Friday Fun – Stealing Gran’s Booty, Chapter Four!!
Who’s ready for another installment of Stealing Gran’s Booty?
If you’re late to the Gran’s Booty party (yes, I said that on purpose), this is an old, old contemporary romance about a pirate treasure hunt on a deserted island that I wrote a long, long time ago when I was still a wee baby writer learning how to tell good stories, and I’m bringing it here to you in the spirit of fun. 
We’re up to chapter four, but you can find chapter one here, chapter two here, and chapter three here! Happy reading, y’all!
Stealing Gran’s Booty by Jamie Farrell
Chapter Four
Raina’s first memory of her father was of the two of them sitting at the oak table in the kitchen working on a Strawberry Shortcake puzzle. She couldn’t remember if she’d loved her father or the puzzle more, but she knew it was first time she’d recognized that as far as people went, he was her favorite in the whole world. Back then, Frank Bishop was her hero. And puzzles had become their thing. All through her childhood, they’d worked brainteasers and riddles and Rubik’s cubes and those crazy metal puzzle contraptions. They did it all. At least, they did until Frank decided he liked the idea of buying into an auto body shop with an old buddy more than he liked the idea of spending Saturdays bonding with his daughter.
It had been a long time since she’d thought about those days, but something about Gran’s mystery man triggered the memories. Maybe it was his game face, his steely determination after the spider incident so similar to the resolve she’d seen on her father’s face when they started a more complex sort of puzzle. Or maybe it was simply that the mystery man was a puzzle, and she was going to have to dust off her critical thinking skills if she was going to stay a step ahead of him and Gran. Given the lack of evidence of more rent-a-dates, she was pretty sure this morning’s surprise was her only option.
She took a vicious bite of her third lemon jelly donut as she watched the surf roll in time with the tropical beat strumming from a portable CD player behind her. She didn’t have to follow through with her plan. But if she didn’t, what would Gran do next? Suggest she trade Heidi for Kyle the steroidal deckhand? Send Pirate Pete out for a mechanical bull and a vibrator? No wasn’t a word Gran was familiar with, and Raina was tired of being Gran’s problem to fix. Pretending to fall in love with the mystery man was, unfortunately, the best of her options.
Even if she managed to convince everyone she’d met her soul mate, he’d make it clear the feelings weren’t reciprocal. The jerk. He was cranky, he touched spiders, he stole the dog’s affections, and he made fun of Raina’s safe lifestyle choices. Did he think it was easy to be so straightlaced? It took a lot of effort to turn boring into an art form.
She chomped into the donut again. She couldn’t do it. It wouldn’t work. So she needed to figure out what Gran intended for him before any plans went into motion.
Her mother plopped onto the blanket beside her and placed a cup filled with a gooey greenish mixture between them. So that was what a tofu seaweed shake looked like. Nadine squinted at Raina. “Feeling better?”
Physically. Raina nodded.
“Good.” Her mom brushed at the sand on the blanket. “Your grandmother wouldn’t let me come over last night. She said it would ruin the surprise.”
Raina cocked an eyebrow at her. “Treasure hunt?”
Nadine’s lips twisted into a wry grin. “She’s getting predictable in her old age.” She leaned closer. “She spent a week swearing somebody stole her map. Even made me take her to the bank to get a backup copy out of her safe deposit box. And do you know what?”
It was hard to guess exactly what when Gran was involved. But Raina was certainly not looking forward to discovering what sort of treasure Gran had arranged for on the island. Especially if she’d already found him. “It turns out Dad and Uncle Steve drew it when they were little?”
Nadine shook her head. “She forgot she sent her first copy to the travel agent for booking the trip. Did I tell you how she found the travel agent and the pirate ship? Through Craigslist. Can you believe that? The internet is the worst thing to ever happen to your grandmother.”
“Mom. She’s a grown woman. She can surf porn for all I care.” Raina had bigger problems than how Gran found the ship. Like how she was going to survive the ride back. And the stupid map would probably tell them to go traipsing through nature’s original landscape nightmare. Ugh.
Nadine scrunched up her nose and pointed at the cup. “I’ll give you ten bucks to accidentally spill that.”
Pirate ships, sand up her butt, spiders in her shirt, cranky gigolos, and now she had to listen to her mother and her grandmother bitch about each other for the next week. It was bad enough they called her at home to mediate their stupid disagreements. Worse when they called her to take sides. Here she couldn’t pretend to lose her cell signal and hang up on them. Hell would’ve been more of a paradise. “Spill it yourself. I’m not here to be your trained monkey.”
Nadine raised an eyebrow. “Now do you feel better?”
