In the future, there will come a day when I will pick up my son from school. I can see a long way down the line now; I can see everything. He will barrel outside through the front door of a brick building, his backpack swinging off his shoulders. Maybe he will be the kind of child to plow into me, all arms and legs, an ecstatic hugger. Maybe he will be the kind who offers a little wave instead and falls into lockstep beside me, a miniature adult. I can see the rest of our day unfolding, an afternoon in spring, crisp and sweet. He and I will run errands together. We will visit the park. We will roam over the bridge. I imagine turning a corner, my son at my side. There, at the end of the block, will be our own house, the windows aglow, as inviting and warm as the beam of a lighthouse, calling the ships home.
In the end, I will be unrecognizable. I will have let you go.
IT IS TIME. The sea has flattened out, as smooth as paper, and the sky is sunny and clean. My knapsack is packed and ready to go. My mind, too, is packed and ready.
This will be the last letter I write to you.
I can hear Mick’s voice ringing in my head. The last time we ever spoke, he drew me aside in the kitchen and lectured me about my journey home. In that moment, I was impatient with him, but now it seems prescient — even vital. Mick warned me that the ferry ride would take several hours. He told me to stay inside the deckhouse, not to risk strolling along the railing. He made me promise to wear a hat. I remember him reaching out tenderly and fingering a lock of my hair. You’ll catch your death, he told me. Suddenly it seems imperative that I obey him. I have hidden all my stolen goods at the bottom of my bag. Beneath my collection of seashells, Mick’s T-shirt, my lucky puffin feather, and my four remaining cameras, I find what I’m searching for.
A crimson stocking cap. A phoenix insignia stitched in gold. I will wear it as I leave the islands for good. I am wearing it now to ward off the chill.
EPILOGUE
GALEN IS STANDING in the lighthouse. Through his binoculars, he watches the ferry cleaving a path through the fog. The mist is inconsistent, thickening and thinning. The boat seems illusory and ephemeral. Galen breathes in the salty air. He can see Miranda poised at the ferry’s stern. Her figure stands out clearly, at once diminutive and bulky, a tiny woman carrying a heavy burden at the midriff. She is wearing a red stocking cap. Galen knows that cap well. Crimson fabric. A gold phoenix embroidered on the side. Gradually the ferry fades into the mist, blurring against the ocean. Miranda’s shape is lost. But the cap is still visible. It remains after everything else is gone, a splotch of red in a bath of gray, burning like a warning light.
A cold wind picks up, circling the lighthouse. Galen is not bothered by the chill; like the line of lightkeepers before him, he has been on the islands too long to be affected. The breeze is such a constant force that he is more likely to notice its cessation than its presence. He adjusts the focus on his binoculars, gazing toward the sea.
The fog has swallowed up the ferry, Miranda, and even the afterglow of crimson. The sky is hung with low, damp clouds. The islands have a claustrophobic feel today, boxed in by shifting gray. Galen steps outside the lighthouse. The gulls are everywhere, dozing, heads beneath their wings. At his approach, a few beaks swivel. Galen adjusts his hard hat. He lifts the mask over his mouth and nose. He moves through a thicket of shifting feathers that rustle like a prairie in a breeze.
As he approaches the cabin, the wind swirls around him, bringing the scent of ammonia and mildew. He enters through the back door to avoid Kamikaze Pete. That poor bird is not long for this world. Like so many other living things on the islands, the gull has fought too much and fed too little. The coming migration will finish it off; it will never last the journey. Galen heads into the kitchen to make himself a soothing mug of tea. The house feels different now that Miranda has moved out. Her things are gone — her smell — her breath. He will never see her again. Galen has watched dozens of people come and go over the years. He has seen heartbreak and friendship and hilarity and pettiness. He has seen death, too, most of it violent. The steam from his tea rises against his face. The daily log is in its usual place on the tabletop — available and open for all to see. Galen glances through today’s entries. Four chicks hatched on Mirounga Beach. Cormorant found P.I.H. on Lighthouse Hill.
Then he reaches beneath the table. There is a special compartment hidden from view. Galen carved it himself. From inside, he withdraws his private notebook. The daily log is a public record, maintained by all the biologists, chronicling the lives of the animals. But Galen’s little green journal is another matter. It is a record of the human activity on the islands. He has been keeping it for years.
He has tracked the romantic entanglement of Mick and Forest — its inception, its increasing fervor, their midnight trysts in the coast guard house. He has reported the date and duration of each assignation. He has written about their coded interactions in public. Galen has kept watch over all of them. He has recorded the progression of Lucy’s grief after the death of her lover. He has transcribed the details of Mick’s friendship with Miranda, Miranda’s friendship with Charlene. As a scientist, he makes sure that his notes are businesslike. No conjecture or emotion. Only actions and behavior, which can be quantified and documented for posterity.
August 12: Miranda injured. Camera broken beyond repair.
August 28: Lucy scuba dives.
October 3: Mick and Forest in the coast guard house for four hours.
Galen is a biologist. His work is a sacred trust: the study of life in all its forms. On the islands, life flourishes in a unique way, untempered and unrestrained. This is true for the people as well as the animals. Galen does not differentiate between his fellow scientists and the creatures they study. Observation and noninterference are the biologist’s central creed. He chronicles the behavior of the sharks and whales, the birds and seals, the biologists and interns. He never intervenes.
But Miranda, the mouse girl — she was something different. Something new. She had a quality he had never before observed. Once he asked her, “What is your nature, Miranda?” He asked it in hopes of provoking or startling her. But there was nothing, no reaction. Her eyes remained as flat as seal stones.
Galen leafs back through the pages. His private notebook is a green jewel, leather-bound. The past year has seen a lot of activity. In his hands, the book falls open naturally to a well-worn date in November. Galen has turned to this page often over the last few weeks and months. Too often, perhaps.
November 5: Miranda raped by Andrew.
He frowns. He runs his finger over the line of his own script. Then he flips forward to the note printed just a few days afterward.
November 8: Andrew murdered by Miranda.
Galen leans back in his chair. He lets his eyes slip closed as the scene plays out in his mind again. He has often considered the night Andrew died. He saw it happen, of course. He sees everything that happens here.
It was a foggy evening. Galen awoke to the sound of the front door. First Miranda left the cabin. Then Andrew left the cabin. Galen watched as the confrontation occurred.