Fresh Flesh (8 page)

"He's sixteen now. Time to stop playing with
bugs. This is a lesson."

"This is no way to teach him anything."

"You're too damn soft."

The sound of the flames cracking through
wood.

"Loving a stubborn fool like you, I guess so!
Now don't you ever take his property again or I'll kick your big
white butt out of this house for good. I mean it, Charles Andrew
Smith."

All three names. You knew Angela was serious
when she rolled out all three names.

A smile crept across Kyle's face. This was
the first time Angela ever stuck up for him in over five years
together. His butterfly collection would be safe.

Angela, however, would not be. She would be
dead before Christmas.

Heart attack out of nowhere and with Angela's
weight she just collapsed and succumbed. Charles first act with
Angela gone was to send Kyle away.

"It's not just you, boy," Charles said,
trying to explain his newest string of C's: callous castaway. "The
foster home is over." Charles wasn't lying, he sent all three
foster kids back to the state saying he couldn't carry on without
Angela. Charles wouldn't have been able to do it alone, but he had
Kyle.

"I could stay here and help you,
Charles."

"Yeah, sure." Charles laughed. "You know you
kids were never mine. And you wouldn't want a crusty guy like me
watching over you anyway."

C is for Crusty, indeed.

Kyle shook Charles' dirty mechanic nails
hand. To Kyle's surprise, Charles pulled him into a rare hug. He'd
been ten or eleven years old the last time Charles had hugged him
like this. "You take care of yourself, boy."

A long, awkward silence before Charles added:
"And don't you turn out like. . .me."

Charles sulked away into the distance. Kyle
didn't expect to ever see him again.

Kyle opened his eyes and it was present day
again. Much older now but the past still clung to him. The
butterfly fluttered away and Kyle waved goodbye.

Seth said he'd seen a woman on the island.
Bobby would find out if Seth was seeing things again. Kyle hoped
this time Seth wasn't delusional because a lot of fun could be had
with a woman on the island.

The young ensign with bleach-white hair, that
earlier bragged of how strong his seaworthy stomach was, violently
upchucked over the right bow. He wasn't the first, though. Six
Coast Guard men and three other Navy ensigns puked too.

"Jesus, Admiral," a veteran Navy Captain
named Wick Eckers said. He had seen some ghastly sights in 'Nam:
rat-chewed bodies, bullet-riddled and rotted flesh, brain-blown
corpses and worse. But he hadn't seen anything as disturbing and
grotesque as the things ten feet away.

Admiral Bodecker tugged his beard, a nervous
habit which had accompanied him most of his adult life. In his many
Navy years, he'd rarely seen the ocean display such gruesome power.
There were three limbless torsos brought in by the Coast Guard with
seaweed wrapped like tinsel around the flabby, useless flesh where
the head, arms and legs should have been. The bodies were all
drained white and well rotted. The sight was terrible, but it was
the horrendous smell that had been the coup de grace for the
pukers.

Ocean rot, ocean decay; the overwhelming
smell of salt and mutilated flesh. Strange how these bodies had
shown up from nowhere, retched from the largest cemetery on earth.
He wondered how they came up?

"Ensign?" He touched the young blonde man on
the shoulder, "Go below deck. Take the day off."

"Yes, Admiral." His face was as green as the
seaweed on the torsos. He slid past the admiral and disappeared
below.

A strong wind came, rocked the boat like a
seesaw, upppppppp. . ..dooooooowwwwwnnn. Watching the wind blow the
dangling seaweed made Bodecker shudder. It was an eerie sight,
indeed. The Navy was good to him the last nineteen years. He
supposed without the ocean, despite the grisly sight before him,
he'd still be boozing it up and chasing different women ashore
every night.

The Coast Guard captain, Roe Simon, climbed
up the small steps to face Admiral Bodecker. He was a short,
middle-aged man wearing an oversized white hat in vain hopes of
concealing his eraser head.

"We found something else."

"Another body?" Admiral Bodecker replied.

"No. No,
this
." The man held up a
waterlogged sign that Bodecker had not seen him holding before.

