Page 107 of In Your Light

She ran to Salem and put her arms up. He picked her up, and she put her head on his shoulder and snuggled in. “I’m tired, Pappa.”

Salem kissed her forehead. “Is it nap time, princess?”

“Yes, please,” Fray said. His mind was reeling, his heart hammering and hurting. And he wanted nothing more than to crawl under some blankets and close his eyes.

“Pretty sure he was asking her that,” Tobin said quietly.

“We’ll be back out soon,” Aurin said, collecting the kittens. He smiled at Salem’s mother. “Come with us.”

She followed them into their little house on the pier, and everyone else just stood there.

“He’s gonna be one of us?” Hendrix asked. “A cephamorph?”

Everyone shrugged.

Then Fray remembered something. “Cern asked Sawyer if he meant what he prayed for. Sawyer said he didn’t pray. He just asked the universe.”

“He put wishes out into the universe,” Fyn said. “He made wishes to the water, to the rain, to the wind.” He shrugged. “He’s been praying to Cern.”

“To make him one of us,” Kellan murmured.

Fray nodded. “All he ever wanted was to join Ciaran in the water. How many times did he nearly drown?”

“Four or five times,” Otis said.

“Per week,” Hendrix added.

They all chuckled.

“He wanted to build a submarine,” Beau said quietly. “He was drawing plans, but...”

“But they were terrible,” Fray said.

“He would have died so fast,” Dylan said, laughing but also wiping away a tear.

They were all quiet then. Even the wind respected their grief, and the clouds hung low in sympathy.

“How long will it take?” Fray eventually asked.

Tobin shook his head. “We don’t know, baby. Minutes, hours, days. We don’t know.”

“I’m going to cook food,” Pania said, determined. “To feed us all while we wait.”

“And I will help,” Otis said. He gave Fray a nod as they walked past. “He’ll be okay. I believe it, brother.”

Fray nodded, and Tobin pulled him in for a hug. Eventually, the rest of them sat down on the jetty, legs dangling, waiting.

“Remember when Sawyer first got here?” Fray said. “He was all serious with his fishing pole and Bruce Springsteen vinyls. He stepped off that boat and fucked up Ciaran’s entire world.”

Tobin laughed. “Remember the sex rut that followed?”

Everyone laughed.

“I remember a naked Sawyer trying to shove me through the wall,” Fray said. Then he tried to put his hands on Tobin’s head. “Look at my memory. See what haunts me.”

Tobin dodged his hands and shoved him away. “I have seen it already. I don’t need a refresher, thanks.”

“Remember when Sawyer almost died because he laughed underwater?” Dylan said.