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“Hurry!” Everett shouts behind him.

The ferry waits for no one. I pick up speed despite the fact that I’m wearing my spilled iced latte. We round the corner of the loading dock, waving our arms like the ferry would even care. We scan our tickets and stumble across the ramp. At the bottom level of the ferry mostly full of locals avoiding the wind, we find a booth.

“We need to skip breakfast next time. And coffee.” I wipe coffee from my arm, cheeks, and neck.

“We need to leave four hours early next time.”

“Or just pull an all-nighter.” Everett laughs and slides two fingers down a strand of my hair. “You forgot some.”

This is the one thing Everett wants from our grand final summer—to climb the lighthouse on Loggerhead Island. Only accessible by ferry, the island doesn’t allow cars, so we have a golf cart rental waiting for us. Had we missed this ferry, it would have taken another hour for the next one and we might have missed our golf cart rental window. I thought waking up before the sun rose would give us enough time to make it, but my bacon came out too late at Landlubber’s Cafe and we stopped for coffee at a different cafe up the road. Too many locals were in line for coffee on their way to work, so it took longer than we anticipated.

On the water, the ferry rocks enough to tell me that we’ve taken off. With my eyes closed, it feels like I’m on a swing. About to fall off the rails. About to jump off just because I shouldn’t.

With my eyes open, the shrinking land teases me. The seagulls at the stern multiply by a pile of Cheez-Its. The waves juggle my life in their hands. I don’t like my chances. The subtle rock of the boat reminds me too much of last August, of Hadley.

I avoid eye contact with the windows and the sprawling ocean behind them, my eyes deciding that the linoleum table is more interesting.

Everett puts a hand on my knee under the table. Until then, I didn’t notice how vigorously I was bouncing my legs. His touch pulls my gaze up to him, pulls my heart like taffy.

His questioning eyes are beacons on a night sky. “You okay?”

I nod and swallow, then try to force a smile. His eyes ground me. “Yeah. You want to climb the lighthouse, so we’re going to climb the lighthouse.”

“Thanks for coming.”

Everyone else is busy today, so even though the what-ifs kept me up last night, I agreed to join him. I deserve to fall in love with living again, and that starts with ignoring the tornado of catastrophic thoughts that enters my mind whenever I’m out to sea. What if we capsize? What if a whale surfaces? What if I glance at the water wrong and hallucinate the ghost of her?

Everett points to a spot on the patterned linoleum. “This looks like a blobfish.”

The corner of my mouth turns toward the ceiling. There’s no blue sky above, no clouds either, at least not on the floor level of a passenger ferry, but Everett has brought the clouds to us. We can touch them. Decode their squiggles. Tell stories from the beige and white mosaic.

I point to a spot next to my forgotten coffee cup. “This looks like a tree with an owl hole.”

“Or the big red storm on Jupiter.”

The clouds on the table show us Christmas stockings, a cricket playing a banjo, two children fighting over a kite string. We map a new world despite the real world just beyond the windows. That world isn’t for us.

Until it is.

The ferry jostles into Loggerhead Island Marina. After we disembark, Everett slinks into the driver’s side of the golf cart and takes off for the lighthouse. The roads are shrunken, only suitable for bikes and golf carts. Landscaped trees line each side, breaking only for long driveways and the Cape Cod style houses sprouted at the end. We drive through palm frond shadows. I stretch my arm out to catch the wind, knit something like magic with my fingers.

The lighthouse, which is a mere chess piece from the banks of Piper Island, towers over the palm trees and mighty oaks. You could unearth stories from the shapes in the worn paint. The color of the moon and its craters, it looks straight out of a vintage postcard. From the parking lot, it’s as tall as the Boardwalk Ferris wheel, and since I conquered that one last year, I know I can do this. I didn’t get on a boat for nothing.

This is for Everett.

I look at him in hopes that he can read the sentiment in my eyes as we enter the ground floor room. It’s dark and musty in the bottom of the lighthouse. Curiosity takes over as we examine the black and white blueprints like historians.

