Ten (2 page)

“Your turn, miss,” the deckhand said, snapping Meg from her thoughts.

“Oh, right.” She swung herself onto the ladder. As she started to climb down, the boat heaved and the deckhand grabbed Meg’s arm to steady her.

“Thanks,” she said, clutching the top rung of the ladder with both hands.

“You sure you’ll be okay?” he asked. His hand still gripped her arm.

“Yeah. Short ladder. I’ll be fine.”

He cocked his head. “No, on the island.”

Meg squinted up at his worn, lined face. “Yeah, why not?”

The deckhand paused, then craned his neck to look over toward the northern part of the island. “Nothing,” he said at last.

Um, okay.

The ferry’s engines fired up again as Meg climbed down the side. “We’ll be back Monday to pick you up,” the deckhand shouted just as her feet touched the dock. “Be careful.”

Be careful? It was a weekend party full of hookups and beer bongs. Other than mono and dehydration, what did she need to be careful of?

Weirder and weirder.

As soon as Meg was clear of the ladder, Branson untied the line and, without a word, scrambled up the side of the boat.

Meg watched wistfully as he swung his body onto the pitching deck and disappeared behind the bulwark as the boat eased away from the island.

She half wished she could join them.

“Now what?” Minnie said. She stood barefoot, twirling a strand of her white-blonde hair.

Good question. Meg reluctantly pulled her attention away from the departing ferry and scanned the dock.

It was a rough, weather-beaten construction that jutted fifty yards out from the beach. Broken planks of moldering wood dotted the path to shore like little landmines, and the swells of water, even in the protected bay, seemed dangerously close to swamping the decaying pier.

Onshore, a forest of Douglas firs towered above the beach, silhouetted against the gray clouds that crowded the darkening sky. Meg thought she caught a glimpse of lights beyond the fringe of trees, but she wasn’t quite sure. She couldn’t see much in the gathering dusk, and with the moon and stars obscured by storm clouds, it was about to get extremely dark on Henry Island.

As the sound of the ferry’s engines faded into the distance, Meg felt suddenly isolated. Other than the dull rumble of water and wind, she couldn’t hear a thing, and there were no signs of life on the distant beach. Meg shivered. They were alone in the middle of nowhere, their only contact with the outside world retreating into the night.

Meg yanked her cell phone out of her jeans pocket. She desperately wanted to call someone—anyone—and tell them where they were.

“What are you doing?” Minnie asked.

Meg sheltered the screen of her phone from the ocean spray. “Nothing. Just wanted to see if we had a signal.”

“Do
not
call your parents.”

“I’m not!” Meg lied. Not that it mattered. She spun around, waving her phone slowly back and forth. The result was the same. “There’s no signal anyway.”

“Good!” Minnie snatched the phone out of her hand and shoved it in Meg’s backpack, retrieving her shoes in the process. She grinned and linked her arm through Meg’s. “It’s more fun this way. Like we’re stranded for three glorious days.”

Glorious
was not the word that immediately sprang into Meg’s mind. “Sure, Mins. Whatever you—”

“Hello down there!”

Meg and Minnie turned sharply. Two figures appeared at the end of the dock, moving quickly toward them. Both were tall and wrapped up in heavy coats. In the muted light, Meg couldn’t see their faces, but one of them seemed oddly familiar.

“Meg!”

Meg’s stomach lurched. She knew that voice.

Minnie recognized it at the same time. She clapped her hands and squealed. “Oh my
God
!”

Meg felt all the warmth drain from her body.

It was T. J. Fletcher.

THREE

IT HAD BEEN MONTHS SINCE MEG AND T.J. HAD
spoken a word to each other. Not since Homecoming. They didn’t have any classes together that semester, and since Minnie had broken up with T.J.’s best friend, they never saw each other. Their friendship was over.

Not that everyone and their mom didn’t know every detail of T.J.’s life. Meg had heard the rumors: the football scholarship to U-Dub, the string of girlfriends, the wild parties. Minnie talked about him incessantly, obsessively. Although that part was normal. She’d been in love with T.J. since freshman year, even going so far as to date his best friend, Gunner, after T.J. rejected her. So in the weeks after Homecoming, when merely hearing his name made Meg cringe, she had to listen to Minnie go on and on about how amazing he was....

Minnie had no idea that Meg was in love with him too.

