Once Upon a Caveman (20 page)

“If
you want to be a photographer, you’d buy a camera not meth.”

He
ignored that inconvenient use of logic.  “Do you have any idea what it’s like
to get turned down by fifty-six different art schools? 
Fifty-six!
  I
was supposed to be nailing models, and taking pictures on the covers of
magazines, and saying something that people would
listen to!
”

“Maybe
they would listen better if you weren’t pointing guns at them.”

He
shook his head.  “
You
are the reason my life ran off the rails.  Sure,
I’ve fucked up since then.  Got stupid and got arrested and, that one time, I
sold my kidney to that rich guy in Toledo.”

“Eww.”

He
kept ranting, ignoring her appalled face.  “But, I don’t deserve to get eaten
by velociraptors.  No
way! 
I don’t deserve that!”

“Dinosaurs
didn’t live in the Ice Age, genius.”  Why was she the only one who knew that? 
Did everyone else sleep through science class?

“In
the end, I
made
something out of myself.”  Craig continued.  “I got into
fencing gems.  Got into selling dope.  Got into the
bigtime
.  That’s why
I showed up at this dumbfuck reunion.  To tell you were
wrong
about me,
Meadowcroft.”  He spread his arm out “ta-da” style.  “I’m
not
a loser,
after all.”

For
a girl who spent four years being the weird loner in the back of the cafeteria,
she sure was the epicenter of a lot of idiots’ high school memories.  Why did
everyone always think she was so damn special?  Lucy totally didn’t understand
it, but it pissed her off.  “Of
course
you’re a loser!”  She bellowed. 
“You sell your kidneys for drug money!  How is that being a successful human
being?”

That
was
not
what Craig wanted to hear.  “I had two of them, didn’t I?!”  He
took a menacing step forward.  “Besides, it’s
your
fault that…”

“Lucy!” 
Rhawn raced into the clearing.  “Are you alright?”  He didn’t wait for her to
answer that.  Brown eyes went from the dead cat, to Lucy’s enraged face, to
Craig’s gun, quickly piecing events together.  The caveman wasn’t Mary Ann or
Ginger.  He was the damn Professor.  She saw him calculating odds and angles.

Amazingly,
that made her feel better.  With Rhawn there, she knew she was safe. 
Nobody
was as smart as Rhawn.  He was going to get them out of this mess.  Lucy took
an unconscious step towards him.  Rhawn reached over, grabbing hold of her arm
and tugging her closer.

“Who
the hell is this?”  Craig demanded.

Rhawn
must have recognized the Glock as a weapon, because he very deliberately placed
himself between the muzzle and Lucy.  His gaze stayed on Craig.  “I am Rhawn,
Lucy’s mate.  Who are you?”

“He’s
Craig Turkana.”  She told him, ignoring the “mate” part.  Over the last couple
of days she’d stopped correcting him on that.  Not that she was
accepting
it exactly, but it didn’t sound quite so weird anymore.  “He’s from my world
and he’s a murdering dickhead.”

“Eat
me.”  Craig told her.  He looked Rhawn up and down.  “What does this guy mean,
he’s your mate?  You fucking these cavemen guys?  Getting on their good side?” 
He snorted.  “Shit, I didn’t think you had it in you, Meadowcroft.  I should’ve
known the smartest kid in school would do what she needed to do in order to survive.”

Rhawn’s
jaw ticked.

“You
know she’s a bitch, right?”  Craig glanced over at Rhawn.  “I mean, you must
have noticed that she thinks she’s better than everybody else.”

“She
is
better.”  Rhawn said softly.

Lucy
winced at bit.  That “goddess” lie weighed heavier all the time.  “Rhawn, I’m
really not…”

Craig
talked right over her.  “I
know
she’s better.  But she doesn’t have to
act so stuck up about it.  And she didn’t have to call me a loser, man!  That
fucking
hurt
.  And she got me kicked out of school and…”

“Nobody
cares
, Craig!”  Lucy interrupted.  “Jesus, I’m sorry I called you a
loser fifteen years ago, okay?  Get over.  I’m sick of hearing how high school
is still ruling everyone’s life.  We have bigger problems.  If any of us are
going to survive, we need to get
off
this island.”

