That Voodoo You Do

This started as a chapter of "A Real Dressing Down," but it grew too much and I had to make it its own story. We've long talked about the pin from "Voodoo" – why he gave it to her, why she kept it after giving everything else back, why he was so proud of himself when he told Skipper about it. Why was it so special?

One

When Mary Ann was three years old, four year old Horace Higgenbotham gave her a dead mouse he found on his porch. He thought it was the greatest thing ever. She cried for an hour and then gave it a proper funeral.

Her cousin Sam gave her his bedroom when she moved in with them, but that was only because his mother made him.

Her one and only boyfriend in high school actually gave her jewelry – a gold bracelet. It turned her wrist green.

Mr. Howell gives her his dinner order.

The Skipper gives her his pants to mend.

Gilligan once gave her a beautiful bouquet of flowers that wasn't actually from him.

He routinely gives her a funny fluttering feeling in the pit of her stomach.

He also routinely gives her a headache.

So she is understandably astonished when Gilligan shows up at her hut one afternoon with a piece of painted native pottery overflowing with beautiful jewelry. On one of his routine explorations of the island, he found a cave filled to the brim with ancient relics – pottery, artwork, jewelry. Lots of jewelry. Mrs. Howell selected one brilliantly rich-looking piece, but Gilligan brought the bounty to the girls.

Mary Ann gasps and carries the jug carefully to the vanity. Her eyes grow wider and wider at every gorgeous piece that she pulls from the depths of the native jug. Beautiful cascading gold necklaces with turquoise jewels. Bracelets. Rings big enough to choke a horse.

"Gilligan!" she squeals as she stretches out her left arm to admire the giant purple stone she's slipped onto her finger. "Look at this one!" She holds up her hand and wiggles her fingers at him. The glittering gem is even bigger than Mrs. Howell's gargantuan engagement ring.

Mary Ann dives back into the jug, but Gilligan is still hovering near the door, nervously shifting from foot to foot, smiling secretively. She glances up at him and pauses, a waterfall of beads and jewels hanging through her fingers. She smiles uncertainly. "What?"

Gilligan inches into the hut. He has both hands behind his back. He looks scared, yet unusually proud of himself. "You and Ginger can go through that and decide what you want, but ... I picked something out for you."

A slow smile spreads across Mary Ann's face and it's like the sun just emerged from behind a cloud and lit up the room, like a flower blooming right in front of him and he has to look away, down at his sneakers in the dirt. "You did?"

Gilligan just nods and thrusts his arm out toward her. "Here."

Mary Ann steps forward and takes the object hidden in his fist. It's a giant oval brooch, pure gold, at least five inches across. She turns it over in her hands, the sunlight catching the dips and valleys hand-forged into the gold in perfect patterns, distinct markings that she can't decipher. She studies it for a long time before looking back up at Gilligan, who looks like he's in complete agony.

"Gilligan!" she squeals again and the wind is knocked out of him as she throws her arms around his neck. The stacks of bracelets on her wrists clang and dig into his back and the pile of necklaces she tried on press into his chest.

Gilligan blinks rapidly and gasps for air. "Do you like it?"

"Like it? I love it!" She kisses him on the cheek and holds up the gift, admiring it over his shoulder.

Mary Ann releases him suddenly and rushes back to the vanity. Gilligan sways unsteadily on his feet before staggering after her. Mary Ann peels off the necklaces and dumps them back in the jug. She hands Gilligan the pin and pulls her hair off her shoulder, angling it toward him. "Go ahead."

"What?"

"Put it on me."

Gilligan's eyes widen, transfixed on her shirt. "I ... I'll stick you with the pin. Why can't you –."

"Gilligan! You gave it to me! Come on!"

"But –!"

"Pin me, Gilligan!"

She grins up at him and he frowns. He's clumsy about it, but he eventually gets the pin through her shirt and fumbles to clasp it. He's nervously pinning it way too high, close to her shoulder. She tilts her head down to watch him and his knuckles brush her cheek. He flinches and almost stabs her with the pin, but she waits patiently until he finally gets it clasped. It's crooked and too high up, but she smiles at her reflection in the mirror, watching Gilligan squirm behind her.

Mary Ann squints, cocks her head as she looks into the glass. Something's not quite right. She quickly strips off the towers of bracelets. She yanks the giant ring from her finger and drops everything back into the native pot. The pin stands out now, shining in the sunlight. She grins. That's better.

She turns around and hugs him again before he has a chance to react. "Oh, Gilligan, you really are the sweetest. Thank you."

Gilligan grins and actually hugs her back. "You're welcome. Boy, Mrs. Howell didn't get this excited over her pin."

Gilligan feels Mary Ann tense in his arms and she pulls back. Mary Ann blinks up at him, confusion settling over her brow. "Mrs. Howell?"

