Mermaids of Glendale - a novel

Chapter 19

The rust-streaked, olive-drab Jeep bounced along to pot-holed, unpaved service road that ran like a spine from the ex-military airstrip in the center of Guadalupe Island, on down past the old sealing station to the Mexican oceanic research station on the Island’s southwestern edge.

Lorna gripped the dashboard with both hands despite Dr. MacAvoy’s reassurances that both the road and the Jeep were perfectly safe. The same darkness on the Island that brought out the constellations above in all their shining glory also meant that Rita was driving by the headlights alone; twin beams of radiance stabbing into the night as she drove towards the far coast of the Island.

Lorna had climbed the trail from the lagoon up to the sealing station, its walls a patchwork of cracked adobe plastered over cinderblock, its windows remnants of glass shards in uneven warped-wood frames. She stepped around the edge of the building into the high-beams of the Jeep, her eyes dazzled by the sudden and unexpected light. Lorna threw up an arm to shield her face.

“Lorna,” said a woman’s voice. “There you are!”

Lorna slowly lowered her arm, shading her eyes with her hand.

“Rita?” said Lorna.

“What did you do, Lorna?” asked Dr. MacAvoy. She clambered out of the Jeep and jogged over to Lorna. “Oh my, you’re bleeding.”

Lorna looked down at her feet. In addition to the cracked toenail, she had also cut the side of her foot on the rocks.

“I hadn’t noticed,” said Lorna as Dr. MacAvoy lifted Lorna’s arm over her shoulder and walked with her to the Jeep. She sat Lorna down sideways on the passenger seat, her feet still on the hard ground. “Why are you here?”

“Dr. Milagros radioed us,” said Dr. MacAvoy. She went to the back of the Jeep for a few moments, and returned carrying a First Aid kit and a pair of sturdy steel-toed ankle boots. She knelt down in front of Lorna and examined her foot. “He told us you dived into the ocean and started swimming towards the Island. He guessed you would come ashore beyond the lagoon. Looks like he was right.”

“I – “ said Lorna. “I guess I wasn’t thinking. I just had to get away, I think.”

“Get away from what?” asked Dr. MacAvoy. She lifted Lorna’s foot and poured saline solution over the cut in Lorna’s ankle, flushing dirt out of it, and then gently patted it dry with a small towel. “Looked worse than it is. You won’t need stitches, but we’ll bandage it.”

“Dr. Milagros,” said Lorna. “He…”

What, Lorna? You swam away from the yacht because Dr. Milagros asked you what you knew about mermaids? What would Rita make of that? She’s a friend, but I don’t think I can tell her about…

Lorna wanted – needed – to see Kitt.

“It’s nothing,” said Lorna, then re-directed the conversation. “Dr. Milagros said you and Kitt had brought the zodiac over to the Island. How else was I supposed to get here, Rita?”

Dr. MacAvoy laughed as she bandaged Lorna’s foot.

“I suppose so, Lorna,” said Dr. MacAvoy. “You must be a good swimmer, but that was pretty dangerous. The waters here are simply infested with sharks.”

Lorna felt dizzy. She had forgotten about the sharks, or maybe part of her had remembered her swim with Kitt, after he had said the sharks were scarce right now. In any case, she was glad she was sitting down. With Lorna’s foot bandaged, Dr. MacAvoy helped Lorna into the ankle boots.

“These are a pretty good fit,” said Dr. MacAvoy. “They belong to Sandy.”

“I’ll make sure she gets them back,” said Lorna, lifting her legs into the Jeep. “Can we go to the research station?”

“Kitt was worried sick about you and said he’d come get you but I hated the thought of losing both of you in the dark.”

“I could see the stars,” said Lorna, as Dr. MacAvoy gunned the engine and, after a brief wheel-spin on the dusty ground outside the old sealing station, its broken windows gaping like mouths filled with broken teeth, drove the Jeep south towards the far coast and towards Kitt.

“Kitt said he was going to wake me, Rita,” said Lorna a little later, after another of Dr. MacAvoy’s reassurances that the road was safe. “Dr. Milagros said you had a call from the research station?”

“Kitt thought it sounded pretty important. They requested our assistance,” explained Dr. MacAvoy. “After all, we’re here on the Island in cooperation with our counterparts – well, at least my counterparts – at the Academia Mexicana de Ciencias. Kitt thought you’d be okay on the yacht with Dr. Milagros, Sandy and Ricky.”

“I guess so,” said Lorna.

It sounded logical, and reasonable. Certainly more so than diving into the ocean because someone asks you a question about mermaids – what may have been a perfectly innocent conversation opener on Dr. Milagros’ part. He did not know Lorna very well and had unexpectedly found himself her host in both Kitt’s and Rita’s absence. It made sense that, since he knew Lorna and Kitt were dating, and that Lorna had attended Kitt’s mermaid exhibit at Aquarium of the Pacific, that he make conversation using that as a way of breaking the ice.

Now she’d both made a spectacle of herself and was missing out on what was a delicious-looking fajita dinner courtesy of Dr. Milagros on board Courageous Otter.

Eventually, they reached the Mexican research station, a small collection of slow-slung pre-fabricated buildings surrounded by a chain-link fence and overlooking the Pacific Ocean. The station was manned year-round by a rotating staff of around a dozen or so personnel, consisting of government scientists, private researchers, and university students. As Dr. MacAvoy pulled the Jeep up to the front of the main building, Kitt stepped out of the doorway, walked across the porch and then stumbled back as Lorna threw herself into his arms. She hugged him tightly, then stepped back and slapped him across the shoulder and then, tearfully, went into his embrace again.

“Ow,” said Kitt in delayed response. “What was that for?”