Tatjana Soli - The Last Good Paradise

Her last year of high school, her dad’s borrowed used Buick stalled in a blizzard on his way home from his latest business venture, a Russian vodka bar featuring ice bar stools that you sat on with thermal cushions, which was too avant-garde by half for Cutthroat. After sliding down an embankment, he inexplicably rolled down the windows and fell asleep, freezing to death. At one a.m., no one was on the road to see or help him. The next day, her mother entered rehab. Her younger sister, Janelle, married her high-school sweetheart while still in high school and stayed in Cutthroat to raise Wende’s new nephew, Petey, who came seven months later. Wende left the day after graduation, propelled as if by rocket fuel out of there.

But true happiness was not as easy as a change of venue. She waitressed while attending Valley Junior College, then transferred to UCLA for her degree. She acted, took film studies, sang in a girl rock band, but nothing clicked. Then she met Dex. That brush with celebrity was seductive, allowing her to skip the whole struggling part and just enjoy his overflow of attention, but at bottom she knew that her life with him would only be a high-octane version of staying in Cutthroat.

* * *

“The problem in the past is that the protesters have all been framed as haters ,” Wende said to the table that night. “Your story needs to be recast.”

In retrospect, in light of what it snowballed into, it was hard to remember how such an outlandish plan had begun. Why hadn’t the rest of them thrown out the idea immediately? Perhaps because Loren, a fatalist, was already caught up in his own personal unwinding. Titi and Cooked were pleased to get an American-style corporate makeover, though later they would be increasingly unhappy when they were pushed out of participating in their own revolution. Richard wanted to see the little man, the overlooked man, triumph at last. Dex thought of it as his brave grand adventure to win back Wende’s heart. They all let the implications slide because in the back of their minds they figured the naysayer of the group, Ann, recovering attorney, skeptic, would squelch it, which she didn’t, precisely because it was expected of her. She had a long history of saying no to the big idea, and what had it gotten her? Maybe naïve Wende had a point. Who would want to grow up and end up Ann? At the very least, what harm could come of such a harebrained idea?

In a partylike atmosphere, they stayed up all that night, eating dessert, then cheese, then fruit, drinking bottle after bottle of rum while hashing out Dex’s idea about a grassroots PR campaign. It was dawn by the time they straggled away to bed.

At noon the next day, hangovers be damned, everyone got up for breakfast and picked up where they had left off the night before, like a prolonged game of Monopoly. The mood at the resort had utterly changed. They were on a mission, and perversely, it felt more natural than the earlier enforced leisure.

Ann dug her phone out of a bottom dresser drawer (it finally had become too ridiculous to fetch it out of its liquid plunge-pool storage each time), and Titi called her relatives to inform them of the nuptials and to pass on invitations for the wedding feast. Cooked did the same (putting Wende on for a moment to say hi to his mom).

In the late afternoon, Loren made a production of handing over a key to one of the garden fares for Cooked and Titi’s use. Titi had to sit down on the step, she was so overcome.

“I never imagined this. I figured that all my life I would only clean these rooms.”

Wende, teary-eyed, patted her shoulder. Titi flicked off the girl’s touch.

“Even though I take naps in the beds during the day,” Titi continued, “I take showers, use perfume left out…”

* * *

Quickly, the computer had gone from taboo to everyday. There was always a line on Loren’s lanai, waiting to check email or surf the web.

While Richard waited for a cake recipe to print out, he sent a stealth email to Javi:

Hope you’re okay. Things are complicated here, but it’s incredible, too. Don’t tell Ann, but I feel guilty enjoying all this while you can’t. I’m making my first Polynesian-inspired wedding cake — how cool is that?

Loren called Steve the manager to see why it was taking so long to procure a boat. Richard was driving him mad with shopping lists.

“It’s on its way from Papeete. I’ll have it to you tomorrow.”

“We’re getting ready for a wedding and a change of ownership here.”

Silence on the other end.

“You should have consulted with me first,” Steve said.

“It had nothing to do with you.”

“Headquarters will make you a very sweet offer.”

“Cooked and Titi own it.”

Steve’s voice rose higher and tighter, like a cord being stretched to breaking. “I won’t be comfortable sending people over under those circumstances.”

“Nothing will change.”

“We need professionals. We need—”

“The resort is closed now. We’re having a wedding feast.”

“Luau style? How about I bring select guests? If you promise drums and dancers, I can charge two hundred fifty euros a couple. We’ll split it sixty-forty. Romantic? Primitive? We’ll get interest.”

“Come near this island, I’ll shoot you.”

“Is that a threat—?” Steve yelled before the connection went dead.

* * *

It was inexplicable how Wende knew exactly what to do, as if she’d been doing it all her life. Leaving Cutthroat had been nothing. Living in LA, ditto. Her life was finally taking off here on the island. For the last two years she had been observing and been disgusted by Prospero’s misguided and behind-the-times marketing and anemic social media campaign, and she had ideas …

Inexplicable also how everyone accepted her new authority and her wish to take control of things. Dex’s muse had been retired for all time. The confiscation of the WILD pendant had been prescient. Gone were the bikinis and short shorts, the leather corsets and platform shoes. She borrowed oversize T-shirts from Dex, and Ann’s lady-birder Bermuda shorts. She tucked her hair up under a baseball cap. Her new outfit announced Serious.

* * *

Members of Titi and Cooked’s extended clan began to arrive. Mostly by motorboat, they came packed in tightly like sardines, wearing colorful printed dresses and shirts in celebration, carrying baskets of provisions for the feast. Dancing, music, and singing started before they stepped on the sand. Loren borrowed a boat for supply runs. Ten people arrived in the morning. By nightfall, one hundred bodies had pitched themselves inside and around the fares , kitchen, dining area, and beach. From splendid isolation the place morphed to happy wedding/refugee camp.

Titi and Cooked got caught up in the celebrations, and now it was Wende rather than Loren who was the taskmaster.

“We need to rehearse, Cooked,” she nagged.

Her transformation included not flirting or even acknowledging their past relations, which made Titi very happy and Cooked morose.

“Remember,” Wende told him, “this is for the cause.”

He swayed, already too far gone on good wedding rum.

“I want a casting call. Bring all the biggest, strongest, meanest-looking guys you got.”

“They will be identified by police.”

“Way ahead of you — we’ll put masks on them.”

“It should be me,” Cooked said, posing for his martyr poster. If he could push soda sales, why not revolution?

“Not you. You’re the hero. You are the future owner of this resort. You can’t be the bad guy.”

“But—”

“I need to conference with Dex now, please.” She tapped her shapely foot, dismissing him. Another surprise — how enjoyable it was to work on a purely business level and not go to the personal. Indeed, after taking meetings with Dex, Cooked, Titi, and some of the male relatives about the casting call, after going over supply logistics with a haggard Richard, who was now overseeing food service for more than one hundred and fifty people, with another hundred threatening to descend on them, Wende and Dex retired to their fare , exhilarated and drained, but did not discuss the schedule for the next day, as was witnessed by about twenty nosy Polynesians peeking in through every available crack in the windows, doors, and walls.