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  I bit my lip.

  “Maybe not,” Dad replied. “Maybe you can just be with us.”

  “Of course,” Mom said quickly. “You’re right.”

  Glancing around, I realized that Taylor had fallen behind. “You go ahead,” I said to Mom and Dad.

  I hung back until Taylor caught up with me.

  “Hi,” I said.

  He smiled. “Hi yourself. How are you feeling?”

  “Okay,” I said. “My arm doesn’t hurt anymore, and my knee’s okay.”

  “That’s good.”

  “How are you?” I asked. “How are things between you and Mom?”

  “Put it this way,” he said. “A month ago, I didn’t think I would ever see her again. Or you, for that matter. The fact that I have both of you here with me—that’s enough, for now. Don’t forget, I put your mom through a lot, too.”

  “She’ll forgive you,” I said. “I know it. And then you’ll come visit us and we’ll come visit you. Maybe you can even come for Thanksgiving.”

  “I would like that very much.”

  “Hey, Taylor?” There was something I had been wondering about since my talk with Mom this morning.

  “Mmm?”

  “Why do you think Mom sent me here?” I asked. “If she didn’t want me to know about everything that happened?”

  “I’ve been wondering that, too,” he said. “It could be like you told me at the beginning of the summer. Maybe they just didn’t have anywhere else to send you. They didn’t know I would be here, and they probably thought one more girl would just blend in with all the tourists. There’s not many of us left on the island who remember the accident now.”

  “Maybe,” I said.

  “Or,” Taylor continued, “maybe your mom wanted to come home, but she didn’t quite know how. Maybe she sent you to blaze a trail for her.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Well, I think the longer time went on, the harder it must have seemed to tell you the truth.”

  “Yeah,” I replied. “That’s what she said.”

  “So perhaps, deep down, part of her was hoping you would find it for yourself,” he said. “Then she would have no choice but to look her past in the face. And then maybe she could finally come home again.”

  We walked in silence for a few seconds, listening to the laughter from the others carrying back and washing over us. “I feel like this is my home now, too,” I said. “I wish I didn’t have to go back tomorrow.”

  “This is your home,” Taylor replied. “It always will be. I’ll miss you when you go, but it’s important for you to be with your mom and dad now. You three need some time together.”

  “Yeah,” I said. “I guess. But what if . . . if Mom is just different right now because she thought I might be dead or something? What if things go back to the way they were before? I don’t think I could take that.”

  Taylor swung an arm around my back. “I don’t think that will happen, Miranda. Your mom told me she’s not taking any more trips for the rest of the year.”

  “Really?” I asked, my voice squeaking with surprise. Hope floated my heart higher in my chest, like a buoy.

  “Really,” Taylor said. “But even if something happens and things go back to the way they were, you know who you are now, Miranda. Better than you did before, I think. No one can take that from you.”

  “But what if I go back to who I was before?” I asked. “The Isle has changed me so much. In a good way, I mean. I don’t want to go back to being afraid all the time.”

  Taylor considered this for a few steps. “Sometimes,” he said, “change is just discovering something that’s been inside us all along. Take you, for example. Even before last night, I thought you were one of the bravest people I’d ever met.”

  “Me?”

  “You.”

  “But why?”

  “I think just about the bravest thing we can do is bare our true selves to the world, or to somebody, and ask them to love us. And that’s exactly what you’ve done all these years with your mother. You never stopped loving her even though you’ve been hurt again and again. Lots of people, in that situation—they would guard their hearts. But not you, Miranda. Maybe you’re too young yet to know how special that really is.”

  Taylor’s words wrapped themselves around me like silk. Before this summer, nobody had ever called me brave. And now Taylor was telling me I’d been brave all along?

  “Just look at your mother and me,” he went on. “Both of us ran away to the farthest corners of the earth so no one could hurt us again. You’re not like us in that way.”

  It was kind of strange how, even though they were apart, Mom and Taylor had chosen to live the same kind of life. “I guess Mom really is her father’s daughter,” I said.

  “And you are your mother’s daughter,” Taylor replied. “But it’s up to you to decide what that means. Too many people in your life have defined themselves for too long by something that happened to them. Instead of creating our stories, we let our stories create us. Does that make sense?”

  I thought about it as we climbed up onto the boardwalk and took off our shoes. “You mean what happened to Ben and Matty,” I said. “You both let it take over your lives. And then you kind of . . . forgot to live them.”

  “Which is the exact opposite of what Ben and Matty would have wanted,” Taylor said. “None of us can escape from the darkness in life, Miranda. But we can always choose to look for the stars.”

