“Want me to take a turn with the wheel, Saralinda?” asks Kenyon.
“No, I’m good,” I say because I hear Evangeline’s teeth chattering. “You stay where you are.” Caleb looks at me, and I stretch my eyes wide open which helps me stay awake. “I’m good,” I say again.
We are quiet then. After a while, behind me, Kenyon mutters to Evangeline, “This is not me making a pass at you.”
Evangeline says softly, “I didn’t think you were.”
“It’s just that some straight people have strange ideas.”
“Isn’t saying that sort of an insult to me?”
“Well—I didn’t mean—”
“Good.”
Bickering again. I reflect that the universe certainly does like to throw Kenyon into intimate situations with straight girls. She might be correct about her bad luck although then again we’re all in the same boat when it comes to luck. Ha! I try to keep my laughter to myself.
“Saralinda?” Caleb says.
“Same boat!” I snicker again.
“Don’t start, Saralinda,” warns Kenyon. “At least not until we’re on land.”
This is a hopeful thing to say and not entirely crazy either, as we are definitely nearer to land now. There is something unusual about the lights on the nearest shore although maybe it is simply that they are plentiful like party decorations. I continue to steer while Caleb watches the radar and GPS and tells me what to do and the lights keep getting closer and I slip into a kind of trance.
Fingertips graze my shoulder. I startle awake although I could not really have been sleeping could I? I find our boat rocking more gently like a cradle which is quite different from the choppiness of the ocean.
Caleb is standing above me.
“I’ve dropped the anchor,” Evangeline calls. “We did it!”
I guess we have done it. I look up and around. Thick pillars hem our boat in on one side and light filters down on us from cracks above. We are partly under a ginormous pier and I must have been the one who drove us here. Go, me.
“Only where are we?” I ask. “Long Island? Brooklyn? New Jersey? Does anyone know?” Caleb gives me a look and I add defensively, “So geography’s not a strong point.”
“I assumed you’d guessed from the lights. It’s Coney Island.”
I stare with new eyes. Beyond the pier, bright strings of lights outline the swoops of a roller coaster, the giant circle of a Ferris wheel, and the length of the boardwalk.
“Ah,” I say. “Of course. Coney Island.”
I grab Georgia and we stand up cautiously in the sloshy water as I try to remember how long it has been since I had insulin, but since I don’t know what time it is I can’t be sure. I decide I feel okay however and it’s not as if I normally take insulin in the middle of the night. I step—stagger—Caleb grabs my arms with both hands. “What’s the story with you needing a cane?” he asks bluntly.
“Oh. It’s just—I was born with this thing, a clubfoot. It’s fixed.”
“Does it hurt?”
“No. I told you, it’s fixed. Mostly.” I push him away. He lets go immediately and I stand on my own in my soaked sneakers.
I move to stand by the other girls, who are looking out at the lights.
“A deserted amusement park by dark of night,” Evangeline says. “What could be more fun?”
“This isn’t a bad place to land,” Kenyon says thoughtfully. “I’m pretty sure there’s a subway stop here.”
Caleb says, “There is.”
“Perfect,” Evangeline says.
I clear my throat. “We’ll need to get clothes first. And food. And money. And phones. Some sleep if possible.”
The boat rocks and none of us move and for my part this is because suddenly our ruined Boston Whaler feels safer than whatever’s next.
“How are we going to get up onto the pier? Climb?” I crane my neck looking for a ladder.
“We have to swim to the beach,” Caleb says.
Kenyon sucks in her breath.
I peer dubiously over the side. It looks deep. Also dark. Also cold.
“I am not going in again,” Kenyon says.
To that nobody says a word not even me.
“All right, fine,” says Kenyon. “I’ll go in again.”
“Good girl,” says Caleb.
“Don’t give me that male condescension.”
“Good woman,” says Evangeline.
“No strong woman crap either.”
