Chapter 28

CHAPTER 28

The rain lashes at my face as I run down the ramp and the dock, nearly wiping out a few times. The wind batters me from the sides, making me wobble, waves smashing up against the sides of the boats as they're tossed violently in the swells.

I reach Mithrandir and pull myself aboard, bursting through the saloon doors and yelling down into the cabin.

"You knew!" I scream.

I scramble down the stairs in time to see Kincaid coming out of his quarters, pulling on his jeans.

"What happened?" he says fearfully.

"You liar!" I yell, storming toward him and slapping him across the face. The CRACK echoes in the cabin, and before he can adjust, I shove him hard against his chest.

He moves back a step, hand at his cheek, staring at me in horror.

"You asshole!" I scream again. "I saw Clayton! I went into the operating lab—I saw him there. He's dead. He's dead, Kincaid. You killed him."

His face pales, and he swallows hard. "I didn't."

"Liar! I saw the blood on your boots! I asked Clayton, and he said you knew! He said you were one of them!"

"You just said he was dead," he says calmly.

"And you know why he was able to speak despite that! You killed him, one way or another, you killed him, and you're making him come alive. You're bringing him back from the dead again and again so you can experiment on him." My heart breaks at the endless cruelty of it all. "All so you can peddle your fucking drugs."

He presses his lips together in a fine line.

"Fuck your NDA! I'm reporting you to the police! I'm reporting you all to the police!" I start looking around for his phone.

"There's no reception here. The storm is causing service dropouts from the satellite," he says. He reaches for me, and I try to pull myself out of his grasp, but he holds tight. "Listen, Sydney, I can explain everything, and I will. But you're not safe now. Neither of us are."

"Why? No one saw me down there. And Clayton wouldn't tell them that."

Would he?

"If they suspect something, they just need to check their monitors. Everything here is recorded, everywhere, all the time. Even in this very boat."

I look around wildly, trying to spot the camera.

"We have to go," he says, grabbing both my shoulders now and peering into my face. "Do you hear me? We have to leave. On the boat. Now."

"I'm not going anywhere with you, and especially not in this storm!" I yell, wriggling myself out of his grasp. Off-balance, I land against the chart table, then spot the VHF radio.

I can call the coast guard!

I reach for it, but then Kincaid grabs me from behind and pulls me away. "Not until I've explained," he grunts, holding me in place.

I squirm, trying to fight him, but he's just too big and too strong.

"Let me go!"

"I can't do that, Syd," his voice rough at my ear. "I'm sorry."

Then he's pulling me backward, and with one hand, quickly reaches under the chart table to pull out a spool of rope.

"No!" I yell. "Help!" I scream. "Someone help me!"

Oh my god, what is he going to do?

"No one will hear you in the storm," he says grimly, wrapping the rope around my shoulders quickly, pinning my arms to my sides. Then he steers me to the couch, plunking me down.

I try to bite him, but he has quick reflexes.

"Stay here!" he commands, his eyes flashing dangerously. "Don't move. I'm doing all of this to help you, Syd. You have to trust me."

"Trust you?" I exclaim as he turns and goes up the steps two at a time until he's on the deck. He turns the engine on, and it comes to life, loud, rumbling and shaking the boat.

Oh my god. He's really going to try and leave with me. He's serious. He's kidnapping me and taking me with him into the storm. We're going to die!

I'm going to die.

I'm going to die and wake up strapped to an operating table.

I get up and run over to the galley kitchen. With the way my arms are pinned down, I struggle to open the drawers. I keep watch through the portholes at the side, watching as Kincaid's legs go past, the sound of ropes being unfurled. I manage to pull a drawer open, leaning just so to try and get my fingers around a knife. I have no idea how I'm going to stab him like this, but it's better than nothing.

By the time I have the handle in my grasp, the boat starts moving backward, waves slamming into the stern.

We're loose, no longer tied to the dock.

"Oh fuck," I whimper. Suddenly, the GPS console at the chart table comes alive, and I can hear beeps from on deck. Kincaid must be plotting a course, using the autopilot on the system in the cockpit, which is showing up on the downstairs chart.

I go over to it, trying not to accidentally stab my thigh with the knife, and watch as the boat's location shows on the chart. He's plotted a course out of the inlet and across the open to Winter Harbor.

Fuck.

I eye the VHF, wondering if I can get up on the table, if I can then manage to grab it. Maybe there's some emergency button to hit. Or if I hold down the depressor on the mouthpiece and shout for Mayday, maybe they'll hear me.

Kincaid will hear you too , I think. And then what will he do?

I have to take my chances. It's worth a shot.

I drop the knife, unable to climb with it safely, then get up on my knees on the bench seat. I'm trying to balance, leaning toward the table, when a wave hits the boat from the side. I yelp and go flying against the communication consoles, knocking loose something that had been stuck in there.

Feeling bruised, I stare at the small square piece of white paper that flutters down onto the table.

A Polaroid picture.

The Polaroid picture I've seen Kincaid carry with him, seen him staring at with so much longing that I was always too afraid to ask what it was.

But now, it's staring at me, right in the face.

And it's my face.

I'm staring at a picture of myself.

Except, I'm…different.

