The Trip

Even though the tropical water is warm, the waves being churned up from the ocean bottom feel cold as they thrash against us. My hands hurt from clutching the sides of the little long-tail boat and I’m clenching my teeth to avoid biting my tongue as we skate up giant waves and then get slammed down as we crest them. The boat driver is a sinewy tattooed statue, he stands rooted, motionless among all the chaos, steering the udder, all his concentration focussed on getting us to the island without getting sunk.

As we get closer, I begin calculating my odds of making it to the shore if we overturn now. I have already slung my dry bag across my torso, first filling it with air as much as I can and sealing the top, so I have something to use as a floatation device. Inside it are only my passport, a small black notebook, my wallet, and my phone, all wrapped in a sarong. If I lose my big backpack I’ll manage, but as soon as I saw how big the waves were, I packed those essentials in my dry bag.

Other tourists are clutching their backpacks and as the waves get more violent one of them puts his on. I yell at him, salty water whipping against my face and getting in my mouth: “Take it off!” He looks alarmed and I yell again “Take the straps off, if we go over it’ll sink you!” He nods and pulls his arm out of the straps, and another wave slams us.

The distance closes between us and the shore, and I see a couple of locals waiting on the beach, to help if the boat starts to tip. Our driver is a pro, though, and he maneuvers us straight up out of the water onto the sand with a shudder that throws us all forward in the boat. I’ve braced myself so I don’t get the worst of it, but I see a girl crack her nose and start bleeding, she’s screaming, everyone is trying to get out as waves pummel the back half of the boat, and I drag my backpack to the edge, throw a leg over and land in the water up to my knees, yanking my bag onto my back and staggering through the waves onto the sand.

My backpack is only wet on the outside, because inside everything is sealed in two big black garbage bags. I throw it high enough to not get washed out and wade back in to help. Some of the bags are soaked, and weigh a ton. I grab the bleeding girl’s backpack from her, she looks like she thinks I’m trying to steal it but I trudge out of the water, throw it on the ground by a palm tree, and wave at her as she stumbles up onto the sand.

I throw my bag over one shoulder, grateful that I got rid of half my stuff already, pat my dry bag, and start walking barefoot through the sand into the coconut grove. I know where to go. Not because I’ve been here before. I know because it’s in the book.

I need to get away before anyone follows me. But they’re still flailing about, trying to gather their things when I glance back. I’ve lost my shoes but I have what I need. I keep walking, away from the off-the-beaten-track resort they are all going to, until the sand under my feet turns to rocks and roots. I get my water shoes out of my bag. They are all I have, but they have good soles and I’ve learned how important it is to take care of your feet out here. The cloudy sky is turning purple. I quicken my pace. I hope the book is right. It has been so far.

My aunt called me as I was studying for my second last exam. She’s always reminded me of the chain-smoking twin sisters on the Simpsons. I’m not sure what she thinks of me. “The money’s gone through. It should be in your account,” she says. “Maybe it’ll help with your student loans haha.” Her laugh is more cynical than humorous. She knows I owe a lot more than $20,000. “Thanks so much, Auntie! I appreciate your help with all this.”

“You’re nuts,” she says. “You’re a freaking nut bar. You’re as crazy as she is. Was.” I laugh.

“Anyway,” she sighs. “I gotta go. Be careful out there. Send a postcard or something.” She hangs up without saying goodbye. I bet she’s relieved to be rid of me. She made it obvious my whole life that she never wanted kids, but she got stuck with me when my mom died and she wanted the small stipend she got for keeping me, which kept her in smokes.

The money is from the estate of her and my mom’s great second cousin or something? I don’t even know. She got $20,000, too, and but their hateful brother didn’t get anything. I only know this because she told me. He beat the hell out of them growing up. My mom ran away, had me at 17, and my aunt got stuck with me when my mom died when I was 5.

I had never met her before the day she came to get me from the hospital, angry and smelling like an old ashtray. I can’t complain though. She gave me a bed, and food twice a day, and left me alone. I studied, I got student loans, I moved out after grade 12 and went to University. Called her once a month but didn’t see her after that. It sounds like a sob story but I’m fine. I’ve always been a loner and I prefer my own company anyway.

