Sunlight stabbed through the gap in her curtains. Like an accusation of wrongdoing, as nights spent drinking usually demanded. Renée lifted her head from the bed with a groan. Her neck protested the awkward angle she'd slept in for too long… as well as the lack of hydration.
The reception had left behind a slight hangover. The kind with enough clarity that she wasn't sure she wanted. It would be nicer to just not remember all the things she did.
The notebook lay where she'd left it. Its cover was closed but the item somehow radiated presence to her. Like a living thing. She placed her palm flat on the surface while remembering what she'd written in the darkness. What she'd admitted to its pages.
[Yep. Time to destroy the evidence.]
But when Renée opened it to tear out its pages - because the blank ones did nothing wrong, right? - her hands shook. The ink stared back at her, raw and real in the morning light. Her usual neat handwriting dissolved into something desperate and jagged where she'd pressed too hard with the pen. Like claws scoring paper.
"Tonight when you kissed me back I felt alive again. Really alive, not just going through the motions…"
After reading most of a line in a whisper, she pressed her fingers to her lips. The kissing felt like a dreamt memory already… but the words on the page were undeniably real. As were the ones that followed.
/ How do you tell someone you love that you remember being killed by a giant bird in another life? /
"Jeez."
Her voice cracked as she lost her breath. She'd never written it so plainly before. Had never let herself be so honest about what haunted her, not even in therapy. The words - she knew should tear these pages out and burn them. Should destroy this evidence of her fractured reality before anyone could see it.
Before Ayla could-
"...Ayla."
The name floated out of her throat like a feather, then stuck in there like the pointy end of it stabbed through. Renée remembered that she had run away again. Of all the times she'd chosen silence over truth, it was *after* making a pass at her ex.
[Yeah. I need to tear these out.]
Her hands moved before she could second-guess herself. She carefully extricated the pages from her notebook. Then she began folding them with trembling fingers. The hotel stationery envelope she found felt too formal for such intimate confessions, but it would have to do. It would prove the moment she had the *stupid* idea, anyway.
/ When I'm brave enough to tell you everything. /
She wrote Ayla's name on the front before adding this line in neat script. The pieces of paper goods felt heavier than they should as she slipped it into her bag. After she let go, her fingers clasped together in long unused prayer.
What she'd done was not quite a promise of action, but something close. A truth that felt dangerous still now held in more immediate reserve. A reality waiting for the right moment.
Or maybe waiting for her to become the right version of herself. The one she needed herself to be - who could share this impossible history without fear of breaking permanently whatever might rebuild between them. Even though she knew nothing *should* start at all with it held secret.
[But I'm weak. And she felt-]
Her phone buzzed with a text that interrupted her descent into thinking thoughts inappropriate for the morning. She sighed before seeing it was Leana mentioning something about storm damage. A knock at her door made her jump.
Over a few seconds she shifted from annoyance that it might be the new bride trying to pull something by texting and entering… to a blend of hopeful fear that it might be a certain lawyer coming to 'talk'. Her fingers flexed nervously while thinking she should clear her throat and respond.
The person on the other side beat her to it.
"Ms. Laurent? The manager needs to speak with all our guests about storm damage assessments."
"Just a minute!"
She called back to the unknown voice. Grateful for the excuse to stop thinking about what she'd written. About what she would have probably done just now if it had been her ex. She hurried to change out of the too fancy dress and into some more normal, everyday wear.
The envelope that now waited in her bag was like a hot potato, but it had nothing on the heat running up her back. Almost nothing. Renée left her messenger bag hanging on the desk chair. She didn't want to be near it or bring it somewhere that her ex might miraculously find it.
Still, she felt its presence like a beacon - or a signboard that declared she was 'insane' - as she closed and locked the room. The key card she stuffed in her pocket felt like insufficient protection, especially with only the layer of tan capri pant material.
The resort's main dining room had been hastily converted into a meeting space for everyone on the island. Most of the wedding guests had stayed and only a few had departed on the afternoon ferry the day before, skipping the reception. Everyone looked about as rough as she felt, unable to sleep through the storm as 'soundly' as she had.
[Passing out after an emotional wringer wasn't exceptionally restful.]
The night manager stood at the front with the day shift… though most of them had been up and down throughout the night. The wedding planner was also nearby, her face showing the strain of a sleepless night replying to guest questions in place of Leana. In a manner of speaking Carmen had fulfilled her duties already, but - like her father always told her - the mission wasn't over until everyone was home.
Renée slipped into a seat near the back, her hazel eyes automatically scanning the room before she could bother to stop herself. They found what they wanted quickly enough. Ayla sat near the front sitting with the posture she learned from her etiquette training.
It made everyone else and their rumpled appearances around her stand out. A crisp white blouse somehow looked fresh despite everything. The writer's thoughts spiraled a little, remembering the feeling of her fingers digging through the other woman's hair again for the first time in six years.
[Of course she looks put together in the morning. Not disheveled… in the slightest.]
Flashes of pulling her back into bed in college began to invade and increase the heat crawling up her back. The night manager cleared his throat and interrupted the thoughts diving straight in the gutter.
"Thank you all for coming. I'm afraid we have several situations to address."
He outlined the damage they'd discovered - not just the broken window from the night before. There were structural concerns about the roof over the east wing that had apparently been struck hard by debris. Lightning had apparently struck the beached ferry and the resort mechanic said things didn't look good.
Early reports from the mainland also suggested more damage. Widespread power outages. Flooding. The emergency response forces were up to their necks dealing with it all. Because of that, it would delay any immediate evacuation plans since the island-goers were better off than most..
In short, they were safer where they were, all things considered.
[Safer trapped on an island with her. With that time bomb of a letter in my bag. No, even that isn't the worst of it.]
Renée was growing more and more confident that her hands had a mind of their own. She was going to get too close and something would go too far. Something her main brain knew should be called a 'mistake' but her hand-brain could only thinking of as…
"Fun. Now everyone is going to remember this part rather than our wedding."
The bride poked the author in the face and while it broke the spell she was casting on herself…
"W-what?"
The words the journalist used felt too apt!