by Laura Wylde
Rose searched her memory for the last thing she remembered. She was in a hotel, a nice one. She could see a big, silver dome outside of her window. She wracked her memory so hard that it made her head ache even more. What was that dome? She could hear faint music in the recesses of her mind...and suddenly it dawned on her, it was The Disney Concert Hall. She had been able to see it outside of her hotel room window and it had made her happy. She remembered looking out at it and thinking about the time when she was 15 years old and her parents had taken her there to see the Los Angeles Philharmonic. That was where her love of classical music began...but how did she end up here? She'd been in LA for an audition, an important one, and it went well. The hotel was downtown LA on Grand Avenue, and she remembered leaving with her luggage and taking the limousine shuttle to the airport and then...Oh God! The plane...it crashed! She looked around her again. No way she was the only survivor! There had to be at least 150 people or more on that plane. She felt tears welling up in her eyes as she struggled to her feet. She had to see if there were any other survivors...someone might need help.
Rose realized as she took a step that she only had one shoe on. She kicked off the other one and with a hobbled stance thanks to the pain coursing through her body, she began to walk along the edge of the ocean, staring out at the deep blue waters and wondering where the rest of the airplane and passengers had gone. As she looked out at the rolling waves it suddenly dawned on her that she shouldn't even be there. How on earth was she on the beach? Why did the plane crash here? The flight had been from Los Angeles to New York and they never should have been over the ocean.
More confused than she was when she woke, Rose continued to walk until she spotted something out in the water. At first she thought it was a dolphin or a seal, but as it got closer, she realized that it was human, or two humans. One person was swimming and carrying another person across their back. She began running toward them. She was running slowly thanks to the pain in her joints and the shifting sand, but she reached them just as the man swimming came up onto the shore, dragging another man behind him. The rescuer was young, maybe around Rose's age. Rose remembered seeing him in the airport earlier. Something about him had caught her attention and when she looked his way, he had smiled at her. She felt butterflies in her belly when he smiled. He wasn't her usual type, so she remembered finding it odd. He was a muscular man, definitely in shape, which she liked. But normally she was more drawn to the corporate types, and with his dread-locks and tattoos, this guy looked more like a beach bum or a surfer, a very good-looking one, no doubt. The other man, the one lying on the ground, had been sitting near her in first class. She overheard him talking on his cell phone before they took off. He sounded like a doctor, or some other kind of medical professional. He had certainly looked the part as well, dressed smartly in a dark gray three piece suit and dark green tie that matched his jade eyes. His eyes were closed now and as Rose reached the two men, she could tell that the one on the ground wasn't breathing. While the other man bent forward and attempted to catch his breath, Rose dropped to her knees and immediately checked the man in the sand for a pulse and respiration. She'd taken a first aid and CPR course when she worked as a life-guard at the local pool as a teenager. She hoped that she remembered what to do as she placed her hands on the man's chest and began giving him compression's.
Rose worked until her already sore arms and hands felt like they might break and then the guy with the dread locks nudged her out of the way and took over. While he did that, Rose moved up to the other man's head and began giving him rescue breaths. It seemed to be taking a long time and Rose was afraid that they weren't going to be able to save him...and then suddenly, he began to cough. Water came spraying out through his mouth and nose and he automatically sat up. He was agitated and confused and swinging his arms and legs around wildly. The guy with the dread locks grabbed Rose's shoulders just in time to move her out of the way before one of his swings connected with her head.
“Hey man, you're okay. Calm down. We're friends,” Surfer guy said.
The man on the ground continued to cough and sputter while Rose and the other guy looked on. It was several minutes before he seemed to have his lungs and airway clear enough to speak and when he did he said, “What in the hell is going on?”
Rose looked up at the guy with the dread-locks and he said, “The plane crashed.”
The man on the ground frowned, pulling his dark eyebrows together. He looked like he was working as hard as Rose had just a while earlier to remember. It was obvious on his face as soon as he did. “Shit. I remember. The engine exploded...or something did, right?”
