AUGUST 7 - 15

DAKOTA

Everything unfolded in a strobe-like montage of blurred faces and sporadic movements. As I slipped in and out of consciousness, the scent of blood, pine, and salt seemed to get caught in my lungs. I couldn't figure out how I moved from the lighthouse to the ambulance, but somewhere between those two locations, I heard Allix's voice. My eyelids were heavy and I struggled to keep my eyes open for longer than a second, but even with blurry vision, her eyes were two sapphires I couldn't miss.

In the ambulance, the incessant beeping of machines was like a catchy pop song I couldn't get out of my head. Paramedics loomed over me, their voices calm yet forceful, but I still failed to understand them.

At some point, I thought about Zachary Healy. He never made it this far.

Dawn was breaking when I woke up in the hospital, every centimeter of my body in pain. It wasn't in the same severe way as when the bullet was inside me, but I felt like one big purple bruise.

My parents informed me that it was touch-and-go for the first day, but that my surgery was successful. They also assured me that the arrival of the FBI from Seattle ensured that Sheriff Wakeman and Mike Bennett were in custody as well as transported off of the island. Processing that information made my brain and heart throb, but at least both were functioning properly. After they each pressed a kiss to my clammy forehead, they allowed me to sleep more. Thanks to the morphine, I didn't dream.

Strangely enough, Brenna Quinn was the first of my friends to drop by my room. I opened my eyes to find her sitting in a chair on the other side of the tiny room, brown strands of hair falling into her face as she focused on the book in her lap. I immediately recognized it as Allix's first edition copy of The Great Gatsby.

As I shifted noisily to be upright, her eyes snapped up. The tiny flecks of mascara sprinkled beneath her eyes reminded me of confetti.

"Hey," I croaked out, almost hearing a question-mark in my voice. She wasn't the first person I'd expected to see.

"Hey," Brenna echoed, closing the book with a soft thud. "You did the damn thing. You nearly got yourself killed in the process, but you did it. It's over."

Even though my parents had caught me up to speed on what was seemingly public knowledge, I still wanted to hear someone else answer my question."Is there evidence that Wakeman was the one responsible for everything?"

Everything was a loaded word.

"I'm sure you've noticed, but I'm not a detective." Brenna paused, expelling a weary sigh. "Based on the leads we provided to the FBI, they did actual investigating, and located the patrol boat that Wakeman used to dump Zachary and Maud into the water on July 10th."

"Anything else?"

She nodded. "Apparently, Wakeman managed to forge the ballistic report for Zachary's case, and it was her gun that fired the bullet. When the FBI found that, it pretty much sealed the deal. Anyway, both the evil human and the unhinged human are in custody now."

"Great," I nodded, tugging in a tight breath. "That's great."

I attributed my lack of vocabulary to the unparalleled relief that was surging through my veins. It was finally over.

"It is great." Brenna flashed me a frail smile. "The details are still being released to the public, but from what we learned at the station, Wakeman was the one who blackmailed Albert, paid Zachary to obtain the screenplay from a power-hungry producer...and eventually murdered Zachary to eliminate any loose ends. The GPS on her car also indicated that she was following you and Syd that day, so that's why she was at the lighthouse."

Sensing that she had more to say, I remained quiet. I might be the only one with a gunshot wound, but that didn't make me entitled to coping with the trauma any more than the rest of them.

"Allix called me," Brenna eventually continued, toying with the gold signet ring on her finger. "After we hung up, I called the police and Conrad. The two of us somehow managed to get to Cape Blue before they did, and we met Allix in the parking lot. I guess she'd dodged Wakeman on the trail, but that doesn't surprise me. Anyway, we got to the lighthouse just as Wakeman was taking Mike outside, and you were..."

She trailed off, and she looked at me with glassy eyes.

"I still can't believe Mike lost it like that," I admitted. Not that I understood Wakeman, but I assumed she hadn't anticipated the producer pulling a gun on us. It had ruined her intricate web of planted evidence and contingency plans.

Brenna snorted. "Mike basically went full on crazy person and pulled a gun on the real killer."

My laugh came out as more of a wince as my wound throbbed. "That's one way of summing it all up."

Brenna drummed her blue acrylic nails against the arm of the chair. "So Wakeman wanted to make a name for herself and nearly ruined our lives in the process..." Her voice grew quiet at the end, and I knew she was thinking about the role she'd played. Even though it was over, we each still had burdens to carry forward.

We didn't speak for a long time, but the soft buzz of the air conditioning and the beeping of machinery kept the quiet at bay. It was soothing in an odd sort of way.

"I wonder how long it will take for everything to go back to normal," I eventually said. I didn't know what I wanted normal to feel or look like, but the abstract idea of it was appealing.

Brenna's smile was strained. "I'm tempted to tell you to fake it until you make it, but I don't think that has ever been an effective strategy."

Before I could answer, a soft knock on the door altered us to the arrival of two new visitors: Syd and Maud. Dark circles hung below their eyes, and Syd's were red-rimmed, but I didn't need to find a mirror to know that they looked a thousand times better than me.

Brenna stiffened in her seat. Even after everything that we'd endured together, some things remained unresolved. We'd all sacrificed pieces of ourselves that we wouldn't ever get back.

Brenna locked a strand of hair behind her ear and stood up. "Good job not dying, Dakota. That was very Hollywood of you."

"My best publicity stunt yet," I managed to grin at her.

Brenna exchanged a few quiet words with Syd in the doorway, culminating in a hug. As Brenna pulled away, she shared a small smile with Maud before disappearing into the hallway.

