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Waypoint

Easton

“ W hat the fuck!” Seriously, I’ve never been scared of a goat before.

But then, I’ve never met one with long pointy antlers on a six-inch-wide trail.

One that has his head bowed in not a respectful come pet me way.

No, the thing is ready to charge like we’re waving a red cape in its face and it’s a running bull in Pamplona. “Nice goat, shoo.”

Calvin’s eyes go wide, and he flicks his head over his shoulder. “Nice goat?”

I shrug. “What the hell do you want me to call it? I don’t want to be gored.

I’ve lost enough blood as it is already.

I’m leaning into the cliff. If the thing does hit me, I want to at least have a chance of not going flying down into the bottom of the jungle.

I’ve already done that once today, and that was enough. I’m keeping my feet on this damn path.”

Calvin puts one massive foot in front of the other and rises all the way up to his full height.

Holy hell, he’s even bigger than he normally is.

Like a yeti rising out of the night. His hands above his head, he yells.

I’m not even sure what. It’s German or something.

He growls and steps toward the goat. The billy goat lifts its head and takes a step back, and then it flips itself on the path, running away from us.

“How in the hell?” I’m shaking my head, but I’m moving as quickly as he is.

The two of us follow the goat down the trail.

I don’t want to be in awe. Too much of the asshole Green has been on display today.

And if there’s anything my dad used to say, it’s that when there is stress, that’s when people show you who they truly are.

Granted, Green’s used his smarts to get us away from the pirates and I’m not dead yet, but there’s a lot of parts of him that I would rather not have to deal with on a daily basis.

“What did you even yell?” The thing was guttural and demonic-like.

“It’s some of the only Norwegian I know. My grandmother used to scream it when she stubbed her toe. I think it loosely means ‘shit tied up with a pretty blue ribbon.’ Or something like that. Used to scare the hell out of me as a kid. I thought it might work on a goat too. You doing okay?”

“Sure, let’s go with okay.” Shot and almost fell off a damn mountain.

But I’m also not dead. So I guess I can go with okay.

“It’s getting dark. I can keep moving. I’d rather not have to stay the night here.

” The ledge we came from would have made a better place to rest for the night, but this path has a good feeling about it.

Moving. Better than not moving. Every little bit adds up.

Damn, I’m just full of memories of my family. Every little bit adds up was something my mother used to say when I was a kid. I adopted it as a mantra for my swimming training. Every second I cut off my time, I’d say it. And it never steered me wrong.

My mom. My real mom. I can’t even remember the last time I thought about her. That’s horrible.

“Right.” Green’s already moving. The wind changes as we round the corner where the goat disappeared to. The rock cliff opens up into a slope. “Fuck, this is good.”

“What?” I struggle to keep up with Calvin.

“This is the pomelo side. I’ve been here before. Well, not here. But over there.” He points into the distance, past the goats. Into the jungle.

The goats scatter from the path, not far but enough that I don’t think I’m going to get gored.

I’m watching the damn goats when my heel gets wedged between two rocks and I stumble forward.

Out of damn habit, I reach with my right arm, and when I brace myself with it, I scream.

It’s probably my imagination, but it echoes around the rocks.

I clasp my arm to my chest with my good hand.

My legs are fine. My feet are torn to shreds, but nothing too bad.

Calvin glares. “You good?” He stands next to me, his hand out to help me up.

“I’m good.”

“Then shut the fuck up.”

I nod. “You ever think of becoming a surgeon?”

“No, why?”

“Just wondered.” I hold my arm close to me. Every last surgeon I worked with during my clinical rounds had the same shitty personality.

“The light’s almost gone. I’m aiming to get us to that flat spot over there. Then when the moon rises, we can make our way down the rest of the way and find some water and maybe some fruit.”

I don’t care what it takes. I’m not going to stumble again. And I’m sure as hell not going to make the mistake of trying to use my arm to stop me from falling. What in the hell was I thinking?

The flat spot against the wall is protected, and there are no goats, boars, or pirates around.

“Get a little sleep,” says Calvin once we’ve settled. “I’ll wake you up when the moon is out.”

“Or we could both get some rest and stay here until morning.”

Even in the almost pitch black, I can sense Calvin glaring at me.

“Whatever.” I lean over onto my side and then roll onto my back. There’s no way I’ll be getting comfortable, no matter how hard I try. Pebbles are digging into the back of my scalp. I brush them away with my good arm.

Instead of focusing on the throb of my arm, I try to think about how we need to get back to camp as quickly as possible.

