Island (6 page)

To Australia.

To its colonies.

To America.

Scenes of the party flashed through my mind, of the different getups — the World War II uniforms, the Pilgrim costumes —

Shipwrecks.

Nesconset Bay has a history of them.

Disappeared, never found.

Swallowed up by the clouds.

Ships from the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.

A World War II submarine.

Grandpa Childers’s party.

An idea was forming, an idea so crazy I laughed aloud.

They didn’t disappear, did they?

They’re all here.

All the shipwrecks.

Here on Onieron, the island where no one grows old.

They just passed through. From one side of the clouds to the other.

To a place that no one ever sees.

Suddenly I remembered Captain Neil’s words. What he had said about the clouds.

Twenty-four hours. That was how long the wall lasted. Then —

“Poof — they’re gone without a trace.”

Gone.

In twenty-four hours, the clouds vanished.

And so does something else, Rachel.

When the clouds are gone, what do you see, Rachel?

Nothing.

No island.

No Onieron.

“Oh my god …” I murmured.

“Rachel?”

Mary Elizabeth again. Louder. More urgent.

“Rachel, have you seen … that book?”

I tried to reply, but the words stuck in my throat.

“RACHEL?”

She knows.

She knows I know.

The door was rattling now.

Rattling hard.

They want me to stay.

To stay until the morning.

“Everything will be back to normal.” That’s what Wes had said.

Yeah. Normal for them.

They’ve been here sixty years.

And now they want me.

WHY?

I dropped the book and looked out the window.

The guard was disappearing around the corner.

Go.

Somewhere.

Find a boat.

Swim if you have to.

I lifted myself onto the sill and climbed out.

I hit the ground running.

They can’t keep her.

They have to.

F
ASTER.

Past the back of the cabin. Toward the pitch-blackness of the woods.

Something hit me. Hard. As if I’d run into a tree.

A tree with arms.

“Where do you think you’re going?”

I couldn’t see him.

But I recognized the voice.

Wes’s.

“GET YOUR HANDS OFF ME!” I shouted.

The hands.

What are they?

A dead person’s?

A ghost’s?

A seventy-five-year-old’s frozen in time?

I shook myself free and tried to run.

Wes blocked my way. “Where are you going?”

“Into the woods. Away.”

“You can’t!”

“Watch me!”

I feinted and lunged, but he jumped in front of me again. “Rachel, what’s gotten into you?”

“I KNOW WHO YOU ARE.”

“Of course you do — ”

“No, I
really
know. You were my grandfather’s friends. All of you — Colin, too! You knew him and you’re trying to hide all traces — ”

“Rachel, you’re exhausted — ”

“DON’T PLAY WITH ME, WES! You were out on a cruise — sixty years ago — and you got lost in the cloud wall. You ended up here and stayed — but he escaped to the real world! It’s true, isn’t it? And don’t try to lie to me!”

‘Yes,” Wes said.

“Yes, what?”

“It’s true.”

“It is?”

“Every word.”

He admits it.

He was looking me straight in the eye.

“Then … you lied to me,” I said.

“White lies,” Wes said softly. “For your own good. To protect you.”

“From what, Wes — the truth about the cloud wall? Tell me what happens when it disappears. The island goes, too, doesn’t it?”

Wes shook his head. “No, Rachel. We stay. We stay exactly as we are. It’s your world that disappears.”

“
My
world?”

“When the cloud lifts, we don’t see it. To us, it’s gone.”

Two realities. One here. One there.

Never existing together.

Except when they’re brought together by the clouds.

“But my world
is
your world, Wes!”

“Not anymore. I can never go back.”

“Colin did! He swam through, right to Nesconset.”

Wes’s face tightened. “He betrayed us, Rachel. He almost destroyed us. And he paid.”

“How is that betraying you? It’s his own life — ”

“There are laws here. Laws you don’t know about — ”

“It was his choice, Wes. His life. So get out of the way, because it’s my choice, too.”

