Amy had come home from the hospital; he’d called the nurses’ desk so many times that they knew his name and always told him how she was, when she left. He’d driven past her house five, maybe six times now in the past week, but couldn’t tell if anyone had been home. He would go today—give it one more try before heading back to Oystertip—an island he’d believed would bring her back to him.

When he’d first seen the island, he had become convinced their mutual work would save it, and that all his wishes, hell, his prayers, had been answered. Fate had finally intervened; she also had to see it. And for the briefest time she had seen it. He just had to make her see and know their destiny again.

Lost in his thoughts, he found he was already in Darby, driving past the house he had memorized: the gingerbread trim on the front porch, the frozen ferns in the front planters, the curtain pulled further open on the right window than the left, the front-porch light that remained on all the time.

The garage was open, empty save for Amy’s SUV. Nick looked at the truck’s clock: ten fifteen in the morning. It was time.

He pulled the truck up to the curb and parked, opened the driver’s-side door, then shut it with a soft push. He didn’t want to make a single noise to startle her, to make her scurry to the far corners of the house where he couldn’t reach her. He walked to the front porch and stood for a minute, breathing in, out. He lifted his hand and knocked.

No sound came from the house: no footsteps, no muffled music wafting through the front door’s glass side panels. He took a deep breath, knocked again, more forcefully this time.

“I’m coming . . . coming.” Amy opened the door, pushing something aside with her foot. She glanced up. Only silence dropped from her open mouth.

“Say something. Anything,” Nick said.

“What . . . what are you doing here?” She glanced outside, motioned for him to come in, then shut the door behind him. “You can’t . . . come here. I thought you were my neighbor bringing dinner. They’ve all organized dinners. How humiliating is that?”

He reached out to touch her; she backed away from him.

She held up her hand to stop him. “Yes, sir. The entire town believes that I got lost in the woods trying to save our precious earth. They believe this because it’s what Phil told them. So they come by with dinners and flowers and books and . . . sympathy. I want to scream at them, tell them I don’t deserve their dinners . . . that I can’t eat their food, because I have a rock where my stomach used to be. . . .”

“Amy.” He took a step forward, reached for her.

“Why are you here?”