Stay.
Stay.
Stay.
My treacherous heart whispers, so soft and quiet it could fool me into believing it.
I blink. And he watches me. Traces the slope of my jaw like he doesn’t want to forget.
The feeling of his hand is a warmth I haven’t known in too long. An intimacy I’ve craved. A silence, a gentleness that waits beneath his palm.
But with the next inhale, his hand falls away—like he forgot the reason for touching me in the first place. Forgot who I am—an intruder, a stranger. Forgot the hour.
Forgot that I’ll be leaving soon.
Soon.
Soon.
My body sinks down into the chair, eyelids pinched shut, breathing in the salt air. And when I shiver my eyes open again, he’s gone back into the house.
I drink down the last of the whiskey.
I lie in his bed.
Alone.
I press my palms against my eyes, remembering the feel of his hand on my flesh. He’s touched me before—when pulling me from the sea, when working together in the garden or in the kitchen. But not like this.
Not like this.
There was something solemn in it. Desperate. Pleading.
I’ve never been reckless with my heart. Even in college. I was cautious, reticent when someone asked for my number, asked me out to coffee, asked for my notes after class. I watched others fall in love quickly and I never understood. With James, I was slow, hesitant. I needed convincing. I needed time.
So why do I feel this way now?
It must be the sea air, the madness of this place.
Or maybe it’s him.
I drop my hands and twist James’s ring around my finger, using it as a tether to pull my mind back. I’ve made promises to myself. I wear a ring given to me by a man waiting for me across an ocean. And still.
My skin is thinking of something else. A man who is painfully, undeniably handsome. Hardened by the sea. Quiet and gentle and kind. Who looks at me like he’s peering through a crack in my surface, like he’s letting in the light with his eyes. A man unlike anyone who has ever touched me before.
I lie in bed.
Imagining things that are a knife’s edge away from unfaithful.
The morning is gray and wet, the day muted as I move through the house—avoiding Clay—but by early evening, the sun pushes away the storm, leaving the sky calm and mercifully blue.
Barefoot, I walk down to the rocky shore where the ocean has gone flat and still—no threatening whitecaps or gusts of wind. It’s placid enough to swim in. This is the break in the weather I’ve been waiting for. I’ve been handed an opening. An invitation. A question. As if the sea itself is testing my loyalty. My determination.
I have to make a decision.
Back in the house, I gather a loaf of freshly baked bread, a jar of blueberries I picked yesterday, and a canteen of rainwater. I hope I won’t need any of it. I hope I’ll see land within an hour of leaving the island. I hope this isn’t a mistake.
Tomorrow, just after sunrise, I plan to leave.
