The Living

by Matt De La Peña

  When he’d seen the island from Shoeshine’s motorboat, he had assumed the worst was over. And maybe it was. But things were still pretty messed up. California had been rocked by an earthquake. And he had no idea about his family. And now he’d found out a bunch of people, including his boy Rodney, were sick.

  “Get some rest,” Carmen said. “I’ll come get you before we meet for lunch.”

  Shy looked at her hovering near the door. “Thanks for telling me about Rod,” he said. “Guess I shouldn’t even ask about Kevin and Marcus.”

  “Marcus is here,” she said. “The people on the second boat fished him out of the ocean.”

  “So he’s not sick?”

  Carmen shook her head. “He’s been holed up in his room the past couple days trying to fix some portable radio. He found it at the bottom of a huge puddle, though, so I have my doubts.”

  “And Kevin?”

  Carmen shook her head, looking at Shy. “He wasn’t on any of the boats.”

  Shy nodded.

  Not only did he feel exhausted, he felt empty. Just a few days ago they were all hanging out together on the ship for Rodney’s birthday. Now Rodney was sick. And Kevin, the strongest and smartest of all of them, was missing. Drowned, probably. Or mauled by a shark. It proved to Shy that the most important part of surviving was dumb luck.

  Carmen stared blankly at the floor a while. “Look,” she finally said. “A lot of bad things went down. We both saw the footage of what the earthquakes did.” She shook her head. “I can’t even sleep really ’cause all I do is think about my family. And Brett. And whether or not they’re still alive.”

  Shy nodded.

  “But me and you are still alive,” Carmen said. “And we’re going home. That’s what we need to focus on, you know?”

  “You’re right,” Shy told her.

  “Now get some rest. I’ll come wake you up in a few hours.” She picked up one of his room keys and slipped it into her pocket.

  “Thanks, Carm.”

  She smiled. “You’re family, too, Shy. Remember that.” She turned to leave but then stopped herself and looked back from the door. “Before I go, you know the rules. Give me one thing I don’t already know.”

  Shy looked out at the ocean, thinking. Carmen had just told him the truth about Rodney and Kevin. He wanted to tell something truthful, too. “You know that girl Addie?” he said, sitting down on the bed. “The one I was out there with?”

  Carmen nodded.

  “She’s actually not that bad. I probably never would’ve made it back without her.”

  Carmen stared at him for a few long seconds, like she was trying to figure out what he meant. Then an understanding came over her face and she said: “I’m happy you had someone.” She smiled at Shy and stepped out of his room, slowly pulling the door closed behind her.

  Shy lay back on his pillow and stared up at the ceiling. He thought about everything he and Carmen had just talked about, and he thought about Kevin and Rodney. He was definitely grateful to be where he was. Alive. Back on land. About to return to California on the research ship. But at the same time he felt guilty, too.

  Why should he live and Kevin die?

  What made him any more worthy?

  Nothing.

  He closed his eyes, remembering Kevin following him to the Lido Deck on the first night of the voyage. Warning Shy about the guy who’d been asking about him. Saying with his eyes that he had Shy’s back.

  Kevin was a good guy. He was probably a better guy than just about anyone else Shy had ever known, including himself.

  44

  Giving Thanks

  Shy felt like he’d just fallen asleep when he opened his eyes and found Carmen shaking him awake. “Sorry I can’t let you rest longer,” she said. “But we need to find out about this departure.”

  Shy sat up. “How long was I out?”

  “It’s one already. So almost three hours.”

  “For real?” Shy wiped the sleep from his eyes and got to his feet. He followed Carmen out of his room, saying: “I probably could’ve slept for three days.”

  Carmen stopped in the middle of the hall. “So which room is hers?”

  “Who?”

  “Blondie,” Carmen said. “Ol’ girl you were stranded with.”

  Shy gave her a confused look. “What are you talking about?”

  “Just gimme the room number, Shy. I decided me and her are gonna be friends.”