LADY STA. The name of the same boat which
belonged to the ripped-apart bodies? Did the ocean think man was
too dumb to figure anything out? Or was it just a strange
coincidence?

More eeriness filled the salty ocean air.

"You see how the edge of the sign is broken
off?" Captain Simon pointed„ "I think it's missing the last four
letters. About a month ago, during that bad storm, our records
reported a yacht disappeared somewhere in the vicinity of where we
found the bodies and this. The name of the yacht that went down was
LADY STANTON."

"The ship with that rich mogul?"

"Edward Stanton, yes."

"Isn't he one of the wealthiest people in the
world. Forbes list, all that Wall street stuff? Made some computer
chips or something?"

"He is—was. One of those. . ..bodies. . .
could be Edward Stanton."

"Lord of mercy, Jesus." Admiral Bodecker
shook his head. It was becoming a task to lay eyes upon the
chewed-up corpses. He quickly ordered them covered and taken
away.

"How many people were on her when she went
down?" Bodecker asked.

"Eight were reported missing. Five males,
caucasians, middle-thirties to forties. Three women including
Stanton's wife."

Admiral Bodecker watched the ensigns cover
the hideous torsos with a heavy white tarp. He motioned the Coast
Guard official to the bridge.

"Come, please. We must speak privately."

They left quickly. The ocean grabbed the
gigantic Navy ship in its steel fist and cradled it like a toy.

Admiral Bodecker led the Coast Guard captain
to his well-kept, neatly organized office on the bridge. On
Bodecker's desk was a detailed map of the Pacific, showing
everything from ocean depths to latitudes and longitudes. He took a
compass from his pencil and pen holder, an IN GOD WE TRUST coffee
mug, and handed it to Captain Simon.

The Coast Guard man took it and pinpointed
where they'd found the torsos and the sign. He grabbed a sharp
pencil and drew an X at the latitude and longitude coordinates.

"The sign and bodies came up here, roughly
four-hundred miles north/northwest of the Hawaiian islands.

"There was never an S.O.S or any cry for help
from the LADY STANTON. Dead radio silence. It's damned peculiar
that these bodies turned up at all. Christ, it's been over a
month."

"I was thinking the same thing myself. Give
me your best assessment of what happened."

Simon nodded. "Stanton and his friends were
headed for the Hawaiian islands. Their vessel was competent for the
journey, that's not the problem. The storm came and they were too
busy partying to get the hell out. To be blunt sir: they fucked up,
and it cost them their lives."

"Yes, but according to where you found the
boat insignia and the bodies, that's four hundred miles off course.
How could anyone get that far off course?"

"Drugs? The rich ones like to party hard, you
know."

"Hmm."

"Unless," added Captain Simon, "the ocean
dragged those bodies—and the sign—four hundred miles."

Actually, Admiral Bodecker had two nervous
vices: beard-pulling and pacing. He did both without thinking.
There was something disturbing about the LADY STANTON sinking and a
month later spitting up three bodies.

"Survivors?"

"Impossible. No one. Nobody could have lived
through that."

"But what if they went down close to here,"
Bodecker put his finger on -156 degrees longitude, 29 degrees
longitude.

"That would make them several hundred miles
off course."

"It's possible?"

"Yeah, with a dumbass at the helm and a
shithead for a navigator."

This time it was Bodecker who said,
"drugs?"

"I. . .don't know. Pretty sketchy. They're
all dead and that's how I intend to put it in my report."

"No. I'm afraid not." Bodecker shook his
head.

"What? I have to file a report."

"No Captain, not if I say you can't."

"And why would you do that?"

"Because if they did go down here." he tapped
the spot on the map, "they're close to this island."

"Yes, but that island? Government-owned land,
right?"

"Yes, and
what if
the LADY STANTON
went down and there was a survivor who made it to the island
somehow?"

"It would be a governmental matter."

"That's why you aren't going to write
anything in your report."

Simon knew it was an order not to be
disobeyed.

"Then how can I file a report if I can't put
anything in it?"

