Shiloh leads us to the communal area, where we stop, standing around the fire pit. We’re still in groups, taking our respective sides, but the mood is less on guard and more like we share a purpose.
Not too far behind, Will enters the space, murmuring something to Duke right before he gently sets him on the floor near the fire. Duke seems to drift right to sleep.
Will catches my eyes as his overflows with emotion. It’s glossy with tears, but none fall. Instead, a strength and conviction take over.
“Okay,” Shiloh says. “This way.”
Tommy, Noah, and Henry stay back with Duke as the rest of us continue behind Shiloh into one of the many tunnels. A couple hallways twist in other directions, but we head down one that ends in a small cove, and I realize this place is more extensive than I thought—like a prairie dog burrow, full of infinite passageways.
Shiloh shines her torch over the wall, spotlighting one area. There, as if carved into the rock by nature—but somehow intentional—are cave hangings; large straws of rock growing down from the ceiling and up from the stone floor. But the way it’s grown is like art, sculptures. What I see, and what I suppose the other’s see, is a group of people—kids, in my opinion—connected and standing in a circle. In the center of the circle is one thick cylinder coming down from the ceiling, split in two, so there’s a hole in it like a window.
The image is so obvious, but also not, like finding shapes in clouds—from one angle, you’re certain what you see, but then you shift and see something entirely different. Because when I tilt my head, the kids become trees in a forest. And when I turn the other direction, they are a pride of lions, sitting at attention. Another, candlesticks. The only constant is the window. It’s like the island knows. Has it been giving us hints all this time?
“We have no idea what it is, but it almost seems carved, doesn’t it?” She glances over her shoulder and we all nod. “Anyway, when you mentioned the window… Well, you see it, too, don’t you?” Again, we all nod. “Either it’s natural or there were others before us. Either way, it’s something significant. We’ve always known that much.” Shiloh turns back down the tunnel.
We meet up with the rest of the Panthers around the fire in the common area and sit as one group.
“Tomorrow night is the full moon,” Shiloh says, stabbing a piece of coconut with a stick and putting it over the fire. It crackles and she passes it down, starting another. Eventually, we’re all chewing on toasted coconut—all but Charlie. Jude pulls something from his pocket and hands it over.
“Where I’m from, the full moon is an omen, a sign of luck and great possibility. It can also bring the opposite, but…we won’t focus on that.” Shiloh snatches her coconut with her teeth and pulls her eyebrows together.
I think back to that full moon gazing down on me the night I arrived. If asked back then, I’d have said without hesitation it was a bad omen. Now, I’m not so sure.
“Seems as good a time as any,” I say. “What are you thinking?”
“Well, you said you figured out theories for each of you. We’ll do the same, then try our best to make each happen. Then, tomorrow at dusk, we’ll go to where each of our windows should be and—”
“See if they’re open.” I finish her sentence.
She nods.
I nod back. “Since we just visited our arrival locations, we’re all familiar. How about you guys?”
Shiloh opens her mouth, but Tommy breaks in. “Duke never let us forget it.” He glances down at their sleeping, fallen leader. “He told us to remember where we came from, but never to run from it. He believed we were so much better off here. I was starting to believe it until Jack…” Tommy’s eyes dart to mine.
My heart breaks into a million pieces.
“Okay,” Shiloh says, reeling the conversation back in. “We remember, but could definitely use a refresher.”
“All right, well, how about we split up? You all pinpoint where you entered the island and we’ll recheck our windows to see if any happened to open.”
“Sounds good. We can come back together on the beach mid-point between our two camps around sunset and figure out what to do next.”
Everyone nods in agreement.
Once finished with our snack, we leave. Will and I hold hands as we make our way through the tunnel, but I stop at the mouth of the cave, jerking him back.
“What’s wrong?” he asks.
“I need to do something. I’ll be quick.”
“Okay,” he says, cocking his head to the side, then softening his expression, nodding.
Walking through the cave by myself is creepy. It’s dark and cool and I can barely hear Shiloh and the boys talking, figuring out who needs to do what. I enter the common area and everyone stares at me. I take a deep breath.
“Tommy?”
He looks at me, swishing his long, sandy tangles to one side, raising his eyebrows.
“Yes?”
“Can I talk to you?”
He stands.
The others disappear down one of the tunnels—to gather their things, I assume. Duke lies still next to the fire. I swear I see his eyes open, but if they were, they’re closed before I can be sure.
Walking toward me, Tommy is petite, all muscle and bones, his skin lightly tanned. He’s actually quite striking, and I can tell he’ll grow into a beautiful man one day.
He stops a foot away but won’t look me in the eye.
“I just need to tell you… I’m so, so sorry about Jack. I never meant to… I didn’t know…” Hot tears surface and fall like heavy raindrops. “I have a little brother, and if anything ever happened to him…” I sniff and let out a sob.
Tommy stares straight at me, the slightest glint of tears in his dark coffee eyes. “Hey, it was an accident. And we were being jerks. If you didn’t fight back, who knows?” He sticks his hand out.
I shake it. It’s small, but his grip is strong.
