Terror on the Beach (19 page)

I was terrified and all of a sudden things were becoming fuzzy around the edges again.
I tried my best to keep it together, but as I watched, Elizabeth came out of the fuzz. It was like watching someone through a thick fog.

It was me but not me.
It was like stepping aside and watching yourself do things but being an observer and I had a sense I had done this before when I was much younger. It was a thought I couldn’t hang onto so I decided to try and relax as much as possible and observe.

The first thing I heard myself say, as Elizabeth was, “Where is that pilot?
I thought we might have some fun, the three of us.”

Bucky immediately perked up, “I thought you didn’t want to do it with him.”

“I can change my mind anytime I want to just like you. First we were going to Miami then we weren’t going to Miami. You better go get him before I change my mind again.”

“Hey Elizabeth, let’s all go down to the beach.”

“No,” I heard myself say. “You never want to save any of the best parts for later. We’re going to be on this island a long time. We have a lot of different experiences ahead of us. Bring him here, Bucky.”

Bucky ran and jumped off the front porch without using the steps.
I, as Elizabeth, took off my clothes and sat on the bed and began to play with myself. I must say it felt good. I didn’t remember ever touching myself and I came right away and heard Elizabeth say, “Wow, that was fast.”

I decided to see if I could integrate with Elizabeth and though
t if I moved toward her I could get inside her. Logically, I knew we were already the same person.

I remembered what Dr. Anna had said about people with MPD.
“Everyone has a lot of different sides to them. The healthier a person is the more they embrace all the parts. With an MPD, like you, the parts are too split off to embrace.”

Now I thought I got it.
A person with MPD had to do more than embrace all the parts. We had to integrate. I was frightened as I watched myself lay spread eagled on the bed waiting for the two men.

Soon after I became so scared, I was snap
ped back into my own, Sarah’s body and I didn’t know if I could do what was expected of me as Sarah. It was so much easier while I was observing.

I heard the two men come up on the porch talking in an exciting manner and I jumped off the bed and pulled on my terry bath
robe I had evidently brought from the psychiatric center. It said, WHITE SANDS on the lapel in gold embroidery.

It sounds crazy when I describe it but I needed to become the bad girl, Elizabeth.
When they entered the bedroom, I brazenly untied the robe and let it fall to the floor while giving them a smirk.

As soon as I did that, Elizabeth and I became one.
I had never been surer of anything before in my life. I knew from that moment on I could be a good person and still enjoy the body I was born with and worked so hard to keep in shape. But I didn’t want to have sex with someone I didn’t love.

In that moment, I felt healthier psychologically than I had ever felt in my entire
life but knew I had to do this thing in order to survive. It didn’t mean I was a bad person.

Now I really did understand.
I didn’t have to develop a bad personality to survive a bad thing that was happening to me or to enjoy the sex act with someone I loved.

I pretended to enjoy everything that was being done to me that night and I didn’t split off.
It was survival and only survival. I was very clear in my mind on this.

Toward morning we all fell asleep and I didn’t wake up until almost three in the afternoon.
I found a note on my pillow that said, “We went fishing, Elizabeth. Fresh fish for dinner tonight! It was signed, Bucky.

CHAPTER 39

I hoped they would be gone all day so I could plan how to get off this island.
I fixed myself toast and coffee and ate in peace. When I walked back into the bedroom things began to get fuzzy around the edges again and then I saw Beth through a fog, sitting on the bed.

As I watched, she put her face in her hands and started crying.
I walked over and embraced her, this wounded inner child of me. We cried together and I suddenly began to remember what had happened to us at age four and a half.

The memories came as clear as watching a movie.
I could see my daddy come home and go into my room, my mama screaming at him the whole time.

I could see Bucky standing in the corner of my room, not much older than me.
He looked scared like he didn’t know what to expect. I also saw the little mute boy standing next to him and knew that was the part of me that was responsible for keeping all these horrible family secrets quiet.

I motioned for him to come over and he
sat on the other side of me. I embraced him and told him we didn’t have to keep quiet anymore. Now I sat alone, knowing the two wounded children were a part of me, and watched the memories like I was watching a movie.

My daddy locked the door while my mama was screaming on the other side about how worthless I was and how I should have never been born.
Daddy walked toward me and told me to take them off. “You too, Bucky, I need to watch and I don’t have all night. He was unzipping his pants and as I watched my daddy entered me, the little girl, from behind while Bucky watched.

He couldn’t seem to achieve an
orgasm so he pulled out and told Bucky to spoon me and I realized that the word I had used as the little girl, Beth was spoon but she couldn’t pronounce it and so she said twoon.

The whole time Bucky spooned the little girl who was me, my daddy continued to play with him
-self and he eventually was able to come. I watched in horror as all of this was taking place and I now understood why Bucky had turned out the way he had. I finally understood everything and I knew I would now begin to heal.

After witnessing all this and getting my memory back, I fell asleep and slept the rest of the day.
Bucky came back at around seven and had fish which he proceeded to clean. I didn’t offer to help but let him fry the fish too. He made hush puppies and he looked like a little boy. I knew he was a monster but I also knew he had been wounded by my sick parents.

“Bucky, why did you come live with my family?”
I asked on impulse.

“Don’t you remember?
My parents died in that car crash.”

