Chapter Thirty-Nine
I’M NOT SURE at what point life slips into the kind of happily ever after that used to end the children’s books April and I scrounged from collapsed homes.
I never knew how to picture that when life was nothing but a smear of survival.
If I lived happily ever after, what would be the illustration the author used to communicate my bliss?
I can name a few moments.
Like Christmas Day. April and I give bracelets we wove from cedar to all the boys and Sid surprises me with a fabric box. Inside are my mother’s earrings.
“But how did you…?” I scream, and throw my arms around his neck while he laughs.
“After we got married, I went to the hospital and reworked the billing so it was in my name. They gave me a full refund.” He grins. “Headed to the exchange right after.”
“But they must have cost more than I sold them for.”
He shrugs. “You need to get your ears pierced.”
As it turns out, on Salt Spring Island, even Santa Claus is real.
Then there’s the day April and I are granted full citizenship. We celebrate by surprising April with her own bicycle. She shrieks in terror when James lets go of the seat for the first time and suddenly, she has to rely on her own momentum to stay upright. That day is perfect, too.
And I’m not quite sure I would call it happily, but life does seem like it will be at least better ever after on the day Council grants our petition to revoke Astolia’s provisional ally status, with a full investigation to come.
And yes, okay. I admit it. I am happy when the Grand Astrologue—or should I say, Gord—spots me watching the hearing.
He starts cursing when he recognizes me and tries to make his way toward me, only to be caught by the island guard.
And, oh does it feel delicious when the mayor declares that this makes the decision easier.
That night, I wake up gasping, cold with sweat, trying to make sense of where the nightmares came from, but Sid’s hand is there, steadying me. Helping me find the right pace for my heartbeat.
No one told me that about happily ever after.
It can still have sleepless nights and days where I admit, that yes, my husband is right.
I need to start therapy. So I finally go and talk to someone who helps me make sense of myself.
And just like how all Wildlings lie on their papers, apparently most of us also have issues left over from—how does she put it?
My time disconnected from a safe environment.
She even says it’s normal that I reacted so negatively to my first taste of safety, because my body wasn’t used to living without a crisis.
I had years upon years of unprocessed pain waiting to burst out of me when I got here.
It’s nothing to be ashamed of, she says.
It stings to clean a wound before it heals.
It’s worth putting up with those days, because in March, the election comes.
Amy makes Council, because of course she does.
But so does Sid. His involvement in the Astolia situation reassured voters that he was someone with a balanced view on human rights and immigration and all that government shit.
Tom, as my brave sponsoring immigration officer, played a role in the success too, so he also gets in with a landslide.
The newspaper even makes him and Sid pose together for a photo—not that it will actually go in physical papers, but Amy says they have a database on a computer somewhere that holds onto important records of the island’s history, in case there’s a distant day when they can print the images.
Our victory matters enough that it’s going to be saved there.
As people come to shake Sid’s hand and congratulate him, a few throw me winks and say they would have voted for me, if they could.
“Oh, believe me. No one wants someone with my mouth in government,” becomes my refrain. “And honestly, I would get bored.”
When Mrs. Buckerfield hears this line, she blinks in surprise. “Well, what is a brave girl like you doing with herself so she doesn’t get bored?”
“Well… not a lot. But I really like to cook.”
“Do you? Why haven’t I seen you at my place, then? Bring Carlos by. He never visits.”
“O-okay.” I can’t fight the grin on my face.
But none of those moments beat today. It’s a little over a year since I first arrived on the island.
I’ve been given the day off work from the café to help with the pandemonium on the acreage.
Dom has agreed to move into the spare room in Albert’s unit so we can open one of the apartments to another family—sanctuary seekers. They asked for us in particular.
It’s merry chaos. Outside, Silas is hastily constructing a goat pen, not easy in the autumn rain.
April has instructions to pick up any books she can find on animal husbandry from the library after school, while Carlos rearranges the kitchen, as a generous ration upgrade was dropped at the farm to accommodate the newcomers.
I’m helping to transfer Dom’s rock collection to its new lodgings. James, Young Tom, and Wendell are carting in furniture for a woman and three children.
“We really don’t have to worry about them liking it. This is more space than they’re used to,” I say, boxing up another geode, then attempting to heft the collection into my arms.
“Kayla, for the last time! You’re not supposed to be lifting things!” James rushes to pull the box out of my hands.
“It’s, like, ten pounds!”
“Twenty!”
“If you don’t let me do this, DeLuca, I will whip your ass!” The box teeters against my belly, which has started to make itself prominent. Five months prominent.
I had a few rough days during my first trimester—a mixture of fear that I might lose this baby too, and guilt about having a child with someone other than Curtis. But more often than not, I feel so lucky. I’m due in February.
James throws his hands up in surrender. “Far be it from me to call your judgment into question.”
“Thank you.” I do my best to stride away with purpose, but between the box and my condition, it’s more of a victory waddle.
