Anyway, last week, I parked on the street and walked up the driveway. I knocked, but no one answered, so I let myself in. I know the security code to their house. Ed’s mom is usually shuffling the boys to soccer or karate or something in the afternoons and his father works until dinnertime. He’s a lawyer, and Ed wants to be, too. Will be, too.
I found them in the backyard fixing the fence. They didn’t see me, and I stood inside at the screen door and listened. Ed was talking.
“You didn’t even let her finish.”
“She didn’t have to,” Noah answered.
Ed leaned a piece of plywood against the outdoor table. “You’re so stubborn, man. You know we care about you.”
Noah looked up at Ed. He wiped a hand against his forehead. “We,” he said. It sounded mocking.
I saw Ed stop moving. “All of us. Don’t sabotage your future because—”
“Because what? Because I don’t want to keep taking charity from my best friend?”
I felt my blood turn cold. Noah and Ed never fought. They were brothers. They had each other’s backs. And I didn’t want to admit it, but the idea of Ed giving Noah money made me uncomfortable. I didn’t want to think about Noah being in his debt, even if it wouldn’t be that way.
“Take the money,” Ed said. “Go to college. It’s what my mom wants.”
“You’d like that, wouldn’t you?”
Ed exhaled. “Yeah,” he said. “I would.”
“You can keep being the good guy,” Noah said. His tone was acid. “Maybe after this we’d be even.”
They stood there, staring at each other, until I couldn’t take it anymore. I rattled the screen door and stepped outside. “Hey, guys!” I said, a little too brightly. “What’s going on?” Ed came over and kissed me quickly, and Noah left shortly after, but I haven’t been able to stop thinking about it, what he meant. “Maybe after this we’d be even.”
“We need water,” Noah tells me now. How long has he been looking at me? A minute? Ten? For the first time since I woke up healed, I notice my throat is bone dry. The thirst rages not only in my lungs but in my whole body. I stretch my swollen fingers.
“Okay.” I follow him as he turns away from the beach and into the woods. There is no path, and as I follow Noah—fast—I curse myself for wearing shorts today. Weeds bite at my legs as I scramble to keep up. Noah bends down every once in a while, runs the ground between his thumb and forefinger, and then takes off again.
The air is hard to come by in my chest, and I’m not sure my legs can continue. Ed would never do this. Ed would let me set the pace. He’d keep turning around, asking me if I was okay. But Noah won’t stop climbing.
I’m about to tell him I can’t go any farther when I hear it—and then see it—a stream. No, better than that. A river.
Noah turns around, offering me his hand. But I don’t take it. I plow right past him and into the water. I cup it in my hands and bring them to my lips, and when I swallow I’ve never tasted anything so delicious. It’s cool going down and seems to spread through my body instantly—hydrating my stomach, limbs, toes. It zings through my head. I keep drinking.
Noah is next to me, and he does the same. We stand like that, gorging ourselves on water, for what feels like an hour.
When I’m finished, I run my hands in the water. I bring some up to my neck and scrub. The dirt and grime is pretty stuck, but a bit comes off. I’m too tired to try for more. I collapse on the riverbank. It’s like my body was using all its reserved energy to get to water and now that I’ve drunk, there is nothing left, not even to stand.
But Noah reminds me we’re not done yet. “We have to find food,” he says.
I just want to lie on the ground by this riverbed forever, but I struggle to get up.
“We’ll come back,” he says, picking up on my hesitation.
Food proves to be much more challenging than water. We stumble around for hours. Plants that should bear fruit seem to be dried up. It’s spring where we live—but it feels like a strangely warm, barren winter.
Noah urges me on. I know he’s exhausted, too, but he doesn’t say it. When we finally find a cluster of half-rotten apples, he holds them in his palms. Immediately they begin to turn—from brown to maroon and then to a bright, shiny red. No more holes. No more worms or dirt.
“Incredible,” I say. “You healed the apples.”
“Here,” Noah says, holding one out. “Eat.”
