Thirteen Pearls (23 page)

I raced back into Red's curtained-off cubicle with an armful of cushions. Outside there was a tearing sound as if sheets of roofing iron were peeling off the shed. I glanced up fearfully. The roof shook, but it was still intact. When I looked down again Aran was gone.

‘Aran!' I ran into the living room and kitchen. He wasn't there. Rain knifed through a gap in the sliding door. I wanted to vomit. ‘Leon! Kaito!' I screamed.

They both appeared with a corner of mattress in each hand.

‘Aran's outside!' A gale of wind caused the whole shed to shake, and the tin walls undulated. ‘He 's out there!'

Neither hesitated. They both ran to the door. ‘I'm coming too,' I shouted over the howling wind.

Leon pushed me back inside. ‘Stay here in case he comes back.'

It made sense, but I couldn't bring myself to huddle in Red's room. Instead, I fetched the sofa cushions and, making an armoury out of them, stared fixedly at the sliding glass door, willing Aran to return. He had seemed so terrified by the storm – what on earth could have made him go out there?

Another branch hit the door. I held my breath, waiting for it to shatter, but the wood bounced off and rolled to the ground. Stones, leaves and sticks pelted against the windows and walls, making a hideous racket. As the tin lifted and groaned, I huddled deeper into the cushions, worried that a sheet could rip off and guillotine me. But worse – far worse – was the knowledge that Leon and Kaito and Aran were all out there and I was waiting here, safe, and unable to help.

What if the wind blew them into the ocean, or if a snapped-off branch bludgeoned them to death?

It felt like hours had passed before a dark shape appeared at the smeary sliding door. I rushed over to scrape the door back.

Kaito staggered inside, holding the side of his head. Blood seeped between his fingers.

‘Kaito! Are you all right? What happened?'

Kaito gave no response, only stumbled further into the shed and collapsed onto the cushions. I stared, trying to remember my first-aid course. Then I raced into the kitchen and grabbed a clean tea towel to hold against the gash.

I found myself gabbling, asking Kaito about life in Japan, treating him to a step-by-step rendition on how I built my boat. Anything to keep his eyes open and focused on me. But the whole while I was acutely aware that Leon and Aran were still out there. The island was so tiny. Surely if Leon had found Aran they would be back by now? What was stopping him?
Them?
Aran was so little and light. What if he had been blown into the sea?

An eerie roar made me rush to the sliding door. A surge of water trammelled towards the shed and slapped against the glass at ankle height. The next wave was bigger. A steaming froth of water pushed against the shed so that the iron bulged inward for a single awful moment before there came the hideous suck of a wave receding.

I raced to Kaito and, grabbing his arm, half-carried, half-dragged him into Red's bedroom to sit on the iron-framed bed.

Another wave slammed against the door. I shuddered. This time a thin slick of water seeped across the floor. Then another wave battered the shed. Thirteen Pearls was flat as a pancake. If the waves were coming this far, then they were sweeping across the entire island and I knew, without a doubt, that Aran and Leon were dead.

B
Y THE TIME THE WIND
died to something more like a regular storm, it was almost dark. I clutched Kaito. We had survived. We were alive. The tide had receded and with it the terrible waves that had threatened to wash away the shed. But I felt no sense of celebration, only a stark, surreal horror. Three days ago we'd been sitting around eating seafood and reading out lame jokes from bonbons. Now the island was ruined, half-drowned, and the ravages of saltwater would ensure nothing could grow here for a very long time.

I thought briefly about our fledgling vegetable garden and that's when the tears finally came.

The floor was awash. Putting my shoulder against the sliding door, I used all my remaining strength to push it open. It was half off its tracks and buckled from the onslaught of waves. But it had held. It had held!

Outside was a scene of devastation. Clumps of sticks and seaweed littered the non-existent garden. The outdoor furniture had washed away. Numbly, I shuffled around behind the home-shed. The mango tree was still standing; the tree house was still intact.

And there was a sound coming from inside it. A whimper. A rush of love and thanks filled me as I practically leaped up the tree. Aran was huddled around his soaked elephant. And, curled around him, was Leon's still body.

The relief I had felt was just as swiftly consumed by horror. Leon's body was clammy and cold. I gingerly felt the base of his neck.

There was the faintest throb.

I started to scream for Kaito, screamed like a crazy banshee woman.

He staggered out to beneath the tree, still clutching his head.

‘Help me! Help me get Leon inside!'

Together, somehow, we carried Leon down from the tree and into the home–shed where we laid him on Red's mattress.

I rolled Leon into the recovery position, checked his airway and then gingerly felt along his head for injuries.

It was twenty long minutes before Leon groaned and slowly opened his eyes. I had been sitting beside him the entire time, holding his hand and listening anxiously for his breathing.

