But just like our island...there was nothing.
We were in a snow globe. The centre figurine surrounded by invisible walls.
We faded into despair after that.
Conner didn’t mention rescue again. And Galloway erected impenetrable partitions around his soul. Pippa was the only one who spoke, but the childish belief that things would work out faded quickly as repetitive sunrise and sunsets stole us into an unsurvivable future.
I sang snippets of my songs-in-progress to lull her to sleep. I stole precious moments to scribble in my crinkled notepad, outlining sonnets that would never be heard.
With nothing else to do, the children kept themselves occupied—building an occasional sandcastle, swimming where I could keep an eye on them, and napping in the shade.
We’d all lost weight.
Galloway’s cheeks were gaunt but that was from agony as much as the lack of food. His facial hair grew thicker every day, the same chocolate brown as his head.
My hipbones steadily made themselves known and the broken ribs I kept strapped slowly protruded from my flesh.
We needed to fish. To learn what other food we could find. We needed to think long-term, rather than pin our hopes on a fantasy of rescue.
As the sun slowly set on yet another day, we shared the collected water like we did every night, and settled in to rest. Once darkness fell, there wasn’t much to do apart from sit around the fire and talk.
But tonight, we couldn’t even do that.
We didn’t have the energy to form conversation.
Galloway curled up in his bed, finally succumbing to his body’s need to heal and his incorrigible mood. The children decided to dig a bed together, falling asleep in each other’s arms. And I stared sleeplessly, long after they’d left me for dreams.
Ever since we’d put up the memorial cross and given the children the bracelet and pen, they’d been closer. Less argumentative and more compassionate. They’d grown up faster in a few days than in years of their happy childhood.
Unable to lie still, I pulled out my cell-phone. I kept it hidden as I couldn’t stomach the looks of despair whenever anyone looked at it. The screen came to life, bright in the dark, fully charged thanks to my solar charger.
I tried again to find rescue. Scanning and searching for any hope of connection. I dialled the emergency number in all its variations, listening for anything but the empty silence of unsuccessful outreach.
Silent tears cascaded down my face. Sniffing quietly, I brought up the calendar app and rubbed the sudden ache in my chest.
Yesterday, I had a lunch date with Madeline.
The day before, I had a vet appointment for Shovel-Face and his yearly check-up.
Next week, I had a Skype conference with my agent to discuss the songs I’d agreed to pen and perform for my producer.
A life waiting for me to return.
A life thinking I was dead.
I can’t look at it anymore.
Closing the app, I switched on the camera. I didn’t dare flick through the gallery and torture myself with pictures of the trip in the USA, of funny faces with Madi, and landscape panoramas of the crowds who’d come to hear me sing.
I merely opened the camera, switched it to night mode, and stood.
Silently, I catalogued our beach. I imprisoned heart-splintering pictures of Conner and Pippa sleeping back to back. I guiltily snapped images of Galloway, slumbering with a frown permanently on his face.
I took photos of the moon.
Of the sea.
Of the beach.
Of shells.
And a selfie of me with the campsite behind.
I liked to think I took it so I had evidence when we were found. A picture to discuss with Madeline when she begged for tales of my castaway days.
But the truth was, I took it to monitor how I fared over the next few months.
I took it knowing full well that if we didn’t eat better, drink more, and figure out a way to survive, the selfies would slowly show a young music-writer with hazel eyes and long blonde hair turn into a haggard, skeletal woman walking quickly into her grave.
I didn’t want that.
I won’t let that happen.
I had Galloway and the children to fight for.
We would find a way.
We have no choice.
Chapter Twenty-Six
...............................................
G A L L O W A Y
......
DAY SIXTEEN
I WOKE UP drowning.
My muscles hauled me into a sitting position; I opened my eyes to a bloody miracle. “Estelle!”
Estelle flew upright, her eyes wide and unfocused from sleep. Understanding registered instantly, and the brightest smile I’d seen in days spread across her lips. “Oh, my God!”
“Get whatever you can.” I hurried upright, wincing against my break.
Conner and Pippa sprang to their feet, dancing in the phenomenon.
Rain.
Delicious, precious, drinkable rain.
Fat raindrops exploded on our skin, washing away the salt for the first time in weeks.
“Yay!” Pippa squealed, holding her face to the sky. Her tongue flicked over her chin, slurping as fast as she could. “More! More!”
Conner whirled around with his arms spread. “Yes!”
Estelle bolted to the forest edge where we kept our clothes and belongings. We still hadn’t built a shelter. We hadn’t needed to. The fire kept away most of the bugs and chilly nights and the sky had been dry up till now.
It’d been a blessing not to have to build and struggle with my broken limb. But now, we paid the price as everything we owned was drenched.
The sand pockmarked with raindrops, slowly darkening the harder it fell.
The fire hissed and spat, fighting to keep burning.
Part of me wanted to protect it. To cover the blaze so it didn’t go out. But we had my glasses. We had the sun. We could rebuild it.
“Grab whatever you can and store as much as possible.” I looked for items of use. We’d already dug holes and lined them with deflated life-jackets. We’d been prepared for this for weeks.
