20. Dane Gallagher
Dane Gallagher
New Caledonia announces itself as noise. The dock is loud in a way I’ve forgotten—voices layered over each other, constant movement, something restless in the air.
I step off the boat and stop.
People with cameras are waiting for us.
For a second, it doesn’t register. I see them, but don’t understand why they’re here, why they’re pointed at us, or why this feels arranged instead of accidental.
Then I hear it.
“—fourteen years—”
“—they’ve been out there—”
The words come in fragments, then start to make sense.
Charlotte stops.
“Keep walking,” I say, close to her ear.
“There are—” she starts, then stops.
“I know, Charlotte. Keep walking.”
I shift automatically, stepping slightly in front of Charlotte as we move through the crowd, guiding us forward without slowing down.
The noise closes in, questions rising out of it.
“How long were you out there?”
“What happened to you?”
“Can you tell us what it was like?”
“Charlotte, over here.”
“Dane, can you comment?”
“How did you survive?”
They’re saying our names, and that’s what hits. Not the cameras. The voices. Too many of them, coming from every direction. For years, I’ve heard my name from only one person. Now it’s everywhere at once.
My hand settles at the small of Charlotte’s back, guiding her forward. “Keep going.”
A woman steps through the crowd, moving with purpose. She doesn’t raise her voice, but everything shifts around her.
“Dane, Charlotte—you’re safe. We’re going to get you checked out first. Just routine medical. After that, we’ve arranged a hotel so you can rest.”
I focus on her voice and let everything else fall away.
“Your family is on the way,” she adds.
Family. The word feels strange now, like something half-remembered from another life. “My mum?”
“Yes. And your grandfather, Michael Gallagher. He’ll be here tomorrow.”
“Grandad’s still alive. Wow. I can’t believe it.”
Charlotte stays close to me as we follow the woman through the noise.
Then they separate us for the medical checks. I don’t like it immediately—every instinct in me pushes against it—but they promise it won’t take long. That we’ll see each other again soon.
They lied. The medical checks feel endless, all questions and bright lights. Instruments I don’t recognize. Hands on my wrist counting my pulse, a cuff tightening around my arm.
They speak carefully, simplifying things as if I might not understand. I answer what I can and let the rest go. They take blood. Listen to my chest. Write things down.
When they’re done, we’re moved again—this time to a hotel. They take us to separate rooms.
Everything is white. Walls, sheets, ceiling. Clean in a way that feels almost sterile. The air smells like disinfectant. The bed is perfectly made, every line exact.
I stand in the middle of the room and feel what’s missing.
No ocean. No wind moving through trees.
I’m alone—for the first time in years—in the cleanest room I’ve seen in fourteen years.
It doesn’t feel right.
There’s a connecting door between the rooms. I look at it for a second, already knowing Charlotte is on the other side in a room exactly like this one.
I cross the room and tap on the door. She opens it almost immediately.
“I was about to knock,” she says.
“I know.”
She steps back, and I walk in, the door closing behind me. I sit on the edge of the bed, and she joins me.
We don’t talk at first. I take her hand, and she lets me. After a moment, she leans into me, resting her head against my shoulder while we sit together in silence, letting the reality of it slowly catch up to us.
“What do we do?”
I take my time before answering.
“We sleep tonight… in a real bed. Tomorrow we see Grandad. Then we go home to Brisbane.”
Home.
Something in me pushes back against the word before I can stop it.
Brisbane is where I was born. It’s where I’m supposed to belong. Where people would say my life is. But when I reach for it, there’s nothing there I can hold onto. Not the way I can with the island.
Home is the sound of the ocean at night. The shelter we built, piece by piece, until it could hold against anything. The fire at dusk. Days shaped by light instead of time. Knowing where Charlotte is without looking, and her knowing the same about me.
It’s the graves under the trees.
It’s where our son is.
That’s where everything that matters to us still remains.
Brisbane is a place I remember.
The island is where I lived.
Charlotte presses a soft kiss against my shoulder. “People are going to have opinions about us. Strong ones.”
“They will.” I look at her. “Let them.”
“You make it sound simple.”
My fingers brush over the wedding ring on her finger. “We know what we are, Charlotte. That doesn’t change just because we’re back.”
She lifts her eyes to mine. “People won’t understand.”
“I don’t care, babe.”
