by Liz Kessler
Aaron shrugged. “I don’t know. It’s all a bit . . . weird.”
“Weird?” I asked.
“Look, I’m just going to say it. You have feelings for him, don’t you?”
My face turned into a furnace. “Feelings for who?”
Aaron made a face.
“For Sam?” I asked.
“It’s obvious, Em.”
“I don’t!” I protested. “I don’t have feelings for him. I mean, yeah, feelings of — of friendship. But not . . . I don’t . . .” My words tumbled out of me in a garbled rush. Eventually, I stopped fighting against them. “I don’t know,” I admitted. “I really don’t know.”
Aaron nodded sadly.
“You’re my boyfriend,” I said weakly. I couldn’t bear to see him look so crushed.
“But I’m leaving,” he said.
“You’re still going back to Forgotten Island, then?” I asked.
“My plans haven’t changed,” he said. “I’m going to go back to Brightport to get things sorted. And then, yes, I’m going back to Forgotten Island. That’s where I need to be. Unless . . .” He paused.
“Unless what?”
“Unless you want me to stay in Brightport,” he mumbled. “With you.”
It wasn’t till he said those words that I finally knew what I wanted.
I took his hand in mine. “Aaron,” I said. “You’ve got your life waiting for you at Forgotten Island. I’ve got mine at home in Brightport. And Sam’s got his, traveling around the world righting wrongs. We can’t follow each other’s paths. We have to find our own.”
Aaron laughed gently. “That’s deep,” he said.
I laughed too. “Yeah. But it’s true.” I took hold of his other hand. “And you know what else is true, don’t you?” I asked.
“I — I think so,” he said. “But I don’t want it to be.”
“I know,” I agreed. “Nor do I. But it is. You have to go and I have to stay. On my own. I’m sorry, Aaron, but you and I — I think we’re over.”
Aaron nodded without lifting his head. He let go of my hand to swipe an arm across his face.
“You’ll come visit me, won’t you?” he asked.
“Of course I will. And I’ll write, and we’ll talk. We’ll still be friends — if you want to be.”
Aaron finally looked up at me. His cheeks were wet. “Of course I want to be,” he said.
And with that, he threw his arms around me. As I hugged him back, I let my tears fall onto his shoulder.
“I’m sorry,” I whispered into his neck.
“Don’t be. It’s OK. It’s the right thing.”
We sat like that for a few moments, holding each other, maybe for the last time. The last time we’d hold each other like that, anyway.
A voice interrupted us. “Um, Emily, Aaron. Sorry to interrupt but . . .”
It was Sam. We pulled apart and stood up. “What is it?” I asked.
Sam was grinning. “You need to see this,” he said, beckoning us to the front of the ship.
The rest of the crew was already there, cheering, high-fiving one another, grinning, calling down to someone in the water.
Aaron and I hurried to join them. I looked out to see what they were looking at.
And there, in front of the ship, I saw it.
A huge pod of dolphins. Maybe the one who had helped us find this place was there; I’d probably never know. In the middle of them was —
“Shona!”
Shona waved at me.
“What are you doing here?” I called.
“I’m your best friend!” she called back. “What did you think? That I’d leave you to deal with this on your own? I’d never do that! Have you seen who else is here?”
I craned my neck to see who she was pointing at. There was someone else in the water. I couldn’t see their face from where I was, as they were busy tying a rope onto the other side of the ship.
Then they swam around to my side and looked up.
“Dad!”
“Emily!” Dad’s smile was brighter than the three bags of sparkling jewels the boys had already brought over from the pirate king’s ship on their first haul. He attached a rope to a cleat on the side, then swam over to me. “You OK?” he asked.
“I’m great!” I said. “Especially now.”
“Shona’s been amazing. She found me and told me everything that’s happened. Together we caught up with the Sunbeam and they’ve said they’ll hold their position till they hear from us. They’re going to do whatever they can to help you.”
“And Mom and Millie?”
