After securing the mooring lines, we heated up frozen lasagna and garlic bread for dinner. Killis ate his grouper alone which made me envious, but nobody else offered me their fish, either, so maybe sharing the bounty wasn’t customary. Being Saturday night some of us decided to visit Alice Town for a few hours, listen to music, have a drink and maybe meet some women. The problem was we were on a different island. Alice Town was a couple miles away.

At dusk four of us stood on the dock and considered the channel crossing in a leaky eight-foot skiff. Carl and Killis wore their buoyancy jackets while Jimmy and I had life jackets.

Carl said, “It’s no problem, the development owner told me. We can take this skiff right over to Alice Town.”

Killis disagreed as expected, “It’s full of water.”

Carrying a Heineken six-pack Carl said in his sarcastic voice, “What are you worried about? There’s a pump in it.”

“The developer claims it’ll get us there,” Jim said.

“Oh, crap, whatever, let’s go for it.” Carl had his mind set and stepped into the skiff with water sloshing around his feet. I reconsidered his size, all six-two, two-hundred fifty pounds or more, almost twice my own weight. Throw Killis in there, too, and the eight-foot skiff suddenly got very small.

“I’m not sure about this,” I stated. “It takes on water.”

“Are you going?” Killis said to Jim.

“Oh, I’ll go,” Jim replied with that distinctive drawl. “But we need to see how bad the boat is. That’s all open ocean out there. I’ll try the engine.”

Jim hopped in and tried for ten minutes to crank the outboard motor. The moment I gave up on him, it snorted loud, and started. Meanwhile, fun-loving Carl ejected water with a bicycle pump while guzzling a beer.

“We’re ready,” he called up to Killis and me waiting on the dock. We got on, trying to balance the weight while the skiff almost capsized. Jim steered by the handle on the outboard motor, and we left the marina at nightfall.

Once we were outside the island’s breakwater I felt the hardening breeze, and the land faded into the surrounding darkness. “This is kind of scary,” I observed. “Is this a smart thing, just to see female flesh?”

“Not too smart for any reason,” Killis spoke up with an uncharacteristic wry smile.

“Sure, Killis, why should you worry?” Jimmy told him. “You frogmen can swim 10 miles of open ocean if you have to.”

Carl hoisted his beer. “If anything’s worth it, female flesh is!” There was a second six-pack beside his feet.

Killis peered ahead intent. “That’s what I’m concerned about.” He pointed to a fast yacht crossing our path. “We’re running without lights.” Everyone noted this fact. “Nobody brought a little flashlight?” He checked around but no one responded, all of us remained somber and stared straight ahead as if not wanting to see or know too much else. Wind gusted.

“Watch out for rocks, too,” warned Jim. “Can’t see a blessed thing back here.”

A terrible thought occurred to me. What if old Jim lost control his bodily functions in this little skiff? Considering the size of Killis and Carl there was no place to move. No. Such a thing wouldn’t happen. What was wrong with me that I’d even think it? Maybe because I was trapped.

The motor coughed in spurts and almost stalled twice, but we continued hugging as much shoreline as possible though it took longer. The new moon resembled a curved assassin’s blade while the waves and the wind, both noticeably strong, were cooperating on the way over.

“Let’s hope we get back okay,” I thought out loud.

Flashes of lightning backlit the clouds over the horizon as if arching toward us from the other side of the earth. “Looks like cloudy sky coming on,” Jimmy observed. “A storm?”

“Some rain.” Killis scanned the sky. “Still hours away.” His profile was sharp against the sky, capped by the prow of hair trimmed up high and sharp in the front.

“Should we turn back now?” Jim asked.

“Na-ah, no way,” scoffed Carl. “Shit, we’re almost there now.” He finished off a beer.

Carl was right. Despite twenty tense minutes of navigating the desolate waters between us and the lights of Alice Town, we landed on a government ferry dock and headed down the main street of dirt to the one “happening” bar with all the Ernest Hemingway memorabilia, including his fishing equipment, signed photographs and pieces of manuscripts.

Later, we wandered to another place at the furthest edge of the village, a falling-down shack in the sand with a crude sign over the entrance which read, “The End of the World.” This place did not have a floor but it did have hundreds of cockroaches scooting around the tables and chairs, with vintage trophy-fish photos and hundreds of articles of female underwear hanging from the ceiling and nailed to the walls. Over the bar were bamboo letters, It’s Always Happy Hour!

Without a floor, this was little more than a big Tiki hut with a colorful past. Nails and rope combined with dozens of unbreakable white plastic ties to hold up the roof trusses and wall structure. A group of smiling Bahamian men with black leathery skin and scraggly facial hair celebrated around a long table. The big black barmaid tended to them. Besides another tourist couple, two beautiful women were there—one looked like the astonishing blond on The Rapture with her sheen of long hair, a black top that made no attempt to hide her breasts and long perfect legs I could see as she stretched out from her sitting position. Her exotic companion was probably the same Asian girl in the limo who bought the lobsters last night.

My eyes must have been riveted on her because she abruptly stopped talking, and said to me, “Yes? What?”

“Aah…um, no. Sorry, nothing. Did it look like I wanted to talk to you?”

“Looked like it.” She was cordial at least, and played with her big diamond ring.