Chris and Ian were already eating hamburgers and drinking beers with some of Ian's old high school friends. It's hard to explain how great it was to see Ian smiling and laughing. It had been a long, long time since I'd seen him like that.
As much as I was tempted to join in with them, I really needed to be alone for a while. I started off into the shadows toward my dad's old fishing spot.
It was the first warm night of the spring. Moonlight rippled across the river's still surface. All the way along the river path, the scent of new growth filled the evening air.
When I reached the willow tree at the bend in the river, the same one my dad used to sit under in his lawn chair, there was a shadow in the reeds.
I couldn't believe it. It was my dad's old canoe. It had actually survived the winter moored to the tree.
When I was a kid, my dad used to take me out on the river at night to look at the stars. He taught me all the constellations. Sometimes, when we were far enough from the bank, the stars were so bright that you couldn't even tell where the stars ended and their reflection on the water began.
I untied the canoe. I stepped in, grabbed an oar, and tried to balance myself on the wobbly little boat. I couldn't think of a better way to remember my dad than to go out on the water and try to find all the constellations he'd taught me.
But that's when I heard something in the reeds.
A figure was standing on the bank, only a few feet away from where I was trying to regain my balance.
"Ashley," said a voice.
I startled and almost fell into the water. I had no choice but to sit on the canoe's seat, grab a cattail, and try to ease the boat's swaying beneath me.
"What are you doing?" said the same voice. "Ash, be a little careful in that thing, will you? It's dark."
I realized now that it was Ian.
"You followed me?"
For a moment he didn't answer. "I need to talk to you, Ash," he whispered. His silhouette rose above me, broad-shouldered and tall; I realized that by now he'd gotten all of his old strength back. "I was just—I was hoping to get you alone for a couple minutes," he said, a little shyly. "I need to tell you something. . . It's just that I've been needing to tell you something for a long time. A really long time."
He reached down to grab the canoe's narrow prow in an attempt to help me steady it.
As he knelt, a shadow rose up behind him.
There was a sickening whack in the darkness.
Ian instantly collapsed to his knees.
Then he fell face first into the water. He didn't move.
Someone had hit him in the head with the canoe's other oar.
Before I could even attempt to stand, the shadow that had risen up behind Ian leapt into the canoe with me. The full force of a body shook the canoe and sent it skimming out into the river, yards from the shore.
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