“Is it? Is it what you really want?”

Is it?

The question stabbed me.

I tried to say yes.

But I couldn’t.

Wes looked at me for a long moment. Then he stepped aside.

He was letting me go.

I was free.

Before me lay a path into the woods.

Go.

I wanted to. My heart was racing, my legs ready to spring.

But I just stood there.

“Well?” Wes asked.

“I — I — ”

GO!

“What is it, Rachel?” Wes said. “The idea of growing old and sick? The fact that you’re on the fast track to the Big Time — adulthood, here we come! What fun that’ll be. Or maybe you’re imagining the priceless expressions on your parents’ faces when they see you again.”

I pictured Dad
(How could you scare us like that? How could you ruin this cruise?),
Mom
(Who was that boy, Rachel? I want his name right now — I will bring a lawsuit against his parents),
Seth (
I told everybody in school that you eloped with a busboy),
and I tried to imagine what I’d tell Grandpa Childers
(They’re all alive, like Colin was)
and I saw the expression on his face, and it wasn’t happy, he was crying and looking out to sea with a longing that broke my heart —

I can’t.

Everything’s different now.

I can’t go back.

“Clemson would want you to stay,” Wes said softly. “You know it. I know it.”

Yes. He would. He would say that.

“But — but he wouldn’t
mean
it,” I said. “Not really. He loves me — ”

“And he wants you to live forever. If he could be here with you, you know he would. But he’s there, Rachel. And he’ll be gone soon. They all will, sooner or later. In the end, all you have is
Rachel.
And who is that? A girl you don’t know yet. A girl you can’t know. Because her soul is being trampled into the dust.”

I felt as if Wes were pulling me open like a book and reading the table of contents.

I looked beyond him. Into the dark woods.

I heard a splashing sound in the distance, the beach beckoning.

The beach and the cloud wall.

Which almost killed me.

Which will surely kill me in the dark.

So what is it, Rachel?

Death there?

Or life here?

“If you’re going to try it, you might as well wait and do it by daylight,” Wes said.

“But the cloud wall will be gone by tomorrow.”

Wes nodded. “Yes. But there will always be another one.”

“When?”

“Soon.”

“How soon?”

Wes took my arm. “The last one seemed like yesterday.”

We were walking back now. Passing the still-flaming bonfire.

“Have there been many since your accident?” I asked.

Wes didn’t answer.

A small crowd had gathered in front of the cabins, and it was heading toward us.

I could see Mary Elizabeth. Carbo. Barbara.

“Have there been
any
in sixty years?” I pressed on. “Any at all?”

Wes suddenly tightened his grip.

“GET HER!” Mary Elizabeth shouted.

The crowd was advancing on me.

Fast.

I
KICKED HIM.

Hard.

“YEEEOW!”

He jumped back, leaving a path between him and the cabin.

I ran for it.

Wes darted after me.

The crowd was closer now. Twenty yards behind me, tops.

As I glanced over my shoulder, I stumbled against something.

A shovel. Someone had left it leaning against the wall.

I fell to the ground.

Take it.

My fingers clasped the shovel handle.

I stood.

No time to think.

I ran to the fire. Pushed the shovel underneath.

I lifted a mass of pulsating orange. As I tossed it into the woods, it spat sparks like a comet.

The grass caught first, the flames immediately spreading to the brush and beyond, a rolling carpet of fire.

“RACHEL!” Wes yelled.

“What are you doing?” Mary Elizabeth pleaded.

I scooped a mass of burning ash and spun around toward Wes.

He backed away. “Rachel, we aren’t the enemy. Don’t do this.”

“You look afraid,” I said. “Why? You live forever, don’t you?” I turned toward the crowd now. “DON’T YOU?”

They were already dispersing. Running for water.

I saw flames licking the bark of the trees. Climbing upward. I could feel the heat of the gathering fire.

