Plastic Girl

Day 2,375-2

THE SUN PEAKED THROUGH the canopy, shining on the few remaining pink apple blossoms. Most of the blossoms had fallen to the ground, and the buds were transforming into fruit. The girls had spent half the day walking to the other side of the island and back, and they still hadn’t found any signs of Eva’s boat. The grass became greener and taller the closer they got to their beach. The apple trees on the other side of the island still had only a few buds, whereas the trees on this side were starting to fruit.

Eva stared up at the branches. A blossom fell and floated to the ground, landing next to a few others. She took a deep breath and decided to share a secret she had been keeping from Iris.

“You know, I think they are edible,” Eva said.

“What are?”

“Apple blossoms.”

Iris glanced up at the few remaining blossoms on the tree and then at the ones on the ground.

“You should eat one,” Iris said, excitedly.

“I don’t know, Iris. I’ve never eaten anything that wasn’t in a can.” She had only read about people eating flowers.

“Your canned food is probably more contaminated than these new flowers.”

Eva opened her mouth to argue but shut it immediately. The soil and ground water were filled with toxins when the last foods were canned. The food she had been eating was past any reasonable expiration date. More and more of the cans she had opened in the past year had been spoiled. Their island was healthier than any other place she had been on Earth. Iris was most likely right.

Iris gathered a few blossoms off the ground. She held out her hand to Eva. “So, maybe it would be okay to try just a few?”

Eva stared at the flowers in Iris’s hand. She was so hungry her mouth was watering over a few wilted petals. She had one can of beans left and a bottle of water. In a few days, she wouldn’t have a choice anymore.

Eva shook her head. “No. It’s not a good idea.”

Iris sighed and dropped the blossoms. “It might be the only idea, have you thought of that? You will have to adapt if you hope to survive out here.”

“I know that, Iris! That’s all I’ve ever done. I’ve spent my whole life searching for food, for life, half the time, all alone. I never even thought I’d make it to my sixteenth birthday, but I did. I never gave up. I kept trying new things. I kept searching, and I found life. I found Abel and then all this magic happened, you happened. So, believe me, I get what it takes to survive.” Eva’s face flushed, and she turned her back on her sister.

“That is all true, Eva, but now, your boat is gone. You can’t search out new sources of food without it. Even if it floats back someday, who knows how long we will have waited? You will have to try something different, sooner than you would like, because things aren’t going back to normal.”

“Me being stranded out here is way more normal than the last few years with you have been. Not having enough food, water, hope? That’s normal. Having to make choices, none of them great, choices that could kill you, that’s what it is to be human. That’s my normal.”

Iris winced as each of Eva’s barbs stuck her. She clenched her fists. “I know that you are scared, Eva, and I wish that you weren’t. I know you think I don’t understand, but I do. I know you must eat. You can eat these flowers. They aren’t going to kill you, I can feel it. They are going to help you. Eva, you have to try!”

“I don’t have to do anything. Why don’t you do something that might actually help me find my boat, like make Cain tell you the truth about it? You know, he has never liked me.”

Iris stood silent.

“I didn’t think so. You trust him more than me.”

“Eva, please stop. Cain didn’t do this,” Iris stated firmly and quietly.

“How do you know that?”

“Because that’s not how I made him.”

“No? Well, you sure made him to not like me very much.”

Eva turned on her heel and dashed off into the woods away from her sister. Iris sighed and watched her sister disappear behind some trees, finally whispering under her breath, “Pig-headed.” She started gathering more apple blossoms just in case Eva changed her mind.

Eva returned to the house around dusk. She was still angry and arguing with Iris in her head. Iris always landed on human error when something went wrong. When she said they must have made a mistake with the boat, what Iris really meant was that Eva must have made a mistake, but Eva had never made that mistake, not one time, ever. Her life depended on beaching the boat properly when she visited the island. No, Eva knew one thing for certain, someone had messed with her boat.

Eva was trudging up to the stairs of the cabin when the sound of Cain’s ax splitting wood caused her to grit her teeth and bite her lip. She touched her mouth, then pulled her fingers away, examining her blood. Great, now another part of her ached. She stomped up the wooden steps to the enclosed front porch. She stopped at the door and glared over her shoulder, releasing an angry huff in Cain’s direction. He glanced up at her and then back down at his wood, always chopping, always busy.

Iris had made Cain the first night Eva had left her alone on the island. Iris had hated going back to the cabin each night because of the little death she experienced every time she went too far past the sandbar. When Iris or any of the creatures got a certain distance away from the island, all life left them, as if their soul was torn out of their body. Because of this, Eva believed the source of this new life was locked away somewhere on the island, an invisible lifeline to her creations. Eva had searched and searched for this life source but had not yet been able to uncover it.

