Virgo's Vice Read online

  “What kind of animal was it?” Jared asks.

  “It was too dark to see,” Billy answers for me.

  “Animals are scared of fire, aren’t they?” I say to him.

  “Sure.”

  “The shelter’s done,” Kelli says. “You can put your stuff in there now.”

  I edge over to the tree where Trip is standing and grab my backpack. He bends down to help me and I yank it away from him. “Leave it,” I hiss.

  Someone has left a lighted candle on a tree stump that’s doubling as a table inside the shelter. It makes flickering shadows on the leafy walls, but there’s enough light to see by.

  “The girls put their backpacks in this trunk, and the guys in the other one.” Kelli points. “My feet are better. Maria—she’s the nurse—put some salve and Band-Aids on them.”

  I dump my bag with the others, where Kelli shows me, and go back for the cardboard box with Jake’s food in it. Trip watches me pick it up and move it into the shelter, but doesn’t try to help me this time.

  I drop the box where it’ll be out of the way, under the bed in the shelter, and bring out Jake’s bowls and open his bag of food, and pour some out. He licks my hand and then buries his nose in it and starts crunching. “You’re hungry. Me, too,” I say to him. “At least you had a drink.”

  Mark has moved the big cardboard box that holds the camera equipment into the shelter and I make certain my camera is there before I go back to the fire.

  “Can I have a drink yet?” I say to Faith.

  She stares at me for a few seconds with those weird eyes. “Yes. I don’t know why you’re asking me, but you can. Just remember to ration it. There’s only enough for one mug full each.” She says this loudly so most of the people sitting around the fire can hear her.

  I grab my mug and head for the water bags, which are on the tree beyond the one Trip is leaning on. I feel his eyes on me again and it sets my teeth on edge. Billy brings his mug and helps me pour water into mine. I try to sip the water slowly but end up gulping it all down in one swallow. I’m still thirsty.

  I can smell the rice cooking now, and my stomach rumbles. I perch at the end of one of the logs in front of the fire and listen to the murmur of conversation. Jared and Billy and Andy are standing a short distance from me and every now and then I can hear Billy’s laugh. I think about the day’s events. It has definitely been the strangest day of my life, and the scariest at one point. I swallow hard. I find myself wondering why I thought I could do without my meds. I laugh cynically to myself. You chose this. Now suck it up. I’m always such a wuss. At the first sign of trouble I can’t wait to get to the Zoloft, and I really wish I had brought some with me now, but it scared the crap out of me when my shrink said it could have lasting effects on my balance, and I could get shaky hands that wouldn’t go away. I hold out my hands in front of me. I can’t see them in the shadows, but I can feel them shaking. It’s probably withdrawal symptoms.

  Mark sinks down beside me. He’s still carrying his camera. He turns it off and rests it on his legs, which are stretched out in front of him. “You okay?”

  “Yeah. Thanks. Tired,” I say with a yawn. “I’ll take over filming if you like.”

  “Nah,” he says. “I’ll take a little footage of them all eating and when they get into bed, but then I’m shutting it down. Yours is in the shelter.”

  “I saw it. Thank you.” I yawn again.

  “The next problem,” Trip, who is still standing on his own, says loudly, “is eating utensils. We don’t have anything.”

  “We’ll have to use sticks,” Eve says. “Like chopsticks.”

  Nobody has a better idea, and Jared, Trip, and Billy get the flashlight and the machetes and head into the darkness beyond the camp.

  A few minutes later, we hear a scream and running footsteps, and Jared is charging toward us. We all leap to our feet and turn to face him. My heart is beating so hard I wonder if it’s gonna jump right out of my chest.

  “I put my hand on a spider,” Jared says. “It was like this big.” He holds his hands out.

  “Did it bite you?” says Maria. “We don’t have any spider bite anti-venom.”

  “No,” he says with a trembling voice. “It was close though.”

