Page 22 of Restoration

I snort with amusement as I stand back up. “I’m not trying to be a downer. I figured you might have seen rocks.”

“Oh, by the stream,” he says, already turning in that direction with one of the coconuts in his hands. “There were some big ones over there.”

Now that he’s mentioned it, I can visualize the rocks too. I grab a coconut of my own and follow him.

There’s a whole collection of rocks around the stream. They’re mostly small smooth ones, but we find one large jagged one that we figure has the best chance of working.

I nod toward Edmund. “You get the honor of trying first.”

He makes a face and shifts his weight from foot to foot, moving the coconut in his hands like it’s a basketball he’s about to throw.

Then he leans over and bangs it hard against the rock.

It’s a hard impact. I can tell from the way it jars his body. But it doesn’t make a very loud noise, and it doesn’t break the thick husk of the coconut.

He’s frowning as he straightens up, peering at the coconut.

“Nothing?” I ask.

“It kind of dented it.”

“Maybe try throwing it at the rock. You might be able to get a harder impact that way.”

“Ah, smart.” He backs up a couple of steps. Winds up like he’s about to pitch a baseball.

I giggle since he’s hamming it up on purpose, and then I gasp with genuine surprise when he slams the coconut down against the rock and it smashes into pieces.

I jump up and clap my hands.

He blinks and stares like he’s startled by his own accomplishment. But it doesn’t take long for his mind to catch up. He grins and struts over to the broken pieces.

I help him gather them up. “The water all spilled out,” I say. “But the meat inside looks good.”

“Yeah. That water is supposed to be full of electrolytes, so once I figure out a more efficient way to open them, we can try to save the liquid.”

“We’ll have to have some sort of bowl or cup. Oh wait, if we can keep the coconut shell from breaking into so many pieces, we can clean out the halves and use them as bowls like you mentioned before.” I scrape out some of the meat in one piece with my fingers and try it.

It’s not the most delicious thing I’ve ever eaten, but it tastes fresh and mild. And it’s food we definitely need.

We finish off the coconut quickly, and then Edmund tries throwing another one against the rock—this time with slightly less force. The half that hits the rock smashes, but the other half doesn’t.

He loses most of the water again, but we have an intact half that I work on cleaning out for a bowl.

On the third try, Edmund manages to crack the coconut but not smash it. He grabs it and tips the cracked side into my improvised bowl.

I laugh and clap my hands again, delighted by our accomplishment.

We split the water and eat as much of the coconut meat as we want. Having another source of food will help our protein bars last a lot longer.

By the time we’re finished, we’re basically full and we have two usable bowls that we fill with stream water so we can have it later this evening.

Pretty good for two city dwellers with no tools and no survival training.

“With your smarts and my creativity,” Edmund says as I place our bowls of water in our hut where they’re not as likely to get spilled, “we’re going to Robinson Crusoe the hell out of this island.”

I can’t help but giggle again. He might regularly drive me crazy, but it’s impossible to be gloomy in Edmund’s presence.

The sun is getting lower in the sky, and thick clouds have been blowing in. It gives me an idea. “Let’s get the stuff out of the tub and put it inside our shelter. Then we can leave the tub out with the top off and maybe collect rainwater whenever it rains.”