Chapter 5

CHAPTER 5

"I'm sorry," I cry out as I collide with Dr. Kincaid's chest. The man is built like a stone wall, but even so, he takes several steps backward, his striking eyes widening for a second.

"My apologies," he says, his voice sending a shiver up my spine. I've always been a voice gal. If a man has a low, gravelly voice, a little rough, a little rich, it makes me weak in the knees. If the man also happens to possess muscled forearms and strong hands, then that's Sydney's sex trifecta.

My gaze drops to his hands, which are clenching and unclenching into fists in a way that reminds me of the infamous Mr. Darcy shot from Pride and Prejudice. Those fit the bill, though I can't tell what his forearms look like under his black coat. It's thick and wool, more suited for winter than a mild evening. Two out of three ain't bad, though judging by the breadth of his shoulders, I'd wager his forearms would earn him the trifecta anyway.

Knock it off , I chide myself. Lusting after your professor slash psychologist is the very last thing you need.

Old habits, they die hard.

"If you'll excuse me," he says, still keeping his distance and gesturing to the door, which had closed. He seems to want to avoid me, and I figure it's because I'm probably staring at him with googly eyes.

But as he steps around me, I meet his gaze for a moment, and I swear the world goes still, like the fog wraps around us, blocking out the sporadic calls of the ravens, the haunting trill of the varied thrush, until there's only silence. His eyes are shadowed by his dark, low brows, his irises a ghostly shade of grey that matches the mist. His stare is intense, electrifying, burning straight into my soul, like he can see all of me.

And what he sees scares him.

Enough that he has to quickly look away.

"I'm Sydney Denik," I blurt out, not wanting him to walk away, not wanting my future shrink to already make some crash judgments about me. "I'm in your classes," I add, though I wince inwardly because of course I'm in his classes. We all are.

He freezes, his long fingers grasping the door handle. He nods, licks his lips, hesitating. Then he closes his eyes for a moment and turns to face me.

He meets my gaze again, and this time, the intensity is turned down. He still has a bewildering thousand-yard stare, but his brooding brows have softened. The corners of his eyes crinkle enough that I'd place his age in the late thirties.

He wipes his hand on his coat. "Sorry. Hands are clean, but they smell like diesel." He shakes mine, firm and hard, his palm warm, and it's as if a current of electricity runs from his skin to mine. Not enough to shock, but enough to make my nerves dance and send sparks down my spine. He holds on to my hand longer than is probably appropriate, and the longer he does, the more intense his stare becomes, until I can feel it start to unravel something in me, something I don't want unraveled.

He swallows hard, his full mouth forming a hard line, and then looks away, dropping my hand. Again, his fingers flex at his side.

"Wes Kincaid," he says, clearing his throat.

"Do I call you Professor Kincaid or Dr. Kincaid?" I manage to ask.

"Either one is fine," he says, his voice turning raspier. He clears his throat again. "Do you prefer Sydney or Syd?"

"Either one is fine," I echo. "I think I'll just call you Kincaid."

He gives me a soft, genuine smile, like I've amused him. His eyes light up, his face too handsome for his own good. "Then I will call you Sydney unless you tell me otherwise."

"My friends call me Syd," I tell him coyly. "I can't tell if we're going to be friends or not."

I know I'm sounding a little flirty, and I shouldn't, I really shouldn't, but he doesn't seem uncomfortable by it.

"I guess we'll see," he says. "Don't be late for your class tomorrow." His face grows stern, a look he does so well, but I can tell it's in jest.

"I won't," I say as he gives me a nod and then disappears into the building.

I stand there for a moment at the closed door, feeling strangely outside myself. The fog around me seems to be wisping away with the briny breeze, the light growing brighter. I sniff my hand. It does smell faintly of diesel, though I detect the scent of tobacco as well. He probably smokes.

Either way, it's not unpleasant at all. I keep my hand to my nose as I walk over to the main lodge, the scent reminding me of something I can't quite place but is comforting nonetheless. Perhaps the smell of my childhood. My grandmother chain-smoked Marlboro Lights for the longest time, and my father always smelled of diesel from his fishing boats.

At the memory of them, my chest aches. Grief is funny like that. It lives alongside you, sometimes in silence, and then a random thought, or memory, or smell will punch through you like a fist, your bleeding heart in its grasp, and you have to relive it all over again. I often think of grief as a cycle from which there is no escape, an ouroboros, a snake of sorrow eating its tail.

My father died three years ago, and most days now, I can think of him without crying or getting sad. We were never that close since he was so rarely home, but we still had a good relationship. We were passing ships in the night, and with him, it was literal. Sometimes I think my struggle with object permanence—the ability to forget that certain things or people exist if they aren't present—is one reason why I'm not insane with grief all the time. It's one of the few concessions that my ADHD grants me. That and my ability to hyperfocus and grow obsessive over the things I care deeply about, which is why my grades are so good but only about the subjects I'm infatuated with (which is why that one calculus class I had to take was a bitch).