Rose shrugged and the surfer guy said, “I don't know man. There was an explosion and a fire and then we started going down. They never said what it was. They were too busy trying to save us, I guess.”
The man on the ground finally looked around them and said, “Well, they're doing a bang up job of that, not another soul in sight. Where's the wreckage?”
“I haven't seen it,” Rose said. “Maybe in the ocean.”
“The ocean...” the man with the dark hair pulled his eyebrows together again and his green eyes narrowed slightly. “How...?”
The surfer guy shook his head. “I don't know. I had the same thought. We should have been heading across the continental US, no ocean.”
“Is there any way for us to tell which ocean this is?” Rose asked.
The dark haired guy pulled himself up off the sand and teetered sideways. The other guy caught him and held onto him until he was steady on his feet. “Thanks. And no,” he said, looking at Rose. “Not unless you've got a compass.”
“We hadn't been in the air more than half an hour,” Surfer guy said. “This would have to be the Pacific.”
“But only if we turned around. I wasn't looking out the window, but I sure didn't feel the plane turn around,” Rose said.
The dark haired guy scanned their surroundings with his jade, green eyes. “Planes don't fly over the Pacific,” He said, “But anyways, it looks like we have bigger problems than which ocean this is. If the wreckage went into the ocean, we've got no supplies and they won't be looking for us here....” an almost deafening boom suddenly cut through the air like a knife. The three of them looked toward where it came from, a large clump of trees and vegetation just about a quarter of a mile to the east of them. They could see light curls of smoke, but nothing else through the trees. “Maybe we just found the wreckage,” the dark haired man said. “Come on.” He began jogging toward the vegetation. The two men seemed to be as shaky and sore as Rose was. She and the surfer guy actually gained on green eyes and passed him up, arriving at the thick clump of trees before he did. They stopped when they reached it, taking stock of what lay before them.
“It's like...a rain forest,” Rose said.
“Here,” Surfer guy said, picking up a large stick that lie on the ground. “Follow me, I'll try and beat us down a trail.” Another loud pop pierced the silence of the jungle and sent a chill skittering down Rose's spine. As she stepped into the foliage behind the cute surfer, Green Eyes said,
“Maybe you should sit this out...until we make sure it's safe.”
Rose looked at him and rolled her eyes. “Because snakes and spiders and big, furry mammals wouldn't dare attack a man? Or explosions wouldn't kill you because you have a penis?”
“Whatever,” he said, sarcastically. “Don't cry to me if you get mauled or poisoned, or blown up.”
“Back at you,” Rose said, continuing her forward path. Even with the big man in front of her, beating down the vegetation, she couldn't take a step without a plant touching her somewhere. They hung low and brushed her face, they slithered up underneath the legs of her trousers, they scratched her bare arms. Rose always thought she wanted to visit the rain forest, but she was beginning to quickly change her mind. Everything she thought she might love about it was causing her heart to race and sweat to soak through her blouse. The noises that on video sounded
like beautiful symphony were more like subtle threats in real life. She stayed close to the man in front of her, with her eyes wide open and each step of her bare feet, carefully placed.
They walked for what seemed like a long time, with the sounds of the forest all around them and pops and booms off in the distance. The smell of something burning began to overcome the smells of the jungle around them as they grew closer to the smoke. Rose's stomach churned and she longed to be back home, safe between the four walls she'd grown up in, with her parents watching out for her from a safe distance. After a while she began to become disoriented, unable to tell if they were still going in the same direction they had started in, or if they had taken a turn somewhere and she'd missed it. Everything looked the same. It was like looking out into the ocean, only instead of blue, everything here was a sea of green, except the dark smoke against the blue sky above the trees. It seemed to be everywhere now though and she wondered if they were really following it, or if they were lost...in the jungle.
