Gillian's Island

by Natalie Vivien

Ivy doesn't have my address. She doesn't have my phone number. I handed her my business card days and days ago, but I doubt it was on her person when we got rescued, which means she has no contact information for me. So how are we going to find each other?

  My heart splinters, and a single tear slides over my cheek.

  I wonder if I'm ever going to see Ivy again.

  Chapter Eight

  I spend my stay at the hospital sick with worry—not about my health; I feel well physically. I'm worried about the fact that Ivy and I have been separated, that I don't know how to find her, don't even know her last name.

  So the first thing I do when all of my hospital tests are complete—stating that I'm perfectly fine, maybe better than ever—is find Charity in the hospital.

  She's about to be discharged, too, and she's staring at the pile of dirty, tattered clothes that she wore on the island, folded neatly on the hospital chair next to her bed in the emergency ward. Charity looks pretty unhappy as she holds the hospital gown tightly around herself, trying to bring herself to put those dirty clothes back on.

  “Hey, are you okay?” I ask her, with a faint smile.

  She glances at me, one brow raised, before looking down at herself and gesturing. “Hardly. I need access to my closet and a case of wine. Then I'll be peachy.” She offers me a tired smile. “You?”

  “I'm okay,” I lie. Well, it isn't really a lie, because health-wise, yeah, I'm okay. But emotionally? Ha. Not so much. “Hey, listen,” I begin, clearing my throat as my heart beats erratically inside of my chest. I finger the hem of my paper hospital gown with a grimace. “Um, do you remember the name of Ivy and Rusty's boating company?” I ask, watching her face.

  For a long moment, Charity remains silent. And then she sighs a little. “Oh, Gilly,” she tells me with a grimace. “They didn't have a...a boating company.” She shakes her head, gestures with her hands again. “Originally, we weren't supposed to go out to the island on the Swan Song, but the boat we'd reserved had some sort of scheduling problem, so that plan fell through. Remember the email I sent you about it, the day before we left?”

  I do, vaguely. It all seems like a lifetime ago. I stare at Charity hopefully, waiting.

  “Let's cut to the chase: I don't know their last name,” she says, anticipating my next question and folding her arms over her chest. “I figured I could ask the harbor master if he knew who was paying for the boat slip. I had to phone him about my left-behind luggage, too. But here's the problem: they weren't renting the slip. Ivy and Rusty don't normally do business out of Jupiter. Rusty was telling me something about that one day... They usually stick to the west coast of Florida, and they were only over here for an uncle's birthday. It's all a complicated mess,” she says simply, with a shrug. “The harbor master told us the night before that the Swan Song was available, so we booked it, no questions asked.”

  “So they were like...like ghosts,” I whisper, trying to hold myself together. “Wait. They brought Brian back in the same helicopter as Rusty and Ivy. Maybe he—”

  “Brian was brought to the hospital,” Charity interrupts, holding up her hand. “According to him, a lady medic—a 'smokin' hot lady medic,' in his words—took Ivy and Rusty someplace else. I guess the medic and Ivy were friends. Good friends, if Brian is to be believed.” She pauses, searching my face. “Gilly...do you understand what that means? Rusty told me when we were on the island that...” She sighs. “He told me about Ivy's, um, patterns.”

  A sob wells up in my throat, but I shake my head; I refuse to cry. “What about you and Rusty? How will you get into contact with him? I thought the two of you became pretty close...”

  Charity lifts her chin. There's a hardness to her eyes that I've never seen before as she purses her lips, turns away from me a little. “We're easy to find, aren't we?” she says, voice low. “Coyne Hotels and corporate headquarters are just an Internet search away. If Rusty and Ivy want to find us,” she says, jaw tightening, “they'll find us.”

  I consider this, frowning. “I guess so...” I trail off, searching her face. “Are you in love with him, Charity?” I whisper.

