Chapter Eleven
Early the next morning, the two men were working together to catch fish from one of the island’s many fresh water streams. They liked to hunt before the sun rose too high and made activity impossible in the midday heat. The armband, which Tall still wore to keep things easy for Melanie, lay to one side as he exerted himself in the shimmering blue water. Even their own mother couldn't have told their bronzed muscular, shining bodies apart in the sun-dappled waters. Not without a second look, anyway.
They had been fishing together for an hour in stubborn silence when Sebastian broached the subject of Melanie with his big brother.
"I think I'm in love." He said quietly.
Alex didn't respond but continued waiting, intently focused on the approaching fish in the stream.
"Did you hear me? Sebastian said.
"I heard you."
"So what do you have to say?"
"How about you stop bullshitting her?"
Sebastian said nothing.
"And stop bullshitting me as well."
"I'm telling the truth, Alex. I really think she's the one, ever since I first saw her."
"What? Two weeks ago at Drummond Airlines check-in? Don't make me laugh shorty, because I'm not in the mood."
"You're just jealous because you can see she wants me and not you."
"Why the hell would that make me jealous? I've passed on a hundred girlfriends to you without a thought. I've never been jealous of you about anything because I've never needed to be."
"By passed on, you obviously mean that they’ve abandoned you for me and by never jealous, you mean never jealous for long."
"You’re the one who’s jealous. Anytime I get close to a woman, you come running like a hound to start playing around with her. When have I ever done that to you?"
"Never, because I’ve never been close to a woman."
"That’s the first true thing you’ve said since we crashed on this island."
"Until Melanie."
Alex smashed his fist into the water.
"God damn it, you aren’t even close to her. The only reason she talks to you is because she thinks you’re me."
"You have no idea what happened between us before that plane went down."
Alex turned on his brother.
"You better tell me exactly what that means."
Sebastian smiled. He knew his brother inside and out. Maybe it was an identical twin thing, but he could read him. Even if he didn't move or say a word.
"Forget it." He said. "You wouldn’t even believe me if I told you anyway. Let’s just put it this way: maybe you’ll finally know now what it feels like to come last in something."
Alex went deathly silent while his brother waited for his response, smiling. His sinewy muscles flexed suddenly and there was a flash of sunlight across his makeshift harpoon blade. Water splashed in front of Sebastian who jumped back, the smile vanishing from his face. When he opened his eyes again, his brother was holding his harpoon up with a skewered fish on the end.
"You’re bullshitting. There wasn’t time."
"Jesus Alex, you need to relax. Of course, I’m bullshitting. How could there possibly have been time?"
Alex tried to reckon the time in his head but it was already so long ago and it had been so crazy with the turbulence and the accident. He couldn’t tell if his brother was telling him the truth or just trying to rile him up even further.
"You've got to admit that she's something special though, right?" Sebastian continued.
"I don't want to talk about her with you."
"That's because you can see it too, right? You can’t bullshit me bro, I know you too well, just like you know me."
Alex ignored his brother and began wading back to the sand to bag up his fish. Sebastian followed him.
"I've never seen anyone like her. She's not like any other girl we've ever dated. All those debutantes, heiresses, and movie starlets with their fake boobs and plastic lips. Melanie is for real. A true, honest to God authentic American beauty, inside and out."
Alex stopped dead but didn't turn around. His lengthening hair was beginning to spread out over his broad, tanned back. The muscles of his shoulders bunched and knotted with tension.
“Okay." He said softly. "Look, you're my brother all right? My twin brother. We've always shared everything, and we’ve never held any secrets from each other."
Sebastian smiled. Now the truth would come out and the truth had ever possibility of setting him free.
"You’re right bro. Come on, it’s time for a little truth here. What’s really going on?"
Alex turned around to face him.
"You know how long I’ve been looking for the right girl."
Sebastian wanted to be as sarcastic on the subject as usual, but he knew this wasn’t the time. His face was serious as he nodded his head.
"I haven’t dated anyone seriously in over a year."
Sebastian raised an eyebrow.
"By haven’t dated, you mean you haven’t slept with anyone in over a year?"
Alex nodded his head.
"Jesus Christ bro, no wonder Melanie is beginning to look like the Holy Grail to you. You have one serious case of blue--"
"It’s not that. Come on Sebastian, grow up for God’s sake. Do you know how many women I’ve met over the last year?"
"Not as many as me."
"Granted. But a gynecologist probably sees fewer women than you do."
"I don’t know what you think I am."