They taste sweet and tangy going down. The most satisfying meal I have ever had.
He watches me as I eat and then takes one himself. He chews it carefully. I see that he, too, is marveling at what is happening—at what he can do.
It gets dark around us fast—and with the absence of sun, I’m freezing.
Noah wants to head back to the beach, but we can’t see—and I’m afraid of getting lost.
“We’ll stay the night here,” he says.
I’m shivering now—pulling my arms against my chest, my teeth rattling. Noah removes some rocks and clears a resting place. “Lie down,” he says. “I’ll keep a lookout.”
“Noah—” I start, but I’m not sure what to say, and I’m too tired to form the words.
I fold myself down onto the grass. Despite the temperature, it feels deliriously good. My body is already falling into sleep before I even close my eyes.
I don’t close them. Not yet. I look at Noah—backlit by the moon, his hands by his sides. I can’t see his facial features, but I know he’s watching me. I can feel his gaze on me like the sun. And it’s this warmth, this light, that allows me to finally fall to sleep.
I wake up disoriented—where am I? What happened? I roll over and see Noah sitting, his back to me, and yesterday comes rushing back—the crash, the water, Ed, my sister. Noah healing me.
“Hi.” I prop myself up onto my elbows. He doesn’t immediately move, and I have the striking terror that he’s dead. But then he swivels his head and his eyes meet mine.
“You’re awake.” His face is pinched up, tight. He has black circles under his eyes.
“Did you sleep?”
I see him glance at the ground next to me. “A little.”
I imagine him lying next to me, his arms curled around me. I blink the image away.
“We should go back to the water,” he says.
I nod and stand, but my feet give out beneath me. He lunges forward and catches me around the waist. I lean into him, slip my arms around his neck.
“I got you,” he says.
I breathe him in—dirt and mud and the faint whispers of sea salt. But just as soon as they caught me, his arms release me.
“Here.” He holds out an apple. “From yesterday,” he says. “You need it.”
I choke it down. It doesn’t taste like it did yesterday. It tastes dry, chalky. Noah’s right, we need water.
The sun is climbing in the sky, and my thirst is back again—it makes my body feel impossibly heavy. We stumble forward. Noah studies the ground—careful of the path we’re taking. We walk for what feels like hours, until I’m convinced I cannot take another step, and then mercifully the stream reveals itself.
I plunge in like I did yesterday, drinking deeply. Noah does the same. But I can’t stay in this time—it’s too cold. I crawl out of the water and collapse onto the ground.
“Can you make it back down?” Noah asks me once we have rehydrated. He comes to kneel on the ground beside me.
I shake my head. “No,” I say, honestly.
Noah nods. “Okay. You stay up here. I’m going to go back down. I know how to get back. I left markers.”
I think of him feeling the ground, carving into the trees yesterday.
“No,” I say. I reach up and grab his shirt. I see the surprise on his face, but I don’t let go. “You can’t leave me.”
“August,” he says. “What if someone comes to…” Rescue us. I hadn’t thought of that. How stupid. “We were gone all night,” he says.
“I’ll co
me. Just give me five minutes.”
“Okay,” Noah says, but his face looks doubtful. I pull my arms around me. All of a sudden I’m freezing. But when I look at my body I see that I’m sweating.
“Something’s not right,” I say.
Noah gathers me against his chest. He traces my skin with his fingers. “You’re burning up,” he says.
“Cold,” I mumble, because it’s the only thing I can say. Everything begins to go foggy. It feels like it did on the beach, except this time I’m not worried about dying. Noah will save me. Noah—
His hands run over my damp neck and hair. I feel his concentration. I hear him curse. “It’s not working,” he says. “Nothing is happening.”
I’m shaking now. I’m pressed against him, but all I can feel is the cold. It bears down on me like ice. It presses me farther into Noah—in search of warmth—but all I feel is pain. Freezing-hot pain.
I’m not sure how much time passes. It’s dark and then it’s light again and then it’s dark again. I’m vaguely aware of Noah bringing water to my lips. Of his cool hands trying to soothe my head—and the question: Why can’t he heal me?
