Chapter 9
Shanna munched on chips as she and Gran sat in front of the TV, watching Below Deck. “Maybe I should go work on a ship. Travel from place to place. Seems fun.”
“And who’ll take you, dear?” Gran mused. “You don’t cook that well. And I’ve never seen you make your bed in your entire life.”
***
Leaving Holly’s place, Shanna, Simon and Chris retraced the route previously taken; if for no other reason, because their thoughts were too preoccupied to think of another way back to the hotel.
“What do we do now?” Chris asked as they were hiking back up to the rose garden.
What did they do now? What did she do now? Shanna had assumed finding her mother’s last whereabouts, and especially the whereabouts of the onyx bracelet, wouldn’t be easy; but Mom’s “adventures on the South Island” still felt like a major wrench in the plan.
Wellington was right at the bottom tip of New Zealand’s North Island. Not too far from its South Island—but that one was larger and wilder, with tall mountains and impassable forests hugging its western side. If Mom had been chasing adventure, she could have gone anywhere in there.
If they were to pursue her long-forgotten steps, it would take a lot more time, and Simon was already reluctant about coming here.
“We have the rest of the postcards,” Simon said. “Is there a chance those were sent from her adventure trip?”
“You mean the order has been reversed?” Shanna reached for the postcards in her bag.
Gran had said Wellington was the last stop, but she assumed that from the dates on the postcards, not any spell or divination.
Mom could have sent them in the wrong order, except Shanna had no clue as to why she’d do that.
“Either way, she’d been to those places at some point,” Simon said. “It wouldn’t hurt to check them out. It’s the best we’ve got.”
Shanna scoffed at herself. Of course, Simon wasn’t excited to go on a full sightseeing tour of New Zealand. He wanted their bond resolved.
They grouped together, and Shanna flicked through the cards.
“This one is easy.” Chris pointed to the postcard with an image of a fjord and pulled out a tourist brochure with an almost identical image on the cover. “Milford Sound. It’s a fjord way down south on the west coast.”
“Where did you get that?” Shanna asked.
“I took it from the plane.”
“You stole a brochure from the plane?” Simon slightly raised his voice.
“What?” Chris blinked, unimpressed. “You stole the blanket.”
Simon stuttered. “Because it was nice and soft. And if I can’t fly business, I might as well take what they provide.”
“Anyway.” Chris looked back at Shanna. “It’s about as far away from here as it can be.”
Wonderful.
“By that logic, the rest should be closer,” Simon said. “Which means we can try those points first. So, what are they?”
Chris looked at the postcards. “No clue about this one.” She thrust a postcard with the picture of river rocks, interspersed with gold nuggets, back into Shanna’s hand.
“This one looks like the Abel Tasman National Park, though.” The last postcard featured a golden sandy beach with a turquoise sea and lush, green vegetation.
Simon tapped away on his phone. “That’s rather close. On the very north of the South Island. Sounds like a good next stop.”
Shanna turned over the card. In the same handwriting as on the Wellington one, it said, “Everyone else forgets, but the trees will remember.”
“What does that mean?” Simon had moved in closer, their shoulders touching.
The rain that had drenched them earlier added a refreshing layer to the pine smell of his cologne. The smell of a rainforest—as if he was already geared up for adventure.
“No idea. But I’ll try to do the same searching spell as I did here.”
“Hey.” Chris had walked ahead, reaching the statue of a man on a pillar at the end of the road. “Can we do something I want now?”
“This isn’t a tourist trip,” Simon said, but Shanna patted his arm and said to Chris, “Sure. Where do you want to go?”
Chris nudged her head. They followed her to the monument, but she ignored it, instead heading through a wrought-iron gate into a park.
Despite being in the middle of the city, it was wonderfully quiet and calm, as if an invisible barrier, or perhaps the force of the place itself, kept noise at bay.
Descending twilight wrapped the downhill path in a soft purple haze as, amidst the trees, statues and stelae rose.