The pit of Raina’s belly gurgled. Nadine wasn’t talking about her physical ailments this time, but she’d had enough of the touchy-feelies for one morning. “If I say yes, will you and Gran act like adults?”
Nadine poked at the side of the cup. The green goo inside jiggled. She poked it harder and the cup swayed, though the sludge inside barely rippled. “God knows I can’t speak for your grandmother.”
“Then don’t.” Raina shoved the last of the donut in her mouth.
Nadine chuckled. “If I’d known a pirate ship was all it would take to get you to voice an opinion again, I would’ve hired it a year ago.”
Raina ground the donut to bits between her teeth. Her mom might not approve of her methods, but Raina was doing her best to get on with her life. If Nadine wanted to help, Raina could think of a few other things her mother could’ve done, or rather not done, in the last eighteen months. Losing her dad was hard enough. Living with her mother and grandmother after the fallout was sometimes worse.
“But you have a good point.” Nadine abandoned all attempts at subtlety as she swung her arm around and backhanded the cup. It flew through the humid morning air, tumbling end over end. Fluorescent glops of goo splattered across the blanket and dropped into the sand with a series of gummy plops. Nadine giggled. “Oh, dear me, just look at that mess. And now I’ll have to eat a donut for breakfast instead. The horrors.”
Gran shuffled to the edge of the blanket, her wrinkled cheeks pink from the exertion of dancing in the sand. The stuffed parrot pinned on her shoulder toppled over backwards, pulling her graying button-down shirt tight across her saggy breasts and revealing a skull-and-bones tattoo on her shoulder. She’d donned a pair of Grandpa’s old work trousers and rolled the legs up to fit her short frame. The only thing she lacked to complete her outfit was Pirate Pete’s eye patch and Jack Sparrow’s hat. “Now look what you done! Pirate Pete done got that seaweed just for you, and you be treating it like dirt. He even be learning was a bean sprout was, though I be telling you, his bean don’t got no trouble sprouting.”
So that’s what the old folks were calling it these days.
Nadine grimaced as she wiped her hand on a clean corner of the blanket. “I told you I didn’t want a special diet.”
Gran bared her blackened-out teeth. “I done been telling you the same thing the last ten years, but you still be putting that healthy crap on the table every night.”
Nadine sat straight up, game face on. “The doctor says you need to eat better, and it’s only been two months.”
Gran snorted. “He done say that to make you happy ‘cuz he be knowing how much you be liking to torture me.”
Gran had moved in with Frank and Nadine five years ago. They were in the middle of divorce proceedings when Raina’s dad died. Raina thought her mother should’ve divorced Gran at the same time, but Gran didn’t believe in it. She’d been convinced she could keep her son and daughter-in-law together despite all the evidence to the contrary. And now she believed there was no reason to move out of her almost ex-daughter-in-law’s house. As for Nadine, Raina suspected she let Gran stay as penance for misdeeds in her marriage. They both needed to grow up and get along for the peace of the rest of the family.
“Oh, for heaven’s sakes.” Raina put the right inflection in her tone to perfectly mimic her mother. Gran chortled with glee, but Raina switched voices and glared at her too. “We be here to be having a good time, so we be fighting until we be puking all the way home.”
This time Nadine snorted, but Gran didn’t seem to notice she’d been mocked. The older woman nodded. “And don’t be forgetting the sex part. We done gonna fix you yet. You be seeing how nice that Kyle be playing with Xena? Wouldn’t he make a fun lay?”
And so it began. Her mother was right. Gran was getting a tad predictable.
Nadine sputtered. “Eleanor-”
Heidi paused from watching Kyle long enough to glare at Raina over the top of her oversized sunglasses. “I don’t share.”
Raina’s cheeks burned as she dropped eye contact with Heidi. That was another memory she didn’t need to relive this morning.
“But it only be for one or two nights, just so’s Raina don’t be tossing her donuts no more.”
Yep. She was going to have to do this the hard way. She shoved to her feet. “I found my soulmate this morning.” She didn’t know words could taste so bad and yet flow so easily from her mouth. “So there’s no need to fix anything else or for anyone to share, thank you very much.”
“Oh, for heaven’s sakes,” Nadine muttered.
Gran clapped with undisguised joy. “Shiver me timbers and blow me down. It done be about time. Does he be looking hot enough to lick?”
Raina swallowed hard. That was one image even her lust wench couldn’t handle this morning. “Like a lollipop.”
Heidi snickered. “Does he run on batteries?”
“He runs on his love for me.” More like he’d recoil in horror and run away if he knew Raina was professing their never-ending devotion to each other.
Nadine glared at Raina, obviously not amused or believing a word of it. “Enough.”