A raven's throaty warble draws my attention upward. It's perched on the top of the totem pole in front of me. I'd walked past the lodge without realizing it.

Instinctively, I reach inside my jacket for my phone to take a picture, since the totem at the top of the pole is a raven too, and with the fog as a background, it would make a stunning photo. But my fingers grasp nothing, and I remember my phone is gone, and I won't be able to look at it for a hella long time. The idea makes me feel twitchy, like I'm missing a limb, but I remind myself again that it's for the best.

I take my watch out of my pocket. Still have forty-five minutes to kill. I could go to my room and unpack, but it seems too daunting at the moment. I could wait in the mess hall, but I don't want to be that early, sitting all alone.

I decide to walk toward the gazebo, following the stone path as it undulates between salal bushes, the wet, rubbery leaves brushing against my legs, leaving damp spots on my jeans.

The mini peninsula that the gazebo is built on is treeless, mostly rocky outcrops and moss, giving an unobstructed view of the inlet—on a clear day, that is. Right now, all I can see is the dock and the blanket of fog. Somewhere beyond it is the wild North Pacific Ocean, reefs and rocks and small islets breaking up their force until only gentle waves roll into the inlet. It's calm here, peaceful, and I sit on top of the picnic table, trying to do some deep breathing exercises. I hear the cry of a bald eagle, but the rest of it remains a ghost.

I tell myself it's okay to be sad sometimes. I tell myself that what's done is done. I tell myself that no matter what happens, even if they find out tomorrow morning that I lost my scholarship and I'm sent back home, I'll be alright.

And where is home? I think, panic simmering. I have no home anymore. I turned in my keys. I can't live on campus. I'll have to find a job when I get back, but until I do, I'll have nowhere to stay. It's not like I can afford to live in the Bay Area anymore, but where will I go?

I'm so very fucked.

I run my fingers over the old wood of the picnic table, over the carved initials and tag lines.

EJ+MP.

Nick smells like surfer bro.

Martin loves Amy.

Don't eat the walking ones, don't eat the talking ones.

Jessica is a…

Someone had written something, and then it's been crossed out.

Don't trust any of them.

They're all lying to you.

I pause over that one just as I hear a rustle in the bushes behind me.

I twist around to see a flash of a pastel pink hijab and a smiling, warm face.

My heart leaps.

Amani?

"Come on, Syd!" Amani yells at me, waving her hand. "You'll be late for dinner!" Then she turns and runs off into the bushes.

"Wait!" I yell, getting to my feet and bursting out of the gazebo. "Amani?"

I nearly slip on the moss, but I gain my balance and run down the path, trying to catch up, but she's damn fast.

By the time the main lodge comes into view, she's disappeared.

"Amani!" I yell, looking around, only to see Lauren, Munawar, and another guy step out of the building.

"Hey, tuba girl!" Munawar greets.

I run up to them. "Have you seen Amani?"

Lauren frowns. "Who?"

"Amani," I say, scouring the area. "She has a pink hijab. She wasn't in the class, but she was on my plane."

Lauren shakes her head. "No, I haven't seen anyone like that here. Ready for dinner?"

"I guess," I say reluctantly. Amani had said I would be late. Maybe she's already inside the mess hall.

"I'm Justin," the other guy says as we start walking. "Justin Wong." He's cute, tall, with thick black hair and a cocky smile. From the way his zip-up fleece fits him, it seems he works out too. "I did actually play the tuba in high school."

I laugh. "Maybe Nick got his wires crossed." I pause. "Hey, does it bother you guys that we aren't going to be working in the lab that much?"

"Lab work bores me," Lauren says cheerfully. "My major is forest biology. University of Victoria. I'm more happy to be out in the woods than in the lab."

"I'm doing marine science," Justin says. "I'll be in the floating lab when I'm not in the water."

I look over at Munawar and his fungi shirt. He smiles and nods at me. "I'm just happy to be here."

I feel I should be taking an example from him.

We enter the mess hall, which is a lot more elegant than the name implies. It resembles the common room of the main lodge, except there are long wooden tables done up with red checkered placemats and comfy-looking chairs. While the fireplace crackles and burns at one end, at the other is a bustling kitchen, the smell of roast chicken in the air.

I scan the room, but Amani isn't here.

One table is already full, so we take our seats at the other before the rest of the students file in. The sound of awkward conversation and scraping chairs fills the space as a staff member with braided grey hair comes out of the kitchen doors with two jugs of water and starts filling everyone's glasses. I keep looking around, expecting Amani to pop up at any moment. Perhaps she's in the washroom.

A door at the corner of the room beside the hearth opens, and David Chen enters, followed by Everly, Nick, and three people that seem familiar but I don't recognize: a white man in a tailored suit with shoe-polish black hair, very deep-set, beady eyes, and stiff posture; an Asian woman with glasses and long hair; a brown-skinned woman with layers of necklaces over a lab coat with a big grin, and a Latino man with a shaved head who waves at us. The door almost shuts before Kincaid squeezes his way through, joining the row of people who have gathered in front of the fireplace.

