On the Island (18 page)

“You don’t get along well with those,” she pointed out.

“This one hit me.”

Anna put another ice cube in her mouth and kissed my neck and my chest.

“How long until room service gets here?” she asked.

“They didn’t say.”

Anna kissed my stomach and moved lower. When I felt her mouth on me, I gasped because it had never been cold before. I closed my eyes and rested my hands on her head.

When room service knocked on the door a little later, I tied my robe and answered it. The man who delivered the food put everything on the table, and as soon as I added a tip and signed the check, we spread it out, taking the lids off.

“We have silverware,” Anna said. She held up a fork and stared at it for a second before spearing a meatball.

“And chairs,” I said, pulling one out and sitting down next to her. I handed her some garlic bread and cut a piece of steak. I groaned when I put it in my mouth. We fed each other bites off our forks and drank our Cokes. Our stomachs filled up fast; we weren’t used to such heavy food, or so much. Anna carefully wrapped up all the leftovers and put them in the refrigerator.

We stretched out on the bed afterward, to let our food settle. Anna played with a piece of my hair and put her head on my shoulder, tangling her legs with mine.

“I’ve never been so content in my life,” she said.

I muted the TV. We had been watching coverage of the tsunami while we ate, amazed at the amount of devastation. Indonesia seemed to have been hit the hardest, and the death toll had already reached the tens of thousands.

“I feel terrible saying this because so many people have died, but if it hadn’t been for the tsunami, we’d still be on that island,” Anna said. “I don’t know how much longer we would have lasted.”

“I don’t either.” I stretched my fingers toward the nightstand and turned the clock radio on, fiddling with the dial until I found an American music station. Boston’s “More Than a Feeling” was playing, and I smiled.

Anna sighed. “I love this song.”

She snuggled closer, and I held her tight.

“Has it hit you yet, T.J.? That we’re safe and we’re going to see our families again?”

“It’s starting to.”

“What time is it?” she asked.

I turned my head toward the clock. “It’s a little past two.”

“It’s one in the morning in Chicago. I don’t care. I’m going to try Sarah again. There’s no way she or my parents are sleeping anyway.”

Anna sat up and reached for the phone, pulling the cord across my body. “I’ll try her home number first.” She dialed and waited. “It’s busy,” she said. “Maybe she’ll answer her cell.” Anna dialed the number and waited. “It went straight to voice mail. I’ll leave her a message,” she said, but then she hung up without saying anything. “Her mailbox was full.”

“Try again in a little while. You’ll get through eventually.” She handed me the phone and I put it back on the nightstand. “Anna?”

She snuggled back into my arms. “Yeah?”

“What about John? Don’t you think Sarah probably called him?”

“I’m sure she did.”

“What do you think he’ll do when he finds out you’re alive?”

“He’ll be happy for my family, of course. Other than that, I don’t know. He’s probably living in the suburbs with a wife and a kid by now.” She paused for a minute and said, “I hope he gave my stuff to my parents.”

“Where will you live?”

“With my mom and dad. Wherever that is. They’ll want me to stay with them for a while. Then I’ll get my own place. I still can’t believe they sold their house, T.J. They always talked about buying something smaller someday, maybe a condominium, but I didn’t think they’d actually do it. I grew up in that house. It makes me sad to know they don’t own it anymore.”

I kissed her, and then I untied her robe and slipped it off her shoulders. We made love and fell asleep afterward. When I woke up it was 5:00 p.m. Anna slept soundly beside me. Staring at the ceiling, I thought about our conversation. I had asked her about John, but I hadn’t asked the only question I really wanted an answer to.

What about us?

Chapter 41

—

Anna

I opened my eyes and stretched. T.J. was leaning back against the headboard with the TV on low, eating a Slim Jim.

“That was a good nap.” I kissed him and swung my legs out of bed. “I have to pee. Do you know what I love the most about this bathroom?” I said, looking over my shoulder as I walked toward the door.

“Toilet paper?”

“Yep.”

When I got back from the bathroom, T.J. made me try a bite of his Slim Jim.

“Admit it. It’s not bad,” he said.

