Chapter 3 Gil
Three
Gil
Present Day
“What did Sparrow mean by the treasure stealing our chance to age?” Gil asked the girl who was said her name was Everly but went by Benny. Wasn’t Ben a boy’s name? Gil tried not to let his confusion show.
Benny looked at Aggy as if she knew her. Or at the very least, as if they shared a secret he wasn’t in on. But how was that possible?
“And what did Sparrow mean when she said Aggy told her not to worry?” Gil continued. He stared suspiciously at his friend. “How would Evelyn know what worries you when the two of you haven’t spoken since we’ve been trapped here?”
Aggy’s eyes flitted to Benny’s again, and Gil felt a prickling sensation at the base of his neck. He was being kept in the dark about something.
Moments ago, there was a part of Gil that wanted to follow Axel and that other strangely dressed boy through the cave off the island.
Now that they had been rescued—just as Aggy swore they would be—Gil didn’t want to waste any more time.
Forget about the treasure. He just wanted to see Sparrow.
There was so much he wanted to say to her, and he didn’t want to wait another second to do it.
Gil heard the pirate give an exaggerated sigh. “I can see we’re doing nothing till you tell the kid what’s going on.” Gil assumed kid referred to him. “Get it over with.”
Gil knew who Kimble was. Aggy had told them about Captain Jonas Kimble, but Gil had never met him.
To Gil, he was a legend. Someone mentioned in bedtime stories.
The pirate who had found a treasure that could make an individual immortal and save them from illness or peril.
And now Kimble was standing in front of him.
He wasn’t dressed like any pirate Gil remembered seeing paintings of.
He had on a heavy-looking pair of blue pants and a short-sleeved shirt made of cotton that looked like an undergarment.
“When you’re done filling them in, come get me.” Kimble moseyed over to the nearest palm tree and sunk down next to it. He closed his eyes. “I’m going to take a nap.”
“You’re going to nap?” Benny looked like smoke was going to come out of her ears.
Her manner of dress was unusual too—a girl in short pants?
Rubber shoes that looked like clogs? There was something about Benny that felt almost familiar.
Was it her brown eyes that reminded him of Evelyn?
She held Sparrow’s letter tightly in her hand.
“No. Now is not the time for a nap! I need your help explaining all this. If we’re going to break this curse, we’re all going to have to work together and fast.”
Kimble snorted. “Together? No way. Kid, I work alone.”
“Not anymore you don’t.” Benny held herself high and looked defiant. “Evelyn said you could help me, and you will. This curse affects you too, you know. So get up. We’re on the clock!”
On the clock? Gil didn’t know the expression.
Kimble groaned and opened his left eye. His brow furrowed as he pulled himself up again wearily. “You sound just like her.”
“Who? Evelyn?” Benny’s eyes flashed. “I’d hope so. We’re related.”
“You are?” Gil and Kimble said at the same time.
“We’re getting off track here,” Zara said hastily.
“I agree,” said Aggy, moving to stand beside Zara. There was something about the two of them that felt similar also. How strange, Gil thought.
“Look,” said Kimble. “Leaving the island does nothing—you’re all still cursed till we deal with the matter of the treasure.”
“I don’t like the word cursed,” said Laurel, scrunching her toes and looking down at her feet in the sand. “I prefer trapped.”
“I agree,” Thomas echoed. “We were trapped, and now we can leave. Isn’t it that simple?”
Gil heard a purr and looked down. Winks, Aggy’s cat—who somehow the pirate also claimed was his cat—was winding her way around Aggy’s legs.
Aggy picked the cat up, and she blinked her one good eye at Aggy, letting herself be petted rather than trying to get away.
How could the cat they’d been trapped with on the island also be with the pirate who lived off-island?
Nothing made sense. Gil scratched at his chest, which was suddenly itchy. “I just want to go home.”
Aggy’s face seemed to crash then, like the waves lapping at the shore.
“Oh, Gil.” She reached for his hand and then, with her other hand, grabbed for Laurel’s.
“I’m afraid I haven’t been honest. I didn’t withhold the truth to be cruel.
Evelyn and I just thought that the best way to help you survive was if you didn’t know. ”
“Aggy,” Thomas said, his voice hoarse. “What haven’t you told us?”
