The Walk of Shame

The Skipper twisted his hat in distress, nearly tearing it in two in his giant hands. The Professor was saying something, but he couldn't hear him. He anxiously shifted in the sand by the table, his feet wanting to move, to run, to keep looking.

He froze and stared at the Professor in dismay as he displayed what he had found on his search. The Skipper looked from the items, up to the scientist's face, and back again, still not hearing a word he was saying.

"W–where did you say you found them, Professor?" he asked the Professor set Mary Ann's shoes down on the table next to her purse, which the Skipper had deposited there just a moment before.

"At the oyster bed," he replied as Ginger reappeared in camp, sauntering over to the men with both hands behind her back and a satisfied smirk on her face.

"You know what they say about oysters, Skipper," Ginger offered with a grin as she stepped up beside him. The Professor shot her a look, but the Skipper didn't seem to hear her at all. The captain's mind was too full of wild animals, cliffs, quicksand, and vicious headhunters.

The captain suddenly turned to her. "Ginger, are you sure Mary Ann didn't come back to the hut at all last night?"

"I don't know, I was with the P –." Ginger stopped and gazed innocently at some spot over the Skipper's head. "I was asleep."

"And they weren't at the banyan tree either?" he asked and Ginger shook her head. "They love that tree! I thought for sure they'd be at the tree!" The Skipper smacked his hat down on the table in frustration. "Did you look in the tree?"

"They weren't there, Skipper. But I did find something." Ginger took one hand from behind her back and the Skipper gasped.

"My little buddy's hat!" he exclaimed and snatched it from her, turning it over in his hands and studying it for any clues. "He never takes off his hat! Where was it?"

"In the underbrush around the tree. Right next to this." Ginger grinned wickedly and raised her other hand, a long swatch of blue fabric rising before the Skipper's growing eyes.

After a moment, the Professor hesitantly asked the obvious question, "Ginger, what is that?"

Ginger tauntingly swung the fabric in front of the still-stunned Skipper like a hypnotist's pendant, hoping he'd get the hint. "Mary Ann's dress."

The Skipper's mouth started moving before any sound escaped. "Headhunters," he muttered and Ginger grunted with frustration. "They took her. They got them both. We gotta do something. Professor! We have to get down to the lagoon and see if they've left! We can build a raft. We gotta get them back!" The Skipper clutched his cap to his head and started for the lagoon, but the Professor grabbed his arms, digging his heels into the sand to hold the captain back.

"Skipper! Skipper, stop! I've already been to the lagoon! There's no sign of any native boats or rafts being there recently. The only footprints in the sand are Gilligan and Mary Ann's. There never were any headhunters!"

"But Professor –!"

"Gilligan and Mary Ann are still on the island. And they're together. We have no reason to believe that anything has happened." Ginger snorted and the Professor tried again: "We have no reason to believe that anything bad has happened." Ginger giggled and the Professor continued without turning to look at her, "There is evidence of a bonfire, but they clearly didn't stay the whole night at the lagoon. At some point they moved on and put out the fire."

"Not entirely."

Ginger grinned and the Professor ignored her again, raising the volume of his voice to drown her out. "Skipper, Gilligan knows this island like the back of his hand. And you know he'd never let anything happen to Mary Ann."

The Professor seemed to realize his continued poor choice of wording and paused, anticipating another comment. He turned to Ginger, but the actress just shrugged and smiled placatingly at him.

"But what about the notes we found, Professor?" she asked in her sweetest voice.

"Notes? What notes?" the Skipper exclaimed, overwhelmed with thoughts of ransom notes and badly spelled announcements of Gilligan's intentions to run away and spend eternity in the jungle as a lone wolf.

"Ginger, that's hardly relevent."

"Sure, it is, Professor."

"Where are they? Let me see them!" The Skipper was practically shaking with worry, the actress's nonchalance only frustrating him more.

"They're written in the sand down on the beach. The tide probably washed them away by now." Ginger shrugged and the Professor shook his head hopelessly.

"Well, what did they say?" the Skipper exploded, redfaced and quivering.

The Professor sighed grandly. "Ginger, we don't have time for this." The actress ignored him, however, and wrinkled her nose in exaggerated thought.

"Let's see. There were some drawings, mostly stick figures. They looked like Gilligan's handiwork. Something about 'kissing trees,' which I don't really understand. Oh! There was one about 'hunting my butterflies.' I will most definitely be asking some questions about that." Ginger added as an aside to the increasingly impatient Professor, not noticing the Skipper growing paler beside her. "Initials, plus signs. You know, the usual. Oh, and my favorite!" Her eyes lit up and she swept her hand across the air in front of them as if displaying a headline: "'I Heart Mary Ann's Pancakes.'"

The Professor dropped his head, but the Skipper suddenly seemed to snap back to reality, confusion settling in where terror once was. "What's so strange about that? We all love Mary Ann's pancakes."

