Sun on the Rocks - The Emotion Scale, Page 7

  Chapter Six

  The 737 of Cayman Airways brought in from Miami international airport showed a distinct set of tropical assortment colors in its tail, reminiscent of a fruit basket. Clarity climbed up the airport staircase in the back of the plane, followed by Lanai, observing a truck driving past the left wing of the plane towing a trailer which was labeled Herbaline course work material. The material was uploaded into the plane through a conveyor belt leading to the luggage area of the plane.

  Clarity sat down in one of the back rows of the plane, liking the idea of being able to watch all passengers seated in front of her. Two hostesses dressed in Herbaline uniform, a grayish skirt and matching shirt, with a green scarf, walked elegantly past the passengers, all of them, new and prospective Herbaline employees, who had signed the agreement offered by the company. One of the hostesses stopped in front of Clarity, offering her a badge of the company, a small pin, with the B letter in green clearly on it, B for beginner, beginner at sales, according to the hostess.

  "What type of course work does the truck carry?" Asked Clarity, looking out the window. The hostess, hired on a temp basis, offered Clarity a magazine titled High Rise Apartment, featuring naked women, shown against ample, sunny, glass window background of what clearly was one of the floors of a lush fifteen floor skyscraper.

  "It's the coursework used by our sales guru Coleman Cartmel. He is a well known authority on sales, with plenty of tutorials on YouTube, living between the islands of Fidji, the Bahamas, and Cayman." She handed Clarity a booklet, labeled with the number 055.

  "This is your beginner course work, our basic booklet, all sales for you at Herbaline begin and end with this booklet."

  Clarity read the title, 'Public relations and communications booklet for the poor sales person aspiring to a lush lifestyle.' The hostess looked at a list she had in front and handed a variation of the same booklet to Lanai, one labeled with the number 056 entitled 'Public relations and communications booklet for the follower of the poor sales person aspiring to a lush lifestyle.' Clarity looked closely at her own leaflet and found a white square placed top right, with the words HTSA, Herbaline Testing Service for Adults. The word promotion was conspicuously absent from the booklet, replaced by the expression gaining agreement, agreement with Herbaline supervisors, and with other employees or customers. Public relations was defined as a principled social science, with laws and idiomatic principles, like any science, derived from language, instead of numbers.

  The flight landed late in the evening at Owen Roberts International airport in Cayman. Herbaline paid for access to a rented parking airport slot for its planes, next to the slot of the Virgin Caribbean Airways 747 flown in from Heathrow every week.

  The driver of the shuttle leading them to the Midland Civic Center, picked them up off the tarmac of the airport, forfeiting the passenger transfer vehicle, a luxury limousine stationed there only for Manglove and Stive, or for company workers having a tenure in the company of more than four years. The shuttle driver boasted a large Herbaline badge. He was the same driver that Clarity had seen at the Beverly Hills hotel pool. His name was Fletcher Conahue, and he seemed unusually jovial, and genuine, showing a distinct pattern of friendliness that was not noticeable when he drove through highway four oh five, in Los Angeles, to Orange County. Clarity shared her observation with Lanai.

  "It's just being here, I think, that makes him so happy," said Lanai, "it's the same driver we saw in Los Angeles. Maybe it's the weather."

  "It can't be just the weather, he has been here before, he's used to the weather, his badge says, weathered six years of Cayman Island weather."

  "Maybe the weather makes him nice. Not sure, yeah."

  Fletcher drove them to the giant entrance of the Midland Civic Center, a resort and educational center spanning three hundred ample rooms for its guests. They were led to a cocktail area offering, and Nahan, the official lawyer in charge of human resource affairs, gave them a survey titled adaptable relational ability. Their room on the second floor of the five floor building included a safety box made of scandium, as shown on a bronze etching below the three letter combination area of the box. The manufacturer of the box was Caribbean Alloy Limited, a company based in the Cayman Islands, in Nelson Quay, belonging to a prominent businessman of the island, Buddha Talk, that Clarity knew from a previous trip. A vertical etching on the scandium box, read Ad Iudicium, an expression which meant common sense, as per the explanation written below, in English.

  The next day, Clarity and Lanai put on their swimsuits and went out to the Center's pool, which was built right near the Caribbean sea. Half of the people in the pool were naked. Clarity took off her swimsuit and dove naked into the warm Caribbean shore. She loved the Caribbean and enjoyed swimming naked with the sun bathing her skin. After a few moments hesitation, Lanai took off her bikini and followed Clarity. They took two lounge chairs and laid out in the sun without any clothes.

  "This is good," said Clarity, feeling the warm sunshine dry the salty water droplets.

  Ivy came by forty minutes later around lunch time.

  "Time to get back to your room, got to do some work."

  After lunch, a maid came into their room and filled out a survey with Lanai and Clarity, asking them to define and look for the wording of common sense, the meaning of it.

  "Language is important at Herbaline," said the maid.

  "Common sense is just something you do that makes sense, sometimes practical, sometimes following what others you trust say about that," said Lanai. The maid looked at Lanai, and filled in her own remarks on the comment. She glossed over a second page and stared at Clarity, eliciting a response.

  "Common sense, with or without the Latin inscription on the box?" Asked Clarity.

  "With it," said the maid.

  "Then, somewhat of a definition might be, wisdom with a touch of understanding, the understanding that our Herbaline agreement stands as long as the stay here is not permanent, and is also pleasant."

  The good looking maid kept staring at Clarity, noticing the look of Clarity was firm, quite feminine, and firm. After jotting down a few checks and balances on her pad, all coming out of or leading to the word level-headed, she placed the pad on a round table meant to carry out and fill out surveys.

  "Very good, now I'll do the room with you, and check out both of you naked. Got to check your arousal, Manglove said so."

  "That's nice of you," said Lanai, scared by the expression which had come out of her mind so immediately.

  "Coley gave you a soft brush for the hair in Los Angeles, didn't she?"

  "True, it was pretty useful to comb my hair," said Lanai. Clarity observed the maid somewhat sheepishly. She checked the toiletries pouch that the waiter in Orange County had given her, and took out a soft brush made of hard plastic.

  "You can use it to comb my bum cheeks," said Lanai unabashedly. The maid liked the answer and went along.

  "Very good, I'll get you ready for the sales course tomorrow," said the maid.