The Rattled Bones(63)

Sam sits back, a smile rolling over his features. “I like that.”

“She believes that stories connect us, make us appreciate all the shared parts of being human.”

“I feel the same way about the earth. That it keeps our stories.”

“Exactly. And what if . . . what if the girl has a story that can’t be told through the archives or your dig site?” How far would she go to crawl under my skin, make me know her truth? “What if the girl from the island has a story she’s trying to tell me?” The girl from the sea, the girl with her song. Is she trying to tell me not to make a mistake?

DONT GO!

Or is she trying to tell me about a wrong that was done to her?

IM HERE

“I’d like to know her story,” he says.

“Me too.”

“Can you tell me what you know?”

I stretch my gaze to the sea, to the blue horizon with its straight line and perfect predictability. And I let go.

I tell Sam about her voice singing from the shore, singing from the deep. I tell him about the scratches in my sill, the flower she left on my boat. I tell him about the baby’s wail, the fingers at my window, the girl in my bed with her matted hair, the cut on her lip, the raw of her fingertips. I tell him everything because we’re supposed to share our stories. Some so they bring joy. Some so we don’t repeat our mistakes.

I slog up the stairs when I get home, my muscles tired, even if my head feels lighter for sharing with Sam. I run my fingers through the divots of scratched wood at my sill.

DONT GO!

“I have to,” I tell her. “I have to go.” I need to see the bigger world.

Then I trace IM HERE and press my palm over the two words, honoring them.

“I know,” I tell her. I know.





CHAPTER EIGHTEEN


The next morning, I drop anchor off Malaga Island. I turn off the VHF, can’t hear Reed’s All in? I don’t know how I’d answer his call now, if he’d even make one at all. I haven’t answered Reed’s text, his apologies.

“You’re sure you don’t need to pull traps today?” Sam asks.

“I’m sure. I’d rather be out here, if that’s okay. My muscles could use a rest after the last few days.”

Sam nods like all of this—everything I’ve been through lately—is perfectly acceptable and sane.

He rows to shore and we unload, me with a backpack heavy with food and water, Sam with his shoulder bag stuffed with tools. We hike to the dig site, set down our belongings.

The sun is already warm above us, and the gulls are pecking at the water, darting with the retracting high tide. I tuck my fingers into my lower back and arch to stretch. My muscles are still calming after being dragged down through the ocean, then hauling such a strong catch yesterday. My eyes scan the forest edge, the rock face of the island. There’s no movement in the trees, no wind to bend them with its sway. I catalog all the things I know: the sea, the sky, the granite ledge beneath my feet.

And the things I don’t know: how the girl could be here still, how I can see her, hear her. “Could I ask you to walk up through the trees with me without sounding too weird?”

“Only if you tell me what you’re looking for.”

“That first day, I heard an infant crying. I saw the girl run into the forest. I think . . .” What do I think? That she could be camping here? Living here? “I think maybe she’s there somehow.” Somehow.

“Let’s go.”

It’s an easy invitation despite how strange this information must sound to him.

We walk to the woods, and I search the tree line, the low spruce branches that reach out, almost naked because they can’t get enough sun at their bottoms. I look for anything. Hanging wash. Caught fish. Blankets warming. Anything to tell me that my girl lives here, that she is human and not a ghost.

We hike the length of the forest but find nothing. Not a hint of campfire, no area of needles disturbed. No girl. No baby. When we round high on the cliffside of the island, we leave the dense forest at our backs. Sam points to a patch of ground. “That’s where the university wants to set up the next dig.”

“Why there?”

“We know from photos that a boatbuilder’s home sat on the ridge there.” He scrambles down to this future dig site, and I follow.

I can see Fairtide from here, my closed window, the trellis just below it. The skin along my spine pops with gooseflesh as if I’ve been here before. I feel the weight of memory like years sitting in my bones. Me, staring at Fairtide. Staring at the house’s windows as they flickered with candlelight. An instant stretches into years. And I am here, watching Fairtide’s green lawn, its dock. Me never taking my eyes from the house, the home, its people. It is a tsunami of a déjà vu.

And then it’s gone.

And I know the memory isn’t mine.

My legs feel shaky, unsure of their strength. My head spins, knowing this girl has watched my home for decades. She watched my mother here, maybe even my gram, the men and women of my family who came before. My flesh bumps cold, knowing that we are connected, me and this girl. But how?

Sam turns to walk to his dig site. I’m not ready to leave this spot. Not yet. “You go ahead. I’ll catch up.”

Sam leaves me where a craftsman made his home. The air feels thick in this place, pressing against me on all sides as if holding me upright. There’s an odd smoke that fills my lungs. I cough out the burn that sits in my throat, and the air around me smells of death holding its breath.