babies.”

  “Maybe I’ll make you beg for my baby,” Maria said as she stepped forward.

  Ryan kept her at arm’s reach. “Not here,” he said. “We’ve been lucky twice today. I doubt the third time would be so charmed.”

  “You promised me love whenever I want it.”

  “And you promised me a private relationship.”

  “For a time,” Maria said with a laugh, “but you’ll be publicly exposed before I’m done with you.”

  “Just not today,” Ryan said. “It’s getting late.”

  They left the tent together but separated on the trail. Ryan reached his tent unnoticed and came out a few minutes later in clean clothes, having hidden Jason’s shorts in his dirty laundry.

  For her part, Maria wasn’t so lucky; she almost had reached the privacy of her own tent when Kit saw her.

  “That skirt looks like mine,” Kit said.

  Maria fingered the grass sheaves. “I found it in the tent out of camp. Is it yours?”

  “I made it for my honeymoon,” Kit said without a smile.

  “I’m sorry,” Maria said, “I didn’t know. I stepped into the tent to take a rest when I saw it. It looked so authentic I just had to try it on. I hope I didn’t ruin any surprises.”

  “Not if Ryan didn’t see.”

  “I was alone.”

  “May I have it back?”

  Kit waited for Maria to change and took the skirt back to her own tent, hiding it behind her clothes. A little while later, Kit found Ryan eating a midafternoon snack at the mess hall—where he explained how he’d staggered into the woods after being sickened and stoned by the burning marijuana and spent the day sleeping off the drug’s effects. Kit thought the story funny and repeated it to Heather, though the teenager just forced a smile.

  Hilary stared at Sean, her face taut and eyes fixed, the late afternoon sun burning behind her like a torch. The woman didn’t smile and her voice growled as she clenched breadfruit in her hands and glared at Sean—who reached to the lower branches of a fruit-filled tree to twist breadfruit free before handing each one to his coworker.

  “You’re a pig, Sean.”

  “All I said was that it’s not real rape. I agree he needs to be punished for not respecting her. But you can’t tell me he wasn’t as stoned as she was—maybe more as much as he smokes. If the pot excuses her, why not him?”

  “She’s a girl.”

  “What if she were twenty?”

  “She’d be old enough to know better.”

  “So,” Sean said, stretching to reach a large breadfruit that he twisted from its stem and tossed to Hilary, “you wouldn’t prosecute if she were twenty?”

  “It depends on the circumstances.”

  “You mean,” Sean replied, “it depends upon the girl’s mood the next morning. If she calls it rape, it is.”

  “I didn’t say that.”

  “No, but you meant it. If the sex is good and the man sends flowers, all is well. Otherwise, regret becomes rape.”

  “Nonsense,” Hilary said. “It’s a matter of consent.”

  “Fine. Give me the rules. I’ll play by whatever set you choose. But they can’t be changed after the fact.”

  “Respect.”

  “I thought you considered respectability bourgeois.”

  “Respect isn’t respectability.”

  Sean just smirked.

  “When respect is shown,” Hilary continued with a frown, “rules aren’t necessary.”

  “That’s where you’re naive,” Sean said. “The people on this island are no different than the ones across the ocean. The point is to get the rules straightened out properly.”

  “No,” Hilary said, “rules are for lawyers. Character endures.”

  “You sound more like Bill Bennett than brother Bob. More Republican than progressive. Are you certain you voted Democrat?”

  “As a point of fact,” Hilary answered, “I voted for Nader.”

  Sean cursed and asked which state.

  “Florida.”

  “Thanks.”

  “Jeb,” Hilary said, “was going to steal that election in any case. I’d have been just another voter to disqualify. Another chad to hang.”

  Sean pulled another breadfruit from the tree and then several more while Hilary carefully stowed each fruit in a storage bag.

  After a time, Hilary renewed the debate. “Would you do it?” she asked.

  “Do what?”

  “Take a fifteen-year old girl stoned out of her mind?”

