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Me? A baby?
I can’t.
I’m not the right person. I’m not a good mother.
“I …” I sigh.
How do I even respond to such a thing? This isn’t something I want to be thinking about right now.
“What?” Lock grabs my chin and forces me to look at him. “Please, Jules. How can I make you happy?”
Oh god. When he says it like that, it’s almost impossible to say no.
“Why do you want me to stay so badly, Lock?” I ask. “You said you wanted to be left alone.”
“Because I like you,” he mumbles.
His words turn my heart into a mushy mess.
“But we don’t even know each other,” I say, frowning.
“Yeah, we do. You prefer greens over meat. You like soft beds. You like how the jungle smells in the morning and prefer to go to bed after sundown. You like to take showers with herbs, and you’re a good cook and a good cleaner. And you enjoy working on the hut too.”
“But …” I laugh and shake my head even though it isn’t funny. It’s sweet that he considers all that ‘knowing me.’
He lowers his head so he can look me in the eye. “That’s all that matters to me.”
“But I need more …” I reply.
And I don’t mean babies.
God, I’m so glad he didn’t bring that up again.
“What? Tell me,” he asks.
“Well, I don’t know anything about you,” I say, trying to fill the void. I really don’t know much about him.
A difficult frown marks his face. “Like what?”
“You won’t tell me anything about you. The you from before this island. Where you came from. Why you left. Who you were.”
It would help me understand why he is the way he is.
Maybe make things easier.
His face darkens, and his shoulders slump. “Oh … no.” He shakes his head. “I told you, I don’t like talking about that.”
There it is again. The avoidance.
“But why? Why are you so desperate to keep people away? What did they do to you?”
He looks away, visibly strained. “I can’t …”
But I still want to know. “Why?”
He sneers, “Because you’d definitely leave if you knew.”
Now my curiosity is definitely piqued. “Knew what?”
“Everything.”
Chapter Seventeen
Accompanying Song: “Through Falling” by Johann Johannsson
Lock
Fifteen years ago
A girl knocks on the glass behind me.
I ignore it.
I have no interest in her whatsoever.
She isn’t the first, and she won’t be the last.
That’s what my father does … take girls and locks them in here with me. A thick layer of glass separates our cells. The only doors inside our cells connect to a room in which he allows us to meet.
Whenever he wants, of course.
Which is when he assumes I’m going to fuck her because that’s what he wants.
My father wants a lot of things from me, but I’ve already lost interest.
It’s not her fault; it’s his.
He keeps throwing girls at me, but they’re not what I want.
What I want is to be outside this glass prison.
To see what the world has to offer.
I lie on the metal bed and stare at the ceiling. It’s so dark and gray in here that it hurts my eyes, so I close them. I imagine being back there, outside, exploring the vastness of the world. It’s so colorful, with green and blue everywhere, and a yellow bright light in the sky. The sun.
Father told me about the beauty of this world.
He told me all the things I asked for and more.
But it still isn’t enough.
Each time I win a fight against an opponent, my father earns money, and he rewards me with girls … and time outside the cage.
I’m only interested in the latter.
Being out there is like a drug to me.
The pull is stronger than any girl.
So I keep ignoring the girl knocking on the glass, hoping she’ll go back to sleep. Hoping I’ll get to have my real reward soon.
Because when I do …
It’s the very last time I’ll ever see this prison again.
Accompanying Song: “Through Falling” by Johann Johannsson
Present
“So how did you come here? To this island? Did you pick it beforehand, or did you just happen to end up here?” Jules asks, pulling me from my memories.
I stare at the sand between my feet. It still amazes me that it exists.
“It just happened. I traveled. Stole. Lived like a thief. Then I stole a boat and sailed the oceans until I found a place for my own. This island,” I say.
Her eyes perk up. “A boat? Is it still here on the island?”
I shake my head. “There was a storm. It capsized and smashed into the cliffs on the other side of the island. Not much left.”
She sucks her bottom lip and nods in defeat.
Still so focused on leaving this paradise.
I don’t ever think about going back.
Before I came here, I never knew beaches as beautiful as this one existed.
Or that there would be jungles as vast as this one.