"I'm afraid that's not my problem. Uncle Sam
wants it that way, you know."

"Well, sir, if you don't mind me saying: it's
a crock of shit. Nobody survived. Nobody. And even if they did, the
storm would have ripped them up so badly they'd never have
recovered on their own."

Bodecker said, "That will be all, Captain
Simon. The Navy will take it from here."

Simon started for the door, grumbling, "Yeah,
yeah I bet they will."

"Not a word of this to anybody, Simon. Keep
the lid tight, understand?"

When the door slammed shut, Bodecker looked
back down at where his finger was still pointing. Government land
was all even he was told. Well, now with possible civilian(s)
shipwrecking they would have to tell him more about what was going
on there. If there was one or more survivors on the island,
Bodecker could order one or more ships in his fleet to travel there
in no time. They would have to brief him on this small mysterious
island in the Pacific.

He left his office to get permission from the
higher echelons to search the island for any survivors of the
downed LADY STANTON. Surely they would give him clearance.

Bodecker should have known better.

Jessica had a vivid dream about someone she
knew, but when she awoke she couldn't remember who it was. She
didn't wake with a start. She sensed danger from the person in her
dream.

A sheen of sweat covered her body. Her
favorite Friday night red blouse was glued to her skin. Examining
it's ragged condition, she couldn't describe it as her favorite
anything any more.

It reminded her too much of the island. Dick.
Lies. Every aggravating, yet always humorous, episode of Gilligan's
island. How could they screw up getting rescued so many times?

She realized she was still alone. Had been
all night. How had she fallen asleep? She had laid there depressed
and in pain.

She felt it all over, a bad bout of menstrual
cramps coupled with an aching jaw.

Why did he hit me?

Sunlight shone brightly through the cave
entrance and warm sea-wind rushed in.

She slid across the dirt and took the knife
that Dick had thrown down last night. Holding his pocket knife made
her feel both relieved and worried. She felt safe holding a weapon,
yet worried about the possibility of having to use it. What if Dick
had not lied about the "night creatures" and they decided to become
day creatures?

Why did he hit me?

She closed her eyes, frightened and hurt by
memories of Dick. She was at risk of starving without him. She had
tree-branch fishing poles and plenty of worms for bait but she
didn't have the knack. She could quiet even the most rambunctious
child—a feat most men would cower at mere contemplation—but she had
no talent for catching her most abhorred food. Stinking, smelly,
salty, fish. And the coconuts, she couldn't kid herself into
thinking there was an icecube's chance in hell climbing fifty feet.
She wasn't a monkey.

Berries. That left the berries. She would
live strictly off berries—a berritarian! Hell, she could probably
even prune that nagging twenty pounds.

Face it, Jessica, you're screwed.

She climbed to her feet, her weak bones
barely holding her. Firecracker snaps told her that even her
skeleton felt drained. Which did she have worse: emotional or
physical damage?

Why did he hit me?

She limped across the dirt floor, more
bone-snapping, until she made it to the entrance. She stopped and
stared out into the bright ravine, almost expecting a grief-laden
Dick—he
had
pulled the punch—to be there.

He wasn't.

Maybe he's on the spying trip again, waiting
to surprise me? She searched the dense ravine with hopeful
eyes.

He wasn't.

There wasn't even a strong wind to play
tricks with her mind like it had before. There was emptiness and
nothing else.

She looked down at Dick's pocket knife. She
clutched it, making white knuckles. What if she had to defend
herself with it, could she do it? Yes. Could she stick another
human being—even Dick—if there was no other alternative?

Was Dick a foe or a friend?

Why did he hit me?

She left the cave, went to the bathroom and
peed dark red blood.

On the way out, she tripped over it.

She thought at first it was either a small
rock jutting out of the ground, or a cluster of tenuous vines.
There were lots of those little pitfalls on the island, but the
thing she felt touching her bare foot was not as hard as a rock,
nor was it grassy, nor thin, nor flimsy like any vine she had
touched on the island. It was soft and flesh-like.