  Shy was still too asleep to know what he thought about this. He reluctantly gave her the room number and followed her down some stairs and through a hall. Before he fully comprehended what was happening, they were standing together outside Addie’s room.

  “Go ’head,” Carmen told him. “Knock.”

  Shy did.

  As they waited for Addie to answer he got a strange nervous feeling in the pit of his stomach. Carmen and Addie, together? It was too weird, like worlds colliding.

  The door opened slowly, and there she was. Blond hair tangled in her face. But she looked alert, like she’d been up for a while. She smiled at Shy, then turned to Carmen and said: “Oh. Hi.”

  “Addie, meet Carmen,” Shy said, trying to act like it was no big deal. “Carmen, Addie.”

  He watched them smile at each other and shake hands like two businesspeople. Then it got all quiet and awkward.

  “You feel better?” Shy asked Addie.

  She shrugged. Something was seriously bothering her.

  Shy thought he understood what it was. “I know you wanna look for your old man,” he said, “but everybody’s supposed to be coming to this meeting, right? So I guess…”

  “He’ll either be there or he won’t,” Addie said, finishing Shy’s thought. She glanced down at the ground, all sad-looking.

  It went quiet again, so Shy told Carmen: “Addie’s dad was on the ship.”

  “Yeah, I kind of figured that out,” Carmen said.

  “No, but then he got on a boat and headed here,” Shy added. “She’s not sure if he made it or not.”

  “Oh,” Carmen said. “Sorry to hear that.”

  It went quiet again, until Carmen said to Addie: “No offense, girl, but you look like you might need to spend some time with a bar of soap.”

  “Come on, Carm,” Shy said. “She was in here resting.”

  “I know that, Shy. I’m saying, I can show her where the freshwater pool is. We still got time before people start showing up at the restaurant.”

  “Wait, what?” Shy tried to imagine them hanging out, just the two of them. “Or how about we could all go together,” he said.

  Carmen rolled her eyes and looked at Addie. “You see how this vato is, right? Next he’s gonna wanna soap up your back.”

  Addie smiled uncomfortably and looked to Shy for help. But before he could say anything, Carmen was walking into the room and grabbing Addie’s stack of fresh clothes off the foot of the bed. She linked her elbow in Addie’s and started them out the door, telling Shy: “Meet you in the restaurant in fifteen, Sancho.”

  Addie looked over her shoulder at Shy, but he was helpless. Carmen did what she wanted. Nothing he said was gonna change that.

  Shy sat down at an empty table inside the buzzing restaurant. There was food on a buffet-style counter near the miniature stage: chips, cookies, pretzels, oranges, bags of beef jerky and hundreds of personal-sized bottles of water. Nothing that needed refrigeration, because, as Shoeshine had told him, the island didn’t have electricity.

  Shy started wolfing down everything he could get his hands on, and he looked around at all the survivors. A couple of them had worked with him on the cruise ship. Everyone else had been a passenger. They were all wearing clothes left behind by previous hotel guests or the people who worked on the island.

  Shoeshine wasn’t there.

  Neither was Marcus.

  But he recognized many of the other faces. One of the women the oilman had shown the ring to by the pool. An older gray-haired man from Shy’s
muster station. A mustached guy he always saw at the blackjack table in the casino. When Shy noticed that someone was staring back at him, his stomach dropped.

  It was the man in the black suit. Bill.

  He was all the way across the restaurant and no longer in his suit—their eyes stayed locked for a few long seconds until Shy looked away. He flashed back to when he helped the guy get out from under the chandelier in the Destiny Dining Room. He remembered the heat from the fire as he’d leaped through the flames. How he and Kevin got the man onto one of the lifeboats. How was it that this Bill guy was still alive and Kevin was dead?

  Carmen and Addie walked into the restaurant just then and headed straight toward Shy’s table. Carmen pointed at him and said something he couldn’t make out and both girls laughed a little. When they sat down he frowned and said: “What’s so funny?”

  “That’s between me and her,” Carmen said.

