Chapter 15 #2
“That’s an excellent idea,” Arthur says. “Stella’s an artist, apparently. Maybe she can help you get some good shots for the photobook.”
I shoot Arthur the weakest smile in history as Joanna leads us down the dock. So much for staying away from Caleb. This is fine, I tell myself. Totally, totally…
“I thought we were going to stay away from each other,” I hiss quietly as Caleb’s measured steps fall in line beside me.
“A bit difficult on a ship, love,” he says under his breath.
“A ship that you could have stayed on,” I say.
“If you’ve got a problem with it, by all means, take it up with Patricia. I’m sure she’d love to hear why.”
Jules must hear him, because she darts a questioning look over her shoulder. I throw my head back and fake a laugh to throw her off. At least, it was supposed to be a laugh. It comes out like a horse’s whinny.
“What the hell was that?” he asks when she looks away.
“I’m trying to cover for us.”
“Ya, well, you’re not doing a very good job. You sound like a dying cat.”
I glare at him.
“Welcome to Narara island!” Joanna waves her arms out to emphasize the little paradise in front of us. “I have to say, I was surprised when Chris and I got the call this morning from your captain. It’s not too often we get visitors from the yachting community.”
“I can’t imagine why,” Matthew whispers, and Harry elbows him again in the arm. He’s got to have a bruise there by now.
“This is a very special project that wouldn’t be possible without the blessing of the people that have called the island home for hundreds of years,” Joanna continues, even though I’m sure she heard them.
“I know it’s not easy to see through the jungle, but if you look towards the foot of those hills, you might catch a glimpse of some of their homes. ”
Joanna gestures to the north, where a few wooden structures can be seen through the thick palm groves.
I watch in delight as Patricia weighs whether or not to remove her gold loafers as we reach the bottom of the beach.
For all I know, she’s hiding hooves under there.
She elects to leave them on, and she steps across the sand like a cat in booties, completely out of her element.
I can’t help but wonder when her feet last touched an unpaved surface.
We follow Joanna up the beach to the research station: a simple white building with a corrugated metal roof and garage-style entry. Inside the building, a man in his late fifties with sandy-blonde hair stands before several tables stacked with plastic tubs and small concrete cones, welcoming us in.
“This is Chris Crawford,” Joanna introduces him “He’s a marine biologist from San Diego. He started his research in Fiji fourteen years ago, and he brought me on board a few years back to help him get the coral restoration project up and running.”
“Research is a strong word,” Chris jokes. “I came for the surf and stayed for the reefs. I never thought I’d fall so head over heels for the islands.”
Joanna walks us over to some of the plastic bins, where chunks of colorful coral are resting in salt water.
“Our mission at FMCC is to help revive reefs that are under stress due to human impact,” she says. “Coral reefs are the backbone of the marine ecosystem, and in the last decade, up to 50% of shallow water reefs have disappeared.”
“Is that why we’re all wearing reef-safe sunscreen?” Steven asks.
“It’s true that chemical sunscreen can damage the ecosystem,” Joanna says. “So can fertilizer and pesticide runoff from farms, overfishing, and warming waters due to climate change.
“We work with the local residents to plant the coral—it’s our mission to get the community as involved as possible in our conservation efforts.
This way, our impact is full circle: the coral improves the health of the reef and marine life, which not only keeps the fishing boats that feed these villages full, but encourages safe and sustainable tourism that circles back to fund the programs. We love having visitors because it allows us to share our mission to restore a healthy ecosystem with people from around the world. ”
“So… how does it work?” Harry asks.
Joanna chooses a purple coral head from the plastic tank that fits in the palm of her hand and we watch as she uses a large pair of clippers to chop off a piece.
“We remove some of the coral from our beds to repropagate, much like you might with a plant or succulent, and attach the fingerlings to disks like these,” she says, holding up a concrete cone, “So they can be replanted on our artificial beds. We have up to a hundred full beds in our nursery at any time.”
She points to a flat of mesh about five feet wide that rests against the wall.
“You’re creating an artificial reef?” asks Jules.
