Recluse Island

Chapter 2

Present

June 2049

"You better put that away honey, we're about to prepare for landing."

Mia Niles jerked and turned to the man sitting next to her who also happened to be her father (well one of them anyway). He was pointing at her laptop. She glanced out the cabin window and away from the testimonies she had compiled and was editing and for the first time noticed they had begun their descent toward Pigscula Keys. Below her she saw the beautiful azure ocean, white sand beaches and tropical rainforest that she had heard so much about from her fathers.

Mia nodded and clicked to save what she was working on and closed her laptop storing it below her seat. Then for the first time she allowed herself to feel real excitement at the prospect of finally stepping foot onto the island her fathers had grown up on.

Despite her childhood being filled with stories from the two men who had adopted her from Vietnam, about their lives on this Caribbean Island they had never once suggested going back... that is until recently.

Now nineteen and fresh from her first year of college, Mia decided it was time she saw firsthand the roots of the two people she loved and admired most. At least that is what she told them. Mia had another reason as well.

From an early age, Mia always loved a good story. The ups and downs, twists, and turns and then the conclusion that wrapped everything up perfectly so that you couldn't help but sigh in pleasure. As a journalism major the perfect story, the right angle, the right collaborators were her life's blood.

And as far as she could see, despite the newspaper articles, documentaries, movies and books written about Pigscula Keys and the suffering the people who lived there endured Mia couldn't help but notice that not all angles of this story had been explored. It was absurdly lacking in eyewitness accounts. Their experiences, fears, struggles and most importantly their feelings on finally gaining their freedom were all decidedly missing.

How could anyone begin to understand what they had endured when their voices were not heard? Mia knew there was still a lot that hadn't been vocalized and even though her fathers may not approve (particularly Nelson) Mia was determined she was the journalist meant to break this story to the world.

It had already started. Unbeknownst to her fathers she had been contacting their friends and acquaintances from the island compiling their testimonies and accounts of the conditions they lived in, the treatment they received, the restrictions, rules, responsibilities, and punishments that dictated and controlled their daily lives.

Surprisingly, most were open and receptive to her inquiries and questions as if they had been waiting this whole time to tell the truth of what had really transpired. All the information she gathered was safely saved on her hard drive and the Tweety Bird flash drive her best friend Alan Barrington had given her when she first mentioned her intent to pursue this story.

Alan was also a journalism major. He is also, it is prevalent to mention, not gay. Although her father's think differently, having grown up with two homosexual men Mia has come to consider herself to have very good gaydar and Alan is not gay.

Okay so he only wears button down khaki shirts that he irons every night and has all his favorite music organized into his iphone according to category such as "great for studying" or "cleaning bop," or Mia's favorite, "dangerously close to losing my sanity!" and maybe he makes the best homemade cheesecake she's ever had that doesn't mean he's gay. It could mean he has OCD or ADD or some other medical diagnosis.

The point is if he had been gay Mia would have been the first to notice. Plus, if he was gay wouldn't he have a poster of Cece La Due in his dorm room, only the most sought-after actress in all of Hollywood more for her D-Cup than acting ability but that's beside the point.