Maybe a day has passed. Maybe more. I know I have not eaten. I start to hallucinate. I’m slipping in and out of consciousness, so I’m not sure what’s real. I see Noah on his knees, eyes skyward. And then I see figures around us. Trick of the light, I think. Trick of the imagination. Their faces are painted. They carry spears. They look like something out of a movie. I see them approaching us, but I’m too sick to do anything. If we died, would it be any different? I can’t tell what’s real. Maybe we already have.
Chapter Three
I wake up in the forest. The fever is gone, but I’m still cold—my clothes cling to me. I’m also starving. Hunger rages through my body like a fire. I sit up. I’m alone. Noah isn’t next to me, and I feel the panic rise in my chest, frantic, where is he. But in the next moment I see a campfire. Through the trees, there is a clearing. It’s big, about the size of a handball court, and standing in the center, right by the fire, is Noah.
I open my mouth to call to him, but my eyes flash to the left, and I see that he is surrounded by what I can only describe as tribesmen. They’re covered in nothing but loincloths and headdresses, and they are speaking to one another in harsh, low whispers. So I wasn’t hallucinating before. They’re real. I count twelve. Twelve men encircling Noah. And they’re speaking in a language that I cannot understand but that sounds familiar.
And then I know—it’s the same one Noah whispered to me on the beach. The chant.
I’m in trouble. I think we both are. This meeting does not feel warm and fuzzy. We’re intruders.
I stand to the side of the clearing. My legs seem to have moved on their own. I clench and unclench my fists, digging my nails into the skin of my palms. The tribesmen begin to move in on Noah. Their circles are getting smaller; they’re coming closer—and pointed at him are daggers. Sharp, metal edges. Like the shards of plane he dissolved in my body—yesterday? The day before?
Do something, August, I silently scream.
For some reason, I think about the time when Ed let Noah cheat off his Algebra 3 exam. Ed is a rule follower, but for Noah, he always had a soft spot. Noah wasn’t like us, Ed used to remind me. He didn’t have any parents who would sit and do homework with him. He hadn’t since he was ten years old. He didn’t even have time for homework. He was always working.
Sure, he lived with his aunt, but she had a family of her own, too. She’s the single mother of five-year-old twin girls. I think Noah contributed to their household more than his aunt did, and Ed knew it. It was why I saw them having that argument last week. It was why Ed broke the rules for Noah, and Noah alone. He didn’t have anyone looking out for him, so Ed did. “He’s my family,” Ed used to say.
They got caught. Mrs. Sullivan knew Noah had cheated. They had the exact same answers. But Ed wouldn’t let Noah take the blame. Ed insisted he did it, that he was the one who had copied off Noah. Everyone knew it was a lie, Mrs. Sullivan included, but there was nothing they could do after Ed confessed.
He got an F on the exam and a B minus in the class—the lowest grade on his transcript to date. But I know he was proud of it. I know he saw that B as a mark of loyalty.
But now Ed isn’t here to look out for either one of us. It’s only me. I can hear his voice in my head, urging me forward, urging me toward Noah.
The men are rounding on Noah, so close it’s hard to tell whether they’ve already descended on him. I can see his face. His eyes have always been the deepest blue. Clear. Like the sky in the dead of July—not a single cloud in sight.
But now they’re unsteady. They look like a stormy sea. He looks unsure. Afraid.
And it’s this that makes me run forward, into the clearing.
“Stop!” I yell. “Don’t hurt him!”
Everyone turns to me, and for a split second no one moves. Then they start for me, their arrows drawn. I look at Noah. Our eyes lock for a moment before I shut mine. Tight. I’m not dead. The crash didn’t kill me and the sickness didn’t kill me, but this certainly will. I open my eyes.
But I feel nothing. Instead, I hear Noah’s voice. He’s speaking, but it’s not English; it’s that language again. The one I heard him chant in a whisper above my broken body. He’s wrestling with the words, grasping, but it’s working—they’re listening to him.
