The Stars Will Catch Me

Chapter 16

The flowers Aaron gave me are in a pitcher I found in the kitchen. I couldn’t find any sort of vase so I had to improvise. It actually looks nice in the pitcher, like it was an artistic choice meant to symbolize something - though I’m not sure what. 

José heard me come back in with Aaron and is begging me to play chess. It has to be close to midnight but I’m learning the boys here go to sleep far into the night. Luka is with him, wrinkling his nose at the younger boy’s request. 

“Chess is not a very suitable game for us three amigos. It's only for two players.” 

“Exactly,” José says, rolling his eyes at Luka. “I don’t know how to play. I just want to watch.” 

Luka gives me a look over José’s head. It tells me the young boy’s logic is invariably like this.

As we relocate to the study room where the board games are kept, I overhear José and Luka whispering to each other. With them both glancing back at me frequently, I start to think they want me to hear them. 

José leans over to whisper in Luka’s ear, cupping his hand over his mouth animatedly. “Do you think her and Aaron were making out in the woods?” 

José teasing me about Aaron in private was one thing but now he’s getting the rest of the boys to gang up on me too? I cross my arms over my chest. “Don’t say things like that!”

Luka looks me up and down while stroking his chin. “Her hair's a mess. They definitely were.” 

I catch my reflection in a mirror mounted in the hall. “My hair is always like this." 

He winces. “Yikes.” 

The boys run the rest of the length to the study room to avoid any retaliation. They make it there before me and set the box of chess pieces on the table after pulling up chairs for the three of us. 

"Cookies would make this better." José waves Luka off. "Get our signature three flavor combo, por favor!" 

Luka does as he says, exiting the room to go back to the place we just came from. I would have told José to get off his lazy behind and do it himself had he asked me. Luka’s patience shouldn’t shock me. He does share a room with Shawn, after all. Plus, I can see he has a soft spot for José. Who wouldn't? He's such a character. 

I’m lining the pieces on the chessboard when José timidly says, “I like having you here on the island.” 

The relaxed posture of his tone shifts into something startlingly vulnerable. He tucks his head in between his shoulders, a shell of the confident boy he normally is. 

The comment makes me smile but I hide it the best I can, keeping my gaze on the knight in my hands so as to not scare him into silence. For whatever reason, admitting his feelings so boldly seems difficult for José. 

“Really?” 

He frowns, rolling the stray pawn around the table. “You remind me of my older sister.” 

Due to the circumstances of all of Neverlands’s members, it’s hard to grasp if any of them had a family or think fondly of them. After a conversation with Aaron, I learned that Nakpuna’s facility got a hold of these kids in a number of ways. All of them were illegal in nature. Some were sold after being kidnapped or trafficked, some given away by their parents. I know whatever happened with José has to be bad just based on the fact he’s here. 

I tread carefully as I propose my question. “Where is she?” 

“We were separated before I got taken onto the ship.” He absent mindedly slides the chess piece across the board like a toy car. “I wish Aaron had been able to rescue her too. I have a feeling she ended up in a worse place than the ship.” 

My heart tears in my chest for him and his sister but it also burns for justice. Nakpuna needs to be stopped from ever doing this to other children. Saving a few isn’t enough. There will always be more. He'll keep stealing more away, he'll keep running tests on them. 

Taking down such a powerful and protected organization is easier said than done. We only have Neverland because a few adults back in town were willing to sacrifice their own safety to fund this runaway shelter. 

I guess the good guys can't win all the time. Even though Neverland is a small victory, it's amazing these children have been saved. 

“I’m sorry they couldn’t help her.” 

He shrugs and speaks in a consolidating tone that gives me the impression he’s sorry he may have said something to upset me. “What makes me feel better is I don’t think of it as something sad I’m dealing with alone. Everyone else here has something that makes them sad. They’re all different things but it hurts the same.” 

They shouldn’t have had these things done to them in the first place, I want to say. 

A child shouldn’t know what it's like to be rejected by their family. A child shouldn’t have to grieve this young. They shouldn’t spend their playground days locked up and tested like lab rats. 

This isn’t normal, José. 

You should have had more. 

I force myself not to over complicate things for him. He seems to be coping best he can without my commentary. Instead, I commend him for his wisdom. “That’s very true.”

“Besides, I didn’t even make it onto the ship. Luka and Shawn did but they’re doing fine now. If they’re fine, then I’ll be fine too.”   

It’s sweet that he looks up to his friends. I suppose it was natural for him. We're constantly trying to find someone to model our life by. If it’s not our parents, it’s siblings. If not them, it’s friends then neighbors then celebrities. We want to be led even when we don’t realize it. 

I haven't had anyone to look up to. My parents are the opposite of what I want to be and before Neverland I didn't know anyone who had been in my situation. 

The thing is, José's friends probably aren't coping as well as he thinks they are. I remember Jimmy sobbing in his bed the night of the storm. Maybe the others are better at hiding their pain but they're just as wounded. They have to be. 

 “You’ve got a strong group of friends here.” Strong not because of their lack of suffering but their ability to bear it. 

“Family,” he says. “We’re more like family.” 

Luka waltzes back into the room with a giant packet of cookies in his hands. He balances a jug of juice on top of it and I worry he'll drop onto his toe. After plopping the goodies onto the table, he places himself onto a chair. 

“Alright,” he says, ripping open the package. He takes three cookies from the stack; one vanilla, one chocolate, and one strawberry. He hands me the strawberry, José the chocolate, and keeps the vanilla for himself. Thus, it completes the ‘circle of cookies’ as José called it. “Let’s play some chess!” 

We each take a bite of our cookies, the crunch noise resounding in the space. 

During the chess game, in the back of my mind, I start to rethink my definition of family. Maybe they're not bound to the traditional concept. Maybe I don't need to have parents to have a family. I could make one of my own, composed of three people who decide they will be there for each other. 

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