The Lifeboat Clique (19 page)

“You never know, Sienna,” I said. “And what if someone was out there and didn't know we were here? I'll be fine, don't worry.”

I went down the beach and gathered more driftwood for the fire, then stood out at the edge of the waves with the heat at my back, looking out at the sea. The water shimmered. A dolphin jumped in the distance. The wind moved long grasses on the dune and swept a fresh scent through the air. This island was absolutely beautiful, and had we been here by choice, it would have been even more so. But for now I just appreciated the quiet, the sound of the waves, and the warmth behind me to reassure me the fire was still going and we were still visible to anyone who happened to look.

I felt stronger now, somehow. As though with the island had come a new opportunity to test myself with the things I had learned. The others had started to look on me as their savior. I could hear it in their voices, and though I was not so sure myself, that tone with which they spoke to me gave me new determination to get us back home.

A voice in my ear.

“Denver.”

I turned around.

There was Hayley, barefoot in the sand, the firelight emphasizing that tentative way she had of approach.

“Hayley, what are you doing up?”

“I couldn't sleep, so I thought I'd come over and see what you're doing.”

“Oh, you know, the usual.”

She smiled. She seemed to be getting younger as the days passed. It was hard to imagine her at that Malibu party, dressed to the nines and perfectly groomed. I felt sorry for Hayley. She seemed so lost in this new world, and by all rights, she shouldn't be here. She should be in bed in some nice house, asleep under a quilt with flowers on it, and the problems in her head should have been mild and subject to evaporation.

“You are always watching out for us, aren't you?” she asked me.

“Sure I am.”

Her face took on a quizzical look. “Can I ask you something?”

“Sure.”

“Why are you trying to save us? I mean, after the way Sienna and I treated you. And Abigail hates you. Why do you even care if we live or die?”

I found my answer hard to put into words. Finally I
said, “Because, you see, life is important. It's this magical thing. My life, your life, Sienna's life, Abigail's life. I think I appreciate it now more than I ever did before. Think of all the things you have left to do, Hayley. Think about the songs you'll sing, the mornings you'll get up, the people you'll meet, and the man you'll marry. Maybe even the kids you'll have. Think about everything you could change, just because you stayed alive.”

Hayley was quiet for a few moments.

“You know,” she said at last, “right after Trevor died, I didn't want to live. But now I do. I want to be a better person.”

“You're a good person already,” I said.

“No, I'm not. I'm not like Audrey Curtis. I've done things to people I thought were funny at the time but now I realize were just cruel. And Denver, I did something to Abigail once. I did something to you.”

I turned and looked at her, puzzled.

“What do you mean, Hayley?”

“Abigail's soccer party. Sienna and I were there, remember?”

“I remember.”

“I put something in her drink.” Hayley started talking faster, rushing the words. “Sienna told me to do it. She said Abigail was starting to think she was better than
everyone else and needed to be put in her place. It was supposed to be harmless, like a prank. She kept pressuring me, so finally I did it. I didn't know she'd get so drunk, or she'd get thrown off the team, or that it would ruin your friendship. I wanted to tell you earlier, but Sienna told me to keep quiet.”

I felt a rush of anger. “You have got to be kidding me,” I said.

“You must think I'm the worst person in the world,” Hayley said.

I wanted to yell at Hayley and ask her if she realized how much trouble she had caused, but she sounded so sorry—on the point of tears—that I forced myself to take a few deep breaths.

“People make mistakes,” I managed to say. “People do things that they don't really think will turn out so bad. I wish I could go back and do everything different that night, too.”

“Oh!” Hayley cried, looking relieved and grateful. “Me too, me too. I'm so sorry. I'm going to tell Abigail what happened tomorrow. It's my fault you're not friends anymore.”

“No, it isn't,” I said. “I've been thinking a lot about Abigail and me lately. Our friendship was on pretty thin ice even before that party. My dad moving into her house,
Abigail making the soccer team . . . those things were pulling us apart. I guess it's no one's fault we're not friends anymore. I guess those things kind of happen. Besides, since we're telling the truth here, I filmed Abigail because I was mad at her, and I sent the footage to Quinn for the same reason. I never should have done that. So there's enough blame to go around.”

