The silence following Curtis' appearance was blissful. The soft murmur of waves caressing the southern cliff side in a harmonious manner with the rough grunts of the more spiteful northern sea against its opposition, played to be a relaxing music trying to get Curtis to sleep.
The after-effect of the teleportation from the Goonterim had Curtis paralysed, as it did with many newcomers. Curtis, stuck in place, could only move his eyes around to see the greenery in a blue canvas.
Such an empty place, what could I possibly be doing here? Curtis thought to himself, as his body slowly returned to normal.
Unbeknownst to Curtis, behind him was the reason that he had been teleported to the island.
Curtis felt the feeling of his mouth, his whole head in fact, come back. He could speak now.
"Fuck am I doing here," Curtis felt the need to say out loud, like it was not enough for him to only think it, he had to say it too.
"Beautiful place though, better than the white prison from before," Curtis kept speaking, the naive boy had regained feeling above his hip, yet he still had not turned around to observe the island.
The sudden speaking from a secondary individual had devastatingly destroyed a primary individual's sweet slumber. A shadow engulfing Curtis' entire figure slowly arose behind him.
"Damn…" Curtis was not paralysed anymore, he could have looked backwards before speaking instead he stood still, facing forward, expressing his own desires, "…this would be a beautiful place to fuck."
"Where my girl at… hahahhaha…" Curtis continued, appreciating the scenery while self-deprecating. In his own world, Curtis looked forward and stared at the blue sea in hope. He was realising his goal, his personal goal.
Curtis closed his eyes.
A beautiful symphony playing in his head with the vision of a future yet to come, a man and a woman with their three children. A small brown cottage house for the family, laughter echoing everywhere. His wife had her head resting on his left shoulder, whilst she was hugging him from behind. Her mouth opened next to his ears, he knew the words that were about to be said.
"How about we go to town boy~," a hoarse voice entered flowed into his ears. Curtis could feel his the ends of his mouth stretch from one ear to the other.
"I love you too darl-," Curtis stopped mid-response in his fantasy, shot his eyes open and looked towards his left. A sharp pointed nose, curled at the end, sitting atop a mouth whose ends curled down with a long slimy red tongue reaching out, almost licking Curtis' ears. A chin, clefted and a pair of furious eyes staring through him with red streaks surrounding the iris.
As would a person used to living in a warm climate getting a cold once the temperature drops, poor Curtis who had just been fantasising a distant beautiful future fainted.
"Hmph, I thought he was tryna fuck, he must be a Gooner." The horrifying face that caused Curtis' fainting had relaxed to reveal big beautiful eyes on an decently bridged nose above pink plump lips. The hoarse voice from before had also disappeared along with the face, now changed to a soft, high pitched melody every time that the woman spoke.
"I'll let you go for now boy, maybe you are my one and only. Not yet though."
The woman left Curtis' slumped body where he had fainted and walked into the hut for a short while before returning with a folded chair, unfolding the flashy pink folded chair and placing the unconscious Curtis on it.
——
When Curtis woke up, a sudden flash of what had occurred appeared to him which he dismissed as some bad dream due to teleportation. Instead, Curtis accepted that he had teleported right into the inclined chair he was in.
Curtis looked to his right, a seemingly endless field of green that seemingly ended at some point and started a field of blue.
Curtis looked up, a bright blue sky with little-to-no clouds and a shining sun which was relaxing for his eyes to look at even though it was extremely bright.
Curtis looked to his left; a set of light hazel eyes, shaded by long eyelashes, sitting underneath a pair of cleanly shaped eyebrows. All of this on a bronze canvas along with a decently long nose above pretty plump pink lips. With her hair blowing around due to the sequential breezes, Curtis saw what was the prettiest, most beautiful woman he had ever seen.
Locking eyes with Curtis, who had his jaw hanging open due to his astonishment, the woman spoke softly, "I'm Rhea, nice to meet you."
Now, Curtis' jaw performed an astonishing movement where it went up, fell back down, then as it went up again along with a small noise stemming from the back of his throat, it stopped midway and fell back down before Curtis could speak a word.
Showcasing his persistence, Curtis spent ten minutes jiggling his jaw; one might call it some sort of mating ritual akin to the dances of some species of birds, before he introduced himself to this new persona.
"Curtis, right back at you!" Non-existent charisma flowed into him as Curtis protruded his introduction.