“How? 
I saw the end of fucking
Lost
, man.  I didn’t understand it, but I saw
it.  I think we’re all --like-- dead or some shit.”

“We
have boats.  Put the gun down and we’ll let you on one of them.”

He
squinted.  “You’ve got the Neanderthals building
boats?
”

“We
don’t have much of a choice.  This is an island and that volcano is going to
explode.  I don’t want to be here when that happens.  Do you?”

“I
don’t want to be here, at all.  I want to get back to fucking
America.
”

“Well
that’s obviously not going to happen if we stay put
.
  Movement is
life.”  She either heard that in self-defense seminar or a Brad Pitt movie. 
She couldn’t remember which.  “We’re building boats for everyone to evacuate and
we’ll make sure you have a seat, if you give me the gun.  Do we have a deal?”

Rhawn
didn’t look happy about that idea.  “This man will not come with us, Lucy.  We
clearly cannot trust him.”

“Do
you have a better idea?”

“
Yes
.” 
His tone left her in no doubt that his idea involved Craig’s body disappearing
into the tar pits.

“We
can’t kill Craig!”  She hissed back.

“Why
not?”

“It’s
illegal for one thing.”

He
snorted at that.  “No, it isn’t.  Our laws do not allow for dangerous men to
threaten our mates without repercussions.  I am well within my rights.”

Craig
seized onto the one part of Rhawn’s complains that he’d overheard.  “That’s
right.  I
am
dangerous.”  He sucked on his teeth, his eyes going crafty. 
“Now, you’re bright about most things, Meadowcroft.  But you know shit-all about
people.  You think I’m going to just fall in line with your plans, like you’re
the Mother of fucking Dragons?”  He waggled the revolver at her.  “With the
gun, I can just take
your
boats.”

“And
go where?”  Lucy arched a brow.  “Any idea which direction to sail?”

“I’ll
figure it out, with --like-- astrology.”

“Astrology? 
How is it going to help you to know if you’re a Capricorn or a Libra?”

“I’m
a fucking Taurus.”  Craig snapped, looking annoyed.  His eyes flicked down to
the sparkly necklace for beat and it seemed to distract him.  He frowned and
shook his head, like he was trying to focus, again.  “Fine.  Whatever the hell
you call it to drive around using the stars, then.  As
tron
omy. 
That’s
what I’m gonna do.”

“Sure.” 
Lucy pointed upward.  “Remind me again: Which of the moons should you navigate
by, Magellan?”

Craig
looked up, apparently noticing for the first time that there were two bright
orbs in the nighttime sky.  When you were high, you didn’t pick up on a lot of
details.  “Holy
shit
.”  His jaw dropped.  “What happened to the moon? 
What
did you do to the moon?!
”

“It
wasn’t me, you idiot.  The sky looked different because we’re not on Earth
anymore.”

Rhawn’s
hand came up, keeping her behind him.  His eyes stayed on Craig.

Craig
was lost in his chemical-induced mania, convinced that Lucy was to blame for
everything that had ever happened to him.  “You did something to send us here,
then!  The last thing I remember before we sank was
you
, somehow knowing
it was going to happen!”  He pointed the gun at her.  “If I get rid of you,
maybe all this goes away!”

Lucy
felt her heart racing.  “You can’t be serious.  Not even you are paranoid
enough to shoot me for…”

Craig
started firing.

“I’m
thinking of getting a dog.”  Lucy says conversationally, brushing a hand
through the caveman’s thick, tawny hair.  “Like a cute little one.”

“A
little dog?”  He seems puzzled.  “No.  You should get a
large
one.  Then there is more meat on it for cooking.”

Lucy
stares at him for a beat.  “…So I take it you’re more of a cat person, then.”

Rhawn
and Lucy’s Dream- Five Years Ago.

