The Ones We're Meant to Find by Joan He

Author:Joan He [He, Joan]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Roaring Brook Press

* * *

For a while after I come to, I lie, alone, in the dim of M.M.’s bedroom, remembering everything that happened. Waking up in the ocean. Swimming to the shore. Blacking out from the pain—the worst I’ve ever felt.

There’s no pain now. No feeling at all. My limbs feel like newly set gelatin. My arms won’t support me when I try to sit up, and my head bangs into the headboard on my way back down. A curse rips from my lips, and the door whips back on its hinges. Hero rushes to the bedside. He helps me up. He hands me water I didn’t realize I desperately needed until it’s trembling in my hands. I drain it. He sets the emptied glass on the rocking chair, then sits beside me, the mattress dimpling.

I look at him. He looks at me.

I know what we’re both thinking: I woke up in the ocean today. I warned him last night this could happen, but now that it’s actually happened, it’s scary. Ten times scarier than falling off the ridge. I should address it.

“About today…” I look down at the blanket in my lap, suddenly at a loss for words. I feel stripped bare of my usual defenses and when Hero’s arms go around me, I let myself be enfolded. I bury my face into the scratchy knit of his sweater and let myself be cradled. I don’t need saving—but honestly? I wouldn’t mind it, every now and then. Certainly didn’t mind it today. I’m tired. Tired of chopping down trees and wearing ugly sweaters and eating the same three things. I miss Kay. I miss my life of sequined dresses and fancy mashed potatoes and boys—

Scratch that. The boy I have here does just fine.

“So,” I start when I begin to feel more like myself. I push back from Hero’s chest to make myself audible. “Still up for beach yoga?”

He peers at me through his lashes. “Was that what today was?”

“Advanced-advanced. What, scared?”

“Very,” he admits. “But sign me up.”

“Done. We meet at eight a.m.”

Speaking of time … I glance toward the window.

“You were out for a day,” supplies Hero.

A day. My gut knots. Even if it was a dream, the fear of finding Kay too late is very real, and now my sleepwalking habit has sent me an ultimatum: Find Kay or drown.

Good thing Leona’s almost built. I just need to tie all the logs together and fashion the oar.

When I’m feeling up to it, and with Hero’s help, I make it onto the porch, down the steps, and to the house side, where—

The sand beside the rocks is empty.

No Leona.

No logs.

No pieces on the beach, when we scour. And we do, for hours, until at last, I go back to the house and stand by the hollow in the sand where Leona should be but she’s not. Not coming back. I have to accept it.

Leona is gone.

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