by Carrie Ryan
He kisses me then. On the mouth, the chin. The hollow at the base of my throat and along my collarbones. As he pushes me to the surface, his mouth carves memories across my flesh.
My finger trembles as I press at the power button, not knowing what to hope for. Would I want to see those pictures of us again? After everything else, would he have even kept them?
And why hide them away?
“Battery’s dead,” Shepherd points out needlessly when the screen remains blank. I bite back a sarcastic retort and examine the plug. Of course it’s several generations old, which means having to find the right charging cord.
With a sigh of frustration, I begin searching through the kitchen drawers. Growing up we always had a junk drawer in the kitchen where we stuffed odds and ends like batteries, random tools, old power cords, loose change, and other detritis that accumulated on the counter. Once a year my father would tip it out and let me keep the money in exchange for sorting through it all.
My lips twitch at the memory. How my father would make a big production of carting the drawer over to the kitchen table. How he’d sit next to me, pretending to be a pirate in search of treasure as he helped me paw through the debris. How he was able to turn something that should have been a chore into an adventure.
“What are you thinking about?” Shepherd’s question breaks me from the memory.
“Nothing really,” I mumble, still intent on my search. “Why?”
“You looked . . .” He frowns, searching for the right word. “Happy.” This makes me pause and I glance up at him, meeting his eyes. “It’s a good look on you,” he adds. “You should be happy more often.”
The comment takes me aback. “I didn’t realize I wasn’t.”
He shrugs. “I think I have a charger that’ll work up in my room,” he says, changing the subject. He starts out of the kitchen, motioning for me to follow.
FORTY-TWO
Shepherd’s bedroom is above the garage, and the only way up to it is a set of narrow stairs tucked away in the back of the house. I’m surprised when we reach the top to find a sprawling open space with slanted ceilings and dozens of dormer windows. The space is bright and airy with long countertops running down one side and a narrow bed pushed into the corner.
Maps of Caldwell and the surrounding counties line the available wall space, plots of land outlined in heavy black Sharpie and color coded by status and ownership. A vibrant green marks the conservation easement, an angry red indicating formerly protected land slated for development.
Shepherd pulls a basket onto the counter and riffles through a tangle of cords, comparing the ends against the phone until grunting, “Aha!” He plugs in the phone and I stare at it a moment, willing the screen to flash to life. “If the battery’s all the way drained, it’s probably going to take a few minutes before it’s charged enough to turn on.”
I bite the inside of my cheek and pace the length of his room impatiently. The far wall is dominated by built-in bookcases, each shelf piled with paperbacks. Most of them have broken spines stamped with the names of various libraries and I trail my fingers across them. Richland County Library, Greenville County Library, Aiken County Library.
“Why was Morales asking about your ring?” Shepherd’s question breaks the silence.
I shrug, pretending that my attention is still focused on the books. Calhoun, Charleston, Georgetown. “How many late fees do you owe for having all of these books?”
“I bought them all at library sales. You going to tell me about the ring?”
“Why not just buy new ones? Cecil would have given you the money for it.”
“Money from the sales goes to support the library.”
Lancaster, Marion, Florence. “You could have just made a donation.”
“Libby—” he starts and then all the air leaves his lungs and even his shoulders cave as though he’d been punched.
Libby. The name echoes in the silent bedroom.
“God, you look like her,” he mumbles. “I can’t believe she’s . . .” He shakes his head. We stare at each other, for that one horrified moment as it hits him all over again, the truth of this situation. That I’m not her. That’s she’s gone. Dead.
It’s one thing to know something in your head, but it’s another thing entirely to convince your heart of it. I can see it in his eyes, the realization that the name Libby means nothing anymore.
It’s dead, just like the girl it had belonged to.
He presses a curled fist against his forehead as he struggles to regain control, his breath coming in tight gasps.
And I realize, he hasn’t had time to mourn. Even though he hadn’t talked to Libby in four years, he still loved her. She still mattered to him. He still got to think about her being out in the world, living her life.
He still had hope that one day she might return. She might again love him back.
Now all of that is gone.
Has been gone for years and he just didn’t know.
I move across the room and perch on the edge of the bed. “Maybe I should have told you the truth four years ago.” I stare at my hands. “Libby trusted you. Maybe I should have too.”
He doesn’t respond, just continues to stand there, his eyes squeezed shut and jaw clenching, everything about him wound tight. I wish I knew what to tell him to make it all better.
But maybe that’s the problem. Maybe there is no such thing as better. Maybe there’s only grief and loss.
Maybe, for some people, that’s all their life will ever be.
“She talked about you more than anyone else at the end,” I tell him. He tenses, listening. “I think what upset her most about dying was leaving you behind.” Shepherd draws a sharp breath at this, his fist digging harder into his forehead.
There’s no way for me to retreat from the intensity of his emotions. No way to avoid them leaking past my defenses. Making me care. Making me feel. How did I not realize that this was always going to be the problem with coming here? I’d spent so many years freezing my heart. But then Grey set fire to it all over again. Now that it beats, I don’t know how to stop it.
