No one replied.
The sounds of the waves crashed against the debris.
A rush of dizziness came over me. I licked my lips tasting blood and let out a cry.
“Mademoiselle.” A strained voice murmured behind me. It was the one that had awoken me from my dream.
Sobbing, I looked over my shoulder.
Leon lay a few feet behind me. His shirt was off, displaying his muscular body. Little red cuts covered his arms, hair wet and slicked back, his face sunburned.
Instinctively I touched my cheeks. Irritated and hot, they felt burnt too. My body started to tremble violently, almost as if going into shock over what happened. “How long…have we been…on here?” I glanced up at the sky.
The sun wasn’t up as high as when we’d first taken off.
“Heures,” he said. Leon inched himself closer to me and held out his hand to try and comfort me. “Please don’t cry.”
“I need my friends.”
“Are you hurt anywhere?”
“No. I don’t think so.” I placed my palm against his. “I feel…disoriented.”
“Did you hit your head?” With his other hand, he touched the back of my neck and examined my scalp. “I do not feel any bumps. What do you see?”
“Your beautiful chest.”
He smirked and asked, “Any white spots?”
Shaking my head in response, I couldn’t believe we’d been on this makeshift raft for hours. “What happened?”
“We crashed.”
“I get that. Where is everyone?”
He didn’t say anything.
Emotions soared inside me. Tell me they landed okay. Everyone is floating up ahead of us. They’ve gone for help. Something. “Leon. Please.”
“I do not know…”
“Then tell me what you do know.” I studied his handsome face. He had a wide forehead, thick eyebrows, and lips that I’m sure, under any circumstance except for today, were kissable.
“The pilot made a sharp turn—back to the island.”
“Didn’t we fall apart in the air?” It was all a blur.
His feelings seemed hidden. Upset. I could tell by those kissable lips of his. They trembled. He cleared his throat and said, “I grabbed onto you. My seatbelt snapped.”
“We got sucked out together?”
“Oui. We ended up in the water with a chunk of the ceiling. I pulled us up on here. You were unconscious.”
“Leon, you saved me?”
He tapped the metal. “This is what saved us.”
“Where is everyone?” I asked him again. I had to know.
Leon’s eyes settled on the water. I followed.
Aquamarine and dark navy waves were all around us. We were in the middle of nowhere. Even the air seemed still. No breeze.
I wanted to get up and run. Run like when I knew the “F” train was on the subway platform back home and I had to catch it. The anxiety coming over me became unbearable. Would there ever be another train to catch? A ride to take us from here to there, wherever here was exactly…I hadn’t a clue.
“My friends didn’t get sucked out like we did.” I thought about Lex, Blake, and Vive. Such a nightmare—how could they be taken away from me?
“The plane turned back for the island. They must be close to Eden.” Leon’s words filled with hope.
“Eden?”
He nodded. “They probably swam to shore.”
“You think so?”
“Oui.” For a second, I thought I noticed tears in his hazel eyes. Blinking a few times, they disappeared.
“How do you know they’re alive?”
“Stop.”
“No. You don’t know. Do you?”
“Arrête!”
“They’re dead.” I cupped my mouth. “Sorry. I didn’t mean—”
“My heart would tell me if they were gone.”
“Your heart?” I didn’t know what the hell he was talking about.
“If your friends had died, do you not think you would feel their loss, deep-down inside, even without anyone telling you?”
Hmmm. I didn’t want to go there.
Move Over Brooke Shields
On a floating piece of the aircraft, we sat in silence.
Leon glared at me. I searched inside myself for an answer to his question about whether or not I thought my friends were…dead or alive.
My mind recounted the time my parents had dropped me off at Avon Porter. When their sedan had pulled away, I knew in my thirteen-year-old heart that I’d never see them again. And I didn’t, not until years later in family court.
Today, sitting here on this piece of floating shrapnel next to a man I hardly knew, did I sense that same despair about my friends? The only thing I felt was anger. Pure rage boiled within me. If I’d taken my besties money, and not this silly job, none of this would’ve happened. Boarding Air Carribea was all for me, my wants and needs. Not my friends. Therefore this crash weighed on my shoulders.
“Well?” He made his impatience evident. “What does your heart say?”
“I’m not sure. I try never to get my hopes up about anything. I usually…expect bad things.”
“Do bad things usually happen to you, Mademoiselle?”
“Look at us.” My arms flailed around, mocking his question. “Yes, Leon, I seem to get the worst in return.” Crap, I heard myself and that didn’t sound good. I couldn’t lie. My life sucked.
People assume because I came from the Brillford legacy and hung out with rich people, my future was perfect. They were wrong.
“Mademoiselle, you are saying you are pathetic and hopeless.”
“I guess…I am.”
“No,” Leon snapped, in his thick French accent. “I expect Fab is worried, and Gus is looking for us.”
I sucked in a breath, gaping at him. I suppose a crash like this could bring out the soul searching in anyone. This was the most Leon had talked to me all week. And to think that it took a plane crash, and us being isolated, to make it happen.
“I believe you.”
“You do?” His forehead wrinkled in surprise.
“If I don’t have faith that they’re safe, I’ll stop breathing. Right here, I’ll die.”
“Me too,” he said, and rubbed my shoulder. My skin felt sticky to his warm touch.