✯ North Star ✯

4 - Cracks In Paradise

The storm hit long before the thunder did.

I shot awake, or — no, not awake. Ripped out of the nightmare like someone yanked a cord. My chest was heaving, sweat dripping down the side of my face, fingers shaking even though the room was warm. John B was dead asleep beside me, tangled in the sheets, and for a second I envied him. I wished my brain knew how to stay still like that.

The dream clung to me like wet clothes.

Dad's voice...Rafe's eyes...
Accusing. Blaming.
Grabbing.

I felt phantom fingers on my throat and wiped at my neck before I even realized I was doing it, my whole body still convinced for one horrible second that it was real.

When lightning cracked outside, the whole room flashed white and I flinched so hard my back hit the headboard.

Too loud. Too sharp.
My ears rang like someone fired a gun.

I slipped out of bed quietly, knees weak, and walked to the window. Rain hammered against the glass. Another flash — and the lightning hit the shop across the water. I jumped again, heart ramming against my ribs like it wanted out.

I stepped back, sank to the floor, hugging my knees.
Come on, Stella...breathe. Just breathe.

But the more I tried, the faster everything played back: Dad's face, the gunshot, the island, Rafe screaming, the storm that night. Fire everywhere.

And suddenly I was crying and shaking and telling myself to stop like that ever actually worked.
"Come on....come on, stop. Please," I whispered, my voice breaking.

But the storm didn't care.

Morning came like nothing happened. It always did.

Everyone was outside arguing about budgets and fish and repairs. And I was just pretending my hands weren't still trembling, the exhaustion of last night still sitting heavy behind my eyes.

"Anyone want fried fish?" John B asked, holding up a net full of dead ones.

"What's the damage Pope?" JJ asks.

"Fuse box is busted. Without the live bait, the fisherman won't come, and there goes half our business right there. We have enough profit to cover it, but barely just barely. All right? This is it. The last of our AU," Pope says, holding out the last piece of gold we had left.

"Uh what?" John B asks.

"Gold. It's the periodic symbol for gold."