“Good mammal,” I say wittily but no appreciation this time either, my friends just do not get me. Then I have a question. “If we’re going to abandon the boat, shouldn’t we at least leave an explanation? An apology? Some kind of note? We stole it, then we crashed it.”
“When this is over, I will find the owners and pay them,” says Evangeline tiredly.
“But they won’t know that when they find the boat,” I insist.
“What do you want to do, Saralinda?” Caleb asks. “Leave our names?”
I consider. “At least an anonymous note with an apology.”
Evangeline sighs. “Fine. Write it. Quick.”
I find a pen in a compartment. On the back of the operator’s manual, I write:
Sorry we took your boat. No choice, emergency. We’ll find you and pay you back later, I swear. Bless you.
All this time Kenyon stares down at the water.
“I’m ready,” I say.
Without another word Caleb lowers himself over the side of the boat. The water comes only midway up his chest and Kenyon heaves a sigh of relief. She slides down into his arms. Evangeline goes nimbly over next and I hand Georgia down to her. I climb over the edge and slip down into the murky water which is shockingly cold, my head goes under and my sneakered feet flail, then they find the slippery bottom and I stand. I sputter, salt water nearly to my shoulders and in my mouth.
Evangeline puts an arm around my waist.
I say, “I’m okay. I’ll hold my cane now.”
But I let her help me and, staying beneath the shelter of the pier, the four of us lurch our way to the beach, where we stand together on the sand and shiver. We are wet and our clothing is scanty and before us the amusement park is all lit up and empty and looming.
It is a big victory to be here and alive but I do not feel victorious.
Kenyon says in a low voice, “You know what, we’re idiots. We should have waded in naked. Carried our clothes on our heads.”
Evangeline makes an impatient noise. “I should have thought of that.”
Caleb says, “Uh . . . you would have done that?”
“You thought of it?” I swing to face him.
“Yeah, but I figured . . . you know.”
“That we would rather preserve our maidenly modesty?” I am indignant and glad of it because better to be angry than scared. “You might have mentioned it.”
“Sorry.”
“Seriously!”
Chapter 37. Caleb
You trudge up the beach behind the girls and smash your nose on a metal pole that’s planted in the sand. You squint upward. The pole has five identical fronds spiraling out from the top.
“Because nothing says beach like a fake palm tree.” Evangeline comes up beside you.
You wrap your fingers around your nose. As you wait for the pain to ebb, you think of the soaked and ruined copy of Dracula. It wasn’t that you didn’t think of dragging it along anyway.
It just seemed pointless.
“Look, there’s more of them.” Kenyon points to a whole line of the fake palm trees.
Saralinda says, “They add a certain something. Caribbean flair?”
“Florida surrealism,” says Kenyon.
“They’re not surreal, they’re macabre,” Evangeline corrects, which is all that’s need
ed for her and Kenyon to start in.
“They wouldn’t be macabre in daylight.”
“Yes, they still would.”
“No—”
Where are they finding the energy for this? You interrupt. “This place is surreal and macabre, okay? Can’t you imagine, like, a toddler impaled on one of these?”
They stare at you. You clutch your nose. “Kiss and make up,” you say sourly, and turn away. “We don’t have time for one of your pretend arguments.”
You plod onward. The girls follow.
When you reach the boardwalk, Saralinda boosts herself up, inelegantly but with determination. Once on her feet, she leans on her cane. You’ve heard of a clubfoot before, but you’re not sure what it is. She said it was fixed, mostly. What does that mean? She still needs her cane.
Meanwhile Evangeline heads with determination toward a small industrial building. The rest of you trail her, arriving as she wrestles fruitlessly with the knob of the locked ladies’ restroom door.
“There’s always that metal palm tree,” says Kenyon. “Or you could dig a hole in the sand.”
“I’ll wait,” says Evangeline.
“Can you?” asks Saralinda practically. “How long?”
Evangeline sighs. “Be right back.”
