What we did see, however, was what the storm had thrown onto the rocks.
“More planks.” I pointed to a tangle of broken white boards, like the one Robbert had buried only longer. Since I had told the others, and since we had all talked about the Mary being sunk on purpose, I decided I could say “more” instead of simply “planks”—and Irene didn’t correct me.
“Are they from the Mary?” asked Eleanor.
“Are they from the supply boat?” asked Caroline.
Irene shook her head. “The supply boat is mostly steel.”
“How does steel float?” Isobel said, but then nodded, blinking. “Displacement. Could anything float with displacement? Could we?”
“If we were shaped like boats,” said Eleanor.
“Just being in water is dangerous,” said Caroline. “Not only sinking.”
“Is anyone shaped like a boat?” Isobel asked Irene.
“I’m afraid not.” Irene turned back to the debris, and we all looked with her.
“We should tell May,” I said. “If they’re from her boat.”
“Wouldn’t anything from the Mary have drifted away by now?” asked Caroline. “It’s been weeks.”
“Work out the current,” said Irene.
“It depends on the storm,” I said, but then I nodded to Caroline. “Probably not.”
“Then whose boat could it be?” asked Eleanor. No one had an answer.
“Do you see anything else?” Irene asked.
We looked from where we were, because no one felt confident climbing out on the rocks, especially because the rocks were full of little pools. If we had seen something special Irene could have collected it, but we didn’t: only knots of nylon rope, chunks of packing foam, and strips of plastic that could have once been anything.
We returned down the beach, each of us trying to walk in our original footsteps. This was one of Robbert’s tests for balance, and even after we got it right we all kept doing it. We passed the beach path and continued in the other direction with Robbert’s and Irene’s footsteps ahead of us.
We just found more junk. Most was what Irene called natural junk, like coconuts or driftwood or jellyfish or shells or kelp. Irene said this was how palm trees got from one island to another. With jellyfish it was different, because they were all dead. Eleanor once compared the dead jellyfish to things on land that couldn’t live in the water, wondering if there were jellyfish swimming past dead sunken birds and people, wondering where they were from. It had made Robbert laugh. He patted Eleanor’s head and made an entry in his notebook.
This junk was the same: coconuts and wood and kelp and jellyfish, and also regular fish as well, caught in a wave and flung up to die. Mixed in were more of what we’d seen on the rocks, except not planks, just plastic, packing foam, bottles, nylon rope.
It was disappointing, but then we came to where the back and forth tracks from Robbert and Irene stopped at the same place, where there had also been some digging.
They had reached this spot, dug something up, and then come home.
We all turned to Irene. If Irene really hadn’t wanted us to know about what they’d found, she would have stopped the walk halfway.
“What did you find?” asked Caroline.
“Did you bring it back?” Eleanor tugged Irene’s hand. “What was it?”
“Should we guess?” asked Isobel.
“Was it something useful?” asked Eleanor.
“Was it another plank with holes?” I asked.
But Irene wasn’t listening. She stared over the water. She went up on her toes and shaded her eyes with both hands.
“Irene?” I asked.
“What do you see?” Irene asked. She extended her arm. “What do you see there.”
We all looked. A gleaming fleck against the darker waves, spray breaking across it like a rock, except the fleck heaved up and down, in motion.
After all this time, it was a boat.
10.
We had never actually seen the supply boat, so as much as Irene hurried us back, we kept craning our heads to catch another glimpse. We talked aloud to each other, describing the color, the size, and making guesses about displacement, wind shear, speed. At the courtyard Irene called for Robbert, then waved us impatiently to the kitchen. Robbert came out, and we all shouted that the supply boat had finally come. Irene wheeled and told us to get going. Robbert ran back into the classroom.
Since we’d seen the boat from a distance, we hoped to see it up close, too, and meet the men who sailed it, because finally it had come when we were awake and ready. Irene just shook her head.
“No. Everyone on their cots.”
“But, Irene—”
“No.”
“But, Irene—”
“No! Keep your smocks on—there isn’t time.”
We were very disappointed. Robbert called from the yard. “I’m going ahead!”
“Be right there!” Irene called back. Robbert’s footfalls went thudding off. Irene knelt next to Isobel.
“We could help,” Isobel said.
“I know you could,” said Irene. “That isn’t why you have to stay.”
“Why, then?” asked Eleanor.
“Sleep tight, Isobel.” Irene touched the spot behind Isobel’s ear and shifted to Eleanor. “It’s because we don’t know everything that’s happened. Next time, if things are fine, I promise you’ll see more.”
“Everything that’s happened where?” asked Eleanor. “Do you mean with May?”
“Sleep tight, Eleanor.” Eleanor fell asleep, and Irene swiveled to Caroline. Caroline turned from Irene’s hand.
“Don’t.”
“Don’t what?” asked Irene.
“Don’t go,” said Caroline.
“Why not?” Irene’s hand curved gently around Caroline’s neck. “What’s wrong?”
“I don’t know. I’m trying to know, but I can’t.”
Irene frowned. “What makes you say that? Was it a dream?”