Before we ascend the staircase, an actual historian teaches us about its dramatic construction, the Destruction of 1877, the ghosts that “haunt” the stairwells as a result. I don’t believe in ghosts, but I still shiver from the thought despite the hot, humid, unventilated room. Visions of ghosts cross my mind, tattered souls wandering the beach in ruffled, white dresses, lost in one way or another.

I wish they were real, so I’d know Hadley was still here.

I’d know Hadley was being taken care of.

Is Hadley over there, on the banks of Piper Island? Does she wonder why everyone left her there? Is it cold when night falls? Does she stand over a perfect sand dollar, screaming at distant beachcombers to grab it before the ocean takes it?

Do they know she’s really talking about herself?

I don’t believe in ghosts, but would it make things better to know that she’s there and I just can’t see her?

This is for Everett, so it’s not time to cry. I bite my lip and look toward the end of the spiral staircase to distract myself.

I have the entire climb to compose myself, pretend I’m only distraught from the endless steps and summer heat. Everett goes ahead of me, clambering up the first set of stairs. We pass a few windows, which must have been put there to revive the lighthouse keepers, remind them of their ascension, assure them they’re not too far from sunlight. Dust motes come to life inside the golden rays. Distant footsteps echo as we approach the top.

The stairs spit us out at the top. Once our eyes adjust to the blinding sun, the view takes our breath away. A sea of lush green treetops, paper white rooftops winking in the sunlight, waterways carved through the marsh grass like fireworks, exposed and ruddy in the low tide.

The panoramic view showcases each shade of blue swirling in the sky. No longer just blue; the sky is every blue. The horizon is moon jelly blue from a blanket of clouds miles away. The swath directly above us is sapphire blue, unobstructed by the spider web clouds. Where the blues meet, the sky is the color of Neptune. I bet if I touched it, my fingers would freeze.

Water surrounds us on all sides, its own confident shade of blue, unique from the sky, but only blue because of it. Since the lighthouse is situated on the top of the island, half of the view is the churning sea.

“Wow,” I exclaim once I catch my breath. I could stand here forever, watching the tides cover the marsh and reveal it again. “Is this everything you hoped it would be?”

“More.” The wind makes a mess of the hair just above his forehead.

My hand springs into action, but it’s a fruitless endeavor this high up. His hair has a mind of its own, as does mine. “I can’t believe you’ve never done this. You’ve been here, what, five years now?”

“Almost six, but they’re only open in the summer and we’ve just never gotten around to it.”

“I wonder what this looks like in the winter.”

“Black, white, and dead, like those pictures at the bottom of the stairs.”

I giggle. I understand what he means. Winter might as well be colorless, a photograph of summer left to wilt in the sun before it boards itself up for the off-season. This winter sent me into hibernation, but instead of sleep, I became consumed with homework, exams, college preparation, therapy, and my weekend job at the tennis court. On the coldest, busiest days in Raleigh, I wished to be a Piper Island toad warming on a rock, but there was life to live and a mind to keep in line, so I couldn’t.

The first day the warmth came back, sap rose in my soul.

I woke up hungry for more. At least that has never changed.

“Except the sunsets. They’re more vibrant in the winter. Something about clean, dry air and a lower angle on the horizon,” Everett says.

“You researched that?”

He smirks at me. “You weren’t born knowing that?”

“Of course I was.” I smirk. Heat creeps on my face from more than just the sun.

Somewhere out in the middle of the water, a dolphin comes up for air, its gray skin glistening in the sun.

I gasp. “Look! A dolphin!”

It’s gone as quickly as it came, but it returns a few waves down. With it returns our gasps. We lean farther off the railing like a few inches will make it easier to see. Another one appears behind it, then another, until all three dance among the waves.

I raise an eyebrow and look at Everett. “You know you can make wishes on dolphins?”

“You researched that?” he asks.