Which is why Meg needed to control herself, keep her emotions in check. One look at T.J.’s smiling face, his gorgeous dark brown skin, and prominent dimples, and it would be like one of those cartoon moments where the French skunk’s heart pounds so fiercely it literally leaps out of his chest for everyone to see. She couldn’t let that happen. No one could know how she really felt. Not Minnie. And especially not T.J.

“Glad you made it,” T.J. yelled as he strode down the dock.

Meg tried—and failed—to prevent the hot flush from creeping to her face. She prayed Minnie didn’t notice.
He doesn’t like you
, she told herself.
He’s still mad at you.

Luckily Minnie only had eyes for T.J. “T.J.!” she squealed. She padded toward him, a slingback dangling from each hand. “We didn’t know you’d be here.”

No, they didn’t. Because there was no way in hell Meg would have come if she’d known T.J. was on the guest list.

The second figure followed T.J. down the dock. At first Meg thought it was Gunner, but the figure was too tall, too lanky. Someone new.

“I was afraid you guys had missed the ferry,” T.J. said, slightly out of breath. He wore a beanie cap pulled down low over his ears, covering his closely shaved head, and a peacoat buttoned up to his chin.

“You knew we were coming?” Minnie threw her hands—shoes and all—around his neck and practically launched herself into his arms.

T.J. gave Minnie a combination brosive chest bump and back pound, then sidestepped her entirely and moved to Meg’s side. “Of course I knew you’d be here.”

Meg’s heart thumped so loudly she was convinced everyone within a two-mile radius could hear it. She dropped her eyes to the warped wooden dock to hide her confusion. “Yeah,” she said. “Um, you too.”

“Hi.” The other guy stood right behind them. “You must be Minnie.”

He was just as tall as T.J., but thin and lithe where T.J. was muscular and athletic. His vivid blue eyes sparkled as he grinned at Minnie, the ends just crinkling by his temples, which gave his face a puppyish expression. More striking, he had a shock of hair almost as white-blond as Minnie’s. Blonde and blonder.

Minnie cocked her head. “How did you know who I was?”

“I heard you’d be the pretty blonde one.” Blondie winked.

Meg desperately fought the urge to roll her eyes at the nacho-cheesiness of his line, but it was like crack for Minnie.

“Oh!” Minnie cooed. She glanced at T.J. “Did you tell him that?”

“Um …” T.J.’s eyes darted to the retreating ferry. “Is it just the two of you?” he said, changing the subject.

“Yep,” Meg said. “Were you expecting someone else?”

T.J. shook his head. “We got a call from Mr. Lawrence earlier saying Jessica was going to try to make the last ferry. Apparently she and a bunch of friends got stuck at some school thing today, so they’ll join us tomorrow.”

“Cheerleading,” Blondie piped in. “Last-minute practice.”

Now he had Minnie’s full attention. “You’re friends with Jessica?”

“Er,” he said, flashing a boyish smile. “Something like that.”

So Blondie was Jessica’s new boy toy? Interesting.

“Sorry,” T.J. said, slapping Blondie on the back. “I should have introduced you. This is Ben.”

“No worries, dude.” Ben’s blue eyes landed on Meg. There was something kind of easy and comfortable about him that she immediately liked. “You must be Meg?”

“Yep,” Meg said. She shifted her feet, suddenly conscious that a house full of strangers must have been discussing her if Ben knew who both she and Minnie were.

“M and M?” Ben laughed. “That’s adorable.”

Minnie grabbed Meg’s hand, her attention fixed on Ben. “Besties since we met in the seventh grade.”

Ben continued to smile at Minnie. “Can I carry your bags?” he asked.

“Ooh,” Minnie said, glancing at T.J. “A gentleman.”

T.J. ignored her, and while Ben shouldered Minnie’s bags, T.J. gently tugged on the sleeve of Meg’s coat. “This way.”

T.J. hurried down the dock, his long strides putting easy distance between them and Minnie and Ben. Meg scrambled to keep up with him. Part of her wanted to stay behind with Minnie, avoiding alone time with T.J. at all costs. But there was something else spurring her on. In that moment when she saw T.J. smile at her, Meg realized how much she’d missed him.

They walked in silence, though Meg’s mind raced. Should she say something? Bring up what happened on Homecoming night? Try to explain why she bailed on him and beg forgiveness? She wanted to, desperately. But instead she didn’t say a word. As usual.

