by Sara Saedi
“Is he dangerous?” Wylie asked.
“Possibly,” Maz replied, but Wylie got the feeling he didn’t want to alarm them. “We just don’t want him back on the island, that’s all.”
Joshua waved the photo around. “What if we forget what he looks like? We’ve met a lot of people in the last day. It’s not easy to keep track of everyone.”
“His right hand is a dead giveaway,” Maz replied. “It’s missing a few fingers. Let’s just say he had a need to inflict pain on himself, and that’s part of the reason he’s not here anymore.” Their raised eyebrows prompted Maz to elaborate despite his obvious reluctance.
“Sometimes,” Maz continued, choosing his words carefully, “new recruits don’t exactly work out as planned. In those rare cases, Phinn decides it’s better to send those people back home. Hopper was a bully. He made people feel uncomfortable, so we got rid of him. It’s only in the most extreme cases that we ship people off the island.”
Maz passed around another faded Polaroid, this one of a girl named Olivia. According to him, she had left the island on a one-year sabbatical to travel the States and returned after her eighteenth birthday. Years after she came back, the residents slowly started to notice she was aging. From the picture, Wylie could see the slightest trace of crow’s feet forming at her eyes, and a few smile lines.
“Olivia was another rare case of someone we had to banish from the island. We have her to thank for the discovery that staying on the mainland past our eighteenth birthdays has disastrous results. It took a lot of gray hairs to realize she was aging once she got back from her sabbatical, but when we did, we had to ask her to leave. If I’ve got the math right, Olivia would be in her late forties today,” Maz told them. “Last I heard, she’d gone to medical school and was looking to start her own pharmaceutical company. It makes sense. She was a big science geek when we knew her.”
The remaining pages were devoted to a set of laws that were grounds for exile if broken—all the things you would expect to be illegal: murder, attempted murder, treason, rape, and so on. There was a specific clause citing that any environmental crimes against the island would come with a swift punishment. Again, Maz went through each point meticulously, and Wylie began to wonder if they were actually going to spend the entire day in this room.
The last page contained a nondisclosure agreement the Daltons were required to sign. There was still no explanation of what would happen to them if they got kicked off the island and blabbed about its existence once they returned to the States. Wylie wondered if the punishment was death or a stint in a mental institution. It would be hard to convince the authorities that a girl ranting about a magical land where the weather was always warm, where teenagers could fly, and where no one ever grew up wasn’t a raving lunatic.
“We know the mainland is all you’ve ever known,” Maz said after they’d all signed, “but we ask that all new recruits adapt to the culture of the island. None of us here needs lessons on popular culture in the States. We don’t need to know about your favorite albums or movies or websites. We certainly don’t need to know what all the cool kids are saying. We have our own slang words and phrases. You’ll adopt them along the way. We want to make the cultural shift as seamless as possible.”
The back cover of the handbook included a vow the Daltons had to recite in order to gain their citizenship. Wylie expected confetti or trumpets when it was finally over, but all they got was a handshake from Maz and permission to go back to their rooms.
It had been a long and draining day. Wylie was looking forward to taking a hot shower and getting in a nap before heading to the dining room for dinner.
“Wylie,” Maz said, “I’m going to need you to stick around for a few more minutes.”
Joshua and Micah lingered at the door, not wanting to leave her behind.
“I’ll be okay, guys,” Wylie assured them. “You can go.”
Once they left, Maz nervously looked at his hands as he addressed her. Great, Wylie thought. Here’s where he tells me it’s time to harvest my organs.
“There’s something else Phinn won’t allow on the island.”
The suspense was killing her. What could it be? Show tunes? Orgies? Crack cocaine?
“Procreation,” he continued. “We don’t have any parents here, and Phinn would like to keep it that way. So, although it’s fine to have as much sex as you want, we can’t have any of the girls getting pregnant.”
Wylie laughed. This was the exact opposite principle from the one her grandmother had tried to instill in her. According to her, there was no point in having sex unless you planned to create life.
“Trust me,” she reassured him, “we’re on the exact same page. But this sounds like the kind of thing my brothers should be lectured on, too. Why am I the only one being told?” The sound of a bell chimed loudly through the island, saving Maz from answering her question.
“Perfect timing,” Maz said. “Come with me.”
Wylie followed him to the clinic. At least a dozen other girls were already waiting inside, and more had flowed in behind them. Maz stood back as the girls formed two lines, facing each other. Lola gestured to Wylie to stand next to her. She scanned the faces across from her, and aside from Tinka, who was probably still in detox, Wylie was almost certain every single female on the island was present.
Aldo and Patrick entered the room with charts and made their way down each of the lines. Wylie could see that Patrick was passing out a pill to each girl, while Aldo made notations on a clipboard.
“What is this?” Wylie asked Lola.
“Our daily dose of birth control,” Lola whispered.
Wylie wasn’t on the Pill. She’d lost her virginity a couple years before, but her escapades were few and far between and didn’t warrant a very awkward conversation with her mom and a regular birth-control regimen. It creeped Wylie out to be standing in this room with all the other girls from the island, waiting to take an extra dose of estrogen, although all of them were in this together, at least. And that was why she didn’t protest when Patrick handed her a tiny pill. Wylie simply placed it on her tongue and swallowed it down with water.
After all the pills were administered one by one, the girls were released, and Lola and Wylie headed back to their bungalow.
“The bell rings every day at five p.m. to alert us to head to the clinic and get our appropriate dose. Even if we’re menstruating, we’re still required to show up for placebo pills,” Lola explained.
“Don’t they trust you guys to just take them on your own? Do we really have to line up like cattle every day?” Wylie asked, with more than a trace of judgment in her voice. She couldn’t help feeling bothered that the onus of birth control was placed solely on the female population.
“Phinn thinks it’s just easier this way. Some of us are very responsible, but others might forget, and then we’d have babies crawling all over the place.”
Wylie wondered if accidental pregnancy was grounds for exile. It was nowhere in the handbook, but neither was the “no procreation” rule.
“It just doesn’t seem right to have anyone else give us orders on what to do with our bodies.”
“That doesn’t happen on the mainland?” Lola asked.
“It depends on which state you live in, but shouldn’t we be doing things better here?”
“I don’t exactly disagree, but a friendly tip? I wouldn’t go around talking about it to anyone,” Lola said, lowering her voice. “Phinn doesn’t like to be challenged.”
“Well, then he shouldn’t have invited me to stay on the island,” Wylie said, stopping right in front of Phinn’s bungalow.
Lola gave Wylie a quizzical look. She put her arm around Wylie’s shoulder.
“I know I haven’t said this yet, but I’m really glad you’re here.”
“It took you long enough,” Wylie joked.
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p; “But I’m going to let you fight this battle on your own. I’ll be in our bungalow if you need me.” Lola gave Wylie a peck on the cheek and skipped off toward their room. Before she could lose her nerve, Wylie knocked on Phinn’s door.
“It’s open,” he called. “Come in.”
Phinn hummed to himself while he hammered a shelf into the wall. He wore a pair of linen pants, but didn’t have a shirt on. Wylie tried not to look at his bare chest and the scars scattered across his skin.
“Hey, Wylie,” Phinn said, cocking his head.
Now that she was in his room and he was half naked, Wylie had no idea how to communicate like a normal person.
“I just had my swearing-in ceremony,” she managed to say.
“That’s great. Congratulations.”
“I don’t like the birth-control ritual,” she blurted.
Phinn was expressionless. “Do you have religious issues with it?”
“No,” Wylie said, nearly laughing. The Daltons didn’t even go to church on Christmas. “I don’t like being told what to do. The girls should have a choice whether they want to be on the Pill and if they do, you should trust us to take it ourselves.”
Phinn shrugged. “We’ll just have to agree to disagree on that one.”
“That’s it?” Wylie asked. “That’s all you have to say?”
Phinn pulled a T-shirt on over his head. “Let’s go for a walk. I want to show you something.”
“I’m not done discussing this,” Wylie said.
“Good. Neither am I.”
They made their way through a trail behind the bungalows.
“Did Maz give you more information on Hopper?” Phinn asked.
Wylie nodded. “He told us to be on the lookout for him.”
“Don’t let it scare you. I just like to be cautious. The kid was mentally ill. We couldn’t give him the proper help. Hopefully he’s getting the treatment he needs back home.”
As they continued down the trail, a popping sound in the distance grew louder. Wylie had heard it a few times around the island and didn’t know where it was coming from. It sounded just like microwave popcorn.
“What’s that sound?”
“You’ll see,” Phinn answered. “Now I want you to close your eyes.”
Wylie didn’t like where this was going.
“Are they closed?” he asked.
“Yes, they’re closed. You know, this is a whole lot of buildup. It better be worth it.”
“Oh, it will.”
The popping sound moved at a steady rhythm as Phinn slowed to a stop.
“Okay, open them.”
Wylie opened her eyes and let out a small gasp. They were standing in a field of parvaz flowers that seemed to go on for miles. The flowers were growing at a rapid pace, each new one making a pop-pop sound as it sprouted. In the background, the ocean glistened as the waves gently moved back and forth. Behind them stood a massive weeping willow. Phinn plucked a flower and another one instantly grew in its place.
“When you care for the island the way we do, its resources stay abundant,” Phinn explained.
He offered the flower to Wylie, but instead of placing it in her mouth, she slipped it behind her ear. The sun was setting and the sky was a neon pink.
“It’s so peaceful here when the sun goes down,” Phinn told her. “It’s not just watching the stars come out or the light of the fireflies coming into view. It’s that it gets quiet enough to hear all the natural sounds the island makes. The rhythm of the waterfall, the hum of branches moving in the wind, the pop-pop of the parvaz flowers—it’s like an orchestra. Can you hear it?”
Wylie nodded.
“And you know what you can’t hear?”
“What?”
“The sound of crying babies.” Phinn looked at her straight-faced, then laughed. Wylie couldn’t help but laugh along.
