“I started this all wrong. Well, maybe not started it, but it didn’t go as I planned. I’m going to start over.”
I wasn’t sure what to say, so I just stayed where I was and kept quiet.
“I’ll start from the beginning. I really like you, Andy. I know you think of me as just a friend, but we could be so much more than that. Please just think about it.”
I couldn’t shake the unsettled feeling I had in my gut, but I nodded anyway. After all, he was my best friend. Maybe there was some sense to what he was saying. I didn’t know anything about relationships, but maybe he did.
“Okay,” I said quietly.
“Okay as in you agree or okay as in you’ll think about it?” He looked hopeful.
“Okay as in I’ll think about it.”
He sighed, but it was more out of relief than anything. He started to come toward me again. My body automatically tensed. He noticed, but continued forward. He stopped right in front of me, and it made me so uncomfortable that I couldn’t look up at his face. When he stood this close, I couldn’t help but notice how much taller he was. My eyes were level with his shoulders. I felt a chill go down my spine. I wasn’t sure if this was how you were supposed to feel around someone who had just confessed his feelings toward you, but I didn’t think so.
“Don’t be scared of me,” he said softly as he leaned his head down to look in my eyes. When I returned his gaze, he smiled lightly. “Come on, I’ll walk you downstairs.”
After I settled into my hammock, I started to think about what Mark had said but stopped. I didn’t know anything about relationships. I didn’t fully trust Mark either, but maybe everything he had said was correct. But why would this matter cause a fight between him and Jason? Jason was smart, so if something like this was unsettling to him, then maybe it was the same reason why I wasn’t so sure about it. I lifted my head and looked down a couple rows where Jason was. His arms were behind his head, but that was all I could really see in the darkness. Mark was at least further down from him, but as of where I wasn’t sure. This made me feel more settled. I relaxed back into my hammock and closed my eyes and let the slow rocking motion put me to sleep.
When I woke, I was one of the first. I heard someone close by snoring loudly. I quietly rolled out of my hammock and noticed that Jason wasn’t in his hammock either. This was the perfect time to talk to him. I went up on deck and looked around. I didn’t see him. Then again, I didn’t see anyone. A fog had rolled in during the night. I turned around and jumped. He was right there.
“Hey.”
“Hi.” I paused, while I tried to get my heartbeat back to a regular pace. “You startled me.”
He shrugged.
“I was looking for you actually. I want to ask you something.”
He looked down. “Mark talked to you didn’t he?”
I nodded, even though he wasn’t looking at me. “He wants us to be closer. I’m not sure what he means exactly though.”
He sighed. “Can we go into your room for this conversation?”
He followed me and then stood behind me as I shut the door. We hadn’t had this private of a conversation before. I’d had a couple with him and Mark that were private, but Jason and I hadn’t had one that required us to be locked in my room. Even though Jason was the only other person I felt close to, we had an awkward relationship. He was protective of me, acting as a brother would as I had come to think, but we never seemed to be completely relaxed when we were around each other and no one else was with us.
I turned around to look at him. He stood and looked uncomfortable by the window. I observed him in the candlelight for a few minutes waiting to see if he’d speak. He was my height, but hunched, so he seemed a little shorter. He was lean and he had muscles, but he almost looked like he had none. He could hold his own when Mark would throw out one of his challenges though. He told me once that he could actually beat Mark but didn’t want to shatter Mark’s self-esteem. His white-blonde hair he kept a little longer and ruffled at the top, as if he had just run his hand through it. His eyes were twilight-blue and with his eyelids naturally drooped he always looked tired. It wasn’t a tired as in he was ready to fall asleep, but more as if he had seen too much in the world at his age and couldn’t take much more. He was only a year older than me, but whenever I gazed into his eyes, he looked much older. He had joined the crew a few years earlier, but it felt like I had known him much longer.
I leaned back against the door and crossed my arms over my chest. “So what is it between you two? He said you guys had a fight about me.”
He nodded. “Yeah. He’s not lying about the fact that he really likes you. It’s more of why he does, and that’s what we fought about.”
“Why does he?”
He scuffed his foot. “I can’t say.”
“Why not?”
“It’s not my place to say.”
“But you think I should keep my distance or what?” I stepped away from the door.
He shrugged, but still wouldn’t look at me. “I can’t tell you what to do. I just have my own thoughts on the subject.”
I stood next to him. “Why is this such a big deal? Does it have anything to do with being the only female on this ship?”
He sighed again. “No.”
This was getting tiring. I wasn’t getting answers, and it felt like he just kept going in circles. But whatever happened between the two of them was big enough to make them not want to be near each other. It had to do with me, and that bothered me.
“I’m getting rather impatient here. I need something more.”
He finally looked at me. “I can’t.”
“Then why was this necessary?” I motioned to the room.
“I don’t know.” He rubbed the back of his neck. “I felt like I should say something, but I really didn’t know what.”
He was really getting on my nerves. He never kept his thoughts in his head. If he disagreed with anything, he wasn’t shy about speaking up. That was one reason why I liked him as a friend and thought of him as the brother I never had. This was not normal, so it must have been something really horrible.
