Sinjin nodded. “Mmm. Saffron Hill.”
Petra raised an eyebrow. “Saffron … Hill?”
“Yes, Saffron Hill. And a terrible place it was. Made us work all the day, never got enough food. Mr. Bumble — the headmaster — used to beat us.”
“Sounds like you had a dickens of a time.”
Sinjin glanced at Petra’s impassive expression. “Indeed, indeed. Finally, at fifteen, I couldn’t take it any longer. I ran away. Lived on the streets with m’ pal, Jack D —”
“Dawkins?”
“D’you know him?”
“Our mutual friend? Purely coincidental. Go on.”
Sinjin’s grin spread. “I had great expectations about how my life would go and then …”
“… Nicholas Nickleby! — you fell on hard times and were living in a real bleak house.”
“Absolutely. I was totally scrooged.”
“What a pip.” Petra’s smile wobbled into a laugh. “If you figure out how to work The Mystery of Edwin Drood into it, I’m yours for life.”
Sinjin laughed. It was a good laugh, Petra thought.
“So what’s the real story?”
Sinjin shrugged and leaned back. “The real story is dead boring. I grew up in London with me mum and dad, sister, brother, and a parakeet named Benny Hill.”
“Come on!” Petra laughed.
“Swear!” Sinjin raised three fingers on his right hand like a scout’s pledge. “M’ parents are still very much in love. We have this old piano, and on Friday nights we’d sing and eat beans on toast and watch telly all together and have a laugh. It’s a nice, comfortable life. That’s the tragedy of it. I’ve got no dark secrets. I love my family and mates. I’m just as content playing darts as I am waiting for the bus. I see beauty in everything. I’m a happy person,” Sinjin said with utter sincerity. “God. That’s awful, isn’t it?”
“I think that’s lovely.”
“Thanks,” Sinjin said, almost shyly. Carefully, he tucked a strand of hair behind Petra’s ear and let his hand rest for a moment against the soft, wide plain of her cheekbone. “I think you’re beautiful. And brave. And really f**king cool. And you can make Charles Dickens puns.”
Petra leaned the weight of her face into Sinjin’s palm. “You know who and what I am. So, if this is just the old curiosity shop, you can stop right now.”
Sinjin looked her in the eyes. There was not a trace of smirk in his expression. “‘I hope that real love and truth are stronger in the end than any evil or misfortune in the world.’”
“David Copperfield,” Petra whispered, positioning her lips close to his.
“Why are you bringing magicians into it?” Sinjin said and kissed her tenderly. It was a kiss small in its ministrations but epic in its feeling.
Petra broke the kiss. “Your mates may give you a hard time about this.”
“I don’t care. If I like somebody, I like her, and that’s that.” He thumped his chest and made a scowly face. “Let ’em come for me. I will stare down the mob with their pitchforks! I will make a speech about tolerance and love! I will show them the folly of their ways! And then I will grab your hand and run like hell because, Jesus, a mob with pitchforks?”
“Sinjin, I think we may have just found your talent.”
“What? Chest thumping?”
“Humanity.”
Sinjin wanted to toss off a witty comeback but found he had none. “Thanks, luv,” he said softly, sincerely.
“It’s the truth, Ruth.”
Sinjin put a hand to his chest in mock offense. “I’ll have you know it’s Shirley. I could never be a Ruth.”
“You know what I’m going to give you, Shirley?”
“What?”
“A makeover.”
Sinjin crawled over her, going for the kiss. “What if I look Droodful? Edwin Droodful?”
Petra winced. “Oh, good God.”
“Sorry.”
“Just for that, you’re getting the works.” Petra took Sinjin by the hand and dragged him into her tent.
Guitar at the ready, Ahmed sidled over to Nicole and Shanti’s hut with Charlie in tow. “Can I hang with the nondrinking party? Not a big fan of slurring my speech and walking like a toddler with a poopy diaper.”
“Totally,” Shanti said, making room.
Ahmed strummed and crooned softly. Jennifer lay her head in Sosie’s lap and Sosie stroked her hair absently.
“I feel like we’re in one of those old surf movies and we’re gonna have to do the Watusi,” Nicole said.
“No Watusi for me. I made a pledge of purity,” Tiara said.
Shanti shook her head at Nicole. “You’ve done all you can.”
“You know, I’ve watched Miss Teen Dream every year,” Ahmed explained. “I’ve got five sisters. The best was the time they did the Night of the Living Beauty Queen opening number and everybody looked like zombies in sequins? They were pretending to shamble and eat each other’s brains but they still had to smile and shout out their states? That was so wrong, it has its own zip code of wrong.”
