The Missing by Kiersten Modglin (essential books to read txt) 📕

his lips colliding with mine so hard I immediately tasted blood. I recoiled, pushing him away from me.

“What are you doing?” I demanded, standing up as I dragged my hand across my mouth in horror.

“Oh, shit. Oh, god. I shouldn’t have… I wasn’t thinking. I just—”

“You weren’t thinking,” I repeated. “I have a husband, Noah. Our friend just died. You can’t just… You can’t just do that.”

He hung his head, and I realized I was rubbing salt in an already torn open wound. “I wasn’t thinking. I just acted.”

It wasn’t an apology. I wasn’t sure what it was, but it wasn’t that. It should’ve been an apology. I was a married woman, and he knew that. “I know we’re all in a weird headspace right now. Just…you can’t kiss me, Noah.”

“Understood,” he said, giving a firm nod. He stood from the rock, rubbing his palms over his arms quickly, as if he were cold. He wiped a stray tear from his cheek, his tone cooler, but not unfriendly. “What are we doing tonight? We can’t see the trees we marked in the dark. We’re going to have to make camp.”

“We have to bury him,” I said. “Before anything else. He deserves to be laid to rest the right way.”

“I don’t disagree, it’s just… How will we manage that?”

“We’ll use our hands if we have to,” I said, the very thought of leaving him without a burial making me sick. “We can’t just leave him.”

For a moment, I thought he was going to argue, but instead, he offered a small, sad smile. “Harry could use coconuts for just about everything. If he were here, I’ll bet he’d suggest using them to help us dig.”

In a morbid way, it felt as if we’d come full circle. Harry had taught us how to survive on the island using only what was readily available, and now we’d use what we’d learned from him to pay our respects.

We worked in silence, both of us sniffling and wiping away our tears as we dug. The process was long and grueling. My forearms burned, my fingernails had chipped and broken to the point that most of them were bleeding. The moonlight cast shadows across our faces so we had a form of privacy, though we were completely together in this.

When we’d dug a grave as big and deep as we could manage, our bodies and hair caked with mud and both of us completely and utterly exhausted, we stood there, the reality of what we were about to do sinking in.

“He deserved better than an unmarked grave in a random jungle in the middle of nowhere.” The words came out angry, bitter, and without being able to make out Noah’s features in the moonlight, I couldn’t tell whether that was what he was feeling too.

“It seems like that’s all any of us are going to get.”

“Don’t talk like that,” I said with a sharp inhale, though I couldn’t deny that I’d thought the same thing.

“Come on. You know as well as I do, if Captain Mega-Brain can’t make it in a place like this, the rest of us don’t stand a chance.”

“Harry’s…” I could hardly bring myself to say the word. “Death…was a terrible accident, but it was only an accident. We can still survive this. You have to believe that.”

I watched his fists move to his hips. “Why do I have to?”

“Because…” I had no real answer. “Because if you don’t, what’s the point?” I’d felt all the same things earlier, but now, hearing Noah say them, I felt powerless and angry that he’d given up so easily. We had to keep fighting. We had to never give up. If we didn’t, Harry would’ve died in vain. His death had to mean something, it had to propel us forward, give us a reason to keep going.

“I guess the point is that there is no point. We’re trapped on this stupid island with no idea when or if we’ll ever be rescued, no resources or idea what we’re doing to even attempt to survive—”

My voice rose with anger as I cut him off. “Harry taught us—”

“What?” he screamed, his voice echoing throughout the forest. “He taught us what? How to boil water in coconuts and how to build some makeshift shelter that the slightest storm will destroy? Can we really live like this for years? For the rest of our lives? Do we even want to?”

“What are you saying, Noah?” Anger and hopelessness had begun waging war inside of me, each emotion fighting for my attention. How dare he believe we are all going to die?—but also—we are all likely going to die.

“I’m saying we’re fucked. Don’t you get that?” He launched forward, grabbing two handfuls of dirt and throwing them to the side with a loud growl. “How are we supposed to fight this? We don’t know where we are, we don’t know what we’re up against, we don’t know anything.”

“You’re wrong. We don’t know where we are or why we’re here, but we do know something. We know that someone else is on this island. Harry died helping us to get that information. So, stop. Stop with the poor pitiful us talk. You’re allowed to be mad. You’re allowed to be sad. But you’re not allowed to give up. You’re not allowed to feel defeated. Harry died, and we’re still here. We have to keep going, if not for ourselves, for him. For your brother. For Harry’s daughter. We keep going because they didn’t get to. Because as long as we’re breathing, we still have something to fight for. You don’t get to give up right now. You have no right to do that. None of us do.”

“I don’t get you sometimes, Ace,” he sneered. “Let’s just get this over with.”

With that, he climbed out of the shallow grave, and I followed his lead. Fresh tears filled my eyes as we stood over Harry’s body. I had no idea what, if any, religion he