She wished it was September and she was already at college in LA away from all this, from everyone who knew her. Somewhere she could start over and not feel like such an awkward spaz all the time.

T.J. trudged steadily in front of her. As they approached the tree line, she caught their familiar scent—all piney and Christmasy—over the briny sea air and the stench of rotten seaweed wafting up from the beach. Meg took a deep breath. Those two smells, Christmas and the salty sea, were what home smelled like.

The dock itself extended well onto the island and disappeared into the trees, but instead of following it, T.J. deftly leaped down to the beach. He turned to help her just as Meg jumped into the sand. Her momentum pushed her forward into T.J., who put his hands on her waist to brace her. They stood there in the wet sand for a moment; T.J.’s hands never left her waist. It felt so comfortable to be that close to him again, as if there had never been a rift between them. She’d missed him so much....

Minnie’s high-pitched giggle rang out as she and Ben approached the end of the dock. Meg shook herself, then broke free from T.J.’s embrace and hurried across the tightly packed sand.
You have to get over him.

She paused halfway down the beach. Through the trees a house was visible. It seemed as if every light in the two-story vacation home was on, and Meg could hear laughter and music, which swelled and ebbed on the wind.

“They’ve been partying since the sun went down,” said T.J., at her shoulder.

“That’s not White Rock House?” Meg asked.

T.J. shook his head. “The Taylors live there. Lawrence Point is at the tip of the island.”

“How do you know?”

“I’ve been here a few times,” T.J. said with a shrug.

Oh. Duh, Meg.
When he was dating Jessica’s best friend
.

“It’s kind of nice,” T.J. barreled on. “To know there’s another party happening nearby. Don’t you think?”

“I guess.” Actually, it
was
nice. Somehow knowing that a house full of people was close by put some of her nervousness at ease.

“Come on.” T.J. nudged her and Meg followed him past the house. The trees thinned and a narrow strip of land lay ahead, illuminated by the soft orange glow of the Taylors’ interior lights. The isthmus protruded from the main island, maybe twenty feet wide and barely four feet above the waterline, with Lawrence Point looming in the distance. The blanched carcasses of dozens of stripped tree trunks littered the isthmus like a giant game of pick-up sticks.

A severed strip of land, besieged on all sides by a hostile sea. Meg felt as if she’d reached the end of the world.

A giant wave crashed onto the eastern shore, completely washing over the tiny land bridge. Meg’s eyes grew wide. “We have to cross that?”

“Yeah, there’s a path down the middle.” T.J. pointed into the semidarkness.

Meg didn’t see anything at first, until the receding waves exposed what looked like a rickety handrailing. “Is that a bridge?”

“Kinda,” T.J. said. “More like a raised platform, a footbridge to keep you above the water.”

Another wave washed over the isthmus, fiercer this time, and Meg and T.J. had to retreat several steps to keep from getting wet. The wave submerged the footbridge completely, leaving only a few inches of the handrail visible above the churning surf. The water retreated, gurgling playfully as it withdrew to either side of the isthmus, taunting them almost, to test their luck.

“There’s no other way to get to the house?”

“Nope,” T.J. said. “But it’s not too bad. We all made a break for it between waves.”

“Easy when you could actually see them.”

T.J. shoved his hands deep into the pockets of his coat. His face was serious, the dancing smile and dimples gone. “Are you being hostile on purpose?”

“I …,” she faltered. “I didn’t realize …”

“Yes, you did. I know you, Meg Pritchard. You don’t say anything unless you mean it.”

Meg winced. That was true, the flip side being that she didn’t say half of what she wanted to.

“Look,” T.J. said in the face of Meg’s silence. “I just don’t want this weekend to be awkward for either of us. We used to be friends, remember? We used to have fun.”

There was that word again.
Fun
. Had she really lost that side of her? No, she was sure she could be that girl again, the girl that laughed and joked with the one guy on the planet with whom she felt she could be completely herself.

“We
are
friends,” she said. “And we’ll have fun this weekend. I promise.”
Even if I die trying
.

T.J. arched his brow. “Yeah?”

Meg eyed the footbridge. The white foam of a retreating wave sparkled in the dim light. The timing was perfect.

A grin stole across her face. “Yeah. Starting now.” She spun on her heel and took off running across the isthmus.