“Yeah, something about extending your good luck on a rare sight.” I let him believe it for a half second, then nudge his elbow with mine. “No, I made that one up.”

“We should still wish. You can’t be too careful.”

Nodding, I close my eyes and wait for a wish to emerge from the dark waters of my mind. I need to stop trying to fix the past, but I can’t help the first thing that comes to mind.

I wish Hadley didn’t get in the water that day.

Staring at the water from the cosmos, of course it’s my first thought. Ghosts must be real, after all, and the ones at the lighthouse have been speaking to me all day. That’s what echoed up the staircase. That’s why the dust motes were so thick in the sunlight.

Everything is a ghost. Every memory is haunted.

The wall in my hallway, the ice cream shops, the books about the stars: all footprints washed away with the tide.

“What’d you wish for?” Everett asks.

It doesn’t matter whether I tell him—this wish cannot come true—but Everett doesn’t deserve the sorrow of the truth. Not on his day. Not on top of the lighthouse. Not in the presence of dolphins.

“Happiness,” I say with a smile.

Age 13, June 17

Holden and Haven didn’t see danger like I did.

Of course Saray insisted on coming to Sapphire Beach Boardwalk with us. My mom would have done the same, and she would have been upset with me if she found out we’d walked around by ourselves in such a public place. Walking around alone only felt safe on the island; Piper Island had a bubble around it that would never burst.

I didn’t mind that we had to walk so close to Saray. How could I be mad? She bought me cotton candy.

Haven was not as content. Her sandals snapped louder than usual on the wooden slats beneath us. I offered her a pinch of cotton candy. She smiled and took some.

Boardwalks were pretty, but they also reminded me of gas stations—something about the bright lights visible in broad daylight and the vague smell of car exhaust. Not to mention the sweaty people we slunk through and the smell of cigarettes and beer everywhere.

We made our way to Tsunami, and then it was just me dissolving cotton candy on my tongue next to all the parents waiting for their adventurous children to get off the ride. Making small talk with Saray beat dying on a rollercoaster thanks to flimsy harnesses, even if that meant I had to watch my best friends die instead.

Saray started in, asking me questions about school and how I was going to fill my summer and the off-season back home. I told her that I loved school but always counted down to the summer on my school planner. I told her I planned to spend the summer doing everything with the twins and Mason and Jorge just like last summer, with riding Tsunami as the only exception.

She laughed and said something in Spanish, then agreed.

I told her all about my mom. I didn’t tell her about my dad.

I thought she might have a clue. She was a mom, after all. Haven’s mom, no less.

When the twins’ train car made it down the big drop, they put their hands to the sky, mouths open wide. I couldn’t hear them over the wooden creaks, but I knew they were screaming for their lives. Even though it looked like a fun time, I couldn’t shake the words Mom said when we drove past the bright, beckoning lights of the North Carolina State Fair years ago. Promise me you’ll never get on one of those death traps.

Promises are sacred, especially when sealed with pinkies.

The twins ran back to us.

“Quinn, you have to ride it with us next time!” Holden sounded like he was still on the rollercoaster.

Haven nodded, her hair crazy from the big drop.

“I like watching,” I said to my flip-flops.

“It was nice of Quinn to keep me company,” Saray said. She put a hand on my shoulder, squeezing tightly like we were buddies bonded from waiting together.

It was a weird feeling—a motherly touch not meant to scold me or keep me nine steps from danger.

We started to feel the effect of the June afternoon sun and escaped under a shaded picnic table. We ordered steamy corndogs from a vendor for lunch. It was almost too hot to eat them, but Holden still challenged me to an eating contest. I objected, but Haven took him on. Holden won, but I told them both I was the real winner for still having my corndog.

“I missed you, Quinn.” Saray laughed heartily, revealing the wrinkles around her eyes. Mom had those same wrinkles whenever I actually got a laugh out of her.

Saray’s phone pinged. “It’s Everett’s mom. She wants us to meet them at the front.”