Lucy
instinctively ducked to the side, narrowly avoiding getting shot in the brain. 
The bullet impacted one of the mutant trees, the sound like a thunderclap.  How
the hell was that damn thing even working, after it had been dunked in the
sea?  Craig must have kept it and his precious dope sealed up in plastic or
something.  Before she had time to figure it out, Rhawn was shoving her to the
ground.

“Stay
down!”

Lucy
landed on her backside, cringing as more gunshots exploded.  “Rhawn!”  She
shouted in panic.  The lunatic was headed
towards
Craig, rather than
away.  “Don’t go near him!  He’s going to…”

Her
frantic warning was cut off mid-word, as it became clear Rhawn didn’t need it. 
One huge palm locked around Craig’s hand, forcing the gun into the air through
brute strength.  Craig futilely struggled for control, but it was like fighting
against the Terminator.  Rhawn was bigger, stronger and he wasn’t going to
stop.

Lucy’s
eyebrows climbed in amazement.

“
Shit!
” 
Craig shrieked.  “You’re gonna break my wrist!”

Rhawn
ignored that.  His other fist hammered out, slamming into Craig’s jaw.  Lucy
flinched, pretty sure she’d just heard some teeth being pulverized.  Clearly,
the caveman wasn’t going to solve this using his superior brainpower.  Craig ended
up flat on his back, crying.  He was literally
crying
.  The whole fight
took about three seconds and Rhawn made it look so damn simple that Lucy could
only blink.  She couldn’t believe it had been that easy.

Neither
could Rhawn.

Three
seconds wasn’t enough time for him to adequately work out his frustrations.  Cursing
in caveman-ese, Rhawn tossed the gun aside and hauled Craig back up to hit him
again.  “You threaten
my
woman?!”  He roared.  “You try to take her from
me?! 
I should throw you in the pits to die!
”

“It
wasn’t my fault!”  Craig screeched.  “She started it!”

By
this point, other members of the Clan had shown up, drawn by the unfamiliar
sound of gunshots.  They stood around in a loose circle, not one of them doing
a damn thing to stop the show.  Nobody knew exactly what was going on, but they
were ready to be entertained by the bloodshed.

God,
Lucy didn’t care what Rhawn said about their wonderfulness.  Most of the time,
her “followers” were completely unhelpful.

In
fact,
all
of the time.

“Awesome! 
Someone should have beat the piss outta Craig years ago.”  Warren said
cheerfully, coming up beside her.  He looked pretty good, considering he’d been
on a bender for days.  His hair wasn’t oiled down and his face looked younger,
like he was happy about something.  This place was actually good for him.  “Hell,
maybe I like your boyfriend, after all, Moose-y.”

Lucy
flashed him a distracted glare, staggering to her feet.  “Aren’t you supposed
to be out cold someplace?”  She hurried over to grab the gun off the ground
before somebody else got it.  Aside from Rhawn, there was no one around here
she trusted with a weapon.

“Hey,
you’re just luckily I didn’t use my green belt on you earlier.”  Warren
retorted with a snort.  “I
do
know karate, ya know?”

She
barely resisted the urge to shoot him.

“Warren?” 
Taffi came strolling over, like they were all meeting up for cocktails.  She
even had her hair fixed in a jaunty braid high on her head.  “Don’t tell me
you’re finally out of that cave.”

“No,
I’m still in there.  I’m just a fucking mirage, right now.”  Warren snapped
back, in possibly his wittiest remark ever.

Taffi
sniffed, unimpressed.  “Well, as you can see, Lucy and her missing link boy-toy
have been screwing things up royally, while you were plastered.  As usual, it’s
up to
me
to lead the way.  No wonder I was vice-president of the class
and not you.”  She gave Skoll a careless wave from across the clearing. 
“Luckily, I’m totally winning over the savages.  They believe I’m a god or
something.”

“Yeah,
that’s kinda common around here.”  Warren agreed sourly.  “It’s a way worse job
then it seems at first, though.  Trust me.  People throw rocks at you.”

“Oh,
don’t be such a whiner.  I know what I’m doing.”