Surfer guy walked at a steady pace, slapping at the bushes and trees in front of them, and suddenly he stopped and Rose slammed into his back. He was as hard as a rock, it was like hitting a wall, and she started to fall backward. Green eyes was still right behind her and she found herself suddenly with her back to his hard chest. She tipped her head back and their eyes met. He held her gaze for several beats and she experienced another tingling sensation, a weird connection like she felt for the surfer in the airport. It was only when Surfer guy said, “You two need to get a room, or...?” that she came to her senses and got back upright on her feet. Green Eyes finally let go of her and suddenly whatever it was she had been feeling was gone. Embarrassed about her fall she cleared her throat and mumbled, “Sorry.”
“Look,” Surfer guy said, ignoring the apology. They followed the direction he was pointing and that's when they saw actual flames licking up out of the thick, gray smoke they'd been following. “That must be the wreckage,” he said.
“That's Northeast of us,” Green eyes said. “By the way, I'm Ryder.”
“Hey Ryder,” Surfer guy said, laid back and cool as if they'd met in a bar. “I'm Beau.”
“Rose.”
“Nice to meet you, Rose,” Beau said.
“Yeah, same,” Ryder said. Beau turned slightly to the north and they began walking again. As they got closer to what they assumed was the wreckage, the air grew even thicker with smoke and the wind carried with it, the sounds of soft groans of pain. “Someone's alive,” Ryder said. Neither Beau, nor Rose answered him. From the agonizing sounds, alive might not be such a good thing, Rose was thinking. She almost felt guilty for her minor aches and pains, just knowing there was someone experiencing far worse on the same island. “An opening,” she heard Ryder say behind her. “To the left.” Beau turned toward it and he stepped out first and let out a low whistle. Rose stepped out behind him and then Ryder. At first the three of them just stood there, looking at what was left of the plane they'd boarded only a few hours earlier. It was a tangled mass of smashed, broken and burnt metal. One part of it was still on fire, but it was in pieces and there were several parts that just lay dormant, or smoking on the sand. The groans had stopped and for a few seconds it was eerily silent.
The two men began to approach the plane and Rose followed them. They were almost upon it when she heard another loud groan and followed the sound with her eyes. A pair of legs were half visible underneath a large, heavy-looking chunk of metal and that's where the moans and cries were coming from. “Guys! Someone is trapped!”
She ran toward the legs and the men followed. When they got there they were able to see over the chunk of metal. A young man with short brown hair and gray eyes was lay on his back, sweat coating his face and the front of his shirt. His face was contorted with pain and both of his legs were trapped from the thighs down underneath the chunk of the plane. “Oh thank God,” he said in a strained voice when he saw them. “I tried to get out myself, but every time I start to pull my legs out, it rolls toward me and crushes another spot. I think I've got some kind of an open gash on my right leg. It's burning and stinging like hell. This big bitch on top of me is probably keeping me from bleeding out, but Jesus, I want out of here!”
“Okay, lie still. We're going to try and get it off without hurting you. Stay really still,” Ryder told him. He nodded at Beau and they each took a side of the metal. As soon as they touched it, they both flinched, “Shit! It's hot.” Ryder said. Beau was already pulling his shirt off over his head. Rose knew this wasn't the time or the place...but it was hard not to appreciate his tanned, sculpted, tattooed body. When she turned back toward Ryder, she saw that he had done the same...and he looked damned fine without his shirt too. What the hell was wrong with her? She was just in a plane crash, in the actual center of nowhere...and she was thinking about sex like a nymphomaniac. The two men used their shirts to protect their hands, but even using all their strength, they were only able to budge the metal about an inch, not enough for the man trapped underneath to move.