“You’re going to love Everett.” Haven grabbed my wrists and said with a laugh, “He’s just like us—can’t find his name in the gift shops.”

I laughed and bit the last crunchy part of my corndog on our way to the front. I didn’t have the heart to say I’d recently found my name on a few items.

Haven had told me little bits about Everett Bishop, their new friend from school. His mom, Liezel, immigrated to the United States from the Philippines and met his dad, Hank, in Chicago. Everett grew up in Chicago and moved down here once Hank sold his construction empire and used the profits to build a beach house, have a simpler life with his wife and son. What an impossible dream.

“He’s way too nice and mature to be one of us.” Haven looked at Holden, smirking. “I know an immature teenager when I see one.”

Holden rolled his eyes and flipped her off, just like an immature teenager would. Saray couldn’t resist a laugh, despite the promise to ground him later.

At the mouth of the Boardwalk, I saw who I assumed were Everett and Liezel. He had black hair curled like the ocean waves crashing below us. He was taller than her already, standing with his hands in the pockets of his board shorts.

The moms did some secret parental exchange while Everett joined us past the ticket booth.

“Everett!” Haven said, grabbing his wrist. “Meet Quinn!”

“Hello to you, too,” he said to Haven. He turned to me and waved. “Hi, Quinn. I’m Everett Bishop. I’ve heard a lot about you.”

I made a point to look him in his brown eyes, trying to make mine look just as happy as his. “Same. I mean, I’m Quinn Kessler, not Everett Bishop. I’ve heard a lot about you, I mean.”

What in the hell, Quinn?

Everett laughed. “So Haven was right, you are funny.”

“The funniest,” Haven said.

What other things had Haven told him about me? He was probably expecting my dirty blonde hair and freckles, but was her story similar to what she told Jorge and Mason two summers ago?

If she told him I was funny, did she also mention the not-so-funny things? It didn’t seem that way, because he seemed interested in me. Or maybe he really was as nice and mature as Haven said. Or both.

“It’s great to meet you.” I smiled and stared at a beauty mark in the center of his cheek.

It had to have been put there on purpose by some universal force that kissed little brown dots on people’s cheeks. It was the same force that gave me and Hadley our freckles, but it must have lingered with Everett, molding his with more purpose so he could still wear his kiss long after summer was gone.

“I’m bored. Can we go ride rides again?” Holden faked a yawn, earning another sharp look from Saray.

“I forgot the world revolves around Holden Rivera-Sanchez.” Everett crossed his arms and smirked, which earned a few laughs from everyone but Holden, who seems surprised someone finally played along.

We said goodbye to Liezel and headed to the end of the Boardwalk where the rollercoasters were. It smelled like a weird mix of fried Oreos, onion rings, soft pretzels, and popcorn. We slunk past the arcade’s midday neon and the rigged games for the people who liked to throw money away.

When a game attendant noticed us, I looked down and pretended my ears didn’t work, just like Mom taught me to do whenever a stranger tried to talk to me.

Back at Tsunami, I was a speck, a mere whisper among the distant screams, squealing chains, and groaning wood. Holden and Haven headed for the line, their hair waving goodbye for them. My sandals were stuck, melted in the sun like a piece of gum. Haven and Holden shrank from our sight.

Everett looked at me. “You don’t want to ride it?”

If I hadn’t been frozen here in this blistering heat, wearing fear on my face like sunscreen, I would have thought this Everett was very perceptive. Or maybe Haven told him more than I initially thought.

I shook my head. He must have thought I was so lame. Saray looked between us, sorry but silent.

“We could do the Ferris wheel instead.” Everett pointed to the other towering structure above us.

Looking at it was dizzying. It felt like there was a wheel going round and round in my head. The Ferris wheel was a spindly, shaky monster that stared straight at the parts of the ocean deep enough to drown in. From that high up, it turned wooden slats into concrete bricks, people into ants, me into a pancake.

I raced through the horrors and gulped. “I’m scared of that, too.”

