The chief leaves me on the bluff. It’s not until he’s gone that I begin to understand what he means. What I have to do. What I will.
I climb down the mountain easily. The sun is shining brightly, and by the time I get back to the cottage, the water jug is empty. Noah isn’t there. I slip off my shoes and head out the back way down the path to the ocean.
I walk right in—feet, ankles, then knees—all the way up to my waist. The water is crisp and cool, and I dive under, letting the blast of cold dissolve into a sharp clarity. I come to the surface gasping, awake, alert. I think about the countless mornings begun with a cell phone alarm. That’s one thing I won’t miss. This way is better.
I flip onto my back and shut my eyes against the intensity of the sun. I just wish there was a way for them to know I was okay. Some message I could get to them. But what would I say? If they knew I was alive they’d never stop looking.
I open my eyes and begin to swim back to shore. No, they have to think there is no hope. That’s the only way. If we can’t leave, the chief will send them a message. I know he will.
I get out and wring my hair. It’s getting long. I can knot it without any kind of tie. I walk up the path. I’m so lost in my thoughts—going over what I want to say to Noah, how I will phrase it, arranging and rearranging the words—that I almost miss him. He’s seated on the deck, looking down on me. I climb up.
“Hey,” I say.
He smiles. “Busy day?”
I eye him, shrug. “I got hot. Did you catch anything?”
He nods and cocks his head in the direction of the kitchen. “A bunch, actually. I think I’m getting the hang of it.”
“Me too.”
I hoist myself over the railing and go to sit down next to him. The wood floorboards are warm, and they feel good on my damp skin. “I realized something this morning,” I say. “About you. About the position of Healer.”
Noah doesn’t answer. He’s looking beyond me, down at the water. It’s like he’s seeing something else, lost in a different world. “I have something for you,” he says. He hands me a folded leaf that immediately opens when I take it. Inside is a tiny cowrie shell, with a hole in the top.
“I saw you lost your bottle cap,” he says, his eyes on the shell. “I thought you could wear this.”
I touch the gold strand around my neck. I feel my throat constrict.
“It’s beautiful,” I say. I take the gold chain off and slip the cowrie shell on. It slides down easily. “Will you?” I say, holding it out to Noah.
He edges closer to me and takes the necklace from my hands. I move my hair to the side as he loops the chain back around my neck. I feel his fingers on my skin as they gently find the clasp.
“There,” he says.
I turn around and look into his face—heavy, beautiful, so full of love. And I want now, more than anything, to tell him what I need to.
“Noah,” I say. I slide closer to him and take his face in my hands. “I want you to be here. I want you to be the Healer. They need you, you said it yourself. Tell them you’ll do it.” I don’t let my eyes leave his. “This is where you belong.”
He snorts. “Belong,” he says. He stops, looks at me. “And you?”
I swallow. “I want to stay with you.”
Noah shakes his head, pulls my hands down. “You’re just saying that because you don’t think there is another way.”
“Is there? Noah, we’ve been trying to figure out how to get off this island and failing, and maybe—maybe it’s time we tried to figure out how to stay.”
“Your whole life is somewhere else,” he says.
“Not anymore.” I take a deep breath. “I know my sister is safe. I know it will be hard, but she’s—” My voice catches, but I push forward. “She’s going to be at college soon and until then Ed will look out for her. I know he will. Noah, my life—my life is with you now.”
He looks at me. I see his eyes get liquid. “August,” he says. “This isn’t what you’re meant for. This isn’t your destiny.”
“But it’s yours.”
I see him swallow. “You’d do that for me?”
“Yes.”
“Why?” he asks, and I see the bewilderment in his eyes. The way his forehead knits together.
I think about the chief’s words on the bluff. About sacrifice. Duty. About how we show it. “Because I love you,” I say.
He doesn’t react, just keeps looking at me. “That’s not a good idea,” he says.
“It’s not really a choice, Noah.” I fold my hands in my lap. Suddenly, I feel exposed. What if I’ve misread this entire thing? What if he doesn’t want me to stay with him? “What about you?”
“You have to ask?”
My heart leaps up into my neck. I feel it beating there, trying to scramble up my throat and out of my mouth, through my words. “Yes,” I say. “I do. We’re talking about forever.”
He nods. Then he runs his hands over his forehead. “When we started second grade, Tobias Scarsdale used to pick on you. You were so small and he was one of those freakishly big kids, remember?”
I nod, but I don’t say anything. I have no idea where he is going with this.
“He hit you once. You were answering a question, and he just leaned over and grabbed your elbow and smacked you. He wasn’t allowed to sit next to you for the rest of the year.”
“Noah…”
“After school that day he was waiting for his mom. I almost killed him.” Noah looks up, shuts his eyes briefly. “I pummeled him. I was suspended for a week, but it didn’t matter. I couldn’t let someone get away with trying to hurt you.”
His head snaps back down. He looks at me. I feel all the air leave my body in one, solid rush.
“Summer after seventh grade. Your parents wanted you to go to Europe with them, but your sister had soccer camp and they didn’t want her to miss it. You thought it would be unfair to just bring one of you, so you stayed home. Your aunt came to look after you guys, and you made Italian every night. You even went and used your allowance to get one of those pasta makers so it would feel like you guys were in Italy.”
“How do you…”
“Freshman year, when your mom got sick, you didn’t leave the hospital for eight straight days. Ed and I would go home at night and you would sleep on the two chairs in your mom’s room. Maggie didn’t visit. You were angry about that, but you understood.
“And that night Ed asked you to be his girl I came there to tell you how much I loved you. I came there because I couldn’t bear to think of living another minute without you by my side. Ed showed up and he knew what I was there to do, but he said he wanted you, too. He said the right thing to do was to let you go. That he could take care of you the way I couldn’t—I thought he was right.”
Without even realizing it, I’ve begun to cry. I feel the tears sliding down my cheeks, landing in my lap and mingling with the ocean water.
“What I am trying to say to you, August, is that asking me is a really stupid response. Because it has been you, only you, every single day, for as long as I can remember. And I hate myself because the only thing I want is to stay here with you forever.”
I don’t know which one of us moves first. It doesn’t matter. Because soon I’m in his arms and he is kissing me like I have never been kissed before. Nothing has ever felt so good, so true, and I know, now, that what I’m doing is right. I can’t not be with him. Leaving here, going back to a life that was, I can’t do that. Because he’s everything now. Wherever Noah is is where I want to be.
My face is wet from crying, and he kisses my eyelids and then my cheeks. When his lips meet mine again I taste the salt on them. His lips travel down to my neck and then he’s standing, with me still in his arms. He carries me through the cottage and into the bedroom. He takes my wet clothes off, but this time there is no chill. I am already heated up by the sun and his kisses.
It’s different this time. Slower. More familiar. My body folds to him instantly. He traces his fingers all over me, like he’s mapping my body, drawing it, memorizing every inch. His lips find the backs of my knees, his hands find my thighs. I don’t feel shy or nervous. His kisses are deeper. His hands move farther. It feels like everything is more weighted, heavier. Like just by being together we’re making an impact.