"Sure. I found this great big fancy pin in the cave, too. I let her pick from the jewelry and that's what she wanted. It looks like something she'd wear."

Gilligan shrugs and he sees Mary Ann start to pout, just a little, probably unconsciously. "Does Ginger get a pin, too?"

Gilligan glances around the hut. How did Ginger get brought up? How did the entire mood change so quickly? "No. She can pick whatever she wants from the pot." He looks down at Mary Ann. "Everybody gets something. Mrs. Howell's like our mother here, you know that. And you're like my –."

Gilligan freezes. He has no idea what he was going to say. He's working this over in his mind and Mary Ann waits, peering up at him.

"Well, you're ... you're like ..."

"Your sister?"

"No," he replies quickly, maybe a little indignantly, and shakes his head to clear his mind. "I want to ask the Professor what the designs on it mean. I think the natives used it for something different than the other jewelry." He's changed the subject on purpose, but Mary Ann still looks skeptical. He's not entirely sure why, but he knows it's not what he wants. "I picked this out especially for you. It reminds me of you," he admits and then cringes. He can almost see the words hanging in the air between them, out in the open, taunting him.

Mary Ann's features unknot and her eyes widen. "Really?" she whispers.

"Well ... yeah. It was the only one like it in the cave. Everything else was real fancy and flashy, but this is beautiful 'cause it's natural. I just got the feeling that I needed to give it to you."

Mary Ann stares up at him through giant eyes. "Oh, Gilligan," she finally says again and looks for all the world like she's about to cry.

"Mary Ann, don't – ." In an instant, she wraps her arms around his middle and he yelps in surprise. He's quiet for a moment. "It won't turn your wrist green either," he adds and he feels her squeeze him tighter.

When Mary Ann shows the pin to the Professor the next day, his eyes light up and an impressed "ah!" escapes his lips and Mary Ann can sense that a lecture is imminent. He takes it from her gingerly, with the utmost respect, and carries it to the table to consult a book that's lying open to a page about native artifacts.

"Do you know what it is, Professor? Gilligan thinks it's different from all the other jewelry he found."

"Oh, it is. It is," the Professor murmurs, peering closely at the pin as he holds it next to a photo in the book.

"He said he felt like he was supposed to give it to me."

The Professor's head snaps up from the book so quickly that Mary Ann takes a step back. "He said that?" he asks, eyes wide, and Mary Ann nods. "Fascinating," he breathes and turns back to the table. Mary Ann watches him for a moment, flummoxed, and is about to ask why that's so important when he speaks again: "I wasn't convinced that these even existed. It's all legend. No one's ever found one." The Professor is now studying the designs on the pin through a magnifying glass. "They're usually destroyed when its owner dies."

"Why?"

The Professor looks up at her. "Because it's meant only for one person. No other woman can possess the same one."

The reverence in the Professor's voice stops Mary Ann in her tracks. He usually isn't as intrigued by the legends and stories associated with the relics they find as he is by their archaeological and sociological significance. "But what is it exactly?" she asks warily.

The Professor smiles. "It's a fascinating story, Mary Ann. Sit down." He puts down the magnifying glass and pulls a chair over for her, brimming with excitement over this apparently monumental find and the opportunity to tell its story. "There used to be a tribe in these islands called the Kupa Kai. Although fierce and dangerous, they were very spiritual people. Their past kings became gods and they believed that everything was preordained by these spirit leaders. They barely made a move without being convinced that it was absolutely correct, that it was their destiny."

"When a young Kupa Kai man comes of age," the Professor continues, "he's taken to the cave where the tribe's treasure is kept. He must then select an artifact. It can be anything – a necklace, a ring, a bracelet, a pin – anything as long as it has these markings." He cradles the pin in the palm of his hand and shows her the symbols forged in the gold. "These indicate the sacred concepts of destiny and fate. He isn't supposed to pick the most beautiful piece, or the one made from the most precious stones, but the one that he's drawn to for some inexplicable reason. The one that speaks to him, that he feels in his soul is the one he's supposed to select. When he sees it, he'll know."

"What does he do with it?"

"He carries it with him until it leads him to the woman he's supposed to give it to. He just feels it. This –" he holds the pin up and Mary Ann's eyes widen "– supposedly does all the work. It keeps him from making a mistake."

"But ... but Gilligan ..."

The Professor smiles and takes her hand, laying the pin gently on her palm. "This is a very important piece of history, Mary Ann. Everyone thought this tradition was just a myth."

Mary Ann looks down at the gold in her hand. She stares at it for a long time, feels the weight, the significance, tries to comprehend how old it really is. "Professor, if this survived, then that means it never found its rightful owner."

"That's where you're wrong." The Professor folds her fingers around the pin and holds her hand warmly in both of his own. "It found you."