"Lost is what I think you are, which is why I want you to just back off from Melanie. You don’t need to add her to your list of conquests."
"Oh, so you’re allowed love her but I’m not? I don’t get the distinction. How am I any different to you where she’s concerned?"
"I’ve been looking for someone to get serious with for over a year while you sleep with anything that moves, insisting that I’m crazy. Then as soon as I find the girl I want, you suddenly fall in love with her too?"
"Yeah, exactly. Why is that so hard to understand? While we’re at it, let me come clean as well. I’ll admit that when you told me you had fallen in love at first sight, I thought you were just in need of a good blow--"
"Don’t go there."
"--whatever. A good time. When you said it was with a flight attendant, I thought you must be jetlagged or overworked. When you said it was a Drummond employee, I figured you had lost your mind and I was determined to save you from your own stupidity. When I heard that Melanie already had a relationship with another Drummond employee--"
"What?"
"Didn’t you know? She was seeing Mitch McGovern until very recently."
"How the hell would you even know that?"
"Don’t look so surprised. Melanie told me. Maybe she trusts me more than you. Did that ever occur to you?"
"It’s bullshit. She knows who we are. Why would she risk getting herself and Mitch fired by telling you?"
"If you don’t believe me, then just go and ask her. I’m curious to find out if she’ll even tell you."
Alex glared at the brother he loved and trusted his whole life. He had never felt anything like hatred for him before, but there’s a first time for everything.
“Okay, I’ll ask her. But it won’t make any difference one way or the other -- not to me anyway. It won’t be me that passes that on to Human Resources, even if it were true."
"It is true. So, when I heard that I thought, 'Okay, this girl is trouble'. She’s willing to take risks and she has a big mouth. It’s a very bad combination."
"So if you’re scared, just keep away from her. Maybe Mitch could get away with seeing her but you know as well as I do that she’s off limits for us."
"Now that truly is bullshit." Sebastian said. "The Drummond uniform never stopped the old man from getting what or even who he wanted."
"That's exactly why he's so against it now."
"It was all his fault and you know that. Our mother never did anything wrong. The old man is a good guy, but he just won't admit to being wrong about anything, ever. He's always been like that."
Alex took his brother’s arm into a tight grip.
"We can't touch her, you or me -- end of story. You know what the rules are: you lay one finger on her and you're out. Zip. Nada. Homeless. A nobody."
"I don't care." Sebastian retorted. Alex gave a belly laugh at that.
"Sure. You've never wanted for anything your whole life. The same as me. We had brand new Maseratis on our sixteenth birthdays for God's sake, personal shows from pop stars and comedians, whatever and whoever we wanted. Now you're telling me you're going to give all that up at the age of 31 and start from scratch with a flight attendant who will also be unemployed. Have you ever even set foot inside a 'normal' person's apartment? You wouldn't have space to store your vintage wine collection for Christ's sake, let alone live and be happy."
"I won't need wine. All I'll need is her."
The two went silent for a moment.
Melanie had wandered up to the two men as she heard Alex’s loud masculine laugh through the trees. She had intended to sit and watch them fish but when she heard they were talking something made her hold back. The conversation sounded too interesting and authentic to be interrupted. Maybe if she had a little patience she might have a chance of figuring out the truth about who these two men really were. She decided to stay hidden and listen in.
"I'm not saying I don't understand." Alex said. "I've got to admit that this last week...I don't know what's happening to me...every day I see her she just looks more beautiful than the last. Every movement, every word from her mouth."
"I know." Sebastian agreed. "This sunshine and healthy living isn't helping any. She was already gorgeous to begin with, now with her golden brown skin and that glow of happiness and health -- she was obviously stressed-out before. Now she's relaxed and happy. My God, it's like I can't even look straight at her anymore. I want to, but God, it's almost too much."
"Is it her? Is she really this gorgeous? This perfect? Or is it just some kind of island fever?"
"Maybe both. I mean, we've been here three weeks now and well, we don't exactly have much privacy, if you catch my drift. She's everywhere. All I can think about is her, and well, we're just human beings; we have needs. You might be able to live like the Pope but I'm not used to going this long."
"Especially not with someone so gorgeous tempting you all the time, just by being there, and being who she is."
"I know. If only she was an asshole or superficial, dumb, or something, but not such a perfect lady."
"A lady I need to fuck."
Melanie’s jaw dropped. She gasped and covered her mouth with her hand.
"Tell me about it."
The two men stood with their heads hanging down, their increasingly wild dark brown locks covering their bronzed backs.
