Sun-Kissed Secret Baby by Leigh Jenkins
Chapter 15
Allie could see the pier, on the far curve of the beach’s half-moon shape. In front of her, Sam and Daria walked side by side. She couldn’t tell if they were talking much, but their footsteps were in tandem.
She felt a confusing flood of emotions, many of which she couldn’t identify, but the prevailing one was an odd sense of relief. She’d done as she had promised herself, ripped off the Band-Aid, and now the wound was open, and all she could hope for was that it would knit well.
Just ahead, there was a commotion; a group of children gathered in a half-circle, and to Allie’s horror, they looked like they were beating up another kid. They hurried towards the melee, with Daria asking, “What’s that?”
“Come, see,” Sam said. He didn’t sound bothered.
As they drew up to the kids, Allie could see why. The victim wasn’t a person at all, but a homemade mannequin: a pair of ratty pants and a t-shirt stuffed with rags, topped with an old basketball for a head, and a straw hat. Its legs were stuffed into old boots, and it was tied securely to the spreading limbs of an almond tree. There was even a face crudely painted on. Next to the tree, a cigarette and a rum bottle were balanced atop an upturned bucket.
The kids were whaling on the mannequin like a piñata, using sticks and tree branches, even pelting it with small stones, all the while exclaiming gleefully whenever anyone got in a good blow.
Daria looked on with her mouth hanging open. Sam explained, “That’s a Good Friday Bobolee. You’ll see them all over the island every Good Friday.”
She wrinkled her face in puzzlement. “A ‘bobolee’?”
“An effigy. A stand-in for someone else. You remember the story of Judas? How he betrayed Christ?”
“Sure!”
He pointed at the poor defenseless mannequin, which was looking much worse for wear. “Well, that’s Judas. And today, we’re making him pay for his sins.”
“Is candy gonna spill out when they break him?”
“Nope. But I like the way you think.”
A grin crept across her face. “Can I try?”
“Sure.” Wordlessly, Sam held his hand out to one of the older kids and wiggled his fingers, and immediately a cricket bat was put in it. “Here, Mr. Sam.”
He nodded his thanks and placed it carefully into Daria’s hands, showing her the correct grip. “Flat side faces forward, okay?” Then he stood behind her, positioning her arms back so the bat was above her shoulder.
For a few brief seconds, Allie had a memory of teenage Sam, standing behind her at a steel band competition, holding her hands and showing her how to play the notes. That night, they’d run off under a sprawling, flowering Samaan tree, and kissed and kissed….
“Go for it!” Sam instructed, and Daria stepped forward, whacking the hell out of poor Judas as the other kids went nuts. When she was tired and panting, she handed the bat back to the other kid with a grin, looking up into her father’s face with a look of sheer accomplishment.
Sam threw Allie a relieved, delighted glance. Maybe she likes me, the look said. She gave him an encouraging smile.
They kept walking down to the pier, towards a large yacht that looked about 40 feet long, bobbing gently on the water. They clambered on board, both Allie and Daria declining Sam’s offer of a hand up, and he shrugged as if he had expected nothing less.
He passed around life jackets, cracked open a few sodas, and then it was time for the boat ride. Allie sat on the banquette at the back, looking on as Sam pointed out the instruments on the panel to Daria, who seemed utterly engrossed.
He looked up at her, his face a mixture of curiosity and concern. “You okay?”
“Great,” she reassured him, and promised herself that she really was, honest.
As the next couple of hours passed, she struggled with the increasing sensation that she was merely an onlooker, bearing witness to the meeting of a newly formed club to which she didn’t belong.
At noon, Sam and Daria carefully cracked one egg each into a glass of water, as Sam explained that if you did it at precisely midday on Good Friday and left it in the sun until three p.m. after the Lord’s Passion was complete, you could look into the water and see what was in store for you over the year to come.
And though Sam politely invited her, holding out an egg, she declined with a smile. “Hey, you guys go ahead. I’d like to be surprised by my future.”
“Your mom’s afraid of island magic,” Sam told Daria.
Daria looked at her questioningly. “Are you really?”
Allie was pleased by the slight warming of Daria’s attitude towards her; maybe their little tiff would be over soon. But still, she denied the charge. “I am not!”
Sam grinned. “She can say that, but she knows it works. Ten years ago, the last time she was here, she ate a cascadura fish. And you know what the native legend says about that?”
Daria waited, wide-eyed, for him to go on.