“How old were you?”

He stared off into space. “I was six,” he said. “I was lucky to be able to live with y’all. But your parent’s were sick people. You realize that, don’t you Elizabeth?”

“Yeah I do and that’s why you wanted for us to go off together and why you killed them.”

“Come on, we don’t have to think about all that right now. You want a salad or Cole slaw?”

“Cole slaw,” I said. “Do you want me to fix some cheese grits to go with this?”

“Nah, I think this is good enough.”

He dished up our food a
nd we ate in silence for awhile. “You know, Elizabeth, you wore me out last night. You wore ole Josh out too but I don’t think he liked sharing you. I think he wants you for himself.”

“
Well, I don’t want him. He was horrible in bed,” I said as a plan was forming in my mind.

Now that I didn’t have to live with the fear of another personality coming out and killing me, I had less stress and could think straighter.
I decided to make friends with the old man who lived in the house boat and had the short-wave radio.

Bucky got up early the next morning saying he was going to run on the beach.
It was amazing how contented he seemed to be. How long would it last? How long before he would need to hurt someone?

I rolled over in bed pretending to go back to sleep.
As soon as I knew he was gone, I jumped up and put on a pair of short shorts I had purchased the day before. They were light tan and I put on a dark green muscle shirt. I didn’t bother with shoes.

I walked along the beach as if I was just wandering around in case Bucky spotted me.
I wanted it to look like I just happened to end up at the old man’s house boat, so I purposely walked in the opposite direction.

I walked for miles and I was thinking about how much better I felt now that I didn’t have any missing time.
I stopped and talked to a dark lady with a baby. He was a fat little boy she said was six months old and he reached for me.

The lady told me her name was Rena and she was the wife of the witch doctor.
I walked on and before I realized it I had come to the house boat. I had walked all the way around the island.

The island was apparently smaller than I at first thought.
The old man was sitting on the deck of the house boat and I waved to him. He was so small I think I could have picked him up. He was not only short but he looked like skin stretched over bone.

He was chewing on something and the way his chin kept coming up against his nose, I realized he didn’t have any teeth.
When he saw me he motioned for me to come over.

I stepped off the dock onto his deck and he got up and gave me his hand.
It felt like a piece of leather and his skin looked the same. It was brown as a coffee bean. The only thing he had on was a pair of cut off jeans that looked like they had been washed thousands of times.

He picked up the thing he had laid on the deck when he offered me his hand and put it in his lap and started working on it again.

He was making a rope out of what looked like coconut pulp. “I’m pretty much self-sufficient here,” he said. “I make, catch, kill, or grow whatever I need. Clothes are the only problem. I haven’t figured a way to make clothes yet. This is my last pair of pants and as soon as they wear out I have to figure a way to get something else to wear.”

“What kind of clothes
do you want?” I asked without thinking.

He scratched his chin while he studied me, “I could wear your outfit.
It would fit me.”

I looked down at my clothes and laughed, “I just bought this outfit and I want to wear it awhile, but I think I can get you some clothes.”

“Why? So you can use my radio?”

I must have looked shocked.
He laughed again. “Why else would you be wasting your time with an old man like me, a pretty young thing like you? Are you here against your will?”

I didn’t
say anything but looked up and down the beach. He followed my lead and then nodded like he had made up his mind. “I can help you but I’m not putting my life in danger again. I helped one girl and almost lost my own life.

“There are some bad people on this island.
Most of us are hiding out. I like it here and I don’t bother anyone and they don’t bother me. I let them use my radio and they leave me alone.”

“Who are you?” I asked.

“Just call me Noah,” he said and I knew he must have a criminal record. I didn’t want to know.

“Oh, I get it.
You’re Noah and this is your Ark.”

“That’s it.
Now this is the way we will precede, but only after I have some clothes. This island is not on the map but I can give you the coordinates. I gave the last girl the coordinates too soon and her boyfriend found them. He killed her and I had to do some fast talking to keep him from killing me.

“He’s in jail now for life.
In fact you’re living in his house. They caught him in Miami so they still don’t know where this place is.”

He looked over my shoulder, “I believe your boyfriend’s coming.”

I turned around and saw Bucky and waved him over, trying to act like I had nothing to hide. When he got to the houseboat he ran down the dock and jumped onto the deck.

I made the introductions then said, “Bucky,
did you know Noah is almost one hundred percent self-sufficient? The only thing he can’t make is clothes. Do you have any you’re not wearing? I could alter them for him.”

He eyed me suspiciously.
“What’s he going to want in return?”

“He’s going to teach me to weave baskets and make ropes
and build traps, things like that,” I said making things up as I went and hoping Noah knew how to do all those things.

“This is my last pair of pants,” he told Bucky.
“I’ll be glad to teach y’all anything you want to know in return for something to wear. This will do me for now while it’s still summer but, even on this island it can get chilly at night in the middle of winter. I have a couple of blankets and I wear them sometimes but a nice coat would be nice.”

I knew he was trying to take advantage of me b
ut I didn’t care. I would give him everything I had just to escape.

Bucky glared at me and it took everything in me to appear to be unfazed by his anger, “I need all my stuff.
Besides, we don’t need to know how to do all that stuff.”

I shrugged like I
didn’t care one way or the other. “Screw it then,” I said.