“There’s nothing artificial about this coral! But no—when the fingers grow large enough, we return them to damaged areas of the existing reef for replanting.”
She sets down the coral in her hand and reaches for a dead piece of coral about the size of a microwave.
“In just a year, those tiny pieces can grow larger than this!”
She passes around the small piece so we all have a chance to see before placing it back in the plastic tub.
“Is it all the same type of coral?” asks Matthew. I have to do a double take to make sure it’s him. Is Matthew actually engaging with something other than his cellphone?
“We have over sixteen different varietals of coral in the nursery—enough to make up a rugby team!”
I look across the room and catch sight of Caleb, who’s standing behind Arthur with his go-pro at the ready. Even though he should be looking at the coral, I can see that his eyes are stuck on me. Do I have something on my nose? Some sunscreen I forgot to rub in?
“OK,” Joanna says proudly, “Enough time in the classroom. Let’s get out and see this coral at work!”
The group files out of the lab back towards the beach, but Jules lags behind. Now’s my chance. I grab her by the arm and pull her back through the door before anyone can see.
“Jules—” I start, but she shakes her head.
“No. Me first.”
I drop my hand, preparing myself for a verbal beating.
“You were right last night, Stell. I should have said something about the whale—about all of it. I’ve been trying so hard to make this work that I’m not being myself.”
I sigh out a breath of relief. I’m glad I’m not the only one trying to apologize.
“But mostly, I need you to know that I didn’t mean what I said about regretting bringing you here.”
She chokes up a little, and I wrap her in the tightest hug I can manage. She lets out an audible breath.
“I know,” I assure her. “And I know how important Harry is to you, and how hard you’re trying. The last thing I want to do is make things more difficult.”
“Harry is my family Stella,” she tucks her head under mine. “But so are you. And I need you both.”
I smile. I don’t remember the last time we just stood together like this, and it feels good. I didn’t realize how much I’d missed her.
“Girls,” Harry pops his head back in, stammering when he sees Jules wiping a tear from her cheek.
“Sorry—is everything ok?”
“Everything’s perfect,” she sighs. “I’m just so moved. By… the coral.”
Harry smiles, wrapping an arm around her shoulder as he steers us towards the door.
“That’s one of the many things I love about your sister, Stella. She sees so much beauty in everything. But we’ve gotta hustle! They’re waiting on you!”
With Joanna in the lead, we grab our snorkel masks and trek past the outskirts of the village to a set of blue pangas tied up off the shore.
Steven walks close to me, his stride awkward as he attempts to keep sand out of his shoes.
I feel a huge weight off my chest knowing Jules isn’t still furious with me, but somehow I still feel tense.
And if I had to guess, it probably has something to do with the uniformed man walking a few yards ahead.
When I was in college, Marianne told me that the best way not to catch feelings was to snap a rubber band against your wrist every time you thought of someone off limits.
But all I have is a hair tie, and even though my wrist is red from it, I can’t seem to shake the memory of the elevator from my thoughts.
Caleb looks back at me, catching me in my shameless stare, and I grab Steven around the ribs instinctively, pulling him so quickly that he nearly trips.
Only it’s not Caleb, but Matthew, who seems to notice.
He purses his lips at me as he passes us, one step short of actually sticking his nose in the air.
Probably disgusted with Steven for even touching someone like me—a member of the working class.
Several tan dogs with wagging tongues come out to follow us as we load ourselves into the boat, all of us armed with a bucket of coral implants from the lab.
I never thought I’d see Matthew doing manual labor, but even he doesn’t complain as we haul our buckets across the hot sand.
One of the lab techs brings two beach chairs for Arthur and Patricia to wait on shore.
“I’ll wait with you,” Caleb offers them as we load into the boat, but I can tell he’s uneasy about something by the way his voice wavers.
“And miss filming this? No chance,” Arthur replies. “Patricia and I will be just fine on our own.”
“Alright,” Joanna rubs her hands together in anticipation. “Who’s ready to plant some coral?”
We leave them on the beach and jet out over the reef, my knee uncomfortably close to Caleb’s as the panga bounces across the break.
Joanna kills the engine as the sea becomes teal blue, indicating shallow waters.