He tightens his fingers around mine, then pulls me in for a hug, planting a quick peck once on each side of my face.
The sudden action catches me off guard and leaves me speechless. The way Tommy stares at me, I can only imagine my expression.
“Thank you,” I say, because I don’t know what else to say.
He nods, laughing under his breath. “It’s how we show forgiveness around here… Well, that and giving you the eyeballs from the sheep after we slaughter it.” He shrugs and I’m not sure whether he’s messing with me or not.
“I’m glad you chose the first.”
He laughs—a normal boy laugh.
Once outside, we decide to split our own group up for another window check. We’re questioning all our actions now. The smallest change could possibly be the key to someone’s freedom.
After talking, it’s agreed upon we’ll pair up by location to save time.
Jude and Bug’s entry windows are pretty close, but Lewis’s is far-off and in the opposite direction of everyone, even the Panthers, who have already scattered.
“I’m fine. I’ll go alone. I can find it,” says Lewis. “Mental map.” He taps the side of his head.
“You really shouldn’t go alone, Lewis—” I start.
“I agree,” Will cuts in. “We know you’re capable of finding it, but still, you never know—”
“I’ll go with him,” Charlie blurts, stepping next to Lewis.
“No, Charlie. You go with Olive and Will. I’m fine.” Lewis all but shoves Charlie at us.
“Wait. Great idea, buddy. No point in three of us going to the same spot.” Will crosses his arms. Is this really a mini Lewis-Will pissing match? Now? I step back and take in the show. “Olive and I can find it no problem.”
“But Charlie should be there, to try to go through himself,” Lewis adds, a satisfied grin stretched across his face.
“True. How about you and Charlie meet us there right after you check yours?” Will says.
“It would be easier and faster if he went with you.”
&nbs
p; “We don’t mind waiting on him.”
Oh, good God. This is ridiculous. I step forward. “Charlie, what do you want to do?”
Charlie raises his eyebrows. “I can wait. I want to go with Lewis.” With that, it’s settled.
Lewis exhales through his nose and turns away. Charlie follows. Lewis slows to let the kid catch up and nudges his shoulder. Charlie nudges back.
The rest of us set off down the mountain and into the woods, where Will and I go one way, Jude and Bug the other.
“Be careful. We’ll see you back at the beach,” I call to them as we split and just as Will clasps my hand in his.
“Thanks. You, too,” Bug sing-songs and then spots our hands. Her eyes go wide. “Ooh…”
Jude laughs and scruffs her hair.
Heat rises up the back of my neck, itching at my ears as I watch them disappear around a corner.
Will and I continue on our path. After a few minutes and once we’re out of earshot of the others, he pulls me in closer, wraps his hands around my waist, and does that thing where he’s right there, a breath away from my lips. My stomach twirls, my heart raps against my chest, and my breathing hitches right against his mouth.
Pulling me even closer—I can feel the heat radiating off of his chest—Will closes his eye, leans in so our foreheads touch, and runs his nose up the length of mine. Then back down. A fraction of a second passes when we’re suspended in time, just long enough to draw things out so my breath catches once more. Then he kisses me.
It’s a kiss that says so much without words. It’s a kiss of contradictions… Good-bye and hello. Please don’t leave and I set you free. More and too much.
We share several more kisses as we walk in silence—until a question starts nagging at me. I go over it in my head a thousand times before daring to speak it out loud. I inhale then breathe the words out. “What happens if this works?”
Will turns his head. “What do you mean what happens? We go home. Finally.”
“No, I mean… Will I see you again?”
He stops, takes my other hand in his, and pulls me closer. “Olive, I don’t exist in your time.” Will’s sight falls to the forest floor. “I don’t see how… If my door ever shows up and I choose to go through it, we’ll be living in different times. It wouldn’t work. And what if we forget? What if all of this feels like a strange dream? Or we have no memories of it at all?”
“You’ve been thinking about this, too,” I say.
“Of course I have. It’s killing me.”
We continue walking.
I stop, pulling him into me this time.
“Come with me. To my time. Through my window. You yourself said you have nothing to go home to. I don’t have much, either, but what I do have is beautiful and I’ll share it. With you. If you’ll come.”
Now he won’t look at me. His jaw flexes back and forth. I close the gap between us and run my fingertips over his eye patch. “Please. Say you’ll consider it.”
Again, Will rests his forehead against mine. “I can’t be a burden to anyone ever again. That’s all I ever was. I won’t be that person. Plus, I tried to go through and couldn’t.”
“You’re not a burden. Never. I’m asking you. And, what if we’re holding hands? Maybe I can…I don’t know…pull you through with me.”
He smiles and laughs through his nose. “You’re amazing, Olive Gagmuehler.” And there he goes again, saying my name like it’s a pretty thing.
“Tell me you’ll think about it.” I run my hands along his back.
He sighs.
“Please?”
“I’ll think about it.” It isn’t convincing, but I’ll take it.
He kisses me and I might melt away. His lips are coconut mixed with mint. It’s a great distraction on his part. Point, Will.