The first and only time I heard about the great second cousin before she died was on my 18th birthday. My aunt gave me a book of old photos as a moving out gift, along with some kitchen stuff in a cardboard box. I flipped through them as she smoked and we waited for my taxi. I couldn’t use Uber because I didn’t have a credit card.

I was stunned to find a photo of a bunch of girls at a lake, splashing around in retro style bathing suits, because one of them had my face. The same big eyes, squared off nose, and curling dishwater blonde hair. “Who is this?” I asked.

“Oh wow,” said my aunt. “Does she ever look like you, hey? Loretta. She’s a second cousin, or maybe our mom’s cousin? I heard she tried to burn down the house when she ran away.” She shook her head and blew out a cloud of smoke. “Anyway, she never came back.”

I didn’t hear about the girl with my face again until my aunt called to tell me about the inheritance. She was so excited about the money, I guess the small estate was split between any living relatives but there were only the 3 of us, her, me, and her mean brother, and he had been explicitly left out.

One day I had to go sign a bunch of papers, then a balding little man handed me a small box. Inside was a bracelet, some more paperwork, and a small black journal, crammed with messy handwriting. I could barely read it because we didn’t really do handwriting in school, but the more I read the easier it became to understand.

At first I read it because I was curious, but as I got more into it I began to realize that parts of it were waiting to be read. Parts of it were calling out to me. There were detailed lists of things to pack to travel, ways to find cheap tickets, even hostels to stay in. She made a living buying and selling raw stones and gems that were made into jewelry for the tourists, and there were descriptions and sketches of beautiful, fanciful pieces.

Her love of the beautiful white sand beaches, brightly colored tropical fish and birds, spicy foods and smiling people began to draw me in more and more until I decided that I was going to take a year off to travel before looking for work.

Then one day, I read about the secret beach you could only get to by long-tail boat. She described a cave she had transformed into a house of sorts. The bed made of driftwood dragged up the beach. The mattress and solar panels she had to wait to bring over until the sea was calm and still, and her friend, the boat man, could help her. The papaya, mango, and bananas that grew outside her door. The spring she bathed in and drank from. Her books that she constantly had to air out in the sun to avoid them molding in the humidity. The family who ran the restaurant at the small set of huts they rented out to tourists, and how she bought eggs and rice from them, coconuts, and cake, which she craved.

It became my driving mission to find her cave house, surely abandoned after she died. Maybe I would find it ransacked and full of mushroomy old books. But I had to know. I traveled for months before I got a clue about which island it might be from a couple of Aussie guys who had been all over.

We sat in the hostel comparing notes and they said if they didn’t have to go back they would have come with me. I kissed one of them later that night and said goodbye as they left in a tuktuk to the bus station where they would take a bus to the airport.

Through the coconut grove to the left, follow the stream to the land slide, under the hugest fallen rocks, through the gap between the biggest and second biggest rock, then to squeeze behind the white rock that was cracked almost in two.

And suddenly I was at the stream. My heart was pounding as I followed it up and saw the huge looming shapes of the boulders against the sky. If it was too ransacked inside, I might have to go back to the shoreline, and follow it to the little restaurant that would have been to my right from the boats.

If everything was still there, though, I knew I would find a small handmade hearth, so I began gathering little sticks though it was still very warm out and I was sweating. I would make tea in my camping cup over a candle and wrap myself in my sarong. I had nuts and cookies and sesame snaps in my bag and if everything was in okay shape I planned on staying there tonight.

I was terrified of the sounds of the jungle as it began to get more purple. I knew that even though it was only around 5pm, the sun would be completely gone within an hour and if I had to go back I didn’t want it to be in the dark.

I took off my backpack to get through the huge boulders, then saw the white one and breathed out a sigh of relief. This was it. I had made it. I held my bag in front of me and it scraped on the rock as I squeezed through.

“Who’s there?” a voice called out, unafraid, and a thin tanned hand, glittering with colorful rings and bracelets reached out and pulled aside a thick canvas door, revealing the face of a small woman with wispy white curls. She gasped when she saw my face, and her mouth fell open. “You came!” She cried, and her other hand went to her flushed cheek. “You came!” We both laughed, big eyes widening even further. “You’re here!”

“I’m here,” I said.