Estelle flew past with the three bottles we drained every night, planting them securely in the sand.
Conner dragged a piece of fuselage that would eventually lose its contents as it had no sides, but as a quick gatherer to drink from, it would do.
Pippa grabbed the pot we used to boil clams, tipped out the seawater, and held it in her skinny arms to the sky. “Fill it up. Faster!”
I laughed as Estelle looped her arm through mine. She kissed my cheek. “I’ve been dreaming of this to happen. Begging it to.”
My body came alive beneath her touch.
I was stupid to keep her away from me. For days, I’d avoided her, refusing to talk, letting every moronic excuse turn me into an ass.
I’d been miserable—we all had. Why had we segmented ourselves off from one another? Things were so much more bearable when fought side by side.
I’m sorry.
I wanted to apologise, but she wouldn’t understand. She wouldn’t understand that I wasn’t just apologising to her but to myself, my past, the circumstances that’d made me this way.
I trembled with desperation as her eyes glittered brown and green. I dragged her closer, wrapping my arm around her waist.
Ever since dealing with the dead, we’d been linked. Despite our days and nights apart, I was achingly aware of her. I hadn’t tried to kiss her again, but it didn’t mean my heart didn’t leap whenever she was near.
I needed her with an inferno that licked every part of me but my need was more rounded now. I no longer wanted the quick satisfaction of sex but the full-bodied joy of connection.
I fell into her eyes.
Instantly, the joy of the rain disappeared and desire ignited on her face.
She looked at my lips.
She stopped breathing.
&nbs
p; I couldn’t stop myself.
My hand crept up her back, tracing the beads of her spine that were more pronounced than before. Silently, I cupped her nape. “Do you remember my challenge?”
“Yes.”
“And?”
“And?”
“What do I have to do to make it come true?”
Her cheeks pinpricked with heat. “To make me fall in love with you?”
I nodded. My throat dry like ash. My heart imitating the booming thunder.
She’d kissed me the first time. She’d taken me by surprise.
This time.
I kissed her.
My head dipped down; hers tipped up.
My lips parted; hers fluttered open.
My nose brushed hers; she sighed softly.
My arm summoned; she came closer.
And our lips...they met.
She whimpered.
She undid me, claimed me, owned my very soul with that whimper.
My tongue licked her; she licked back.
My head tilted; she mimicked.
Our lips turned from touching to embracing. Our tongues danced, heat bloomed, and the kiss turned into a meal of desire.
“God, I want you.”
She moaned. “You have me.”
“No, I don’t.”
“Yes. Yes, you do. Believe me. You do.” Her breathless voice wrapped around my cock, pounding my need into something I could no longer fight.
Rain mixed with our kiss, diluting her flavour. “It's raining.”
She nodded.
“Is the sky weeping or happy for us?” My lips trailed from her mouth to her ear. “Are the clouds sanctioning this or forbidding it?”
Her fingers curled on my t-shirt (the very same one she’d washed with sand and kept as sanitary as possible), pulling me tighter toward her. She whimpered again, and this time, she stole one, twenty, a million fragments of my heart, placing them in her bikini top and stealing them forever. “It’s raining because the sky wants us to survive.”
“And what of my challenge?”
“What of it?”
I bit her throat. “You know what I want.”
Her heart drummed against mine, our bodies as close as we could get. “What if I said there is no challenge. That whatever you’re doing...it’s working.”
Whatever I was doing? I wasn’t doing enough. I’d reached my limit mobility-wise, and spent my days hobbling or resting. I was of no use to her.
To say there was no challenge; that she was falling for me just as surely as I was falling for her.
Christ.
I kissed her again.
Hard.
Fast.
Brutal.
She matched me lick for lick, turning a simple kiss into a complex sin.
Breaking apart, she breathed, “I’m glad it’s you on this island. I’m glad it’s you beside me.”
I had no defences left. All I could do was cling to a raft of wishes and potential possibilities. Potential possibilities of actually winning her, of seducing her, of calling her mine.
“Eww, what are you guys doing?” Conner’s hair was plastered to his head.
We pulled apart.
“Nothing, silly.” Estelle recovered first. With a quick glance, she jogged down the beach and took Pippa’s hand. They danced around the pot, filling quickly with water. Pippa’s back had scabbed and scarred, slowly erasing the method of how we’d arrived.
“Come on.” Grabbing the discarded coconut shells, I gave one to Conner and hopped down the beach to my stranded family.
Scooping the half-shell into the pot, I filled it to the brim with drinkable liquid. Holding it aloft, loving the way the heavens drowned us, I said, “To us and surviving.”
Everyone followed suit, filling up their fancy goblets and toasting.
“To rain and drinking.”
We drank. Fast. And repetitively.
We drank as quickly as the rain refilled.
We drank until our stomachs bloated.
We drank until we replaced every hydration.
And still it rained.
It poured and stormed; lightning flashed and thunder boomed until midnight turned to midday, and our island glittered with droplets in the new sunshine.
.............................
“What are you doing?”
Estelle hid something behind her back, guilt washing over her face.