She runs her thumb slowly over the braided band on my finger. “I think we should keep our relationship to ourselves for now,” she says. “At least until we can gauge what’s happening.”
I study her face for a second and catch the uncertainty she’s trying not to show. Then I nod once. “Okay. Whatever you want.”
We sit there for another moment, the quiet settling comfortably around us.
“I’d like a shower,” she says eventually. “What do you say?”
I glance toward the bathroom, then back at her. “I think that sounds like a really good idea.”
We move at the same time, like we always do—standing, crossing the room together.
I turn on the shower, letting the water heat up while we undress.
There’s a mirror above the vanity, and Charlotte catches sight of herself in it as we step into the bathroom.
She pulls her shirt over her head, and our eyes meet in the mirror.
I don’t look away.
Neither does she.
She steps out of the rest of her clothes and pauses there for a second, studying herself properly. Her hand drifts to her stomach. It’s flat again, her outer body carrying no visible sign that Connor was ever there, even though the mark he left on her heart will never disappear.
For a moment she goes somewhere else entirely. Somewhere painful.
Then she looks back at me. “Your turn.”
I pull my shirt off, and her gaze moves over me. My body looks exactly like what the island made it—lean and solid, built from years of carrying, climbing, building, surviving.
We step into the shower together the same way we’ve done everything else for years now—side by side.
The hot water hits immediately. Charlotte goes still under it for a second, eyes closing as it runs over her shoulders and through her hair. I watch the reaction move across her face, the almost overwhelming shock of simple comfort after so many years without it.
“This is—” she starts, then shakes her head slightly. “There isn’t even a word for this.”
I let out a breath that’s almost a laugh. “Yeah.”
She reaches for the shampoo, but I catch her hand before she can take it.
“Let me.”
She studies me for a second, then nods once. “Yeah… okay.”
“Turn around.”
She does.
I step in behind her and work the shampoo slowly through her hair. The scent fills the steam around us almost immediately—clean and floral and almost overwhelming after years of going without anything like it.
Her eyes close as my fingers move across her scalp in slow circles.
“Feels good?” I ask quietly.
“Yeah,” she says. “Really good.”
I keep going, working through the length of her hair before tipping her head back beneath the spray to rinse it clean.
When I finish, she turns slightly toward me. “Can I wash yours?”
“Yeah,” I say immediately. “Please.”
She reaches for the shampoo bottle.
“You need a haircut,” she tells me while working the shampoo into her hands.
“Only if you’re the one doing it,” I say. “Not letting anyone else near it.”
A small smile touches her mouth. “I will. I always will.”
Charlotte works the shampoo into my hair, fingers moving through it before pressing lightly against my scalp. I go still beneath her hands almost immediately.
She takes her time. When she rinses the shampoo away, the water carries the foam down over my shoulders.
Neither of us steps back afterward.
I turn toward her fully, water running down my face, and she reaches up automatically to push the wet hair back from my eyes. Mine close briefly at the touch. When I open them again, her hand is still there against my cheek.
For a moment neither of us moves. The water runs steadily around us while steam gathers thickly through the room until everything outside this space feels impossibly far away.
Then the remaining distance between us disappears naturally, like it was never really there to begin with.
Charlotte reaches for the soap, working it between her palms before sliding her hands slowly over my shoulders and down across my chest. Something about the intimacy feels different here. Softer. More exposed somehow.
My breathing shifts almost immediately.
So does hers.
I let my hands settle against her waist, lingering there with the same careful attention I give everything that matters to me.
When she looks up, I’m already watching her.
There’s no hesitation in me. No uncertainty.
I kiss her slowly at first while she moves closer, her hands sliding up my arms and over my shoulders just to hold onto me.
The kiss deepens gradually, familiar and unhurried, carrying the full weight of everything we survived together and everything waiting for us outside this room.
We don’t rush it.
We don’t need to.
For the first time since the rescue, the rest of the world feels far enough away to ignore.
We finish bathing—soap rinsed away, hair clean, salt and sweat and sand finally washed from our skin after years of carrying it. I shut the water off, and for a second we just stay there together in the lingering steam, foreheads resting together while droplets slide slowly down our bodies.
Neither of us reaches for a towel. We walk straight out of the bathroom and into the bedroom, water still running down our skin. I notice it, then let it go. Nothing’s interrupting this.