Academy Island

Story

I gazed into the fire, seeing images of chaos, panic, and the despair when boat and family could not be spotted above dragging waves rather than the flames. Nobody wanted to hear about that, did they? They all sat forward or moved closer so they could hear and it was a struggle not to shrink away from the invasion of personal space. This was far more attention than I was used to.  I breathed deeply for courage and shrugged, doing my best to blow it off as uneventful so I wouldn't have to go into the gory details. "The boat I was on sank and I swam for it. That's all there is to it."

The guys looked at each other, mouths grim. Kota nudged at his glasses, gazing over me like he'd missed something he hadn't noticed before. "Well that's alarming."

I didn't understand and it probably showed on my face, because the doctor leaned forward, apologetic. "We didn't notice a boat that swung by the island. We're supposed to keep an eye out for these things, if we want to get rescued that is."

My eyebrows crinkled at that. "But I didn't even sight the island until I'd been swimming for a few hours. How could you have possibly seen the boat from that distance?"

Kota visibly paled and sounded strangled. "Just how long were you in the water...approximately?"

I had to think about that for a minute. "The boat sank in the middle of the morning, so the better part of a day. I didn't land on the beach until it was evening I think."

"Holy shit."

I looked up to see most of the guys gaping at me. I cringed into myself and poked my lower lip up at my teeth. "Is it so surprising that I swam that long?"

Dr. Green had his hand over his eyes. "Not...exactly. Surprised you found the island and managed to get up on shore after such a feat, yes. That's a long time for anyone to swim, especially in bad weather."

The implications for the fates of my family members wormed a thread of despair through my chest. There was no way. I'd gone silent, my mouth rigid and had to come back to myself and the guys staring at me for more. I smiled tightly and dropped my hands into my lap, clasping them as if I had my heart between and couldn't let it escape.

"Anything else you want to know?"

There was a chorus of different questions, most of them aimed at where I was from and if I had anyone at home waiting for me. I guffawed at the last, was estranged from the first. Illinois wasn't much more to me than an occasional walk in the woods, besides the snow I missed so much. I focused more on the last place we'd lived, a quiet street called Sunnyvale Court. As soon as I mentioned it there was a sharp gasp and my hands were being gathered, tightly, Kota's green eyes catching every other thought away with their intensity.

"What are the odds? My mother and sister...ah, the Lee residence, did you know them? How are they? Anything you know, any news...please."

I glanced back and forth between the begging in his eyes, more than a little freaked out, and thought about the street I'd lived on for more than a year before my father had made the decision to take us on vacation, racking my brain for a mother and daughter that had lived around there. I wasn't too familiar with the neighbors, mother never let us talk or socialize to really know anyone. I had seen people living their lives around me for the most part, but to know their names or anything about them...I couldn't say. I went through everyone I'd seen in passing, bewildered, trying to make some kind of connection that would be meaningful to him. I was reaching, I knew, but I drew from the only name I really knew, and I hoped that he wasn't related, because we weren't on the best of terms.

"Do you mean Danielle?"

All life seemed to leave his shoulders and his head dropped, but his hands had tightened painfully on mine. Nathan put a hand on his back, lips tight and replacing Kota's intense stare with one of his own.