Chapter Seventeen
Two years later
I’ve decided the sun is out to end me.
A lot of things are out to end me—cancer, animatronic dinosaurs, general death. But out of all the dire and dangerous things in this world, the sun has to be the worst of them. It grows our food and keeps us warm in the vast infinite cradle of space-time, so it forces us into the illusion we should be grateful for it, when in fact it’s very hard to be grateful to anything blinding your eyes with a cheerful saw blade of ultraviolet rays.
“Ugh.” I roll over on my beach towel. “Can you cool it for, like, five seconds?”
The sun brightly declines. I sip my Barbie-colored fruity drink from a fancy glass and try to pretend it doesn’t exist.
“Where the heckle—” My hands scrabble for my sunglasses, and I shove them on my face. “Ahh, temporary relief. So sweet, so transient, so Gucci.”
“Mademoiselle!” a voice rings out. I groan and sit up, watching Gregory stride his way through the sand toward me. Even the southern French villagers, used to bright and colorful Mediterranean clothing, stare at his atrocious green-and-orange Hawaiian shirt. When we said “come visit us and have a vacation,” he apparently didn’t get the memo that he wasn’t visiting a tropical island.
“Gregory, you’re an eyesore,” I complain. Gregory laughs and offers me a hand up, his eyes taking in my white swimsuit with the low-cut back.
“And you, madam, are quite the opposite.”
“No!” I protest as I stand up. “No, no, no, look at these thighs! I’m far too young to be a madam. Try again in like, seven thousand years.”
He chuckles. “Very well. Come on, he sent me to fetch you and for some reason he’s antsy as fuck-all.”
“Antsy? Jack?” I quirk a brow, picking up my towel and drink and slipping on my sandals, trudging through the sand with Gregory. “Are we talking about the same human being I’m in regular personal contact with?”
“The one and only.”
“Are you hiring him again? Please say yes, please! I want those amazing little chocolates from Paris again—I want them with all my crappy idiot heart.”
“God knows you deserve them, putting up with him all the time,” Gregory huffs. “He’s been so off-kilter lately. Not that I’d know, but we do keep up in emails.”
“Oh, I know.” I nod. “I’ve seen those emails. It’s always you, begging him to come back to Vortex.”
Gregory laughs. “Can you blame me? He’s Jack.”
“He is Jack!” I agree. “Which is why he left in the first place. Teaching is a viable career, too, you know.”
Gregory’s eyes crinkle like a father’s around the edges. “He’ll be a good teacher. And that glare of his? He’ll have the most well-behaved students, I bet.”
Gregory walks with me up the beach to the tiny dirt road that splits the village in two. It’s been two years since Jack and I first visited, and eventually stayed, but still the villagers are a little wary of us, the American couple. But I’ll win them over. Or wear them down. Whichever comes first. I wave at the villagers as cheerfully as I can.
“Bonjour! François! La bouche un petite chienne! Oh dear, they don’t look happy about that last one.”
“That last one didn’t even make sense,” Gregory emphasizes, and makes little pardon noises at the offended nearby villagers. I walk briskly past him and up the cobblestoned road. The village is tiny; children carrying boogie boards and floats bob and weave between bikes and too-slow couples. Two old men in stodgy caps take turns playing chess and drinking wine under the eaves of a flower shop.
Toward the edge of the village the cobblestone fades, replaced with a well-worn dirt road. Tall summer grasses sway on either side. I scoop up yellow and purple and white wildflowers, a honeybee fighting me for a particularly beautiful orange blossom.
“Go on!” I shoo her. “There are a thousand more; you can afford to donate one to the poor humans!”
Gregory chuckles, looking out at the ocean and the small farmhouses we pass.
“I’ll miss this town. You two’ve picked the best place in the world to settle down, I reckon.”
“Hey! No one’s settled! We’re going to Cambodia next year!”
“What’s the difference?”
