Total pages in book: 62
Estimated words: 59521 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 298(@200wpm)___ 238(@250wpm)___ 198(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 59521 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 298(@200wpm)___ 238(@250wpm)___ 198(@300wpm)
“Rachel?”
She doesn’t answer, but her shoulders drop just a touch, so I know she has heard me. I sit beside her, leaving plenty of space. The wind stings my cheeks, and it feels scary sitting this close to the edge, but it is also weirdly freeing. Like we could just soar off and find freedom. Even though we both know that isn’t how it would go.
Neither of us speak for so long, I wonder if I should start the conversation, only I don’t know what to say.
“Do you think they’ll find us?”
Her voice comes out crackly and broken.
I want to lie so badly it hurts, but the truth is, I actually don’t know the answer so maybe it isn’t a lie at all. “I don’t know,” I say, “but even if they don’t for a while, we’ll make it. We’ll survive until they do. We have to.”
Rachel’s hand tightens on her knee. “What if we all just die slowly, just like Iris did? Eventually, what if this world here consumes us all. What then?”
“We will do everything we can to make sure that doesn’t happen. We won’t give up. I don’t know what the future holds, but we are here, we are alive, and that is all we can focus on.”
“I don’t know if I will ever be okay again,” she whispers, her voice barely there.
I feel that.
Oh, do I feel that.
I sit there with her, letting the silence fill whatever needs filling. We stare at the horizon, together but apart, and I hope that somewhere, someone is looking for us.
Because I don’t know what we’ll do if they aren’t.
10
I WADE THROUGH THE crystal-clear ocean, trying to see if there is anything we can collect from the shallow pools. Aggie and Tatiana swim beside me, enjoying the warm sun far more than they are helping, but I don’t mind. Sinking to my feet, I look over to where Aggie has her head tipped back, eyes closed, letting the sun shine on her face.
“So,” Tatiana says, eyes focusing on me. “What’s with you and Ace?”
Aggie’s head snaps forward, and her eyes pin mine, too. “I was going to ask the same thing.”
I knew the questions were coming.
Of course they were.
I exhale. “Honestly, I don’t know. I just know that he makes me feel safe, and I need that right now.”
“I say this with all the love in the world,” Aggie goes on, “but honey, you’re risking a lot sleeping with a man out here, unprotected.”
She’s not wrong.
It has been playing on my mind all day.
Ace pulled out, but still, many a baby has been born using the pull-out method.
“I know,” I say, closing my eyes for a second. “God, this is so fucked up, isn’t it?”
“Do you think we’ll be out here for much longer?” Tatiana asks, a fear deep within the depths of her eyes. “I don’t... I’m scared of what might happen if nobody shows up.”
I feel my skin prickling at the question, not from the heat, but from the honesty of it.
Aggie flicks water at me, smirking, and I know this is her way of trying to lighten a very difficult subject. That’s just what she does. “So long as you’re gettin’ it, Grace.”
I flick water back at her with a smile. “There are two other good-looking men you could be getting it with,” I tease.
She wiggles her brows. “Not a bad idea. Kellen is all kinds of fine.”
Tatiana is still frowning, and my heart breaks for her. “I wonder what my parents are thinking right now.”
We all fall silent. A thought that makes our chests curl up within ourselves, but for very different reasons. Tatiana has a loving family, and Aggie has a mom who would die for her. Me, my parents are probably celebrating that they don’t have to pay for me anymore. My father...
No.
I refuse to give him a thought.
Aggie swims closer to Tatiana, draping an arm around her. “They’re searching for us, honey. No way they aren’t. People vanish on yachts sometimes, but not the whole damn ship.”
“I don’t want to die here,” Tatiana says. It isn’t dramatic. It’s terrifyingly normal, the way you’d say, I don’t want mayonnaise on my sandwich. Plain and simple truth.
I swim up to her now, too, and take her hands in mine, squeeze until she stops trembling. “We’re not going to die here. We’re too pretty to die. Nobody could be that cruel.”
A small smile from Tatiana.
Aggie sighs and flops backwards, letting the ocean cradle her. “All I know is, if I get eaten by a shark, I want it to be one of those giant sharks that look like they’re straight out of Jaws. I want to be famous. Don’t let me get taken by a tiny girly shark. That would be shame...”
Tatiana laughs, and the tension loosens just enough.