  “That reminds me, the pilot said something else,” Mark says. “There’s some kind of superstition about this place, some kind of monster who comes out at night and kills people.” He shrugs. “Maybe I shouldn’t have told you.” He’s staring at me when he says it.

  “What kind of monster?” Kelli says, hugging herself.

  “I don’t know any more than that,” Mark says. “There wasn’t time to discuss it further.”

  “What exactly did he say?” Stretch asks.

  “He said he hopes I’m not superstitious because, although AIDS and other diseases have caused a lot of deaths here, all the surviving locals have moved away from this area because they believe there’s a monster that comes into their villages at night and kills people and eats them.”

  I gasp. “That’s scary.”

  “Yeah, I heard him say that, too. It’s only scary if you believe in that kind of thing,” Billy says and grins at me.

  I don’t know why he’s so happy about it. It doesn’t seem to bother him at all. All this talk about giant spiders and monsters sure is scaring me. I decide right then that I won’t be sleeping tonight. I would rather sit by the fire.

  “I don’t know about the monster specific to this region,” Trip says. He’s holding his pipe in one hand. “There’s a monster in some of the local people’s folklore called the Tokkoloshe. It’s supposed to be a dwarf so they put their beds up on blocks and that keeps them safe. I guess it’s something like a troll.”

  I shiver and hug myself. I’m glad the bed platform is up fairly high. It’s totally dark now, but the fire gives off enough light for us to see by. The chopsticks kind of work, but I still manage to spill some of my rice on the ground.

  “At least we don’t have to do the dishes,” Sam says. “Just lick them clean.” Nobody laughs.

  “What about latrines?” Rafael Rodriguez says. “We have two shovels, but we need to designate an area or two areas.”

  “How about that way for the men and over there for the girls,” the NBA player says, standing up and stretching. It reminds me he told us to call him ‘Stretch.’

  Someone takes the flashlight and heads into the darkness.

  I carry my mug over to the water bags. “Can we dole out more water now?” I say. “I’m really thirsty.”

  “Bring your mugs.” Faith heads over to the water bag tree. She lifts one of the bags off its hook, a protruding stump of a branch on the side of a tree trunk. “We’ll still have to ration it to half a cup each,” she says. “Hopefully by tomorrow night we’ll have a lot more.”

  I allow the other girls to go first. My mouth actually waters when I watch it pouring into my mug. I know I have to sip it slowly to make it last. I’m surprised at how cool it is.

  “We should boil more water now. And anyway, how are we supposed to wash the rice pot and our bowls?” Lela says.

  “Give the pot here,” Rodriguez limps to the fire, takes it from her and picks up some cold ash from the side of the fire. He pours it into the cup, scoops up some sand, and rubs it all around the bottom then holds it toward the fire to see if it’s worked.

  “Someone will have to rinse it down there,” he points in the direction of the waterhole. “I would go, but my ankle . . .”

  “I’ll do it.” Mark taps Jared on the arm.

  “Oh yeah, sure, dude. I’ll help you. As long as there are no spiders.”

  Billy hauls himself up off the log. “I guess I’ll have to show you where it is,” he says. “We can probably take everyone’s bowls and wash them while we
’re there. Bring one of the shovels.”

  I watch the beam of the flashlight bounce off the grass as they walk away, and I think about the glowing eyes we saw reflecting the light. What if they were the eyes of a monster?

  I move closer to the fire.

  Chapter 11

  Stretch yawns loudly. “I don’t know about anyone else, but I’m ready to turn in.”

  “Someone should watch the fire and keep it going, then take the pots off when they boil,” Faith says.

  “I’ll do it,” I volunteer.

  “We’ll take it in turns,” Trip says. “You need to get some sleep like everyone else.”

  “Well, I’ll go first,” I say, dropping to the log seat. I narrow my eyes and give Trip a warning glare. “Do you think this is enough wood?” I point at the pile of firewood the others collected earlier while I went to get water.

  “It’s enough,” Stretch says.