Dad grinned. “They’re fine. They’re on the Sunbeam and can’t wait to see you.”
I was going to see Mom again soon! My heart swelled at the thought.
Dad called across to Shona. “Good to go!”
Shona gathered the dolphins, organizing them into a team and spreading the ropes between them so they could pull us along.
She swam among them and instructed the dolphins to pull the ship around.
“Pull us alongside my father’s ship first,” Sam called to Shona. “We’re collecting all the stolen treasure that’s on board. And the first ones we’ll be returning are the bags that belong to the people on the Sunbeam.”
“Will do,” Shona called back. Then she dived down and swam with the dolphins as they pulled us through the water.
We’d gathered every stolen item we could find from Jakob’s ship and we were ready to leave.
As the dolphins pulled our ship around, Sam and I stood at the back.
“Sam,” I said, pointing to the shore. His mom and dad were emerging from the tunnel.
Sam looked across to them.
“You OK?” I asked.
“Yeah.”
As the pirate king and his wife reached the end of the tunnel and stepped out onto the rocks, they looked across at their son. For a moment, Jakob’s haughty arrogance was gone. In that moment, he looked like a father losing his son. He put an arm around his wife’s shoulders and together the two of them watched Sam leave them behind.
Finally, Jakob nodded. I guess he knew when he was beaten. Even if he tried to get to his ship, he was so outnumbered by Sam and his crew that he wouldn’t stand a chance of reclaiming the treasure.
Sam nodded back to his dad. His mom clasped a hand across her lips, kissed it, and waved the kiss across to Sam. With the saddest of smiles, Sam did the same back to her.
I slipped my hand into his as the ship turned, as we moved away, as his parents faded into the rocky coastline . . . as we left them behind.
Shona and Dad swam with the dolphins as they pulled our beautiful ship through the winding rocky channels in the bay and out to sea.
Aaron joined Sam in the center of the deck. Together, they were already planning out how to fix the ship.
I watched them, wondering for a moment where it would all end up. Where we would all end up. Seeing them working together like that, it was as if they were two parts of me. Aaron, the steady safe harbor in a storm. Sam, the exciting, unknown adventure out at sea. Which one represented the real me?
I laughed to myself. If I’d learned anything on this journey, it was that no one could represent the real me — except myself. I didn’t have to decide between them. I didn’t need either of them to know who I was. I was a bit of both, a bit of neither, and a bit of everything in between. From now on, I would be myself, and if anyone didn’t like it — well, that was for them to deal with, not me.
I made my way to the front of the ship. Looking down, I saw that Shona was swimming at the back of the pod of dolphins. Kat was leaning over the front deck, talking to her. They had already become friends.
Everything was linked. In that moment, I felt it. We were as one. And at the same time, every single one of us was completely separate and unique as well. Just like the sunrise that was breaking through the clouds ahead of us into a gleaming fan of light.
I held the railings as I walked along the deck.
A rope was lying unfurled in front of me. Without thinking about it, I picked up the rope and started to wind it around my arm, in a neat loop.
People around me all doing their thing. Working together, each in their own way. The ship was a well-oiled machine. It was perfect.
And among the cogs of the machine, I took my place.
I was heading home, back to the place I knew, to the family that I belonged with. But in the meantime, I was here — and, for now, I didn’t want anything else.
I smiled as I worked. I closed my eyes and felt the warmth of the rising sun on my face, the breeze in my hair. And as the day dawned, the ship sailed forward, starting a new journey, forging its own path.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places,
and incidents are either products of the author’s
imagination or, if real, are used fictitiously.
Text copyright © 2019 by Liz Kessler
Illustrations copyright © 2019 by Erin Farley
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, transmitted, or stored in an information retrieval system in any form or by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, taping, and recording, without prior written permission from the publisher.
First published in Great Britain by Orion Children’s Books, a division of the Orion Publishing Group
First U.S. electronic edition 2019
Library of Congress Catalog Card Number 2018961117
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