There was nothing left to say. We stood watching the waves crawl in. They were small waves. Trevor wouldn't have been able to surf here. He would be lying on his board right now in the water, his wet hair in his face, drumming on Plexiglas and thinking up songs about calm weather.

Hayley touched my arm. “When we're rescued and we go back home, I'm going to be a better person. You just wait and see.”

DAWN ON THE ISLAND.

Abigail was still asleep. I put my hand on her forehead. It felt warm to me.

The others were already awake.

“If you want to help, you can collect some more wood for tonight's fire,” I told them. “I'll stay here with Abigail.” I sat beside her and watched as Hayley and Sienna ambled down the beach and disappeared out of sight. I'd stayed up all night, and my eyelids were growing heavy. I dug my fingernails into my arms to stay alert, but I was sinking, drifting off. . . .

I awoke with a start. The sun was at its late-morning
position, and Abigail was awake and sipping water.

I sat up and rubbed my eyes.

“How are you doing?”

“Gettin' by,” she murmured. But her voice sounded dreamy, and her face was flushed.

“Where are Hayley and Sienna?”

“Don't know. Haven't seen them all morning.”

“Wait. It must have been hours ago that I sent them to get wood.” I glanced down the beach. It was empty of piled driftwood and girls. “They should have been back by now. I'm going to go find them.”

I rose to leave.

“I'll help,” Abigail volunteered weakly. She tried to get up but sank back down.

“You stay right here,” I said. “I'll be back. Don't start talking to Mr. Shriek again.”

I took off down the beach, walking along between the high-tide line and the dunes, calling Hayley's and Sienna's names, over and over until they sounded strange, not like names at all. Were I not so hungry and so worried about the girls, you could almost call that walk pleasant. The sea was a shimmering blue, the waves made a beautiful lapping sound against the shore, and the cries of birds were welcome after so many silent hours at sea. I started losing my breath, probably due to my weakened state. I sat down
in the warm sand to rest, watching one wave lap and then another, feeling suddenly so tired. I wanted to lie back and go to sleep, but there was this whole survival thing going on that had become my life's work.

I made myself get up, and I kept walking.

I found them a hundred yards past the first cove, lying side by side in the sand. Their eyes were open and fixed; their lips were stained purple.

I felt a pulse of disbelief run through me. My knees gave out, and I sank to the ground between the bodies.

No. This could not be happening.

I waved a hand over Hayley's face, but she didn't blink. I touched her cheek. It was cold.

“Oh no,” I said. “Oh no oh no . . .”

Hayley had something clutched in her fist. I opened her fingers and found a cluster of purple berries. Suddenly furious, I knocked the berries out of her hand.

“Why couldn't you have waited?!” I shouted at them. “I would have gotten you food. I promise I would have!” A wave of grief and loss swept over me as I stared down at their faces, not so peaceful in death but looking scared. Carefully, I closed their eyes with the tips of my fingers. I did not know what to do next. They were dead, and somehow I felt it was my fault. I shouldn't have left them alone. Should have guarded them, because they may have been
sophisticated in Malibu, but they were helpless in the wild with no pavement or Starbucks or iPhones.

I broke down, remembering what Hayley had confessed the night before. “Hayley,” I said to her, crying, “everyone makes mistakes. You were a good person; can't you see that?”

I found a place a short distance away where the sand was soft and dug their graves with a stick and my hands as tears ran down my face. The sand gave way easily, but it was still hard work to clear a hole three feet deep and six feet long. I dug as quickly as I could, needing to get back to Abigail so I would not have to make a grave for three but knowing Abigail would also want Hayley and Sienna to have a decent burial. The sand turned wet as I dug deeper, and when water began to fill the hole, I stopped. It was barely deep enough, and I didn't like the idea of burying them somewhere wet, but I didn't feel I had much of a choice, and it was better than leaving them in the woods with palm leaves draped over their bodies.