  I sit on the hard seat and gaze into the flames. What is it about a fire that almost seems like it’s hypnotizing you? Not to mention it might keep wild animals at bay. And what about that moment with Billy? It’s still with me, and I can’t stop thinking about how it would have felt if he had kissed me.

  The air has cooled down quite a lot and a few moths are flying around. I stare into the fire and think how much I had wanted to come on this gig, and how excited I had been. This was my first real attempt at self-healing, and it took a lot of determination to make myself do it. If I had known I would be lumped in with the contestants I probably wouldn’t have come. I’ve never had anyone in my life to take me camping. Even so, if they had, there would have been restrooms and electric hookups. And now here I am with nothing.

  Things would be better if Trip wasn’t here. I still can’t really believe it’s him. I know I’ll always hate him, but I had almost forgotten just how much I hate him. Almost. Every inch of my body hates, loathes, and despises him. It’s like a cancer that I thought I was free from and now I know I’ll never be free from him.

  “I’ll be the first to try out our bed.” Maria interrupts my thoughts. “Where are we supposed to sleep? Girls on one side?” She’s put on her warm jacket. It is getting cool quite rapidly.

  “Uh, yeah,” Andy says. “Ladies should probably be on the inside away from the elements.”

  I get my camera and start filming again.

  Faith checks her candle. It’s still got a ways to go. “Last person to bed blows it out,” she says.

  I keep filming as Maria takes off her shoes and lines them up in front of the Samsonite trunk with the ladies’ duffel bags in it.

  The guys have laid the parachutes out on top of leaves as a mattress, and made sheets with a couple more. They’ve made pillows by stuffing leaves into the canvas cargo bags.

  Maria slides onto the bed in the farthest corner beside the pole walls, and lies on her back. “It’s not too bad,” she says into the camera. “A little lumpy, but I’m tired enough to ignore it.” She yawns, pulls up a little of the parachute sheet, and turns on her side.

  Lela sits on a big rock by the fire and takes off her jeans, with a lot of wriggling and grunting. I stand at the shelter’s door and film her. In the firelight I can just make out that she is wearing a very skimpy pair of lace panties, kind of like the extra ones she brought. Her shirt covers most of her butt and she crawls in and lies beside Maria. Faith, Eve, Sam, and lastly Kelli also get onto the bed.

  Andy is quick to shuck his suit pants and his shirt, and slide in beside Kelli. He’s only wearing his boxers. Rodriguez hobbles over and crawls in next to him with a few grunts and groans, and then Stretch lays his long body on the platform. His feet hang over the bottom edge.

  I turn my camera off and set it down in the equipment box. “Night, night,” I say, and make my way outside again. I’m really glad the fire is burning so brightly, and I slide onto a log, and stare at the flames. I wish the boys would get back because now I’m alone out there with Trip. He’s still leaning on the tree a little distance away, smoking his pipe. I feel his gaze on me and a cold shiver runs through me. I concentrate on stroking Jake, who has laid his head on my lap. He probably misses the Old Man and I wonder again at the sanity of that man.

  “You can’t ignore me forever,” Trip says quietly. “I’m here whether you like it or not.” He lifts one foot and bangs his pipe on the sole of his shoe to knock the tobacco out.

  “Just stay away,” I say, taking care not to raise my voice. I turn my gaze back to the fire. So many memories haunt me. I was so helpless. He is an adult. He is supposed to protect me, but he . . . I have to think of something else because I can feel myself getting all tensed up again. I can’t do it. I can’t ever forget the pain.

  I glance over at him and my jaw clamps down so hard my teeth hurt. I might have been a kid, but I knew it was wrong. I tried to tell Aunt Jess, but she didn’t want to believe it, and then he said he’d kill her if I said anything else to her. I had no one else to turn to. She was all I had. I can’t really remember what my parents looked like. I was so young. I do know my life would have been very different if they had survived the car wreck. Aunt Jess probably didn’t want a kid but she took me in and never complained. I couldn’t let her die.