“It’s a graveyard,” Shanna said.
“Here.” Chris opened a black plastic sack she’d pulled out of her bag. Inside were flowers—roses—of all colors, looking slightly familiar …
“You stole roses from the garden?” Shanna whispered.
“Nobody else was going to use them.”
Simon rubbed the bridge of his nose.
“Take it or leave it.” Chris picked up a few blooms and left the bag with Shanna. She wandered down the path and began to put one rose at the foot of each gravestone, kneeling down for a few moments.
Shanna headed to the graves on the other side of the path. She picked out a soft pink rose and laid it on the grave.
“They’re so old.” Simon stood behind her. “All of these graves. These people died over a century ago.”
“So what? Does that mean they don’t deserve to be remembered?” Chris’s voice came from a few graves down.
Shanna slid her fingers along the etching on the gravestone. The occupant had died in 1897. There wouldn’t be anyone still around to remember them. Was there anyone who cared, even, except for this strange goth girl who stole roses for them?
She twitched when something brushed her fingers, her mind reaching to spirits coming to join them in the night. But it was just Simon, taking hold of the bag. Their eyes met, and he nodded.
And they walked in silence, from grave to grave, leaving roses in their wake.
Shanna woke up the next morning, stretching her arms toward the ceiling, gazing at the unfamiliar black dot on it before she remembered this was the hotel room and not her house.
And Simon was here.
In the bathroom, more accurately. The sound of running water came from behind the door, and his bed was hastily made up. Shanna smiled to herself, drawing her knees up underneath the blanket. They were leaving today, and for some reason, he still made the bed.
“Morning.” Simon came out, looking crisp and ready for business in a new shirt and a pair of black slacks. “Bathroom’s free.”
She heard him talking on the phone while she freshened up, although she couldn’t make out any words. They packed up, met Chris in the lobby, and Simon headed toward the hotel’s garage.
“Aren’t we catching a shuttle to the airport?” Shanna asked. There were flights to Nelson, a city in the north of the South Island, which would put them only about an hour’s drive from the park.
“I rented us a car.” Simon looked over his shoulder. “We’re going by ferry to avoid planes.”
“Nice,” Chris said.
Shanna remained speechless, but a sunny warmth spread through her chest. Did he do it for her so she wouldn’t be afraid again?
“It’ll also be useful down there,” Simon continued. “If we’re not successful at the first spot, we can drive to the rest instead of mixing flying and driving all the time.”
Obviously. He did it for practical reasons. He probably made calculations of fuel costs versus time consumption and final profit, or something. Surely he had an entire Excel spreadsheet saved on his phone.
But regardless of why he did it, an hour later, as they boarded the ferry, Shanna was more than grateful for it.
She had no idea why, but being on a boat felt safer than being on a plane, even though her curse could strike just the same.
It had been pretty funny, though, seeing the car Simon had rented—the oldest model the rental had available, a Toyota that looked like it came straight from the nineties. No modern systems to break.
On the ferry, they followed the slew of passengers to the main space inside the ship: a big open room with multiple seating areas, a bar, and a restaurant.
“I’d like to go up on deck,” Shanna said. “The staircase is there. I think it shouldn’t be more than a hundred feet away.”
Simon nodded. “I’ll go get some coffee. Don’t yank me too hard.” He gave her a lopsided smile that made her insides feel as if they’d already been boosted by several cups of coffee.
One of these days, she’d have to get over her fantasies of them ever being a thing again.
“Do you want to come with me, Chris?” she asked.
“Nah. I’ll go find someone to reenact Titanic’s bow scene with.” Chris turned to Simon. “Can I have your phone?”
Wordlessly, Simon handed it over.
Considering it had to do with Chris, Shanna probably shouldn’t inquire what that was all about.
So, she made her way to the upper deck overlooking the stern of the ship. A few brave souls were out here, too, deciding that the lovely views on a sunny day overcame the cool breeze coming in from the ocean. She sat down on a bench next to the fence, closed her eyes, and let out a deep breath.