She dons her scuba equipment and helps us put on our snorkels and fins.
Once we all have our gear on, Joanna leads us down to the garden to show us the beds below.
Duplicates of the wire frames we saw in the lab are laid out along the bare ocean floor, some empty, some covered in a rainbow of large corals that have been previously planted.
She shows us how to attach each cone to the wire and we all work together until an entire flat is covered with new seedlings.
Then, Joanna takes us out a bit further to show us the reef they’re restoring with the gardened coral.
“It’ll take a few days for it to attach,” she tells us when we’re back on the boat, breathless from holding our air for so long. “But this reef is already coming back from the brink of death.”
She’s not wrong—even though part of the reef is covered in dull grey, broken coral, fish are already gathering in areas where the new coral has been planted.
“If we continue down the path we are on, 90% of coral reefs will be gone by 2050. But if we can expand our work here to new reefs and continue to raise awareness, there’s a good chance we’ll be able to change that.
In the Great Barrier Reef, for example, offshore beds like ours have helped regenerate coral that was previously thought to be beyond saving. ”
“So… what can we do to help?” Matthew asks, and Caleb and I share a look without thinking. “As fun as this is, it’s not like the average person can jet out to Fiji to plant coral every winter.”
“That’s a good question,” Joanna answers.
“For starters, you can cut back on eating meat and conventionally grown foods. The fertilizers and antibiotics used in mass-produced food sources are one of the largest contributors to ocean toxicity. You can support organizations like ours, which exist all over the world. Most importantly, you can spread awareness about the commercial fishing practices that are destroying reefs around the world.”
Matthew grabs his brother’s arm and whispers something to him, but it doesn’t look like he’s complaining.
For a moment, I let myself dream of a world where people like the Warrens, with the means and clout they have to make a difference, really started to care about efforts like these.
What could be accomplished if men like Matthew, with seemingly unlimited resources, put his energy towards improving the planet rather than getting sloshed in embarrassingly luxurious locales?
We arrive back to the beach to a familiar sight: Arthur fast asleep in his chair, head lolled back and snoring so loudly that he may as well be an erupting volcano. But there’s one thing missing.
“Where’s Mom?” Matthew asks, looking to Patricia’s empty beach chair. Harry shakes his dad, and he awakens with a violent snort.
“Dad, where’s Mom?”
“She’s right—“ Arthur looks around and realizes he has no idea. “That’s funny, I could have sworn she was right here…”
“Well it’s not as if she’d go for a swim,” Harry looks up and down the beach. ”I haven’t seen here in the water since 2009.”
“Do you think she might be hurt?” Arthur jolts out of his chair, genuinely concerned.
“I’m sure she hasn’t gone far, Arthur. She probably just went to find a bathroom,” Jules puts a comforting hand on his arm.
“We should walk back to the lab and see if she’s with Chris,” Joanna tells us.
Harry nods.
“Jules and I will head up the beach to see if she’s wandered north,” Harry offers. “She used to have a habit of collecting sea shells.”
“Is a rogue tidal wave too much to hope for?” Matthew jokes. His brother glares at him—quite a surprising expression on someone who doesn’t so much as swear.
“Hilarious, Matthew.”
“I’ll walk up the riverbed and see if she’s gone to the village,” I offer. “Steven, will you come with?”
Steven raises a single dark eyebrow at me, giving him the overall look of a reluctant showpony.
“In these?” he protests, pointing down at his suede loafers. “I didn’t exactly dress for a jungle hike.”
I roll my eyes.
“I’ll go,” Caleb says sternly. I open my mouth to protest, but when I look down at the collective footwear of the group—a pair of Sperrys, two sets of loafers, and some leopard calf-hair sandals that are better suited for Bushwick than bushwhacking, I realize that I don’t have much of a choice.
But somehow, Caleb and I alone in a hot, steamy jungle together seems somewhat inadvisable.
For the first time in my life, I am deeply regretting not putting on heels this morning.
“Don’t worry,” Joanna says as the rest of them head toward the lab. “It’s a small island—not many places for her to be hiding! I promise we’ll have your mother back in one piece.”