Cain had been the first thing Iris did without Eva, and he always felt like Iris’s retribution toward Eva for causing her those many little deaths. He was also the only other creature that created things out of wood. It set him apart from the other plastic people. It made him more like Eva in a small way. Eva frowned; she didn’t want to have anything in common with him. Cain chopped a log in half.

Eva shifted her focus to the wind that blew the leaves and flowers of the apple trees behind Cain. The last bit of sunlight disappeared behind the large hill in the center of the island, and deep within the woods a flash of light illuminated a small part of the dark forest. Eva inhaled sharply. She saw a face and then the light was gone. She sprinted down the stairs, searching for another flash of light or a glimpse of the face but none came. Cain stopped chopping wood. His gaze flitted between Eva and the woods.

Eva slowed, stopping short of entering the woods. The winds were getting too strong, and the temperature had dropped ten degrees and continued to drop. Eva felt too weak and lightheaded to venture into the forest at night. Maybe she imagined the light, dreamed of seeing another human face, someone she had cared for once. She had been rationing her food and water and was having trouble sleeping, so her mind wasn’t processing things just right. She couldn’t even trust her own eyes right now. Maybe her mind was manifesting a ghost, a will-o’-the-wisp to seduce her deep into the forest to meet her demise. Or maybe there was a dark spirit in the woods like she had always feared.

“Good evening, Eva.” Cain’s steady voice halted her racing thoughts, uninvited. He was standing close to her. Eva grunted in his direction, several feet away. He stared off into the woods as well.

“Did you see something out there?” he asked, peering into the woods.

Eva turned slowly toward him, a bit shocked. She hesitated. She didn’t want Cain knowing anything about the face in the woods, but she did want to know if he had seen it too.

“No. Why?”

Cain frowned at her. “You ran toward the woods, stopped and stared into it for a long time. It seems logical that you might have seen something.”

Eva watched him walk away from her, pick up his ax, and resume chopping wood in the same half-note in 4/4-time cadence. God, he made her so mad, always acting like he was better than her, even though he was a complete weirdo. Her eyes narrowed, and she stomped over to his wood pile.

“I know you come into my room at night,” Eva accused, trembling in front of him, fists clenched. “I don’t want you creeping around me while I’m sleeping.” Eva spat, tossing her arms angrily into the air.

“You make weird noises at night. Do all humans make weird noise when they sleep?” he questioned.

“Wait, what? This is what I am talking about. Are you even listening to me?”

“You make strange noises while you sleep, awful ones,” he answered with an unreadable expression frozen on his face.

“So, you admit it, you come into my room while I’m sleeping?” Eva couldn’t breathe. Her hands were shaking.

“Yes. I check on you at night,” he stated matter-of-factly.

“I don’t want you to check on me,” she snapped.

Eva’s cheeks reddened, and she couldn’t focus. This was the longest she had ever spoken to Cain alone, and she vowed never to do it again.

“The coughing is worse at night. I worry you might stop breathing.” Cain stared at her with his charcoal brown eyes. If he wasn’t mutant-sized and always scowling at her, he wouldn’t be so terrible to look at.

“I’m fine, I don’t need you to make sure I keep breathing at night,” Eva replied, flabbergasted.

“I wouldn’t do anything to hurt you, Eva, unless Iris thought it was necessary,” Cain stated.

“See!? That’s what I am talking about. That’s freaking terrifying, Cain,” Eva shouted. “Just stop coming into my room at night!”

“Okay, Eva,” Cain answered.

“And I know you messed with my boat. I’m going to find out a way to prove it to Iris. She’s going to see you for what you really are! A monster!”

Eva flipped around and stalked away.

Cain followed her. She sped up. His large hand clamped onto her arm. She jerked back and fell into his chest. She quickly pulled her body away from his touch, but she couldn’t rip her arm out of his grip.

“Cain, let me go. Now!” Eva shouted. Cain released her arm.

“I didn’t do anything to your boat, Eva,” Cain stated, glowering at her.

“I don’t believe you.”

“And I’m not a monster,” Cain whispered, a twisted expression darkening his face. He turned away from her. “I’m going to start a fire for you tonight. Please let me know if it makes breathing too difficult.”

Eva’s heart raced as he stalked away from her, her fear and anger fighting for center stage. She stood quietly for a while until her heart rate returned to normal, almost matching the beat of Cain’s ax, and a new emotion entered the fight: guilt.

Maybe Cain didn’t mess with her boat.

Maybe.

She jumped as if slapped when a few raindrops hit her cheeks and thunder grumbled from the other side of the island. She raced back to the house, shielding her eyes from the toxic rain but keeping one eye on the forest, suspecting that Cain might have seen the light and the face too.