  For a moment, pain flickers across her features, but then Charity shakes her head, laughing under her breath, her eyes bright with unshed tears. “It was just an island romance, Gilly,” she says, her mouth lifting up at the corners, though the smile doesn't quite reach her eyes. “I had my sea captain—in every way I wanted him, and then some—and I brought home some nice memories, sure. But we're back in the real world now, and in the real world, that sort of stuff doesn't happen. Rusty was there, and he was a great distraction for me from the fact that we were shipwrecked. I imagine I was a good distraction for him, too. But at the end of the day, that's...all it was.”

  “A distraction,” I repeat quietly, gazing down at the floor, willing the tears not to spill out of my eyes, willing the lump in my throat to disappear.

  “Maybe I'm wrong,” says Charity, slinging an arm around me and hugging me tightly. “I'd...love to be proven wrong. But Rusty didn't say anything to me when they pulled him toward the other helicopter. He didn't even look over his shoulder to watch me go,” she says, shaking her head. “He didn't try to say goodbye.”

  “That doesn't sound like him,” I begin, but then Charity pins me in place with a hard stare.

  “Like sister, like brother, maybe,” she murmurs sadly. “Who knows? What can we do but wait and see? If either of them actually cared...” She shakes her head at me again. “I'm glad that Ivy made you happy, Gilly. But remember what I told you on the island? People change when they're in situations like that.”

  I want to tell her, I did change. I changed for the better. I'm a better person than the woman who went on that boat. I'm stronger, braver, and I'm in love...

  But I bite my tongue. I'm too shattered, too tired. I only say, “You're right,” my voice catching as I offer her a watery smile. “Of course you're right. As always.”

  In that first day after our release from the hospital, I'm too busy adjusting to normal life—and taking a long, hot, luxurious shower—to miss Ivy too much. But the first night? Agony. I lie in my cushy bed in my cushy apartment, and I can't sleep at all. I'm used to sparseness. I'm used to stars spreading overhead, to a crescent moon hanging low in the sky. I'm used to a fire roaring outside of our little shelter, to the gentle, insistent shushing of the waves, lulling me into dreams.

  I'm used to being held by the woman I love with my whole heart.

  I toss and turn, aching, wishing. Down by my feet, Kodak—who was ecstatic to see me—grumbles as my legs move under him again, and I shift my weight to the side of the bed, clutching the sheet.

  Where is Ivy? How could she just be gone?

  Will I ever see her again?

  I think about what Charity said, that a female medic took Rusty and Ivy somewhere. I can only assume that that medic was Abby, and that the “catching up” she'd hoped to achieve with Ivy has already happened.

  I hate that that's where my brain goes. I hate that everything has become so bittersweet.

  I toss and turn all night long, missing and worrying, wracked with the pain that only a heartbreak can bring.

  When I wake up to sunshine pouring through my filmy curtains, I'm confused; I can't remember where I am. It's only when Kodak licks my foot, his big, brown eyes beseeching me for a walk, for breakfast, that I remember what's happened.

  I'm back home.

  And I'm alone.

  I grab my camera from the bedside table, and I insert the recharged batteries, switching the camera on. Dully, I thumb through the photos I took while I was on the island—of water, of flowers, of forest, of Ivy—until the ache in my heart becomes a squeezing, a pinching pressure.

  I have to go out. I have to do something.

  So I take Kodak for a walk along the oceanfront, behind the tall condominium buildings near my place. I thought that seeing the ocean in its morning light, like I saw it every day on the island, might bring me s
ome semblance of peace. Of comfort. But the ocean doesn't look quite right here. It's not as blue; it's not as beautiful.

  Nothing is as beautiful...

  The days pass in mundane pursuits, and I acquire a new cell phone and give my new number to the hospital, to the harbor master. My stomach twists every moment of every hour as I wait, anxious, for a phone call from Ivy. A phone call that might never come.

  I wait and wait.

  And...nothing.

  So, on Monday, I get up bright and early, put on one of my power outfits—a pinstripe skirt and creamy blouse—and I return to work. I pull my car up to the office building, take the key out of the ignition, and I stare at Coyne Hotels' corporate headquarters, tapping my fingers against the steering wheel.