“Settlement means like, minivans and baby barf. Home base implies we are explorers of the highest caliber. And after Greece—after that it’s back to Ohio.”
“That’s the plan, huh?”
“Yeah.” I kick a pebble down the path.
“Do you miss your family?” he asks softly. I nod.
“We stayed with my mom for two weeks after, planning stuff. We’ve Skyped, but…it’ll be good to see her in the flesh. And bones. And all the other parts of her.”
Gregory laughs. I watch the village crowd, mesmerizing in its fluid dance. I got kicked out of college the day after I confronted Will. He didn’t leak the video of me defacing the office or anything. I told them myself. I wanted them to kick me out, maybe. Or maybe I just wanted to come clean about everything.
I hugged Diana and Yvette good-bye, promising to keep in touch, and then I packed my things and left with Jack for Northplains and Mom’s house. Those two weeks after dropping out were some of the best in my life. Mom, Jack, and I hung out, playing board games and going to the zoo and making delicious meals together. I was so happy that when we got the news about Will’s arrest I barely batted an eyelash. Barely. But it was still batted. He got seven years in an Ohio jail for aiding and abetting a criminal organization, and that’s the last I heard of him.
After the night I confronted Will, I never heard from Vanessa again. I did, however, get an email four days later from someone claiming to be a “friend” of hers, who told me all recorded instances of the tape of Jack and Sophia and the others had been destroyed. It’d be easy to distrust Vanessa’s promise, but when Will’s arrest popped up in the news so quickly and he was sentenced so thoroughly, I knew she’d never leave something unfinished. I scratched her back, and she scratched mine, and that was the end of that.
When I told Jack, he’d held me close, wordlessly and tightly.
He quit Vortex shortly after that. Charlie came to my house, banging on the door and demanding Jack come back, but not because he liked him as a partner or anything. Jack went out and they talked, and eventually Charlie left, the spikes of his hair wilting a little in disappointment. Then Gregory visited, gave Jack his pay for Vanessa’s job, and it was enough for us to travel. Jack wanted to leave, and I wanted to visit somewhere. Anywhere but Ohio.
But first, good-byes were due.
Kayla and Wren couldn’t make it to see us off, so we planned to visit them instead when our airplane to Europe stopped at Boston. There were a lot of happy tears and ruffling of hair and promises to keep in touch. Promises that were kept, daily, with my internet connection and a lot of time zone planning.
Even before the airplane, there were other good-byes.
I said good-bye to Mom the only way I knew how, with tears and a hug and a cheek kiss and swearing I’d be back. Mom laughed and hugged me back, insisting she would be all right on her own. We call every day, and sometimes Skype, and it was through Skype she introduced me to Harold, a round, pudgy man with a warm smile who always wore sweater vests and treated my mom like a precious vase, a queen made of diamonds. She’s seemed happier than I ever could’ve thought possible after Leo, but when I get back to Ohio, I’ll be sure to check up on Harold’s sincerity. It’s not that I don’t trust him; I just don’t trust anyone. But for now, she seems all right.
After my mom, we visited Jack’s mom. Mrs. Hunter answered the door covered in paint stains and with her customary messy bun. When she saw Jack, she dropped the glass jar full of murky paint-water she’d been holding and flung her arms around him and sobbed. He’d called her before that, of course, but it was the first time she’d seen him since he left after Sophia’s funeral. I cleaned up the glass bits while Jack held her and soothed her and Mrs. Hunter wailed. Finally, when she’d calmed down enough, she invited us in for tea, and Jack explained where we were going. She tried to get us to stay—we could live at her house, she insisted—but we managed to convince her we needed some time away. She pulled me aside just before we left and thanked me for finding him, for being with him, and my heart melted on the edges as she hugged me. She made me swear to make Jack call her at least twice a week, and I Scout’s-honored it.