‘W—'

I shook my head and shushed him. ‘Don't try and talk. We're all okay. Aran's here and so am I and so is Kaito. We're all okay.' And I said it again, like a mantra, ‘We 're all okay,' because it was the most wonderful thing I had ever said in my whole life. And then I sank my head against his shoulder and sobbed.

Thirteen Pearls was ruined. The oysters had been smashed to smithereens and only a masochist would try and start up again. When Uncle Red arrived, I thought he would cry. We 'd done the best we could: clearing up piles of debris and pop-riveting loose shed panels back together, but nothing we could have done would ever have been enough.

I was a mess, alternating between relief that we 'd all survived and anxiousness about what would happen next. Obviously I'd have to go home; there was no work to be done on the island apart from helping him to salvage anything that we could. And it seemed a low act to ask for money from someone who'd just had his livelihood decimated by a cyclone. I wondered if he had any savings; if I could at least ask for a partial payment. I disappointed myself with my pettiness.

You'd think a cyclone would make me never want to go near the sea again, but actually those pounding waves had had a curious effect on me. I wanted to live more intensely, with more raw, undiluted life-greed than ever before.

It turned out that Uncle Red wasn't as devastated as I thought he would be. On my final night, he confessed to us all (after downing five stubbies) that he had actually been to Darwin to see Lowanna. They'd arranged to meet there because she 'd refused to come to Thirteen Pearls after she 'd flown back to Australia; she 'd hated every lonely, domestic-slavery moment of it. There was a chance of reconciliation, but it would be on her terms. She wanted him to come and live in Darwin with her and Aran.

I felt more relief. It was good news for Aran, and there was good news for me too, because Uncle Red had been insured. He did try to short-change me (just as Mum had predicted) by offering me two thousand dollars, but I stuck to my guns and in the end he upped it to three thousand. A grand short of what I'd been promised and what I needed, but there was always Mr Halabi and tahini-stinking Kevin.

On my last night, before I was getting a lift to Horn Island, Aran was especially affectionate. His hot little body wiggled in beside me sometime during the night. Through a sleep haze, I'd dimly thought,
Damn, I forgot to make him wear a
nappy . . .

But the next morning, my sheets were dry. He hadn't wet. On the way across in the tinny he 'd clung to my hand, clutching his elephant with the other. And when we said goodbye at the airport he started to cry. In seconds, I was bawling too. Uncle Red had to prise him off me. Not one for sentiment, he started to march away well before the plane was due to leave. Aran kicked and struggled and reached for me, howling the same words over and over. ‘Pom rak kun! Pom rak kun!'

I watched as they walked away, a big knifing ache in my heart, tears streaming down my cheeks and dripping off my nose. I'd left three pages of instructions with Leon and Kaito because they were staying an extra couple of weeks to help fix as much of the damage as they could. My list ranged from:
Aran needs to wee just before he goes to sleep (his favourite place is
the hibiscus)
right through to,
He's only allowed to kill twenty bad
guys a day before he has to play in his tree house or do something
active outside
.

Saying goodbye to Leon and Kaito had felt like losing two of my best friends. It's not like we'd spent a lifetime together, but Thirteen Pearls was another world – it made every interaction intense. Life on a tiny island was so circular, so . . . intimate.

After Uncle Red and Aran left the airport, I was surprised to see a familiar face. ‘Uncle Bill! What are you doing here?'

The old islander rose off the bench with rickety knees. ‘Little bird told me you were leaving and I wanted to say goodbye.'

Fresh tears welled in my eyes. Who would have guessed how a month in the Torres Strait could have changed me? I was turning into such a sook.

Uncle Bill shyly reached behind his back and revealed a parcel wrapped in Mr Men gift wrap. ‘For you.'

‘Thank you. Can I open it now?'

He shook his head, clearly embarrassed. ‘Not now. Open it later. Just wanted to say, me and Sally, that we hope you come back to T.I. one day.'

I gave him a fierce hug. ‘I will,' I said. ‘I promise.' One thing for sure though, I wasn't going to be flying – I'd be sailing the
Ulysses
.

On the plane, I opened the parcel. The gift slipped from the paper into my lap. It was the beautiful oyster shell I'd seen at Uncle Bill's that first day I'd arrived on Thursday Island. Five exquisite teardrop pearls gleamed lustrously inside it.

Tash and I mooched along the Esplanade. She was evading Swedish-stalker Sven, who'd somehow managed to wangle an extension on his working visa, and I was generally feeling cross about still being months off-schedule on the
Ulysses
.

It was three months since I'd been on Thirteen Pearls and Tash had managed to score me a weekend job in the deli section of the IGA. I resented having to stick my hands up chickens' bums, but I closed my eyes and dreamt of the open sea.

When I'd returned to Cairns I'd googled
Pom rak kun
and discovered it was Thai for –
I love you
. But any thoughts about returning to look after Aran had been wiped out with the news that Red and Lowanna were happily (or unhappily) ensconced in Darwin and had taken over management of a pub.