A Candle in the Dark

Ignoring Ezra was useless now. Any progress she’d made by doing so had been completely washed away by the days spent searching the forest. Astrid sighed, her eyelids drifting shut as she floated on her back in the river. Eden had dragged her down to the water for a day of swimming and relaxation, which Astrid thought everyone desperately needed after the tightly coiled nerves over the last few days.

There were others swimming right where the path from the camp came out, so Astrid and Eden walked along the water until the river bended and they couldn’t hear the sounds of splashes and laughter anymore. Eden had gone in first, stripping off her shorts and long sleeved shirt and running right in. Astrid threw a stick for Monroe for a good ten minutes before going in more tentatively than Eden had.

She’d been floating around for at least an hour, and her fingertips were starting to wrinkle. Monroe was on the shore, gnawing on the stick she’d been chasing earlier. Eden was lying on a rock, soaking in the sun’s rays.

“There you are, I’ve been looking everywhere.” came a voice. It was Ezra, coming around the bend. He didn’t seem to see Astrid in the water at first; his eyes were focused on his younger sister.

“We didn’t want to swim with the families,” said Eden, throwing an arm over her eyes.

“We—” began Ezra, looking first at Monroe and then out at Astrid, who maintained an air of casualty despite the fact that he was now staring at her in nothing but a bra and underwear. He had, after all, seen her in less. “Oh.”

“You should swim. You never do anything fun.” Eden told her brother. “When was the last time you washed your hair?”

Ezra rolled his eyes.

“It’s nice,” Astrid called, from the middle of the river. She couldn’t touch the bottom there, but she could see it through the clear water. She kicked her feet under and tread water, rather than float on her back. “Come in.”

After another minute of Eden badgering him, Ezra relented. He lifted his shirt over his head, revealing a narrow but strong torso, and kicked off his jeans. His machete clanged as it fell against the rocky beach.

“Those tan lines are hilarious,” Astrid said, biting back a laugh. His arms and neck were brown from the sun, a marked comparison to his much paler chest.

“Shut up. You’re paler than I am.” he retorted, then held his breath as the cold water lapped at his stomach. “It’s freezing!”

“I like it,” said Astrid, shutting her eyes as she submerged completely.

When she came back up Ezra was only a few feet away from her; close enough that if she reached out her hand she’d be able to touch his shoulder. His eyes were bright, flecks of gold shining amidst the brown. For a moment, Astrid forgot to keep treading water and slipped beneath the surface again.

Almost immediately his hands gripped her arms and he pulled her back up. Astrid blinked the droplets out of her eyes. “Careful,” he warned softly.

“Don’t start making out in front of me!” Eden yelled from the shore.

Ezra’s hands dropped, causing a splash. Astrid felt her face heat up, and she swam away from him and to the beach. She glanced toward Eden, then bent down to steal Monroe’s stick and toss it into the water.

“Sorry,” said Eden.

“Nothing was going to happen anyway,” Astrid muttered, sitting next to the younger girl to let the sun dry her skin.

Ezra emerged from the water then, his boxers hanging low on his hips. Her cheeks had already gone red again just from a momentary glance at the V that formed above his waistband.

Something in the trees on the other side of the river caught Monroe’s attention. Her ears perked up and she stood right at the water’s edge, staring intently at the opposite bank. Astrid’s eyebrows knit together as she studied her dog’s alert posture, and she felt a familiar flutter of her stomach. Something was out there.