The Island

THE ISLAND

  Two young men, their faces sleek and vibrant as sunlight, lifted the dull, rumpled old man onto the boat. The motor idled restlessly, ready to race its powerful legs across the water. The old man licked the sea mist from his parched lips, the salt burning the sores on his tongue. A woman standing on the dock, wearing a white dress and matching hat, let go of the two children she had been holding back and cupped her hands around her red-penciled mouth.

  “Goodbye, Papa.”

  “Goodbye, Paw-paw,” the children echoed.

  “You’ve been a good father,” the woman yelled above the racing motor.

  “You’ve been a good Paw-paw,” the children yelled.

  “We’ll see you in another place someday,” the woman smiled as she waved.

  “We want to go too,” the children said, switching their gaze from the old man to their mother.

  “One day you’ll go too,” she replied. “One day we all will go.”

  The old man raised his cracked, brown hands, drew them to his mouth, and then stretched them back out toward the family as the boat jerked away from the dock and lunged out into the open sea. He took a deep breath that bathed his lungs in cool mist and his spirit in unquenchable loneliness.

  “Alright, old man, hold tight,” one of the young men said.

  “Why should I? It won’t make one goddamn bit of difference whether I hold on tight or fall into the sea, will it?” The old man flapped his bent arms like a crippled bird. The wind raced across his body, a youthful spring breeze warming his chilled bones. The old man gulped in breaths of salt air that penetrated his senses until he could not only taste but also hear the dissonant sounds of warm air meeting cool, of salt destroying sweetness, of memories being forgotten. He waved his arms even wilder. “I’m flying. I’m flying to the end of the world,” he screamed above the deafening roar of the motor.

  “You’re going to the end of the world, all right, old man. You’ll have to write me and let me know what it’s like.” The two young men laughed and slapped the old man on the back.

  The old man dropped his arms and sat in his seat, like a night owl, his eyes wide and consuming and knowing.

  The boat pulled up to the island. The young men tied the bow to a long pier, with carelessly nailed mismatched boards stretching out like a long country quilt.

  “It’s the end of the road, old man.”

  “Or maybe just the beginning,” the old man grunted.

  “Well, don’t call us, we’ll call you.” One of the young men nudged his buddy.

  “You’ll get here, one day,” the old man said.

  “Not me, brother,” one of the young men laughed. “I plan to be long gone from here before that happens.”

  The old man shook his head. “That’s what I thought too.”

  The young men lifted the old man out of the boat and sat him down on the dock like a dirty sack of aged potatoes.

  “The others will come down to meet you,” they yelled over the grinding motor as they sped away.

  “I’ll be waiting for them,” the old man whispered.

  He looked around. The island was pretty enough from where he sat on the dock. Its palm trees looked like giant birds against the sky, flapping their muscled wings in rhythm with the syncopated wind that blew across his face and sang in his ear. The sandy beach that yawned out from where the dock met the shore seemed almost like a warm, golden hand beckoning him to come closer. The water behind him was a deep, cold, bottomless blue urging him forward. But the old man did not move.

  It took a while until he began to hear voices.

  “It’s another arrival.”

  “Good, another set of hands to help.”

  “I hope his arthritis isn’t as bad as mine or he won’t be much help at all.”

  “Well, any help is better than none.”

  The old man gazed down the dock, his wrinkled hands held above his eyes to shade them from the sun. Several dozen people behind the maze of palm trees were slowly advancing toward him like thick, brown lava. They hobbled in a smooth way, together, in a creeping, fluid motion, as if they had been used to moving in harmony for many ages. He saw them at first as one aged being, many centuries old, with the wisdom of many lives. As they crept down the dock, he began to see the details of each person, the silver head of one, the snow-white hair of another. Some were bent almost to the ground while others stood as tall and erect as they did in their youth. All were browned by the sun and, as they reached him, they stretched out their leathery arms toward him and began to speak.

  “Welcome, brother. We’ve been waiting for you.”

  “We’ve been here long, but we’re close to the day when we’ll be able to go back.”

