The Key Largo Public Library is the rendezvous area for everyone in the Keys after the storm. Its strip mall location has the added benefit of offering room and shelter for about twelve hundred people—the current tally, which, rumor has it, is not expected to grow much more.
We still don’t know what happened on the lower Keys, but over the last three days there have only been a hundred or so stragglers. None of them were at the naval base.
There’s talk about sending a few groups there to find out what happened, but mainly it’s to get supplies. Because what survived the storm is dwindling fast. They’re saying we might run out of food by Christmas, which is in five weeks. But that’s another rumor. That’s what happens when a committee of elected officials isn’t able to give answers immediately and locks themselves away in a conference room in the library while they have everyone else doing supply runs and returning with waterlogged boxes of canned goods from around theKeys. Rumors start. Rocky Horror has been off with a couple other tech people helping to get the radio tower going again so we can check in on the Cuban colony and a few settlements we’ve talked with up the coast.
Meanwhile the rest of us stay here, waiting for something to change. Half the people in the Key Colony are dead or missing, but I can’t stop thinking about Liz and Frank and Matthew and Lisa and Quinten and Jeremy and Lucy. The seven people I saw every day since I got kicked off the boat but won’t see ever again.
It’s especially hard because I can’t really take the time to grieve them without neglecting the kids who are still here. They’re all orphans, and the ones who died were really the only family any of them had left. So I’m stuck trying to pretend to be strong while inside I have flu-year flashbacks of every person I knew dying. And I have to remind myself the kids all experienced that, too. And, yeah, sometimes Jeremy could be a real shit, and Frank had no filter, and Liz was a know-it-all who liked to scold me for every little thing as though I, personally, was going to destroy the kids’ ability to function in postapocalyptic society. But I still miss them all so much.
While I’m in the middle of thinking about them—distracted when I should be paying attention to the card game I’m playing with Taylor, though she doesn’t seem to be into it either—a white guy with dark brown hair and a long beard goes over to Amy and asks to talk to her.
Amy gets up and walks about three feet away. I can hear almost every other word they say, something about the Committee and the Keys. He looks over at me and Amy follows his gaze. Then she thanks him, and he nods and leaves.
“What was that about?” I ask.
“Where are Jamie and Cara?” she asks.
I point over at the boat crew, who are doing a wonderful job making me feel excluded and keeping their meetings away from me. “Mourning the loss of their boat. Did you know that damn thing was struck by lightningtwiceand survived another hurricane when it was in New Jersey? Plus it’s from the eighties. Maybe she needed to be put to rest. Right on top of a house.”
“I need to talk to the three of you when they’re done. Come find me?”
I don’t like the tone of her voice. “What’s up?”
Henri-Two fusses in the sling across her chest. “Just come find me. I’m going to go feed her.”
“Yeah, all right.” I watch her go, then turn to Taylor. “Can you help Daphne look after the kids while I’m gone?”
“You gonna tell me what she tells you?” She doesn’t even look up from her cards. But next to her, the Kid looks away from Bobo long enough to glance between the two of us.
“Of course. But try and eavesdrop a little more on that lady who thinks her husband is sleeping with the rabbi.” It’s nice to know other people in the Keys still have their own relationship dramas despite the devastation from the hurricane. It adds an illusion of normalcy. I’m also thankful that all the uncertainty between Jamie and me has been on hold the last few days. That’s a nice change.
I hand over my cards to Taylor, who begins putting them away. Admiral Hickey sees me coming, and Jamie follows his gaze over to me.
“Amy wants to talk to us about something,” I tell him, then turn to Cara. “All three of us.”
Cara and Jamie turn to Hickey, probably to ask for permission to leave. Without a word from either of them, he nods. “Go ahead; I’ll send Trevor for you both when we’re heading to the marinas.”
Jamie and Cara follow me. “What was that about marinas?”
“He wants to find another boat,” Cara says. “But not to get Henri. To do supply runs along the coast to see if there’s anything we can bring back.”
At least this means we can put a pin in Jamie’s need to go back to the cabin. That fills my chest with a bit more hope. After everything, maybe staying here and helping out will make him realize we’re a part of this community. It could make him change his mind about staying.
Especially since it seems we’re going to be living with the remainder of Team Orphan now. And, honestly, I really want to. Losing the other kids and Liz made me realize exactly how much I care about them. Seeing people for ten-plus hours a day almost every day will do that.
I want to make sure all the others stay safe. That includes Amy and Henri-Two.
And double for Jamie and Cara.
We find Amy at the bank near the shopping center’s entrance. She’s under the awning of a drive-through teller window feeding Henri-Two.
“Sit,” she says, motioning to the asphalt in front of her.
“What’s going on?” I ask.
But Cara sits across from her. Jamie follows, so I finally sit, too.
“Rocky Horror sent someone to tell me so I could be the one to tell you all.”