I step outside, meaning to head straight to Albert’s—but then I spot them coming up the drive. I drop the box and it clunks to the ground. I shouldn’t be trusted with heavy objects at the best of times.
“Beth-Anne!” I sprint towards her, James’s voice chasing me.
“You shouldn’t be doing that, either!”
I don’t pay him any attention. In front of me is a woman my age, her golden hair falling loose from a sensible bun.
She walks tentatively onto the acreage, a small girl’s hand in hers.
Behind them are a pack of five goats, which an eight-year-old boy drives forward with a thin willow branch.
Bringing up the rear is Sid, carrying the baby.
“Kayla Hollins.” She says my name so softly, reverent. “As I live and breathe. It’s really you.”
“Can I hug you?” I want to, desperately.
I found out she was alive months ago, after Astolia conceded to Salt Spring’s terms. In order to maintain access to the hospital and other island services, they have to allow regular visits from the League of Gulf Nations, including a medical practitioner, to assess the entire population.
I wanted to go and see her myself, but Astolia made it clear that my husband and I aren’t invited.
Last month, Beth-Anne decided to take Salt Spring up on the offer to apply for sanctuary, which was extended to any colony members who were kept from knowing about the so-called alliance for all those years.
Most didn’t accept. Either they’ve been there too long to see straight, or it feels too much like home to them. It isn’t for me to judge.
Beth-Anne grins and opens her arms. I reciprocate and find the one thing that feels better than letting go of the past. Holding on. “I got your letters,” she says.
“I’m so glad.”
“Doctor Levy had to sneak them in. But she said you were happy. She said…” She trails off, looking around the freshly harvested fields, and the boys popping up to wave at her. “By Aries, you’ve got a lot of space here.”
“You’re going to love your apartment.” I slide my arm through hers. “There’s a big room for you, and a whole second one for the kids.”
“Rafe, take the goats to that tall man over there. He seems to want them,” she says to her son, and the boy drives the flock toward Silas. Beth-Anne looks at me, expression wary. “Your husband says they’ll want the kids to go to school? All day?”
“All day,”
“Well, that’s a long time.” Her eyes drift over the acreage again, resting on the house. I wonder if I looked this spooked the first day I arrived. Scratch that, I was worse. “I guess they need it, though, to live in a place like this? It’s so big.”
It’s tiny, really. A single island in an ocean of unknowns. But it’s enough.
“Who’s ready for the grand tour?” James strides forward. He’s under strict orders not to flirt with her, but even when he’s not trying to sleep with a beautiful woman, James is perpetually friendly. I let him get away with it.
Especially because two seconds later, Dominick pushes him out of the way. “It’s my old place! I get to show it to her!”
“Hope you like overgrown boys,” I whisper, and she laughs.
“I do. I like men best when they’re still boys.”
I nod. Maybe her sanctuary papers say why she came without her husband. Maybe it’s a pleasant reason, like he’s dead. I’ll wait for her to explain when she’s ready. It’s clear that she’s here for a fresh start, and if there’s one thing I’ve learned since coming here, it’s that change takes time.
“I like your husband.” She nods in Sid’s direction, who is gingerly setting her youngest down so that she can pull at a dandelion she spotted. “He’s a nice man.”
“I like him, too.”
He perks up, as if he just caught us talking about him, looking slightly embarrassed.
I give Beth-Anne a parting squeeze, then skip toward him.
He pulls me into a hug and a handful of papers press against my back—probably the sanctuary documents for Beth-Anne’s family.
This time, the whole process went through the right government offices, instead of happening hastily in a hospital waiting room.
“She says you’re great,” I say. “Which I have to agree with. You look pretty okay holding a baby.”
“Trying to get practice in while I can,” he says.
“Just so you know, though—you’re not allowed to marry her. Not even if she asks nicely. That’s the rule.”
“As I explained to Tom, that is not going to be our policy with sanctuary seekers going forward.”
“He’s still on your ass?”
“Worse than ever. It’s the closest he gets to the concept of friendship.”
I laugh, before realizing two things—one, I might pee a little if I’m not careful. And two, Beth-Anne is waiting for me. I can catch up with Sid later tonight.
And catch up we do. After we’ve eaten together with our new family.
After we’ve sat around the fire, James playing his guitar.
After I’ve guided Beth-Anne back to her apartment, because the music brought her to tears and she needs a moment alone.
After the kids are in bed and April is cursing at a worksheet on the quadratic formula and Carlos has dampened the fire in the stove.
After all of that, I curl up next to Sid and we swap stories.
Mine involve purchasing children’s beds at the exchange.
His describe the commotion at City Hall when the boat from Astolia arrived.
Four families came all at once. We haven’t had a refugee situation like that since the early days after the Quake and the government is a-twitter about it.
Once the words are caught up and there’s nothing left to say, we simply exist together. He kisses me, gentle as his hand slides over my swollen belly, flutters of small limbs dancing against a father’s hand.
It’s not quite what I would call a storybook ending. But it is happiness. And it is ever after.
And it means the whole world.
THE END