PROLOGUE
THE LETTER
Dear Alex,
There are things you don’t know about me. Some things I should probably share with you.
I’m twenty-seven years old; that’s my best estimate anyway. I was abandoned as a baby, left in a cardboard box on the roadside of a busy street between two countries. At least that’s what I read about myself years later when I stumbled across a news article about a boy who went missing thirteen years prior.
I’m that boy.
I was five when I was kidnapped and put on a yacht, taken far away from my country, whichever one that might have been. My feet never touched land again. The Mediterranean Sea and a 450-foot mega yacht became my home… it also became my prison.
I have a sister. She’s older than I am. She witnessed the first time I was molested by my captor—I was still only fiveyears old then, maybe six, but I’d already spent so much time in the rain, that time just washed away.
What do I mean by spending time in the rain, you ask? It’s what my sister taught me to do… a coping mechanism. It’s how I survived. “Run into the rain,” she told me, right before my captor came into my bedroom. “He can’t hurt you in the rain.”
She was right. There was safety in the rain.
It was the one place my captor couldn’t see me—he wanted to see my tears, but he couldn’t see them through the rain.
The rain is what saved me from the storm happening to me.
I’m a survivor. But I stayed in the rain.
I write poetry. That’s another thing you don’t know about me.
“Putain!” I crumple up the stationery and shove it off to the side of my desk, joining the six other failed attempts at writing this letter. French isn’t my first language, but the swear words sound more sophisticated, so I lean toward swearing in French. But don’t let my foreign tongue fool you… I’m not French. I actually don’t know what I am—except lost, somewhere in the rain.
I reach for another piece of paper and angrily lean the tip of my pencil against it. I should just write a poem. I’m much better at writing poetry. He’d probably appreciate it more too. I’d name it?—
Rain and Tears…
I’m lost
Somewhere between Rain and Tears.
But I’m safe
Just trapped by my fears.
Can you see me?
I’m right there, between the two.
I went back into the rain
In search of you…
Ugh! I just can’t! He’s gonna think I’m gay. Well, I totally am, but still.
I push the paper aside, along with my frustration. Maybe I should just talk to him. Tell him everything. He probably won’t believe anything I have to say though. Really, why should he? I’m nobody. I have no home. No country of origin. In fact, there’s nothing at all that certifies my existence.
I’m nonexistent.
I’m just… Noah.
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