She slips down off the pier and underneath it. The rest of you step away politely and look at the storefronts along the boardwalk. Beach Shop. Sunglass Hut. Nathan’s Famous hot dogs. Saltwater taffy. Tight metal shutters telegraph rejection from the front of each shop, and behind the row of stores, the giant skeleton of the lit-up roller coaster dominates. There’s also a barred gate at the entry to the amusement park, and above it, a cartoon man’s wide, disembodied face leers down.
“That’s one happy vampire,” says Evangeline, returning.
“Is he a vampire? He doesn’t have fangs,” Kenyon says.
“Only because he’s waiting for us to get within snapping distance. Then they descend.”
You’re annoyed again at their pointless chatter but they stop and the four of you shuffle wearily along the boardwalk. Everyone has their arms wrapped around themselves for whatever small heat it gives. You try to imagine what this place would be like on a hot summer’s day, with the taste of salt in the air and tinny calliope music teasing people toward the rides. But the wet cold is seeping from your clothing through your skin and reaching for your bones, and you keep thinking of that imaginary toddler impaled bloodily on the fronds of the metal palm tree, because his mother—yes, you blame his mother—didn’t protect him.
“We’ll have to break in somewhere,” Saralinda says quietly. “You guys realize that?”
Of course you realized. But shopfront after shopfront is shuttered and impenetrable. You pause before a place that sells Life is Good T-shirts and other clothing. It has a small, unprotected glass display window.
“We could throw a rock through it. But I bet it’s alarmed,” Kenyon says.
“Plus,” says Evangeline, “I won’t wear their clothes. Because life sucks.”
The back of your neck prickles a microsecond before you hear hoarse laughter. You spin to face two bulky men who emerge from the shadows, wrapped in heavy coats. Alcohol wafts from them. Your shoulders tighten.
“You got that right, girly,” the first one says. “Look at you! Look at all of you! Half-naked! And wet.” He’s white, tall, heavily bearded, wears a Mets cap, and waves a bottle expansively with one hand as he speaks.
“What’s with the life preservers?” asks the second man.
You have your pathetic knife in hand.
The second man is broadly built, darker skinned, and wears a knitted cap pulled low over his brow. He hangs behind the first man.
“They seem to have violent tendencies,” says the first man mockingly. “They’re planning to break into a store.” He takes a pull from his bottle.
They block the way forward.
You don’t want a fight, for countless excellent reasons, the first of which is the man’s bottle. If he cracks it against metal shutters, it’s a weapon. All you have is your knife. But maybe the girls will run if you tell them to—a big maybe—and then you can at least try to delay the men so the girls can get away . . . but to where? Your thoughts chase themselves in a grim circle, and meanwhile the man in the knit cap says, “There was a story on TV tonight about four teenagers.”
Your breath stops.
He continues. “Three girls. One boy.”
Saralinda can’t control herself. “On TV? What did they—”
“Saralinda!” Kenyon warns, too late.
“—say about us,” finishes Saralinda defiantly. She puts her hands on her hips.
Silence.
The two men look at Saralinda, who seems tinier than ever in her sopping clothing and life preserver, and then at Kenyon, and then Evangeline, and then finally at you.
You stand as still as criminals in the dock.
“Runaways,” says Knit Cap. “That was what they said you were.” He leans slightly on the word you. He drinks and hands the bottle back to his friend in the Mets hat.
“Is there a reward?” Mets Hat asks. “For information?”
“The TV said nothing about a reward.”
“Well, then,” says Mets Hat. “These teenagers are not our business.”
“Correct.” Knit Cap nods.
Are you about to have some luck? Will they let you walk away?
“We’ll forget we ever saw these strange and violent runaways,” Mets Hat says.
Yes. You are about to have some luck.
“For a consideration.” He lifts his hat. “If you would be so gracious.”
Evangeline says, “Okay, fine. That’s reasonable.”
“Kind and generous teenagers,” Knit Cap says with a bow.
Then Evangeline gasps. She holds out her hands, palms up, fingers wrinkled like prunes. They’re trembling. “So, it turns out that I’m wrong. We don’t have any money at all. What we had was in—uh, my pants. Sorry.”