He pulls away, gazing down on me. “Let’s check on this so-called window. Keep your fingers crossed it’s still there.”
Mesmerized by the glimmering heat waves, I run my hand across the top of the fuzzy rock.
It’s still there.
But something’s changed. Where before the window was a single pane, like a flat mirror, it’s now doubled. Now twice the shimmers, twice the thickness. I have no doubt another window’s appeared.
But will it let Will through? If not, is it possible to pull him through with me? Because maybe it’s Charlie’s. The kid’s done so much these past few days. We decided his equation is about finding his voice, and boy, did he ever and in so many ways.
“Whoa,” Will whispers behind me. “It’s gotta be Charlie’s.”
“You think?”
“I know.” He moves farther behind me, so he must be leaning against the boulder.
I look over my shoulder.
Will’s watching me.
My cheeks catch fire. “What?” I ask, laughing in a nervous way.
“Has anyone ever told you you’re beautiful?”
Now my entire face and neck are ablaze. I shrug because, how do I answer that question? My mom has. Um, no.
“Well, I mean it. You. Are. Beautiful.”
Before I can react, he’s right there, holding me, and we’re dropping to the ground in front of the mossy boulder and kissing. There’s skin and warmth and the cool ground beneath us, the trees above us. And it’s just us. Alone. No one to interrupt or try to push us over a cliff or bomb us or spy on us.
Just us.
The forest.
The sun.
Nothing happens. But at the same time, everything does.
We lie, embraced, closer than I’ve ever been to anyone. Will brushes my ear with small kisses and I kiss his chin. His nose. His closed eyelid. Then his injured one, concealed by leather.
He stares at me.
I stare back.
Will goes to take his patch off.
I grab his hand.
He smiles in a sort of sad way and removes it.
The swirls are there, as they were so many days ago. Lovely. Honest.
A tear streams down his cheek from his good eye and he nudges his head into the crook of my neck. “Olive?”
“Yeah?”
“What if when I go back my eye heals?”
“Well, that would be great, right?”
“No.” He pulls back and stares at me. “It wouldn’t be. I deserved this wound. I deserve worse. But this…” He puts the patch back on. “Is my reminder of who I was and how I can’t be that person again.” Another tear falls. “What if I forget?”
“You won’t forget.” It seems silly, but at the same time, not.
“What if I do?” His eye searches mine for an answer. But I don’t have one for him because we don’t know. We could go back and never think of this island and the people on it again. Or we could remember every second of our time here.
I hug him, tangling my legs with his, getting as close as I can. “I guess we have to take that chance to get home.”
He tightens his embrace.
We stay like that for a while. Breathing. Being. But the task at hand forces us into reality. We unwind from one another. I pick the leaves and sticks from my hair.
He stands and walks up to the window. Looking down at me, he winks, then turns and pushes his face through the waves. But his shoulders fall—in frustration or relief, I’m not sure—and he walks through it without consequence, just as he did earlier.
“Told you it was Charlie’s.” Will loops around back to where I sit. “Your turn.”
“We know I can get through—”
“No. I mean… Your turn.”
I shake my head, because is he serious? “I’m not ready.”
His forehead crumples. “What if it disappears? You can’t risk it.”
I think on that. It would be awful. I take a deep breath. But it would be nothing compared to not knowing.
“I need to know you’re all okay before I can leave.”
He stares, then pulls me tightly into him.
“Come with me,” I whisper in
his ear.
Will shakes his head so his cheek grazes mine, the scruff grown more soft than prickly.
“At least try? See if it’s possible?”
“Olive, nothing happens when I go through.”
“But, maybe if I’m with you…” I’m grasping at straws.
As if to make his point, he stands, shoving his hand out at me. I stand up next to him and take it. “We’ll just stick our heads in.”
“Just our heads.”
“On three… One, two, three.”
I shove my head in, and I’m overtaken by the multi-layered sensations of the carnival: popcorn, noise, the sweet smell of corn, with the bitter aroma of dirt. I glance to the side. No Will. I thrust my body backward because I’m half afraid he’s going to shove me through so I don’t miss my chance.
I land at the base of the boulder next to him.
Will has a peaceful smile across his face. “That one’s there for one person. I couldn’t go back with you if I wanted.”
And those last three words tear me apart because…
Had he wanted to?
Chapter Thirty-Nine
Mission: Return Home
The sun sets at the horizon, the sky awash with pinks, purples, and blues. I’ll miss this. The smell of ocean. The salty breeze off the water. This family of strangers who took me in with open arms.
Everyone’s back now from checking their windows. When Lewis and Charlie met us at the boulder, the little sneak was so excited to see his window had materialized, he kept sticking his hands and feet into it, making them disappear. We had to stop him from chucking stones and leaves through the shimmers. And despite his anticipation about getting home, he insisted he’d wait until Bug’s window showed up. We didn’t dare argue.
The fire crackles as we sit in a large circle on the beach. Duke is even in attendance, leaning against a large rock. Noah and Henry helped him make the trek, but he actually seems…almost content. Less extreme. Less angry. More present.
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