* * *
The next morning, as the sun rose, we were brought to a seaplane that hadPoseidonpainted on the side.
Brando still refused to tell me where we were going, especially after he made it clear that we were not staying at the property my father and mother owned. The property Elliott had wanted. Uncle Tito and Aunt Lola (aka Henry and Zita) had no idea where we were going either, an idea that wassimply fascinating!to Zita. All Brando had told us was that this was our first stop.
Before we stepped onto the plane, Brando took my arm in his hand. “I wanted to do this for you. All me. This belongs to no one but us.”
I left it at that and said no more as we glided over countless miles of sea that glittered like azure glass in the early-morning light. The further out we went, the darker it became, until I could see the telltale signs of an island, an irregularly shaped green patch in the midst of what reminded me of cut Larimar stone, or as I had always known it, “Stefilia's Stone.” It sounded more romantic.
“I have never been on one of these before!” Aunt Lola said, oohing as the plane turned a bit, wings at an odd angle. “Tit—ah,Henry, this is so wonderful!”Click, her camera went off.
“Yes,” the temporary Henry said, but his skin had turned a pale shade of green. He swallowed hard and kept his eyes closed. “How much longer, nephew?”
Brando kept his eyes on the sea. When I elbowed him, he answered the summons with a look that said, “What?” I nodded to Uncle Tito.
“How much longer, nephew!” Uncle Tito said again through clenched teeth, over the whirling of propellers.
“Here we go, sir,” the pilot said.
The plane began its descent. Its shadow glided along the greenest part of the water like a great shark below the surface, until the plane met its counterpart with a jerk, shimmying its way forward, navigating to shore.
I was never great at measuring distances, but it didn’t take an experienced voyager to understand that we were on a mystery island, somewhere far offshore. Once we were off the plane, a man driving some sort of off-road vehicle met us.
“Brando,” I said, giving him my hand to help me in. “I wore sandals.” I was still in the dress that I left Tuscany in, which didn’t seem to be a concern of my husband’s. After we had arrived in Nadi, we had grabbed a bite to eat and then, because of a snafu at the hotel, we were given pillows and told that we could sleep in the lobby. None of us really slept.
“This doesn’t seem like sandal terrain,” I continued, eyeing our surroundings and then glancing at my thin shoes. Once past the sand along the outskirts of the beach, green seemed to sprout for miles on end. I was nervous, unsure; my heart beat in time to the ramblings of my mouth. “Should I have brought tennis shoes? Or—”
Brando squeezed my hand as the vehicle started its bouncy trek toward the unknown. “Relax, baby. You don’t have to walk.”
I took a deep breath, inhaling the thick, salty air, the fresh scent of sun, and the bitter tang of shore. Birds chirped madly from their perches, serenading us on our way. Beneath the copses of tall trees, the light was barely able to peek through the canopy of jade, cooling the air but leaving the humidity. Sweat began to moisten my scalp, causing the small tendrils of hair along my forehead to swirl and stick; it rolled between my breasts, down my back, saturating my underwear.
Sparks of crimson feathers, little red sunbursts patched with camouflage green and tiny spots of purple and black, caught my eye. Their beaks were tropical orange. The two parrots sat side-by-side, sunbathing, sharps rays from above glinting around them. One seemed to be cleaning the other, the quietclicksof its beak an unusual song. They didn’t bother to stop the sweetness as we rode by.
“Collared lory,” I whispered to myself. That was the species of parrot. One year my father took us on a guided excursion of some of the islands, and the name came to me all of a sudden.
“What’s that?” Brando put his ear closer to my mouth.
I pointed them out to him and repeated the name.
“This reminds me of the movieSouth Pacific!” Aunt Lola said, breathless.Click.
The old doctor and his wife sat behind us. I turned to see Uncle Tito, a wide-brimmed explorer hat on his head, white strips of sunscreen lotion on his face, his glasses fogging from the wet air, smiling at me. All he needed was a mosquito net.
“Uncle,” I said, trying not to talk too loud. “Are panic attacks—are they common after—”
Brando’s head whipped around, examining me as though I might break. I grasped his hand, feeling cold despite the heat.
Uncle Tito thought about this for a moment, removing his glasses and cleaning them with the hem of his shirt. He bobbed with the motion of the vehicle and nodded. “Sì. What you went through was traumatic. Not only did you lose,piccola colomba, but you were alsomolto malato.Very sick,” he emphasized.
I had never seen the doctor pale in the face of a medical emergency, but his face turned to ash for a brief second before he composed his features. And I wondered what he saw in me that night, what he thought was going to happen. I had never inquired, seeing as I slept most of the time and really didn’t care to know.
“You having one now?” Brando’s eyebrows were drawn down in worry, his eyes wary.
“I’ll be all right.” But I wasn’t sure if I was going to be, if I could go another minute more without screaming or hiding my face in Brando’s chest. I didn’t know whether my skin stretched or sagged with weights. My heart beat as though I had run a marathon while being chased by monsters.
“Here,piccola colomba,” Uncle Tito said, reaching inside his backpack, pulling out a bottle of pills and removing one. “Take this.”
He placed the small pill in Brando’s palm. Brando frowned at it for a moment before he turned to face Uncle Tito.
