Valley of the Dolls

(ii) About The Destruction Of An Island

Rose, Ward's wife, brushed past her and shot her a smile. She had a pair of sunglasses over her head and she paraded around outside as though she owned the place. Rose wasn't a bad woman, but she somehow still managed to anger Blair so much it boiled her intestines out. She shook her head and used the signet ring on her index to prop open a bottle of rose lemonade and swished it around as she made her way outside, translucent glass tinkling against her array of pure gold rings.

"Blair! Blair, sweetheart." Her father appeared from behind a crane pulling a statue out of their pool with a woman she took a second to recognize by his side. Lana Grubbs. She was a pretty and warm woman but the panic in her eyes ultimately made her frown. "Can you help us out for a second?"

Blair nodded and hugged her father with one arm when he got close enough. "Is everything okay?" she asked and held a hand out for Miss Lana. "Hi, I'm Blair," she introduced herself.

"I'm Lana," the woman said. "You were with my husband yesterday, right? Scooter?"

"Yeah, he helped Sarah and I latch the cabin on the boat," she nodded and looked at the My Druthers, hooked on the edge of the dock. "Why? Is he all right now?"

"Yes, he's completely alright, Blair. Thank you," Ward spoke before Lana could, but there were words on the edge of the woman's lips she saw were ready to escape if it wasn't for him beating her to it. She titled her head to the side just slightly in confusion and Ward placed a hand on her shoulder.

"Did he tell you where he was going, by chance?" Lana pressed, and Blair brows twitched into an imperceptible frown. "Did he get a phone call or anything? Do you have any idea where he could've gone?"

She rubbed the back of her neck pensively, fingertips delicate over the clasps of her overlapped necklaces. "He called someone before the cell towers went down, but I don't know who it was." Sarah was already inside by then, then Blair followed and nestled herself in her brother's room for a while before migrating back to her own where Wheezie came knocking just a few moments later. "It didn't seem all too serious, though. Why, did something happen to him?"

"No, not at all," Ward shook his head and smiled, but there was something behind it that felt almost odd. "He's probably hunkered down with a six-pack somewhere. He'll go back home soon, Lana, don't worry," he said.

"Thank you, Blair," she thanked, grateful.

"Good luck," Blair waved and walked away just as they did so in the opposite direction. Then she frowned and mumbled to herself, "what the fuck?"

The man had helped them out the night before, to prep for a hurricane, mind you, and now he was AWOL and not even his wife had a clue as to where he could've disappeared. She ran the night over once, where he had latched the cabin alongside them then took a phone call once Sarah was inside and Blair and locking it. She couldn't tell who it was, but it seemed casual enough, like no hand gestures, grimaces or furrowed brows. She guessed it was his wife then, but it couldn't have been if she was going around looking for any shreds of a possible hint.

          A voice in the back of Blair's head, always so fucking morbid, kept saying that he was dead.

          She walked up the path and through the backyard, all the way to the front of the house where Rafe was looking down at his phone angrily. She came up with two conclusions: either, one, it wasn't working and he was violently trying to glare it back to life or, two, he just got a message that he didn't exactly like. Blair held her drink out amicably as she made her way to him and smiled, eyes squinted from the sun.