“It’s okay, but I’m a lot less picky than I used to be. Where did I leave those SweeTarts?”

I found them on the dresser. I wasn’t used to air-conditioning, so I wrapped my robe tighter around my body and snuggled back under the covers next to T.J.’s body. I was stiff and sore, more than I’d been when they first pulled me from the water, and I was thankful for such a soft bed.

At 10:00 p.m. I tried Sarah. It was 9:00 a.m. in Chicago, but I got a busy signal on her cell phone. “I still can’t get through,” I said. I called her home number but it just rang. “Her machine isn’t picking up either.”

“I’ll try my dad. Maybe he’s talked to her.” T.J. dialed his home number and waited. He shook his head. “Their line’s busy, too. I guess they’re both getting a lot of calls. We can try again in the morning.”

T.J. put the phone back and stroked my hair. “I don’t know how I’m going to get used to not sharing a bed with you every night.”

“Then let’s not get used to it,” I said. I propped myself up on my elbow and looked down at him. I wasn’t ready to let him go, no matter how selfish it made me feel.

He sat up. “Do you mean that?”

“Yes.” My heart pounded and my brain screamed that it was a bad idea, but I didn’t care. “We’ll be apart for a while. You need to be with your family and I do, too. But after that, if you want to come back, I’ll be waiting.”

He exhaled, a relieved expression on his face. He pulled me into his arms and kissed my forehead. “Of course I want that.”

“It won’t be easy, T.J. People won’t understand. There will be lots of questions.” A knot formed in my stomach just thinking about it. “You might want to mention you were almost nineteen before anything happened between us.”

“You think someone will ask?”

“I think everyone will ask.”

I woke up in the middle of the night to go to the bathroom. We had fallen asleep with the TV on, and when I crawled back into bed, I picked up the remote and scrolled through the channels, stopping to watch the news for a while.

I sat straight up when CNN announced breaking news and there on the screen, under the caption
TWO FROM CHICAGO LOST AT SEA, RESCUED AFTER
3 1/2
YEARS
were pictures of T.J. and me, frozen at sixteen and thirty.

I reached over and gently shook T.J.’s shoulder.

“What, what is it?” he asked, still half asleep.

“Look at the TV.”

T.J. sat up, blinked, and stared at the screen.

I turned the volume up just in time to hear Larry King say, “I think I speak for everyone when I say there’s a story there.”

“Holy shit,” T.J. said.

Here we go.

Chapter 42

—

T.J.

I woke up before Anna and ordered eggs, pancakes, sausage, bacon, toast, hash browns, juice, and coffee. When it arrived, I kissed her until she woke up.

She opened her eyes. “I smell coffee.”

I poured her a cup. She took a sip and sighed. “Oh, that’s good.”

We ate breakfast in bed and then Anna took a shower. I stayed by the phone in case my dad called. As soon as she was done in the bathroom, we switched places. When I walked out, drying myself with a towel, she stared at me.

“You shaved.”

She rubbed the back of her hand against my skin.

I laughed. “You told me if we were ever rescued I’d have to do it myself.”

“I didn’t really mean it.”

The phone rang at 11:00 a.m. My dad had chartered a plane and said we needed to be at the airport in one hour.

“Other than refueling, you’ll fly straight through. We’ll be waiting for you at O’Hare.”

“Dad, Anna’s been trying to reach her sister. Have you talked to her?”

“I got through to her twice. Her line has been busy, but ours has been, too, T.J. The news spread fast. The airport made special arrangements, and they’re allowing us to be at the gate when you land, but the media will be there, too. I’ll do what I can to keep them at a reasonable distance.”

“Okay. I better go so we can get to the airport.”

“I love you, T.J.”

“I love you too, Dad.”

I dressed in the T-shirt and shorts we bought in the gift shop. Anna wore the blue dress. I fished the business card for the seaplane charter out of the pocket of my shorts and threw our filthy old clothes in the trash. We stuffed everything else into two plastic bags we found in the room.

After checking out, we took the hotel shuttle to the airport. Anna could barely sit still. I laughed and wrapped my arms around her.