Being here wasn’t supposed to change me.
I wasn’t supposed to second-guess myself.
Past Me didn’t prepare for this and now Present Me is floundering.
I swallow. Knowing that I’ve been a horrible person for keeping Libby from Shepherd. He deserves better, I think to myself.
“What did she say?” he asks. His voice is calm, though all the sharp edges to it are honed and deadly.
“That you were the best thing that ever happened to her. That you opened her eyes in a way no one else ever had and she was grateful for it.”
He walks to the window, stares at the ocean. “I’m sorry,” I whisper. “I shouldn’t have kept that from you.” He doesn’t respond.
A small chirp sounds from his desk where the face of Grey’s phone now glows. Quietly, I push to my feet and make my way over to it.
“Why are you doing this?” Shepherd asks just as I’ve picked up the phone. I stare down at the face of it. The home screen is a picture of Frances and Grey underwater, his lips pressed against hers. I suck in a breath, trying to focus on Shepherd’s question.
“Because you deserved to know,” I tell him.
He turns, facing me. “I don’t mean this.” He gestures between us. “I mean that,” He points to the phone. “Grey, the Wellses, all of it. What are you expecting is going to happen? What do you want?”
It should be such an easy question. All the usual answers are there at the tip of my tongue. I want the truth. I want revenge. I want relief. But none of them feel right anymore.
“I want it to be over,” I finally say, my voice betraying my exhaustion. Who knew guilt and rage could weigh so much?
“Then let it be. You’re so full of anger—you let i
t fill you up so that there’s no room for anything else. You never talk about your parents or what your life was like before the Persephone. Or what you want your life to be like now. Everything you do is so focused on getting back at the Wellses. If you want it to be over, then it’s over.”
I shake my head, wishing I could explain that it’s not that easy. My finger hovers over Grey’s phone, ready to swipe it open. “Do you think if it had been different, if it had been Libby who’d survived and me that died, she’d be the one here doing this?”
Shepherd doesn’t answer immediately. “I doubt it.”
I nod. It’s what I’d expected to hear, but it still stings. “You’re right, she’d have been able to put the past behind her and move on.”
He crosses the room, places his hand over mine so that it blocks the phone’s screen. Forcing me to look up at him. “No,” he says, meeting my eyes. “She wouldn’t be here because she wasn’t strong enough to survive in the first place. And you were.”
I let out a laugh and shake my head. “Surviving had nothing to do with strength and everything to do with luck.”
A frown furrows between Shepherd’s eyebrows as his eyes search my face. Then he makes a noise in the back of his throat as though he’s just figured something out. “So that’s why you pretend to be someone else.”
“Because I had no other choice,” I point out.
He shakes his head. “There are always other choices.”
I let out a snort, rolling my eyes. “Then why?”
“Because you don’t have enough faith in yourself.”
It’s as though he’s poured frigid water into my veins. I stiffen, the heat around my heart rapidly cooling past the point of freezing.
He must notice the shift in my demeanor because he steps back, giving me space. But he keeps one eyebrow raised and I hate that he might think my reaction has proven his point.
“No, I pretend to be Libby so that I can get things like this.” I hold up the phone. “Now let’s see why Grey felt like this was something worth hiding.”
FORTY-THREE
I lean my hip against the counter, Grey’s phone still tethered to the wall in order to keep charging. Shepherd stands facing me, his head only inches away so that he can see the screen as well.
For a moment I want to push him away. This phone feels somehow private, a piece of my past with Grey, and I hate the idea of sharing it. But Shepherd’s a part of this now too; it’s only fair he be here.
“Maybe put it in airplane mode first,” Shepherd suggests. “So no one can trace it.”
“Right,” I say, making my way through the settings. I realize I’d have probably forgotten to do that and am grateful he’s here to remind me.
Then, blowing out a long breath, I brace myself and open the photo app. The screen fills with familiar thumbnail-sized images. I click on one at random and it’s a candid shot I don’t even remember him taking. I’m sitting on a lounge chair out on deck, my face scrunched in concentration as I lean over a book reading. In the next picture I’m glaring at him. Then I’m laughing. Then I’m reaching for him. Then it’s a selfie of the two of us, his lips pressed against my cheek.
I flick through them maddeningly fast, knowing that if I pause at all it will break me. Already I remember too much. The feel of him and the smell and the way his breath tickled the edge of my ear as he hovered, hovered, hovered, until finally flicking his teeth against the lobe, causing me to gasp and shudder.
But then Shepherd mutters, “Stop.” He gently nudges my finger from the screen and flips back to an earlier picture. It’s me and Libby. We’re in our bathing suits by the pool, hair wet and slicked from our faces. I’m making a funny face and she has her head thrown back laughing.
She’s so stunningly vibrant and full of life that it makes me ache just to remember it. I’m hit again with how unfair it is that she died and I didn’t. She was the brighter person, how could her light ever go out before mine?
