FIRST
Heart racing, blood pounding, Lucy circled all the last letters until she had the answer.
FIRST TO FIND ME WINS.
Chapter Nineteen
Lucy ran her gutsout. While she walked everywhere and biked everywhere back home, she hadn’t done much running since leaving school. Now she was furious at herself for quitting 5Ks. Her legs and lungs were screaming at her after only a couple of minutes of hard sprinting.
But she kept on running, wouldn’t stop. She ran like kids run when the final bell rings on the last day of school before summer break. Jack was most likely in his writing room, so that’s where she was headed. If he wasn’t seated behind his desk…well, she’d worry about that once she got there.
She wasn’t even halfway back to the house when she had to stop to catch her breath. Leaning over, panting, stupidly grateful for the hiking boots Hugo had given her—no way could she have run in her old Converse sneakers—Lucy’s lungs burned as she gulped air. She could see the house in the distance.
She saw something else too. Someone was on the Five O’Clock Beach.
Andre. Andre was on the beach, unmistakable in his baseball cap and bright blue windbreaker.
And he was running.
Running toward the house.
Lucy took off as fast as she could, the soles of her new shoes echoing off the wooden boards of the walkway that ringed most of the island.
Andre was taller than her, bigger, faster, but she was closer. It was neck and neck as he ran up the beach, and she ran down it, the house just ahead five hundred yards, then four hundred…Lucy’s heart felt like it could burst from her chest. Three hundred yards…she wanted to throw up. Two hundred yards. She slipped on a loose board but caught herself before hitting the ground. Had those two seconds of delay cost her the win? She kept running. Andre was close, but so was she. Lucy ran up the cobblestone walkway to the front door with a last explosion of adrenaline and burst into the house. Andre was only a few steps behind her. Now she had to find Jack. Her best guess was the library. But Andre was heading up the stairs, maybe seeking out Jack in his office. Had he seen Jack up there in the window? Was she going to win the race only to lose by picking the wrong room?
Lucy burst into the living room, and there was Jack standing at the fireplace, a cup of coffee in his hand.
And there was Melanie standing with him, also with a cup of coffee. She was smiling.
Lucy collapsed onto the sofa. Andre came in one second after her and stared at the scene in front of him.
“Damn,” he said and kicked the door shut behind him. The sound made Lucy jump.
“Sorry, kids,” Melanie said with a shrug. “Like Jack said, no points for second place.”
Lucy didn’t begrudge Melanie her moment of triumph. She wasn’t going to be a sore loser like Dustin.
“I might as well go home,” Andre said, though he didn’t sound heartbroken, merely resigned. He sat on the sofa, shoulders slumped, looking defeated. “My wife was right when she told me girls were smarter than boys.”
Good to see he still had a sense of humor about the whole thing. Lucy wanted to cry, but she would save that for later.
“Ah, don’t give up, son,” Jack said, patting Andre on the back and winked. Andre smiled. The tension lifted a little in the room.
Andre scoffed. “No offense, Jack, but maybe this would have been fun when I was eleven, but now? It’s stressful as hell.”
Jack didn’t seem surprised or offended. “I’m only giving you what you kids wanted back then—to make a wish and play a game and win the prize.”
That wasn’t what Lucy wanted. She loved the books, and she daydreamed about being a character in one of them the same way her friends dreamed about going to Hogwarts or Narnia. But what she’d truly wanted was what Jack jokingly offered in his letter—to be his sidekick. She’d wanted to live here with him, help him, be a daughter to him, let him be a father to her. As much as she’d loved the books, she wanted the reality, not the fantasy.
“What’s the next game then?” Andre asked Jack. “I’m not giving up yet.”
“You’ll find out tonight after dinner. But until then, have fun. This is Clock Island, not the gulag.”
—
Lucy’s hot streak wasn’tjust over, it was dead and buried. That night they played “Clock Island-opoly,” which was the Clock Island version of Monopoly. Andre, a corporate lawyer, won without breaking a sweat. Melanie came in second. No points for Lucy. She’d never played Monopoly before. She might have enjoyed learning how if it hadn’t been such an important game. Instead of going straight to jail, they went into the Clock Tower, and they were not allowed to collect two hours. Time was money, said the box.
By the end of night two, the score stood at:
