This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental. The author makes no claims to, but instead acknowledges the trademarked status and trademark owners of the word marks mentioned in this work of fiction.
Copyright © 2020 by Dallas Woodburn
THE BEST WEEK THAT NEVER HAPPENED by Dallas Woodburn
All rights reserved. Published in the United States of America by Month9Books, LLC.
No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.
Trade Paperback ISBN: 978-1-951710-11-8
ePub ISBN: 978-1-951710-12-5
Mobipocket ISBN: 978-1-951710-13-2
Published by Month9Books, Raleigh, NC 27609
Cover design by The Leaf Book Design
PRAISE FOR THE BEST WEEK THAT NEVER HAPPENED
“A poignant and gripping heart-tug of a page-turner filled with heart and hope. I couldn’t put it down. Magic.” —Jennifer Niven, New York Times bestselling author of All the Bright Places and Holding Up the Universe
“Dallas Woodburn weaves a bittersweet love story between star-crossed lovers—thwarted not only by distance but also by insurmountable tragedy. This captivating, poignant story is perfect for teens on the brink of discovering who they are and what really matters in the time they have left.” – Natalie Lund, author of We Speak in Storms
For Allyn and Maya:
Every week I get to spend with you is the Best Week of My Life.
A long life may not be good enough, but a good life is long enough.
–Benjamin Franklin
Table of Contents
Praise for The Best Week That Never Happened
The Fish That Swim Up the Waterfall
PART ONE
Monday
Tuesday
PART TWO
Wednesday
Thursday
PART THREE
Friday
Saturday
Sunday
Today
Acknowledgements
About the Author
Connect With Us
Other Month9Books Titles You Might Like
The Fish That Swim up the Waterfall
At Akaka Falls, on the Big Island of Hawaii, there is a fish called the o’opu alamo’o. These fish are born in the waters above the falls. Their babies drift in the current all the way down the falls, down the river, and out to the Pacific Ocean. There, they grow into adult fish.
When it is time, they begin to swim back from whence they came, up the freshwater streams toward Akaka Falls. At the base of the waterfall—which is more than four hundred feet high—they do an amazing thing. Using a sucker on their bellies, the fish climb up the sheer cliff wall, painstakingly making their way up and up and up, until they reach the top of the waterfall. There, they hatch the eggs of the next generation of o’opu alamo’o, new fish that will make the same journey.
The o’opu alamo’o, you see, understand that life is a cycle. We could all learn from these fish. Sometimes we must hoist ourselves up waterfalls in our own lives, back to our origins, back to where we began.
DEADLY TRAIN ACCIDENT IN VIRGINIA
Sixty-eight people were killed and hundreds wounded in a commuter train accident on the Northeast Corridor from Philadelphia to Washington, DC, on Monday. The train unaccountably derailed, and the first two cars careened into the mountainside, killing sixty-seven passengers along with the train conductor. Eight passengers remain missing.
Authorities have not announced the cause of the accident and are withholding further details pending further investigation by the National Transportation Safety Board.
Vigils are being held for the victims in Philadelphia and Washington.
hey tegan,
i know it’s been a while. i was just thinking of you randomly today and that time we followed the sea turtle. remember how we thought we could chase her all around the world? bet we could have, if your parents hadn’t called you in for dinner.
are you still mad at me? i hope not, because i miss you. i’m not mad at you anymore. i’m sorry for ghosting you. truce?
—kai
PART ONE
MONDAY
When I open my eyes and sit up, everything is dark. My brain is cottony, and my eyes won’t focus. I can’t remember where I am or how I got here. I’m not afraid. I mostly feel … empty.
The warm air is humid and heavy. Beads of sweat trickle down my back, even though I’m wearing a thin tank top and jean shorts. I take a deep breath. Then another. I am sitting on the bare ground, hard and bumpy. There are rocks, sharp and pointy as blades. Impulsively, I slip one into the pocket of my shorts. Protection.
When I stand, I hit my head on something hard. A sloping roof? A shelf of rock? Has someone kidnapped me and taken me captive underground? I should be terrified, but I’m mostly confused and curious. Something about this place seems familiar … but whatever the memory is, it remains out of reach, like wisps of clouds passing through my brain, impossible to grasp.
Gradually, my eyes adjust to the dimness. Black walls of rock surround me. I begin crawling forward on my hands and knees, a strange anticipation fluttering in my chest. If I’m lost, why do I have this hopeful feeling? The rocks graze my bare knees and sting my palms. My eyes blink against the darkness. And then, I see it—a shaft of light, up ahead. I crawl faster.
The roof of rock slopes up and up until I find myself in a large dark chamber. A shaft of light streams down through an opening in the ceiling, like the Pantheon in Rome, which I think I’ve visited before, or maybe I’ve just seen pictures. Right now, my memory isn’t working all that well. It feels as if I’m half-asleep, waiting for the details of my life to come into focus.