“Jason, if you aren’t going to tell me what’s going on then I’m not going to stand here and pretend I’m not mad at you.” I turned on my heels and went toward the door. Suddenly, his hand was on my arm and he was pulling me back. I started to struggle, but that only made him hold on tighter. “Let go of me.”
“You need to understand that he isn’t a good person. He isn’t as good as you think he is.”
I started to struggle more, and panic flared up inside me. He spun me around so that I was close to his face; close enough to feel his breath on my nose. I glanced at his eyes, and I felt my body drain itself of everything. They were unlike anything I’d ever seen. The desperation and fear made me feel like something terrible was going to happen. I forgot everything but those eyes for that instant. Then reality settled back in, and I started to struggle against his grip.
He let go, and watched as I backed against the door and slid to the ground. I was never going to forget the way his eyes looked. They would haunt me forever. I looked up at him again, but he had turned around.
“Jason, what is it?”
He shook his head. “I don’t know.”
“You don’t know what?”
“He’s not a good person, Andy.” He glanced over his shoulder at me. “I can’t tell you why because I don’t know why. I just have this feeling, and I care about you too much to let you walk into a situation without giving you any warning. You’re practically family to me, and I couldn’t bare it if he did something to you.”
I was so confused. What was he talking about? What would Mark do to me? How was he a bad person? But if all he had was a feeling, then how could he actually know?
I struggled to get up, since I was still shaken. “I’ll keep my eyes open for anything suspicious.”
He shook his head. “No, Andy. That’s not good enough.”
&n
bsp; “Then what is, Jason?” I snapped at him. “I don’t understand what you’re saying, and neither do you it seems.”
“Don’t trust him.”
I rolled my eyes and turned to leave, but his hand was once again on my arm. I instinctively turned, my arm already swinging. He ducked, but let go as I ran from the room.
My reaction to people touching me depended on what they did exactly. Usually I would start to panic and struggle until I was loose. Sometimes, if I had been startled, my arm was immediately swinging as if it had a mind of it’s own. But I would almost always get so shaken that it took several minutes to relax. I was the only one who knew why I reacted like this. I felt like my father knew, but I’d never actually told him.
I returned to my room a while later to find that Jason had left. Good. I could finally get the alone time I was desperately seeking. So for the next few hours, I hid in my room with the door locked. Even when someone knocked and tried the handle, I wouldn’t move. I stayed curled up on the cushion by the far back window and stared out at the water behind us. I didn’t move until I heard the men getting louder outside. They were yelling at each other over how to do things correctly. We would be docked very soon. I slowly sat up and stretched. I took my time until I was sure that we were stopped and that a good portion of the men were off the ship. I walked across the room to unlock the door, and when I opened it Mark was waiting. I walked right past him, as if I hadn’t seen him, and kept going until I was at the railing.
We were at an island with a very small town on the beach. This wasn’t a port. This was a pirate cove. I sighed. I had really wished for a place where there were actually people, not just someplace with a few buildings stocked often from some anonymous pirate. Then again, my father never stopped at a place where there were lots of people. The one time he did, I took off, and he said no every time since. And with a place like this, I couldn’t get lost even if I wanted to.
“Shall we?”
I turned to face Mark but didn’t say anything.
“This is the last boat to the island so if you want to go, we have to go now.”
He had his hand out to help me down the rope ladder to the boat waiting below. I ignored it and went down without help. He followed right behind me, and as soon as he was in the boat we were rowing away from the ship. I was sitting in front of him so that he could help row, but I could feel his eyes on me the entire time. As soon as we hit the sand, I was out of the boat and walking toward the forest.
He came up behind me quickly and didn’t wait to get his thoughts off his mind. “What’s the matter?”
I shook my head. I was still confused and I wasn’t about to bring up anything Jason had said.
“You can’t run away on this island.” He touched my shoulder to try to slow me down.
“I know that,” I snapped while I pushed his hand off.
“Why are you mad at me? Does this have to do with last night?”
I shrugged.
“Stop, will you? There’s nowhere to go anyway.”
I sighed and stopped. He came around to be in front of me. “What’s wrong with you?”
I glared up at him.
“That came out wrong. It’s just that you said you’d think about us last night. And now you’re angry with me. Something must have happened this morning.”
“I’m not angry at you per say. I’m just angry in general.” I looked away through the trees ahead of me. I could see the ocean. I sighed again. Was a piece of land that was small enough where you could see ocean from all sides when you were in the middle really supposed to be called an island?
“Did you talk to Jason by chance?”
I glanced at him. He groaned and shook his head in frustration.
“I knew it.”
“He wouldn’t tell me anything though. He left me just as confused as you did.”
He closed his eyes, and his face relaxed. “So you’re mad because you’re confused.”
I shrugged. I wasn’t going to admit it.
“Look, I didn’t tell you to make you angry. I told you because I thought you should know before I go to your father and tell him my intentions.” He opened his eyes. The look he was giving me was so intense. My suspicions grew.