“She so doesn’t have a guy.” Heidi rubbed noses with Xena. “Isn’t she so sad, my little baby love, making up a fake boyfriend? Oh, yes, so very very sad.”
“For your information, he’s real, and he’s perfect.” Perfect? The woman-hating rent-a-date cabana boy? So maybe he wasn’t her boyfriend. But he could’ve at least come down to breakfast. Heidi’d change her mind about sharing then. “He’s strong and kind and protective and hot. Seriously hot. Like he’s probably raised the temperature of the island by ten degrees just by being here. He’s got the most perfect set of shoulders I’ve ever seen on a man. And you can look in his eyes and see right through to his soul.”
Overkill alert. Did she want them to believe this or not? When it came right down to it, so long as Nadine and Heidi didn’t convince Gran it was a lie, did it matter?
Gran nodded at Raina as a gust of wind lifted her eyepatch. “That be the spirit. Does he got a brother?”
Ew. “We were too busy talking about other things. Like his volunteer work with African orphans and how many one-handed pushups he can do. I’ll have to ask next time.”
Heidi set Xena down and shoved to her feet. “Could you be pathetic on your own time? Gran has a surprise for us.”
Raina resisted the urge to stick her tongue out. Barely. But boyfriend-stealing wasn’t an easily forgiven offense, so it wasn’t a big surprise that Heidi still held a grudge. “I’ve already gotten the best surprise. I don’t need anything else.”
Both of Nadine’s ears twitched. She looked like she’d found out the donuts were made of tofu and wheat germ. “Raina.”
It was fine for Nadine to overshare, but Raina had to keep her sex life to herself? A girl couldn’t even have an imaginary boyfriend without getting parental crap. “I wish I could bottle my happiness and share it with all of you. It’s like having a little rainbow dancing in my soul.”
Heidi rolled her eyes. “Nadine, you shouldn’t have dumped that shake out. Raina’s mistaking constipation for happiness.”
Nadine stomped her foot. “Eleanor. Tell us about the treasure hunt.”
Gran sniffed. The parrot tipped off her shoulder as her posture drooped. “You done ruined the surprise now.”
Guilt nudged Raina. Gran generally had good intentions even if the execution was poor. Raina braced herself for the worst, but still had to ask. “So what kind of treasure are we hunting?”
Gran stared forlornly out at the ocean. “It be pirate booty. I got me a map.”
“Real live pirate booty?” Raina prompted.
“Darn tootin’.” Gran tugged the parrot back upright. “And we all be splitting it when we be finding it, and we all gonna be rich.”
Nadine tugged on her ear. “My life is saved. Chocolate pirate coins will surely keep me from financial ruin in my old age.”
Gran wagged a finger at Nadine. “You be making fun of my booty?”
“Of course not.” Nadine stared serenely at Gran. “Why travel hundreds of miles when I can do that at home?”
Raina held up a hand to cut off whatever Gran was about to say. “Mom. Gran gave me the greatest treasure in the world. The least you can do is pretend you’re grateful.”
“I’ll be grateful when I get a chance to approve of your soulmate.”
Heidi’s lip curled. “If this is going to get all touchy-feely, I’m going back to the ship.”
“The only thing we be touching today be pirate booty.” The parrot wobbled back over Gran’s shoulder as she reached for her flamingo-speckled backpack in the sand.
Nadine sighed. “Hope we brought enough hand sanitizer.”
“And this here be the map what’s gonna take us to the loot.” With a flourish, Gran pulled a yellowed, folded piece of paper from the bag. “I done got it myself from a real live pirate back in 1945, right before I met my dear George.”
“God bless his soul,” all four women said in unison, though there was much eye-rolling on the part of the three who hadn’t been married to him.
Gran made the sign of the cross. “Amen. Now let’s go get us some booty. Who be having the compass?”
After a chorus of not me’s, Gran shrugged. “Don’t matter. The map ain’t got north marked no how. We just be looking for the palm tree.”
“There’s one.” Heidi pointed to the nearest of about a dozen scattered at the edge of the beach, her silvery orange nail polish sparkling in the morning sun. Xena let out a yip and ran to the tree, then squatted in front of it. Heidi didn’t seem to mind her dog spreading organic joy. But then, the dog’s diet was probably more organic than Raina’s.
Nadine tilted her head up toward the sky. “Lord save us all.”
Gran stomped a boot in the sand. “Not a straight tree. We be looking for the crooked palm tree. Look here on the map. It done be more up the hill. Then we be going twenty paces east and we be looking under the rock shaped like Texas. That’s where our treasure be.”
