Apex

01 | ecosystem

MAY 10
[ two months before ]

ALLIX

It wasn't easy getting better.

Running the risk of feeling like a narcissist, I decided I understood this better than anyone I'd encountered in my eighteen years of life.

I'd promised myself that it wasn't going to happen again, but I'd thrown myself back into the deep end, and in January, my parents shipped me off to Seattle for inpatient treatment instead of back to New York City for college. I was stubborn by nature, so I wasn't thrilled. Even in retrospect, I cursed the silver-lining.

That was half of the reason why I'd decided to fabricate a story about living in Ireland for the last five months with my extended family. It wasn't that farfetched, considering my family had lived there for two years when I was in elementary school. So aside from my family and longtime therapist, no one was the wiser. The other half of the reason was that nothing was more frustrating to me than feeling passive in my own existence. I might not be able to control my worst impulses, but I could control my narrative. Besides, recovery was hard enough without everyone secretly waiting for me to make the same mistakes all over again.

"How are you feeling?"

Snapping out of the metaphysical, I shifted in my seat and faced my father. Despite his Irish genes, Jon McGovern's face sported a healthy tan. I imagined he'd spent the weekend out on our sailboat, Galway's Treasure, soaking up the sun and fishing while wearing his iconic green fisherman's vest. Now on a foggy Monday morning, he sat beside his eldest of two daughters on a ferry boat heading home to Friday Island, Washington.

"I have vertigo," I answered deadpan. I'd popped a tablet of Dramamine before boarding, but the choppy waters still made my stomach twist.

"I know. You do look a little green, Allix," my father quipped.

Despite my best brooding efforts, I cracked a smile. 

"J pod is back from Vancouver," he continued, referring to one of the three Southern Resident orca populations in the Pacific Northwest. The pod travelled through the water channels between the San Juan Islands in Washington and the Gulf Islands in British Columbia. Friday Island was right smack in the middle of the archipelago. "Just in time to impress the film crews."

"Film crews?"  I asked, lifting an eyebrow. I must've really fallen off the face of the Earth. 

"For the new drama series that your famous friend is co-producing. You'd think I'd remember what it's called considering it's all anyone is talking about these days, but I must've blocked it out."

In the stupid amount of time it took me to realize who my father was talking about, I blinked and said, "Oh. That's neat."

Dakota Black was my only famous friend. Or, more accurately, Dakota Black was my friend. Our once iron-clad friend group had drifted apart when we started college this past fall and was probably nearing extinction. In all honesty, I wouldn't be surprised if it was already extinct, and I just wasn't aware. After all, I hadn't spoken to any of my friends since New Year's Eve.

My father had started talking again, saying something about when Dakota was supposedly returning to Friday Island to begin filming, but I wasn't paying attention.

Across the aisle, a middle-aged man with a bad spray tan removed a banana from his briefcase and wasted no time peeling it. Its potent stench hit me almost instantaneously, and my queasy stomach threatened to rebel against my resolve.

"I need to get some air," I declared, jumping to my feet as the bitter taste of bile suddenly became all-consuming. I'd always made a point of never emptying my stomach in a public place, and I wasn't keen on starting now.