"I'm sure you do, Skipper."

"Ginger, that's enough!" the Professor finally interjected. "Despite your great amusement – and I must admit that the concept itself is vaguely entertaining – the fact that we did not find them indicates the possibility that they may have met with an accident."

"Oh, Professor," Ginger scolded with her best pout, "How can you be such a party pooper? Especially after we –."

"Good morning, all!" Mrs. Howell trilled, much to the Professor's relief, as she emerged from her hut. "I do hope the children weren't too traumatized last night. I'm afraid Thurston acted atrociously. I just wanted so much for them to see how lovely marriage can be. Although at the moment I'm not too fond of it myself," Mrs. Howell added with an icy glance back at her hut, where her husband was still sulking. "I do want to apologize. And perhaps try again," she added with a wink to Ginger. "Where are they?"

"They haven't come back yet," Ginger replied, a smile pulling at the corners of her mouth.

"Haven't come back? But ... but it's tomorrow!" Mrs. Howell exclaimed, scandalized. She paused and raised a thoughtful finger to her lips. "Oh, dear. I didn't think it would work that well." She pointed to the blue fabric in the actress's hand. "Ginger, isn't that ...?"

Ginger grinned and nodded, waving it teasingly in the air until the Skipper couldn't stand it any more. Redfaced, he grabbed it from her and hastily threw it down on the table amidst the other found objects.

"Oh, dear," Mrs. Howell repeated, looking stricken. "It must have gotten ripped by something."

"Or someone."

"Ginger!"

"I'm sorry, Mrs. Howell. But you got what you wanted."

"I wanted a wedding!" the socialite defended her moral standards as the Skipper turned to gape at her.

"What are you two talking about!" the captain demanded, but Ginger ignored him, smirking at the socialite.

"Well, depending on how last night went, you might get one."

"Ginger, please!" The Professor had finally had enough and waved his hands in the air with great resolve. "We need to regroup and continue looking."

"Oh, Professor! We were out looking for them for hours. If they wanted us to find them, we'd have found them. I say we leave them alone."

"While I, perhaps ... in theory, agree with your general hypothesis," the Professor admitted and the actress grinned, "you cannot deny the possibility that something may have happened. You women have no sense of danger."

"And you men have no sense of romance!" Ginger shot back, hands planted on her hips, and Mrs. Howell nodded once, decisively, in agreement.

"Romance?" the Skipper finally exploded. "What's that got to do with anything?"

"Everything! Mrs. Howell was trying to set them up before she and Mr. Howell got into their fight. That's why they both went over there last night."

"Is that what you've been talking about?" Realization seemed to dawn and the Skipper blushed briefly before anger set in. "Now see here, Ginger! My little buddy is nothing if not a perfect gentleman!"

"Captain!" Mr. Howell thundered as he stormed from his hut, waving an empty champagne bottle. "I demand your crew be keelhauled for this! Draining an entire bottle from the Howell private stock right under our noses while our backs were turned! And then leaving the detritus lying about my hut!" Howell shook the bottle in the air in resentment before noticing the scene before him. "What's this? Shoes on the breakfast table! Really!"

"Thurston, be quiet!" Mrs. Howell whispered urgently, clutching at her husband's shirt. "The children never came back last night."

"Hiding in shame, I suspect! Serves them right! Breaking my priceless, one-of-a-kind, solid-gold camera. Drinking my champagne! Carousing at all hours of the night!"

"That's enough, Howell!" the Skipper interrupted, "I've never met two more innocent people in my entire life! They would never –."

The conversation screeched to a halt as Gilligan and Mary Ann staggered into camp. Five pairs of eyes widened at their arrival and Ginger's perfectly arched eyebrows rose in amusement. The Skipper's last statement hung heavy in the air as Mrs. Howell peered at them through her lorgnette.

Mary Ann stopped dead when she saw the others gaping at them and Gilligan stumbled to a halt beside her. He had one arm around her back to help her stay upright, the empty champagne bottle they found in the clearing clutched in his other hand. As he emerged from the shadows of the trees, the morning sun illuminated his pale face, lipstick war paint deepening in contrast. Mary Ann still wore Gilligan's shirt, her disheveled hair falling in her face. She grasped one end of her blue ribbon, the bouquet of flowers dangling by her side. Her other arm was wrapped around Gilligan's waist, fingers hooked in his belt loops.

The seven castaways stared at each other for a long moment.

The champagne bottle slipped from Mr. Howell's limp grasp and landed with a dull thud on the Skipper's foot.

Finally, Ginger spoke, making a valiant effort to suppress the smile trying to force its way onto her face. "Is that – is that a hickey?"

Mary Ann's eyes grew to three times their normal size.

In the long and uncomfortable silence that followed, Gilligan's brow furrowed and he glanced around the clearing as if he would be able to find one lying in the sand.

"What's a hickey?"