I don’t want Haley thinking we’ve been kidnapped by the pirates or, worse, are dead.

She had a hard enough time when we didn’t know what had happened to Sam.

Closing my eyes, I can see her blond hair on the day we buried the diamonds.

And then I see her in the house in Miami.

She’s floating on a raft in the pool while I make her drinks.

But then she’s telling me how to make the drink, and I just stand back and laugh.

Fucking hell, did I make a mistake not telling her I love her? I should have told her. The second I see her, I’m going to tell her.

The unicorn float she’s on turns into a Jolly Roger. And her bathing suit changes to a ragged, turn-of-the-century, pirate costume—not one with guns but a kind of bad Halloween costume. She turns to me, and it’s like a horror movie; her hands are stumps. I drop the glass.

“Wake up, Rockwell. The moon’s out. We can make our way down to water and down the path to the east. I’ve got an idea. If I can find something, I can make you a better sling for your arm.”

I’m shaking and I’m cold, but my eyes are open. I run my hand over my face, half to wake myself up and half to check whether I have a fever. I don’t think I do. But what the hell is Calvin talking about? “Like, out of what? Banana leaves?”

“Yeah, maybe? That might be just the thing, banana leaves.”

“Sure.” The guy’s crafty. After all, he came up with the idea for the fish weir. But mostly, I’m thankful the damn dream’s gone. I shiver, remembering parts of it. It wasn’t bad, more odd and frustrating.

There are moon shadows around me which remind me of Emily. She used to love to get up in the middle of the night to take pictures by the light of the moon. My sister—I don’t think she ever had a good night’s sleep in her whole life.

My chest weighs heavily as I clamp my arm to it. Emily and Haley. Fuck, I don’t seem able to protect either of them. If the pirates rounded the island looking for us and found Haley, I don’t know what I’d do. If anything happens to her, I’ll pay to have the entire ocean wiped clean of the vermin.

Fuck, it never crossed my mind before that the other raft might have been found by pirates. I keep picturing them safe and sound back home. Emily and Dad.

I shake the rest of the sleep off. “Sorry. Yeah, I’m ready to go. You think you can make a sling? That would help when we climb over to the other side.”

“Yup. It’s not as steep as what we had to climb from Chicken Beach, but it’s not a stroll on the beach either. You want help?” He’s offering his hand to me again.

“No.” I glance at my feet. There are scabs and scratches all over them. What’s a few more? I step through the sharp rocks, following Calvin downward to the jungle floor. Down and down, losing all the elevation I worked so hard for. But he’s right. It’s fine.

The jungle floor here is a lot like back at camp.

There’s a small stream and ferns, but after a half hour of stumbling through the night, it slowly changes from ferns to grass and stretches of fruit trees.

My forehead furrows. Calvin specifically said he didn’t think they had been planted by people.

But last time I checked, trees didn’t naturally grow in a straight line.

Calvin frowns at me. “Yeah, I told a white lie. You’ll see.” He trudges through the dry grass. We break through the grass. There’s a small cottage. A barn. Or what used to be a barn. It burned down a long time ago. And the cottage’s roof is caved in.

I scowl at him. There are white lies, and then there’s just outright lying. “Why?”

“I guess you don’t have to see for yourself. Wait here.”

“Why?” I follow him.

“Trust me. You don’t need to be haunted by it too.”

My eyes flit from the caved-in roof to the charred barn.

Both buildings were small. But big enough.

I could imagine living here. The mud brick walls and tin roof are falling in on the house.

There’s no exact way to figure out how long it’s been here.

Not without picking around in the house more.

But I’ve got enough things haunting me. I’ll stay here for now.

The way things are overgrown, it’s been a long time since this was an active farm. Ten years? Maybe more. There’s a coconut tree growing in the middle of the shell of the barn that is twenty feet tall. How long does that take? I have no idea.

The house is set back far enough that I can’t see the ocean from here, but I can hear it. Calvin said there aren’t any people over here, but there’s definitely a trail that leads down to the water. Goats maybe?

I inch forward. Something rubs up against my leg.

I look down at what has to be one of Pepper’s siblings.

I sink into the grass and sit with my legs crisscrossed as the cat jumps into my lap.

Emily’s always watching those reels and YouTube videos of people saving cats from storm drains and junkyards.

They’re not born liking people. They have to be trained.

This one tilts its chin up to me and demands to be petted.

Calvin’s gone for a while. I hear him cough. My eyes flick up to him.

“Yeah, I’ve got some explaining to do.”

“You think?”