He finishes the liquid in his glass, then fills it again. “Dinnae ken. I stopped keeping track of time long ago.” He lifts the glass but doesn’t drink. “This island is anchored to no land, no calendar, no place thatis governed by man.” His eyes flick to the window, rain blowing hard against the glass. “The island is its own country now.” He takes another long sip of the whiskey.
“The country of Saltwell,” I mutter, running my finger around the rim of the glass. “Population two. Or no…” I smile to myself. “Population one, tourist one.” I take another drink, and this time it only warms me, so I swallow another, my head feeling soft, the corners of my vision melting into the background. I like the feeling. I want to forget for a night where I am—all the reasons why I shouldn’t be here.
“Two months,” I mutter to myself.
He squints at me.
“I’ve been here over two months—” My grip tightens around the glass.
“Aye. An’ I’m just starting to get used to yer clatterin’ around the house.”
I make a face, but I can see the smile edging at his lips. “That’s not true. I’m as quiet as anything. You hardly even know I’m here.” My tone is light, teasing, and I feel myself wanting to laugh.
Now it’s him who makes a face. “Ye been knocking around the house like a hairy coo was set loose in here.”
“A what?”
“A hairy coo,” he repeats, as if this clears it up. “A Highland cow.”
I laugh, loud and full—unable to hold it back—and take another drink of the whiskey. It tastes like water now. Like nothing. “Wow,” I say, still grinning. “I’ve never been compared to a cow before.”
“Ye should be honored. A Highland cow is a beautiful sight. Wish I had one on the island.”
I lift an eyebrow. “Apparently you do.” I wave a hand at myself, and he laughs, eyes twinkling, relaxing even more into his chair.
But when the quiet settles over us, I force myself to look away from him—that old peculiar itch working its way up into my chest. I watch the rain thrash against the kitchen windows, listen to the house groan and settle, trying to keep its footing.
“Ye from Nova Scotia?” he asks, and I tilt my eyes back to him.
The question feels so… normal. As if we’re sitting at the hotel bar back in the Faroe Islands, and he’s trying to make small talk. Pass the time.
I shake my head. “Lived there when I was young, but moved away to go to college, didn’t go back after that. Things were… difficult there, after the night—” I inhale, looking away. “After I met you. People didn’t believe me, about the island.”
He nods, savors another drink, touches the table with his other hand. His movements seem slower than usual, careful, or maybe I’m imagining it.
“I live in Seattle now, where I went to university.”
“With James?” he asks, glancing at my ring.
I extend my fingers, staring down at the ring. It seems absurd suddenly, wearing it, out here in the middle of the Atlantic. I put it on the day before I swam to the island—a promise that I would return to Seattle and marry him. But I think I also wear it now because it feels like a tether to home, a reason to hope, someone to go back to no matter how much time has passed. “No,” I answer, turning my hand so I can no longer see the ring. “We don’t live together.”
“But ye’ll be married?”
The question makes every muscle inside me tense. “Yes.” I swallow another sip. “I think so.”
“Ye think so? It seems an odd thing, to be unsure,” he says, pushing the bottle of whiskey toward me. “Ye either love the lad, or ye don’t.”
“I love him,” I answer quickly.
Clay lifts an eyebrow, like he can hear the waver in my voice. Like I’m trying to persuade him, and myself, into believing it.
“It’s not that.” I lift the bottle and carefully fill my glass again. “He’s a good man, I know that. I just wonder if I’m not any good at love, at knowing what I want. At seeing what’s right in front of me and trusting it.” This is far more than I intended to say aloud—more than I’ve everadmitted to anyone about myself. The whiskey has muddled my head. But as I stare down at the glass, I wonder if this is the center point of my whole life. I’ve been unable to trust myself—trust what’s right in front of me—because I’ve never trusted what I saw that night when I was twelve years old.
But now I know I was right all along. The island is real. My mind was never as faulty as I once thought.
“You shouldnae need convincing about who ye marry.” Clay rests an arm over the back of the chair, the glass of whiskey suspended at his lips before he takes a drink, and I have to look away. From him. From his liquid blue eyes. “He’s either the one ye want, or he ain’t.”
I smile a little. “If you met him, you’d see that I’d be stupid to say no to him. I’d be a fool not to marry that man.”