Raina gingerly grasped an edge of the map as a light breeze fluttered the paper. Nadine and Heidi moved to peer over her shoulder. An oval-shaped blob covered the top two-thirds of the paper, with Cartesian coordinates and written instructions scrawled beneath in faded ink. A big X marked the spot two inches left and down from the center of the blob.
“Gran, this doesn’t look like our island.” Heidi smirked at Raina. “Maybe we should get back on the ship and look around for a while. That’d be fun, huh?”
“Sure. Didn’t you bring your new Coach purse along? I used up the other barf bags.”
Heidi rolled her eyes. “Is your boyfriend going to hold it for you?”
Where was her boyfriend? She hadn’t scared him off that fast, had she? Maybe his other responsibility was to bury the ring pops and Mardi Gras beads while everyone else ate breakfast. Or maybe the spider bit him and he was laying on the hillside dying.
Or maybe he decided he’d rather take his chances with the sharks and swim home instead of putting up with the Bishop women for a week. That did seem the most likely scenario.
An image snuck into her mind, his arms slicing through clear blue ocean, water gliding over the rigid muscle in his upper back. Bad lust wench. A pretty body didn’t equal a good partner. But if she was going to pretend to be in love with him, she might as well admit his looks were more pleasing than his personality. Grumpies aside, he couldn’t be all that bad. He’d been nice to Xena.
Gran tapped the map. “No, this be the island. See here? It done says Conqueso Cay, and Pirate Pete says that what this island be called forever. Nobody ever comes here. I done bet it’s because they think it be made of cheese. Them hurricanes and cheese monsters what the island be named after maybe changed the shape, but I know we be in the right spot.”
Cheese monsters? Raina cut a glance at her mother.
Nadine shrugged as if to say she’s your grandmother. “How do you know, Eleanor?”
“‘Cuz I got me good instincts, and that’s what they be saying. We be on the right island.” With a hmph, she crinkled the map and shoved it back in her bag. “We be going this way.”
“Gran.” Raina grabbed her arm. She acted like an eight-year-old, but her bones were a little older. That forest was no place for a woman in her eighties. “The ground is really uneven in there. Are you sure you know what you’re doing?”
Gran scoffed. “Do I ever be steering you wrong?”
Nadine snorted. “Since you asked-”
Raina poked her mother in the ribs to shush her. “I’m serious, Gran. One of us could get hurt.” Or eaten by a creepy crawly family of miniature beasts. The more she thought about it, the more she hoped the gigolo cabana boy was okay. At least Gran wasn’t acting like anyone was missing. But she also thought there were cheese monsters.
Gran planted her fists on her hips. “Better men than us done be hurt for less. We be having us a duty to find this here treasure and divvy up the plunder.”
Heidi stepped on Raina’s foot. “Do not mess this up,” she hissed. “Do you know how much good a pirate treasure could do for the planet? You owe the Earth.”
Was she kidding? Had she forgotten Gran hired guys to dress up like aliens and jump out from behind cacti when they went to Roswell a couple years back? Whatever treasure Gran had dreamed up, it wouldn’t be valuable enough to save the Earth. It certainly wasn’t worth risking life and limb and peace of mind to crawl around in the forest. “In case you haven’t noticed, we’re in the middle of nowhere. What happens when one of us falls and breaks a leg? Where are we going to find a doctor?”
“Excuse us.” Heidi grabbed Raina and pulled her through the sand to the water’s edge where Kyle sat staring at the ship. “You must’ve puked out your common sense yesterday. Gran wouldn’t have brought us here without scoping out the perfect place to hide it first, which means somebody’s already cut a clean path. If you don’t want to go, fine, sit on the beach and be a baby. But don’t screw this up for the rest of us.”
“It still won’t be worth anything.”
“Wanna bet? Gran’s loaded, she’s old, and she knows it’ll be a lot more fun to watch us spend it now than after she’s dust.”
Raina sputtered. “That’s- That’s-”
“That’s life. Suck it up.”
Raina’s stomach twisted. She didn’t want to think about Gran dying. So she tucked the thoughts away and concentrated on the immediate problem on the island. And she had to admit Heidi had a good point where their vacation was concerned. If she was right, odds were good Raina’s soulmate was the gardener. It explained the lack of pirate speak. And his irritation about her wanting to see his ass. Crap.
“Honor to hunt pirate treasure.” Kyle looked up long enough to stare at her boobs. “Don’t be disrespecting.”
She never would’ve made this mistake if she’d had her morning oatmeal. “I still don’t think this is a good idea.”
And there she was, boring old Raina once again. But better boring than hurt.
“Suit yourself.” Heidi sniffed. “But if you’re not going to hunt treasure, do the rest of us a favor and take a bath.”