  We stood at the top of the boardwalk now, staring down at the moonlight glittering like confetti on the water.

  “I don’t want you to make the same mistakes as we did,” Taylor said. “That’s why I’m going to leave a space open in the observatory for your story. Whenever you’re ready to tell it.”

  “My story?” I asked. “What’s my story?”

  “That’s what I’m telling you, Miranda,” Taylor said, pulling me in to his chest and kissing me lightly on the head. “It’s up to you to decide. You and nobody else.”

  55

  A small crowd of people was already on the beach, forming a line that reached from the nest to the sea.

  “Oh, good!” Charlie said, catching sight of us. “You’re here! Come look.” She pointed down at the nest. “See how it’s moving?”

  It was hard to make out in the dark, but there was just enough moonlight to see that the sand had begun to bubble like a witch’s cauldron.

  “That’s them climbing up to the surface,” she said. “In a few minutes, they’ll be starting down the beach toward the surf. You can all form a second line on the left there. Any turtles that get off course, just give them a very gentle nudge toward the ocean. Otherwise, don’t touch them, and keep quiet. Okay?”

  All of us nodded, excited and solemn at the same time.

  We formed a line across from the first one. Dad stayed closest to the nest, then Mom and me, then Taylor. Caleb stood on Taylor’s other side, and the Grovers positioned themselves by the surf. Sammy leaned forward to give us a thumbs-up.

  Soon we saw Charlie wave her hands.

  “They’re coming now,” Dad said.

  I craned my neck to get a better look. After a moment, tiny black specks appeared in the sand, slowly squirming toward us. As they neared, I could make out the shapes of their tiny flippers and heads.

  “They’re so small,” Mom whispered. “They could fit in your pocket.”

  There was only a trickle at first, but then the beach began to fill with teensy turtles, crawling determinedly toward the silver sea. Mom and I both reached down as one began to veer off the path. We made a little wall with our palms. When the turtle bumped into us, it set off the other way, rejoining the line of its brothers and sisters.

  We looked at each other and giggled.

  “Matty would have liked this,” I whispered. “Wouldn’t he, Mom?”

  She watched the turtle we’d helped as it inched away, and a little smile made her cheeks bob. “He definitely would h
ave,” she murmured. “I guess we’ll have to soak it up for him, huh?”

  Mom found my hand, laced her fingers through mine, and squeezed.

  Farther down the beach, we could just see the shapes of the turtles as they made it to the water and began to swim away, off into the ocean to start their lives.

  Mom and I stood together, holding hands until the last few scrambled by. When they had all been swept into the waves, a quiet cheer rose up on the beach.

  “We did it!” I heard Sammy exclaim.

  Dad walked around giving everyone high fives while Taylor went to talk to Charlie. I let go of Mom’s hand and drifted away from everyone else, standing in the surf where the turtles had just disappeared.

  It was strange, I thought, how the sea had taken Matty and Ben away, but tonight, it was giving all these turtles a chance at a new life. It stung to know that not all of them would have an easy time. Some of them, like Matty, wouldn’t even get to grow up. There was no predicting where the tides would sweep them.

  All they could do was keep swimming for the horizon.

  And one day, some of them would return to August Isle, following in their mother’s footsteps—or flipper prints, that is. Just like I had. And the story would start again.

  I thought about how I used to sit on my bed in Illinois, staring down at the postcards Aunt Clare had sent. How I had been looking for Mom in the postcards, but I had also been looking for me. I thought that if I could uncover Mom’s past, I might discover the truth about myself.

  But now I knew that the past might tell you why you were, but it couldn’t tell you who you were.

  Taylor was right. It was up to me to decide that. Matty and Ben’s story would be in my heart forever, but it was finally time for me to write my own.

  “Miranda!” Caleb was calling. “Come on!”

  I turned to see him and Sammy standing by Jai’s lifeguard tower. Sammy had unclipped a life jacket from it and was holding it in the air. “We’re going swimming. Come with us!”

  I looked back to where Mom, Dad, and Taylor stood with the Grovers.

  “I don’t know,” Dad said, worry creeping into his brow. “It might not be the best idea.”

  “The current isn’t very strong tonight,” Jai said. “I’ll keep an eye on them.”

  I met Mom’s eyes, saw the surprise in them. She nodded. “If you want to go,” she said, “it’s okay with me.”

  “Thanks, Mom,” I said. “I’ll come back. I promise.”

