The fog outside the car danced on the wind, broken only by a few lone orange lights shining through the night, barely visible in the midst of it all. My fingers clenched and unclenched against the steering wheel as my gut churned with anticipation. For someone that always had to have everything planned, this was completely out of character for me.
I was barely fourteen before I knew what I wanted to study, which college I wanted to go to, where I wanted to live, and which company I wanted to work for. So yeah, I was a planner to the bone and the fact that I had no idea what I was getting myself into was skyrocketing my nerves.
My hands trembled as I pushed the doors open and then pulled my suitcase out, shaking in the freezing cold air of Ashbourne. Locking the doors of the car and placing the key behind the tire in the wheel well, as instructed by the company, I started rolling my suitcase toward where I assumed the pier stood.
The fog no longer felt like a static phenomenon coming from the sea.
With each new step, each passing second, it felt more and more as if it were caressing me, urging me to go faster, closer, to the pier. The sound of my steps echoed around me, breaking through the silence of an early morning, but there was no onein sight. I could hear the water crashing against the shore, the sound of a car driving somewhere in the distance, and as if on cue, the old lighthouse I read about suddenly lit up, the glare of its light breaking through the fog.
I stood there, transfixed, staring at the blurry light coming from the tower I couldn't see now. I was convinced it didn't work. I couldn't see its lights last night, or even on the night when I arrived. Weren't lighthouses supposed to work daily, regardless of the amount of boats in the town's marina?
"Do you need help with that?" suddenly came from behind me, and I jumped.
I fucking jumped in the spot as goose bumps erupted all over my skin. The voice came from somewhere behind me and as I turned around, slower than a fucking snail, an elderly man stood there, his hands up in the air and his eyes wide, apologetic, realizing what he must have done.
"I am so sorry for scaring you," he said, remaining in the same spot without moving a muscle. "Most of us are used to this weather, but I can see how scary it can be hearing someone out of nowhere."
I exhaled slowly, closing my eyes as I rubbed the space between my eyebrows. "It's fine," I murmured, trying to let go of an earlier anxiety now mixed with the fear that crashed into me when he spoke. "I’ve been feeling a little jumpy lately," I added, opening my eyes and seeing him properly this time.
My heart was slowing gradually, and the more I looked at him the more I could see the resemblance with Mrs. Wren.
"I’m sorry. Who are you?" I asked, noticing the graying hair at his temples and the lines around his eyes and mouth. He seemed to be younger than her, but I could be wrong. Some people were lucky enough to be granted good genes that allowed them to look youthful, and I tried not to assume anyone's age unless I really had to.
"My name is Jacob." He grinned. "And you must be Kaira. My sister told me about you,” Jacob added when I kept staring at him without moving a muscle. “Macy. You met her already.” My entire body relaxed at the mention of her name. “I wish we had met under different circumstances, but one day we will both laugh about this entire interaction. " Maybe, maybe not. Seeing how I still held on to my suitcase with a white-knuckled grip and stayed away from him, maybe I did need a few more minutes to calm my racing nerves.
I was perfectly capable of fighting, thanks to my mom's insistence to take on martial arts from a very young age, but that didn't mean I was more powerful than some men, and I saw time and time again how monstrous they could be. My friends often asked me how I could watch horror movies without flinching, without being scared.
Simple.
Real monsters didn't have fangs, horns, or claws. They looked just like us. They were perfect strangers, often kind, charming, good-looking, and you never would have thought that someone like that, someone that kind, could become someone so monstrous. Some of my friends learned the hard way how monstrous people could be, and I was only lucky enough I didn't have to experience something like it.
So yeah, I treaded carefully with strangers. I made sure someone would always know where I was, hence my constant messages to Ingrid. But looking at Jacob, I could feel he wasn't a monster waiting to attack. I could feel his energy caressing against mine, and I had no idea when that started happening, me being able to feel other people's energy, but he reminded me of Macy so much that I couldn't help myself but relax a little.
"Thank you for wanting to help," I said, "but this is not heavy at all. It's just some clothes and some books inside, so I'm okay dragging it with me."
This time he did take a couple of steps, coming closer to me, and I immediately noticed his nose was shaped like Macy's as well as those green eyes that reminded me of a forest on a sunny day, when rays broke through the trees, illuminating the ground.
"If you say so." He smiled again. "I think we should get going, Kaira," Jacob added, passing next to me. "The weather is okay for now, but they have announced a storm later on today and I don't want us to be on the sea once that starts."
A storm? "Fuck," I murmured, practically running after him. "How long is the trip?"
"I don't know." He shrugged, smiling.
What? "What do you mean you don't know?"
"I mean…" Jacob suddenly stopped and looked back at me. "I don't know. I never know." I was both confused and shocked and more than a little perplexed.
Jacob kept walking as if this entire conversation wasn't weird, heading deeper into the fog. "Come on, Kaira. We don't have the whole day." His voice carried on the wind rushing around, swirling the fog.
I should've turned around and gone home, forgetting this entire trip, but I couldn't. Whatever it was that waited for me there in the darkness of the sea, I had to meet it. I had to explore this, otherwise I would spend the rest of my life thinking of possibilities.
So I followed him, crossing deeper into the fog, into the unknown.
The lights from the lighthouse passed over us once more as I caught up with Jacob, illuminating the pier more than the streetlights were able to, and that's when I saw it.
A boat, no—a ferry. When Mrs. Wren mentioned a ferry an image in my head was of the ferry on Staten Island. This one looked nothing like the Staten Island ferry. It wasn't even close.
Even under the darkness of the night I could see the peeling paint coming off of its sides and the rust gathered at the metal parts that were supposedly holding up the awning, or whatever they called it. The metal that held it together groaned as another wave slammed into it, stopping me in my tracks.