Eventually, Jack and I visited Avery’s house. The massive town house was chilly inside, all marble and white walls with no paintings or tapestries or even stains. Avery’s parents weren’t there, too busy with a case in Columbus, but Avery was. She came down the stairs, then froze when she saw it was us. Jack and I talked that way, her on the stairs and us in the hall. She didn’t look as bad as she did at graduation—she wasn’t as thin, and some color was back in her cheeks. Her hair was as vibrant red as ever, if not more so. Her eyes were skittish, though, and she was still too small. And she kept her mouth silent, no matter what we said.
“Isis!”
Halfway out the door, Avery called out to me. I turned, and she was at the bottom of the stairs, face earnest and honest in a way I’d never seen it before.
“Have fun,” she said, green eyes boring into mine. She wasn’t smiling, wasn’t frowning. But her expression was saying more than her words ever could. “Have fun” was also “be safe” and “thank you,” but silent and hidden in that reluctant, subtle-as-a-hidden-knife Avery way. I knew it, and she knew it, and finally I smiled.
“You got it, Avery Bobavery.”
Jack drove us to Belina’s house. We had to all but fight off her invitation to stay for a delicious-smelling dinner. She hugged Jack in farewell and cupped his face with her hands like he was her own child, saying something in Spanish I couldn’t understand.
Later, in the car, Jack told me she’d told him to live well and happily.
And then came the harder good-byes.
We visited Tallie’s grave one last time with a picnic. We had sandwiches and wine, and I poured a little cup of lemonade for Tallie and put it on her grave, and we talked about how cute she was, imagining all the different ways she could’ve grown up. It should’ve been sad, something like that, but Jack and I couldn’t stop smiling. When the sun set behind the lake, we packed up, and Jack’s hand went to the white bleached-wood cross that served as her marker.
“What are you doing?” I asked. Jack stared at the cross, then looked up at me with a soft gaze.
“They should be together,” he said simply.
“We can’t just deposit a baby skeleton on her grave,” I say. “The police will be all over that.”
“No, you’re right. But we can take the rest.”
So we took the cross. Sophia’s grave was serenely quiet, the graveyard empty and painted metallic by the golden sunset. Jack put Tallie’s white cross on the grave.
Jack let me talk to her first, alone. It didn’t feel right, visiting together, so we took turns. I told Sophia everything about what happened at college—from the bad food to the classes to Yvette and Diana to Will. I told her everything, just like I used to tell her in the hospital. She’d want to know. She couldn’t do college, so she deserved to know.
Jack took much longer than I did, and I sat beneath a tree a ways away and let him have space. He knelt at the grave for two hours, and sometimes his lips would move. I don’t know what he was saying, but it was personal, and important. That much I could tell from the way he clenched his fists.
And then, all at once, his fingers went slack, and he approached me, and together we got in the car and drove to the airport.
I’m so lost in my memories I don’t realize Gregory’s led me out of the village and up the dirt path that leads to our cottage.
Gregory breathes the fresh air in deep. “How’re you doing here, anyway? Picking up the language at all?”
“Well, there’s honey and bread and lots of fruit in the fall, and I can’t speak a word of French, but at least my boyfriend can.” I smack my lips. “Boyfriend. Ugh, that word still tastes funny. There should be another word. Prince, maybe? No, that’s too regal. Significant other? Ugh, too suburban. Buttbear?”
I pause, then turn to Gregory.
“I think I’ve struck gold.”
“Buttbear sounds like a disease.” He sighs.
“Exactly! Haven’t you heard? Love is a disease, and the only cure is death. And sad breakup songs.”
Gregory shakes his head. We walk in silence, me skipping and him sticking to the shade of the oak trees. We pass another farmhouse, all white stone and logs and dogs chasing goats around.
“I’ve heard,” Gregory starts, “that a funny, beautiful girl has an internet advice show that’s gotten very popular lately on a certain you of the tubes. Something about…a network approaching her? And a contract?”
I wave him off. “It’s nothing big, really. People just like to watch me flail around and say weird things. That’s pretty much been my entire life. So really, they just like to watch my life. Not bad for a girl who got kicked out of college for defacing a professor’s office, huh?”
