PAGE 14/16
I looked around at the crowd. Everyone was walking around like ghosts, with pale skin and droopy smiles. I ran towards an old fisherman who was wearing thongs and sunnies. “Who are you, sir?” I asked.
He looked at me and shrugged. “I dunno, kid. I’m a person who is in paradise, that’s all that matters.” He sat down to rest, that sentence apparently being the hardest to ever say.
“How long have you been here?” I asked again.
“’Bout, a month, I dunno!” he said again, falling onto his hammock.
Another lady approached me. She was tanned but had black hair. She wore a sunflower dress with thongs. “Boy, please stop asking questions,” she huffed. “You’re wearing them out!”
I stared at her. “Them?” I said, intrigued.
“Yes, well … our energy people. You’re wearing them out. Less energy to live off. So, go and play and don’t talk to anyone, please,” the tanned lady ordered, shooing me away.
“Violet, Charlotte, Adam!” I yelled, searching for my friends.
Adam ran towards me. “What?” he asked.
“We need to go,” I answered.
“I don’t want to. Just a little longer,” he whined.
“They’re eating our energy! Charlotte and Violet have been here too long to want to go, so we need to force them.”
Adam gasped. “Okay,” he said.
We dragged Violet and Charlotte out of that place, as they both whined and quarrelled with us. By the time we got them out of the resort and onto the beach, they had snapped out of it. “I feel so used,” Violet said, too embarrassed to look at us. Charlotte leaned against Adam’s comforting arm.
“Let’s go!” I said. They nodded, and we set forth for our last stop.
Rigid rocks came into view as grey mist swarmed around our rowing boat. We were able to swerve around the rocks like snakes because our boat was small and thin. Violet’s neatly brushed hair became knotted and salty as it blew in the wind. Two rock walls appeared on both sides of us. “Paddle harder on the left!” I commanded.
The sky got foggier, and it grew harder to see. “Are we there yet?” asked Charlotte. She pointed at the dead end that curved around the rocks.
I looked at the rock wall in confusion, “I don’t get it … The map says here!”
Violet peered at the map. “Maybe it’s in the rock? It is a ruby, right?”
I nodded, steering the boat to a halt.