Thepitter-patterof rain against the roof intensified, and I tore my gaze away from my phone to look out the window. It was mostly a black square of night, beaten over and over with translucent streams of water. Then the low rumble of thunder began. Water droplets clung to the windowpanes, and bright whitelightning cracked the night. The thunder grew louder, crashing booms I felt in my chest.
It got to me, the deep roaring going on and on. I sat up in bed, staring out the window. I felt odd and strange, like something had slithered under my skin and wrapped around my heart and bones—this house, this island. This storm. It made me feel like something was supposed to happen. If I’d been a little kid, if I believed in fairies and dragons and quests, I would have said it was magic sparking in the air.
Rolling out of bed, I swapped my oversized T-shirt for a tank top—the less fabric the better when it came to rain on my skin. Two minutes later, I pushed open the door to the roof walk and stepped into the downpour. In seconds, the rain soaked me through—slashing, drenching rain, plastering my shirt to my skin and my hair to my head. Water dashing over my cheeks like tears. My lashes were spiky, and aboomof thunder made me gasp.
And I could see a light in the east wing. A silhouette, a boy. Then the light went out.
I lifted my face to the sky, half drowning in the endless deluge. There was no moon tonight, no stars, only darkness, except for when those white lines illuminated the world—the wrecking sea, the tossing waves, the whipping trees. I drank it in, this wild world, this island that people had tried to tame. People always wanted to tame things, to bend the strongest forces to their will, make them soft and palatable. But how did you tame a feeling bottled up inside you so tightly you thought it might burst? And if youdidtame something—if you covered an island in roads and houses and cars—didn’t you regret it in the end?
“What are you doing?”
I spun, almost slipping on the soaked boards. Ethan stood in the entryway. “Come inside!” he shouted. “You’re soaked.”
“Come outside!” I shouted back, because why not, because here we were in this wild world. “Or are you going to tell me it’s dangerous?”
I won the standoff; he stepped outside. “Be careful, okay?” he said, still yelling slightly to be heard over the rain, which soaked him as immediately as it had me.
“You be careful! I don’t want to be careful.” My gaze slid over him, over the cotton of his T-shirt, now molded to his arms and chest.
He took a step closer and slipped. I grabbed for him, catching his arm. His left hand landed on my shoulder with a firm grip. “Careful,” I said, breathless, raising my face to his. “The larger they are, the harder they fall.”
“I’m not falling.” The rain poured over us, streaming down our faces, sticking our clothes to our bodies.
“Good.” I wasn’t falling either; I wouldn’t. But I did take a last little step forward, the heat in me so strong I couldn’t even consider ignoring it, so strong I half expected steam to come off our bodies. I reached my hands up and placed them on his shoulders, and when he didn’t pull away, I pressed my lips to his.
I felt his intake of breath, and for a moment his hand curved around my hip and he pulled me closer—and then he paused, frowning. “Are you okay? Are you drunk?”
Offended, I pushed at him—not enough to disengage butenough to let him know he’d annoyed me. “I’m fine. I just wanted to kiss you. Silly me. Sorry.”
“Don’t go.” He didn’t let me pull away. “I just wanted to make sure you wanted this.”
“Yes,” I said. “I want this.”
He wrapped his arms around my waist and pulled me flush against him, and my hands slid around his neck and we were kissing. The tight, hot heat inside me finally found grip on something, on him, as I pressed myself closer and deepened the kiss. I tried to drink him in, this boy. I pulled at his shirt, trying to peel the sodden fabric away from his skin, and we were laughing, wrestling the T-shirt over his head.
The rain stopped as abruptly as it had begun.
I froze. The rain had felt like a cover, keeping everything safe and secret. Without it, my sodden clothes felt heavier and more uncomfortable, and I felt like a silly, desperate fool, throwing myself at Ethan when he clearly thought I was a mess. He’d thought I wasdrunk. “I’m sorry,” I said. “I shouldn’t have done that.”
He reached for me, but I stepped back.
“Jordan. Are you okay?”
“Yes.” I took another step toward the door, the water from my hair and clothes pooling on the deck. “I was in a mood. I should go. Shower and sleep.”
“Jordan—”
“Sorry,” I said again, interrupting. “I shouldn’t have grabbed you like that. Um—sleep tight.”
I didn’t sleep at all for the rest of the night.
Twelve
As the calendar flipped into July, Dad and I explored the island in the long evening light. He showed me the national forest and boggy marshes thick with cattails. We walked along the harbor, picking out our favorite boats, and sailed around Coatue, the strip of land almost entirely blocked off as a natural reserve. Tourists invaded the island, but Dad and I still managed to find untouched beaches far from town, and I felt so happy, getting back in the habit of spending time together.
Working for Cora also made me happy. She was a mix of droll humor and impressive intensity. Sometimes she’d spend a full day studying graphs with a crease between her brows, downing endless cups of coffee and barely speaking, except for long, complicated calls with collaborators. But when she did talk to me, she was patient and thorough and kind. I learned about the people she worked with—the other astrophysicists studying debris in space, the government agencies involved, the chair of her department—DH—who was not her boss, but notnother boss.
“Does it ever make you mad?” I asked her once, after I heardone of her male colleagues’ voices become a little too condescending.
