My only visitor is Ezra, but he doesn’t come to see me. He comes to remember June and to check on the place. He likes to study the ever-changing remains of the fire, walk the trail June restored, visit West’s grave, sit on the end of the dock to stare out at the view.

In the beginning his heart was broken into a million tiny pieces, but over time it’s mended. I can feel it each time he sets foot on the island; it’s almost whole again. The last time he came, he brought a woman with him. I listened to him tell her the stories of this place, and I felt her receive them with empathy and understanding. She is as good as him—I can feel it all around them.

Ezra is proof of one thing I now know for sure—we all heal eventually. As long as we let go. Shed the anger, the regret, the guilt. Stop letting other people’s words scream through our heads, accept that not everything is good or right or fair or the way it’s supposed to be.

Mothers are not always good just because they’re mothers, and fathers are not always good just because they’re fathers. Wives are not always faithful, husbands are not always honest, daughters cannot be perfect, and sisters cannot be saviors. The sooner we accept those variables and forgive people for them, the sooner we heal.

JUNE

I will wake up every day, remember that my sister is gone, and mourn her. I will also get out of bed and continue living life. I will talk to her throughout the day, not sure anymore if she’s there to hear me but finding my words to her comforting. The piece of me that she took in death will remain an open wound. I will bandage it regularly, but it will never fully heal. She was my sister and she took part of me when she died. A part that nobody else in the world can replace.

For several years I’ll have dreams where I get to speak to May, to hug her, lie with her, laugh with her. The ones that help me miss her not quite so much. We will always meet in her bedroom at Avril Island. Then one day those dreams will stop and I’ll have to accept that she’s moved on to wherever we move on to.

I will have regular dreams of Avril Island as well. Sometimes I’m a child and my mother and sister are there, frozen in time. Sometimes I’m an adult and Ezra is there and so is the fire. No matter what age I am when I dream of it, Willa is there. Maybe in the garden pulling out weeds, maybe a flash of white nightgown through the trees—always reminding me.