The morning grows darker as the storm approaches. I can’t catch my breath, so I stumble to a slow jog, then a determined walk. I don’t have the energy to be upset at you, not anymore. It’s all been run out of me. All I feel is a deep sadness that this is how it has been, and perhaps this is how it will be until I die.

I don’t know how long it takes me—maybe thirty minutes—but I finally arrive at the clearing surrounding the old cabin, and seeing it again like that, on a stormy morning, takes my breath away. It might be lonely, and Tom might be part of the last generation that keeps it from crumbling into disrepair, but it is still the place where I fell thoroughly in love with your grandmother. The darkening gray light casts every edge into sharp relief, and memories bombard my mind—Tom and me laughing while fixing the roof, and Mary and Shirley rigging up a pulley system to raise a thermos of cold water up to us; that early evening when we played a game of tag around the house, when Mary and I hid in the brush; that feeling of having nowhere to go and nothing to do but sit in the sun and look out over the water.

I stand at the edge of the clearing and put my hands on my knees, try to catch my breath. My heart beats so hard it feels like it might break one of my ribs. I move closer to the cabin. The memories draw me in; I am helpless. But I don’t have time to think any longer about the old days, because as I come around the side of the cabin, I see something bobbing along the edge of the lake. At first I’m sure it’s a pile of clothes one of those trespassing high school kids left behind. As the rain comes down harder, I stare at the spot, and I nearly go into the house looking for you, but something about it makes me stop. And that’s when I realize it.

That floating pile of clothes is you.

You are facedown on the bank, but your body is a rag doll, dipping up and down with the small waves created by the wind of the approaching storm. I race through the clearing and slip through the mud and the wet leaves, fall down, get back up. Fortunately, at that particular spot the bank is shallow, so I reach down and gently scoop you up.

Your face is pale as death.

I start to cry. “No, no, no! No, Pearl, not you. Not you.”

I hold you close, trying to convey all of my warmth into you. I would give it all to you if I could. I carry you back to the path, and the cursed branches pull at your hair and our clothes as we leave the cabin behind.

We don’t go very far before I lay you down on the packed dirt. The rain is falling even heavier now, so I lean over you to try to keep you dry. I can’t tell if you’re breathing. Your skin is the color of white-gray clouds, your lips blue, your black hair somehow darker than black. I put my ear to your mouth.