The Guardian of the Words

      Annie jolted to a stop and I lost my grip on the wheel arch and fell to the sand, collapsing like jelly out of a mould, my legs giving way beneath me.

      “Bee-a-trizz!” Annie leapt down from the tractor and hooked her arms under my armpits to lift me to my feet again.

      “For heaven’s sake, child!”

      She was really strong for a little old lady. She held me like a rag doll, so that my feet dragged through the sand and my face was buried against her chest. I could smell the cotton of her dress and see where the blue floral pattern had gone all yellowed with sweat.

      Annie carried me up the beach to the tidemark where the sand was dry and I lay there for a while with my eyes shut, taking deep breaths, trying to make the sick, dizzy feeling go away.

      That was when I heard the Zodiac coming. I recognised the familiar whine of its outboard motor and the slap-slap the rubber inflatable made as it smacked across the waves. I opened my eyes and there was Mom steering the Zodiac to shore. She gestured frantically to me and I gave her a feeble wave in return. I felt like I was going to throw up.

      “Wait here, Bee-a-trizz.” Annie headed down to the water to help bring the Zodiac in. She stood knee-deep in the waves, holding it steady, and Mom jumped out and left her there as she ran up the beach to me.

      “Beatriz!” She dropped to her knees beside me. “Oh my God, Bee!”

      “Hi, Mom,” I managed a weak smile. When she touched my face her hand felt like ice against my skin.

      “Beatriz, you’re burning up!”

      “I’m OK,” I insisted. “I just got a little sunburnt.”

      “OK?” Mom looked horrified. “We have to get you to a hospital…”

      “No.” I pushed myself up off the sand. The world was spinning around me. “I’m fine. Honest…”

      “De child be al’right.”

      It was Annie.

      “I’m sorry?” Mom said, clearly shocked at the declaration from this stranger. “Are you a doctor?”

      “Bee-a-trizz don’ be wantin’ no doctors,” Annie replied. “Child had de fever real bad, so I keep her to sleep at ma crib til day-clean. De fever broke, so she be al’right now…”

      “At your place? She’s been missing for two days…” Mom’s voice was tense. Here we go, I thought. Mom was going to grill Annie until she got the whole story. She was going to hear all about the horse and the mud flats and Annie finding me…

      But Annie’s attention had been caught by the Phaedra, moored about forty metres offshore. She gave a flick of her head, gesturing at the boat with her lips, using them the same way other people used their hands to point at stuff.

      “You all alone on dat tink?”

      Mom’s eyes flitted briefly to the boat, then back to Annie. I could see that she was suddenly aware that we were in the middle of nowhere with no one else around except this weird old lady with her tractor.

      “Yes,” Mom said warily. “I mean, alone with Beatriz – the two of us.”

      Annie frowned. “You takin’ a vacation?”

      My mom shook her head. “I’m a marine biologist. I’m working on a research paper for Florida University, studying the migratory patterns of sea thimble jellyfish…”

      Annie grunted. She had lost interest and began to walk back to her tractor.

      “Wait!” Mom said. “I mean… Thank you. For bringing Beatriz back. I have been worried sick…”

      “De child be al’right. No need for worryin’,” Annie said. She clambered back up on to the tractor seat, yanking at her skirt to get comfortable. Then she turned the key in the ignition and stuck her bare foot down hard on the tractor pedal. The rattle and burr of the engine instantly killed any hopes Mom might have had for further conversation.

      Annie shoved her straw hat down hard on her dreadlocks. “De island be a dangerous place,” she said. She was gazing over at the dunes where we had come from, taking in the far distant end of the island where the mud flats lay. “Very dangerous. You best be careful…”

      Then, the tractor rumbled forward and Annie swung the steering wheel, turning the tractor so close to me, I thought she might run over my toes with those giant tyres. Then she raised her hand to flick me a goodbye wave and set off, the tyres digging zigzag patterns into the smooth white sand.

      Annie’s battered straw hat was the last thing I saw as she crested the dunes and sank out of sight.

      “That woman is flat-out crazy.”

      My mom, making her usual proclamations.

      “Annie’s not crazy,” I countered. “She’s my friend…” Although that really wasn’t true, was it? Annie gave me the creeps. The whole time I had been at her place I had wanted to leave. But I would never admit that to Mom.

      “You stayed at her house?” Mom launched into it. “What were you thinking? Why didn’t you call me?”

      I pulled my phone out of my pocket. It was sandy and crusted with salt, its insides totally soaked.

      “It died,” I said. And the thought briefly flashed into my mind, should I tell Mom what had happened to me? No. I stopped myself.

       If she knows what happened then she won’t let you go back there – and you must go back. You have to see your horse again…

      “Mom?” I took a deep breath. “Can we go back to the boat, please? I think I’m going to throw up…”

      I managed to control the nausea, even with the Zodiac bouncing and skittering across the waves. I sat in the prow on the bench seat, focusing hard on the horizon, which is what you do to stop feeling seasick.

      When we reached the Phaedra, Mom tied off the inflatable while I dragged myself up the ladder and on to the deck. I was still a bit shaky and I stumbled and fell forward, grabbing the side of the boat to stay upright.

      “Are you sure you don’t need a doctor?” Mom asked. It was a silly question. Even if I did need a doctor where would we find one in a wilderness reserve on the outer edge of the Bahamas?

      “I just need to lie down,” I insisted.

      “Do you want me to make you something to eat?” Mom offered.

      I shook my head gently. “No thanks, Mom. I just need to sleep.”

      I made my way past the steering cabin and the kitchen on the upper deck, gripping the railings the whole way, and then down the narrow stairs that led to our room.

      Below deck there are two rooms. The room at the front of the boat is where the jellyfish tanks and monitors and equipment are kept. And the other room is for me and Mom. On my side the walls are covered with horse pictures. The best one is of Meredith Michaels-Beerbaum jumping her horse Shutterfly over this huge water jump at the Olympics.

      I flopped down face first on my bunk mattress, my sunburn throbbing, body aching. Then I thought about the diary and I forced myself to sit up again.

      I had dumped my backpack on the floor and I reached out and