Once the door closed behind my friends, gratitude washed over me, and it was the first time that I acknowledged how lucky I felt to be the one with the gunshot wound. I wouldn't be able to forgive myself if that bullet had ended up in them instead of me. One day, I'd joke that I would literally take a bullet for them.

"You look better than I did during my stint here," Maud said, and I rolled my eyes as she settled into the chair Brenna previously occupied. "Not that I look any better now, but I guess that's what no sleep does to someone."

"Hey, I saw you take a nap at the station this morning," Syd told Maud before smiling widely and crossing the room to tug me into a gentle embrace. "I can't tell you how good it is to see you in one piece."

"It feels good to be in one piece," I said when Syd stepped away. According to the doctors, I'd have my stitches for at least another week and they would keep a close eye on the wound to ensure that I didn't get an infection.

"Allix is knocked out in the waiting room, by the way," Syd told me hastily, rocking back onto his heels. "We couldn't bring ourselves to wake her up...I don't think she's slept in a while."

I nodded, smiling to myself as I pictured Allix curled up in a chair, her features at ease. "She deserves to sleep."

Despite there being so much to discuss, we didn't address much. It was still all too raw and real. Besides, we would likely be able to recount everything that happened at the lighthouse second-by-second for the rest of our lives.

Maud massaged her temples. "I still can't believe I left the crowbar Allix gave me outside. It could've been useful."

I snorted, knowing that Maud was referring to the crowbar Allix always had stashed in the trunk of her Subaru.

"Maud, I swear to you that having a crowbar would've only made things worse," Syd said and sighed in a way that informed me that this was not the first time he'd told her this. "Also, I need a break from hypotheticals. Hell, my brain needs to take a hiatus after hypothesizing all summer long."

"Fair enough." Maud rose to her feet and threw me a gentle grin. "Enjoy the painkillers while they last, okay?"

"Okay," I sighed out.

Syd heaved out an exhausted sigh the moment Maud left the room. "You're an asshole for almost dying. You know that, right?"

"Well thanks for making sure that I didn't," I said. Syd dismissed the comment with a flick of his wrist, acting as though those harrowing moments before I blacked out wouldn't stick with us forever. "How are you?"

"Better than you," Syd joked as he became the third person to drop into the chair. He looked down into his hands. "I'm just tired. I'm really, really tired, Dakota. I couldn't keep track of the number of questions the FBI asked me, but I think I'm in the clear now."

"Good." I hesitated for a beat before asking my next question. "Do you think you'll ever forgive Brenna?"

Syd offered me a sad, almost wistful smile. "Hopefully someday. Maybe that day is tomorrow or maybe a year from now. I honestly couldn't tell you. But for now, I think we all need time to...breathe."

"Breathing is good," I agreed.

A nurse stepped into the room and informed me that he needed to examine my stitches.

Even though I wanted Syd to stay, he took this as the nurse's polite cue for him to leave the room. He stood up and offered me a salute. "See you around, asshole."

When I laughed, it didn't hurt. "See you around."

*

On the day the hospital released me, Allix drove us to the lighthouse at Cape Blue. When I'd first asked her, she hesitated for all of the obvious reasons - the chief one being that I almost died there - but she eventually understood why I felt like I needed to. It was the first of many steps in putting that trauma behind me.

But now, as we sat with our backs pressed against the exterior of the lighthouse, I realized how unrealistic that was. It wasn't fair of me to measure my recovery in linear steps.

"So, I'm actually going to Ireland this time," Allix informed me, adjusting her sunglasses to sit on the crown of her head. The sun had almost slipped behind the mountains. "The whole family is too."

I chuckled. "Good. You deserve a vacation."

"So do you."

"Once Apex finishes filming, I'll go on a whaling watching cruise in Alaska or something," I joked, earning myself a grin from Allix.

After what happened, GBC postponed filming Apex until late September, and Conrad Kane will once again be an executive producer. The cameras never went away, though. Despite succeeding in keeping a safe distance from them, I knew they were always there. Journalists from local news outlets had joined the paparazzi, hunting us down from dusk until dawn.

Allix exhaled a soft sigh and ran a finger over a thin white scar on her forearm. "There's a part of me that feels like I'm just running away from everyone and everything again, but I know this time is different. This time I'm actually going on vacation."

"And I'll see you soon," I promised. We'd formulated concrete plans, solidifying things between us. 

Her lips formed a delicate smile. "New York is beautiful in the fall."

Before I could reply, Allix's eyes widened, and she pointed out at the water. "Dakota, look."

I followed the direction of Allix's finger, my gaze coasting over the water until I saw it. Five black dorsal fins oscillated amidst the glassy blue surface of the water. In the soft evening light, the orcas' black and white markings seemed even more polished. Clouds of mist emerged from their blowholes as they exhaled in a steady rhythm.

I smiled as I was struck with the realization that this was what I hoped Apex would capture. Forget the acting and the storyline and everything else that went into filmmaking. I wanted my audience to see and feel a moment like this one.

"The so-called 'bringers of death' deserve a happy ending." Allix paused, laughing softly when I lifted an eyebrow. "Not like a real ending, but a happy continuance of existence."

"I'd like to believe that we deserve that too."

"Agreed." The flecks of green in Allix's blue eyes sparkled as she gave me a faint smile. "I've turned into a bit of an optimist, and you're to blame for that."

I threaded my fingers through hers. "It's far from the worst thing that's happened this summer."

Beyond the water where the mountains met the sky, the last rays of sunlight glowed - soft and golden like any romanticized summer sunset would be. Even if I could somehow change the course of the past few months, I knew I wouldn't. There was no screenplay I wanted to follow. The best endings wrote themselves.

THE END