“But you make enough to live here,” he presses.
“Yeah. I mean, Jack helps, too. A little.”
We share another smirk. Gregory and I both know Jack helps a lot. The pay Gregory gave him was more than enough to last us for two years. But now that Jack’s getting his teaching degree at the nearest French college, things will be a little different. He’ll want to start work again—his plan is to teach high school science. Which I find hard to believe, since I know he’s a dunce. A smart dunce. But a dunce nonetheless.
“He’s your dunce,” Gregory corrects my out-loud ramblings, and I roll my eyes and run up to the gate that is the entrance to our house.
It can’t really be called a house—more like a run-down shack planted next to a peach tree. The walls are white stone reinforced with wood. The windows are a little crooked and don’t keep much heat in the winter, but our woodstove takes care of that, and the roof never leaks, so it’s the small things that count, really, and also the big things, because we have the biggest claw-foot tub and the fattest gray cat named Oolong sitting in the windowsill sunning himself. I dash up to the door and Oolong raises his head, giving me a thorough and vastly intimidating once-over before purring himself back to sleep.
“The party has arrived!” I herald my own return and throw my towel on the back of the chair and survey the kitchen—sea glass and shells decorate the windowsill by the rusty sink; mugs of morning coffee still sit on the counter next to stringy remnants of the waffle-maker’s mess. I fish around in the fridge and look up as Gregory seats his weary butt at the kitchen table. The chair protests loudly.
“Do you want milk? Fresh from the cows next door. Or—ooh! We still have some wine left from last night.”
“Water will do fine,” Gregory insists. I pour him a glass and pop my head into the living room. My laptop and the camera equipment I use to record videos are still in a pile on the ugly yet hella charming paisley couch. The woodstove is cold, only used for the chilliest of nights, and the pile of wood next to it is high. Jack must’ve refilled it.
I tiptoe through the living room and into the bedroom. The door’s open, the queen-size brass bed just as unmade as we left it this morning. Jack sits at the desk in front of the windows overlooking the sea, talking to someone on Skype on his laptop. His disheveled tawny hair catches the sun, his lazy flannel and jeans only making his back look broader. But I hardly have time to appreciate it, because at that exact moment I see who he’s talking to.
“…but what if I ask her and—”
“Wren!” I scream, launching myself across the room and hanging over Jack’s shoulder. “Look at you! I can’t believe you’re graduating early, you dumbass! Or, shit, I can’t call you that anymore, can I? You have a college degree!”
Wren, his glasses perched on his nose and his stubble dark, laughs.
“No, you can’t.”
“I think you should still call him that!” Kayla chimes from behind him. “And hi, you. Love the tan you’re working on.”
“Hi, sweet stuff,” I coo back at her. “It’s been too long.”
“Isis, we talked last night.”
“Too long! You should come back. I miss you and the house misses you and the shitbaby cat misses you,” I lament. Jack reaches up and strokes my back with one hand, the other clicking around on Skype.
“All right you two, I should go,” he says.
“Right! Talk to you later.” Wren smirks.
“Good luck!” Kayla beams. Jack growls and shuts the laptop quickly.
“Hey grump-ass! What’s the frown for? Wait, don’t tell me, Oolong took a crap on the bed.”
Jack sighs and entwines his arms around my waist, pulling me into him. “No.”
“Diiiiddd he eat your hair gel again?”
“No,” Jack murmurs, resting his head in the crook of my neck and sniffing my hair. “You smell like ocean.”
“I smell like questions!” I correct, and turn to face him. “What’s got you so worked up, huh? You’ve been out of it for days. And every time I catch you on Skype with Wren you always exit out so quick! Are you two sharing porn? Is this a porn thing? Am I a widow now?”
“He’s going through puberty!” Gregory shouts from the kitchen.