  “Who’s to say I haven’t?”

  When Hilary didn’t laugh, Sean grimaced.

  “Sorry,” Sean said. “That was tasteless. And no, I wouldn’t do a girl like that. Not even when I was fifteen myself. I guess I’ve chosen an existentialist morality; there may be no essential difference between right and wrong, but there is a difference between taking responsibility and avoiding it. You can’t sleep with a girl who can’t understand the consequences. It’s like seducing the simple and slow—it’d be very poor sportsmanship. No matter how nice her hips might be.”

  “And which morality does Ursula preach?”

  “The old-time religion,” Sean said, “the way she hounded me for marriage.”

  “Marriage? She’d rather see you sent into the open seas on a burning boat.”

  “And to think,” Sean smirked, “I fathered her only child. She’s not a particularly grateful person.”

  “Back to our point,” Hilary said with a scowl. “How is Jason wronged?”

  “I didn’t say he is. But there’s a mob mentality at work and he won’t stand a chance at trial.”

  “And rightly so.”

  “What if,” Sean chose his words carefully, “Deidra and I chose to down a fifth of whiskey figuring the night would end with sex? Should I be punished because she willingly surrendered control of herself and only decided the next morning she wished she hadn’t taken me?”

  “No one would punish that.”

  “Why not?”

  “Your relationship is already known.”

  “What if it were our first date?”

  “It would depend on circumstances.”

  “How?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Then you tell me,” Sean pressed his point, “when I’m not allowed to take a woman.”

  Hilary didn’t hesitate to answer. “When she’s drunk or stoned. Or if she just says no.”

  “How drunk?”

  “Too drunk.”

  “Are we going,” Sean again smirked, “to set up breathalyzers and blood tests for sex? Maybe prosecute SUI: Sex Under the Influence?”

  “Don’t be a jackass.”

  Sean climbed from the tree, still talking as he reached the ground. “Give me a standard.”

  “It’s relative to the situation.”

  “And the girl,” Sean said, “and that’s not fair to men. I’m as progressive as the next guy—more than most—but I can’t live my life by the moods of women whose expectations don’t line up with mine. We need a shared standard. Good sportsmanship requires known rules. Even hockey has referees and boxing has regulations.”

  “Then I’d say,” Hilary observed after a moment’s consideration, “that any woman too drunk or too high to prepare for sex should be left alone. So should girls too young to understand the full consequences of their actions.”

  “What do you mean by full?”

  “I don’t expect her to be either omniscient or as celibate as a nun, if that’s what you’re getting at. She just needs to have enough maturity and sobriety to weigh risks.”

  “That’s it?” Sean asked. “Nothing more?”

  “I don’t think so.”

  “So I could sleep with a woman on our first da
te, as long as we drank two glasses of wine instead of four.”

  “That seems reasonable.”

  “What if we drank three? Is a man a rapist for one glass of wine?”

  “Be practical.”

  Sean stopped laughing. “I am being practical,” he said with an irritated voice. “One of my college buddies went to jail for drunk driving because his girlfriend was paralyzed in a car accident. The wreck wasn’t even his fault, but he was .001 percent over the legal limit. He only drank three beers. If he’d crashed fifteen minutes later or even drank one swig less, he’d be a free man instead of a felon. To be honest, if he’d pissed before he left the bar, he’d be out of jail.”

  “And the girl would still be paralyzed.”

  “What if,” Sean continued, “a woman consented in the evening after two glasses of wine but changed her mind with the hangover?”

  “That’d be her fault,” Hilary said.

  “But how could it be judged if she swore otherwise. Your standards rely on the wisdom of Solomon to sort out every lover’s quarrel.”

  “And yours,” Hilary said, “are no standards at all.”

  “There are no real standards,” Sean said, “beyond the choices of individuals.”

  “Which society must sometimes arbitrate.”

  “Why? It’s a personal matter.”