Suddenly, a figure steps into the shaft of light. I freeze. His back is to me, but there’s a spotlight on him, like an actor onstage. There is something recognizable in the way he carries himself: the breadth of his shoulders and the slant of his hips. As I scoot a little closer, the rock falls out of my shallow pocket and plunks onto the ground. A soft thud is loud in this hushed chamber of stone. The boy turns, glancing around.
When I see his face, my breath catches in my throat.
Kai.
The sight of him brings a memory into focus: the last time I saw him in person, three years ago. He looks exactly the same as he did then.
He stares in my direction, but his expression is utterly blank. Does he recognize me? Can he even see me in this darkness? Or is he looking past me, lost in thought? I stand, ducking my head to keep clear of the ceiling. I am about to call his name when he steps out of the light, vanishing as quickly as he had appeared.
I slip the rock back into my pocket, and then I follow him.
The last time Kai and I talked, it did not end well. I was angry with him about something. And he was upset with me too. He was so upset that he said he needed space and hung up the phone. Thinking about it now makes a rain cloud sit heavy in my chest. Why would I ever fight with Kai? He is so easygoing and gentle—he never argues with anyone. God, I must have done something terrible to actually make him angry. What did I do? How can I make it right?
I need to catch up to him so we can talk. Then I can explain, or maybe he can explain to me. And then I can apologize. And then things will be okay between us again.
When I reach the shaft of light, I til
t my head back and gaze up. The light filters into the rock cavern through a round hole about the size of a dinner plate. Through the hole, I can glimpse clear blue sky. Wisps of cloud skitter past.
With a flash of recognition, I know exactly where I am.
The lava tubes.
Our place, mine and Kai’s.
Three years ago …
“Meet me tonight at the lava tubes,” Kai said. His brows were knitted together, his tone urgent. His fingers lightly touched my hip. “So we can, you know. Catch up.”
“I’m not sure,” I hedged, glancing at my parents in the distance. They were distracted, gathering our snorkel gear and dumping our dirty towels into the laundry bin at the resort kiosk. Expecting me to be following right behind them. If I didn’t hurry, soon they would notice my absence and start bickering.
“I don’t even remember how to get there,” I said to Kai.
“Don’t worry, it’s simple—I bet you’ll remember as you go along. Follow the path along the edge of the golf course. You hit the parking lot, and the path turns to gravel and veers down to the lava tubes. You can’t miss it, really. I still go there all the time.”
All the time. His words made me flinch inside, which surprised me—I didn’t have a crush on Kai. But then why did I hate to imagine him bringing other girls there? Maybe because the lava tubes were special: the hideout we had discovered as kids, the place we had spent those magical summer hours dreaming, pretending we would run away together. Silly plans. Childish games. Still—it hurt to think of him there, without me. With someone else instead.
I turned away. “Look, it was great to run into you, but I should go … ”
“T, please.” He touched my shoulder, and I couldn’t help myself. I paused, turned back around to face him. “It’s our place,” he said. “Remember?”
Our place. The look in his eyes was so earnest.
“Okay,” I whispered. “I’ll see you there. Midnight.” Then I reluctantly pulled away, heading up the sandy hill to my waiting parents.
I’m not buried in some scary underground cave. I’m somewhere familiar and safe: the secret hideout of my favorite childhood vacation. As I gaze up at the bright-blue daytime sky through the round hole in the rock roof, memories come flooding back about a different sky I once glimpsed through that hole—night, star-studded.
Kai is here somewhere. I need to find him.
In the distance, a faint glimmer of sunlight marks the cave exit. I plunge toward it through the darkness, memories of that night swirling through my mind. Memories of the last time I was here, three years ago.
Three years ago …
I couldn’t remember when I had ever been so nervous. You’re being stupid, I told myself. Get a grip, Tegan. I prided myself on having nerves of steel. Public speaking, drama auditions, sports tryouts and championship games—I strode through it all with a calm smile on my face. So why did the idea of a midnight excursion with Kai make me so jittery?
It’s just Kai, I reminded myself. Your random childhood friend from a lifetime ago.
Kai was born and raised here on the Big Island, and I had come here with my parents on vacation when I was eight. I first met Kai on the beach when he accidentally knocked over my sandcastle. For the rest of that vacation, he and I were inseparable. I had been devastated to return home. Back then, neither of us owned smartphones. We hadn’t kept in touch. I had always wondered what happened to that little kid I once knew.
For some un-pin-downable reason, seeing Kai again on this trip seemed like a gift from the universe, a remnant of my past washed up onto the shore of the present. Life had been so complicated and difficult—my parents tried to act as if this trip to Hawaii was a normal vacation, but even I could tell it was a last-ditch effort to save their marriage and keep our family intact. Kai was a reminder of a time I was nostalgic for, a time when everything was right in my innocent little world. A time I yearned to go back to.
I slid out of bed and crept through the dark hotel room, carefully stepping past my snoring parents and the land mines of half-empty suitcases, and snaking cords belonging to laptops and phone chargers, until I finally reached the oasis of the bathroom. I changed into a sundress, leggings, and my favorite cozy sweater, the only warm thing I’d brought to Hawaii. I didn’t dare turn on the light to put on any makeup. I pulled my hair into a low ponytail, grabbed my mini flashlight from my backpack, and slipped out of the hotel room and down the outdoor hallway until I reached the beach.