Lucy
seriously doubted that.  “Skoll is a psycho, Taffi.” She warned, distractedly. 
Damn it, Rhawn had better not hurt himself fighting.  “You should stay away
from him.”

Taffi’s
eyes took on an angry glow.  “Why?  So
you
can be the one to save the
day?  So
you
can get the credit?”  She shook her head.  “Oh no…  You’re
not taking
this
from me, too, Lucy!  First it was my prom dress and now
it’s the spotlight.  Well,
you
might have given up on getting us home,
but I haven’t!  I’m going to figure out a way to save us all and then I’ll
finally be the star!”

Warren
blinked over at Lucy.  “You’ve given up on getting us home?  Hang on… we’re
stuck here
forever?
”  For some reason, he didn’t look too broken up
about that idea.  In fact, he started to grin.  “That’s fucking
tremendous!
 
My ex-wives are going to be
so pissed
about losing their alimony checks.” 
He chortled with glee.

“No!” 
Taffi raged.  “
I’m
getting us home!  Aren’t you listening?”

“Oh
be real, Taff.”  Warren rolled his eyes.  “If Lucy can’t do it, then
you
sure as hell can’t.  Face it, we’re stuck in
Jurassic Park
.”

“Dinosaurs
didn’t live during the Ice Age.”  Lucy interjected automatically.  She got
so
sick of telling people that.

Taffi’s
collagen plumped lips flattened into a thin line, ignoring her.  “This place is
my
second chance. 
My
do-over.  This time, Lucy’s not the special
snowflake. 
I
am.”

“I
was
never
the special snowflake, Taffi.  I never did
anything
,
except score high on a couple of standardized tests.  And really?  I think that
fucked up my whole life, because of the unrealistic expectations that got
heaped on me.  In real life, I haven’t done anything extraordinary.”

“No
kidding!”  Taffi shouted.  “But you’re
still
the one everyone asked
about, when I sent them invitations to the reunion.  ‘How’s Lucy doing?’  ‘What
kind of amazing job does Lucy have?,’ ‘Is Lucy off changing the world someplace?’ 
Teddy O’Connell even wanted your phone number and
I
was the one who gave
him a hand-job at graduation!”

Lucy
rolled her eyes.  “Just stay out of my way, while I go help Rhawn, okay?  I’ll
listen to your oversharing later.”

“Since
Craig is the one crying, I don’t think Rhawn needs any help.”  Warren said
casually.  “I think he’d want you to stay outta it.”

He
was probably right, but that didn’t do a lot to make her feel better.  To his
credit, Craig
was
trying to fight back, even through his tears.  Somehow
he broke free of Rhawn’s hold and slithered forward, heading for a rock to use
as a weapon.  He didn’t get far.  Rhawn grabbed him by the back of the neck and
lifted him right off the ground.  The rest of the Clan cheered
enthusiastically.

Lucy
flinched.  “Rhawn, please be careful!”  She spared Warren a quick glance.  “You
see?  He’s going to strain his back doing that.”  She held up a palm to shield
her eyes, as the caveman tossed Craig into a prickly-looking purple bush.  “God,
I can’t watch this.”  Rhawn was following her wishes and not killing Craig, but
there was still way too much violence for her liking.

“Just
give Rhawn a second to work through some stuff.”  Warren soothed.  “It’s a perfectly
natural guy thing.  I wail on people all the time at karate.  Relieves stress,
ya know?”  Meanwhile, his attention kept flicking over to Skoll.  “Hey, do you
think that dude is better looking than me?”  He asked suddenly.

“Yes.” 
Taffi said without even checking to see who he was pointing at.

Warren
made a face.  “Well, I think Skoll’s a dickhead.”  He grumbled.  “He wants to
date Anniah or something.”

“Who’s
Anniah?”  Taffi asked without much interest.  “That girl who looks like
Twiggy?”  She clearly wasn’t worried about competition for Skoll’s fair hand. 
In her own mind, Taffi would always be the head cheerleader who all the boys wanted
to ask to prom.

