With a practiced grace, Jojo slid the boat between two others, the docks alive once again with skiffs and watermen, lugging nets and traps out of their boats. “Today’s Labor Day.” Anders spoke his thought out loud, to no one in particular. “Don’t they ever take a break?”
“Sure—every Sunday,” Kenny said, and then stood in front of Anders, blocking his path off the boat, which Anders found disconcerting until he remembered Piper had promised he’d pay them. He reached into his back pocket for his wallet, which seemed to be the only thing on him not covered in filth, and plucked his last two twenties from it, handing them over, trying not to panic about how much cash he was steadily blowing on this podcast venture. Discreetly tucked beneath his napkin at breakfast that morning was the bill for two nights at the bed-and-breakfast. And while he had anticipated it, having spent the night there two weeks earlier, and while it was wildly reasonable—much cheaper than anything you could find on the mainland—there was no way Anders could continue to pay two-hundred-plus every weekend, on top of his rent.
Kenny snatched the bills and moved to the side, and Anders stepped off the boat onto the dock. Before he could even turn around to say thank you, the two boys were off once again, to God only knows where. What were those weird names they were tossing about—Pitchfork Point? Dipstick Creek?
As Anders rubbed the back of his neck, sore to the touch both from the angle he’d had it bent all afternoon fruitlessly looking down and from the fire-hot sun that had surely left its mark, and stared at the retreating boat, he marveled once again that he was standing here, on this strange little island.
In the din of watermen shouting back and forth, a familiar voice drifted to his ears, drawing his attention to land. Sure enough, when he turned his head, he spotted Piper standing next to a bench, in animated conversation with BobDan.
He started walking toward them up the long dock, his stride slightly off-balance thanks to the missing shoe. And he noticed Piper glance his way, her eyes shining, her hand held up to her mouth but not quite covering a wide grin. He couldn’t be sure, but it felt as though she were laughing. At him.
He stepped off the dock onto hard land, and when he finally reached the twosome, Piper dropped her hand. “Did you have a good afternoon?”
Anders bit off his instinctual reply—Does it look like I had a good afternoon?—and plastered a manufactured smile on his face. “It was . . . something I had never experienced before. And it only cost me forty dollars”—he reached down to hike up his pants leg and show off his muddy-sock-clad foot—“and a shoe.”
“A bargain, don’t you think?” Piper said, her eyes twinkling. Anders peered at her, unable to shake the creeping suspicion he was in the middle of a game he hadn’t signed up to play and didn’t even know the rules for—and that Piper was winning.
Just then, BobDan put his hand on Anders’s shoulder and squeezed. “Peter Jennings,” BobDan said jovially. “Just the man I wanted to see. Think you could come help me in the office? I have a few boxes need moving.”
Anders looked into the old man’s eyes. Something felt off—BobDan had been nothing but gruff with him from the moment they first met, and suddenly he was being . . . friendly? And overly so. His hand dropped to Anders’s elbow and he tugged—not gently. Were the boxes on fire?
“Wait!” Piper said, and Anders turned toward her. “Anders hasn’t met Tom yet.” She looked to the empty air to her right. “Tom, this is Anders, the journalist I was telling you about. Anders, my husband, Tom.”
Anders froze, staring at Piper. It seemed ridiculous in hindsight that he hadn’t planned for this eventuality. That he hadn’t given any thought to how he would respond. Up until this point, this delusion of Piper’s—and the islanders going along with it—was something that felt outside of him; something he was observing from afar. But now it was here, staring him in the face. Or not here, depending on how you looked at it. But something he was going to have to deal with, just the same. BobDan’s grip tightened on his arm.
Anders’s mind raced as he considered his options, and the story of the emperor with no clothes popped into his brain. When his father read him that fable as a child, Anders naturally saw himself in the role of the tale’s hero—the little boy in the crowd who finally shouts out the truth. The emperor was naked! Everyone could see! It was frankly absurd everyone else went along with it. Of course Anders would never do that.
But now, here it was, happening in real life. And as the pressure mounted—BobDan’s glare nearly burning a hole in his face, his bony fingers pressing harder into Anders’s elbow, Piper’s brows drawing into deeper confusion as she waited for Anders to respond, and was it just his imagination, or had every waterman at the docks stopped what they were doing to watch this exchange?—Anders no longer had to speculate what he would or would not do.
“Hey, uh . . . Tom,” Anders said to the same empty air Piper had looked at. “Nice to, er . . . meet you.”
And just like that, the men at the docks seemed to spring back to life around him, BobDan’s grip relaxed, and Piper smiled, her brows unknitting. “Oh, I’ve told Tom all about you. I’m sure he feels like he already knows you, don’t you, babe?”
Tom, of course, did not respond.
“Anyway, we’ve got to go. Tom’s mother is expecting us. Coming back next weekend, Anders?”
“Um, yeah. Yep. I will be here,” Anders said, slowly enunciating each word,
