Page 20 of Dance Practice, Marooned: Part 2

“I can’t do this,” I groan. “Aggie, I can’t fucking do this. It hurts. So bad.”

“I know, honey. Ace has gone to find more painkillers. We’re going to do everything we can to make you feel better.”

“Please,” I beg. “Make it stop.”

I must drift off again, because I am woken up to the sound of Ace’s voice. He enters, shaking water from his hair, telling me it must be pouring outside. His shirt is stuck to his chest, and he’s panting. “This is all I could find,” he says, holding up the orange pill bottle. “Four left. That’s it.”

I pretend not to notice the look Aggie and Ace share. The look of concern, maybe even fear.

He crouches in front of me, the space suddenly small, hot with his presence. My skin crawls, every movement a fresh agony. “Ace—” My voice cracks. “I need you to make this stop. Please.”

He tips the bottle and shakes a single pill into his palm. “I know, Gracie.” He slides it into my mouth and holds the water to my lips with an impossible gentleness. “But we have to make these last.”

I want to scream at him to dump the whole bottle down my throat, but I don’t. I let the pill slide down. “Am I going to die?” I croak.

“No,” Aggie says, her voice firm. “No, you are not.”

“It’ll stop,” Ace goes on, his jaw tight. “You just have to keep drinking. Aggie, can you go and get more water for these electrolytes? Coconut too, if you can.”

She nods and then disappears.

Ace’s hand moves to my forehead, tracking rivulets of sweat, and he wipes them away with the sleeve of his shirt. Each touch is a small mercy. “Try to sleep.”

I nod, but my head is pounding. The pain drills through my bones, bursts like static behind my eyes. I can’t orient time. I’m underground, then burning up under the sun, then lost in black water with my limbs tied down. Sometimes I hear them talking outside—Ace, voice like a slow storm, Aggie’s sharp inquiries, even Adrian’s distant sarcasm. I can’t make any of it out. I just float.

Somewhere in the blur, I hear footsteps and a scuffle. Ace and another male voice, deeper, barking. I blink my eyes open to see Kellen, angrily glaring at Ace, his hands shaking. “It’ll fuckin’ help, Ace.”

Ace glares at him. “No, it fuckin’ won’t. Drugs ain’t the fuckin’ answer.”

“You got a better fuckin’ idea? We can crush this weed up, give her tiny doses for the pain and inflammation.”

“No. It’ll kill her,” Ace barks. “She’s already burning up, you want to shut down her fucking body, too?”

Kellen’s jaw works. “It is a tiny dose, Ace. Barely enough to change anything. It’s worth a shot.”

I try to speak, but my tongue is too heavy. My body twists, a bolt of nausea flipping my stomach. Kellen glances at me, hands balled into fists. “I’m not watching her die out here.” The force of his anger is almost comforting.

Fear washes over me.

Aggie appears, soaked through, a water bottle in one hand and a coconut in the other. “Try some coconut water with electrolytes mixed in. It’s worth a shot giving her a bigger dose. Also, Zeke has made salt from the ocean. He boiled it down and so we put a hit of that in there, too. Salt will help her muscles and pain.”

Ace nods.

She walks over, placing the coconut down and bringing the water bottle to my lips. I take a sip and force myself to swallow, even though the taste is absolutely vile. I retch once, maybe twice, but it stays down.

“Good girl,” she says, and I want to cry from the simple way her voice softens.

The pain ebbs and roars, a tide that never leaves me alone. Hours pass—maybe days, I don’t know—punctuated by Ace cooling my skin, Aggie giving me water, Tatiana just lying with me, and sometimes Rachel even sits with her hand tucked over mine, whispering stories about her own childhood like I’m her sick baby sister. Through it all, Kellen and Zeke argue about the best ways to crack a coconut, whether a sharpened rock or repeated blunt force trauma is best.

It takes days, but eventually, when my eyes open, it doesn’t feel like I’m dying.

I still feel horrible, but I can see the light at the end of the tunnel.

I’m alone in the shack, but I can hear voices outside.

Kellen, I think, and Rachel.

As the voices go on, it becomes apparent that I’m right, it is the two of them.