“If she traced this correctly, and I don’t know how she could possibly mess it up, this is definitely not Milwaukee.” He looks at me. “In fact, I think it’s the north view of Chicago.”
The room explodes in questions. We all talk over each other until Trey emits a shrill whistle with his fingers.
“Knock it off, guys,” he says. “I don’t know how the ferry could be this close to Chicago, but it is. That’s the John Hancock building, and there’s the Sears Tower. Or whatever they call that building now.”
“Willis,” Rowan mutters, but nobody cares. It’ll always be the Sears Tower.
I’m so confused. “Why is the ferry this close to Chicago? Are we sure this is the Milwaukee ferry? It shouldn’t be anywhere near here. It’s almost a straight shot across the lake to Muskegon.”
“Tori saw the ferry’s website, including a picture of the ferry,” Ben says. “She said she was sure that was it. Besides, our only other option for ferries on Lake Michigan is the one that operates even farther north than Milwaukee, and it’s an old nineteen-fifties schooner type—nothing like the high-speed Milwaukee ferry.”
“Okay,” I say, “but Milwaukee isn’t just the next town north of Chicago, you know. It’s like seventy miles.”
“True,” Trey interjects. “But Tori’s sketch shows the skyline quite far away. And Chicago is on the southwest curve of the lakeshore, so it’s possible to see the skyline from quite a distance.”
“But I don’t understand how or why the ferry would venture so far off course.” I know I keep saying this, but it doesn’t make sense. And I’m getting frustrated.
“Maybe there’s something wrong with the ferry,” Ben says. “Maybe it’s not just the storm causing this. Besides, I’ve been thinking about the storm a lot. And if the waves were really that enormous, no captain would take a passenger vessel out to sea. I could see them taking it out in eight- or even ten-foot waves, but not much higher than that, or everybody would be yakking the whole trip. It must not be as rough as Tori made it out to be. I keep reminding myself that Tori’s personal experience factors into her perspective.”
I lie back on the floor and close my eyes. We’ve managed to come up with more questions than answers. And I’m starving. “Foooood,” I groan.
Sawyer rolls over to me and rests his head on my stomach. “Yep, you’re definitely hungry,” he says. “And I think we can all use a break. Let’s go get dinner.”
“But we need to save our money for ferry tickets,” I moan.
“I’m hungry too,” Rowan says. “Hey, I know—we could go find Mom and Dad. They’ll feed us for free. I think.”
“They will,” Trey says. “Well, maybe not Sawyer.” He grins.
Sawyer shrugs. “I can pay. I’m not some jobless punk like you, you know.” He straightens his collar. “I work with kittens.” He pulls me to my feet and we all stagger to the not-delivery car and go in search of the giant balls.
While everybody chatters around me, I realize the thing that’s so unsettling about the ferry within sight distance of Chicago is that it would take quite a long time for it to travel that far. And if Tori’s spot of potential light low in the sky is actually the sun, I need to know how low in the sky it really is. And if it’s possible for it to still be “low in the sky” if it takes a while to get from Milwaukee to the location in the vision.
Tori didn’t draw the possible sun on the sketch. I text her. What would you guess is the angle of that spot of yellow to the Earth?
Sawyer peeks at what I’m doing. He nods. “Yeah, I was wondering the same thing.”
Tori replies: I was told there would be no math.
“Oh, look,” I say. “Tori’s being funny for the first time in her life. She must be feeling better.”
“I bet it’s because we’re figuring things out.”
We wait, and in a few minutes she has an answer. Around thirty degrees, I guess.
I glance at Sawyer as Trey pulls into the parking lot for the Friday-night food truck festival. “You up for a little early morning research at North Avenue Beach tomorrow?”
“I don’t start work until one,” he says.
“Cool. I can probably get the car. I’ll pick you up at five?”
“Oof, that’s early. Yeah, sounds good. It’ll be cold out there by the water.”
“We can snuggle,” I say. “I’ll bring a blanket.”
He wraps his arms around me and kisses the side of my head. “I like it. We can do more sexy time.”
“You don’t do sexy time. You have it.”
“Yes, yes, I do,” he says.
“Please stop now,” Rowan remarks. “Gross. It’s time to eat some juicy balls.”
“Dot-com,” I add. Hey, it’s good to mix things up a little.
Thirty-Five
“There’s probably a math problem that will tell us the answer here,” Sawyer says. We snuggle together under a blanket on the beach facing the water, looking toward Michigan even though we can’t see it, and watch the sunrise.
“Yeah, but any math problem that relies on the rotation of the Earth makes my head explode,” I say. “Besides, this is more fun.”
Sawyer rolls onto his side, facing me, and rests his hand on my stomach, his fingers tracing the stitching on my pullover. He nuzzles my neck. My skin tingles. I close my eyes and suck in a breath. My brain argues with my body, but my body wins. I turn toward Sawyer and slip my arm under his head, and my lips find his.