8. Salvage
Salvage
Victoria
“We have water—we’re making progress,” Knox announced once we returned to the beach. “We didn’t secure food as planned, but it’s not the end of the world.”
He was about to continue his pep talk when Josh raised his hand, interrupting him. “Yes, Josh?” he answered with a sigh.
“How long can we survive without food?”
“Good question. Would you like to answer, Discovery Channel?”
“Answer yourself, Boy Scout,” I huffed, folding my arms over my chest.
He’s not the only one whose blood sugar is running a little low, especially after a six-hour hike.
“Fair enough. Conservatively, about three weeks,” Knox answered.
“We’re fucked.”
I glanced down at my toes that sank in the warm sand and caught movement out of my peripheral vision.
It was a hermit crab moseying along the sand without a care in the world.
We could eat them, but we’d have to find and consume a fuckload to make a dent in the calorie intake needed for three people to survive on an island.
I bent down to pick it up and examined it.
“What do you have there, Victoria?” Knox asked.
“It’s a hermit crab. Where there’s one, there’s more.”
“Thank God. I’m starving,” Josh said, reaching out for the crab. I gave him my meanest stank face and pulled the crab out of his reach. “What do you think you’re doing?”
“Being a selfish prick. That’s what he was doing,” Knox growled, frowning in disappointment.
“That’s what I’m saying. Your greedy tail was about to be hunched over with the shits. You can’t eat these raw. They have to be cooked, meaning we need more supplies so we can build a fire.”
“Okay. You and Knox can return to the wreckage, and I’ll stay behind and gather hermit crabs,” Josh suggested.
“No. You’re going with me—”
“Knox, it’s fine.”
“It’s safer for you on the beach,” he insisted.
I waved him off. “We work better together, and the last thing we need is you stroking out in the ocean because he got on your nerves, and Josh can get in less trouble if he’s on hermit crab duty,” I reasoned.
Knox nodded resolutely and retrieved our life vests.
“What’s the matter?” I asked, accepting the orange reflective vest that could be seen from space.
“Nothing,” he mumbled, glancing at Josh, who walked the expansive beach on the hunt for crabs.
Something.
“Is it Josh?”
“It is. My gut is telling me not to leave him alone. He reminds me of a toddler, and it makes me wonder if his father bought his pilot’s license.”
I sighed and clipped myself into the flotation device. “At this point, it wouldn’t surprise me, but honestly, I think you’re overthinking as usual.”
“Maybe,” he responded skeptically. “Let’s head out. We only have a few more hours of daylight. We need to grab as many items from the wreckage as possible, but let’s not overdo it. Only grab items that’ll be practical.”
“Aye, aye, Captain,” I responded with a lazy salute, forcing a grin from him.
“Always with the smart mouth.”
“You say that as if your toxic ass doesn’t love it,” I teased, helping Knox push the raft past the shore into the shallow end of the ocean.
“You say that as if you’re not equally toxic.”
“I’m not toxic,” I argued, accepting his outstretched hand. “I’m reactionary. There’s a difference.” I climbed into the raft and waited for him to join me.
“You’re toxic because of how you react,” he remarked, pushing us away from shore.
“And you just be doing shit, Knox. Real talk? You’re talking shit about Josh and how he got his pilot’s license, and I wonder how you’re the CEO and owner of a billion-dollar company. Seriously, Knox, you could’ve flown to Miami and stalked me on my vacation instead of doing the absolute most.”
“Huh…I didn’t think of that,” he murmured as he rowed us to sea.
I rolled my eyes.
Of course, he didn’t.
“How mad would you have been if I crashed your little girls’ trip?”
I shrugged. “I wouldn’t be stuck-on-a-remote-island-for-the-rest-of-my-life mad. However, I would’ve used you as a personal ATM for the duration of my trip.”
“I expected nothing less from Tori Montana.”
* * *
Sweat dripped in my eyes as I cut through the thick fabric of the seatbelt from the seat I’d occupied earlier.
I had no idea what we’d do with seatbelts, but I figured it could come in handy.
If I had to guess, we’d been at the crash site for over two hours.
So far, the raft was filled with items from the galley, including an assortment of sodas, a bottle of champagne and bourbon, bottled water, a stainless steel pitcher, some silverware, including a steak knife, the ice drawer, some ready-made meals that wouldn’t last more than three days, and liquid antibacterial soap.