“You’re wired.”

“I know. I’m excited and I drank a lot of coffee.”

The shuttle slowed to a stop at the airport entrance and Anna and I stood.

“You ready to get out of here?” I asked, taking her hand.

She smiled and said, “Absolutely.”

The flight crew—pilot, copilot, and one flight attendant—cheered and clapped when Anna and I ducked our heads and walked through the door of the plane. They shook our hands and we smiled and introduced ourselves.

I checked out the cabin. There were seven seats; five single seats separated by a narrow aisle and two attached seats. A narrow couch stretched along the wall. I couldn’t imagine what this must have cost my dad.

“What kind of plane is this?” I asked.

“It’s a Lear 55,” the pilot said. “It’s a midsized jet. We’ll have to stop a few times to refuel, but we should be in Chicago in about eighteen hours.”

Anna and I put our plastic bags in the overhead compartment and settled into the side-by-side leather reclining seats. A large floor-mounted table sat in front of us.

The flight attendant walked over to us as soon as we buckled our seat belts.

“Hi. My name is Susan. What would you like to drink? I have soft drinks, beer, wine, cocktails, bottled water, juice, and champagne.”

“Go ahead, Anna.”

“I’ll have water, champagne, and juice, please,” she said.

“Would you like me to make that a mimosa? I have fresh orange juice.”

Anna smiled at Susan. “I would
love
a mimosa. Thank you.”

“I’ll take water, beer, and a Coke,” I said. “Thanks.”

“Certainly. I’ll be right back.”

We had zero tolerance for alcohol, and we got kind of hammered. Anna drank two mimosas and I had four beers. She couldn’t stop giggling, and I couldn’t stop kissing her; we were loud, too, and Susan did an awesome job pretending not to notice. She brought over a huge plate of cheese, crackers, and fruit, probably hoping it would sober us up. We inhaled it, but not before I insisted on trying to throw several grapes into Anna’s open mouth. I missed every time, which cracked us up.

When it got dark, Susan brought over blankets and pillows.

“Oh, good,” Anna said, hiccuping. “I’m a little sleepy.”

I spread the blankets over us and slipped my hands under Anna’s dress.

“Stop that,” she said, trying to deflect my hands. “Susan is right over there.”

“Susan won’t care,” I said, pulling the blanket over our heads so we could have some privacy. I was all talk, though, because five minutes later, I passed out.

I woke up with a headache. Anna was still asleep, her head resting on my shoulder. When she woke up, we took turns cleaning up and brushing our teeth in the bathroom. Susan set a plate of turkey and roast beef sandwiches on the table along with potato chips and Cokes. She also handed me two individually wrapped packages of Tylenol and two bottles of water.

“Thanks.”

“You’re welcome,” she said, patting me on the shoulder.

We tore open the Tylenol and swallowed the pills with a drink of water.

“What day is it, Anna?”

She thought about it for a minute before she answered. “December 28th?”

“I want to spend New Year’s Eve together,” I said. “I’ll be missing you a lot by then.”

Anna gave me a quick kiss. “It’s a date.”

We ate our sandwiches and chips and passed the rest of the time talking.

“I’ve thought about this day for so long, T.J. I can picture my mom and dad, Sarah, David, and the kids all standing together as I run toward them with my arms wide open.”

“I’ve thought about this day, too. I worried it might never come.”

“But it did,” Anna said, smiling at me.

The sky lightened, and I gazed out the window at the frozen Midwestern fields. When we descended for our landing in Chicago, Anna pointed and said, “Look, T.J., snow.”

We touched down at O’Hare a little before 8:00 a.m. Anna unbuckled her seat belt and stood up before the plane came to a full stop.

We grabbed our plastic bags from the overhead compartment and hurried down the aisle to the front of the plane. The pilot and copilot came out.

“It’s been a pleasure bringing you home,” the pilot said. “Good luck to both of you.”

We turned to Susan.

“Thanks for everything,” Anna said.

“You’re welcome,” she said, giving us a hug.

Someone swung the door of the plane open.

“This is it, T.J.,” Anna said. “Let’s go.”