“I am too. I was just testing you. You passed.” His smile melted off one side of his face.

The way his chest puffed out when he spoke made me think he only just decided he didn’t like spindly, shaky monsters. Or he could just be like me, with a mom who painted darkness in her child’s eyes. I couldn’t tell. No matter the truth, that made at least two smart kids in this place. We could make our own fun. That was what smart kids did.

“Let’s ride the carousel,” I said because I was getting tired of being a jagged shard of my mom. I wasn’t crazy enough to ride the monsters, but carousels had to count for something.

Everett let me lead the way, half a shadow behind me. The railing was cold and stuck to my sweaty arms.

“How old do you think that gum is?” Everett pointed to a clump of gum next to his Converses.

It boasted its soot-colored glory. It looked like bird poop, or a very unlucky penny. I thought really hard about it, my fingers wrapped around my chin, a scientist mulling over the possibilities of the unexplored ocean.

“I think it’s fresh. This is a boardwalk in June. It could easily look that bad after one day.” I pointed to everyone around us: parents pushing strollers, gaggles of scary teens, seedy guys stumbling all by themselves. “Our shoes are filthy.”

“True, but look how smooth it is. People have been stepping on this baby for years. It almost makes you want to chew up a piece of gum, stick it there, and come back a few hours later.”

“I can’t promise I won’t send the twins to destroy it, Dr. Bishop.”

I had no idea why I added that last part, but before I sank into myself, Everett chuckled. “That would be cheating, Dr. Kessler.” He tightened a fake tie around his neck, his voice uppity.

My face warmed. He was willing to be just as dorky as me.

Everett Bishop really was as nice as Haven said, but mature, I had my qualms about.

When it was our turn on the carousel, I darted for the white and orange horse I’d been eyeing in line. It was a chore to pull myself up. I figured out the seatbelt situation and rested my temple against the bar. Everett buckled into the gray and teal horse next to mine.

Hidden in the shade of the carousel, the light bulbs glowed brightly in the daytime. Golden trim, red curtains, and porcelain horses waited for their millionth trip around nothing. I saw myself in an oval mirror behind Everett’s head. My reflection shone back, bulb-yellow, red-faced, and freckled.

Everett looked at me in the mirror. I looked back at his beauty mark, yellowed in the light.

He turned around to look at the real me. “Haven told me about your necklace,” he said.

“Oh, this?” I grabbed the three coquinas.

“When will you put this summer’s shell on?”

“When it feels right.”

“I think it’s really cool. Piper Island does seem like a place you’d never want to forget.”

“It is.” I smiled and let go of the memories trapped in each shell.

A bell went off and the carousel cranked up. The horses started their dance to an airy carnival jingle. I watched the Boardwalk go up and down with me. Even though we were barely moving, my stomach got confused.

I looked at Everett to steady myself. He was already looking at me. He must have been dizzy, too.

“How do you like North Carolina so far?”

“It’s different,” he shouted over the music. “So much quieter and slower. And you guys talk really weird.”

“You think I have an accent?” I gasped fake offense. I never thought I was one of those southerners with a thick accent, but if anyone could sniff out the southern twang in someone’s voice, it was a northerner. The thought of him noticing things about me the same way I’d noticed things about him made me feel warm inside.

“Like a hillbilly,” he said in an offensively drawn-out accent.

“Your impression is awful.” I laughed with my entire mouth.

I caught myself in the mirror, careless next to a boy I’d just met, conversing over the carnival tunes like we’d known each other forever.

It felt like we lived on this Boardwalk and the carousel was part of our daily routine.

Our new introductions felt more like old talks and old laughs.

Natural, like how the moon churned the tides.

If this was what being on a rollercoaster felt like, then maybe my mom was wrong.

Still, I needed to be careful.

I needed to listen to my stomach, mad at me for the cotton candy and corndogs, and maybe something else I wasn’t ready to admit just yet.

When we stopped spinning, a couple of kids ran to their parents who were hiding under the palm tree shade.