I went back to where they lay and took Hayley under the arms and moved her body across the sand to the new grave, then did the same with Sienna. I arranged them so that they lay together in a spoon position. They looked peaceful now that I had closed their eyes, as though they were dreaming of all the water they could drink and all
the food they could eat and all the life they could live, now that they were safe.

I said a few words over their bodies, something about resting in peace and all the typical things I thought were usually said, then I brushed sand over them until the beach was smooth again. If not for a small disruption in the sand, you would never have believed that two girls lay beneath it.

I wasn't sure what I was going to tell Abigail. I didn't want to upset her, but on this tiny island, the truth was hard to avoid. And the truth was that her friends—no, our friends—were dead.

Abigail was asleep when I returned. I knelt down next to her, and she opened her eyes.

“Did you find 'em?”

I helped her sit up.

“Yes.”

She looked around. “Well, where are they?”

I swallowed. This was hard.

“Well?”

“I'm sorry but . . . they're gone.”

She cocked her head slightly to the side. It was that same quizzical look I had known so well and loved so much in years past, when she was trying to solve a mystery or formulate a plan. Now it broke my heart.

“They ate poison berries, Abigail. They're dead.”

She snorted a little through her nose. “Stop horsing around, Denver,” she said, but her voice trembled, and her eyes slowly filled with tears. She wiped a streak of watery snot from her nose.

“For real?” she said at last.

“Yeah.”

“It's not fair. They made it so far. . . .”

I sat down next to her, and we looked out over the ocean, tears running down our faces for the two girls we had once hated but now mourned. “I didn't mind them so much, in the end. I even kind of liked them,” I said. “Hayley more than Sienna, of course.”

“I remember when I used to hate Sienna. Seems like so long ago. And Hayley. Always thought she was a blabbermouth. But there was more to that girl.” She let out a long breath, as though the two sentences had exhausted her.

I touched her warm hand. “Just so you know, I'd appreciate it very much if you didn't die, Abigail.”

She closed her eyes. “I'll give it my best shot.”

SURVIVORS CAN'T JUST
sit around and mourn the dead. Survivors have to get up and survive. So that is what I did. I found one of the spears I had crafted for Hayley and Sienna, and sharpened it with Trevor's pocketknife. Then
I headed out into the ocean, wading in the shallows, moving down the beach until I found a place where the water was relatively calm and clear.

I waited, my spear poised, my eyes searching the water.

Finally I saw a small group of brightly colored fish languidly swimming toward me. I waited, tensing, the fish coming closer and closer. I picked out the one in the lead and plunged the spear with all my might.

I screamed. The water turned red as the fish scattered. I had speared my own bare foot.

I lifted my foot and saw that the tip of the spear had gone in just behind the toes and emerged between the soft pads of my sole.

Blood was everywhere.

I hopped backward toward the beach, holding on to the spear, the tip of which was still through my foot. When I was clear of the waves, I fell back in the sand and closed my eyes and tugged on the spear with all my might.

That kind of pain is very hard to describe. It felt like my foot was tearing in half, and I wailed in agony; but I tugged on the spear until it was free and cast it to the side and grabbed my foot, desperately trying to stop the bleeding. That would be perfect for me, bleeding to death after spearing myself. Abigail would perhaps find it sadly amusing just before she died, too. And there we'd be, four
corpses on the island: two in the sand, one under a tree, and one on the beach clutching her foot.

The blood wasn't slowing down. I needed something to staunch it. I saw some kind of straw-looking material sitting on some nearby dunes, and I dragged myself over to it slowly, leaving a trail of blood in the sand, finally reaching it and realizing . . . it was a nest.

A nest with eggs in it.

Food. Protein. Salvation.

I tore off some of the nest material and pressed it over my wound, waiting until the blood flow finally staunched, refusing to worry about germs and infection.

There were four eggs in that nest. Four perfect, pale-blue eggs. I gathered them in my arms and hobbled back up the beach. The sun was low in the sky now. Abigail was watching me.

“What happened?” she asked, gesturing to my foot. “I heard you holler. I tried to run to you but I couldn't walk.”

“It's okay. It's nothing,” I said. “I stabbed myself with my own spear. But guess what I found?”

