• Koneku sighed as she turned away from the setting sun and walked back up the beach to her waiting friends.
    “What’s the matter?” a shorthaired blond girl asked. Koneku just sighed and sat on a log.
    “I just miss being home… and having a good hot shower,” she added as an after-thought. Three other girls nodded their agreement and sat next to Koneku, sitting in the same position on the worn, smooth log.
    “I know what you mean,” a long almost black-haired girl commented. The fourth, however, was silent.
    “What about you, Dakra?” the blond asked the silent girl. Dakra looked up and slowly turned her head to the blond, looking through her medium length brown hair with a small frown on her face.
    “We’ve been stranded here for nearly a month and no ships what-so-ever have come even close to this damn island.” She said softly, quiet annoyance in her voice. Then she lowered her head to her knees again.
    It was true though, Kit-Kit remembered. May first, the four girls who had never met, all boarded a cruise ship, headed for the Caribbean for a week long vacation. The first night the ship set sail, it had run into jagged underwater rocks that hadn’t shown up on any radar until it was too late to turn, and the ship had rapidly begun to fill with seawater. By the time the four girls had gotten to the deck, all but one life raft was left. It was dark and windy, with rain falling in torrents.
    “You two! Get in the boat!” A soaked blond with short hair yelled, her name was Victoria, pointing to one girl with long brown hair, and another with long near black hair. “You!” she yelled over the wind, pointing at the remaining girl. “Help me get this thing into the water!” Staying silent, the tall girl helped Victoria lower the boat with the other two girls in it into the water. Leaping over the side of the ship, Victoria and the other girl landed in the dingy, causing it to rock for a moment. Grabbing the oars, Victoria strained, trying to get the boat to move, but failing to do so in the tormenting wind and rain. “Hold onto the sides- try to stay in!” she yelled over the wind, holding onto one side. She saw the other three also holding onto the sides, hanging on for dear life.
    Dozing on and off through the night, Victoria finally felt the dingy floating in the shallows, rocking gently with the motion of the tide. Looking around herself, she saw the other three girls sleeping on the bottom of the dingy, their clothes still damp from last night’s storm. Looking around from the boat, she saw that they were half in water and half on fine, white sand. Trailing her eyes up the beach, she saw straggled trees on the sand, then forest further up, and in the distance, a mountain. Turning her attention back to the sleeping girls, she shook them awake, barely dodging a flying fist from one.
    “Sorry,” the medium length brown-headed girl apologized as she rubbed sleep and sea salt from her eyes. Victoria just shook her head, excusing the apology.
    “Come on, let’s get out of the boat,” she said, hopping over the side, the other girls following. Walking to the other side of the boat, Victoria pulled it with the help of the medium brown haired girl. They pulled it up the beach, out of the water’s reach. Then she plopped on a log, the others following suit, staring at her.
    “You saved us.” the black haired girl announced, finally breaking the silence. Victoria blushed, but slightly nodded.
    “I just used my head in a crisis.” she replied. “My name’s Victoria, by the way.”
    “I’m Amber.” the tall medium length brown haired girl said next.
    “I’m Megan.” the long black haired girl said next to Amber. Victoria saw that she had a streak of blond on the top of her head. Her black hair turned out to be dyed.
    “And I’m Alexis.” The last girl said.
    “Who’s the oldest?” Megan asked, looking at Amber, who was the tallest. “You?” she asked Amber.
    “Well, I’m fifteen.” she said, shrugging.
    “Fourteen.” Both Megan and Alexis said one after the other.
    “Sixteen.” Victoria said last.
    “Oldest and shortest,” Alexis teased. Victoria grinned, but didn’t say anything.
    “What are we gonna do now?” Amber asked, looking at Victoria. The other two also looked at her, waiting for an answer. Victoria felt like it was a deer-in-headlights moment, caught in the spotlight.
    “Well, apparently our cell phones don’t work out here without power lines,” the other three whipped out their phones and started pounding keys, getting no signal on the island. “I’m surprised that they survived the rain during the night.” Victoria continued. “I guess the best we can do is stay here, build temporary shelters, gather food, explore, and hope someone notices we’re missing and comes looking for us.” Victoria said, making eye contact with each girl. “But first, we should give ourselves new names- sort of like Island Girls. Mine will be Kit-Kit.” the other girls pondered for a few minutes, then one- Amber, gave hers.
    “I like the name Dakra. It was something of a nickname I had in my high school.”
    “How ‘bout Koneku, for me?” the other three nodded, and then turned to Megan.
    “Daku. It’s been one of my favorite nicknames since I was a little kid.”
