Page 38 of Hate Wrecked

“Yeah. I had to get a bathroom door open,” he says. And I wonder if he means for my mother. Or for me.

“Holy shit,” I whisper, walking past Rowan. There are wrought iron beds and piles of mattresses everywhere. “You mean we’ve been sleeping on the ground, and there are mattresses here?”

Rowan grumbles. “What part of waiting and being careful do you not understand?”

“All of it, sometimes.” I shrug.

“Do you want to sleep on one of those?”

An image of a den of spiders lurking in the mattresses flashes into my mind, and I start to gag. Rowan nods. “Yeah, that’s what I thought.”

“But…” I bargain with myself.

“Maybe if we find a decent one, we can lay it out in the sun. If anything that loves the dark is in there, it may move on. We could put the tent on the mattress if it’s comfortable.”

I get excited by the possibility. The sand is okay to sleep on, but I miss a mattress. Not that these are the therapeutic kind, but it can’t hurt to try.

I walk to the stack of mattresses, leaning in, squinting my eyes.

“Watch out. One might jump on you,” Rowan hisses.

I jump back, and he laughs. And I know I would do it again to make him give me that sound.

I inspect the mattresses in the large room from a safer distance as Rowan moves about, overturning items and looking for anything we may need.

Many items are decades old, but there is always the chance of finding something valuable from the Fenwick-Lowe family, something recent and not in ruin.

Unfortunately, the room is a bust, other than the mattress situation.

After we canvass everything, Rowan joins me at the mattress pile. “Did you pick a winner?”

I point to the one I want, wedged in the middle. “I think, or hope, that since it’s in the middle. Maybe it’s the least damaged. No moisture from the ground? No moisture from a leaking roof?” I shrug. “Or, you know, it could be the one with the most spiders because it’s in the middle.”

“Always a possibility,” Rowan shrugs, and I reach out, smacking him on the arm.

He tries to swat it away a little too late, and I wish I were slower or faster so he would have touched me back.

“Okay, let’s get the ones on top of it off. Go to that side.” He points to the edge of the mattresses. I jog over, and we both grip the edge of the one directly above it. “Okay, pull,” he instructs. We remove the stack of four mattresses above it, sliding them off. Dust goes everywhere—in the air, in my nose, making me cough.

I step away, fanning the air. Through the smog and dust, I see Rowan doing the same. After rubbing his eyes, he gazes at the mattress I wanted.

I step closer, squinting as I look for bugs and other gross things.

“Okay, let’s get it out of here,” Rowan commands, and we both reach for the mattress, sliding it off the stack. Rowan adjusts his grip, flipping to a vertical position, and backs out to allow me to walk forward. I appreciate the gesture. If I had led, I would have found myself flat on my ass with a dirty mattress suffocating me.

We wrangle the mattress out of the building and walk toward a clearing, leaving the cover of trees, dropping it on the ground unceremoniously.

It feels like another small, bright moment in a day I hope won’t end in tears.

I’VE GOT YOU

ROWAN

The day unfoldswith quiet anticipation as Riley and I investigate the remnants left by the island’s former inhabitants. We walk cautiously, our shared curiosity driving us to uncover hidden secrets. I want nothing more than a way to call back home.

Amidst the overgrown vegetation, we stumble upon a building with more recent traces of human habitation—signs of Gerald Extroix’s solitary existence. Rusty tools, weathered books, and makeshift furniture.

“Looks like we’ve hit the jackpot,” Riley remarks, eyes scanning the treasures scattered around the building.

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