Caroline nodded. Irene glanced at the door, then back to Caroline. “Is it the boat?”
“I don’t know.”
“Is it the men?”
“I don’t know. I’m sorry.”
“It’s not your fault, Caroline. You’re doing very well. We’ll talk it through when I get back.” Irene’s finger found her spot.
“Don’t,” whispered Caroline.
“We’ll talk later, I promise.”
Irene pressed the button and Caroline settled, fluttering eyes gone still. Irene reached for me.
“What did she know?” I asked.
“It was just a dream, Veronika.”
“Sometimes her dreams come true.”
Irene looked at me. “Why do you say that?”
“Caroline had a dream about hiding.”
Irene sighed and shook her head, as if she’d been thinking I’d say something else. “I know she did. But no one has to hide.”
“May is hiding.”
“But she doesn’t have to. That’s different—and it’s not what Caroline dreamed. Sleep tight. I’ll be back before you know it.”
I felt her hand behind my ear.
“I love you, Irene.”
Her finger found the spot but didn’t press. Irene bit her lip.
“Why did you say that?”
“Because I do.”
“But why? What does that mean? Veronika—why do you say love?
“Because.” I felt like I was on the dock, so alone. I felt like I was on my face in the sand, struggling. “Isn’t that the right word?”
“Word for what, honey? Why do you say it now?”
I shook my head. I didn’t know. Irene smiled and sighed at the same time.
“I love you, too, Veronika. Don’t you forget it.”
I felt her lips on my forehead, soft and warm, and then the click.
• • •
There are different ways to understand time, different units to count. We knew minutes and hours
and seconds without even thinking—as just part of waking up—but as we learned more about the world, our vocabulary for time expanded, too. It could be small things like meals—how long one took to make or eat—or how often the water filter had to be refilled, or how often Irene or Robbert went to the chemical toilet. It could be larger forces that touched the entire island, like tides or moons or seasons or birds laying eggs or grass flowering. We named these as increments, regular and repeated, each one a new-sized gear whose interlocking teeth made up the schedule of our world.
More complicated were the increments that floated alone: flights of birds, or the time it took us to reach the beach compared to Robbert, or to Irene, or how many whacks with the machete it took to open a coconut, depending on the person and also the coconut. As we grew capable of noticing all these measurements we couldn’t not notice them, and so every different increment joined with hundreds, and then thousands, of others. And because we didn’t forget things, our understanding kept everything ready to connect.
May, of course, presented entirely new measurements, and while we had figured out some of them—how wide she stepped, how long she took to eat—a lot still remained uncertain because of how sick she’d been when she arrived. We knew May was faster than us, but not how much, mainly because her feet had been hurt. Was she faster than Robbert or Irene? We didn’t know, but we were watching.
So when I woke to find May kneeling next to me, out of breath, her body moist with sweat, I didn’t know how long it had taken her to reach the kitchen from her hiding place on the cliffs. I knew that it had been twenty minutes since Irene had left us, and that it took Robbert half an hour to walk down from the cliffs. It seemed probable that May had come down in a hurry at almost the same time the five of us had seen the boat.
“Get up!” she hissed. “Get up! We have to go!”
“What’s wrong?”
May pulled with both hands to heave me up, though I was too heavy. I caught myself before I fell, and moved my legs off one at a time so I could stand.
“Where are Irene and Robbert?” she asked.
“They went to meet the supply boat,” I said. “But now you’re here, maybe we can all get a peek.”
“Bloody hell! They could be here any minute!” May flung herself toward Isobel’s cot and began groping behind her ear.
“May, it’s all right—Robbert and Irene won’t make you do anything you don’t want.”
“It’s not Irene and Robbert!”
“May, you have to be gentle—”
“Wake ’em up!” she cried. “Wake ’em up! We have to go!”
“May—”
“We don’t have time!”
She found Isobel’s spot, and Isobel blinked awake. May moved to Eleanor. “Get her up!” she called to me, meaning Isobel.
“What’s happening?” asked Isobel.
“I don’t know,” I said. “May says something is wrong. The supply boat—”
“That’s no supply boat!” snarled May as Eleanor stirred to wakefulness.
“But Irene saw it,” said Isobel. “Didn’t she recognize it?”
May shook her head. “Then she wasn’t paying attention!”
“Tell us why, May.” I reached for her arm, but she pushed me away and hurried to Caroline. “May, what did you see?”
When we had a lot of things to think at once, our eyes blinked. With May it seemed like too many words came into her mouth from different directions. Her jaw worked and the thoughts came out in bits.
“Everyone knows—Will told me. You can tell! They have a flag!” May shut her eyes and waved her hands. “They don’t even care—because they don’t care if you know—they’re coming anyway! And there’s nothing anyone can ever do!”
She thrust her fingers under Caroline’s head, searching for the spot.
“You have to be gentle!” cried Isobel.
May ignored her. She pressed the spot, and Caroline shifted on her cot. “We have to go! We have to hide!”
“But where are Irene and Robbert?” asked Eleanor.
“They must still be at the dock,” I said.
“Do they know about the flag?” said Eleanor.