“If you eat a cascadura on the island, you’ll return within ten years and find your destiny.” He eyed her unwaveringly. “Do you remember that, Allie?”
She nodded. “I never forgot.” She also remembered the rest of that morning, when she’d stood on the beach crying as Sam had begged to be part of her life, turning his love away. So convinced that her future was bright and clear and perfect, and she didn’t need a relationship to weigh her down.
She could see in his eyes that he remembered that, too.
“So what’s your destiny, Mom?” Daria asked.
Sam’s eyes burned upon her, more searing than the rays of the midday sun overhead. “Who knows?” she managed weakly. “Maybe the destiny to be fulfilled on this trip was yours.”
Daria looked at Sam with frank delight and agreed with her. “Maybe it was.”
They rounded a cove, and much to Allie’s trepidation Sam briefly let Daria take the wheel. She was relieved as they came closer in and he took back control. They weighed anchor a few yards from the shore. “This is close as we can go in,” he informed them.
Daria leaned over the edge and looked into the water. “It’s so clear! I can see fish! And coral!”
“Yup. Want to go down there and meet them? I have snorkels.”
A tiny ripple of tension ran through Allie. The water was clear, but deep. Before she could say anything, Sam shot her an I-got-this look.
But any objections she might have made would have been worthless anyway because Daria was jumping up and down in excitement.
As he rummaged in a hidden cupboard under a banquette, pulling out packs of snorkels and swim fins, Sam said soberly, “I’ve got to warn you, though: have you noticed that not a lot of people were swimming today? Or fishing?”
“Yeah.”
“That’s because my people say you should never swim on Good Friday.”
She looked eager for the scoop. “Is it dangerous?”
Sam handed her a mask and snorkel, and held up a pair of fins, peering at the size printed on the sole. “Not exactly. But they do say that if you go swimming, you might turn into a fish—”
“A fish! Wow!” She pondered the wonderful prospect for a moment, and then decided to negotiate. “What if I only get half of me wet? Will I turn into half a fish?” Daria looked like that would be the best thing that could possibly happen.
Sam pretended to think about it. “That would make you a mermaid.”
“Cool!”
“And that would make you a member of Mama D’Leau’s court. Ever heard about her?”
Daria shook her head, all the while stripping off her clothes to reveal her swimsuit.
“Mama D’Leau is a very powerful mermaid queen. She followed the first slave ships all the way across the Atlantic Ocean from Africa, vowing to protect the waters wherever her people landed. And ever since, she’s been here, patrolling the Caribbean Sea, making trouble for anyone who doesn’t respect the water.”
“Making trouble how?”
Sam grinned, weaving his tale with admirable conviction. “She goes after poachers and polluters. People who overfish and destroy habitats. She makes their engines stall, fouls their propellers with seaweed, make their boats take on water, sets them adrift….” He lowered his lips to her ear. “If they’re really bad, she and her people lure them over the side of the boat and drag them under the waves….”
“Awesome.”
Sam gently lifted Daria’s thick curly hair out of the way, so the straps of the mask fit snugly. “And you wanna know the best thing about Mama D’Leau? Forget the Little Mermaid; she looks like me and you.”
Ready for the water, visibly delighted, Daria asked Allie, “Aren’t you putting on your snorkel?”
Father and daughter waited on an answer, but Allie was forced to admit: “I don’t think I can swim as well as you guys. That water looks… deep.”
“I’ve got you, Allie,” Sam gently said.
“Sam will help!” Daria wheedled. “He’ll hold you!”
I don’t know if I want Sam to hold me,Allie thought. “It’s good. I’m a pool baby, not a sea baby.”
Nodding, Sam and Daria sat on the edge of the boat and slid into the water with gentle splashes. She listened to their laughter and to the slap-slap of the gentle waves against the side of the boat.
They like each other, she thought in relief, although she shouldn’t have been surprised, given that she’d always known how alike they were. That was a good thing, right? She shrugged off—shoved away—a mild, treacherous murmur of jealousy. A feeling that her position at the center of Daria’s universe had shifted just a tiny bit.
Bad thought, Allie. Shame on you.
Her phone beeped, and she pulled it out of her purse, knowing before she looked who it would be. Ryan had been sending her stupid, funny memes, complaining that since it was a public holiday and he didn’t need to be in meetings all day, he was rattling around the resort, bored.
Wanna hang out sometime? he asked.
Sure, she texted back.
Because why not?