Two weeks ago, she thought she had her life figured out …
at least by her standards. She knew what to do to bring Simon back, and once he was back, they could pick up where they had left off.
The tragedy that had happened in the meantime—his death and all of Shanna’s tampering to bring him back—seemed to play perfectly into that story.
Every love story needed a hurdle. And for once, Shanna had believed she was finally getting a love story.
With a thrum of the great engines engaged, the ship unglued itself from the harbor, trudging toward the small peninsula that protected the city from the open ocean.
Shanna leaned her chin on the fence, letting the wind blow into her face.
Even though they only spent a day in the city, it was strange saying goodbye to it.
She’d expected she’d leave with a resolution, not more questions.
She’d expected she’d be going home, not into the great unknown.
“Hey.” Simon’s voice made her look up. He approached, hands in the pockets of his jacket, the wind trying its best to ruffle his short hair.
“I’m sorry, did I yank you?”
“No, no.” He sat on the bench next to her. “I wanted to see the view.”
“It is pretty.” As the ship left the city behind, the white dots of the houses spread across the hills looked like sheep grazing upon those slopes.
They stayed together in companionable silence as the ferry rounded the peninsula and the land gave way to the open ocean, beautifully azure against the paler blue sky.
And then, far in the distance, high mountains of blueish gray peeked out from behind the nearer coast. Shanna lifted her head, supporting herself with her hands on the railing.
Her first glimpse of the South Island.
“There it is,” Simon said, his gaze following hers.
“It’s strange being here, perhaps in the same place she once was,” Shanna said. “Maybe riding on the same ferry. Seeing the same mountains. Knowing she went out there. An entire island to get lost in.”
“Do you really remember nothing of her?”
Shanna shook her head. She didn’t even remember where they lived when she was little; Gran and she had moved after Mom left, and the memories of the specific place faded, not because of any curse, but only because of time passed.
In a way, this place, this land, was her most firm connection to Mom.
“I’m sorry to pry,” Simon said. “You don’t need to answer if you don’t want to. Dolores said your mom left because your father forgot her. Did he forget you as well?”
“Never completely,” she responded. “But once he forgot Mom, it was … harder. He got a job that required a lot of traveling. He’d keep calling and sending messages, but without frequent personal contact, it wasn’t the same.
It was more like having a distant father, following a divorce.
” She rubbed the corner of her eye. “He passed away about ten years ago.”
Simon nodded, and they continued to stare at the distant chain of mountains.
“My parents died when I was in college,” Simon then said. “They went together, at least. I was starting up Aries. Everett—he was my dad’s friend, so he helped me with the company. Dad never saw it.”
Before she realized what she’d done, she sought his hand. “I’m sorry.”
“Dad loved to travel. I always wanted to go with him when I was little. Pretend to be an adventurer.” Little creases appeared between his eyebrows as he stared at the horizon.
“I know.”
“What?”
“I mean …” she shook her head. “You said it. In Vegas. That you were an adventurer. Jason. Fresh from the volcanic fields of Iceland.”
He frowned more. “I didn’t tell you who I was?”
“You did, but only after we got married. Don’t worry.” She smiled. “I lied, too. I told you I was a fashion magazine editor.”
Simon squinted for a moment, then burst into laughter. “I didn’t tell you who I was.”
She had no idea why that was important, but oh, it was so lovely to see him laugh. To see Vegas Simon again. It gave her hope—even if she told herself for the umpteenth time she shouldn’t have any—that he was still in there. That there was a sliver of Simon just as magical as that night had been.
She turned her eyes upon the mountains of the new world opening up to them. She’d never bought into Simon’s cover story back then, but it was entertaining to listen to and entertaining to fantasize about. The two of them, going out into the wide, wild world like two brave adventurers.
Their relationship now might not be what she’d thought of back then, but maybe this didn’t exclude the rest. She was already at the end of the world.
All she needed to do was take a step forward and dive into it.