The sky behind him is the color of a Morpho butterfly—bright blue, cloudless, beautiful. It’s the perfect day. Why did it have to be so perfect? I’ve never seen a Morpho butterfly in person, but Wren Christie, my cashier protégé at Sunny’s Beach Market, has a tattoo of one on her left calf. Their blue wings are scaled in real life, making them iridescent. They shimmer at different angles, depending on how you look at them.

Tattoos adorn the arms of the man hovering over me, but he moves so quickly that it’s hard to make them out. A thick, dark line of pine trees on his right forearm is all I can decipher. It matches the tree-tops overhead, like a black-and-white comic book version of the real thing. Sun glimmers through their spiky branches like a disco ball, flickering softly in my eyes with an easy breeze.

It’s so incredibly peaceful here. I slip into the peacefulness, wanting so badly to stay there. Let it take me.

“Marina!”

I gasp, and my breath clouds over my face. Why am I so cold? A warm blanket settles on my belly. It’s blood, I realize achingly.

Oh, it hurts. I feel hole-punched. Gutted. Sliced.

I shouldn’t be here. Unlucky. Cursed. Fated to be alone. Mom was right.

No, Marnie. Positive thoughts only.

Don’t think about the pain.

Look for something good.

His eyes match the sky, the butterfly.

“I like your eyes.” My voice doesn’t sound like mine. There’s no energy or cheer behind my words—two things I’m rarely without. I’ve been compared to Buddy the Elf, only every day is my Christmas, and my workshop is Sunny’s Beach Market.

“I like your hair,” he says, moving with me toward the ambulance.

I get that a lot—less than two percent of people have naturally red hair.

“It’s a mutation,” I sputter, but I don’t think he hears me. That was the second fact Mom taught me about redheads. After a particularly rough day in kindergarten, she followed, “You’re special, honey,” with, “You have a gene mutation,” and I remember being unable to sleep that night over fears that my classmates would google that tease-worthy tidbit. The world doesn’t go easy on differences—an irony since we all have them.

I can’t imagine what it looks like now. Mel worked so hard on it.