Chapter 17

Scarlet awoke with a blissful smile on her face.

For a few sweet moments every morning, and in the time it took her to fall asleep in Robin's arms every night, she got to forget where she was and what her problems were.

She had a beautiful woman curled up next to her. She'd forged strong bonds with a lot of the women here. They had a routine down that was starting to feel comfortable, and they weren't starving and exhausted all the time anymore. The Begonias still did sets most nights of the week.

Yeah, life on Gillian's Island wasn't half bad.

She got up and had a breakfast of coconut rice, then took a quick dip in the ocean to clean up. Robin was working with Simone and Darcy this morning replenishing the camp's firewood supply, so when Amanda approached Scarlet and asked if she wanted to hike down the beach to build a second signal fire, she said yes.

"I'll help," Zoe offered when she saw them heading out. "If that's okay?"

Even Zoe had been better recently. It must have finally put the fear of God in her, having the whole group ready to send her off on her own, because she'd been contributing around camp, doing the most tedious tasks with a smile.

She still had her fair share of detractors –Lex looked eternally about three seconds away from decking her –but Scarlet thought she'd earned her second chance… or third? How many was she on now, anyway?

"Fine by me," she said.

Amanda waved her on. "Come on."

Zoe skipped up the beach to meet them, and Scarlet asked, "Missy's not coming?"

Amanda gave a grunt. "We're not speaking at the moment."

"Again?" Scarlet tried to sound sympathetic, but the two of them had been fighting more than getting along ever since the shipwreck.

"She just…" Amanda sighed. "It's so stupid, but she was using her fingernail to clean her ear and it was just so gross." She shuddered. "I guess I didn't hide my disgust because she noticed and she was all, ‘I would happily use a Q-tip if you'll just pass me one, oh wait!' And I mean, I know we're working with limited resources here and hygiene is the least of our problems, but everything she does lately just… pisses me off!"

She finally stopped to breathe and Scarlet chuckled.

"I'm ridiculous, aren't I?" Amanda said.

"A little. Why don't you just call it quits?" she suggested. "I know how you were back home. Nobody expects you to settle down and be the serious relationship type just because we're stuck here."

"Yeah, but…"

"But it's nice to have somebody to lie down next to at night," Zoe finished for her.

"Yeah."

They walked in silence for a little while, turning out of sight of the camp and finding a spot on the shore that reached out far from the tree line, an ideal spot for a fire that would be visible from overhead. Not that they'd had any luck getting the attention of planes so far. If any of them were flying over, looking for them, they hadn't come through here in a while.

Or they've stopped looking, Scarlet thought, then immediately shoved the possibility to the back of her mind.

"Let's build the fire there," she pointed to a spot on the beach. "It should be far enough inland that the tide won't touch it."

They started to hunt along the beach for driftwood, and while they worked, Amanda stuck close to Scarlet.

"Me and Missy might not be a match made in heaven," she said, "but you and Robin… that's going well, huh?"

Scarlet grinned involuntarily. "Yeah."

Amanda shoved her and laughed. "Yeah," she mocked. "You are so fucking in love."

"Well, I don't know about love." Scarlet's cheeks colored.

"I do. I've never seen you this happy."

Scarlet brushed it off and focused on her work, but the whole morning, she was thinking about the L word.

When they got back to camp, Robin came skipping across the sand to meet her with a kiss. "Hey. How's the signal fire?"

"I hope we built it big enough so we only have to feed it once a day," Scarlet said. "That's the idea, anyway. How was your day?"

"I had an idea," Robin said. She was positively bubbly and it was rubbing off on Scarlet.

"What is it?"

"Do you know what tomorrow is?"

Scarlet laughed. "You're all over the place right now. Umm, Tuesday."

"It'll be our fourteenth day on the island."

Scarlet arched a brow at her. "And that has you giddy? Are you feeling okay?"

"I'm not excited we've been here so long, but I am really proud of us for surviving like we have," Robin said. "This could have gone bad in so many ways, but we're fucking thriving. And I was thinking… you know how much better it makes us feel when we take a little time to ourselves, to pretend we're back home and just living our normal lives."

"Mm-hmm."

"Well, a lot of the others haven't gotten that chance," Robin said. "So my idea is we need to celebrate this milestone. I wanna have a party."

Scarlet"s face lit up. "That"s a great idea, babe. They're gonna love it."

"I was thinking we could ask Lena and Reese to forage for something special, maybe work with Amelia and Simone on coming up with a tasty new dish. Lex could prepare a comedy set."

"And of course, the Begonias will provide the music," Scarlet added.

The others were just as excited about the idea as Robin was when she pitched it to them. They all took the next day off from their usual routines to get ready. Nat and Christy decided to work on improving the comfort around the camp, enlisting a number of crew to tie together life vests to create padded mats that people could sit or lie on. Darcy concocted a drink out of vodka and some berries that the group had deemed safe to eat. Tasha tuned up the guitar as best she could. Even Zoe pitched in, working with Kit to create some torches they could set up around the perimeter of the camp to keep the mosquitoes away.

