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Not a lot had been the same since Claire Hastings' boating accident six months ago. She'd lost her father, Mark, that day and also her love for the water. All it brought her now was sadness and bad memories, instead of happiness. Every time she closed her eyes, all she saw were flashes of that day, and all she wanted was for the nightmares to stop. All she wanted was to go back to a year ago when she and her family first moved to Kildare Island from Australia.
It was always a passion of Mark Hastings's to return to his hometown. He'd been living and working in Sydney for almost twenty years and wanted to spend time with his family where he grew up. So the Hastings family moved and settled in fairly quickly. Mark showed his wife and daughter around the island, teaching them all about the two sides: The Cut and Figure Eight, plus the two tribes that came with: The Kooks (the rich) and The Pogues (the not so rich). The Pogues worked multiple jobs and always found a way to put food on the table to feed their families. The Kooks on the other hand, had everything handed to them on a silver platter and Claire hated the idea of living in luxury.
She loved The Cut. Especially when she met her friends. She fit right in with them, and they were all curious and excited to welcome her into their tight-nit group. Especially Kiara, or Kie as they called her. She was the only other girl in the group, and despite them hardly knowing each other, the two girls quickly found comfort in being able to relate to one another on a level that the boys: John B, JJ and Pope, would never understand. Kiara and her family kindly gave Claire a job at their restaurant, The Wreck, too; a very popular place among tourists and the locals of both The Cut and Figure Eight.
The Pogues were carefree and wild, but fun and worked hard. They more often than not did whatever they wanted, whenever they wanted. They surfed, drank and went on boat rides along the marsh almost every day. It was absolute bliss for Claire, who'd felt like an outcast her entire life. Yet here she was, surrounded by a bunch of other kids who felt the same way.
But after the accident, Claire's couldn't even set foot on a boat without having a panic attack.
They were out fishing when a much bigger boat collided with theirs, and the impact alone was enough to send them both overboard and flip the boat upside down. The last thing she remembered seeing was her father struggling to untangle himself from an empty fishing net, before her head collided with the anchor, rendering her unconscious. She woke up three days later in the hospital and after the doctors explained she'd suffered a major concussion and almost drowned, they informed Claire that Mark had been unsuccessful in untangling himself from the net and drowned.
Her entire world came crashing down that day.
The authorities believed it was an accident but Claire believed otherwise. Of course, she had no proof to say it was a Kook's boat that hit them, so she had to drop the subject.
