Between the Spark and the Burn (9 page)

February

William was coming apart at the seams. Burning up from the inside.

His family was richer than God now. They owned everything. Factories. Ships. Islands. All that burning. I told him there would be a price. There's always a price.

Chase Glenship swaggered back home from a couple of months abroad. We left the city to come and meet him. He was filled to bursting with stories and worldly wisdom so fresh and new it was practically still in the box.

That night, after everyone was asleep, even the servants, he dragged us all up to the attic and showed us the pipes and things he'd bought off a sailor in Greece. He was a true Byron.

I loved the Glenship attic, the angles and cobwebs. I wanted to have an attic just like it someday. Someday I would leave New York City and move to Echo for good. Lucas had promised, earnest, solemn, to build me a house on the sea, like the Glenship, and let me have it exactly the way I wanted. He was already building it, in fact. And was paying the workers double to hurry, in case I changed my mind.

Will's sister, Rose, sat on a sofa in the corner. She was flushed and excited, and Lucas sat next to her, stoic and tolerant, as usual.

I had on my new yellow dress. It was slinky and daring and heavy with beaded fringe. Will said it made my gams look too skinny. He would say that.

Chase stood in the center of the attic floor in his white suit and dared me to do it. To smoke the Oriental poppy. So I did.

Afterward we went for a swim in the Glenship's underground pool, naked as the day we were born. When I started stripping down to my skivvies, Lucas took Rose and left.

The world was a sweet, dreamy blue mist. I slipped out of the water and put on a pair of Chase's trousers and belted them tight to my waist. I buttoned one of his starched shirts too, right over my breasts, nothing underneath. I started walking into town. The boys followed.

We ended up at the church. The doors were locked even though church doors were always open back then. But Chase had a key. Of course he had a key.

It was a small, white building with Hawthorne gables. We went in. I stretched out across a wooden pew, and wiggled my toes. I was barefoot. Where were my shoes? Had I walked into town without shoes? Or had I left them underneath a pew somewhere?

Then Will was kissing me, kissing my neck, warming me up, right there with God watching. Burn and opium. Opium and burn. Maybe Chase kissed me too. Maybe they were both kissing me when the priest found us.

He leaned over me and said I was a drugged Jezebel blaspheming God in his home. He said I was Eve with the apple, and the snake too.

He said nothing to the boys. Even Chase, who he knew from the occasional repentant Sunday. I think that's what angered Will the most. He pushed the priest away from me. Hard.

That night, long after we'd crawled into our beds to dream the dreams of the hell-bent young, the priest set the church on fire, with himself inside.

And that's when I knew how bad it was.

≈≈≈

The bedroom I picked on the second tower floor of Captain Nemo had a treasure map theme. A large compass had been painted on one of the yellow walls, pointing north, followed by a trail of black slashes that went all around the big room and its big bay window, leading to a big black
X
. I wondered if Canto was behind the theme, and thinking so made me like her even more.

The bed was soft and there was sand in the corners and dust on the warped wood dresser and the bay window had a comfy window seat where someone could sit and read and look out to sea. So I sat down right there, read the next entry in Freddie's diary, and then closed the book, slam.

Citzen Kane's library had a rare, seven-volume horror collection—I read the series straight through one lonely winter. In one story, the main character found a diary left by a dead cousin. It gave clues and spilled secrets and solved mysteries. But. But it also stirred up trouble and opened old wounds and made the main character think she didn't really ever know a person, not a bit, not at all.

Part of me wished I would have remembered this story, about the diary, before I started reading Freddie's.

I thought about the burn, and the glow, and Will Redding going mad with it, and River going mad with it, and Freddie wrapped up in it, just like I was.

I got up and went to see what rooms the boys chose. Neely took the other bedroom on the second floor—it had striped wallpaper coming loose in spots, and two black trunks filled with old sea maps and charts.

Finch was in a bird-themed room on the top floor. Bird knickknacks and bird wallpaper and feeders were hanging outside the windows.