The parents greeted their kids with open arms and mouths.

They spoke words I couldn’t make out over all the Boardwalk whirs, but the sight alone made my stomach untwist and twist again.

I wanted to run back around and ride again, but I’d already broken too many pinky promises, so I peeled my sweaty thighs off the horse and followed Everett out of the shadowy wonderland.

On the way back to Saray, we passed a trash can that smelled like vomit.

It toyed with my stomach.

The twins still weren’t done; they were back in line to ride Tsunami yet again.

Tsunami was easier to keep an eye on from this far away.

The drop snarled when a train car rounded the curve.

The wood looked beaten down from exposure to the elements, and you were supposed to trust that suffocating wood with your life.

Behind me, the carousel sang a lullaby.

It was a twinkling sweet music box, the quintessential sound of sugar stomach aches and perfect days.

The two rides competed, yanking me in their impossible game of tug-of-war.

I looked at Everett. “You should join them.”

He chewed on his lip. “I’m okay. It looks pretty scary to me.”

“I’m glad someone agrees with me.”

Under the shade of an umbrella, we talked about everything.

What made us tick, what ticked us off, what stories we told ourselves to fall asleep. His favorite movie genre was science fiction, but he watched Hallmark movies with his parents.

I told him about home: Saturday morning tennis with my mom and ice cream for dinner when I got a good report card. I told him there was nothing more fun than summer at Piper Island.

I challenged him to catch up on the Piper Island adventures he’d missed the past few summers, and he told me that mathematically, he would catch up by the middle of February.

I giggled and asked him if he also earned ice cream for dinner when report cards rolled around.

He assured me he did get a food reward, only it was a Filipino dish called pinakbet, cooked with his choice from the fresh seafood market. “King crab legs,” he said.

Everett pointed to a cluster of clouds in the sky. He spoke its shape into existence as an alien riding a UFO. I said it looked like spaghetti boiling in a pot.

Saray agreed with him after some convincing. The wind that high up changed the clouds frequently enough to keep playing. The sky sent us a starfish. A cactus. A monkey wearing a Santa hat. A garden gnome.

The twins walked back with their clothes clung to them all wrong. They apologized for taking too long, but I didn’t mind.

I was enjoying my time.

The sun finally set, so now the Boardwalk made itself glow. Lights zigzagged all around us, lining food vendors, wrapping around palm trees, and canopying between lampposts. Everything untouched by light was a deep purple color that smoldered opposite the golden glow.

After dinner and a competitive frenzy in the arcade, the Rivera-Sanchezes got on the Ferris wheel for a better glimpse of that post-dinner Sapphire Beach sunset.

Everett and I sat across from each other on a picnic table. He toyed with a bouncy ball he won with his arcade tickets while I pulled away at a new bag of cotton candy I bought with the twenty Blair had given me. It felt right for such a sky, all pink and cotton candy-esque on the horizon. My stomach reeled from all the junk food.

And Everett, I was finally ready to admit.

“I can’t watch you eat that stuff.” Everett eyed the bag and grimaced.

“It’s one of my favorite things ever. It’s what summer would taste like if you could turn it into strings, spin it, and stuff it into a bag.” I rubbed the pink sugar between my fingertips.

“When you put it like that, it makes me almost want to like it.”

I raised my eyebrows. “Well, what does Dr. Bishop like?”

“Dr. Bishop’s a pi?a colada kind of guy. You have to admit, coconut is pretty summery too. If you could beat summer with a hammer and shred its insides to pieces, that’s what it would be.”

“Pi?a colada?” I wrinkled my nose. “It makes my jaw clench. Come on, just have a taste.” I held some cotton candy out for him, a fluffy cloud shaped like nothing but cotton candy. The sweat on my fingers melted it into a darker pink.

“That’s disgusting,” he said, but his voice sounded all light and dreamy like cotton candy.

Or pi?a colada, if you were weird like Everett Bishop.