Escaping the Lost Island (working title)

Chapter 3

Sleeping when you're furious is a really bad idea. Instead of diluting the anger, it makes it even more pronounced when you wake up.

"What is up with you today?" Isaac finally asked as I responded to his latest question with the same unintelligible mumble as before.

"I don't want to talk about it."

Instead of listening to my words, Isaac took my return to sentences as encouragement. "Come on, what's going on? You know you can talk to me about stuff."

"Go away."

"Hey!" Isaac grabbed my shoulder and turned me around to face him. "Talk to me."

I sighed. It was hard to not vent when I had so much on my mind. "It's Toby. He's just... bugging me."

He raised his eyebrows. "Care to elaborate?"

I looked down, tracing a line in the sand with my toe. "I don't know, it's like... He just gets under my skin. It's really annoying."

Isaac stared at me. "Oh wow."

"What?"

"You're still not over him."

My head snapped up. "No, No, DEFINITELY no!" I said immediately. "I am definitely over him."

Isaac tilted his head. "Mhm."

"If there's something you'd like to say then say it."

He shrugged. "Sounds kinda like you're trying to convince yourself. You just denied it four times in one sentence AND you used 'definitely' twice which generally means the opposite."

I glared at him. "Congrats on reading your psychology book, but you're wrong."

He smirked. "Look, Meg, it's nothing to be ashamed of. Why can't you just admit-"

"Because I CAN'T alright?!! I can't let myself go back there, I just... can't." I sat down, hard.

Isaac's eyes immediately softened. "I'm sorry, I was just teasing you, I shouldn't have brought it up."

I emitted a slightly friendlier sounding unintelligible mumble.

He helped me to my feet. "So what do you want to do about him? Do you really want us to send them away?"

I took a deep breath. "I guess not. If he really DID find something important out about the island, we should probably figure out what it is."

Isaac nodded. "Seems like a good move."

I stretched. "Where is everyone this morning anyways?"

"No idea, wanna take a look around?"

We took off, jogging towards the eastern shoreline. Having been lost at sea several months ago, we had explored every inch of our island by now and could have traveled all the paths in our sleep.

After about an hour, we were nearly to the other side of the island but still clueless as to the whereabouts of our fellow survivors.

"Dude what the heck?" Isaac panted. "Unless they're at the banana trees, I can't imagine where they'd be, but we stocked up this morning."

I squinted farther ahead. "Maybe Brian got a craving for cashews again."

Isaac rolled his eyes and nodded.

As hard as I was trying not to, I was thinking of Toby and what he had said when he had first arrived. "There are things about this island that I don't trust; things that none of us can understand. . ." What was he talking about? I had been so distracted by my own feelings that I hadn't given his words much thought.