Sweet (20 page)

“Viv!” I say. “There she is. Viv!”

Viv is lying under a table, with two other people collapsed over her. Tom tries to pull her out, but the other people are too heavy. He has to get down on his hands and knees and try to shove his way under the table.

Finally he can get his hands under Viv and lift her out of the ghastly dog pile.

“Jesus,” he says. “She's like a doll. She weighs nothing. I mean, I carried her not two days ago and she was a decent weight.”

“But she's breathing? She's breathing?” I say.

Tom nods. We go to my room.

*   *   *

Tom lays Viv on the bed.

“Is she going to be okay?” I ask him. I know it's a stupid question. I'm kneading my hands together in worry. I can't seem to stop.

“I … I don't know, Laurel. There's nothing broken. She's just … she's knocked out.”

“I know. Of course you don't know. Okay, get it together, Laurel,” I say out loud to myself. “Washcloth!”

I walk to the bathroom and get one of the fancy washcloths and soak it with cold water.

Then I come back in and lay it tenderly on Viv's face.

Then my sweet friend Viv opens her eyes and starts talking.

“You slippery little
skank
! Why did you take me away? I was having such a GOOD TIME?!”

“Viv, what do you mean?”

“I finally have a boyfriend and you go and take me away?! Do you think you're my mother? Because you're acting just like her. Did she tell you to watch me? Did she tell you not to let me have any FUN—”

Viv pulls herself to standing and starts walking, shakily, toward me and I don't know what to do.

I just start to back up.

Her breath is awful. Like roadkill.

“Stop, please, Viv. You know I'm your friend. I only want the best for you.”

“Sometimes I think they love you more than me! Laurel's so CREATIVE and so TALENTED—”

“Viv! Stop!” I yell. “Please! Look, we're going to leave you here. You need rest. Please go to bed, okay?”

“Did you know we call you the church-mouse at my house? And we LAUGH at you! We LAUGH at your boots and the way you say HERmeees instead of Herm
è
s. You want to be so cultured but you're just TRASH, just trash.”

Tom is pulling me toward the door. Viv is spitting in my face.

My hands are raised up in front of me. For protection.

“Please stop,” I cry. “Vivika!”

“We're leaving,” Tom says. “She's not herself.”

“‘She's not herself. She's not herself,'” Viv mocks. “Says the musclebound oaf—”

Tom pulls me out of the room and shuts the door in Viv's face.

I bury my face in my hands.

I sob against his shirt.

“It's a break. A schizoid break,” Tom tells me.

He leans over, tipping my head up so I will meet his eyes.

“Laurel, listen, I did a guest star on
Criminal Minds.
I played the brother of a character who acted like that. It's called a schizoid break. I researched it. That's not what she really thinks. None of it.”

My sweet Vivika. Saying those awful things.

“Forget everything she said. Just put it out of your mind.”

I can hear Viv raving inside the room. Talking to herself.

He puts his strong hands on my shoulders and rubs them. “Erase everything she just said. She didn't mean a word of it.”

“I know,” I say. “But some of it must be true! Don't you think?”

“No, I don't. I really don't. Let's go to my room,” Tom says. “I don't think … I don't think she's going anywhere. She seems so out of it. I don't even know if she could figure out how to open the door.”

I nod.

I'm starting to feel weak. It must be two or three in the afternoon by now. I haven't eaten anything but an Oreo, eight lifetimes ago.

“But first we should find some food,” I say.

“Thatta girl,” Tom says. He hugs me.

Vivika is still talking, behind the door to our suite.

“Oh God,” I say. “My guitar's in there.”

Tom looks at me.

“I don't think it's worth going in there for it,” he says. “But it's your call.”

I exhale.

“You're right. Let's go.”

Call me a coward, but I don't want to face her again.

 

TOM

DAY FIVE

LAUREL AND I
head to the Club Cassiopeia. It's a club at night, but it serves a seated breakfast to people who don't want to go to the buffet on the pool deck. They have an omelet bar. It's where I've been getting my 6:00 a.m. egg whites.