Captain Kimble motioned to Aggy. “Better get on with it or we’ll be waiting another two hundred years to end this.”
Two hundred years? Gil tried to work the words through in his mind.
The pirate couldn’t possibly mean… Gil looked at Benny and Zara’s strange dress again.
Kimble’s very un-pirate-like garb and the way they all spoke.
His heart started to flutter fast, and he scratched his itchy chest harder.
Gil looked around at the island as if seeing it for the first time. “How long have we been on this island?”
Aggy’s lip quivered. “Not two hundred days. It’s actually been two hundred years.”
Gil heard Thomas inhale sharply beside him. Laurel’s shoulders tensed. Gil tried not to look alarmed. In a way, he’d been waiting a very long time for Aggy to share her secrets. Heaven knows he’d been keeping his own. But this wasn’t something he was expecting. He stumbled back in shock.
“We’ll give you all a minute,” Benny said kindly, steering Zara and Kimble away.
“Years?” Thomas’s voice came out like a hiss. “That’s impossible!”
Aggy put Winks back on the ground again.
The cat sat there, licking her front paws, listening.
Aggy took a deep breath. “I don’t want any of you to be frightened, but it’s the truth.
Time here works differently. It’s a kindness, really.
” Her round eyes were teary. “The island’s way of protecting us while we stand guard over the treasure. ”
“I don’t want the treasure! We gave it back once we were well again!” Laurel sounded upset.
“I know,” Aggy started to say. “But that’s not how the treasure works. We took it for personal gain.”
“Are you saying the island punished us for saving ourselves?” Thomas asked. “That’s why we’ve been trapped here? Why was Sparrow spared?”
“Evelyn stole treasure to save our lives. She did not take treasure to help herself, so the island let her go, just like it let Captain Kimble go once it realized so many years later that the captain was trying to return every piece to the chest.”
Laurel started to cry. “So we’ve been here two hundred years? How could the island be so cruel?”
“I know this is a lot to comprehend,” Aggy whispered, a tear trickling down her cheek. “I don’t have answers for everything myself.”
“No!” Gil said roughly, his voice raw. “The timeline can’t be right. We haven’t grown old!”
Aggy bit her lip. “That’s because the treasure has kept us young.”
“Are you saying I’ve been fourteen for two hundred years? Then that would mean…” Gil scratched his chest. “Everyone we knew…our families…Sparrow.” His voice cracked. “Are you saying she’s gone? They’re all gone?”
Aggy’s voice was barely audible. Her eyes pooled with tears. “Yes.”
Gil felt the wave of emotion crash over him, and his legs gave out. No. Not Sparrow.
“Gil!” Laurel cried, reaching down to help him up.
Gil forced himself not to cry. You’re a survivor, he reminded himself.
He heard his mother’s voice in his head.
You’re meant for an adventure. She had no idea on her deathbed how right she was.
But Sparrow…Evelyn…was gone? It wasn’t fair.
He wanted to cry out. Scream. Hit something. But not in front of the others.
Gil rose awkwardly and took off running down the beach, not stopping till he reached the rock.
There, he sunk into the wet sand, the tears coming fast. Staring out at the water, he could see Greenport.
The shoreline looked different, but his memories were the same.
He and Evelyn together. Now that day would never come.
Sparrow... You knew you wouldn’t see us again. But you did all this to save us anyway. The thought only made him miss her more.
“Gil!” Aggy reached his side and sat down beside him. She was crying too. “I’m so sorry I didn’t tell you. I couldn’t,” she said. “I didn’t think anyone could survive if they knew the truth. I almost didn’t survive. I wouldn’t have if—” She cut herself off.
The two sat there a moment, their sobs carrying on the wind. In the water, Gil saw another strange boat glide by. “I just can’t believe she’s gone. How do we go on without her? Without anyone we knew and loved?”
Aggy looked him square in the eye. “We go on because that’s what Evelyn would have wanted.
For us to live. Evelyn gave us a gift.” She looked down the beach at Benny, the pirate, and Zara, her brown hair blowing in the wind.
“And now we’re going to honor her by making sure the rest of the treasure is found and our curses are broken. ”
Fire rose up inside Gil as he found resolve he didn’t know he had. “And then, and only then, we make sure this blasted treasure is hidden on the island so that no one ever finds it again.”