Work Text:
This whole adventure began, of course, when the small ship I had been upon, bound for America, was caught in a storm. I managed to jump into the water without getting caught in the rapidly capsising ship, and cling to a floating board as the ship went down behind me. I climbed on top, managing to get fully out of the freezing water, before I lost consciousness.
I awoke the next day, somehow alive. Rising, I inspected my surroundings, and found that I was on the beach of some island. I was uninjured, and so walked along it, finding the few supplies left among the beach. I had some fresh water, collected during the storm, and a little bit of food.
I ate and drank sparingly, hesitant to go into the jungle beyond this paradisiac beach, fearful that there were eyes within it. While on the beach I had at times felt an odd presence, and - though I was hesitant to believe many tales where they related to foreigners - none of them had been good. Besides, I knew not what wild animals could live within.
Eventually, however, the sun, nearing its precipice, forced me there. I stopped swiftly once the jungle grew thick enough to shield me, but even then I was certain I was being watched.
In this feeling I was correct. My watcher revealed herself to me with no warning, in a moment emerging into my line of sight.
“Hello,” was my very first word to her, upon seeing her eyes. “I do not intend you any harm.”
She was clearly a European of some sort, or born to parents from that continent, and - based on her later words to me, and their accent - English. By her tan, she had obviously been here some time. She wore strange clothes, that seemed an odd mixture of materials, sewn in no style I recognised, and went barefooted.
She hesitated a moment. There was no friendliness in her face, but no cruelty, or even really unkindness, either. She had a knife in one hand, but she wasn’t pointing it at me, and held it loosely.
“Hello,” she finally said. Her voice was throaty and husky, I supposed from disuse. “Who are you?”
With rather English tact, I extended my hand. “Li Shou Yuing. I am honoured to make your acquaintance.”
She raised an eyebrow and did not shake my hand. “You fell off the ship.”
“Yes,” I confirmed. “Are any of my fellow sailors here? Are you alone?”
“I am,” said she, voice turning a little hard. “I have no intention of changing that.”
I worried rather severely at this. “Madam,” exclaimed I, “I assure you I do not intend to disturb whatever… peace you have found on this island. I wish to leave it as swiftly as I can.”
She viewed me for a moment more. “Very well,” said she, and then, in a moment, she had disappeared back into the foliage.
I was rather put off by this - understandably, I believe - but the sun was still up. I lapped some rainwater from the leaves around me, and nibbled on a biscuit, and once dusk had fallen I returned to the beach. I doubted it was possible to be fully comfortable on the sand, but I preferred that in comparison to the jungle.
In the morning, before it became warm, I started walking along the beach, in search of better shelter.
To one side, I could see grey where the island rose up into rocky cliffs, and fancied that there might be a cave of some sort below. I reached it quickly and found, to my delight, open access to the ocean, which was teeming with fish. In looking through the few things that had washed up on the beach more thoroughly, I had reckoned that with a stick I could fashion myself a fishing rod and feed myself that way - and here was the perfect spot.
I waited out the hot sun there, then made my way back. To my surprise, I found some fruit, wrapped in palm leaves, deposited on the beach. Perhaps the woman’s dislike of me was not so great as I anticipated. Indeed, I felt far more secure knowing that she had offered me this little kindness; now I was quite sure she did not plan to slit my throat in the night.
I walked around the rest of the beach, and by the time I had come to the other side of the cliffs, and then returned, it had become dark. Returning, I slept immediately, and at dawn entered the jungle to start cutting a branch away for my fishing rod.
The woman found me there, and I only realised she had been watching me for a while when she chose to break the silence.
“What are you doing?”
I spun. She was leaning against a tree, looking at me with genuine confusion. I flushed at my ignorance, and mutely showed her a fishing hook. She seemed to understand, but made no further remark.
“What is your name?” I asked eventually. She seemed to properly consider it.
“Ace,” was her answer.
That was no typical name, but I accepted it nonetheless.
I wondered how she had ended up here, how she had come to be so in-tune with the island. She wore dirt like natural camouflage, and moved with such ease among the vines and trees.
She fidgeted for a moment. “Do you know woodworking?”
I tilted my head at the question. “No.”
“Do you have nails?”