We push the doors open and can hear a momentary sound of people talking and then the talking stops immediately.

“Who's there?” comes a nervous voice, just as another voice shushes it.

I exchange a look with Laurel.

“It's Tom Fiorelli. I'm—we're clean. Just looking for food.”

My eyes adjust to the darkness.

Club Cassiopeia has a dance floor at one end, near where we've entered, and lounge seating going up in tiers around the stage. The room is dimly lit by strands of lights set into the floor edging around the tiers and steps.

At the back of the space, raised up by the gradual incline of the room, is the bar with two kitchen doors behind it.

“Hello?” I say. “Who are you?”

“We are just some of the crew members,” comes a voice. This one's got an Indian accent. “Just looking for food ourselves.”

“Jaideep?!” Laurel bursts out.

“Yes. It is I. Who's asking?”

A thin Indian waiter carrying two bags of hamburger buns steps out into the light.

“It's me, Laurel. The seasick girl.”

“Laurel!” he says. “You're safe. I am so glad!”

She strides up the aisle and hugs the guy, then holds him by the shoulders, and hugs him again. “I'm so glad to see you,” she says.

“And I you, Laurel!”

I step up behind Laurel and put my hand on her lower back.

Yeah. I'm showing that she's mine. That's how you do it. I know the guy's just a skinny waiter, but it's the code.

“My friend Viv, she's gone crazy,” Laurel tells him.

“I am not surprised,” Jaideep says. “Everyone who has taken Solu seems to have gone mad. You should see the crew quarters. Though we were prohibited from taking Solu, many, many people seem to have broken the rules.”

I'm just standing there, forgotten, so I clear my throat.

“Tom, this is Jaideep. I met him on the first day. He helped me when I was really seasick.”

“Hello, Mr. Fiorelli. My mother is one of your biggest fans. It is a pleasure to meet you. And I will introduce you to my friends,” he says. “Guys, come here.”

Four people come out from the kitchen. There's a short Filipino girl who looks way too young to be working on a ship, a chubby blond guy, an Indian man who's the oldest of all of us and has a bandage on his head, and a black girl carrying a bag full of oranges.

Jaideep names them: “This is Anna, Milo, Vihaan, and Kiniana.”

“We're a walking United Nations, by the look of us,” Jaideep says.

We all shake hands.

Milo makes a joke: “It's the end of the world, pleased to meet you.” He's got a South African accent.

“What are you guys doing?” Laurel asks.

“We're fending for ourselves, that's what we're doing,” Vihaan snaps.

“Whoa, whoa, Laurel's all right. She's not like the others,” Jaideep says. He explains to us, “The passengers have been attacking us. Wanting us to get them Solu.”

“A woman threw a bottle at my head,” Vihaan says.

“And we can't stay in the crew quarters,” Kiniana adds. Her accent is … Creole? Haitian? “The first mate is tossing all the rooms. He's on Solu and he's got the master key.”

“And below deck, people are almost as bad as the people upstairs. They'd kill for Solu,” Milo says.

“They have!” Jaideep says. “My friend Gede was stabbed for two packs!”

They all start talking at the same time.

“Help is on the way,” I say. “That's the good news.”

“Yeah, the coast guard is coming,” Laurel adds.

“Our friend Rich told us to just get somewhere safe and hole up,” I say. “But help is coming. It really is.”

“We are concerned because we have stopped hearing instructions from the bridge,” Jaideep tells us. “In a situation like this, we should be hearing codes and being told what to do.”

I realize it has been a long time since we heard that annoying woman's voice.

“Well, maybe the PA system is down,” I say.

“It could happen, I suppose,” Jaideep says. He looks to Vihaan.

“Well, I think staying here in the lounge is our best shot,” Milo interrupts. “We've food. We can … well, we can't lock the doors, but maybe we can block them with furniture.”

“Most of the cleaning staff have barricaded themselves in the rec room. But they won't let anyone else in,” Anna tells us.

“We should do the same right here,” Milo insists.

“This room has four entrances, not counting the one in the back of the kitchen,” Kiniana protests. “We can't block them all. We should go back to the crew deck and hide in someone's room.”