  Shy turned to Addie, who was grinning. It didn’t seem as fake this time. She was dressed in baggy jeans and an oversized blue T-shirt, hair all wet and clean-looking. She looked a hundred times better than she had on the lifeboat. “Addie, you gonna help me out here?”

  Carmen cut in again. “This is an A and B, bro. So why don’t you C your ass out of it.”

  Addie shrugged.

  “That’s like something you tell people in third grade,” Shy said to Carmen.

  “Sometimes you gotta speak to children in a language they understand.” She winked at Addie, all proud of herself.

  Before Shy could think of anything to say back, three people from the research crew walked to the front of the restaurant and stood near the tiny stage. The one with the beard, Greg, tapped a fork against a drinking glass until everyone quieted down and faced them.

  “Ladies and gentlemen,” he said. “As many of you already know, we were sent here to study the effects of the tsunamis on this tiny island. Some of the most unique sea life in the world lives in the reefs off the northern coast. However, as soon as we discovered you guys, our agenda changed. We’ve radioed back to our base and received clearance to cancel our original mission effective immediately. I’m happy to report that we will be setting off for California tonight.”

  Everyone cheered.

  Shy felt a surge of emotion as he looked around at all the happy faces. He thought of his mom and his sister and his nephew. He couldn’t wait to get back to Otay Mesa to try and track them down.

  “The coast guard has agreed to meet us halfway and guide us back to Long Beach Harbor.”

  A man with his hair pulled back into a ponytail stepped forward. “Many of you have asked about the state of the West Coast after the earthquakes. We’ve been hesitant to say too much until we gathered more facts. But I can now say this: there is major damage and a pretty significant loss of life near all the fault lines. But rescue crews from all over the country, and even other parts of the world, are there in full force. They are confident that the affected states will be built back up much sooner than anyone expected.”

  “The moral of the story,” the bearded man said, “never underestimate the resilience of the American people.”

  Shy watched the crowd of survivors smile and turn to each other. Everyone was as excited as he was. But at the same time, he wanted to hear more details about the earthquake. He wanted to know specifics.

  The ponytailed man raised his hand, waiting for the reaction to die down. “The fact is, you people may have caught the worst of it. Scientists are saying that the tsunamis you experienced were the most powerful in recorded history. As you can see, they’ve all but decimated this island. They also caused major damage in Hawaii, Japan, Taiwan and the Philippines.”

  Shy was now wondering if these guys were trying to sugarcoat shit. Just tell us the truth, he wanted to say.

  The man in the beard looked at his watch. “I’m sure you all have more questions,” he said, “but there will be plenty of time on our voyage home. That must be a great word to hear right about now, huh? ‘Home.’ ” He motioned a fourth man up from the front table. “Larry here is going to run you through the launch procedures. We’re leaving tonight at seven-thirty, just as the sun sets. It’s imperative that everyone follow his directions exactly. We want to get you all home as safely and efficiently as possible. And this includes our friends currently recovering in the penthouse.”

  Shy and Carmen nodded to each other, thinking of Rodney. Shy wanted to raise his hand and ask about San Diego, but the first three researchers were already walking away.

  The guy who’d just been called up to the stage, Larry, began describing how they needed everyone to line up single file along the shore by six o’clock. Motorized rafts would take them out to the ship, a dozen at a time. The sick would be loaded last. They had a team of fifteen, he said, and if they did things as efficiently as they hoped, the ship would be on its way by seven-thirty. Their estimated arrival back in Long Beach was roughly two days.

  Shy couldn’t help smiling at the thought of leaving on the ship. Neither could Carmen. But Addie looked super stressed as she kept scanning the restaurant. She seemed to spot Bill.

  “He might know something about your old man,” Shy told her. “You should go ask him.”

  Addie shook her head.

  Carmen reached across the table, put her hand on top of Addie’s.

  A few minutes after all the researchers had left to go prepare the ship, one of the former Paradise passengers suggested people go around saying what they were thankful for.

  The crowd caught on pretty quickly.