I have long brown hair, black nail polish, wearing my Miss Piggy shirt with my pajama bottoms. Kincaid is sitting on the floor next to me, his arms around me, clad in ugly reindeer pajamas, and there are some unwrapped presents at our feet.

We're both smiling at the camera, looking happy.

At the bottom of the photo, in my handwriting, it says:

Syd + Wes Xmas at Madrona 2023.

I stare at it, blinking hard, trying to comprehend.

2023?

But it's 2022.

I know it's June 2022.

Why does this say 2023? Why am I with Kincaid? Why am I calling him Wes? Why is my hair my natural color? Why don't I remember any of this?

And then, in the back of my head, puzzle pieces start to fall, not enough for me to put them together, but enough to let me know that I'm missing something.

Something terrible.

Suddenly, I hear Kincaid coming down the steps.

"We'll go extra slow, but I've plotted a course for?—"

He stops.

I turn to look at him, shaking my head, my whole world starting to disintegrate. Tears spring to my eyes because I don't understand.

But you do understand, you do understand.

"What year is it?" I ask him, my words trembling. "Please. Tell me what year it is."

Kincaid's face crumbles. He walks over to me slowly and picks up the Polaroid, glancing at it before putting it back into the spot where it was stuck in between the instruments.

"It's 2025," he says.

I shake my head, my chin trembling. "No. It can't be. It's 2022."

"It was 2022," he says patiently, though his eyes are sad. "It's now 2025. Three years have passed, Syd."

"Passed since what? What was that, what is that? Why are we…why don't I remember?"

He reaches down and unties the rope from around me, the boat shaking as the waves slam into it, the autopilot in control but going slow.

I feel like I'm on autopilot too.

None of this is real.

Nothing is real.

What the hell is happening?

He then disappears into his quarters, leaving me reeling.

Reality seems to slip away, leaving me raw and exposed to the elements.

It's 2025.

I've lost three years of my life.

How?

Why?

When he comes back, he's holding a shoebox. He places it on the chart table and lifts off the top, gesturing for me to look inside.

I hesitate, the fear so acute that I don't think I can move.

But then I do. I peer over into the box.

It's full of Polaroid pictures.

I reach inside and start rummaging through them.

There are pictures of me and Kincaid together. Many pictures of us together. Kissing under mistletoe. Dancing. Having beers in the sunshine on the boat. Playing bocce ball in the field. Feeding a seal.

There are also pictures of me and Dr. Wu laughing about something. As I flip through, there are a lot of pictures of me and Dr. Wu. Going for a hike, roasting marshmallows, working in the lab.

Janet , I think. You called her Janet.

There are pictures of Everly too. Some at Christmas where she's posing with a Santa hat or making a small snowman. One while whale watching, Everly smiling at the camera with the wind in her hair. She and I on the couch in her cabin, drinking pink martinis.

There's even one of me and Amani, lying in a pile of autumn leaves and throwing them up in the air.

Amani.

Tears start to burn behind my eyes as the truth slowly creeps up on me.

I'm starting to remember.

I look up at Wes, at his familiar, beautiful face. His eyes are brimming with emotion, barely restrained.

"Wes?" I whisper to him.

The corner of his mouth lifts. "Hey, sweetheart," he says quietly.

A tear rolls down his cheek.

Oh my god.

I stare down at the pictures again, my old life coming back to me in pieces, all my emotions coming first.

But so much is missing. Too much is missing.

I know…I know I…

"What happened to me?" I ask, but even as I do so, alarm creeps in. I close my eyes, my mind so desperate to remember.

"I don't know if you're ready to hear," he says.

"Please don't lie to me anymore," I tell him, my eyes flashing open. "Please, I can't bear it."

He shakes his head, his mouth grim. "Later."

"Later?" I repeat, getting to my feet. "What the fuck, Wes? What happened to me? How come I can remember everything, but…but…I don't know what the last thing I remember is. I look at these pictures, and I remember the moments, but the moments aren't stringing together. There's no form. There's no function. I remember these things, and that's it. My life is a mosaic."

"We need to get out of this storm first," he says, moving for the stairs.

"No!" I yell at him, punching him in the shoulder. "Stop fucking lying to me! Why were you all lying to me?" I grab my head. "Oh my god, I can't even think. I can't think. I don't know who I am." I stare at him and scream, "I don't know who I am!"

"Calm down," he says, panic in his eyes.

"Fuck you!" I yell. "Don't tell me to calm down!" I go to shove him again, and I slip on the rug.

My body lurches to the side, and out of my peripheral, I see the taped, broken corner of the dining table rushing up to meet my head.

Suddenly, Wes' hands wrap around my arm, pulling me back just enough so that I hit the couch instead.

And that's when it all comes back to me.

Everything slams into me in one horrible, existential moment that blows my mind apart at the seams.

All of this has happened before, and it will all happen again.

I had argued with Wes one night, here on the boat.

We were fighting.

We weren't together anymore, but we were fighting.

Things got physical.

I pushed him, and I think he shoved me back.

Yes, he pushed me.

I fell right here.

I hit my head on the corner of the table.

And that was it.

That was where my life ended.

That was when I died.