    “All right. Dakra and Koneku, you two go out onto the beach and collect as much driftwood as you can for a fire. Daku, you and I will go into the forest and try to find berries.”
    “Why not catch fish?” Daku suggested, looking at the water and then at the boat, which was still resting on the sand not far from the water’s edge. “We can go out in the boat and fish.”
    “We don’t have a fishing pole.”
    “We can make one.”
    “How so?” Daku paused, then grinned.
    “We can make a fish net.” Kit-Kit rolled her eyes.
    “Again, how so?”
    “Haven’t you ever read one of those survival books before, or something like that. Swiss Family Robinson or something?” Kit-Kit thought for a moment, then nodded.
    “Okay, but that leaves the question of how we are to make a net. We don’t have rope or reeds or anything like that at our expense, and there really isn’t a hardware store out here either.” Daku frowned.
    “Fine, I’m out of ideas.” Resignedly, Daku followed Kit-Kit into the boarding forest, soon being surrounded by big, thick trees. “So, what are we looking for?” Daku asked, looking further into the forest, past the never-ending trees.
    “Berries and maybe some tree fruit. Anything safe and edible. We’ll stay away from mushrooms though. A J.I.C precaution.
    “‘J.I.C.’?”
    “Just in case.” Kit-Kit replied, spotting a large bush full of ripe, large, and probably juicy blackberries. “Let’s pick some of those,” she said, walking over to the bush.
    “What’re we gonna carry them in?” Daku asked. Kit-Kit pulled her shirt out, creating a sort-of basket by the ditch in her shirt.
    “We can use my shirt- good thing it’s black.” Daku nodded, and started picking the berries, avoiding the small red ones here and there, and picking the big, juicy black ones. Kit-Kit held her shirt out with one hand and helped Daku pick berries until her shirt was fully. Then Kit-Kit helped Daku fill her shirt with berries, once in a while eating a black berry, spitting out the ones that tasted sour. While they were picking, Kit-Kit piped up,
    “When I was younger, we- my mom, half-brother, and I used to live across the street from a family who had a few black berry bushes behind their house and during the summer I would go over there and pick the berries and we would put them into home-made pies. They were really yummy.” Daku laughed quietly.
    “I love blackberries, just not the one’s that look good and juicy but turn out to be sour- I like the sweet ones.” Kit-Kit nodded.
    “Think this is enough?” Kit-Kit asked as they walked slowly back up to the beach with their shirts full of berries.
    “It should be,” Daku replied, smiling at Kit-Kit. Then she looked up. “What a pile!” Kit-Kit looked up as well and whistled. A pile of driftwood stood on the beach, perhaps three or so feet tall, and was next to a wide, dug-out fire pit.
    “That’s a really good pile, you two.” Kit-Kit praised Dakra and Koneku, smiling broadly at them.
    “Yeah?” Koneku asked, then stood. “Look what else washed up on the beach while you were berry picking.” She had been sitting on a crate that was still wet from the water.
    “Do you have anything we can put the berries in?” Kit-Kit asked, showing them the amount of berries her and Daku had picked. Dakra ripped a big curve of bark from a piece of wood, walked down to the water, rubbed it clean, and then held it while Kit-Kit and Daku poured in their black berries. The piece of bark was large enough for all of the berries. “Okay, step back- I’m gonna open it,” Kit-Kit said as soon as her shirt was empty. The other three took a couple steps backwards. Kit-Kit gave a short karate yell, and swiftly hit the boards with her left hand, breaking the top cleanly in half.
    “Cool!”
    “Pretty neat.”
    “Good job.” Kit-Kit grinned and gave a short bow.
    “Level three brown belt.” she then frowned, looking at the lid. “I would’ve gotten my black belt next week.” her shoulders slumped. Daku gave her a hug, then patted her on the back.
    “We’ll probably be off this island in a few weeks at most, Kit-Kit.” Kit-Kit gave her a small smile, then lifted the rest of the broken lid off the crate and threw it into the woodpile. Looking into the crate, she pulled out a tangled fishing net, four long knives- big enough to be short swords, and several yards of rope.
    “What the heck were those used for?” Koneku asked, picking up one short sword.
    “All of this will be helpful,” Dakra stated, as she inspected the rope.
    “Yeah, but I missed something else,” Kit-Kit said, reaching back into the big crate. She pulled out a few different sized hammers, and two big burlap bags of nails. “Geez, these are heavy,” she grunted, lifting the bags.
    “One thousand count. No wonder they’re heavy.” Daku chuckled, taking one bag and setting it on the ground. Kit-Kit looked at the darkening sky, the setting sun setting the water and clouds on fire.