  I skipped over to Sammy and Caleb, slipping my arms through the life jacket. “We’re just going to go like this?” I asked. “At night? In all our clothes?”

  “It’s our last night together,” Sammy said. “We should make the most of it, don’t you think?”

  “Yeah,” I said, heart beating fast. “I do.”

  “I’ll hold your hand,” Caleb said.

  “Me too,” Sammy echoed. “We’ll do it together.”

  “Okay,” I said. “Together.”

  Then, with Sammy holding one hand and Caleb gripping the other tightly, I began to run. I waited to feel afraid. But the moon and the stars were shining down, illuminating the dark water, and I wasn’t alone.

  We collided with the surf and kept on running. And as I kicked off the sandy ocean floor and began to swim, the first words of my story suddenly appeared in my head.

  I am Miranda, brave and bold, and I am my mother’s daughter.

  Acknowledgments

  This story took me a long time to find. I am immensely grateful to those who stood by me while I searched for it, and to those who were there to help me bring it to life.

  To Alyson Day, whom I count not only as an editor but a friend, for her patience, wisdom, and encouragement from the very start.

  And to the rest of my truly wonderful team at Harper: Manny Blasco, Renée Cafiero, Janet Frick, Vaishali Nayak, Emma Meyer, and Aubrey Churchward for their loving care and attention to this book.

  To Sarah Davies and Polly Nolan—literary agents extraordinaire—who have fielded more than their fair share of neurotic late-night emails, for never losing faith in me and for not letting me lose faith in myself.

  To Sarah Coleman for lending her formidable artistic talents to the cover of this book, and Joel Tippie for the beautiful jacket design.

  I had a lot of help telling Miranda’s story. I am indebted to Tae Keller, Supriya Kelkar, Dusti Bowling, Kristin Gray, and Sally J. Pla for volunteering to be early readers of this manuscript, and for providing me with the insight I needed to craft it into the novel it has become. My thanks to them all for serving as teachers, friends, and inspirations to me along the way.

  August Isle is a book of many stories, not just Miranda’s, and I was fortunate enough to have support in writing those, too. I am deeply grateful to, among others, Devika Abrol, Emelia Asiedu, Devika Bhatia, Leah Henderson, Manayo Oddoye, Kristina Pugh, and particularly to Supriya Kelkar and Sangu Mandanna for lending me their time and wisdom to help me find and craft each story.

  I could not have written this novel without all the friends and family who have rooted me on, listened to me fret, checked in on me, and told me they were proud of me along the way. There are too many to name all of you here, but please know that I feel extremely fortunate and grateful to have you all in my life.

  To the Hatters, the UK 2017 debuts, and the 2017 middle grade debut group for all the advice, encouragement, solidarity, and laughs.

  To Scott, Keith, Blakely, Paige, Emmalea, Taylor, Christie-Sue, and York for sitting around the table with me every other Thursday and gently shoving me in the direction of great(er)ness.

  To Marilyn for teaching me that guilt is often a story we tell ourselves, and how to unwrite it.

  To Molly, Becca, and Ingrid for always asking when they can read the next one.

  To NRP for always reading every page of every draft and for saying, “I told you so.”

  To the Laaksos, whom I can always feel cheering me on even from across the ocean, for being my second family.

  To Mom and Dad, who gave my story the best beginning I could hope for, and whose support means everything to me. Being able to share the good times with you makes the tough ones all worthwhile.

  To Aki, who deserves more thanks than can fit in the pages of this book for his never-ending support these past few years, for being my inspiration, my rock, my shoulder, and my constant champion.

  And to you, treasured reader, for coming on this journey with me. I hope you’ll remember it as fondly as I will.

  About the Author

  Photo by Aki Laakso

  ALI STANDISH, author of the critically acclaimed The Ethan I Was Before, grew up splitting her time between North Carolina and several imaginary worlds. The only award she ever won in school was for messiest desk, but that didn’t stop her from going on to get degrees from Pomona College, Hollins University, and the University of Cambridge. She still spends most of her time in her imagination, but you might just spot her walking her two rescue dogs with her Finnish husband around her neighborhood in Raleigh. You can visit her online at www.alistandish.com.

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  Copyright

  AUGUST ISLE. Copyright © 2019 by Ali Standish. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.

  www.harpercollinschildrens.com

  Cover art © 2019 by Sarah Coleman

  Cover design by
Joel Tippie

  Digital Edition APRIL 2019 ISBN: 978-0-06-243343-5

  Print ISBN: 978-0-06-243341-1

  1920212223CG/LSCH10987654321

  FIRST EDITION

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