Lucy
ignored her narcissism.  “Warren, this isn’t high school.”  She reported
although no one else seemed to have noticed that.  Lecturing him provided a
welcomed distraction from the bloodshed, so she gave it a shot.  “If you
encourage Anniah’s crush on you, there will be
real
repercussions.  You
get that, right?”

“Well
you’re
the one who gave me to her.”

“I
didn’t ‘give’ you to her.  I just said she could have you, if she wanted.”

“How
is that not giving me to her?”

Lucy
had no idea, but she wasn’t going to admit that.  “Just shut up and listen,
okay?  I want you to think about what
you
want.  Skoll could smash you
into little pieces without even trying and he’s totally
going
to, if you
date that girl.”  For whatever reason, Lucy didn’t want this idiot dead. 
Warren was an annoying pest, but he was
her
annoying pest.  “I like
Anniah, but use your head!  You couldn’t even beat
me
in a fight.”

He
brightened, missing the point.  “Hey wait… Did you say Anniah has a crush on
me?  Why?  What did she say?  Tell me
exactly
.”

Apparently,
she was wrong.  It
was
high school.  Lucy sighed.  “She keeps saying
you’re her ‘vando.’  I think that means she likes you.  That’s really not the
point, though…”

“It
clearly
means, ‘I love him’ or ‘I love you’ or ‘I love
whoever
.’” 
Taffi interjected importantly.  “They don’t really use verb conjugations around
here, so you have to use context to get an exact translation.”

Lucy
and Warren glanced at her in surprise.

“What? 
I double-majored in French and Mandarin.  Languages are --like-- my thing.  I can
figure out what these brutes are grunting about, if I pay attention.”  Taffi
was happy to have the attention back on her and she wasn’t letting it go.  “So,
is that
Craig
your orangutan of a lover is pounding?”  She asked Lucy,
even though she already knew who it was.  It wasn’t like there were a lot of
people running around the jungle in “Fuck the World” t-shirts.  “God, they will
just let
anyone
onto this island, won’t they?”  She shot Lucy a pointed
look, making sure to include her in the insult.

Lucy
didn’t give a damn.  Her mind was whirling.

Holy
shit
.  All the times he’d said
vando
, had Rhawn been telling her
he
loved
her?  He must have been saying it all along!  Her mouth
curved.  Wow, that was…

Craig
gave a sudden bellow of pain, drawing her attention back to the fight.  Lucy winced
as Rhawn broke Craig’s nose and kept going.  Craig was back to crying.  Clearly,
this wasn’t going to wind down on its own.

Crap.

“You
know what?  Forget it.  Both of you do what you want.”  Lucy waved aside Warren
and Taffi’s problems.  Right now, all that mattered was Rhawn.  “I’ve had it. 
Warren, help me break this up, will you?”

“Don’t
worry, Moose-y.  Your boyfriend’s got Craig on the ropes, for sure.”

“I
want him to
stop
, though!”

“Why? 
Craig’s always been a dick.”

Craig
gave a choked sound of terror and lifted his arms to cover his face, trying to
hide from Rhawn’s wrath.  It didn’t work.  Since no one else was going to be
the adult here, Lucy would have to do it herself.

“Don’t,
caveman.”  She headed over, intent on saving Craig’s life for Rhawn’s sake.

“He
threatened
you, Lucy!  He could have killed you with that weapon!”

“I
know, but I’m fine.”  She assured him, even as her eyes went down to the gun in
her hand.  Just looking at it had fear coursing through her system.  She
could’ve been killed. 
Rhawn
could’ve been killed.  Really, that possibility
frightened her even more.  Either way, she was fine with Craig getting beat up,
as payback.  She wasn’t about to let Rhawn do something he’d regret, though. 
“Come on, you won.  Now let him go.  This isn’t who you are.  We’ll just…”

Lucy
stopped mid-word, cut off by a bloodcurdling, horror-movie-sound-effect howl.  The
eerie notes of it played over her spinal cord and stopping her heart.  She
instantly realized what animal had made the sound.