And beyond the flames, I saw a figure in the woods. A shadow of a man. Bent, bearded, dressed in a long slicker.

Facing me.

I stood, mesmerized. Wanting for him to come into the light.

But he didn’t move an inch.

“Have you lost your mind?” someone yelled out.

Maybe.

I flung the shovel aside and ran away from the fire. Into the darkness behind the cabins.

Into the trees.

I kept my arms out in front of me, fending away branches and trees. My feet sank into the sandy soil. Scrubby bushes scratched at my ankles. I pumped harder, until my thighs shrieked in protest.

Follow the breeze.

The sound of the ocean.

Where was it?

Lost.

I was lost.

Running blindly.

Suddenly the ground rose in front of me and I was pulling myself upward on vines and grasses, stumbling, gasping —

And then I fell.

Head over heels in the sand. Sand in my hair and eyes and mouth.

It stung. It scraped my dry throat. I stood up, coughing. As I tried to get my bearings, I staggered toward the silhouette of an old hulking

What?

Boat.

It was a boat and I was on a beach.

Alone.

I could hear the crowd. Somewhere. Far.

I felt the boat. It was solid metal. It had curved sides with an enormous, jagged gash. Flat top.

A submarine.

Great. Now what? I pilot it out of here with a yo ho ho and full steam ahead?

The voices were coming nearer.

I glanced toward the water.

In the moonlight, the cloud wall appeared thick and muddy. Where it ended, a path of amber-white led to the shore, illuminating a short, rickety dock.

Tethered to the dock were two rowboats.

Footsteps.

Closer now.

GO.

I ran onto the dock, untied one of the boats’ lanyards, and jumped in.

I pushed off hard. As the boat lazily floated away, I sat down and attached the oars to the oarlocks.

I was facing the cloud wall now.

Heading into its belly.

I could hear its roar. Waiting. Hungry.

Go.

I pulled hard on the right oar and the boat began to spin. I dug again. And again.

But it wasn’t turning right. It was fighting me.

I pulled harder on the oars, but I was moving the wrong way now, moving backward.

Backward?

I looked over my shoulder and saw a silhouette in the water. Wes.

Pulling the lanyard.

Pulling me back in. Climbing onto the dock.

I set down the oar.

And I jumped.

She’s leaving.

She doesn’t know what this means.

She’s human. Like you.

“R
ACHEL!”

Swim.

Swim hard.

My arms ached, but I plunged them into the water again and again, pushing closer to the cloud wall.

The hiss was loud now. Growing to a deep, dull roar.

I fought the memories. Of Colin, sinking back into the mist, sinking to his death —

Don’t think.

Swim.

Suddenly I felt something grab my leg.

I was underwater. Flailing.

I fought my way back to the surface.

Wes had my arm now. He was pulling me toward the dock, gasping for breath. “You … can’t … do this!”

“I want my life back,” I shouted.
“My
world!”

“IF YOU LEAVE, YOU’LL KILL US!”

“What?”

He grabbed on to one of the pylons of the dock, still holding my arm. His face was twisted, pained. “It’s the Law of Onieron. Anyone can enter — but if we lose one soul, the island is destroyed.”

“But Colin already left, and you’re still here!”

“Until the cloud wall rises!”

“And then you all die?”

“Yes!”

“I don’t believe you! Colin is not a murderer. He wouldn’t do that!”

“He hated the island. Like you. He wanted to go back. To grow old.”

“And for that he would kill you? And bring me here, too — to kill me?”

“NO — ”

“So if you’re all doomed, LEAVE! Leave with me!”

“YOU DON’T UNDERSTAND! Colin brought you here to save us, Rachel! As long as you’re here, we live.”

“But you just said that if someone leaves, Onieron is destroyed.”

“I said
if we lose a soul.
But we haven’t. We have you now. You’ve taken Colin’s place.”

We were both paddling water now. Eye to eye.