“Your intentions.” I narrowed my eyes. “You don’t know my answer. Plus, I don’t want you talking to Shawn.”
“Andy, I’m a man who gets what I want either way.” A smirk appeared on his lips as he spoke.
“So you asked me even though you were going to do what you wanted?” I struggled to keep my voice calm. I didn’t like feeling like I had no choice in the matter
He put his hands in his pockets and leaned back on his heels. “Basically.”
I was about to answer when I heard gunfire. Looking around, I noticed it getting darker. How long had we been standing out here arguing? We must have gotten off the ship later than I’d thought.
Before I realized it, Mark had gone past me, and grabbed my hand on his way. As he dragged me through the forest, I clawed at him to let me go. The gunfire became louder and more frequent, but I hardly noticed. We arrived at the edge of the forest where he finally turned around and made a show of letting go of my hand.
“There! We’re all in danger and now you’re free. I’m just trying to get us back to the ship in one piece. Now let’s go!”
We quickly realized we were in a bad position when we made our way to the beach and found all the boats were gone. This wouldn’t have been bad because my father could have left us there for protection. But that wasn’t the case since boats were coming from the direction of the ship that was firing at ours.
“Go into one of those buildings and do what you can to hide. I’ll try to distract them.” Mark turned to me. “Whatever happens, don’t let them get you.”
I wasn’t sure if I was angrier at his suddenly feeling like he had power over me or of the men coming for us. Whichever the reason, I ran back to one of the buildings and went in toward the middle. It wasn’t very full, which made it a bad choice, but I heard voices so I had to stay put. I went to the back and crouched behind a crate.
I didn’t have to wait long before I heard the building next to mine being torn apart. I squeezed myself back into the corner. It wasn’t dark enough for me not to be seen, but I was going to make it as difficult as possible.
I didn’t calculate that they’d have torches though.
One man stepped inside the room, and I knew he saw me. He handed his torch to someone behind him, so I immediately lost what he looked like. I just saw a dark form come toward me. I stood up quickly, and right as he reached me I pulled my arm back and punched his face. The punch should have had him stumbling back, but he didn’t react how I expected. Instead he was quickly behind me. He put his hand over my mouth and tried to get a cloth between my teeth. I bit him between his thumb and index finger. He grunted as he released his hand immediately. I found myself on the floor. I stared up at the man as he looked down at his hand. I was so focused on this that I forgot there were other men around. I was pulled up off the floor and found my hands being tied together behind my back. This time they were able to put a cloth between my teeth. I started to squirm immediately. I felt myself getting picked up, and I started to kick. I must have hit a good spot, because I was suddenly on the floor again. I grunted and felt the unwanted tears spring to my eyes as pain shot through my body.
“Leave,” the first guy said to the ones behind him. His voice didn’t sound mad. In fact, it sounded very calm. “I’ll get her.”
I heard movement behind me, and then the main light was gone. There was still enough light for me to see his form, but not his face.
“You can either stand up on your own, or I’ll help you,” he said. I didn’t make a sound, so he added. “I’m not going to hurt you. But if you can’t get up by yourself, I will help. It is difficult to get up with your hands tied behind your back. I’ve done it before.”
I wanted to ask him what made him think I’d
be so willing to give in. I saw he was standing a little closer, so I tried my best to twirl around and kick the back of his knee with my foot. It didn’t work how I’d hoped, but he did stumble and had to grab a crate to steady himself.
“You’re really making this harder than it has to be.” He stood upright again. He came toward me, dodging my feet and stood at my knees. He leaned over me in perfect position for me to angle my body and get a good kick at the back of his legs. I acted like I was going to try to get up and as I sat up, I struck. This time, he was immediately on the ground next to me, his head by where my feet had been. He didn’t move for a second, and I hoped that maybe I’d really hurt him. And then I heard him sigh, and he raised a hand to his face. He sat up and looked directly at me. I could see a dim light reflecting off his eyes as if two small beams of light were focused on me.
“I get this. But if you let me help you up and out of here, it will be much easier for you than to have several men come in here and carry you. Yes, you could think of that as giving in, but you will come out in much better circumstances.” He stood up. “It’s your choice. Either stand up now or I’m calling in more men.”
I sat for a moment and wondered what kind of man he was. He seemed sincere. He wasn’t angry with me nor was he trying to pick a fight. He was dealing with my behavior as if it was nothing to him. This was probably what surprised me the most, which was why I decided to get to my feet. It was a slight struggle not being able to use my hands, but I made it.
My eyes were at about the level of his chin, which was taller than I had previously judged. He slowly walked around so that he was next me. He placed his hand on the rope instead of my hands, and he gave enough pressure to turn me around. I started for the door. I saw my opening there. If I could catch him off guard and make a run for the forest, I would have time to get the ropes off my wrists. Then I could make a swim for the ship. Surely my father couldn’t have forgotten about me and left. And I didn’t know where Mark was, if he was even safe. What were my chances of making it out of here?
Forgotten Truths (The Forgotten Truths Series) Page 2