  “Stand up, my friend, we’ll take you and show you what we are making.”

  The old man rose slowly, his weak body complaining inwardly of pain and fatigue, but he refused to take the hands that were reaching toward him.

  “It’s a pretty place,” he said.

  “No, it’s a wicked place,” one of the others answered. “We curse the day we arrived, and we’ll curse those who sent us here when we finally return.”

  The old man laughed. “What makes you think you’ll return? No one has ever returned. My father and mother and theirs before them never returned.”

  Someone whispered, “Tell, him, tell him what we are building.”

  “We are building a boat!” another shouted.

  They all smiled, their eyes wet with excitement. “We’re almost done,” they said. “We just have a little more to do and we’ll be gone from here.”

  “Let me see it,” the old man said.

  He followed the mass of people, creeping over hot sand and fragile shells that cracked and broke under the puny weight of his spindly legs, past thorny locust bushes and piles of discarded coconut shells, under groves of palm and bamboo trees, and out to the other side of the island. By then the sun was low in the sky, a once brilliant light waiting to be extinguished.

  “There it is,” someone shouted. “Isn’t it something?”

  The old man stared for a long time at the sleek hull of mahogany and teak boards, its lines graceful and smooth, the amber wood on top polished brightly. He thought it truly magnificent. 

  “We’ve found a long pole washed up on the shore that will be a good mast,” one of them said. “We’ve sewn together some of our extra clothes for a sail. All we have to do now is rig it.”

  “You’ve done good work,” the old man said. “The boat is as graceful as youth itself.”

  The old man stood silent for a while. Then he asked, “Where will you go?”

  “Where will we go?” one of them shouted. “How could you even ask such a question? We will go back, of course. Where else is there to go?”

  “What about other islands,” the old man asked. “What about other places far beyond here?”

  “We have no desire to see new places. We want to go back and show them that we have not lost our gifts.”

  The old many shook his head. “They don’t want us. We are a burden to them.”

  “We will show them,” they all shouted.

  The old man sat down under a palm tree. “I don’t need to show them anything,” he said. “I will not help build a boat that will be used only to return to those who do not value my wisdom. I want to fly. I want fly like a bird to the end of the world and be free.” He leaned his head against the tree and closed his eyes. Soon he was asleep.

  When the old man woke, the sun and mast were up. The people waved to him as they heaved themselves slowly onto the boat, their bony fingers grasping the sides as it rocked like a cradle in the waves.

  “Please come with us,” they begged.

  “No,” said the man. “I do not want to go back. I want to go forward.”

  “There will be no one left here but you,” someone said.

  “I will not be lonely,” the old man replied. He stood still, looking out past the boat to the waters beyond, and watched as the new vessel pitched silently over the waves and on out toward the horizon.

  The old man turned and started hobbling inland toward the forest of trees. He walked silently for hours, pausing occasionally to listen to the wind and the crash of the waves as he climbed to higher ground. He heard bird’s cries—complaining grebes, mournful egrets, the rasping chip-a-chip of the snipe, the long soulful scream of the hawk. He looked up and watched the free flight of the laughing gulls, making playful circles in the air. The same wind that blew over their feathers caressed his face, bringing him the anticipation of freedom that he knew the gulls experienced every day. “I will fly,” he whispered. “I will be free like a bird. I will fly to the end of the world.”

  The old man felt his heart beat faster as he stepped out of the thickness of the trees to an open void of rock far above the screaming blue water below. Even from up high, he could hear each wave demolish itself on the cold stone, tearing apart any plant or sea animal that happened to have been caught unaware on the rock. The gulls continued to circle above him, screaming, “Come home, come home” in his ear.

  “I’m ready to come home,” he said softly.

  Again, he said it, this time louder and more forceful, “I’m ready to come home. I will fly,” he screamed. “I will fly to the end of the world.”

  The old many reached out his arms to the beckoning gulls and stepped off the rock into the light hands of the air ready to hold him.

  “I’m free!” he whispered. “I’m flying to the end of the world.”