THE NEXT MORNING THE SUN is missing in action and the clouds are swollen with imminent rain. It seems like a bad omen to Taylor, who is reminded of the day her family was returning from a long weekend on Kelleys Island when a storm whipped up on Lake Erie. The sky was nearly as black as night and the wind howled as her mom hustled the kids belowdecks, leaving Taylor’s dad to battle the weather alone. In the stuffy confines of the cabin, with the boat pitching on every wave, Taylor felt her insides churn. She made it to the galley sink in time, but she threw up and threw up and threw up. Her mom dosed her with Dramamine and a can of ginger ale, and eventually Taylor fell asleep. Now, as she stands in the cockpit of Whiskey Tango Foxtrot with the first sprinkles peppering her cheeks, her stomach coils.

Taylor checks the weather radar app on her phone, the forecast calling for all-day showers. No big winds. No thunderstorms. But she knows how quickly conditions can change.

“Do you think we should wait out this weather?” she asks, stepping back inside the cabin, where Willa is making up her bunk. It hasn’t even been twenty-four hours and already Taylor’s side of the boat is a wreck. “It’s supposed to rain all day.”

“It’s just water.”

“It should clear up by tomorrow.”

“If we’re going to make it to Key West before school starts, we can’t waste time,” Willa says. “We need to leave today.”

“It’s just one day.”

“Look, Taylor, this whole trip was meant to be an adventure, and that includes the weather. Suck it up. We’re leaving.”

“Just last night you said it was our trip, so if I don’t get to make the decisions, neither do you.”

“Fine.” Willa snatches a coin from the plastic bin filled with quarters for doing laundry. The quarters were a gift from Taylor’s grandparents. “Heads, we leave. Tails, we stay.”

Taylor nods. Willa flips the coin in the air, and Taylor holds her breath as it spins and falls. Willa catches the quarter, then opens her fist.

Heads.

“Shit.” Taylor’s shoulders sag. “Fine.”

She jams her arms into her foul-weather jacket and stomps off the boat. Taylor knows she’s being petty, but she doesn’t want Willa to know she’s afraid. When her dad brought them safely home from Kelleys, he’d had a lifetime of experience and Taylor had no reason to be frightened. Seasickness was the worst thing that could happen to her. Willa might be a good sailor, but Taylor doesn’t trust that Willa will know what to do in gale-force winds or ten-foot seas.

Taylor stands under the awning of the clubhouse porch and phones her dad. “It’s raining.”

He laughs a little, but not in an unkind way. “That happens sometimes.”