Three days had passed since the storm and we’d finally dried our clothing, relined our beds with fresh leaves, and grown accustomed to having a reservoir of water where we could drink when we wanted without waiting for the trees to provide.
Our supply wouldn’t last forever, but for now...we were reckless with our thirst and drank often.
“Nothing.”
I hauled myself to my feet. I’d spent the morning plaiting flax into rope. I had a plan to put a roof over our head and four walls around our bodies, but in order to do that, I needed something to build with. I didn’t have screws or nails (the ones from the chopper wouldn’t work), so rope would have to do.
Once I knew how to create using island fare, a raft was on my agenda.
“It is something. Show me.” I hopped toward her.
“Don’t. Forget it. It was a stupid idea.”
“No, show me.” I moved as quick as I could, hoping she wouldn’t dart away. Holding my hand out, I glared until she pulled whatever she was hiding and placed it into my palm.
My heart wrenched to a stop. “Your phone.”
She nodded.
“Did you manage to call someone? Is that what you’re doing?”
Her eyes widened, filling with apology. “No. I’ve tried every night and nothing.”
“Then why torture yourself?” I ached to comfort her. I would never say it aloud, but here, on this island, even with the trials of surviving and the fear of what would happen, I was happier than I’d been in a long time. The thought of Estelle pining for a life where I wouldn’t be welcome hurt me a lot more than I could admit.
Since our kiss in the rain, we’d kept our distance. Partly for the children’s sake, but mostly because, if I kissed her again, I wouldn’t be able to stop.
And Estelle wasn’t ready for more.
She wanted me; I knew that. But she was hesitant about how far to go. I hadn’t figured out why yet, but I respected her desire for slowness.
“That isn’t what I was doing.” She flinched as if telling me her secret physically pained her.
“I don’t understand.”
She dropped her head. “Go to the gallery. You’ll see.”
Propping myself up with my crutch, I navigated the menu and pulled up the pictures. My mouth fell open as the first image exploded in vibrant pigment. “Why did you do this?”
I’d expected images of her past life, perhaps photos of a past boyfriend (who I would like to murder) or friends who thought she was dead. Not this. Not...me.
“Why?” Her eyebrows rose. “Why not? Isn’t that what humans do? We store memories to look back on later. Happy, sad, it doesn’t matter. We gather them for future use.”
“That’s what you’re doing?”
She shrugged. “I don’t know what I’m doing. I don’t know if we’ll ever get off this island, and I don’t know how much longer my phone will last, but I wanted to honour whatever we lived through with the same cataloguing as I would any other adventure.”
“By taking pictures of us?” My hands shook as I scrolled. She’d taken photos stealthily: me plaiting rope. Conner and Pippa crouched on their haunches, digging for clams. A selfie of her with the helicopter crash in the background.
I paused on the one of me sleeping in the dark. My beard had grown in, and I looked in pain even as I slept. “When did you take this?”
“The night before the rain came.”
I switched to the selfie of her standing alone on the beach—the moon etching her in silver and the shapes of us sleeping in the background. It was a h
aunting image. It sent shivers down my back.
“Wow.”
She tried to take it back. “Anyway, it was a bad idea. I didn’t mean to upset you.”
“Upset me? Why would I be upset?”
“Because I took pictures of you without your consent.”
I chuckled. “Estelle, knowing I mean enough to you that you want to photograph me for future memories is the nicest thing I’ve ever heard.”
She blushed. “So...you’re not mad?”
“Why the hell would I be mad?”
Her lips twitched. “I just said why.”
My insides warmed as fresh desire thickened my blood. My gaze locked on her mouth. “Christ, I want to kiss you again.”
Her throat worked as she swallowed. “You can’t. The children are right there. I don’t want to have to explain—”
“They’re not newborns, Stel. They get what kissing is.”
“Yes, well. I just...I want them to be happy. It’s too soon after their parents’ death. Change isn’t good for them.” She trailed off, tucking sun-bleached blonde behind her ear. “Just...give it time. Okay?”
My heart hurt but I grinned. She didn’t notice I’d used her nickname. And I didn’t let her see how honoured I was to use it. I was allowed. Even though I’d done nothing to deserve it. “That I can give you. What other commodity do we have but time?”
She laughed, but it was forced. “Thank you.”
“Don’t mention it.”
Looking away, I flicked the phone from gallery to camera and tapped the video recorder. “Now, how about instead of taking sneaky pictures, we do this the right way?” Holding the lens up, I captured her beauty. Freckles had appeared on her nose and the salt and wind had banished any hint that she’d been a city girl, replacing her polished smoothness with survivalist edges.
She laughed, covering her face. “What are you doing? Get that thing away.”
“No chance.” Hopping backward, I called, “Conner, Pippi. Home movie time.” Scanning the phone their way, I captured their white smiles, skinny bodies, and feet splashing in the tide.
“Movie? Can I be the Incredible Hulk?” Conner tried to commandeer the phone.
“I want to be a princess.” Pippa twirled.
Looking at Estelle, I said quietly, “Starting today, let’s document every little thing that matters. Be it rain to drink or a fish to eat...or a kiss to pleasure. Let’s be grateful for what we have.”