“May said everyone knows,” said Isobel.
“We don’t,” said Eleanor. “May, who is in the boat? Who is coming?”
May groaned aloud, looking down at Caroline. “Why won’t she get up?”
Caroline’s eyes flickered.
“She’s had a dream,” said Eleanor.
“What?”
“When Caroline dreams, she wakes up slowly,” said Isobel.
“There isn’t time!” cried May. Her eyes had filled with tears.
A sound we’d never heard chopped through the air, echoing across the island. A flat, loud, rattling crack, like a chain yanked fast through an iron loop. It came from the dock.
“O no,” whispered May. “O no.”
I reached for Caroline’s arm, like Irene did. “Caroline, wake up!”
Caroline rolled her head toward me, still blinking.
“The notebook,” she said.
“May says we have to go.”
“Take Robbert’s notebook.”
We got Caroline to sit. Isobel stood at the door, holding the screen open and listening.
“What was that sound?” she asked.
Caroline’s head tilted to one side. One eye blinked faster than the other. “I remembered. They want us to take the notebook.”
“It isn’t here,” said Eleanor, looking around her.
“Then it’s in the classroom,” said Isobel.
“We have to go,” said May, tugging Caroline toward the door.
“It’s important,” insisted Caroline.
“I’ll get it.” I let Isobel take my place with Caroline and went out first.
“You can’t!” hissed May behind me.
“Go ahead,” I whispered back. “I’ll catch up!”
I glanced once at the dock path, then crossed the courtyard as fast as I could.
• • •
I hadn’t been inside the classroom since we’d crept in to look at May. The bedsheets were balled into a pile, as if Robbert meant to wash them but hadn’t made time. The rest of the classroom looked just as disorganized, with things in stacks and boxes pulled out and left open. The boxes were for supplies, so it seemed Robbert had opened them to find out what they needed from the supply boat. I realized the pallet cart hadn’t been under the classroom porch. Robbert must have taken it to the dock, so they could carry back everything the boat delivered.
I didn’t understand what made Caroline dream, but Irene and Robbert always considered it important. If she thought we needed Robbert’s notebook, it was because some inside part of her had been given a question—or realized the question should be asked—and this was the answer she had found.
Because of the boxes and the piles, I didn’t see the notebook right away—or, I didn’t not see it, because it took me longer than normal to see it wasn’t anywhere. I searched the desk and looked underneath piles, all the time knowing I had to move fast. The notebook usually lived on the desk or in Robbert’s satchel. I didn’t see his satchel anywhere in the classroom. Did he have it with him?
The back room was full of machines stacked in metal shelves, with whirring fans to keep them cool. I saw the window where I had peeked in. The notebook wasn’t there, either.
The kitchen had an upper floor where Irene slept, reached by a set of narrow stairs. Because the top of the classroom was filled with batteries connected to the roof panels, there wasn’t enough room for a proper bed—which was why Robbert slept downstairs. But there was an open ledge that Robbert used to store things, and when they put May in his bed he’d stacked those boxes and laid out a place to sleep. Instead of a staircase like Irene, he had a wooden ladder nailed to the wall. I had never climbed a ladder, but this was the last place the notebook could be, so I hurried to it and put my foot where I’d seen Robbert put his. The rungs were
gritty with sand.
I pulled myself up, doing my best to grip the wide rungs, nearer to the whirring fans and less able to hear anything else. When my head came over the edge, I didn’t see the notebook anywhere. But right in front of me, as if it had been hastily shoved there from the ladder, was a round shape, like a ball, covered with one of Robbert’s white coats.
I climbed another step, enough to reach for the coat sleeve. I pulled. The ball underneath turned as the coat came free. From the sand I knew this was what Robbert and Irene had found on the beach that morning, and taken away before any of us could see.
It was someone’s head.
I’d never seen a head quite like it, but I knew enough to recognize the shape, and the eyes and the mouth and what was left of the hair. The head stared right at me, even though something sharp had been shoved into both sockets and rattled around, like a knife getting the last bits from a can, leaving the socket edges broken and scratched. The mouth was dented with round welts, like from a hammer, and smeared with bright red paint, as if there were lips. There wasn’t a nose, but I don’t think it ever had one. The hair was mostly torn out. Only a few lank strands remained, revealing tiny holes where the rest had been woven through, now stubbled with uncoated wire. A tangle of cable trailed from of the neck, bedraggled with sand and kelp, like the tail of a jellyfish left by the tide.
There was more red paint on the forehead, symbols I didn’t know, the lines just wide enough to be made with a finger.
• • •
I could only hear the fans. I didn’t see the notebook. I had to go. There was nothing to do about the head except think, and I could think as I went. I wanted to know what her name had been, where she had lived, everything she’d known, but I knew I’d never get a single answer. Before this, the only thing we were certain never to know was our parents. Was that what death meant—no answers, a finally locked door? As my foot touched the floor I decided that was wrong, because death always left a why, and a how, and a what next. Questions weren’t the same as answers—they didn’t tell me this dead girl’s name—but for her sake I wasn’t going to let them go.