That time of night, the beach was deserted. I kicked off my sandals, relishing the cool sand on my bare feet. During the day, the sun baked the sand, making it too hot to step on for more than a few seconds. As kids, Kai and I would race each other from the ocean across the huge swath of scorching white sand, to the Popsicle cart behind the snorkel gear rentals. The trick was to run fast, your toes barely brushing the ground. Still, we would gasp, “Hot! Hot! Hot!” as we ran. By the time we reached the relief of grassy lawn, we usually forgot to care about who had won the race. It felt like both of us had won, turning our tongues into rainbows, dangling our feet in the pool. I would always order cherry. Kai would mix it up—sometimes pineapple, sometimes lime, sometimes blue raspberry—depending on his mood.
My friendship with Kai was like the sand beneath my feet. As kids, our friendship was midday-sun sand, its heat immediate and strong. In the years since then, the sand had cooled. What was our relationship now? Were we still friends? Was he the same person I remembered?
A breeze teased strands of hair out of my ponytail and brushed them into my face. The moon was a glowing china plate in the sky, so white and smooth it looked artificial. I had expected my stomach to be a riot of butterflies, but now that I was actually out of the hotel room, making my way toward the lava tubes—toward Kai—I felt a strange absence of nerves. It seemed like I was separate from myself, watching my actions from a distance. Like I was a character in a novel, turning the pages to see what would happen next.
From the beach, I headed up the path skirting the edge of the golf course. At night, the golf course was abandoned, the golf flags flapping forlornly in the breeze. A pair of seagulls strutted across the green as if they owned it. Across the parking lot, the path turned to gravel. I turned on my flashlight, aiming its narrow beam at the uneven ground, and willed myself not to trip. My nerves had returned with a vengeance. Every step took me closer to Kai. What was he expecting, exactly? What was going to happen? What did I want to happen?
At school, everything was different. I was different. There I was Tegan, captain of the soccer team. Tegan, leader of the student council. Tegan, straight-A student, never shy about raising a hand in class, the girl everyone wanted as their lab partner. I had friends, sure, but sometimes I felt separate from the other kids. No guy had ever asked me out—unless you counted Mark Teng inviting me to lunch that one time so I’d help him with his science fair project. And I’d had little crushes here and there, but all of them faded within a few months, like seeds that hadn’t been given enough water to grow. My focus was firmly on the future—achieving, striving, succeeding. I was determined to be the first one in my family to attend a four-year university. That goal underlaid everything I did, pushing me toward perfection. I could take risks on the soccer field; I could make a fool of myself in front of the entire student body by acting out some goofy skit at an assembly. No sweat. But I couldn’t take risks outside of the careful parameters I had set for myself. Getting drunk at some party? Nope. Making out with random guys? No, thanks. I’m sure some of my classmates thought I was boring, but I didn’t care. I told myself it would all be worth it, that day I got my acceptance letter in the mail.
Which is part of what made this whole sneaking-out-late-at-night-to-meet-some-guy-I-barely-knew thing so surreal. I didn’t do stuff like this. Maybe I was fooling myself, expecting Kai to be the same guy I knew as a kid. Maybe he was a total asshole. Maybe he was a creep. Maybe he just wanted to hook up. What if h
e expected to? I mean, I was meeting him at midnight in a deserted cave in Hawaii. Nobody knew where I was. Maybe this was the stupidest thing I had ever done.
I stopped in my tracks, breathing in the cool, damp air, trying to decide what to do. I almost turned around and headed back up the path, back to the hotel room, back to my (hopefully still sleeping) parents. But then I remembered Kai’s buoyant smile, the kindness in his eyes, and the way it had been so normal talking with him even though we hadn’t seen each other in years. Deep in my gut, I trusted him.
So, for better or for worse, I kept walking.
The path began to slope downward, and I knew I was getting close to the lava tubes. Soon, the path turned left around a bend, and my heart thudded urgently in my chest. When I rounded the corner, there it was. Like a place out of my dreams, it looked exactly the same as I remembered.
The entrance to the lava tubes—tunnels created from hardened lava hundreds of years ago—was dark with shadows. My grating footsteps on the gravel sounded especially loud in the hushed night. A flashlight beam bobbed into view at the cave opening. I clicked my flashlight off and on and off again, a greeting.
“Tegan?” Kai said. “Is that you?” He didn’t shout, but his voice carried in the quiet draped around us.
“It’s me,” I said, clicking my flashlight back on and crunching down the gravel path toward him. A flash of memory: our eight-year-old selves, planning to hide out here and live like the Boxcar Children so I would never have to return home. Because that summer, leaving had meant the end of the world. Of course, no vacation lasts forever. The world Kai and I had created had predictably ended. My mom had soothed me on the plane ride home, stroking my hair as I cried in her lap.
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