“You have no idea how hard all that stuff is,” Shanti said.
“Doesn’t seem so hard,” Charlie scoffed.
“Really?” Shanti said. The girls exchanged glances. “So you think you could be in a pageant?”
Charlie shrugged. “Yeah. I do.”
“You think you could put up with all the things girls put up with?” Nicole pressed.
Ahmed shook his head. “No way, mate. I was there when my oldest sister gave birth to my nephew? That’s hard-core.” Ahmed nodded to the ekwe. “Cool drum.”
“Thanks. Made it myself.” Nicole pounded out a rhythm.
Ahmed bopped his head in time. “Dead brilliant.” He plucked out a tune on his acoustic to accompany her. The others filled in with what they could find — sticks, coconuts, hollowed bamboo. Sosie did a wild Watusi in the sand while Jennifer stood next to her pointing one finger up and down in a deadpan disco.
Summoning up her courage, Shanti sang an Eastern-influenced riff and broke into a rap about living on an island, eating grubs, rescuing pirates, and eating weird berries. Her singing wasn’t special, but her rap was funny and tight, and the others whooped and applauded.
“You should record that,” Ahmed said.
Shanti adopted a ridiculous gangsta pose. “DJ Shanti Shanti. In the hut,” she said and laughed, but she didn’t feel like a fraud.
Sinjin called from the beach.
“Our master’s voice,” Ahmed said and rolled his eyes.
They looped back to the fire. Sinjin was sitting bare-chested with Petra’s blue feather boa wrapped around his neck and draped over his shoulder. His long dark curls had been teased and sprayed into a sexy mane. Heavy black eyeliner rimmed his eyes. “Am I not gorgeous? I want to snog myself. I’m like a postmodern Lord Byron.”
“You put the ironic in Byronic,” Petra quipped.
“Well said, luv.”
“Every time he calls me love, an angel gets its wings.” Petra’s sarcasm was unmistakable, and Sinjin seemed to enjoy it.
“Is this our new look, then, Captain?” George asked.
“It’s my new look. Get your own, mate. Petra was giving me an appreciation for what the other side goes through.” Captain Sinjin adjusted the boa. “Got to let a tasteful hint of man-nipple show.”
Tiara looked confused. “Men have ni**les? Is that new?”
“Men. Have. Nipples!” Adina shouted.
“Adina’s been teaching us stuff at Smart School. Like about geography and real estate companies and feminism,” Tiara explained to the pirates.
“Cool,” said George.
“Yeah. It is.” She squinted in thought. “Do you think my new feminism makes me look fat?”
“Darlings, do you know what I think it’s time for? I think it’s time for your captain to have a soliloquy.”
Brittani covered her eyes. “Oh. Um. You can just go behind the tree. That’s what we all do.”
“No, luv. A soliloquy. A speech.” Sinjin toasted another stale marshmallow. “Imagine, if you will, that I’m sitting on the ship’s deck, in a spot of moonlight that is doing absolutely fantastic things for my bone structure. Really, I’m like a god right now. Can you see it? I can see it. It’s exciting me. Eh, mates?”
“Arrrrggggh!”
“Well said. I didn’t set out to become a pirate. I’d hoped to become a barrister. Wear a powdered wig like a sexy beast. Hot!” Sinjin brandished the marshmallow and everyone jumped back. “That was before the tragic fire that took Mom and Dad. I was away at boarding school. Then me and my mates witnessed a murder and had to go on the run.”
“I thought that was the story line for the show,” Shanti whispered to Nicole.
“Hello! Mid-soliloquy, luv. Give us a moment in the moonlight. Where was I?”
“On the run, Mr. Micawber,” Petra prompted.
“Right! On the run.” Sinjin’s smile faded. “Look. We weren’t entirely honest with you before, about being blown off course. The truth is, the ratings for Captains Bodacious IV have been down. Really down.”
“More people watched In Your Grandma’s Attic,” Chu said. “We couldn’t even compete with granny’s old brooches going to auction.”
“Marketing says pirates are over — it’s all about hot trolls now. They’ve got a hot troll show lined up and ready to go in our time slot: Trollin’ on Delaware Beach. Ridiculous! Like, who is going to watch a bunch of trolls getting drunk at clubs and trying to entice college girls to their place under the bridge? I heard goats mentioned, too, and that’s just wrong.”
“It’s always about whatever’s next,” Petra said ruefully. “When I was in Boyz Will B Boyz, they treated us like little gods, then threw us away the minute Hot Vampire Boyz came along. They think they can toss you away like garbage.”