Rhea let out a soft giggle, she had introduced herself and said nice to meet you a while back, yet the young man had excitedly responded with right back at you as if he had not just spent ten minutes performing a jaw dancing piece in front of her.
"How do you feel Curtis?" Rhea decided to not bring up the topic of him fainting and steered a conversation in another direction.
"Like- what do you mean how I feel," Curtis paused with a uncertain look then questioned back at Rhea, "How do I feel about the situation I am in currently or how I feel about this place?"
"About this place," Rhea replied. Seeing her gaze turning soft as she spoke, Curtis felt as if Rhea had a deep connection to this place.
"I built this place by myself you know." Rhea added on.
Curtis was right, Rhea did have a deep connection to this place.
Wait, she built this? There is nothing here that is built. Curtis thought and quickly propped up in his inclined chair, supporting his upper body with his arms so that he could proficiently turn around and look.
A small hut with irregularly placed red planks for the walls, no door and a flat roof; Curtis assumed that it was a flat roof as he was currently place in front of the said hut and it was dark inside except the patches of light from the gaps in the badly built walls.
Curtis turned away from the hut and slumped back into his chair, facing Rhea.
With a serious look on his face, almost a worried look, Curtis spoke, "Look here Rhea, it hurts me to break a beautiful woman's heart but if I am anything at all, then I am truthful. Maybe fixing up the angled planks so that it was all aligned will make your hut better, but if you want to know how I really feel about this I going to give it to you straight…"
Curtis paused.
Curtis sighed.
Curtis nodded his head left and right.
Curtis shed a tear from his left eye.
Curtis continued, "That is the worst hut I have ever seen."
Curtis put his right hand on the left side of his chest and clutched it. A second tear came out from his left eye before a whole stream flowed out of both his eyes.
"No! No! No! I could have had her smile."
"BUT!"
"Lying to her and seeing her smile for this once is far worse than telling her the truth, allowing her to be smiling all the time"
"BUT!"
"Am I even going to see her again- CURSES TO MY MAKER, WHY MAKE ME SO HONEST, SO DILIGENT- CURSES!"
Curtis continued rebutting his previous statements with new ones.
Rhea looked at Curtis. Her eyes were expressionless, the curves of her lips were at a standstill and there were no wrinkles or creases on her face to hint the formation of an expression. She just kept looking at the man in front of her talking to himself- no- debating himself.
As Curtis reached the point amongst his debate where he was now cursing evolution itself for causing his honesty, he was interrupted by Rhea.
"The hut was built by the previous Gooner for me as I somewhat resembled his mother, 'My mother's face shouldn't be scarred by the harsh sun' he had said, but he left before he finished."
Curtis stopped his dramatics and ever-so-quickly switched his expression and overall atmosphere. He brought his right hand up and stroked his chin slowly as he asked Rhea, "So what did you build?, there is nothing else here screaming 'I was built!' other than this hut."
"The green field." Rhea briefly answered.
Curtis looked out around frantically and pointed everywhere.
"NO WAY! YOU BUILT THIS?" Curtis was surprised, he seemed to have forgotten that he had just been teleported here.
"Yes, I did." Rhea had a small smirk on her face. A look of pride.
"THAT'S WOW, THAT'S-" Curtis stopped speaking and just started clapping his hands, slumped back in his chair. The loud claps echoed throughout the field at the same time as a breezy breeze breezed around.
Rhea's ears slowly got red, not that Curtis could see this.
"Alrighty, stop now!" Rhea waved at Curtis to tone down his excitement.
The clapping stopped, followed by a wave of silence.
"Answer my question now," Rhea broke the silence, "How do you feel Curtis?"
"Wait a second." Curtis returned, he looked away from Rhea and closed his eyes.
He started feeling.
The perfect amount of warmth being shone onto him by the sun, with a soft cool breeze embracing Curtis every time the warmth got a bit too much, as if the breeze was programmed to do so.
The sound of waves crashing, the occasional sound of the wind going by his ears.
Curtis was relaxed.
"Relaxed." He opened his eyes and gave the long awaited reply.
"That's good." Satisfied, Rhea turned in her chair to face towards the sky.
Fighting back the urge to sleep, Curtis felt off about something, his intuition was screaming.
Curtis thought back to what Stella had said and procured a query for Rhea.
"So what am I supposed to do here?"
Letting out a low chuckle, Rhea softly replied, "Nothing."
"Just Enjoy the Stay!"