"Let's try fishing one more time," Scarlet said to Robin. "I'd love to contribute some protein to the party."

"Feeling lucky?"

"Not with the spears, but the roof of the shelter gave me an idea."

She held up a primitive net she'd made out of vines she'd pulled out of the trees and braided together. Robin's eyes went wide. "When did you do that?"

"Last time I was watching the fire," Scarlet said. "I wanted it to be a surprise."

Robin was running the net through her hands, admiring Scarlet's handiwork. "This is amazing."

"Don't praise it yet –we don't know if it'll work."

They went out to the pond and Scarlet pointed to the inlet that fed it. "It's like a funnel," she explained. "The fish come in from the ocean, and if they want to get back out, they have to swim through this little channel. I think if we position the net across here, then we can kind of… spook them into it."

"It's a great idea," Robin said. "Spear fishing is not as easy as they make it look on TV."

They'd attempted it at least a dozen times with no luck. The only thing keeping them going was the knowledge that if they didn't even try, they absolutely would not be eating fish.

They waded into the warm water, letting the net down in the narrowest part of the inlet. It easily reached to the bottom of this shallow area, and spanned the width of the channel. Scarlet could see all kinds of colorful fish darting around in the little pond, steering far clear of the two sets of legs and the suspicious-looking vines.

"Time to spook them?" Robin asked.

Scarlet nodded. "Go ahead, I'll hold the net."

Robin waded further into the pool, going around the perimeter until she was behind the fish. She gave Scarlet a bewildered look for just a second, like she wasn't quite sure what to do, then she plunged her hands abruptly into the water, making waves.

It worked! Fish darted everywhere, including down the inlet.

"No, no, no," Scarlet cried as little fish swam right between her legs. "The net's too big."

"Those fish are too small," Robin corrected. "Let me try again."

She kicked her feet, sending more fish darting away from her and into Scarlet's path. One of them very obviously would not have fit through the holes in the net, but it either wised up or got lucky because it turned at the last second and skimmed along the side of the pond.

"Almost," Scarlet said. "Do it again."

This time Robin belly-flopped in the water and Scarlet was laughing so hard at her that she almost didn't notice the fish with its big head poking futilely through the net.

"Oh my God!" She shrieked and closed the net around it. "I got one!"

Robin came splashing over and together they lifted the slippery fish in the net and tossed it on shore. It flopped around and the compassionate of Scarlet felt really bad for it, and guilty for the killing tool she'd created.

The part of her that hadn't had protein in two weeks thwacked the fish against the rocks so that its death would be swift and hopefully painless.

They left the pond with three big fish in their net, and Scarlet felt as proud as she had the day the Begonias signed with Butler Records.

"Everyone's going to be so excited to have some variety in their diet," she was saying, already salivating over their celebratory meal.

"Hey, wait." Robin reached out and took Scarlet's hand. "Before we go back to camp…"

Scarlet turned to her.

Robin all of a sudden looked sheepish, and she reached her hand into the back pocket of her shorts. "You're not the only one who's been secretly making things."

Her hand emerged and Scarlet gasped. Robin held out a beautifully crafted necklace, made of a much finer version of the braids she'd formed her net with. Instead of vines, it looked like Robin had used strings from the life vests, and woven into them were tiny shells and the smallest sand dollars Scarlet had ever seen. The whole thing was so perfectly put together, she had a hard time believing Robin hadn't picked it up from some gift shop while they were island-hopping.

"You made that?"

"Hey, I'm no rock star, but everybody's got a little creativity in them." She stepped up to Scarlet, lifting the necklace and placing it gently down over her head. Scarlet's hand went to her neck, fingers traveling along the necklace. "Do you like it?"

"I love it."

"I wanted you to have something beautiful," Robin explained. "Something that would remind you of the good times that we've had here… together."

"I don"t know what to say," Scarlet managed, tripping over her tongue. "This is the most thoughtful gift anyone has ever given me."

Robin pulled her close, their foreheads touching as they stood in the fading light. "I don't think I could have made it fourteen days out here without you, and I know I wouldn't have wanted to try. I wanted you to know how much you mean to me."

Scarlet leaned in, capturing Robin"s lips in a tender kiss. The L word was on the tip of her tongue again. In the real world, it'd be crazy to say it so soon. In the real world, it'd probably scare Robin off permanently at this stage. But on Gillian's Island, every day was like a week and they'd been through more together than most couples ever went through.

She was just about to say it when Robin pulled back, brushing Scarlet's hair over her shoulder and letting her finger glide along the path of the necklace across her neck. "We should probably get these fish back to camp before they go bad."

Scarlet refused to let go of her. "They'll keep just a few minutes longer."