Hidden in the trees, Melanie struggled hard to control her breathing. After all, the men weren't the only ones who had needs. She knew she was more relaxed and happy, maybe more at peace than she had ever been in her whole life. But it hadn't occurred to her that it had made her so much more attractive to her two island-mates. She looked down at her honey brown skin, her flat stomach, and golden thighs. She had to admit; she was looking pretty damn good and feeling even better. Maybe better than she had ever looked before in her whole life, if she didn't say so herself.
"That girl was just created to be loved." Sebastian said.
The problem for Melanie was that the same thing had happened to the boys. Their hair had grown long and their already muscular bodies were more toned and bronzed from island life and tropical sunshine than she could almost bear to look at. She found herself falling into ever more intense fantasies at increasingly shorter intervals throughout the day. Sometimes she had found it impossible to focus on even the smallest task and had to go and bathe in the sea just to calm herself down.
"I need her." Alex said.
The more they spoke, the harder it was getting. She was afraid to move in case she cried out.
"That perfect ass." Sebastian said.
Her heart raced.
"Those gorgeous deep blue eyes; I could look at them forever."
She could feel warmth begin to spread through her loins.
"I just want to get my hands on her." Alex said.
She put her own hands to herself now, between her legs, terrified that they would see her and find her doing this to herself.
"You keep your hands off her." Sebastian was serious again.
"Who says she's yours?"
"Trust me, she is and you know it."
"I don't know any such thing." Alex threw the harpoon into the water and squared up to his brother.
"I’ve already had her for God’s sake. Of course she’s mine."
Melanie jerked bolt upright.
"Stop telling those damn lies! There wasn’t any time, you said so yourself." Alex shouted.
"It’s not a lie. There was plenty of time. Melanie just doesn't remember it yet. We were together in the master bedroom when the turbulence hit. It was the greatest experience of my life and judging from her response, I think it was pretty damn awesome for her too."
Melanie's breath froze. Could it be true? Had she really done it with one of the brothers already? Was that why the name Alex meant something to her and Sebastian gave her bad vibrations? But which one had she been with? Which one was giving her the bad vibrations? The one she had slept with or the one she hadn't?
Her head was spinning again.
"If you fucked her -- and I don't believe you did -- then why are you pretending to be me? What the hell is with that?"
Sebastian stared at his brother across the shimmering tropical water.
"I'm not pretending." He said, very seriously.
"What are you talking about?"
"Have you gone crazy? I really am Alex. It's the accident. The plane crash. You were confused afterwards, very confused. Somehow..."
Alex dropped his harpoon and lunged at his brother, the two crashed into the water and struggled together, wrestling in silence.
Sebastian knew his brother well, but he hadn't expected this level of violence in his reaction. What he thought of as a white lie, an ‘all’s fair in love and war’ game was obviously driving his brother crazy.
Melanie watched, transfixed as the two men thrashed silently in the lagoon. The water made their already slick muscles glimmer in the morning sun. They looked like two Greek gods battling on earth, two pagan spirits of the forest. They fell to the sandy bank of the lagoon and continued struggling. Once again, one of them seemed to be slightly more adept than the other and pinned his brother beneath him. Melanie tried to tell which was which, but the armband was lying on the ground beside them.
"Admit it!" The one on top shouted. "Say your goddamn name!" He held his fist above his brother's head.
"Don't do this, Sebastian." The brother below said. The brother on top drew his fist back, ready to strike.
"Stop!" Melanie shouted. "It's enough! Don't hurt him."
Alex remained with his fist poised, ready to strike.
"Is it true?" He said. "Did you sleep together on the plane?"
"I... I don't know." She faltered. "I don't remember anything."
"Goddamn it." He hissed, lowering his fist in defeat. "This is going to drive me crazy." He stood up and swept his dark wet hair back out of his eyes. "Melanie, you have to believe me, I am who I say I am, even if you can't yet figure out who's who."
"I want to believe you." She said. "I want to believe both of you."
"Thank God for that." Sebastian said. Alex gave him a menacing look.
"I don't know what's gotten into my brother. You'll have to forgive him."
"Forgive him?" She said. "You're the one who was ready to beat his brains out."
Alex stood helplessly, realizing his mistake. He loved his little brother but he knew how shrewd and cunning he was, especially when it came to women. It was the only thing he was unable to beat him at. He had never cared because women also came easily to him; you lost one, there was always another ready to take her place. Until now.
Alex looked Melanie hard in the eyes.
"Mitch McGovern." He said. "Tell me what he means to you."