9 #2
I decide I’ve had enough, and so has August. Hooking my arm through Cillian’s, I drag him toward the boat he should be boarding and bid August goodnight. His rumble of laughter is almost drowned out by the lapping waves as he turns and continues down the beach.
When I think he’s out of earshot, I smack my brother hard in the chest. “Moron.”
“What?” he laughs. “It’s true! You used to have a huge crush on him–” His eyes narrow. “Wait, do you still have a crush on him?”
My brows furrow. “Absolutely not.”
Cillian chortles. “Your protestation was lightning fast. Makes me wonder if meeting him might have rekindled the torch you used to carry for him.”
“Carina carried a torch for him,” I correct. “I just went along with her.”
“I remember things very differently, Sis. Though, I guess your obsession dwindled when you started dating Niall. I wish you’d never met that one.” He taps his lip, squinting off into the distance. “What did I used to call him behind your back?”
My mouth falls open. He gave Niall a nickname?
How did he and Carina keep it from me?
How did Abuela? She eventually lets everything slip.
“Ah! Smelly Kelly. And Carina called him Vile Niall,” he reveals triumphantly, pretending he pulled the monikers up from the depths of his memory when I know my brother would never forget a title he bestowed without his target’s knowledge.
“Both of those are ridiculous.”
Cillian grins mischievously. “Maybe, but neither is as ridiculous as Niall. I never liked him for you. He wasn’t good enough.”
I snort. “Because I’m some prize?”
He hugs me to his side. “Of course you are. My sister deserves the best, or at the very least, not the worst – which he is.”
His friend is still waiting in the beached boat, looking bored, but he confirms that the creatures lurking between our houses haven’t revealed themselves to him. I thank him for helping Cillian reach me and give my brother a fierce hug.
“Don’t come back here, Cillian. I’m serious. That they let you trespass once is troubling enough. I doubt they’d allow a second attempt.”
He reaches into the pocket of his patched trousers, pulls out a long, bright green quetzal tailfeather, and tucks it behind my ear like I used to do when I was a child.
“I saw the other feather in your house. You should wear them tomorrow. For luck. One from me and one from Abuela. That way, we’ll be with you.
No matter what you face, we’re in it together.
It worked last time. The feather brought you back to us. ”
Abuela always says that quetzals only shed feathers in a place they plan to return.
A knot tightens in my throat. “I’ll do that.”
“We’ve got a telecaster. We’ll be with you every moment.”
While I want to ask how he managed to afford one, I’m more worried about the fact that they have it. I don’t want my grandmother or brother to see me fail. “I’m not sure that’s a good idea.”
What if I die and they’re watching?
Even worse, what if I die and they don’t see it, and they spend their lives searching for me long after I’m gone? In every face that passes, every voice and peal of laughter. Truth provides closure, but it doesn’t provide comfort.
I saw Carina being tortured on our screen, but I didn’t witness her last breaths.
My family watched me fall when the newscasters played the battle footage. They didn’t know I’d survived until I limped home days later. They had grieved for me, so I was overwhelmed by their joy.
I don’t know if the telecaster will prove to be a blessing or a curse.
Cillian rocks back on his heels. “Abuela begged me to find one. She gave me Mother’s jewelry to trade for it.”
My brows rise. Abuela had held onto all her jewelry since the day she shed it like a snake sloughing off too-tight skin.
“Watching you is the only thing that allows her peace. She was watching coverage of the ball when I left,” he continues.
“They’re even broadcasting the celebrations?” I scoff.
He gestures to my outfit, mimicking my prior movement. “Like you said, it’s already begun. Hermes is going to show everything.”
Gods above and below! Will there be privacy in our homes?
Cillian stares at the sky like he’s begging it to watch over me, too.
“Cil, Morrigan will carry my soul away if I lose. Now, I plan to walk through Abuela’s bright door at the end of this, knee joint screaming, but I want you and Abuela to know if I don’t, I’ll go find Carina.”
He swallows thickly and nods. If we’re parted in this life, we will find each other in the next.
His friend leaps out of the skiff and into the shallows. “Tide’s shifting. We need to go. Help me shove her back into the water,” he tells Cillian.
My brother runs to aid his friend and soon, the small, weathered boat bobs freely along the sea’s surface. Both clamber in and settle, grabbing oars and rowing as the swells lift and lower them.
“Tell Abuela I love her!” I yell over the wind.
“Don’t forget the feathers! We’ll be with you, tomorrow and always!”
Tomorrow and always.
Hand on my chest, I tuck the promise into my heart and seal it in so no god can tear it away, then stay on the shore long after they row out of sight.
When I retrace my footprints to my oikos and step inside, I find the vibrant green quetzal feather he’d given me when I left home lying on my pillow and lay the newest one beside it.
I can’t bring myself to rip the blanket off the wall like Cillian suggested, but the image is burned into my memory anyway.
I see it even though it’s hidden; somehow the linen is a bandage on a bleeding wound.
Sinking onto my bed, I sigh and hope Cillian listens and doesn’t come back to the island. He did a foolish thing tonight.
And I’m so, so grateful he did.