Departure(32)

A few hours later the five of us stand at the edge of a forest, eyeing an old stone farmhouse in the middle of a rolling green field. It looks deserted. There are no cars, no road or drive of any kind, for that matter, just three small stone buildings.

Nick instructs us to stay under the cover of the trees as he and Grayson set out to search the house. I want to ask whether Grayson Shaw, who’s apparently come away from the crash site with a handgun, is the ideal partner with whom to storm our only potential place of refuge, but they’re halfway across the field before I can object.

I wait anxiously as they slip through the wooden door, guns drawn, crouched like the Metropolitan Police raiding a terror suspect’s apartment block.

Beside me Sabrina and Yul stand in tense, awkward silence.

No one says a word about what I heard back at the plane. The two of them know what’s going on here. They’re part of it—they’ve known since the beginning. I wonder if they’re dangerous. What a fix to be in: Grayson on one side, Sabrina and Yul on the other, and some mysterious army hunting us.

Nick and Grayson trudge back through the green field, handguns stowed.

“It’s empty,” Nick calls. “Come on, quick.” The second the wood door closes behind us, he says, “Stay inside and away from the windows.”

He lays the last bits of food on a simple wooden table. “We split it five ways.”

Nick doesn’t eat his share, though. He just staggers away, exhaustion finally overtaking him. I follow him into the bedroom, where he climbs into the narrow bed and lies facedown, not bothering to remove any of his soiled clothes.

I close the door, walk around the bed, and squat down, facing him.

“We’re in the future, aren’t we?”

“Mmm-hmm,” he murmurs, eyes closed.

“What year?”

“Don’t know.”

“What was in the glass structure?”

“Stonehenge.”

So we are in England. “Stonehenge?” I whisper, half to myself.

Nick’s drifting off. I touch his shoulder. “Sabrina and Yul—I think they may be involved in whatever happened to the plane.”

“Yeah. Gotta rest, Harper. Rough night. Don’t let them leave. Get me up at sunset.”

And he’s gone, out cold.

I settle onto the floor, looking at him, thinking. Then I rise, roll him onto his back on the bed, and take his shoes off. His socks are soaked through. I peel them off, revealing his waterlogged, swollen, blistered feet. The rest of him hasn’t fared much better: bruises cover his arms, chest, and ribs, as if he rolled down a mountain. What happened to him?

We need real help. Rescue. But for now, I’ll do what I can for him.





19





I pulled the curtains closed right after I got Nick settled, and now through the thin white fabric I watch the sun setting over the green fields, the serenity a sharp contrast to the turmoil inside me.

Nick hasn’t moved a muscle for hours. The blankets covering him are yellowed with age—who knows how old they are—and his wet clothes hang over the edge of the white tub in the bathroom. I sit in the corner, on a wooden rocking chair that creaks loudly if I make the slightest movement. It’s been a kind of concentration test—move and the alarm goes off, and Nick wakes up. I’ve passed so far.

These silent hours in the small farmhouse bedroom have given me time to think, to wrap my head around everything that’s happened since Flight 305 crashed in the English countryside. Since then it’s been nonstop, with peoples’ lives—including my own, or at the very least a limb—on the line. Now, as Nick sleeps, I can’t stop thinking about the passengers who perished in the crash, as well the people who died in the days after, seemingly of old age, and those who fled the crash site earlier today, who I imagine aren’t as warm and comfortable as I am right now. I wonder what happened to Nate, the kid from Brooklyn who will never see his mother again; about Jillian, the flight attendant who became so much more in the chaotic aftermath of the crash; about the girl in the Disney World shirt. I wonder where they are right now, if they’re safe and happy.

I am. Despite my fears about what might come next, I’m sublimely happy. I’m happy that Sabrina didn’t have to take part of my leg off to beat the infection. I’m happy that I can walk on my own two legs. And more: I’m happy that I survived the crash, and that Nick did too, and that he’s here, alive and relatively healthy. I feel . . . extraordinarily lucky just to be alive and well. I’ve taken that for granted, just being alive and healthy. It wasn’t until I was at risk of losing my life or my leg that I fully appreciated how lucky I’ve been. Why is it that we only appreciate things we’re at risk of losing?

Here and now, I feel a strange mix of near euphoria and profound guilt—for surviving, for not having done more for the other passengers. At any turn, things could have gone differently, and they did for a whole lot of folks. My actions determined the fate of some, and for the past few hours I’ve replayed every event and decision, until I can’t take it anymore. I’m caught in a circular mental loop with no answer, no resolution.

I have to get out of here, do something.

Maybe it’s the turbulence in my mind, but I’m not that hungry. Or maybe those camouflaged figures fed me somehow, or gave me an appetite suppressant. Another mystery.