She spun in the sand and clomped back to Gran, her flip-flops glittering in the sun. “Let’s go get some treasure.”
“Yar, matey!” Gran snapped her fingers. “First Mate Jack, I be needing my supplies.”
Raina turned her back to the water and stared into the forest. What was he up to in there? Hiding the treasure? Or setting up the next surprise? Nothing was ever straightforward when Gran was involved. Raina had a bad feeling about all of it.
And it wasn’t the rainbows dancing in her soul.
Nadine shuffled to her side and crossed her arms over her chest. “I swear to God, if she doesn’t stop talking like a pirate-”
“Could be worse.” Raina eyed Gran and Heidi as they set off toward the forest. Heidi slung Gran’s flamingo backpack over her shoulder, and Gran carried a metal detector like a cane. Xena frolicked along behind them. Apprehension slithered down Raina’s back, but she pushed it away. “At least she’s never suggested we take a family vacation to do a porn flick.”
Nadine sputtered. “I thought I raised you better than to say things like that out loud.”
Raina set off to follow Gran and Heidi. “Guess I’ve spent too much time around Gran.”
“Try living with her.” Nadine tagged along.
“Mom. Stop it.” Raina watched as Heidi, Gran, and Xena disappeared into the forest. “This isn’t going to end well.”
“Of course not. Your grandmother planned it.”
Raina gave her a warning glance.
Nadine sighed. “You shouldn’t let her get to you.”
Of all the people to talk about relationships, Nadine was the last one Raina would listen to. Look how hers had ended up. “She’s not.”
“‘Scuse me, Miss Nadine.” Jack scampered up to them, a second backpack in his hands. “Miss Eleanor says she don’t be wanting me and Kyle to go ‘long, so’s you should prolly go. You might be needing this here. It got lunch and a little something extra in it.” The more bulgy of his two eyes winked.
Nadine laid a hand on his arm as she took the bag and smiled. “Jack, how sweet. Thank you.”
Raina stiffened. Her mother and Jack? Nadine had no right to do this. Not after the last time. As discreetly as she could, Raina charged up the beach toward Gran and Heidi. They stopped at the edge of the forest.
“Problem?” Raina called. Behind her, Nadine huffed as she struggled to keep up. Good job, Raina. Give her a heart attack.
“Nothing you can help with, Miss Goody-Two-Shoes.” Heidi pushed aside an overgrown bush that probably housed a whole colony of spiders. “Gran, I think we can go in here.”
Raina peered at the opening. No spiders, but no clear path either. If the cabana boy was a gardener, he’d done a poor job. Given the way he’d watched over Xena, Raina doubted he would’ve let her and her family trip along without a clear path. Back to assumption number one.
He was still the treasure.
Would’ve been nice of him to come down instead of making them hunt, but Gran had probably forbidden it. Raina drew close to Heidi. “When she falls and breaks a hip, I hope you feel really, really bad.”
Heidi clipped a leash to Xena’s collar. “That’s the thing about imaginary boyfriends. They can’t satisfy a woman’s needs, and she gets so frustrated she can’t see the positive side of anything. And then no man wants her, so she’s doomed to spend the rest of her life alone and sexually frustrated, because she chases her friends away too. Congratulations, Raina. You are officially a bitter old hag.”
Raina flinched. When did her romantic life become everyone else’s business? “But I still have my dignity.”
Heidi smirked. “If you say so.”
Okay, so she’d given up the dignity when she stole Heidi’s boyfriend at her father’s funeral. But that was almost two years ago. It was time to move on. If that guy had been Heidi’s soul mate, fine, Raina would rot in hell. But Heidi specialized in playmates, and she’d gotten a new one fast enough. Raina, on the other hand, had vowed not to date again until she could do it without hearing her father’s last words echoing in her head. You’re just as much an emotional screw-up as your mother.
Raina blinked up at the woods looming over them, preferring to think about the spiders laying in wait. She could feel them watching her. And she had a horrible suspicion the next time they attacked, her imaginary boyfriend wouldn’t set the world right again. If it wasn’t the spiders, it would be something else.
Raina peered into the dark forest as Gran and Heidi were swallowed up by wild jungle growth. She was right. Gran had led them straight to Hell. Three more steps and she’d join them. She glanced back at the beach. With any luck, she’d see it again tonight.
It went against every ounce of common sense she possessed, but she couldn’t sit on the beach while Gran was in the woods. She stepped forward into the woods with Nadine right behind her. What kinds of treasure would they find in Hell today?
* * *
Hope y’all have a great weekend! Chapter Five’s coming next week.