Knox found a couple of pillows, blankets, soaked toilet paper rolls that would have to be dried out, matches, and the body wash and shampoo dispenser from the shower.
“Victoria! Look what I found!” Knox announced after breaching the water’s surface. He swiped his dark hair out of his face and cleared the seawater from his eyes. I snarled when he held up my work tablet in the air.
“That’s great, Knox. Take it and shove it up your ass!”
“It still works! Good thing I sprung for that waterproof case, huh?”
This isn’t all bad. I might have a night or two of entertainment. We won’t have WIFI, but I did download a few movies from Netflix onto my tablet a few days ago.
“That’s great news. Did you find anything else?” I asked, tossing a belt into the burgeoning raft.
“There’s a lot of debris on the reef, but I haven’t found anything that would be of immediate use to us. Have you found anything we could use for fishing?”
“Nope. If we were on a commercial flight, there would be netting on the back of the seats that we could utilize. I’ll keep looking.”
He shook his head. “Let’s call it and head back. We can try again tomorrow morning. We’ve been out here long enough and have some food that’ll last us a few days.”
“Sounds good. I don’t know about you, but I vote we wait until tomorrow to build a shelter. We’ve expended enough energy today.”
“Agreed,” Knox responded tiredly. I threw the scissors into the raft before slipping into the water.
“I’ll pull first,” I volunteered, grabbing the rope on the front of the raft.
I know one thing for certain: I’ll be in the best shape of my life in a month.
My mind replayed the day’s events, from discovering that That Man Over There canceled my flight to swimming to shore with our salvaged loot.
I have yet to accept that this is my reality—that I’m destined to live out the remainder of my life away from civilization.
It’s only Day One, and surviving in these conditions with minimal supplies and random facts I’ve memorized from the Discovery Channel for a week will be a major feat.
I want to hate Knox for what he did, but I know guilt is eating away at him.
I can see the pain in his dark eyes that begs me for my forgiveness.
I may not 100% forgive him by tomorrow, but the way I see it, the pent-up anger and animosity will weigh me down like an anchor dropped to the ocean floor.
Instead, I’m choosing acceptance and peace.
Knox
“Ain’t this ‘bout a bitch!” Victoria expressed, punching a fist into her open palm.
“You owe me fifty bucks.”
“What the hell do you want me to pay you in? Seashells? I can’t fucking believe this,” she complained, kicking at the sand.
Josh was…dead.
“This is your fault, Victoria. I told you he shouldn’t have been left alone.”
“I’m sorry. I didn’t think we’d have to babysit a grown-ass man. All he had to do was wait two hours, and he could’ve had one of these Fancy Feast dinners.”
I snorted. “The meals are better than cat food.”
“Says you.”
I stared down at Josh, who had turned blue in the face and lips from eating the berries Victoria had specifically warned him to stay away from.
Note to self…always listen to her.
I glanced up when I heard Victoria sniffling. “Are you crying?”
“It’s just—” she hiccuped, “he went out like Seneca Crane in The Hunger Games . I liked Seneca—he had a redemption arc.”
“I don’t know what the fuck you’re talking about.”
“Of course you don’t,” she said, breath shuddering. “I was a child when SAW came out, and you were in the workforce.”
I sighed and shook my head. “What are we going to do with him?”
“Eat him, duh,” she said through her tears.
“What the—”
“I’m joking. It’s not a joking matter, but a little dark humor never hurt anybody. Um…we should send him out to sea with a little homegoing ceremony. We’ll have one of those luxury Banquet meals you love so much at the repast. I call dibs on the bourbon.”
“Now, wait one damn minute,” I said, climbing to my feet. “You don’t even enjoy bourbon—I should have it.”
“Who says I don’t enjoy it?” she asked, wiping a tear away from the inside corner of her eye with her shirt.
“You make this godawful face every time you drink it.”
“So now I’m ugly?” she questioned with a raised brow. In a matter of seconds, all sorrow had dripped out of her tone and was replaced with the venom I lived for.
“Yes,” I said, blocking my abdomen with my arms. She smirked.
“Pussy.” I lowered my arms and flinched when she made a sudden move. “Two for flinching,” she said, punching me in my arm twice.
“You shouldn’t beat on the elderly.”
I chuckled when Victoria rolled her eyes. “I love how you’re elderly when it’s convenient for you. But let me call you elderly, and you’re sliding down the walls.”
“It’s no different than when you play your Black Card.”
