Terminal Island

Chapter Five

Flying Fish



Once they had established a home base at the Formosa Hotel, Henry and his mother spent a few days enjoying the island. They had enough money to live on for a couple of weeks—the sum of their small savings and the severance check from her last short-lived secretarial job, from which she was let go for borrowing from petty cash. She would find another job, there was no rush.

In the meantime, they spent long, blissful days on the town beach, Henry snorkeling in the shallows while his mother lazed in the sun. Occasionally they got more adventurous and would trek the cliff-side road to Lover’s Cove, a stonepile of a beach south of Avalon that was famous for its undersea gardens. It was a spectacular spot, forever ice-cold from direct ocean currents, but teeming with colorful sea life and surrounded by lovely, spooky kelp groves. At regular intervals, glass-bottom tourist boats would pass close by, feeding chopped meat to the fish.

“Mom, why aren’t we rich?” Henry asked, drying off on the rocks.

“We are. There’s more to life than money.”

“Like what?”

“Like this. You and me here together. Don’t you know the best things in life are free?” Vicki stretched, languorously arching her body toward the sun like a movie star. In her bathing suit and big sunglasses she looked a lot younger than usual—Henry could see a couple of creepy old men checking her out. He wanted to go swimming but was afraid she’d start talking to them.

“But you always say there’s no free lunch. That you get what you pay for.”

“That’s different.”

“But how come rich people get to have everything? It’s not fair.”

“Nothing in life is fair. Being rich doesn’t guarantee happiness. It can be a curse.”

“How?”

“Well, when you’re born into something like that, it comes with a lot of responsibility—you live your life under the weight of it, and can never truly discover yourself, the real you. You have to be what they want you to be.”

She paused, so that Henry thought she was finished, but then she went on:

“You never find out who you are, or who you could have been—you’re just a custodian of this thing, this machine, that has no interest in you as an individual, but only in perpetuating itself. They keep telling you that you’re lucky, you’re blessed; that it’s your destiny and you should embrace it. But everything inside you says no—you never asked for this, you don’t want it. Even if you try to break away, the burden of that knowledge pollutes everything you try to do, making your deepest hopes seem trivial in comparison to this great gift that you are spurning.”

Her voice became haunted, her expression turning inward. Henry hated it when she got like that—he didn’t have a clue what she was going on about, and didn’t much care.

Dreamily, she continued, “Every day you struggle on your own is like you’re drowning, swimming against the current. And you tell yourself, ‘This is how most people live—get used to it.’ But it’s hard. It’s hard to let yourself drown as a matter of principle. Sacrificing yourself and your child rather than take the hand that is offered. Because that hand…”

She snapped herself out of it. “Anyway, you should count your blessings. Some people would give their right arm to be in a place like this.”

“All right, all right,” Henry said impatiently. “I get it.”

When the weather was cool, they explored the town or toured the various scenic attractions: the historic cliff mansions, the rugged inland wilderness, the sea life. Henry was especially interested in the nature tours, though most were disappointing. The glass-bottom boat was okay, but strictly for old ladies—Henry could see the same thing snorkeling, only better. The land tours were a big dud; they never saw a single bison or any other wild game.

The flying-fish excursion, though, was more worthwhile. It was a large open boat with a powerful spotlight that followed the dark coastline and picked out nocturnal points of interest. As its beam passed over the water, schools of glassy green flying-fish flitted across the surface like skipping stones, their trembling gossamer fins catching the light.

Shining the beam up at the cliffs revealed glowing pairs of eyes looking down at them—the eyes of wild goats, they were told. Spooky, his mother said.

The jocular tour guide announced, “Now we’ll be making a little surprise visit to Lover’s Cove, and maybe if we’re lucky you folks can see how it got its name.” The passengers tittered.

Arriving there, the boat crept up in darkness, the guide admonishing everyone to be quiet. Henry thought of the kelp jungle swaying in the darkness below them.

“Sometimes we catch ’em with their pants down,” the guide whispered into the mike. At the last moment he flicked on the searchlight, flooding the tiny beach with stark, stagy brightness.

Empty. The eager beam swept up and down the deserted shore, finding nothing to leer at. There was a sense of let-down—everybody had been looking forward to a glimpse of something naughty.

“Aw, I wanted to see some lovers,” Henry complained.

“Oh well,” his mother said sportingly.

The guide’s voice pricked up. “Wait a minute, folks, wait a minute.” The light was moving, scanning and focusing in on something above the shore. “Oh yeah. Here they come now!”

In the white circle of light, Henry could see a man and a woman walking along the cliff-side road from town. They were holding hands and shading their eyes from the glare, obviously confused.

“Oh yeah, here we go,” smirked the guide.

As the boat got closer and the beam homed in more intensely, the couple paused, trying to penetrate that light, then walked faster. It was no use—the powerful beam stayed trained on them.

“Oh no you don’t,” the guide said, like a fisherman playing a wily fish. “Where do you think you’re going?” The passengers giggled expectantly.

As the couple hurried, looking more and more upset, the boat effortlessly kept pace with them, keeping the blinding light in their faces. There was no escape; the exposed road offered little refuge. At the top of the beach stairs was a signboard that warned of the absence of life guards, and in desperation the couple ducked behind this plywood shield, trying to disappear.

“Oooh,” the guide crowed lasciviously. “Looks like they’re going at it!” The tourist mob cackled.

The couple sat tight, but the light didn’t budge from their meager shelter; all aboard patiently endured the suspense as the minutes dragged on.

“Don’t be shy now. Wow, they must really be makin’ whoopee,” the guide said.

Suddenly the pair bolted from hiding, running as fast as they could down the road. This caused an explosion of jeering laughter from the onlookers—“There they go! Get ’em, get ’em!”

The chase was on. With cruel persistence the boat continued to harry the couple as they fled, the tour guide making great hay of their obvious panic, hounding them to the last as they rounded the point and finally vanished behind a huge rock outcropping.

Awww—the fun was over. With a razzing cheer, the boat turned for home.