Kenyon says bitterly, “Life sucks.”
“Your friend mentioned that already,” says Knit Cap. “Try to keep up.”
A grin splits the face of Mets Hat.
Then Saralinda laughs out loud.
You and Evangeline and Kenyon stare at her, and inside you are freaking out, but she steps forward, holding out a hand to the man in the knit cap. “Hello. My name is Saralinda. Who are you?”
Knit Cap smiles at her. “I am Marcial.”
Mets Hat says, “I’m Troy.”
Marcial and Saralinda shake hands. Then Troy and Saralinda shake hands. Then Saralinda says, “Marcial and Troy, these are my friends, Evangeline, Kenyon, and Caleb.”
Everyone shakes hands.
Then Marcial turns a serious face to Saralinda.
“Saralinda?”
“Yes?”
“I don’t want to know how and why you are here, Saralinda.” Marcial waves to indicate Coney Island by night. “All of you. Running away, without clothing and without money and without the sense God gave even to small scurrying mice, and with the police asking after you on TV.”
Saralinda presses her hands together. “Well, there’s a long story. We—”
Marcial holds up his broad hand to stop her. “Troy and me, we do not care why. We all have a long story. Every human one of us.”
Troy nods. Saralinda blinks, looking rebuffed.
But you get it.
You watch as Troy hands Marcial his bottle and Marcial takes another drink. You wonder what Marcial’s story is. How did he end up on the street, one of society’s throwaways? How did Troy?
Because it has hit you like the rock that the boat slammed into. You are all here in this place, on this night. Them, and you. Thrown away. Trying to survive.
Long
story.
Same boat.
Troy says, “Yes, but Marcial, what if they just told us the part about being half-naked?”
Marcial smiles. “No, better not.”
Saralinda says earnestly, “If we did have money, we’d give it to you. We absolutely would.”
Troy and Marcial look from Saralinda, to Evangeline, to Kenyon, to you, and finally back to Saralinda. At last they look at each other and nod.
Marcial bows slightly. “But we would not take it,” he says.
“Not now that we know you,” says Troy gallantly.
There are a few seconds of silence.
Marcial raises an eyebrow at Troy. “Johanna’s?”
“Yeah. Let’s get them out of the cold.” Troy holds up his bottle. “But first. Vodka, anyone?”
“I thought you’d never ask,” Kenyon blurts.
The men laugh.
“Small sips,” cautions Troy.
The vodka goes to Kenyon, then to Evangeline, and next to you. It burns down your throat and warms your grateful body. Saralinda drinks last, after a slight hesitation.
“Johanna’s is a secondhand store,” Troy says as they walk with you away from the beachfront.
Marcial adds, “We will let you in. You will be safe for a few hours. Yes?”
“Yes,” says Saralinda. “Wow. Thanks. Thank you!”
The six of you keep sharing tiny sips of the vodka. Saralinda walks next to Troy and Marcial into the back streets, with the rest of you a few steps behind.
You’ve given Kenyon one arm and Evangeline the other, and as you turn a corner, Kenyon’s grip tightens on it. She nods upward at a set of boarded-up windows and the big yellow sign beside them. It says TERMINAL HOTEL.
The three of you trot closer to Marcial and Troy and Saralinda.
A few blocks in from the beach, you are even more grateful for the men. In the doorways and entryways, shadows move within shadows. Sometimes Marcial and Troy look in at the shadows and greet them by name.
Saralinda says, “On TV, what else did they say?”
“They are looking for you,” Marcial says. “That is all.”
Ten cold minutes later, you stop before a small, weather-beaten store that looks to have been converted from a previous existence as a house. The window of Johanna’s Miscellany & Consignment Shoppe is small. Though barred, it showcases a mannequin in sunglasses, a yellow dress with a poofy skirt, and a dark-blond wig of luxurious locks. There’s a homemade pink sign, with words inside a heart: WELCOME, MY FRIEND!