She opened her mouth to protest and stopped herself. “You know what? Fair.”
“Do you remember that one evening I was craving fried chicken? I asked if you wanted some for dinner, and you went off on me.”
“I said fair. You don’t have to take a stroll down memory lane.”
“No, I have to get this off my chest. You need to know how devastated I was. We had to order pizza instead. That next evening, I binged on an 8-piece family meal while watching My 600-Pound Life .”
“Yeah, that tracks. I do the same thing when I know I’m about to throw down and don’t want to feel guilty. I tell myself, ‘Well, at least I can wipe my own ass.’ I get pretty emotional when they meet their goals, though. I be rooting for them.”
“Likewise. But enough about that—we need to take care of Josh properly.”
“I don’t want to be that person, but you and Josh are about the same height, and you only have the clothes on your back. You might want to consider taking his clothes.”
“I can’t do that,” I said uneasily.
“Bet,” she replied. She crouched down and began to undress him.
“What are you doing?”
“If you don’t want the clothes, then I’ll take them.” Seconds later, Josh was left in only his boxers.
“Why stop now? You might as well take the boxers, too,” I remarked.
“Man, if you’re gay, just say that.”
“I can assure you, I’m not.”
“I didn’t ask for your reassurance. We should get some flowers. You should be good at doing that since you’re—”
“Let’s remain focused, Ms. Caldwell.”
Victoria snapped her head back and glared at me skeptically. “Okay, Mr. Ramsey,” she replied, exaggerating the syllables.
“Let’s take care of the young man and give him a proper sendoff. Grab his arms, and I’ll grab his legs.”
* * *
“Dearly beloved—”
“Knox McKinney Ramsey.”
“That’s not my middle name.”
“Dearly beloved is used for weddings, not funerals,” Victoria reminded me.
“Thank you. Where would I be without you?”
“In the Underworld where you belong.”
“I’m the one who saved you from drowning in the wreck.”
“I didn’t ask for that. You could’ve let me go on to Glory peacefully.”
“Yeah, right,” I huffed.
“I do have a question. How did you manage to survive the crash unscathed?”
I snorted. “That is not the case. My back is screaming louder than you when you discovered someone drank the last of your coffee creamer.”
Victoria sucked in a breath. “Listen, I was already having a shitty morning, and I was looking forward to my morning coffee. You needed to send out a memorandum about respecting co-workers’ property.
Not only was my name written on the bottle in permanent marker, but the asshole returned the empty bottle to the fridge. Who does that?”
“It was me. I did it,” I confessed, avoiding her heated gaze that routinely made my blood simmer and my dick swell.
“Don’t get killed on this island. It’s just me and you. I’ll send you off just like Josh.”
No, you won’t. You’ll miss me too much.
“Noted. Let’s get started. There isn’t much I can say about Co-pilot Josh.
He was a pilot, and he occasionally provided comedic relief.
Unfortunately, his life was cut short before we could witness his full potential.
I’m certain he’ll be missed by his loved ones.
Amen.” I turned to Victoria, who was clutching a hibiscus bouquet in her hands. “It’s your turn.”
“Josh Jayden McClure—”
“Is that his full name?”
Victoria shrugged, her shoulders meeting her ears. “No, but it’s better than Co-pilot Josh.”
“I beg to differ.”
“Overruled. Josh Jayden McClure, I am saddened by your unexpected yet avoidable departure from this world.”
What a lovely and subtle way of saying I told you so.
“I hope you didn’t suffer and that you find peace in the next life. Ashes to ashes, dust to dust. Amen.”
“Amen.”
A few minutes later, Josh was floating away with the tide.
“What are you doing?”
“Pouring one out for the homie,” Victoria said, pouring some champagne into the water before taking a swig. I followed suit and poured a shot of bourbon into the ocean.
“Rest easy, homie,” I said.
Victoria snorted and sprayed champagne from her mouth. She laughed and wiped her mouth dry with the back of her hand. “Don’t ever say that shit again.”
“Don’t worry. I won’t. It didn’t feel right when I said it.”
“Good,” she responded when the giggles ceased.
“I have a proposal.”
“Let’s hear it, Knox.”
“I propose we eat, drink excessively, and fool around. I feel vulnerable and need to be comforted after sending off my best island friend.”
I swallowed roughly in anticipation of rejection when Victoria stared at me for what felt like an eternity. “Okay.”
“Okay?”
“Okay…I’m feeling a little vulnerable, too.”