The Book of Firsts

Twenty-One

Several hundred students all travelling to an island resort makes for noisy airport lounges. Perhaps because I’d signed up at the last minute, I was on a slightly later flight than all but a handful, and told Lania I’d meet up in our room. Tired and feeling low, I wasn’t in the mood for chatting anyway, but the seven-hour flight to Arcadia was useful because airplanes had long symbolised transition for me. Usually, I was leaving a whole school behind, but this time it would only be the Game of Firsts. This time, I still had friends to meet up with, and greatly appreciated Lania’s warmth and care, and her insistence on drawing me in.

Thinking of Lania prompted me to reply to an email from my last school roommate, who had been a great deal of fun, and who was making an earnest effort to keep in touch with me. Usually, emails from old classmates died off within a few months, but I thought perhaps I could make more effort this time around. My last school had been exciting, and different, and I had truly regretted leaving. Not that Corascur could possibly be described as dull.

By the time the shuttle bus arrived at the hotel, I had moved beyond tired into a floaty enervated haze, but also reached a state of acceptance. I would hang around with the Art Club and enjoy this handful of days, and then refocus on my study plan. The games I’d played with the Three Kings would become a unique memory.

My assigned room held a variety of scattered luggage, but no Lania, so I unpacked, put on some precautionary sunscreen, and texted Lania that I was going to look over the activity sheets. These were many and varied, since Arcadia was a large island in the centre of a vast archipelago, with massive resorts at the tips of three different peninsulas. I was narrowing down my selections when I was hugged enthusiastically from behind.

"Sign up for the sandcastle competition on the last day!" Lania ordered. "Art Club is going to field a team."

I obeyed with a smile, then said: "Any other recommendations?"

"I want to go to the Butterfly House, and maybe jet skis, but other than that, I’m still deciding. What about you?"

"Reef diving," I said.

"Don’t you need some kind of licence for that?"

"C-Card," I said. "Already have one, but you could probably fit an intensive certification course in, if you’re interested. Diving is a lot of fun."

"By the time I was done getting certified, we’d be heading home."

"But then we could hire some equipment and go diving around Helios."

Lania shuddered. "Helios lakes are cold even in summer. Most inappropriate city name ever."

"How about reef snorkelling? Looks like it’s tied in with the diving trips, so we could travel out to the reefs on the same boat."

We worked out a schedule, sometimes doing the same activities, and at other times diverging. Lania already knew what most of the Art Club was doing, so it was easy enough to coordinate a couple of group sessions, though I decided to skip the trivia competition that night, and went and walked on the beach after dinner instead. Once away from the resort, there were plenty of options for a quiet walk, and I trailed all the way out to the end of the narrow peninsula and then back up the other side.

Ocean sound is very calming for me, and when I met Lania back at our room, I asked if it was okay to keep the balcony door open, and only took an hour or so to get to sleep.