“A crate of them.”
“That’ll do.” And she had disappeared again.
I tried for the rest of the day to somehow craft a fishing rod, but I could not find the right branch, nor cut it as I wished, and having no clue how to give myself a way to pull in the twine, I went back to the beach unsuccessful.
I was woken twice that night. Firstly, just as I had fallen asleep, Ace came and rooted through my supplies, taking first the nails, then the hooks and twine, then at dawn she crept down and deposited something on the sand. After she had left, I discovered that it was a fishing rod and fruit, cut small.
I had some success fishing with the fruit as bait. I did not particularly look forward to eating raw fish, but the Japanese did it fine, and in the end I managed.
I deposited a leaf-wrapped fish in the jungle where we had first met, and in the morning, when I woke again, it had been taken.
That day, Ace took me around to the other side of the island. There, in silence, I helped her cut down several trees. I was not particularly helpful, for which I dared to guess it was just the company she wanted me for.
At the end, in some fit of strange bravery, I asked how she had come to be on this island as well.
“The same as you,” was her answer. She offered me a shoddily made flask of water, and I drank appreciatively. Days of drinking only from leaves had taken their toll on me, and to my surprise I finished the whole thing.
“Oh,” said Ace, sounding just the slightest bit embarrassed. “You don’t know where the stream is, do you?”
I stared at her for a moment. She dropped her gaze. “Follow me.”
I did. She set off at a sort of jog, loping easily through the forest. I could not hope to catch up, but she would pause for me, atop a log, or ahead of a turn, so I never once lost sight of her. I was grateful for it. This island did not seem to contain any predators more dangerous than the ones you might find in England, but I still would not wish to meet its inhabitants while lost in there.
The stream Ace had referenced was a few strides from the outskirts of the jungle, but hidden away by its foliage.
“It’s just a trickle here,” said she, “but further up it thickens. You may come up and drink whenever the need arises.” She tossed me her flask next. “Take this as well. I can easily make another.”
From there, the little band of jungle I had considered I was free to wander expanded. And, too, at the end of each day working on the boat, I would ask her a question, and she, honestly, would respond.
Had she seen anyone else? She had not.
How long had she spent here? Seven years.
Where was she from? Perivale, England.
Did she want to go back? Not in the slightest.
How old was she? Twenty-three, or twenty-four, she wasn’t sure.
Why was she helping me? So she could be alone once more.
Did she not realise that if she returned to England with me, she could very possibly meet the king, or at the very least become rich and famous? Yes, and it didn’t interest her in the slightest, and I couldn’t tell anyone of what happened to prevent anyone from coming and nosing around.
By then, I had started crossing the jungle through a passage in the centre. I supposed Ace had never forbidden me from going through the jungle - in fact, she hadn't even discouraged it. But my own nerves were enough to stop me.
By then, we had a frame, and were beginning to fill it in. It was tricky, and we’d had to start over time and time again, but we were going at a steady pace. And, more importantly, Ace, bit by bit, had started talking to me. My questions at the end shifted to inconsequential things, things to better learn about her. She had been baptised in a Protestant church, but didn’t really believe in ‘that’ anymore. She told me she was the only other person here, so it wasn’t worth antagonising her over it, but I, who had learnt to read Mandarin through copying sutras, didn’t find it in myself to mind, and told her that.
She hadn’t meant to turn up here. She’d become a stowaway by accident, and jumped ship when the crew found out, and by pure chance landed on this island. She’d thanked God one last time, then got to work making a home for herself. She had planned to study chemistry. I asked how, and she said she just had to deepen her voice a little and wear loose clothes. I confess I doubted her, but she was too much fun to interrupt.
She liked music and would sometimes hang outside the operas and the concert halls to listen to the music, even if it was muted. She didn’t like her mother and barely remembered her father. She had chosen her name during a game of cards.
I spoke of myself too, eventually. I had a brother, and we’d lived together for a while. He’d got himself a job helping fix carriages, which paid well enough, but gambling had led to us becoming distant. I’d hugged him and told him bǎozhòng for the last time before I’d boarded. I’d been on the ship for a while, intending to move to America. I felt there was a wealth of untapped minerals, and I could surely dig them up. All I had to do was tie my hair into a queue and none of the men there would look twice at me. None of the ones on the ship had even realised that I hadn’t shaved the front half of my head. Of course, then the storm hit.
