“How do we help her?”
“I don’t know.”
“Someone just pee on me already!” Naomi shouts.
Theo and I stare at each other in horror, and that’s the moment I register that I’m soaking wet and barely dressed. His eyes fall to my breasts before he immediately catches himself, wrenching his gaze all the way up to the sky.
“Not it,” he says quickly.
“Baruch HaShem,” Naomi says. “No offense, Your Majesty, I’m a big fan of yours, I don’t think I’ve told you that yet. I defended you when Wren called you spoiled and outdated and—”
“Keep it moving, Nay,” I tell her.
“Right. Anyway, you seem great, but I’ll never live it down if you, you know—”
Theo looks at me with wide, panicked eyes. “I’ll get help.”He climbs back up the rocks and out of sight. I send Comet with him.
“I don’t know if the pee thing is true,” I say to Naomi.
She presses the heels of her hands against her eyes. “I’m willing to risk it.”
“But—”
“If you’re my best friend, you will pull down your silk princess underwear and pee on my damn foot!”
“Fine! But we’re never talking about this again, understand?”
Brooke’s head appears over the cliffside. “Keep your princess underwear on, Wren. Don’t pee on her.”
“Why not?” Naomi demands.
“It’s a myth and it won’t help. Bring her up here. Winston says we need hot water and we’re heating some over the fire now. C’mon, give me your hand, Naomi.”
We quickly get dressed, and then I walk behind Naomi as she crawls up the rocks. At the top, Brooke and I each take one of her arms and sling it over our shoulders so we can support her weight between us. Henry meets us on our way back to camp and takes over, giving my throbbing arm some relief.
The group moves to make room for Naomi as he sets her next to the glowing fire. Theo looks stressed. “I could have done that.”
“Well, you didn’t,” Henry barks in response.
Naomi presses her face to my shoulder with a whimper. Winston twists his torso to inspect the sole of Naomi’s foot. “Nasty one, innit?”
“It feels like…” She pauses to pant for breath. “Like bolts of electricity… are shooting into my body. It won’t stop.”
“Is she going to be okay?” I ask.
“Why were you in the ocean after dark?” Reggie demands. The veins in his neck are bulging.
“Where’s the hot water?” Winston asks.
Theo uses a stick to knock the bottle away from the fire and rolls it to Winston, who covers his hand with a spare piece of clothing before twisting the bottle open. “Don’t want it to burn ya, but it should be as hot as you can handle, understand?”
“Will she be okay?” I ask again, Theo’srarelystill echoing in my brain.
Winston tests the temperature of the water on the inside of his wrist before gently pouring it over the long, stringy red welts on Naomi’s skin.
Naomi sucks in a breath through her teeth. “It still hurts… but it’s helping.”
“I need something hard and flat, like a credit card, to scrape the nematocysts out of her skin,” Winston continues.