The men have stopped moving. They all turn to look back at him. And then the circle parts. Out of what seems like thin air a man appears. Whoever these twelve are, he is their leader. His headdress towers high above the rest, and he walks with the definitive authority of someone responsible.
I understand in an instant that it is his decision what happens to us. It is his decision whether we live or die. When he passes, they fall back, one by one, until no one is standing between him and Noah.
I hold my breath. It feels like all thirteen of us do. Even the wind seems to slow down, to stop. The leaves don’t rustle. No butterfly flaps its wings.
They look at each other, Noah and this chief, and I see something pass between them. An understanding.
Noah looks at the chief and then around the circle. Then he throws his head back, looks up at the sky, and lets out a cry. Sharp. Loud. Far-reaching. But it’s not a cry for help. It’s a cry of recognition. If I didn’t know better, I’d say he had just screamed a promise.
Chapter Four
I watch Noah hover with the men. They talk in low, hushed voices and he nods. I start to pace. There are too many thoughts in my head at the same time, and the questions seem to run together, forming a mangled, gnarled mass of how is this possible?
Minutes pass, and I hear something next to me. I spin to find a tribesman—but not one of the twelve, someone else. He’s clothed in neutral colors, and I know he’s been behind the tree all along. Instinctively, I step back, but his face is open and I can tell he means no harm. He’s very thin and young, too—much younger than the rest. He seems to be maybe my sister’s age, and I have the sudden, intense desire to scour this island for her.
He holds out his hand to me. We do not speak the same language, but that gesture tells me everything I need to know. You’re safe. I will not hurt you.
He points to his head and then nods and steps forward, and in the next moment he’s holding something out to me. They’re herbs. They don’t look familiar, but they smell familiar. I remember something—like a dream vision. These herbs being placed on my body. Noah forcing them into my mouth.
“You saved me,” I say out loud, even though I know he won’t understand.
He smiles. “Askuwheteau,” he says. He points to his chest. “Asku.”
“Asku,” I echo. He laughs—a sweet, light sound. He nods forward, for me to do the same.
“August,” I say. I place my hand over my heart.
He pulls me gently onto a trail in the woods, and I look back for Noah, but Asku shakes his head. It’s okay, he seem
s to say. He will come.
I follow him through the woods as it quickly becomes clear we are descending a mountain. The trail is sharp and jagged, and I feel the weeds nipping at my legs like they have teeth. My feet are bare, and the soles are raw, but it doesn’t slow me down. It feels amazing to walk. I feel stronger now, rooted to the ground beneath me. I breathe in the deep forest air.
I think about my wounds from the plane. I touch my tattered shirt. I place a hand on my ribs.
How?
How did he take away fatal wounds in a matter of minutes and with no tools? How does he know this language?
I’m lost in thought for the rest of the hike, a million questions bouncing around my head like a shaken-up snow globe, and before I know it, the path swings right and the ocean is there in front of us—splayed out like a story.
Asku leads me down a few more paces to an overlook with a little sand trail to the water. There is a hut there—a wood structure that looks half tree house, half log cabin.
He holds the door open for me, and I walk inside. It’s beautiful—spacious and cozy all at once. There is a wide, open living room with woven floor mats. Pots hang from the ceiling, and the roof is a canvas tent that lets the sunlight stream straight through. I cross through an entryway and see what must be the kitchen to the left. The hunger that has never really waned rears its head again, and I clutch my stomach, swaying on the spot.
Asku motions for me to sit down at the small table and chairs in the corner and hands me a big clay pot. I’m still not sure what made me sick last time, but Asku urges me with his eyes and I bring my lips to the edge. The water is cool, clean. I drink until the entire pot is empty.
I hear feet at the door, and I look up expecting to see Noah, but am instead met by two women. They come into the house silently, barefoot and dressed in cloth wraps. They carry shawls. As they enter the kitchen, they exchange some words with Asku before he turns to me. I’m not sure what to do, so I bow my head; when I pick it back up, he is gone.
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