I showed her the eggs.

“And, Abigail, there are more nests up and down the beach. We'll have food. Maybe in one food group, but we won't starve.”

“Good,” she said, but her voice was weak. We divided
up the eggs and cracked them and let the contents slide down our throats. They tasted exactly as you'd imagine warm beach bird eggs would taste.

“Slightly better than cafeteria food,” I announced. “I'm going to go get some more.”

“I don't want any more,” Abigail said.

“Are you kidding? You haven't eaten in days.”

She shook her head. “I'm just not hungry.”

“Abigail, you have to eat. You have to.”

She didn't answer me.

“Well, great,” I said. “Just great. You came this far, and you're just going to give up.”

“I'm not giving up, Denver,” she murmured. “Maybe my body is giving up for me.”

“Well, don't let it.” I reached over and felt her forehead. It was hot. “Does your head hurt?”

She nodded.

I made her drink some more water and then I went to get more eggs to bring back to Abigail, ignoring her declaration that she could eat no more of them.

“Come on,” I said. “Just one more.”

But she shook her head, and nothing I said could convince her, so I ate the eggs myself to give me the strength to build a signal fire. The empty nest made good tinder, and there was plenty of dry wood. I used Hayley's lighter
and felt a pang as the flame rose, remembering Hayley's run-on sentences and wondering if she was babbling on right now in heaven to some patient angel.

When the fire got going, I limped back and sat next to Abigail. She seemed a bit more alert than she had the past few days, but I was still very worried about her.

“Signal fire during the day?” she asked.

“Yeah.”

“Think anyone's gonna see it?”

“Maybe. And if they don't, I'm going to start building a large
SOS
out of sticks on the beach. It will be so big you can see it from the moon.”

I was sitting cross-legged next to her. The fire smelled good from a distance. Made up of dry things that thought their usefulness was over.

“You know what I'd like to see right now?” I asked.

“What?”

“A dog pissing against the side of a building.”

“Why?”

“Because it's such a normal thing. And dogs always look so peaceful when they piss.”

“Yeah, I guess so.”

What I really wanted to see right now was the view of Abigail's pool the way I used to see it, while hanging out on a chaise longue next to hers, as we talked about anything
that came to our minds. Her little brother circling out of reach, preparing some kind of verbal or physical attack. Insults or hurled Pop Rocks. Abigail's big red hair drying into kinks and twists. Her freckles multiplying in the sun. Her deranged figures of speech in full swing. Her laughter real. Doing that thing she did with her pointer finger, the way it spiraled in the air when she was trying to explain something difficult. I wanted to be back there, not just because it meant we were saved, but because it meant we were friends.

I sighed.

“What?” she asked.

“Here we are,” I said. “Just the two of us. On an island in the middle of nowhere. All our friends are dead. Is this crazy?”

“Pretty loco,” she agreed.

I poured some more water into the Spam can for her to drink. She shook her head.

“Come on,” I said.

“Ya know what they say 'bout leading a horse to water.”

“I don't want you to die,” I said. “I don't want to die myself. And I sure don't wanna die without telling you I'm sorry.”

Her skin was so burned and freckled. Her eyes so dim.

“Don't worry, Denver. Water under the bridge.”

“I am, though, Abigail. Really sorry.”

The words seemed to make her tired. “Ahhh, Denver . . .”

“Filming you that night was a terrible idea. I guess I was pissed off because I thought you didn't really want me at the party.”

“No, I wanted you there. Guess I was just nervous, trying to impress everyone. Didn't think enough about your feelings. Sorry I got you thrown out. Have no memory of that. I dunno why I got so drunk. I was being careful, honest I was.”

“Hayley and Sienna put something in your drink. That's why you were so out of control.”

“Huh?” Abigail looked at me, her weak eyes showing confusion.

“Yeah. Hayley told me last night. She was going to tell you herself. She was really sorry about it. She said Sienna thought you were getting too cocky and needed to be taken down a little.”

Abigail took a few moments to absorb the information. “Sienna was always a snake,” she said at last. “Never trusted her, not even after we started hanging out.”