    “I think we’ll have to sleep on the sand, at least for tonight. Tomorrow we can start building stuff- temporary houses or whatever until we’re rescued.” Kit-Kit suggested, getting nods from the other three. “Does anyone know how to build a fire?” she asked. Dakra and Daku nodded.
    “I was in girl scouts, so I’ve done it before.” Daku said as Dakra selected a few pieces of wood, building a teepee in the middle of the dug out fire pit. Rubbing two sticks fast together, Daku soon had a fire burning and it grew bigger as she blew on it. Koneku handed Dakra a few more pieces of wood which she put by the side for easier access and later use.
    The girls sat around the fire on smooth logs passing around the makeshift berry bowl, gazing into the flames, each somewhat lost in their own thoughts.
    “So, who wants to talk about where they came from?” Daku asked, after about an hour of listening to the fire crackle and pop. Kit-Kit looked up from whittling a stick with one of the knives, Dakra looked up from poking around the fire, causing it to flare and fall, and Koneku gave up trying to make out constellations from the bright stars.
    “About where we came from?” Koneku repeated, looking more clearly at Daku. She nodded. Kit-Kit shifted, tossing her pointed stick into the fire and put her knife beside her on the log, and Dakra stopped poking at the fire.
    “Maybe not, at least for me,” Kit-Kit said slowly, looking at Daku. “I mean, you guys can, if you want to, but I think I’m gonna hit the sand.” The other three wished her good night, and Kit-Kit walked a couple of feet away, then lay on her back in the soft, warm sand, staring at the stars, wishing she was at home in her real bed instead of on an island with three other girls whom she had just recently met, but was stuck with for who knew how long. Back around the fire, the other three girls were talking softly.
    “I grew up in New York- Upper East Side. My mom and I lived in a condo that had a great view. When I heard about the contest, my mom let me enter- and obviously won a spot on the ship, and everyone knows where that ended me. Or us, I should say.” Koneku started.
    “What about your dad?” Daku asked. Koneku frowned staring intently into the fire before answering, wording her answer carefully.
    “My dad left when I was a little kid- six or so, he didn’t really want a child in the first place. He stayed for a little but him and mom always fought and he would leave and come back then next morning drunk. Mom got tired of it so one night my dad forgot his keys when he left and mom locked the door and called the cops, and he got taken to jail.” Koneku laughed uneasily. “We haven’t seen him since.” Koneku stopped before she could say anymore, feeling like she had said too much. The other two murmured their sympathy, but Koneku just waved it away. “It’s fine, I get my mom to myself and she’s got a great job as a doctor- good position and good pay, so we’re well off. Okay Daku, your turn.” Daku frowned, followed by unhappy memories.
    “We- I lived in Monmouth, in Oregon. It’s a dinky little town, but it has a decent school at least. My parents aren’t exactly the kind who give me all the attention I want nor need, but they leave me be for the most part. My mom is the real problem in my family; she’s the one I don’t really like at all. My dad’s the cool one, the nicer one. We lived in a chocolaty brown town house- only one with a fence- and I had to share a room with my cheerleader sisters and annoying cousins. It’s hell on earth most days.” Daku stopped, annoyed with saying so much so fast.
    “Dang, sounds like you gotta lot on your plate.” Dakra sympathized. Daku gave her a small smile.
    “The only cool thing is, my parents have a sort of “sweet shop”. It’s cool. What about you?” she nodded at Dakra.
    “Both of my parents were in the air force, and we still get an allowance from them, so we’re still well off. We live in Los Angeles, California- it’s pretty nice, except for the earth quakes every once in a while. They’re pains in the a**.” Dakra said quickly, not wanting to say too much. The others accepted her short answer. Koneku yawned.
    “I don’t know about you two, but I’m beat, so I’m gonna hit the sand too.” Daku and Dakra followed Koneku, lying on the sand, Daku curled around Kit-Kit, and fell asleep fast on the warm sand.
    Waking up while it was still dark, Kit-Kit felt the uncomfortable needs of nature. Detaching herself from a cuddled Daku, Kit-Kit walked over to the fire and stirred the embers, creating enough light by which to see. Grabbing a long stick, she managed to catch one end on fire and walked along the beach until she was several feet away from the sleeping girls. Setting one end on the stick upright in the sand, Kit-Kit dug a kitty hole, pulled down her pants and girl boxers, and relieved herself.
    Sighing with content and relief, when she was done- a little annoyed that she couldn’t wipe- she pulled her clothes back up, grabbed her stick and made her way back to the sleeping group, tossed her stick into the fire pit, then cuddled back between Daku and Koneku, falling back asleep.