  I heave a huge sigh of relief when I hear the guys arrive back from the waterhole. They’re singing that song by Shakira, “This Time for Africa.” They sound happy. I ask them for a little water to fill Jake’s bowl, and then they set the filled pots back on the fire, and sit around it and hold out their hands to warm them. The air isn’t cold, but there’s a slight chill to it. It smells of wood smoke.

  “Where is everyone?” Billy asks.

  “They went to bed, so you should probably be a little quieter,” I say in a low tone.

  Jared pulls something out of his pocket. “Smoke, anyone?” He holds up a pack of Camels.

  No one takes him up on his offer. He lifts a burning stick from the fire, lights the cigarette with it, and inhales deeply.

  “What about you?” Mark says. “I’m surprised to see you still up. You said you were tired earlier.” He glances across at Trip, who has not moved any closer, and raises an eyebrow. I know he’s wondering why I would be sitting out here alone with the one person I don’t like.

  I shake my head. “I’m still thirsty, and I’m not tired in that kind of way.”

  The tip of Jared’s cigarette glows red in the dark. “Where’s Kelli sleeping?” he says quietly.

  “Andy is sleeping beside her,” I say pointedly.

  “Ah, shit. The horny fucker,” he says, and flicks the end of the cigarette into the fire. “He’s married, too. I saw the ring on his finger.”

  Billy and Jared sit across the fire from me beside the firewood and we talk about being in Africa and the game and we try to guess what the Old Man is planning. It’s after midnight when Jared’s head starts to nod. “I guess I’m gonna turn in.”

  I watch him amble off into the shelter.

  Billy, Mark, and Trip seem each to be trying to be the last to go to bed. If Trip outlasts them, I’m not staying out here, even though I know I won’t sleep.

  Billy’s taken his hat off and he finger-combs his hair back. My gaze follows his hand.

  “Time to turn in?” Mark says.

  “I’m okay. I don’t feel like sleeping, and someone has to watch the water and keep the fire going.”

  Mark stretches and yawns. “You okay if I go, then?” He dips his head toward Trip and I know he’s wondering if I am okay being alone with him.

  “I have Jake,” I say, “and with all this talk of monsters and wild animals, someone should keep the fire going.”

  He stands up and squeezes my shoulder before heading into the shelter, where the candle is still casting a flickering light.

  The night is quiet except fo
r the crickets and a few frogs croaking from way down where the water is located.

  “How long are you gonna stay up?” Billy glances across at Trip, who is still leaning against the tree, and has lit his pipe again.

  “Someone should keep watch and I’m staying up with Lexie,” Trip says.

  I jump up to face him. “The hell you are.”

  “I wouldn’t stay alone with you if you were the last person on earth.” My anger is clawing at me. I’m breathing hard and I’m so mad I want to scream.

  “Hey, Lexie, that’s not very nice of you,” Billy says. “What the heck’s gotten into you?”

  “Butt out, Billy. This has nothing to do with you,” I say through gritted teeth.

  “Trip hasn’t done anything. He’s just staying out of the way. You have no right to speak to him like that.”

  I stand up to face Billy. “Billy Murphy, you don’t know anything about it. Shut the fuck up.”

  Billy’s eyebrows go up.

  Trip sidles up behind me and strokes my hair and whispers into my ear, “Calm down, Lexie. You wouldn’t want your past to be known.”

  “Don’t you dare touch me!” I turn around and swipe at his face. “I’ll gouge your eyes out.”

  Jake pushes his way between me and Trip and growls, and Billy grabs me from behind around my waist and drags me away. Jake starts barking at Billy, and I kick and yell.

  “Put me down!” I feel helpless the way he has my arms pinned to my side.

  “Quiet!!” someone yells from inside the shelter.

  “Hey,” Billy whispers in my ear. “You’re gonna wake the whole camp. Down, Jake. It’s okay boy.”

  Jake is still barking and nipping at Billy’s ankles.

  “You should probably go to bed, dude,” Billy says to Trip. “I’ll keep watch with Lexie for a while. I’ll wake you when we’re ready to turn in if you want to take a turn.”