Page 119 of Swept Away

“You have curly hair,” Mae says, staring up at Zeke. “Like me.”

I feel the collective intake of breath—me, Penny, Zeke, all at once. I’m sure Mae feels it, too, and I smile to soften the atmosphere, taking her hand.

“Curly hair is the best,” I tell her. “I wish mine was curly. You want to try skimming stones? Zeke’s really good at it.”

He takes my cue, dropping my hand as he crouches down beside her and sifts through the gravel of the path leading to the pond, looking for a flat-enough stone.

“This one’s perfect,” he says, voice catching slightly as he glances at Mae’s profile. “You need one just the right size. Here, do you want to try first?”

I look at Penny. She’s watching Zeke and Mae, her face tight and frightened. I feel the knot of anger I’ve carried this week beginning to loosen, and I reach toward her.

She takes my hand and holds tightly. “I’m sorry,” she mouths at me, and I smile at her.

I might not be completely there with forgiving her, but I do understand why she lied. I know she just wanted to protect herself, and protect Mae, and that self-protection is big for Penny. I know these things are never as simple as they seem.

“I love you,” I whisper to her, and Zeke and Mae glance up.

I could be talking to any one of them, really. I love them all, and lately, since we got home, I’ve had an almost compulsive need to say these things out loud. I wonder how long this feeling will last—knowing how lucky I am, and actuallyfeelingit, instead of just moving through the days without noticing. I hope I can hold on to it forever.

“Are you the one who sailed away with Lexi?” Mae asks Zeke.

“Yeah, that’s me.” He skims a stone over the water—it bounces once, twice, three times.

She thinks about this. “Next time,” she says, “can you call us to say you’re going?”

Penny bursts out in surprised laughter.

Zeke grins. “OK. That’s fair.” He sobers, looking at her properly now, holding out a stone for her to take. “In future,” he says, “I promise we’ll always tell you what’s going on.”

She nods at this, then hurls her stone into the water. It lands with a satisfyingslupof pond water, and the ripples spread outward, reaching for us, steady and sure.

“This is a welcome home party,” Mae says, taking the next stone Zeke offers her and hurling it after the last one. “But this isn’t your home. Is it? Do you live in Gilmouth like Mummy and Lexi?”

Zeke glances at me. We’ve touched on this a little, but we’ve not discussed what to say to Mae about it, and I feel Penny stiffen.

“I think home isn’t really a place for me,” he says. “It’s people. My people. So I want to be where they are, because then I’m at home.”

Mae thinks. “OK. So is Lexi your people?”

“One of them,” he says, with a small smile. “Yeah.”

“She’s mine, too. Her and Mummy and Ryan.”

“I know,” Zeke says. “That’s exactly why I really wanted to bring her back to you.”

There’s so much emotion in his face when he looks at me. I have to bite my lip to keep from crying.

“I get it,” Mae says, with a nod. “What it means. Welcome home.” She points to me. “It means you brought home back.”

I can’t hold it in any longer. I bend to hug her against me, and she leans her head into me with the childlike trust that’s always floored me, even when she was the tiniest bundle falling asleep on my chest.

I’ve seen the wilderness; I’ve seen an endless sea in a gathering storm; I’ve nearly died, and I’ve watched the man I love come close to death, too. But there is no emotion out there as big as the love I have for this little person in my arms. That love—it’s what got me home.

Two yearson

Lexi

“So, what haveyou got for me, forager?” he asks, as he reaches to lift her aboard.

---