Page 20 of The Sailor in Polynesia
I frowned, strangely disappointed that I had two coconuts to enjoy all by myself, when I noticed the dinghy pulling back from shore and turning toward my boat. Jonas picked up speed, zooming in a wide circle aroundWelinabefore cutting the engine and drifting over to my side.
“Mia,” he called out, grabbing the edge of my boat. “Grab the coconuts and come to the beach.”
Jonas waited while I gathered up some things to take with me: a beach towel, bug spray, my camera. When I was ready, I stepped down into the dinghy and Jonas shot us toward the shore.
He threw an anchor out and the tender drifted in, bumping the beach. I climbed out and Jonas handed me my bags.
“Mia!” Lila called out to me. “We’re having a barbie!”
“I can see that.”
“Eivind and Jonas went spearfishing this afternoon,” Marcella told me. She wrapped some large reef fish in aluminum foil while Jonas joined Eivind to help him build a fire. Elayna poked in the trees, picking up wood. “We will have reef fish curry tonight.”
“Yum,” I said. “I was going to set my camera up if that’s okay with everyone?” I asked the general group. They all nodded. “Then can I help?”
Marcella gestured to a bag. “There are blankets in there, and a cooler with drinks. You can set up a place to sit.”
I set up my camera first, getting the tripod together and adjusting the settings to be just right: a little overexposed to carry us through the sunset. After initiating the time-lapse feature, I stepped back and around to the fire.
I worked spreading out the blankets and my own beach towel around where the guys were piling sticks and coconut husks. They had a small bottle of gasoline to get it lit, and it ignited with a loudwhoosh.
Jonas turned to find me and wiped his hands off on his shorts. “You brought the coconuts?” he asked hopefully.
“I did.” I grabbed the bag that contained the two coconuts, a large sheathed knife, and two reusable straws.
I palmed one of the coconuts out of the bag and held it up. “This one must be mine; it’s looking a little ragged.”
“Do you need help?”
“Nah, I got this part. The husking is the hard part.” With one hand, I pulled the knife out and pushed the sheath off with my thumb. I found the three soft spots and pointed them upward. Angling the knife slightly downward, I chopped into the shell right below the eyes.
Like a basketball, I rotated it ninety degrees and chopped into it again. Turn, chop, turn, chop. I cut a small square into the top, which I pried out with my fingers. Bending down, I plucked out a straw and popped it into the water.
“Ta-da!”
I looked up to find the entire crew watching me, and Lila enthusiastically applauded. I offered it to Jonas, who took it in his hands and sipped through the straw. He smacked his lips with a sigh. “Still cold.”
I repeated the process with mine and sat cross-legged on my towel, resting the coconut in my lap. Jonas wedged his into the space by the edge of the blanket and threw some more logs onto the fire, building it up. It tilted into evening now, the sun creeping toward the horizon and the shadows getting longer.
Jonas sat down next to me, wriggling his butt into the sand to get comfortable. Even with the slight heat from the fire in front of me, I could feel the warmth radiating from him. I snuck looks at him out of the corner of my eye. We faced the sunset together and the warm pinks and reds reflected in his eyes and made his hair, loose again now, glow.
Lila and Elayna were laughing about something, but I couldn’t take my eyes off Jonas.
He glanced over at me, his smile slipping as his expression became more serious. We watched each other for a moment until Jonas cleared his throat and broke our eye contact. I swallowed and looked down at my coconut, fiddling with the coarse husk.
Jonas’s chin tilted back behind us at my camera, set up on the tripod. “That is filming now?”
“Yup.” I leaned back on my towel and watched as Marcella carefully placed the packets of fish in the flames and sat back on her heels. Jonas paused for a moment, poking the fire and watching the flames. He glanced behind us at my camera again.
“Jonas, stop!” I laughed. “Stop looking at the camera. Just act natural, or I’ll turn it off.”
He turned back reluctantly. “I do not know how you do it. How do you ignore the camera?”
“Practice,” I said.
Elayna crouched down and dusted some sand off the blanket on the other side of Jonas. “What are you doing with this video anyway? I thought you were not filming.”
I took a sip from my coconut while Elayna sat down. “I don’t have any plans for it, but even if it doesn’t get published, at least tonight is memorialized somewhere, right?”
