Every day here, I worry about how safe we are. Even if Fort Caroline never finds us, there isn’t anything to stop another settlement from coming and throwing the whole system into disarray. And who knows what that would look like for Andrew and me?
“Do you think I’m wrong?” I ask Cara.
She frowns and shrugs. “About?”
“Sorry. I forgot I haven’t talked about this with you for a while.”
She shakes her head. “I don’t want to get between the two of you.”
“I know that. I’m not asking you to. I just mean do you think I’m wrong about wanting to go to the cabin? I’m not asking you to side with me on anything, just trying to get your thoughts.”
She chews at her lip, thinking. “I think... you are notwrong. But I also think you are not right.”
“Thanks, Cara, super helpful. Great talk.”
“Shut up and just listen. You got shot. By the same people I was trying to get away from, and for good reason—the getting away, not the getting shot.”
“I was hoping.”
“So, yes, I think you are not wrong to be worried about staying here. It makes sense to be distrustful. But you should also ask what it is about the Keys that makes you distrustful. I think your idea that Andrew would ever turn on you is obscenely misguided.”
“I don’t think that!”
“Then why is it your way or nothing? You think he won’t pack up and leave with you the second he even hears the name Fort Caroline?”
It’s not that at all. I turn back to Andrew, watching him call out the number two and Taylor and another girl run out to grab the bacon—a throw pillow from one of the hotel rooms—from the faded parking spot line.
I know he’d leave this place behind in a second if it became unsafe. But I can tell how much it’s going to break his heart to do it. He would never admit it, but he was looking for family a long time before he met me.
He left his house in Connecticut after the death of his sister—his last family member taken by the superflu. And on the road in New Jersey he met a couple named the Fosters. He shared food and a fire with them, but that night they tried to rob him. He accidentally killed them while fighting back and from that moment decided he’d go south to Virginia and tell their remaining family what happened to them.
He found me first.
The Fosters in Virginia were long dead by the time we arrived, and I think he still feels the guilt from what happened to their parents—maybe not as often as he used to, but it’s there. And every person we met—Henri; a kid our age at Reagan airport and his siblings; Cara; a girl in a shoe store outside Jacksonville; Daphne; all the kids—hetreated them kindly. Not the people in Fort Caroline, though—but maybe he subconsciously knew they couldn’t be trusted.
It wasn’t until we got here, until he started talking to strangers, getting to know neighbors and making friends, that I realized he was trying to find the right people. The people he could make a family with again.
But I knew—thought—our time here was temporary, so I never did. I also didn’t feel the need to. I like everyone fine enough, and Cara sometimes does feel like the older sister I never had, but in my mind we were always going to go back to the cabin someday. It would be me and Andrew—maybe Cara if she wanted to, but if not, I wouldn’t mind as long as she was safe and happy.
Because I didn’t want to be here if things did go bad. I didn’t want Fort Caroline to find us, and I didn’t want to watch this settlement go through the growing pains of rebuilding postapocalyptic society.
Before, if we had just told Amy where her mom was and then left, we would have been fine. We’d have no more ties to the Keys, and we could be happy that we’d completed our mission to reunite a family, then go live on our own at the cabin. Maybe even make a truce with the settlement nearby so they wouldn’t bother us again.
But the longer we’re here, the harder it’s going to be for Andrew to leave. He’ll never stop worrying about these people.
Especially because he already considers them family.
When Cara sees I’m not going to answer her question, she continues, “I get why you don’t want to trust anyone. I feel the same way sometimes. But these people are different.”
“And if they change?” I ask.
She doesn’t have an answer for that. We sit in silence, and for a few moments I think that’s the end of our conversation, but then she looks over at me.
“Since it doesn’t look like we’re going to get Henri anytime soon, whatisyour plan?”
I hadn’t thought of it. But I didn’t think I’d need to. Without Andrew on the boat, the plan was to come back, and maybe then the two of us could take the boat back up alone—or with Cara.
“I don’t know yet,” I say. “I guess we stay here and try to help wherever we can.”
