Page 53 of Hate Wrecked

Too?I think, but don’t dare say.Do you like being near me?

“Have you set out the basins?” I ask, thinking of our own water situation.

Rowan nods, poking the fire. It’s flickering out. I run a hand over my stomach. The fish was good tonight. Thank God for the spices left behind. Thank God for the flour. The fillets were crispy on the outside and delicious.

Food tastes best when it isn’t doctored by all the artificial shit we add. I think of all the ridiculous and fancy meals I’ve eaten in five-star restaurants. They can’t compare to what we have caught with our hands, tended to. I know this feeling won’t last, and eventually, I’ll be so sick of fish that I won’t be able to stand the sight, so I savor the feeling.

Rowan catches me. “What are you doing?”

I stop rubbing my belly. “Thinking about dinner.”

“Are you sick of it yet?”

“Not yet,” I reply. I’m not sick of any of it—of sleeping beside him, of playing out a fantasy in this dangerous world.

I’m starting to wonder what the hell is wrong with me. A question I have asked myself my entire life. But this time, I’m not as concerned.

“I think my mother would love it out here. Sometimes, I see it play out like a movie. She and my dad are here, filming a survival tale or living it—a team. I’m not foolish enough to wish they were still together. I know they weren’t a match, but for a brief moment, they were. Do you think we have soulmates? Do you think there can be more than one?”

Rowan looks at me with a narrowed gaze as his eyes catch up to the words tumbling out. He’s studying my mouth in such an intense way I almost forget what I asked, and wonder if his mind went back to earlier, when I was naked, close to him.

“I do.”

“It breaks my heart that they weren’t each other’s,” I admit. Another reason I’m terrified to read her book.

“Maybe we get more than one. Or maybe we don’t always end up with ours. Not forever.”

“What’s the point then?” I huff. “Should I be looking for my soulmate and wondering how long he will hang around?”

Rowan contemplates his answer, and I’m transported to a place and time when I wondered if he was mine. I still wonder. I don’t dare allow myself to say I think he is. Because if his idea is true, and we don’t end up with ours, I can’t take it.

It’s hard enough to take the space between us now.

“I don’t know.” He looks down, then at his hands, before turning away from me and my wondering, away from my hand resting on my belly—full yet empty at the same time. He fills me up; I want him to fill me in every way. Take me on this sand, this vacant land.

Anything to stop my mind from swirling.

“Sorry. I just…I feel good out here, and I know you don’t understand that. But when I look at this place, I feel free to say whatever I want and wonder and…” I close my eyes, feeling the storm moving closer.

“And?”

I look at Rowan, daring him to turn away. “And be whoever I want.”

He doesn’t look away, standing, eyes turning cold. “Riley, I need you to pull your head out of the clouds and think about what’s happening here. There’s no one coming for us. There’s no way to radio home. This is where the story ends.”

I stand, defiant, anger in my eyes. “My parents will look for me. They’d never let me stay out here for long. Being their daughter has brought so much fucking pain, but right now, maybe it’ll be a good thing. Because as fucked as they can be, they love me. And they will never let anything happen to me. They won’t let me be lost at sea or?—”

“Or what?”

I shake my head, guilt washing over me over the phone call I never made. “Lost. They won’t let me be lost. They’ll do whatever they can to track me down. You’ll see.”

I don’t stay by the fire with him; his warring emotions are too much. The desire I felt in his eyes in the water—his anger now. I don’t have to take it. I won’t.

So I leave the fire, walking inside the building, to the tent, looking for another escape.

Not long ago, it would have been a drink, pills, calling someone to touch me, make me forget who I am. But I’m different now. Something about this island has made me different. And no amount of anger from Rowan Finn will make me feel guilty or sad I feel good out here. Because I do.

Once I locate my Walkman deep in my bag, I pray to God or whoever that it still has a charge and didn’t get damaged in the wreck.

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