Escaping the Lost Island (working title)

Epilogue Part 3

My dad died four months later. I remember feeling cold all day which didn't make any sense since I was in Georgia in June. It was right around the end of my shift when I got the call. My mom sounded amazingly calm on the phone. She told me she had been there with him when he had passed and that he wasn't in any pain. He just sort of slipped away. I have no recollection other than that except that the whole time my mom was talking I was staring at my fingernails that I had just gotten manicured. Ten smooth little ovals. Twenty minutes at the salon and they could gloss right over the fact that I had chewed my nails for the first twelve years of my life. All the scars and imperfections disappearing to the outside observer. I hated that.

The funeral was held on the following Saturday. I've always disliked funerals. When I was younger, I had just been bored by them, but as an adult my distaste for them is bred of my discomfort around large groups of uncomfortable people. I had already grieved for my father before he had died and I did not intend to grieve openly in front of a roomful of people. It was simply not in my nature to do so.

It would come in waves, the pain. One thing that people don't seem to realize about death is that it is not a "one and done" type of grief. It pops up when something entirely normal happens and your loved one is not there. It will pop up when we are having Thanksgiving dinner and Dad is not carving the turkey in his ridiculous apron that mom bought him as a joke. It will pop up when Magic comes on the radio and he is not there to make cheesy 80's pop synthesizer sounds with me.

So as I wandered the sea of people dressed in black, I felt strangely put together. I could be courteous and detached for a few hours. Then I could return to my normal life to grieve in my own way in my own time. I was not expecting much during this particular time. I was certainly not expecting them to be there.

They were nestled in a corner a little ways away from everyone, talking amongst themselves. It was so strange to see them dressed up. When we had parted, we had been starved and shell shocked teenagers. Now they were successful adults.

Jessie saw me first and before I could move, she was across the room and throwing her arms around me.

"How are... how did you know..?" I stammered incoherently as I hugged her back.

"Your mom called us," Jessie said as she released me.

She stepped back and then I was in the embrace of Rita.

"I can't believe you guys are here," I murmured more to myself than anyone in particular.

"Of course we wanted to be here." Toby's voice seemed deeper than I remembered and when I hugged him next, I found he had grown taller. Looking up, I was relieved to find the same comforting eyes and smile on the face of a man I was otherwise meeting for the first time.

"How are you doing?" Rita asked me, searching my face with concern.

"Well as I can be I guess," I shrugged. "This is all just so...weird. Like it's not really happening, you know?"

Rita nodded. "I too experienced that feeling when my father died."

I had temporarily forgotten that she had lost her dad as well. It was oddly comforting that she knew what it was like.

"How do you...deal with it?" I asked her. "Like every day."

"I have to let myself feel it," she said. "Be sad when I feel sad, and invite him into moments where I miss him. But I also try not to feel guilty for continuing to enjoy life. Like what's happening to me now, making new memories and new experiences. You'll never forget him and you will surely think of him often. Just don't let your happy memories of him become sad ones because you miss him."

I nodded slowly. "Right."

"Think about our friends from the island," Rita went on. "Are your memories of them in their death?"

I shook my head. She was right. I remembered Isaac as he was when we were best friends in jr high, laughing at our stupid inside jokes, and making a sandcastle with Anna and Rita. I remembered Noelle's eyes, how they'd twinkle at me when we were thinking the same thing, and the way that she always kept her space at our camp as neat as she could. I didn't think about them dying anymore; if I did it would drive me crazy. I wouldn't think about Jessie dying, or my mom, or anyone who was alive now that I loved. In the same way, I had to think about my dad as he lived.

"That makes a lot of sense," I told Rita. "Thank you."

She smiled, a little sadly. "It's not going to be easy, I won't pretend that. But we're all here for you."

Toby put his arm around me. "Absolutely."

I felt tears start. "Jeez, you guys are going to make me cry," I laughed at myself. "Seriously though, I can't tell you all enough how much it means to me that you came."

"We love you, Meg, we wouldn't be anywhere else." Jessie gave me another squeeze.

I took a deep breath. "So please distract me from all of these feelings that are happening and tell me what's going on in your lives," I said.

The four of us chatted for nearly an hour and it seemed like no time at all had passed since I had been with them. It felt like I had known them my entire life, not just on an island where we had been fighting for our lives. Then the funeral service began and I lost track of them until the end.

As I smiled and thanked everyone that passed me on their way out, I saw my friends preparing to leave out of the corner of my eye. Excusing myself to an elderly relation, I darted across the room to them.

"Don't be strangers, please," I told them as I hugged them each goodbye. "Let's not wait for another funeral to get together."

"Sounds good to me," Toby agreed. "I hate funerals."

"I think I'm going to be in Kansas sometime this fall visiting family," Jessie said. "That's kind of a halfway point for us right?"

"Not for Rita," I pointed out.

"Well that's your fault for living in Costa Rica," Toby teased her.

We discussed a meeting time, made a tentative plan, and parted. I wondered if we'd really make it happen. Even if we didn't, I was confident we would see each other again. These were the kind of people I wanted to hold onto for the rest of my life. I had found in them love, support, and friendship like I had never experienced and I never wanted let go of that.

Yes, friendship, and only that for Toby and I. That isn't to say I didn't love him. I absolutely did and do. It simply was not the kind of love I thought it was. Five years apart had shown me that. We were desperate teenagers on the island; we knew nothing about each other in an ordinary life. And now that we were back to ordinary life, it had separated us into the places we belonged. I was grateful for the time we had been brought us together; I wouldn't have survived it without him. But as for anything romantic between us, we left that behind on the island.

Speaking of things left behind, the other raft was never found. I prefer to think they all made it to land somewhere and are living happy contented lives. I am not naïve enough to believe this is what happened, but I see no benefit in thinking the worst. As for our island, this much I do know; Rita and Toby saved at least four lives by returning to us. After our rescue, a helicopter was sent to the site Toby and Rita had described. They had been able to map out an area of roughly twenty miles in which the island would be. Three days later, they had found nothing. The island had disappeared into the ocean just like the cave had predicted. All that remained lived in the memories of those who had survived it.