Page 25 of Dearly Departed

“Maybe my phone was right and we’re going to get heavy rain.”

That would make it harder to move around the island. I do not relish the thought of slogging through the rain. However, heavy rain could erase our footsteps. “Maybe.”

There’s no sign of Raymond Harris, but that doesn’t mean much. He knows what direction we went when we left.

We go back into the forest and keep walking. The island keeps curving. It feels too exposed in the trees nearest the beach, so we detour into the darker areas every so often. There are, sadly, bugs. Catherine finally resorts to pulling a jacket out of her bag—the whole thing must crush down to the size of her palm—putting the hood on, and pulling the drawstring tight under her chin.

We pause again to look at the lights across the water.

“The lifeboat’s blown up now.” Catherine purses her lips. “There’s no way I’m getting in the water.”

There’s no way I’m getting in the water, because if I do, I’ll drown. I can barely keep my head upright as it is. Swimming is out of the question.

More walking.

I’m beginning to think my perception of time is out of whack. It feels like so long since we crashed that I should have died, but the sun isn’t rising.

It’s possible this is hell.

No, that can’t be. Catherine would never be sent to hell. She’s too perfect.

I lose track of time, so the new pain comes out of nowhere. My knees. My tongue. I feel like I’m swallowing sand.

“We should rest.” We have to rest, is what I mean. I have to rest.

“Okay.” Catherine yawns, then shakes her shoulders. She goes ahead of me to where the dark part of the forest begins in earnest, then sits with her back against a huge tree trunk. The tree must be ancient. I have a vision of the tree sprouting as a sapling when we landed on the island and growing while we walked and walked and walked.

I sit down next to Catherine. At some point, my head wound stopped bleeding. I can’t remember the last time I had to wipe blood out of my eyes.

“Here.” She’s holding out a bottle of water. “I only brought two, but I don’t know how many more of them I could have carried.”

“The others were near the front of the plane.”

“Oh. Nevermind, then.”

“Don’t be sorry, kitten. It’s all vaporized now.”

“I guess we can rule out learning how to fly the plane.”

“That’s better than—” Catherine interrupts me with a groan. “No. It’s not better. Don’t listen to me.”

“Don’t tell me who to listen to,” she teases. “I’ll listen to you all I want.”

“Serves me right.”

We restrain ourselves with the water and manage to limit ourselves to half the bottle.

“I really don’t want to get up,” I admit.

“I don’t either.” She rests her hand on my knee, and I put my hand over hers. “Do you think it’s getting lighter?”

I look at the ocean, and the sky beyond.

“No.”

Catherine snorts. “It’s not going to be dark forever. The sun will come up.”

“We’ll see about that.”