“Bad joke,” he said. “For the record, I don’t hate babies. But the whole point of living here is having all of the fun and none of the responsibility of adulthood. Raising a child is the ultimate act of being a grown-up. It’s like the antithesis of what makes Minor Island paradise.”
“I don’t have a problem with that. I just have a problem with putting the burden on the girls. And I’m not the only one who feels that way.”
“Who else has an issue with it?”
Wylie didn’t want to sell anyone out, but maybe there’d be strength in numbers. Plus, Lola was a member of the inner circle. Phinn trusted her.
“Lola,” she answered reluctantly.
“She should have explained to you that the burden is for everyone to carry. We require other forms of protection. Especially with new recruits who could bring diseases to the island.”
“I don’t have any diseases,” Wylie was quick to say.
“I know. My point is, we have to be careful. We have to take every precaution. And that includes monitoring all the girls and making sure they’re on the Pill. Can I tell you a story?”
Wylie nodded.
“I was a kid the first time I saw the parvaz field. My mom and I stumbled across it together on a walk through the island, just a couple weeks after we got here. I was about five. Old enough to remember a few things about our old life on the mainland. We stood by this willow tree, blown away by the whole thing. I don’t have too many memories of her, but I remember she had this unquenchable sense of adventure. Anyway, she let me run around the field by myself. I was so little, I got lost in the flowers. It’s like a maze out here. I could hear her yelling my name and I would yell back, ‘Mommy,’ but she couldn’t find me in the dark. And then after a while, she stopped yelling. Finally, I made it back to the willow tree, but she wasn’t there anymore. I was by myself, in the dark, for hours. My mom and dad didn’t come back to find me until the sun came up the next morning. I’d never been more afraid in my life.
“They failed me that night. They left me. And then they left me for good when they died. No one on this island is capable of being a parent, and I won’t let another little kid go through what I did.”
Wylie nodded. She thought back to being at her dad’s office and seeing him with a woman who wasn’t her mom. She remembered feeling like he’d failed their entire family as she made her way down the office hallway and back to the elevator.
“I’m really sorry they put you through that,” Wylie said.
“Wylie,” Phinn said. “I’d like to renege on our deal. I don’t want to be friends. I really like you.” Wylie could feel her skin tingling just from being near him.
Phinn carefully lifted her chin up and moved his face toward hers. Let him kiss you, Wylie thought to herself. Don’t say another word. Let him do it. But just as their lips were about to meet, Wylie pulled away.
“I don’t want to kiss you under false pretenses,” she blurted. “There’s some things you need to know about me.”
Phinn nodded, slightly unnerved. “I’m listening.”
He sat down and leaned against the trunk of the weeping willow. He patted the ground and Wylie sat as close to him as possible. She took a deep breath.
“It happened a year ago. . . .”
CHAPTER 9
truth and consequences
every time Wylie relived the night of the accident in her head, it felt like she was back there again. It didn’t matter that Phinn held her hand for moral support or that she had a view of the ocean and a field of parvaz flowers; she still felt like she’d time traveled to that harsh winter night in the Hamptons. More than a year had passed, but it was a memory she would never escape. And so, as she recounted the details to Phinn, she was transported to an entirely different island.
CHRISTMAS IN MONTAUK ALWAYS FELT WRONG TO Wylie, but her parents insisted every year that they get out of Manhattan to spend a week in their Long Island beach house. Most families left town
for fancy ski resorts or warmer climates and saved visits to the Hamptons for the summer. That’s exactly why we’re going there now, Wylie’s dad would tell them. To enjoy the peace and quiet.
The beach house was a time-share split among several families from their Upper East Side neighborhood. None of the objects inside held any special significance to the Daltons. It didn’t matter that Wylie and her brothers wanted to wake up on Christmas morning in their own bedrooms and open presents in their own living room. Maura wouldn’t hear of it. Wylie had noticed her parents were a little gentler with each other when they weren’t cooped up in the brownstone. The ceilings were higher, and the house got more light. Wylie always hoped the holiday would bring them closer together.
That particular Christmas, Joshua was the most adamant about wanting to stay in the city over the holidays. He told his parents that in a couple of years, Wylie would leave for college, which made it all the more important to spend the holidays together in the home they’d grown up in, but that was just an excuse. Wylie knew the real reason Joshua wanted to stay in Manhattan was because he couldn’t stand to be away from Abigail for more than a few days. For Wylie, the only bonus to going to Montauk was that she could spend some quality time with her brother without his girlfriend clinging to him. She liked Abigail a lot, but whenever the three of them hung out, she felt like a third wheel. Kids at school even referred to them as “Jabigail” behind their backs.
Wylie knew for a fact that if Abigail were around, there would have been no persuading her brother to go to some random party in the Hamptons. It was pure luck that she’d been invited to the party in the first place. The morning after Christmas, Wylie decided to brave the cold to go for a walk. The beach was frigid and uninviting, and she considered turning around when she noticed two guys about her age roasting marshmallows over a small bonfire. Their names were Matt and Tyler and they were cousins. Tyler’s family had a vacation home just a few miles away. Both sets of parents had gone to Europe for the holidays, and the boys had talked them into letting them stay in the beach house on their own.