  “Gilly!” calls Charity, the moment I push through the rotating door. She's sitting in her corner office, leafing through a stack of paperwork. But she drops the stack and leaps to her high-heeled feet when she takes in the expression on my face. Smelling of very expensive perfume, and looking more gorgeous than ever in a slinky blue dress, she approaches me, concern furrowing her brows. “Gilly, you're still on leave. Why are you here?” She pauses. “What are you going to do?” she asks, taking my elbow in her hand.

  “What I should have done a long time ago,” I tell her quietly, with a soft smile. I wrap my arms around her shoulders, and I hug her tight. “Hey, are we still on for dinner tonight?” I ask her, my head tilted to the side as I back up, aiming for Brendan's office.

  “Yes?” she says uncertainly, her mouth sliding into a frown.

  Because she knows. Charity knows me better than anyone else, so of course she knows what I'm about to do.

  Brendan, however, has no idea.

  “Scully!” he yells the second I open his door. He's sitting on his desk, smoking a ridiculously stinky cigar and changing channels on his floor-to-ceiling plasma screen television. He was watching something that looked an awful lot like a Girls Gone Wild video before I came in, but he flips channels until he ends up on a Disney cartoon. I shut the door behind me with a soft click. “So what's the dealio, Red? You're looking fine this morning—”

  “I'm giving you my resignation, Brendan,” I tell him curtly, handing him an envelope.

  He blinks, like the island wildlife blinked when we came upon them in the woods and startled them. He gazes down at the envelope in his hands and shakes his head. “Resignation?”

  I watch him levelly, coolly, and nod.

  I'm not nervous. I'm not afraid. Something has changed inside of me. I can't stomach corporate life anymore. I have my savings, and I don't know what I want to do yet, only that it isn't going to be in an office, or in an uncomfortable suit.

  I could tell Brendan all of these things, sure, but I don't. I'm done here. I've given this place, these people, all I'm willing to give. I simply shake his hand, and I leave his office, offering Charity another hug before I go.

  And when I step out of the building, never to return again, I feel a thousand pounds lighter. I realized a lot of things on the island, and one of the most important was this: Life's too short to put up with an asshole boss.

  Life's also too short to play it safe. To stay in harbor.

  To never take chances.

  “Hello,” I say into my cell phone, ringing the hospital. “Did anyone call looking for me? Gillian Delaney?”

  “No,” says the hospital staff member, sounding just as sad for me as she did the last time I asked.

  “Thanks.” I end the call and place the phone in my purse. Then I close my eyes and draw in a few deep breaths. All I really want to do is tell Ivy that I did it. That I found the courage, and I quit my job, and I'm going to try to be a full-time photographer now. A real photographer, not one who takes pictures of hotels for the marketing department. Not that there was anything wrong with what I did... But I'd silenced my dream in order to be responsible, practical.

  And I nearly died last week. I almost died, and being practical sort of flew out the window when I looked back on my life and realized exactly how unhappy I'd been.

  I want to tell Ivy everything...but she's not here.

  When I get into my car, I turn on the engine, my hands gripping the wheel as I consider all of the places I could go, now that I'm unemployed. I never ended up eating that veggie burger I kept daydreaming about, so maybe I should drive to Burger King.

  “Gillian Delaney, you just survived a shipwreck,” I mutter to myself, putting the car into drive. “What are you going to do next?”

  Well, I'm not going to Disney World. When you're from Florida and have spent every childhood vacation at the park in the dreaded summer heat, Disney World begins to lose a little bit of its magic.

  My stomach growls, offering its opinion on the matter.

  And I nod, decided. I eat my veggie burger one-handed, driving through mid-town traffic, toward the coastline again... Until I end up on the dock where, a little over a week ago, I saw Ivy for the very first time. Before our story began.

  I park the car in the lot, and the second I climb out of the driver's side, I pause, inhaling deeply, the sea breeze filling my lungs. I'm transported back to a few days ago, back to the island... God, will normal life ever be enough for me now? I want to go back to those banana trees and the waterfalls so much that my heart aches.

  Almost as much as it aches for Ivy.

  Okay, here's the truth: I harbored a vague, half-formed hope that, when I walked down onto the dock, my heels clicking over the weathered, wooden boards, I would see Ivy again. That, somehow, she'd be there, possibly with a new boat, or maybe on someone else's boat. Part of me really believed that—out of every place in the world that Ivy could be—she would be here. Now.