“Hey!” Another man was suddenly coming toward them. His blonde hair and handsome face were streaked with ash and his clothing was torn and burned in places. “Here, let me help. One of you guys grab him and pull him out.” None of them argued with him and as Ryder took one of the trapped man's arms, Rose stepped up and took the other. Beau and the new guy pushed on the metal and lifted it about four feet off the ground Ryder and Rose pulled the man out into the sand, clear of the debris. The other two men dropped the metal piece and Ryder was already down on one knee, looking at the deep gash in the recently trapped man's right leg. As he used his shirt to make a make-shift tourniquet to stop the bleeding, Rose's violet eyes scanned the faces of the four men. Her mind suddenly went back in time to a romance novel she'd found in her Aunt Shirley's bedroom when she was about twelve years old. It was about a woman who was shipwrecked on an island full of gorgeous men. She had only read passages of the book and she didn't understand most of it but suddenly felt as if she'd been thrust between the dog-eared pages. She almost laughed at the silly thought, but held back, thinking the men would surely think she'd gone crazy for laughing at a moment like this, and...they might just be right.
Chapter 3
Rose still felt like she was in shock. Her mind was having trouble processing everything that had happened and the more it sunk in that they were stranded on the island, the more she began to think about her life, and her parents. She imagined how upset they must be by now. Surely they'd heard about the airplane crash. She slid her hand into her pocket, for the first time, thinking about her phone. She was almost surprised to feel it was still there. As she slipped it out, Ryder said, “I don't think that will work here.”
“Probably not,” she said, looking at the face of it. “But, it's worth a shot.” She pressed in 911, praying silently that they were close enough to any tower to at least get an emergency call through. She wasn't surprised when the call failed. With a sigh, she put it back in her pocket. Ryder at least didn't say I told you so. “We'll need fresh water more than anything else if we're going to survive until they send help,” he said.
Once again, Rose looked around at her four companions. She had a vague memory of seeing each one of them either in the airport, or on the plane. It dawned on her suddenly that they had all been seated in first class and she wondered if that had something to do with being the only survivors. So far, anyways. They hadn't run across anyone else, or any bodies, which was strange. Not that she wanted to see a body. She looked around at the debris. There didn't seem to be enough of it for it to be an entire plane. Maybe first class had somehow ripped apart from the back of the plane? She had no idea...it was all just so surreal.
“I woke up behind those big rocks over there,” the muscular guy that had helped free the injured man from the rubble said as he motioned to a small hill of rocks in the distance. “I didn't have time to explore before I heard the commotion over here and came running, but I did s
ee a lot of luggage and crates scattered around. Maybe there's something there we can use. I'll go look.”
“I think we should stay together,” Ryder said. “The sun will be going down soon and we have no idea what's on this island other than the five of us.”
The big guy nodded and said, “I agree. I'm Asher, by the way.”
Ryder, Beau and Rose introduced themselves, and the injured man said, “I'm Dexter.”
Ryder was helping Dexter up and Beau went over to help. Together, they brought him up to his feet. He grimaced with pain every so often as the three men and Rose followed Asher toward the rocks. As they got closer, Rose found herself in awe of the natural beauty of everything on the island. Even the rocks looked as if they'd grown there and beyond the crest of them, the clear, blue sky was becoming streaked with the oranges and pinks of the pending sunset. Asher led them along a path that cut through the rocks and once they were on the other side, what he told them became apparent. Luggage, clothing and other debris littered the expansive opening. Rose stopped in front of a large suitcase that had spilled open. Feeling strangely like she was invading someone's privacy, she knelt next to it and began to sift through the contents. There were the usual toiletries and some women's t-shirts, shorts and even a bathing suit that looked like it might fit her. She gathered what she thought they might be able to use and a few pieces of clothing in case they had to spend any significant time on the island and then she stood up and looked around at the men. They were all sifting through things as well. Beau picked up a large canvas bag and shook the contents out onto the sand. It looked like mostly men's clothing, t-shirts and socks and underwear. Once it was empty he said, “We can put what we find in here to make it easier to carry,” he told them. Rose put the clothes she had gathered in the bag and the other three men did the same.