“But Golan has the master key!” Anna protests.

“We'll hide in a room he's already searched!” Kiniana says.

“No. I've got a better idea,” I say. “We'll all go back to my room. We can lock the door, and we've got a window and a balcony so we can see when the rescue ships come.”

Laurel slides her hand into mine.

“It's a good idea,” she says. “I think we're safer if we all stay together.”

“Sounds good to me,” Milo says. “Let's go crash at Casa Baby Tom-Tom.”

Jaideep looks to Vihaan again and Vihaan nods.

“I think it's our best option,” Jaideep says. “If you truly don't mind.”

*   *   *

An hour later, you'd think we were having the best after-party ever.

The coffee table bears the remnants of our bizarre feast. We'd eaten what we could find in the club—all non-refrigerated breakfast foods they had on hand. The cold stuff was kept in the kitchen, Jaideep told us. It meant a feast of jelly sandwiches, dry cereal, raisins, nuts, and oranges.

Now Kiniana is sprawled out on the bed, trying to sleep, or maybe crying. Jaideep, Vihaan, and Anna are out watching for the coast guard on my tiny balcony and Milo is methodically working his way through the minibar.

“D'you guys want any scotch?” he asks.

“We're all right, man. But…”

“What?”

“You maybe … you maybe want to slow down,” I tell him. “You're kind of drunk already.”

“Yesss, and I plan on getting fully, righteously drunk by the time I'm through.”

“I'll take a scotch,” Laurel says. She elbows me.

“Yeah, me, too … I guess,” I add.

Laurel rises and goes over to Milo.

He hands her two of the four tiny bottles of Dewars with broadly visible regret on his puffy, pinkish face.

Laurel comes back to me and she pretends to drink. Then she shoves the scotch down into the couch cushions. She's goofy. But her heart's in the right place. Me? I drink the Dewars.

Jaideep and the others come in from the balcony.

“No sign of the coast guard,” Jaideep shrugs. “I don't know what we are supposed to do.”

Milo shrugs. “There's no drill for ship overrun by zombie cokeheads.”

“You said the coast guard was coming,” Vihaan says, turning to me. “Which one?”

“What do you mean?”

“If it was the Mexican or Belizean Coast Guard, it should have arrived already,” he explains.

“I have no idea.”

“They should have been here already.”

I scratch my head.

“Couldn't you see Almstead sending all the way back to the States?” Laurel asks us. “Like, a pride thing. He'd want to be rescued by Americans?”

That would be exactly his style.

Vihaan nods, too. “I agree. If that is the case, it could be hours before they arrive. Have you noticed that we've changed course?” Vihaan asks Jaideep.

“Have we?” Jaideep asks.

Vihaan nods again.

“We're headed back to the States, I'm certain of it.”

“I feel powerless,” Jaideep says. “We should be doing something.”

“No,” Vihaan says. “This is the right thing to do. We need to think of ourselves now. Screw the passengers. We're staying safe.”

“I agree,” says Anna. “Nothing against the passengers, but this is a different kind of emergency. They are the threat to us, now. We need to stay here, together.”

Kiniana joins us from the other room, eyes red.

“I wish I were home,” she says.

“Me, too,” Laurel agrees.

“I haven't been home in four years,” Anna tells us.

“Four years?!” I exclaim. “They don't let you go home?”

“I'm saving so much money,” she tells us. “When I go, I'll be able to live off this money for a long time. My parents, too.”

“To home,” Milo says, raising a bottle of Absolut. Those of us with drinks clink them.

Milo rises unsteadily and begins to sing.

“Nkosi sikelel' iAfrika!”

In his drunken, wavering voice, he sings the South African national anthem.

Anna sings next, she rises and sings, tears streaming down her face:
“Bayang magiliw, Perlas ng Silanganan, Alab ng puso, Sa dibdib mo'y buhay.”

The language and the tune are so foreign-sounding. I've never heard anything like it in my life.

One by one, they stand and sing the anthems of their home countries.

It comes to Laurel and me.