After a moment Shepherd grunts, “Go on,” he says, and I do.
Five photographs later, I understand why Grey kept this phone hidden for long. At first I think he just mistakenly photographed the inside of his pocket or something. The image is so dark it’s almost impossible to make out any shapes. Then Shepherd reaches forward to tap the screen and I realize it’s a video.
At first all I hear is shuffling, the sound of something like fabric pulling across the microphone. The image remains dark, no objects distinct enough to stand out. There’s a blur of light and the sound of someone breathing in heavy, terrified gasps.
And then the screaming. It’s in the background, far enough away that I have to strain at first to figure out what it is. A woman’s high-pitched shriek. A series of pops like fireworks and she falls quiet.
I collapse against the counter. Letting the phone drop from my hands, I slide until I’m on the floor. Knees clutched to my chest, fingers shoved into my hair and pulling as the memories assault me.
The video continues. “Ohgodohgodohgodohgod.” The same words playing through my head, but it’s Grey’s voice coming from the phone. Laced with panic.
I struggle to breathe, choking on the terror of that night clawing its way free again. Shepherd fumbles to stop the video but I shake my head. “No. I want to hear.”
He hesitates. “Do it!” I yell. Reluctantly he crouches next to me, one hand on my back, the other holding the phone. Thumb poised to press stop at any moment.
There’s not much more to the video anyway. Just more dark. More screaming. At one point Grey mumbles something that I think might have been Frances, but it’s too hard to make out in the midst of the chaos.
It ends abruptly. Leaving us in silence. Shepherd lets out a long breath while I continue to curl as tightly into myself as possible. I feel him slip his arm around me and pull me against his chest. “It’s okay,” he says, holding me.
Only then do I realize I’m sobbing.
“I’m sorry.” It’s probably the tenth time Shepherd’s said this in the past half hour. At first I appreciated his concern, but now I just wish he’d stop. I don’t like being coddled.
I don’t like someone else feeling like they have a right to comfort me. Or that I’m weak enough to need it.
It’s obvious that any doubt he may have had about my version of events has been erased by the video on Grey’s phone. Now he’s all in. “We should call Morales,” he suggests. We’re sitting on the floor in his room, both of us cross-legged with the phone between us. The screen is dark. Once or twice Shepherd has reached for it, but he always hesitates and leaves it be.
I’ve been chewing on my lower lip, thinking. Now I shake my head. “It’s not enough.”
He looks up at me with wide eyes. “Not enough for what?” he asks, incredulous.
“You can’t really see anything—there’s no proof. Grey could have taken the video days or weeks later.”
“Why would he?” he sputters. “Won’t the file have the date and time the thing was taken?”
“You have to think of this the way they would—the outside world. As far as they know, they already have the real story. It takes a lot to change someone’s mind once they’ve made it up. The burden is heavier on us.”
He pushes to his feet and begins to pace, clearly agitated. “You can trust Morales.”
“But she can’t trust me!” I counter. “Look, unless we have absolute proof, it won’t matter. Even if she did believe us, what can she do about it? Maybe, if we’re lucky, we’ll convince some crackpot conspiracy theorists. But no one else.”
“How can that not convince them?” He throws his hand at the phone. “You hear a woman screaming! You hear the shots!”
“Maybe Grey was watching a horror movie in the background,” I offer. He scoffs. “Or the video is from when the rogue wave struck and the woman’s screaming because of that
and the sound you think is gunshots is really support wires on the ship snapping.”
He opens his mouth to argue and then closes it.
“I’m not saying this isn’t useful,” I tell him. “I’m just saying that on its own it’s not enough. We need more.”
He runs a hand down his face. “Someone tried to kill you last night, Frances. This isn’t a joke anymore.”
“This has never been a joke to me,” I remind him. “They sank the Libby Too because they’re scared we’re too close to the truth. They’re worried, which means they’re likely to make a mistake.” I step toward him, allowing a desperate note into my voice. “We’re close, Shepherd.”
He considers this for a long moment and then lets out a sigh. “So what now?”
The plan has always been to shake the tree and see what falls. Now I just have to shake a bit harder. “It’s time for Libby to start remembering a few things from that night. Put a little more pressure on Grey.”
FORTY-FOUR
I wait until that night to text him.
I think I’m starting to remember.
The words glow on the phone’s screen and I drum my fingers on the kitchen counter, waiting for Grey to respond. A bubble pops up beneath my text signaling that he’s typing. He takes his time, pausing and then starting again, as if he can’t decide what to say.
Finally he comes back with: Can we meet?
I smile, pleased he’s fallen for it. Tomorrow maybe? Lunch?
But of course I know he won’t want to wait that long. Any chance you can come now? Start walking up the beach and I’ll meet you halfway?
I don’t answer immediately, letting his tension mount. Making him more desperate. Sure, I eventually type. See you in a min.
“Got him,” I tell Shepherd, even though he’d been reading the screen over my shoulder. I start toward the door. “I’ll be back later.”