"Good evening, students," David says, clasping his hands together, "and welcome to your first day at the lodge. I know you're hungry, probably a little tired too, so we won't keep you long. I just wanted to introduce the team. Some of them you may know of, some you may not, but by the end of your sixteen weeks, the twelve of you will come to think of us as family."

Twelve. There were eleven of us at class. Amani hadn't been there.

I look around, six of us at one table, another six at the other.

Twelve.

There's a girl at the end with freckles and curly red hair. She wasn't in class earlier. She's resting her chin on her hand and watching David speak, enraptured.

I'm about to nudge Lauren and ask who that girl is when David's voice gets louder. I glance at him, surprised to find him looking right at me. I swear they're all looking right at me, waiting for me to pay attention.

"May I introduce to you to the CEO and the COO of the Madrona Foundation, Dr. Everly Johnstone and Dr. Michael Peterson," David says.

A few claps break out. Since I'm being watched, I clap too, even though the motion is causing my head to ache. That's nothing new when I haven't eaten for a while. I hope I get something in my stomach before I get really hangry.

Luckily, the appetizer, clam chowder in a sourdough bread bowl, comes out while Michael is talking.

"This is the seventh year for our grad student program," he says. He smiles every now and then, but it never reaches his eyes. There's something cold about his manner, and it's not just because his eyes are so deep-set, his brow so prominent that he looks perpetually angry. I automatically dislike him. "We started with a couple of students, then made our way up to six, and now a dozen. I'm telling the truth when I say the summer season is my favorite for this reason. You. You bring life to the lodge, to the land. If you can imagine for us researchers, we're in isolation for so long. We love our jobs, and you can't beat the nature here. It's like living in paradise, in the gaze of God's creation, while we ourselves create." He glances at the other doctors, who smile and nod, all except the Asian woman, who is staring at the floor, and Kincaid, who is gazing straight ahead at the back of the room, hands behind his back.

"But you all," Michael continues, looking at us again, "you all make our lives here a lot more interesting. You're not just students, you're not strangers, you are crucial to the work that we do here. You are one of us. So I think I'm not alone when I say, welcome to the family."

More clapping. If this were Everly's speech, I'd believe it, but for some reason, I don't trust a thing that comes out of that man's mouth.

I go back to my chowder. It's perfectly rich and salty, with chunks of wild salmon, and listen as the rest of the researchers introduce themselves. The Asian woman is Dr. Janet Wu, very soft-spoken and seemingly ill at ease being in the spotlight, the one who will be teaching us in the lab. Then, the woman with the necklaces, the bubbly Isabel Carvalho from Brazil, the genomics lab manager, and the man with the shaved head is Gabriel Hernandez from Mexico, who is the head of the marine sciences.

Then there's Kincaid. He keeps it very short. He just offers his name and doesn't say anything else. A man of few words seems to be the right impression of him.

When they're done, they walk off, and the roast chicken comes out. Even though I was hungry earlier, I could only eat half my chowder, and I'm not even sure I can eat the chicken.

I nudge Lauren again. "Who is the redhead?" I ask, trying to inconspicuously point to the girl.

She looks over and shakes her head as she spears her chicken with her fork. "No idea. She wasn't in class. Newcomer?"

But if she's new, what happened to Amani? There's a dozen of us here. Amani would make thirteen?

I don't voice this to Lauren though. I don't want to come across as obsessive and weird on my first day. Honestly, I don't know why I'm fixating on Amani so much.

Except that I kind of do. The more I think about this, the more I'm not thinking about my actual problems. That proverbial shoe about to drop.

When dinner wraps up, I head to my room to unpack while Lauren, Munawar, and Justin lounge in the common room. I'd like to join them and attempt to be social, but I think the best thing for me is to hit the bottle of Nyquil I picked up at the Vancouver airport and go to sleep.

Except once I've unpacked, I can't find the Nyquil anywhere, or my Vancouver stickers and keychain. And some of my clothes are missing too. I swear I brought my white Stanford hoodie as well as my favorite nightgown (technically, an oversized Miss Piggy T-shirt that I've had for ten years and is hanging by a thread), and my black Nike sneakers. Now, all I have are my white ones, which probably won't last very long in this place considering how muddy it is.

I sit down on the edge of my bed and try to think about where I could have put my souvenirs and decide I must have left them on the seaplane. Luckily, I manage to find a bottle of melatonin and take one of those instead. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't, but I'm afraid I won't be able to sleep, that my mind will be racing about all the what-ifs.

I do my best to make myself at home. I complete my nighttime routine of taking off my makeup, doing my skin care ritual, and face yoga for my TMJ, before turning off all the lights. I'm about to go to bed when I walk past the window.

I do a double take.

Standing beneath the cedar, lit only by the burning ember of a cigarette, is a shadowy figure. I can feel their eyes on me, even though I can't clearly see who it is.

They watch me, unashamed, unabashed.

Until they slowly turn and walk away.

And only then do I recognize him.

Kincaid.