  “Not always,” Hilary said, “just ask the baby in Ursula’s belly.”

  “She knew what she was doing.”

  “How many drinks did she have?”

  “No more than two.”

  “So you’re off the hook,” Hilary said, “because she had no more than two drinks. Meanwhile, she has a baby for life. That’s the attitude women hate—that I hate.”

  “It’s her body and her choice,” Sean said, “she can no more make me raise a child than I can force her to have one. Unless you’d rather give men a say over abortion?”

  “Pig,” Hilary said.

  “The problem,” Sean said, “is that you’re one of those who can’t imagine a woman might lie about rape. Or be mistaken.”

  “And your problem,” Hilary countered, “is that you’re one of those who doubt men exploit women.”

  “You’ve too much faith in honesty,” Sean replied.

  “And you’ve too much faith in hormones,” Hilary retorted.

  The debate ended as Sean took his pole to another breadfruit tree a short walk away. He used bare hands and bare feet to climb into the thick tree, its trunk sagging only a little from his weight. Standing among the branches, he used a pole with a sharpened blade (which Hilary handed to him) to cut breadfruit loose. Hilary tried to catch the falling fruit with a net and missed only two. They worked hard the rest of the day and returned several full bags of fruit to the storehouse. The produce was much needed since breadfruit reserves had been reduced to a dozen withered fruit and a couple bags of flour.

  The next few days stretched long. Jason mostly worked compost duty while a dozen villagers constructed a kitchen. Brent built an oven from brick and mortar while others raised a high-roofed building over it. Once finished, the building included a rear entrance near the firepits and an underground storage bin—as well as a dining room with a twenty-foot table constructed of treated lumber and surrounded by twenty stools of all shapes and sizes (each one brought by its user). A Saturday morning christening was held at the new oven, though Jason and John didn’t attend since the former had fled to the north village while the latter disappeared before lunch and didn’t return until dinner. Few talked, except a couple villagers who mentioned they’d be glad to get the coming trial over.

  On Sunday representatives from all five neighborhoods assembled for the meeting of the General Will of the People. Attendance was sufficient to establish a quorum—which was down from the previous General Will of the People (since nearly thirty residents claimed to be too ill or too busy to attend). In any case, the session started at noon with the traditional swearing of the oath shortly after Jason and several compatriots arrived from the north village.

  The trial was underway.

  Dr. Erikson spoke on behalf of the assaulted girl—despite Jason’s objections—as she recounted Ilyana’s story and corroborating details provided by other westerners, testifying for nearly an hour. Jason spoke on his own behalf regarding the mutual intoxication of the couple, his lack of malice, and the unforeseen circumstances in which he found himself. He insisted Ilyana initiated sex while he was too stoned to resist and also swore she claimed to be seventeen. After Jason’s testimony was complete, Olivia gave her account and though Ilyana asked to take the stand, her mother insisted otherwise—unwilling to subject her daughter to public shame. There was some discussion whether she possessed such authority, but no one wanted to force rape victims to testify publicly, so Olivia’s decision was left unchallenged.

  Jason made a good witness. His sobs and sorrow kept the crowd quiet and won sympathy. Olivia, on the other hand, behaved miserably. Her accusations were spiteful and her handling of evidence obscure. She cried a few times and screamed several others. She demanded vengeance and swore defiance when rebuked for burning Jason’s tent. And though her daughter’s sexual history wasn’t reviewed, Olivia didn’t bother to deny that her daughter potentially had demonstrated interest in a man with whom she smoked dope on more than one occasion. As for Ilyana, she was deposed and questioned in private by members of the Executive Council—and her testimony was relayed to the assembly only through a moderator. Witnesses were cross-examined by the contesting parties and final statements made late in the day.

