Island Surprise Continues

Tuesday Tales story using car, limo as writing prompt

Claire stood behind the lush tropical trees, held her breath and watched the bridegroom as he finally walked away in the opposite direction. Great, Claire thought. Hopefully she could get back to the boat without being seen. She retraced her steps and hurried back to the beach.

While she ran through the jungle, her bag strap caught on a branch, drawing Claire and her bag back like a sling shot. Her bag turned upside down, fell and spilled most of its contents. She reached down, tossed her lunch and notebook back in the bag as quickly as she could. She rose to her feet and continued on her way back to the beach. But wait a minute. Things didn’t look quite the way she remembered. She stopped again, breathing deeply from running and tried to get her bearings. She got turned around when she picked up her things. Claire tried her best to remember which direction she came from. Did she make a right turn?  She hoped this was the correct way. All of a sudden she came upon a banana tree she recalled seeing earlier, and practically wanted to reach around and hug it.

A few yards later she was at the beach and saw the little row boat waiting for her. She dragged the boat in the water, and bruised her legs a bit as she jumped in. She threw her canvas messenger bag down next to her, picked up the oars and rowed as fast as she could away from the island headed towards the big island. After she was more than what she estimated shooting distance to be from the island, she put one of the oars down and fished her smart phone out of her bag. Thrilled to see signal bars, she speed dialed Nancy her friend and roommate for the conference.

            “Hey, where are you? You’re missing a great buffet. The workshops are going to start soon,” Nancy cell yelled over the phone with loads of ambient sound in the background.

            “I’m in a row boat, making my way back to the shore. I think I’m running for my life. Can you meet me in a few minutes at the beach behind the hotel?” Claire continued to row with the phone cradled between her chin and shoulder.

            “Sure, I’ll meet you. What do mean running for your life? Did they have cocktails at that island, because you sound a bit strange?”

            “No, there were no cocktails, at least not for me. I might be exaggerating a little, because I’m very excited. I saw something that scared me to death.”

            “All right, I’ll be there soon. Relax, you’ve been under a lot of pressure lately. I was hoping this conference could act as a mini vacation for us.”

            “Yeah me too, till I think I might’ve walked in on a murder.”

            “A what? Oh, come on out here in paradise. I’ll be there soon.”

            Claire said bye, tapped end call and tossed her phone in her bag and continued on her way.

            As Claire paddled on, she recalled the last time she saw the newlywed couple. Last night as she, Nancy and Barbara Reynolds another writing buddy, were entering the hotel, the couple were leaving in a limo. She recalled it must be nice traveling first class on your honeymoon. She thought they were probably going out on the town for dinner since they had no luggage.

****

             Back on the little island, Dan Roberts stood the beach with the towel around his neck. He watched as the small white row boat raced across the inlet to the other shore. He marveled at how fast the woman was traveling.

He was totally unaware that she was on the island, and wondered what she saw. He reached in his pocket, and pulled out the pen he found on the ground on his way to the beach. It was a purple ball point pen with flashy black and blue stars, the copy on the pen read Nancy Wells, paranormal romance with a twist, Midnight Rising. She must be here for that writer’s conference.

“I’ll be seeing you, Nancy.” Dan put the pen in his pocket as he watched the tiny boat disappear.

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