When she broke the surface, Neri pointed at me. “I wanted to see if Aslan was okay.”
Anna focused on me with a frown. “Hi, Aslan. I’m glad to see you’re looking better. Please don’t take this the wrong way, but...how are you here, and how did my daughter know you’d be waiting for us?”
I stood and brushed off my borrowed shorts. Goosebumps darted down my spine as I glanced at Neri swimming at the bottom of the pool and back to her mother.
“I...I have no explanation for how Neri knew. I don’t think she did. She’s just saying that.”
Anna narrowed her eyes. “My daughter exaggerates, that’s true, but she isn’t a fibber.”
“I didn’t mean—”
“I know. It’s fine. Nerida is her own kind of special. I swear I’ll be an old woman before I fully understand how she senses things she shouldn’t. Do you know she almost always guesses where we’ll find the sea creatures we’re trying to study? She’s more reliable than a fish finder.” She laughed under her breath. “She’s wild and free and frankly scares me a little.”
I cracked a smile. “She’s definitely a force.”
“Oh, yes. A force that can knock you over if you’re not careful.” Her eyes darkened, and I swear a warning laced her words. “Anyway, you were saying....How did you get here?”
“I walked.”
“Walked?” Her eyebrows raised as she looked at my boot. “On a fractured ankle?”
“It doesn’t hurt.”
“I’m sure that’s a lie if I’ve ever heard one.”
I dropped my head, truth spilling free before I could censor. “I’ve had worse. Please. Don’t worry. You and your family have already been so nice to me. I’m fine. Truly.”
For a moment, she didn’t reply.
She just stared at me as if she was as in-tune as her daughter and could sense things I would never say. Finally, she nodded. “So you were discharged early, and you came here?”
I fidgeted. “I-I wanted to come and say thank you. Again. For everything.” Throwing a quick look at Neri, she popped up, took a breath, then vanished underwater again.
I added quietly, “I know I shouldn’t have come. You’ve already done so much, but I...” I shrugged all while my eyes stung. “I...”
These people had saved my life, but now I was trespassing in their garden.
Why would they help me further? Why did I think I’d be safe here when it was their legal obligation to hand me over to the authorities and let them deal with me?
Air was suddenly hard to come by.
I squeezed the back of my neck.
A giant splash wrenched my head up and spun Anna around.
Water went flying, followed by a girl’s squeal.
I stood frozen as Jack tossed his daughter into the sky, letting her rain back into the pool with a waterfall of droplets. His t-shirt lay discarded on a rock. The same rock he’d probably just jumped from.
Neri screamed a war cry and launched herself onto her father’s back, scrambling to his shoulders and grabbing fistfuls of his hair. “I win. I win—”
Jack ducked underwater, taking Neri with him.
Anna rolled her eyes. “I live with water babies. I swear. Been on the ocean all day and spent most of that freediving on the reef and what do my beloved husband and daughter do when we get home? Go straight back into the water.”
Jack appeared again, swiping his face free from wetness. “Aslan! Hey. You found us then!”
Neri swam between her father’s legs and popped up in front of him, waving at me. “You’re staying for dinner, right?” Spinning in the water, she faced her father. “Go pick up more Nemo burgers. Aslan wants one.”
“No. I’m fine,” I rushed. “I don’t expect—”
“I have a hankering for pizza.” Jack winked. “Homemade with lots of mushrooms and mozzarella.”
“Yes!” Neri swam to the sandy shore and jumped out of the pool. “I’ll go get changed and help you make them.”
She tore off into the house, leaving me alone with her parents.
One dry and wary.
One wet and welcoming.
No one said anything for a long moment.
Jack clambered out of the pool, grabbed his t-shirt and looked me up and down. “I figured my clothes would be too big on you. For your height and build, you’re slightly underweight.”
I didn’t know how to respond so I just tipped my chin in acknowledgment.
Glancing at his wife, they shared a look before Jack pinned me with a stern stare. “Do you know why I gave you our address, Aslan?”
I shook my head.
Anna mumbled something, but Jack ignored her and strode toward me. Placing his wet hand on my shoulder, he squeezed me once. “It’s because I know what you are, and after what you’ve lost...I wanted you to have at least one safe place to go.”
My eyes shot to his. “You know...what I am?”
Letting me go, he nodded. “You’re here illegally.”
Ice frosted around my heart.
“I figured you’d probably run before they could interview you. You’re alone without anyone to rely on. You also know you’ll either be detained or shipped offshore for processing. Or worse...be deported back to your home.”
The ice thickened, blowing a blizzard in my lungs.
Jack’s voice turned husky. “Answer me two things. Give me honesty and then we’ll eat dinner and afterward...we’ll talk. Properly. With no fear that we’ll tattle on you.”
The rock was back in my throat.
“Ask.” I balled my good hand.
“Where are you from?”
“Turkey.”
“How the hell did you end up here of all places? Turkey is insanely far. If you had to leave, why not stick closer to home? Europe perhaps, or—”
“Australia was my father’s goal.”
“Why?”
“Because it was the farthest country he could get to without moving to Antarctica.”
“And you sailed the entire way?”
How much could I tell them? How much was too much?
Weighing every word carefully, I said, “My family wasn’t poor. We had passports and money. We left the usual way—on a plane, just like everyone else. But...” I tensed and did my best to forget the many airports, the many flights, travelling a little farther from Turkey with each one. By the time we landed in Indonesia, my parents’ panic had reached manic levels to rid themselves of our identities by any means necessary. Next thing I knew, Afet, Melike, and I were somehow on a boat, surrounded by other nationalities, sailing out to sea.
“We traded planes for a boat on the final journey,” I admitted.
Jack studied me for a while before nodding and accepting my unwillingness to share more. Inhaling heavily, he asked, “If you get sent back home. If I tell our government about your status and they choose to ship you back the way you came, would you survive?”
I held his stare.
I stood as tall as I could.
And I uttered the most honest words of my life. “The moment I step foot back there, I will be caught, tortured, and probably be made to beg for death before they grant it.”