  A woman with long brown hair said she was thankful for her husband, who had shielded her with his own body during the second tsunami. She started tearing up and said: “We’d only been married two years. After we got home from this trip we were going to start thinking about children.” The tears quickly turned into full-on sobbing, and the people sitting around her patted her back and rubbed her shoulders.

  Christian stood up next. “I’m thankful to everyone who helped pull me out of the ocean. You had enough to worry about. And there wasn’t any extra room. But you made room. I’ll never forget you for that.”

  People clapped as Christian sat back down.

  Addie told Shy and Carmen that she was going back to her room to try and rest a little more.

  “I’ll walk you out,” Shy said, getting up from the table.

  Addie nodded.

  Carmen winked at Shy as he led Addie toward the door. Addie avoided eye contact with Bill.

  Outside, Shy told her: “Sorry your dad’s not here. But it doesn’t mean he’s not on the island. Shoeshine didn’t show up to the meeting either. I bet a bunch of people didn’t.”

  Addie looked Shy right in the eyes, but she didn’t say anything for a few seconds. Then she took his hands in hers and sighed. “You were really nice to me when we were stranded, Shy.”

  “Wish I could say the same about you,” Shy said. He expected to get at least a grin out of her, but she kept a straight face.

  “I want you to know I meant what I said.” She squeezed his hands. “That last night.”

  Shy didn’t know how to respond to that, so he just sort of nodded and smiled and squeezed her hands a little, too. “Go rest,” he said. “We’ll come get you when it’s time to go down to the beach.”

  “I just want to make sure you understand that,” Addie said.

  “I do,” Shy told her. “And I’m glad you said it. But there’s no need to get all sentimental, right? I’ll see you in a few hours.”

  Addie sighed. She leaned forward on her toes and kissed his cheek. She stood there looking at him for a few seconds with a pained expression on her face, like she still hadn’t fully recovered from fainting. Then she turned and started down the hall.

  When Shy returned to his table in the restaurant, Carmen was shaking her head. “I know what it’s like losing your old man,” she said.

  Shy wanted to tell Carmen about Addie’s dad’s shady business on the i
sland. They had to be in some deep shit for people to have guns and bags of needles, for doctors to end up dead on a boat. There was no way it was just insurance fraud. But it didn’t seem like the right time or place to get into all that now, so he just nodded and turned back to the people saying what they were thankful for.

  “I’m thankful to the men who are taking us home,” an older woman said. “It’s because of them that, God willing, I might get to see my grandchildren again.”

  More applause. Some people raised bottles of water and gave cheers.

  Bill stood up next and pointed a finger at Shy. “You see that young man sitting over there?”

  Everyone turned to Shy. He instinctively sank down in his chair a little, afraid of what the guy was going to say. Carmen was staring at him, too.

  “His name is Shy,” Bill said. “And he saved my life on the ship.”

  People clapped for Shy, but Bill wasn’t done. “My leg was trapped under a chandelier in one of the dining rooms. He and another young man lifted it off, helped me through the burning room and got me onto a lifeboat. If it wasn’t for Shy’s bravery, I wouldn’t be here right now.”

  More cheering. This time it went on for several seconds. Carmen pointed at Shy over the table and mouthed, You’re my hero.

  Shy shrugged uncomfortably and looked at Bill. He felt uneasy with all the attention. Truth was, he’d trade Bill’s life for Kevin’s in a second. It’s not like Shy could just forget everything else that happened on the ship—how the guy had followed him all over and messed up his and Rodney’s room and threatened him in the Luxury Lounge.

  Others stood and announced who and what they were thankful for, but Shy was no longer listening. He was staring into space, thinking about the conversations he and Addie had had on the lifeboat about her old man and his company. Back then it didn’t seem to matter as much. His sole focus was on surviving. But now he was sneaking looks at Bill, wondering what the guy’s deal was. And what about LasoTech? And then a different thought crossed his mind: Bill must’ve had something to do with the dead doctors Shy found. And if that was true, it meant Addie’s dad had had something to do with the murders, too. Even if it was indirect.