Chapter One: Sydney CHAPTER ONE Sydney
Ten Years Before
WE’RE GOING ON a treasure hunt
X marks the spot
You sit behind me, tracing a circle on my back, representing São Miguel Island. Though the island isn’t actually a circle, but the shape of a dragon plopped smack in the middle of the Atlantic. And right now, we’re in the belly of the dragon. We’ve been exploring the island, camping in tents upon its rocky ground each night, nearly five weeks now.
You slash the X on my back. The location of the treasure.
I shiver because it’s ironic: I do know where the treasure is, but you don’t. And I need to keep it that way until I figure out what to do next. Because finding the treasure—it changes everything. My heart does a literal backflip. I don’t freaking know what to do. I don’t—
Spiders crawling up your back
Your fingers creep up my back, over the still-fresh scratch wounds on my shoulder blade, across toward my hairline. A gust slithers in from the cove, teasing goose bumps from my skin. I tuck the little front braids I always wear behind my ears, then adjust my white beaded necklace, returning its silver heart pendant to the center.
It’s not the first time we’ve played this game, said this familiar camp rhyme. Not the first time your fingers have wandered my back. But it’s different now, because of everything that has happened this summer. I’m not the same girl as when I arrived in the Azores, desperate to escape the medical charts and doctors, and to explore this place where distant ancestors of ours landed, escaping persecution, and made their lives and fortunes.
And I wanted to have some fun: that’s what the summer was supposed to be about. Fun was indeed had—my lips curl into a sly smile, then quickly flatline. Because the past few days, I’ve watched my life literally face-plant. Like, in no time things went from mildly shitty to apocalyptic.
I stare ahead toward the mouth of the cave with ferns overhanging, whipping in the wind, and not far beyond, waves foaming onto the black sand of the cove. The air is crisp, with the clean, mineral scent of rocks wet from the ocean spray and the slightly musty smell of moss creeping alongside the cave walls. My flashlight slices through the dark, revealing twitching shadows at the threshold. The ocean crescendos in my ears, and I lick my lips, tasting salt from my earlier swim. I fight the impulse to look around. Definitely not toward the hole in the cave floor roughly four feet to our right, which I’ve covered with my backpack.
Spiders crawling down your back
You whisper it, tapping your fingers down my spine, and then you press closer, so I feel the heat of you settle against me.
“Sydney,” you say, your breath against the nape of my neck, “I’m really glad I came here now.”
I part my lips to speak, but no sound comes out. My chest jitters with a quiet, rising panic.
I still can’t believe you’re here. We campers are supposed to be alone, separated in our assigned spots on the island for our twenty-four-hour solo missions, but I spotted you walking toward the cave. And good thing I had my head in the game to hide the treasure.
I shift on the hard floor. My heart beats frenetically and feels almost painful, like it’s being shoved around inside a mosh pit. And I’m a bizarre kind of exhausted that’s shot with adrenaline. Unsurprising, as it’s not yet dawn, but you didn’t exactly wake me up. I slept tossing and turning, like I was back in the hospital again and aware of every nurse coming in, every beep, ache, and flicker—including the flicker that turned out to be you. And now, finding the treasure and dealing with your arrival have sucked out all my energy and sent every single red flag waving. The sun hasn’t come up yet but I can tell by the receding darkness that it’s not far off. In a few hours, I’ll have to start packing up. Figure out what to do—about all of it. They’ll wonder where we are. But that stuff is intellectual, I realize, because even without a rational explanation of what’s going on, every molecule of me is screaming that something here is totally off.
But I’m kinda scared to ask you to leave because of… I don’t know what, exactly. You? That feels ridiculous. But still. The vibes don’t lie.
I don’t know what to do. I don’t—
Knife in your back
Blood gushing down
You pound your fist between my shoulder blades and suddenly I’m done. It’s too much, this trip, this treasure hunt sprung to life. All the values Camp Zahav has drip-drip-dripped into us our whole lives, of teamwork and Jewish traditions and tzedakah and good deeds and pride in our culture and living off the land, have gone in a flash. We’ve all been possessed, it feels like, by the promise of riches and having all our problems alchemized into gold.
I try to twist around because I don’t want to play this game anymore, but you grip my shoulders with strength that startles me. It feels like you almost trap me in place.
Knife in your back
Blood gushing down
You pound your fist against my back again so hard that I lurch forward. I don’t like your voice. It’s strange, not playful now. Not like the rhyme is supposed to be. I’m about to lose it and just tell you to get the hell out when—
Knife in your back
Blood gushing down
No—that’s wrong. That’s a stanza too many. I’m supposed to feel your breath on my neck by now, followed by your whisper: Cool breeze, tight squeeze, now you’ve got the—now you’ve got the—chillllllllls.
I already feel chills. But it’s too soon. You’ve gone off script.
Knife in your back
Blood gushing down
A sharp, curdling pain between my shoulder blades, but this time it’s not your fist. It’s—
It’s—
A knife, I realize in horror, as excruciating pain spikes through me. I scream. Keel over.
No—this can’t be—how—you of all people—you—you couldn’t—
My vision blurs. A scream tries to claw its way out, but my throat locks up tight. I crumple to the ground and watch you stand, not even glancing back at me.
You walk right toward the treasure. And I realize too late that you knew it all along.
X marks the spot.