I peeked into Canto's room while I was up there, since the door was open. It was cluttered with clothes and books and a sewing machine. Half-finished skirts and dresses were thrown over worn chairs near the windows. Bowls filled with pretty beachcombing finds like seashells and polished glass sat on every free windowsill and dresser. I felt someone behind me, and turned around. Finch was standing there, taking a peek into Canto's room too. He must have liked what he saw, since his damn dimple showed itself again.

We gathered in the living room by the fire, Canto and Finch and me on the floor, Neely in a ragged, rusty-orange loveseat, one elbow crooked around one knee, leaning back. His skin looked smooth and soft like someone who got way more sleep than he did, and drank way less coffee.

I poured myself a cup of caramel milk. My mug was thick, white on the inside, brown on the outside, and missing its handle. The drink was earthy and sweet. I tasted salt on the back of my tongue. I wasn't sure if Canto had added salt to the caramel or if it was just in the air. Everything on this island was salty, much more so than Echo—after all, the ocean sloshed against the stilts underneath the floorboards I sat on. If a person swiped his finger down the mantel and licked it, I'd bet the deed on Citizen Kane that the dust would taste like sea salt.

“So why are you here?” Canto asked, blunt, no hesitation. “No one comes to Carollie in the winter.”

“We're here to find the sea god,” I said, betraying my hard-earned Agatha Christie wisdom. But Canto seemed like the kind of girl who wanted the truth straight up and in her face anyway. “We heard a rumor that a North Carolina island was worshiping a sea god, and we came to see what was what. He . . . we think this sea god could be a friend of ours.”

Neely leaned in closer to watch her face, and then, a second later, Finch did the same.

Canto's dark eyebrows bunched up, and she smiled a puzzled half smile, like she thought we were joking. “A
sea god
? Who told you this?”

“A late-night radio program called
Stranger Than Fiction,
” Neely answered with a confident, cocky grin, like he'd just said
“The New York Times.”

Canto took a sip of the caramel, swallowed. “
Stranger Than Fiction
? That sounds reliable. What time is this show on? Wait, let me guess . . . three in the morning?”

Neely laughed. “Don't knock it till you've tried it.”

Finch made a small sound, kind of a
hmmm.
He was sitting to Canto's right, watching everything she did from the corners of his eyes.

“Speak up, Finch,” Canto said, tilting her face to look at him.

“He said,” I interrupted, when Finch didn't answer, “that the radio show has been right before.”

Finch nodded, once, slowly, the tips of his red hair brushing his chin.

“There was another North Carolina story too,” I added, when Finch still didn't talk. “A haunted fisherman's hut. Teenagers go in and never come out again.”

Canto's eyes snapped on mine. “That story is bullshit.”

I perked up. “What story?”

“Oh, that the Lillian Hut is haunted. A long time ago a fisherman named Clayton Lillian strangled his sister Winks Lillian with a piece of fishing line in a shack by the sea. And then he disappeared. People won't go near it now. But the hut is right down this beach a ways and I've walked by it a thousand times and nothing has ever happened to me. It's just an abandoned shack.”

I met Neely's gaze.

I knew where we were going tomorrow.

I opened my mouth to ask a few follow-up questions, but before I could frame a sentence, Canto pushed her thick curls back from her face, stuck a short finger out, and pointed to Finch. “You. Tell me your story. I don't think you belong to these other two.” She turned to point at Neely and me. “At least, you haven't for long.”

Neely laughed and started rubbing his right forearm with his left hand in an absent way. “You'll want to keep an eye on this one,” he said, speaking to me but looking at Canto. “She's doesn't miss a thing.”

“Yeah, I noticed.” There was a bit of gloom in my voice. And I guess if I thought about it long enough, I might have figured where it came from and why it was there.

So I didn't think about it.