“And that is what you still intend, is it not?” asked she. “To go to America.”
I was a dash caught off-guard by this. “Yes,” said I, after a moment. “Yes, of course.”
By this point, we’d tentatively begun to have fun together. Ace showed me safe reefs and taught me how to swim. We could float in the water for hours and never get bored of talking, or race each other along the beach, or hide and find each other in the jungle, or harvest fruit and fish and hunt. It was only the little boat that kept us from spending all our days like that.
On the day before I set off, Ace took me up to the land atop the cliffs to show me her home. It was a hut, with a fireplace outside, and within was a large hammock. She clearly saw my reaction to it, which seemed far more comfortable than the makeshift bed I’d made on the sand, and invited me to spend my last night in it.
Despite my tiredness, and my knowledge of the energy my journey would require, I struggled to sleep. There was room enough for both of us - and it was a normal thing, was it not, for two girls to sleep together - but something about Ace’s presence there stopped me from sleeping fully.
When I did eventually sleep, it was light, and once it was dawn I was getting up, putting my hair into a queue. We went down to the beach together, and Ace pressed a small, wrapped bundle - a flask of water, some fruit, and cooked fish - into my hands.
“Bǎozhòng.” She’d mangled the tones, but I didn’t mind.
“I will. Thank you, Ace. I won’t tell anyone about this island, I promise.”
Neither of us could say anything more, so I kissed her on the cheek, then she kissed me, and we pushed the boat onto the water together. I climbed in, and began to row north-west. Sat as I was, I could see Ace standing on the beach, and I could see her for a long time as I pulled away.
I was so distracted that I did not notice that the boat was beginning to become slick under my feet. In a moment, I realised we had put no sealant in it, and it was taking in water. It took only a few more moments before I was certain I would drown if I tried to continue, so, for the second time in my life, I jumped out of a sinking boat.
My lessons with Ace and time on the island had done me well. I was fit, and could swim as dogs did, but my time with Ace had been in gentler waters, and I was already exhausted by the time I had crossed perhaps half of the way back there.
Then a most magnificent thing happened. Ace was suddenly there, taking hold on me. She’d pulled me onto my back, and, slowly, started swimming backwards, one arm on my chest to keep our bodies together. I did not know if she could make it, but finally we were close enough that we could touch the sand below us, and crawl out onto the beach, too tired to untangle ourselves from one another.
“Thank you,” I gasped, “thank you, Ace. You have saved me again.”
We barely spoke the rest of the day, and at night we were both still so shaken that we lay with each other. All through that night I thought about myself, and my life, and my plans for the future. Did I really want to spend the rest of my life with people who would never consider me a full human being, or just hoping that the mines wouldn’t get stopped again, or having to hide who I really was? I looked at Ace, and thought about the time we had spent together, and in the morning I was ready to choose.
“I think we have a lot of time,” said I, when she did wake up. “I do not feel the need to attempt to leave again immediately, and if you assent to it, I should not.”
She agreed with visible relief.
In the many years since then, we have not tried to make another boat.
At first, it was under the pretence that I was afraid to repeat my near death, and that Ace did not dislike my company enough to force me off this island, but when we were both certain it was more, that in our time together we had begun to develop strong, unfriendly feelings of affection for each other, we agreed that I wished to stay, and that she wished me to stay as well.
I live my life, now, with great happiness. I did not think it possible, but somehow, despite all our years together, she can never say a single thing that bores me.
I had felt the urge to write down my story in some form for some time now. I knew a message in a bottle would only call people to our island if it were tossed out to sea, and would never reach who I would want it to reach. My brother, I know, is despite everything an optimist, and he needs only pray to know that I still breathe. We said our goodbyes back in London, and though I do sometimes miss him, I know that he has a strong heart, a strong will, and must surely be living a good and happy life now, as I do.
Therefore, I will leave this bottle in the cave I found on my second day here. If, someday, an adventurer finds it, know that we both were greatly happy. If you find our bodies, or our bones, bury them together in the jungle. We have no wish to leave here.
Sincerely,
Li Shou Yuing