Page 45 of Bewitched By the Sea Monster
Tomorrow.
Tomorrow I will hear her voice again.
Tomorrow I will converse.
Tomorrow I will remember what it is to feelmyself.
Something inside of me tightens—a feeling I would not have had a word for before. But now the word comes easily.
Impatience.
I remember now.
Impatience.
And I remember how very long it is, to wait for a tomorrow.
How I managedto get back to our cottage without getting lost, and without people getting an eyeful of my full moon and its orbs (my bare bottom and other assets), I had noclue.
But I did.
I cut my feet to ribbons—the gravelly island soil wasnotconducive to barefooted moonlit strolls. I also got startled half to death each time the thunder teed off, and my side ached something fierce by the time I arrived at our magenta cottage. But I made it.
A light flashed in my face as soon as I opened the door.
“PIPPI!” Jackson plonked his candelabra on to the entryway table and yanked me into the foyer. “I wasjustgoing to see where I could scrounge up some fucking help. I’ve been scoping the shoreline for anhour.And I couldn’t callanyone. Andfuck…” He shoved the door shut and stroked my arm.
I threw myself at him, wrapping him into a rough hug. My side screamed in protest. The pain nearly knocked the wind out of me, but I gulped down my cry, shoved the discomfort down, and held on to him.
“I thought you weredead,”he hissed.
Guilt mangled my stomach. And I, all at once, felt like scum. Worse. Like the used gum that mucked up the bottom of someone’s shoe.
Because he’d been so worried about me.
But I hadn’t really thought of him.
Well, Ihad.But not to the same extent. I hadn’t wrung myself wretched wondering if he was dead.Something inside my gut, my heart, had assumed he was okay, even though I’d had nothing to support that. Jackson had been ravaged by the same wave, he’d merely been closer to the rock face.
“Where did the tide take you?” Jackson pressed. “Why didn’t youanswerme when I was calling for you? How did you—you’rebleeding.Fuck. I’m going to see if I can find the medical clinic.”
“Don’t!” I grabbed for his arm when he made to move past me.“Please.”
“Babe, you’ve got blood running down your leg,” Jackson pointed out.
And I did, from the big, loose-lipped gash that ringed my thigh. It throbbed—a heavy, thudding pulse that jack-rabbited along my leg.
“I’ll be okay. Honest,”I insisted at Jackson’s dubious face. “But I…”
I don’t want to advertise that we were skinny-dipping.It’s embarrassing. If no one knows, I’d rather keep it that way.
I don’t want to be asked to give a play-by-play of what happened when the ocean took me.
I met the Loch Ness Monster tonight, and he was so kind. But I’m worried he’ll get in trouble if I tell people he helped me. I don’t think he’s supposed to interact with us like that.
“I’m tired, Jackson.” I buried my face into his chest, letting my tears dribble onto his shirt.
He’d slithered back into the clothes he’d worn to dinner, but his shirt was inside out. It smelled briny, and musky, as though the rocks and sea salt air had rubbed off his cologne.