“I have no story,” Finch said. His voice was low, with a throaty, hoarse quality that reminded me of scratchy old records playing in the Citizen's attic. “When I was eight years old my mother went deep into the forest to gather wintergreen berries and I never saw her again. Who knows who my father was. I was raised by my grandmother Owl Grieve. Sometimes I went to Inn's End for school, but mostly not. My grandmother died and then it was just me. Chopping wood and walking through snow and making rabbit stew. And the sun rising and setting and the seasons passing. And that's it.” He paused. “There's nothing else to say.”

I was impressed. Canto ordered Finch to open up, and he did.

“You must have been lonely,” I said, mostly to myself.

In twenty-four hours I'd met a boy raised by his grandmother and a girl left alone in a big house. Maybe my life hadn't been as uniquely sad as I'd previously thought.

I guess this is the benefit of travel.

Finch didn't answer me. He was still looking at Canto. “One night I was watching the stars and thinking everything would always be as it always was. Then I was tied up and dragged into the church to be hanged or burned or bled. I was rescued in the nick of time and then taken to the sea. Who knows what will happen next, with the way things are going.”

There was a long silence. I leaned back into the sofa behind me and my shoulder brushed by Neely's knee. He didn't move for a second . . . and then I felt his fingers reach through my long hair and stroke my neck. Just the once.

I looked at Canto. “The radio show said Inn's End had a devil-boy stealing girls' dreams. But the real boy had left by the time we got there. The town had decided Finch would be a good enough substitute. They were going to kill him.”

“Oh,” was all Canto said. No questions about the devil-boy or about a town that executed its own vengeance. But her expression wasn't quite as nonchalant as her mouth. Her black eyes looked thoughtful and her eyebrows bunched up again. She had inched closer and closer to Finch while he talked, until the two of them were sharing the same blanket by the fire, her shoulder touching his.

There was something about Finch. There was something strong and welcoming and . . .
expectant
about him, like a cool autumn breeze blowing across your neck on a hot September day. I was already growing attached to the caged, wild look that slid into his eyes whenever he thought no one was looking—it was charming and cryptic and exactly what I'd expect to find in the eyes of a boy who grew up alone in a forest.

“So what do you think of the world outside Inn's End, Finch?” Neely asked, when he noticed me staring at my Inn's End souvenir. “Does it suit you?”

“It does,” Finch answered. “It's less quiet. And a lot more interesting. I think this place is going to be good for me.” And he was looking at Canto when he said it.

Canto yawned. She put her hand to her mouth, and the yawn turned into a smile.

“I get up early,” she said. “Have to get the fish when it comes in. I'm going to hit the hay. We'll talk more tomorrow night.” Here she looked at Neely. “I want to hear more about this friend who may or may not be a sea god.”

She waved a good-night to us, walked to the tower stairs, turned, and came back. She slid her fingers into Finch's red hair, and messed it up. “Devil-boy. Right. I think you're all a bunch of liars, and you're the worst of the bunch. Still, thanks for telling us your story.”

Finch watched her climb the stairs. I couldn't see his face, but I figured his dimple had popped out again.

The three of us went to bed too, not long after.

I drifted off to sleep in my little treasure map room, listening to the waves lap and feeling a bit of my homesickness drain away. I thought about my brother, and Sunshine. I wondered where they were, if they had made it home yet, if they were scared, if they were hating me for not going with, if it had been the right thing to do, in the end. I was worried about Jack. And I missed Luke. It had only been a day, but knowing he wasn't nearby, that I couldn't walk down the hall or out to the shed and talk to him anytime I wanted . . . it disturbed me in some deep way.

And then my thoughts went to Inn's End as I started sinking into sleep. Inn's End and Finch. I seemed drawn to on-their-own types. Jack, and Finch, and now maybe Canto too. Them and me. Metal and magnet. I guess it was my lot in life, like red-haired, green-gabled Anne, with the twins . . .

≈≈≈

“Violet.”

I opened my eyes and turned over. “Hey, Neely,” I said at the dark shape standing by the bed. “Is it time for
Stranger Than Fiction
?”

He nodded, and his blond hair flopped around, silver-blue in the moonlight. “But you need to see this first. Hurry,” he added, grabbing my hand after I crawled out of bed.