Wish You Were Here

18

Grant looked upset, but he didn't call out to Aaron. We watched him stomp through the woods in a huff and I honestly didn't know what to do. Will looked like he wanted to laugh and was fighting to hide it.

"Is that really a good idea?" Cal asked.

Grant turned around to face us.

"Alright, look," he sighed. "I'm not sure the way I'm going is the right way or the best way...but I'm trying my best. I can't guarantee I'll get you guys to safety. I want to. But if for some reason I can't...All I'm saying is you each have a choice. You can come with me. You can go with Aaron. You can go off by yourself. Okay? But it's your choice."

We all stopped and stared at him. I chose to follow him because he seemed to be the leader of our group. He called the shots and took control when none of us could. Now that he stood there telling us we had the choice of continuing on with him or choosing another route, my stomach sank.

"Grant?" I said shyly. "I choose to go with you. I know you're trying your best and that's good enough for me. The thing is...I don't want to have any choices to make. I'm clearly not very good at them. I chose this stupid phony camp to go to, I chose to get into the truck with Dean, even though he's clearly a total creep, and I chose to walk down those stairs after Gina. All my choices? They got me into nothing but trouble. So...I want to go with you because I trust your choices more than I trust my own. I hope that's okay."

He stared at me, not saying a word. His eyes were tearing up and I wanted to look away, but I couldn't.

"I'm no better at making choices than you are, Ryleigh. I chose to go to camp and go with Dean, too. Same as you. We all did. How does that make me better at making decisions than you?" he asked sadly.

"Because you made mistakes. You learned from them. And you led us out of that cabin and you're still leading us! But me...I could never do that. I want to say I learned from my mistakes, too. But honestly? I have serious doubts. I don't know if I'm capable of making the best decisions right now, and maybe I won't be able to for awhile. So, I just wanted to say I feel that following you is my best chance for me to get home," I rambled nervously.

Grant smiled weakly. "Thank you. That means a lot, honestly. I promise you - all of you - I want to get us off this island safely. And I'll do whatever I can to make that happen. But I won't blame you or have ill feelings towards you if you choose to go another way."

Will stepped up. "I'm going with you, bro. You know that."

Grant gave him a nod.

I looked over at Cal. "Yeah, you know I'm in. If we go down, we go together!" she shouted sarcastically.

We all kind of smiled when Beth raised her hand. "Ummm, my turn! Now that you brought it up, I'm going off on my own. No offense, but you guys are really slowing me down!" Beth chuckled.

We laughed along with her and I gave her a hug as I held her up.

"Okay! Love the enthusiasm!" Grant joked. "Alright, campers! Away we go!"

Cal and I exchanged glances and laughed.

"I feel like we should be singing camp songs or something," she teased.

As we started walking again, I glanced through the woods for a last sign of Aaron, but he was gone. Even though his attitude was bad and he wasn't my favorite person on the planet, I still silently wished him luck on his own.

We hiked for another few hours, stopping only once for a quick break. The fruit we had stuffed into our pockets and the plastic bag was being consumed pretty quickly.

"Maybe Aaron was right," Cal whispered to me as we walked through the forest. "It does kind of feel like we're walking in circles."

I glanced around nervously. "I think Grant would notice something like that, don't you think? All of these trees all look alike, but I think we've been heading straight; not going in circles."

She shrugged, but I could see the concern on her face. We'd been walking for a while without anything in sight other than the same scenery. Our water bottles were almost as empty as our plastic bag of fruit.

"Okay, I'm positive I've seen that tree before," Cal whispered.

"That's because it looks exactly like every other tree here," I said growing irritated.

But secretly I started to think the same thing. We had been walking and walking and all we had seen were trees and the same dirt under our feet. I told myself that I'd give it just a little while longer before saying something to Grant. Beth hung onto me a little harder, her body growing exhausted.

"Hey!" Cal sniffed loudly in the air. "Do you smell that?"

Beth and I stopped. Will, who was in front of us, also stopped and slapped Grant on the arm.

"You smell smoke?" Will asked Grant, who inhaled deeply and then nodded.

We couldn't see much of the sky through the trees, but smoke slowly wafted through the forest in gray puffs. It was too hard to tell which way it was coming from, and we couldn't stop where we were. We tried to pick up our pace. As we got deeper into the woods, the smoke came at us. It was thick enough to fill the surrounding air, making us cough and cover our faces.

"The fire has to be that way," Grant said angrily.

I knew he didn't want to head to our left since that was the same direction Aaron had taken off in. He didn't want to admit Aaron was right.
Our only other option was to go right, so we quickly darted away from the smoke and headed that way instead.

"Doesn't this head toward the center of the island though?" Cal whined. "Which would be near the waterfall, right? We'll be backtracking."

Grant didn't answer her. She looked at me wide eyed and I mouthed I don't know. We came to a slope and steadily went over it, Beth trying to balance herself without bringing me down with her.

"Grant!" Will shouted, pointing ahead.

A small, dark cabin was just ahead of us. Startled, we all froze.

"What cabin is that?" I whispered.

"I have no idea. I didn't think there were other cabins other than, you know, ours," Grant whispered back.

Smoke was still filing in between the trees and depending on which way the wind was blowing, it could come right at us.

"You want to check it out?" Will whispered loudly to Grant.

"Take Beth behind those trees," Grant instructed. "Stay out of sight!"

Will handed me the nearly empty plastic bag and nodded at Grant. Cal and I helped Beth over to a shaded area behind a large tree, sitting her down behind its trunk. We sat down with her, leaning around the tree to try to see Grant and Will. They slowly walked up the side of the cabin and around the back.

I held my breath as they disappeared out of view. Minutes passed as we waited without a sound. The three of us sat nervously, unsure how long we should wait. I peeked out again and saw Will coming up from around the other side. He was giving Grant some sort of hand signal that Grant clearly didn't understand. Will looked frustrated and pointed at the cabin's door.

Grant stood on the other side as Will grasped the door handle. Counting to three, he pulled the door's handle, flinging it open and then rushed inside.