“Shut up!” Jack shouts back, then quickly adds, “Sir!”
Gregory’s chuckles can be heard from here, and I laugh with him, but Jack hugs me close and it’s then I know something’s really wrong.
“Hey, hey you.” I pull away, cupping his face. “If you don’t tell me what’s wrong right now, I’m going to die. And then fly away. Or, wait, reverse those two, I don’t think dead things can fly unless they are zombies-slash-angels and I am most certainly not an ange—”
Jack’s mouth is so close to my ear. “Marry me.”
I freeze, a horde of icy tingles cascading down my body.
“W-What?”
He groans and nuzzles into my neck. I can feel the blush on his cheeks with my own skin.
“Don’t make me say it twice.”
“Jack, what the fuck—”
“Marry me,” he repeats. “Marry me. I want you to be my wife, Isis. I want you to—I want you to be mine.”
“I am yours, idiot.” I kiss his neck.
“I know. But I want everyone to know. I want your mom and dad to come out, and my mom, and I want Wren and Kayla here, and Diana and Yvette, and Charlie—”
“You think he’d come?”
Jack laughs. “Of course. He might be prickly, but he likes me. I think. He’ll bring his grandmother. You’ll love her; she’s much nicer than he is. I just want them all here, with us, I want them to see how happy we are, and I want them to celebrate with us, and I want to see you in a white gown smiling and cutting a cake and being happier than you’ve ever been.”
I mull it over. Marriage is huge. Marriage is the fairy-tale endgame for every movie heroine in Hollywood’s narrow view of happiness. It’s clichéd. The me of two years ago would’ve rolled my eyes at the idea of it. But if you put Jack in the marriage picture, it suddenly doesn’t seem so bad. It seems fun and interesting. Spending the rest of my life with him sounds sort of perfect.
“You haven’t seen your parents in years,” Jack presses. “And I haven’t seen mine. Just imagine this house filled up with people—”
“They’d sleep…on the table?”
“Imagine the village motel filled with people,” he corrects. “All the people you love. You could show them around, we could go to the beach and do fireworks, you’d make the best cake known to mankind—”
“Every cake I make is the best known to mankind,” I say haughtily. He pokes my belly, and I giggle and twist away, but he leans in and captures me again.
“And you’d be…you’d be Isis Hunter. If, shit, if that’s all right with you. You obviously don’t have to, I’m perfectly content being with you like this, but I just thought, I don’t know, I just thought—”
I turn and kiss him, shoving him onto the bed and sitting on his stomach playfully.
“Okay. So I marry you. What’s in it for me?”
“I devote myself to you,” he answers, face serious.
“You are already quite devoted.” I smirk, kissing down his jawline and into his collarbone.
“I protect you. As much as a hellion like you needs outside protection.”
I laugh against his chest and trail my mouth down it.
“I become yours,” he adds. “In every way.”
I kiss the hem of his jeans. “You already are.”
He pulls me up and kisses me hard and fierce, flipping us over and pushing me into the pillows, gently nipping at my ear.
“Then it’s easy, isn’t it? All that’s left is one silly white dress, and a cake, and our families.”
“You just want to see me in a wedding dress.” I snicker. He looks me up and down and gives me a cocky smirk as he gently snaps the thigh of my swimsuit against my skin.
“Can you blame me?”
“I blame you for everything. World hunger, Ronald Reagan, Lady Gaga”—I inhale as he presses his knee between my legs—“my current about-to-be-ravished state.”
He laughs, and the sound rings so clear and true in the house I want to kiss him again, and again. Forever. But he knits his lips instead.
“So, is that a no?”
I lace my arms around his neck and bring him closer to my face.
“Who do you think I am? I’m Isis Blake. I try everything once. Or four times. If it’s cheap enough and tasty enough—”
Jack’s ice eyes are serious and hard, and I lose my joking edge.
“—and I’d be honored to try marriage with you—”
Jack smiles.
“—you big stupid idiot.”