  No one doubted Jason had slept with the girl. What was disputed was the legality of the sexual union, as well as the proper punishment for illicit sexual intercourse. Olivia insisted her daughter was the victim of date rape, statutory rape, and sexual assault—and demanded Jason be punished harshly as a deterrence to sexual predators. Jason, on the other hand, admitted only to having been as stoned as Ilyana and to having shown judgment as poor as hers. He insisted he’d neither broken a law nor intended harm and offered to marry (or otherwise cohabit with) the girl if deemed best by the public assembly. He promised to submit to an intoxication management course—though he reminded his fellow citizens that drug use was a right of Paradise and that he’d provided marijuana to many of them. He publicly forgave Olivia the destruction of his property and renounced any right to restitution.

  Dr. Erikson closed testimony by making a few comments about the gravity of the case, observing that important public safety considerations were at stake, along with the need to outlaw sexploitation and uphold acceptable standards for inebriated conduct. Though it was her personal opinion that statutory rape wasn’t grounds for prosecution (since the recently adopted marriage laws permitted both sexual union and marriage to anyone old enough to consent), she did allow that the power differential of the couple might make date rape demonstrable on the grounds of Ilyana’s youth—as long as the judicial interpretation wasn’t taken to forbid all May-December (or even April-October) unions. Dr. Erikson also publicly rebuked Olivia for lawlessness and vigilantism which had endangered an entire neighborhood. After the psychologist finished speaking, a recess was declared so the judicial assembly might deliberate its judgment. Subsequent discussions were loud and sometimes frenzied as the assembly disputed and debated the island’s first criminal case. Meanwhile, Olivia took Ilyana to the beach to get away from the commotion and Jason stepped into a storage tent to smoke a joint.

  Three hours later, a vote was taken and Jason was acquitted of sexual assault, but convicted of inappropriate sexual contact. The sense of the community was that while Dr. Erikson was correct in arguing that statutory rape technically was not against the law (since no such prohibition had been legislated), the majority also believed that the state of Paradise needed to use this unfortunate event to establish and enforce gender equality: an essential element of the constitution itself. Several feminists protested tacit consent was no consent at all, though even th
ey admitted this was a case of one word against another and it couldn’t be proved Ilyana had withheld permission to be touched either by tacit or explicit denial—especially since Jason had testified so convincingly and Ilyana apparently had been too stoned to remember many details. Though the teenaged girl’s erotic dream was taken by some to be evidence that she’d been aroused enough to enjoy the lovemaking (with arousal being judged the ultimate proof of consent since rape was deemed utterly incompatible with sexual pleasure), others noted that the girl’s shirt hadn’t been removed (suggesting she hadn’t been particularly interested in foreplay). In any event, it was decided inappropriate sexual contact—or date rape in common parlance—was the appropriate charge and Jason was convicted thereof. Following Jason’s conviction, a motion was made to indict Olivia for arson and her subsequent conviction was secured in minutes since she’d already confessed as much during her testimony.

  Both sentences were considered severe. Jason was stripped of all rights as a citizen and forbidden to serve as a public official or vote in public assembly. He also was sentenced to a full week of exile on a motu to contemplate his rehabilitation back into society—though he was provided a sufficient supply of food and water to maintain his comfort and health. It also was decided he should write a letter of apology and undergo sexual predator counseling on Sunday mornings for the next two months and be transferred to the north village to reduce friction within the western village. Olivia was given a similar sentence, though without the loss of citizenship or transfer of residence. Her crimes were classified as hate crimes and punished accordingly. Though most members of the assembly sympathized with her motives, the majority decided vigilantism merited discipline and sentenced Olivia to a full week of internal exile after she absolutely refused to renounce her sins and beg clemency—though the original demand for external exile was mitigated in deference to Ilyana’s needs.

  Following the assembly’s refusal to hear Jason’s final appeal on the grounds that the case was closed and dusk was near, the governing charter was recited and the assembly dismissed. While several citizens of Paradise found flashlights and others lit improvised torches, most islanders stumbled home in the dark. Before they started home, a delegation of westerners met with Dr. Erikson to schedule a visit for Tuesday evening.