  But Ivy's not here. I walk along the dock, glance at the names of the boats, and my eyes fill up with tears as disappointment slows my steps. It was irrational for me to expect to find her here. Still, I hoped—

  “Hey!” someone says. I blink back my tears, scuffing the hem of my sleeve over my eyes, and then I glance up at a tall boat to my right.

  There's an elderly man standing on the deck, and he has his hand raised to me in greeting. He's smiling widely. His boat looks as if it's seen better days, but scrawled along the side of it in a seventies'-style cursive are these two words: The Mermaid.

  The Mermaid.

  A soft smile teases my lips. Ivy always reminded me of a mermaid...

  “Hey,” I call back, glancing up at the man and shielding my eyes from the sunshine beaming down.

  “Can you pass that bucket up to me?” he asks apologetically. “Sorry, but the old knees aren't as spry as they used to be,” he explains, with a small shrug.

  I glance down at the dock beside me and note that there's a bucket filled with small fish. He's a fisherman, then. I heft up the bucket in my arms, and then I'm crossing the narrow gangplank onto his boat.

  “Where are you headed?” I ask him, handing over the bucket of bait.

  “Wherever the wind takes me,” he says, with a wink and a laugh. “Or, you know, the motor, since I don't have a sail!”

  My heart is rising in my throat. Old Gillian would never, in a million years, have uttered what comes out of my mouth next. But with a wild impulsiveness, I hear myself saying, “If you don't have any firm plans, could I...uh...charter your boat? To an island?”

  The man blinks down at me, placing the bucket of fish by his feet on that high deck. “An island?”

  I nod, taking out a scrap of paper from my purse. “I have the coordinates,” I tell him, because I do. I printed them out on the off chance that I would be brave enough to come down here, brave enough to hire a boat...

  I know I can't go back to the way the island was. The way it was when I was falling in love with Ivy. That's all over now. I don't know where Ivy is, and she's certainly not on the island...

  I just want to go back.

  I want to say goodbye.

  “Well, hell!” he tells me, with another wide
grin. “An adventure! I had nothing better to do today.”

  “Great. How much would you charge for something like this?” I ask him, ready and willing to get the money part out of the way.

  “Twenty bucks,” says the old guy, revving the boat's engine. It sounds a little like a dying turkey, but then the boat is rumbling to life beneath my feet.

  “Twenty... But that's hardly anything,” I protest.

  He waves me off with a cheerful smile. “You remind me of my daughter,” he says, tilting his head toward me. “She has red hair, just like you. Though she's got a sailor's mouth. I'm to blame for that.” And he's laughing in such a jolly way that I'm reminded of Santa Claus.

  “Thank you,” I tell him with a small smile. I hand him a twenty dollar bill and make my way toward the back of the boat, my heart hammering in my chest as I realize that I'm on a boat again, for the first time since I nearly drowned.

  But there's a lightness inside of me as my hands grip the railing, my nose lifted to the salt breezes. Yeah, I was in a shipwreck. And, admittedly, it's a little strange to be standing on a boat right now, traveling the same seas, civilization ebbing further and further away every time I look over my shoulder toward the mainland.

  But I'm on the way to the island. The island I miss with a deep pang of loss... So I focus on that, pushing my boat-related anxieties to the back of my mind. Besides, I can swim now.

  And it's worth it, being on a boat, just so I can see that beach one last time.

  The trip takes about three hours. Three hours, and a million memories to relive as I lean on the railing, watching the seagulls fly overhead, or sit on the bench toward the back of the boat, letting the waves move me gently, to match their rhythm. The boat captain's name is Jack, and he talks to me about his bad fishing luck, about the guy who's going to marry his daughter, about his retirement home in Key West.

  I hope I live to be Jack's age, and I hope that—when I get there—I'm as happy and content as he is. He points out dolphins slicing through the water, a pelican plunging into the depths to retrieve a fish... He's tuned in to the beauty of the ocean, and the ocean doesn't ever seem to disappoint him.