Chapter 1: Fire

No one else saw the island burn.

Marisol did.

A thin beam of light, like a golden thread, had risen from the trees just moments before, and she watched it climb into the sky, her fingers tightening around the edge of the boat until it burst loudly, into a thousand smaller lights that drifted downward, settling over the palm trees like falling suns. She felt the BOOM travel trough her and out, invading her chest with agression, like a tsunami breaking through a finishing town, flooding it and then reciding. For a moment, the island glowed, and then, just as quickly, it looked as though it was burning.

She didn’t realize her mouth was open until she tasted the salt in the air as the boat moved forward, her eyes beginning to sting as tears gathered slowly, blurring the horizon. She looked around for the other’s reactions, but didn't find any. Even with her throat tight, she managed to let out, “Did anyone else see that?”

No one answered. They were still talking and laughing about the wipeouts from earlier, their voices light and careless, as if nothing had happened at all.

Charlotte was the only that heard her.

“I don’t see anything,” she said, scanning the horizon, her eyes squinting just slightly.

Marisol didn’t respond.

Charlotte reached for her hand and held it, quieter now—perhaps because she understood that Marisol was a different, and sometimes she saw and felt things others didn’t.

By the time they arrived at the dock in El Tirano, the island looked completely normal.

Marisol helped unload the boards and fishing gear without saying much, her hands moving automatically while her mind stayed behind, somewhere out at sea. What she had seen didn’t feel like something that had just happened. It felt… misplaced. Like it belonged to another moment. Maybe something that had already happened long ago, or something that hadn’t happened yet, but will.

After they finished cleaning the boat and said everyone left to go home, Marisol walked a little farther down the shore and sat in the sand. The sky had darkened, and the horizon was now just a long, quiet line of deep blue, but she searched it anyway, waiting for the light to return.

It didn’t.

A knot formed in her chest. Suddenly she became angry.

Why that place?

The small island where she used to fish with her grandparents, where Charlotte had once spent an entire summer building a trail of sculptures from driftwood and shells, their secret surfing spot. If Margarita Island was her home, then La Azulita was its heart.

she didn’t notice Charlotte was following her until she was already sitting on the sand. Charlotte sat beside her, studying her face.

“You looked really shaken back there,” she said, her tone casual, as if trying to hide her worry.

-What happened?

Marisol hesitated. There are things she could’t share with Charlotte without revealing family secrets she wasnt supposed to. In any case, she didn't even understand it herself and Charlotte didn't have the tools to help her, it would only create a bigger problem if she told her, she thought.

“I thought I saw something,” Marisol said, keeping her voice light. “Something bright in the sky.” She shrugged. “Probably just a really bight shooting star.”

Charlotte didn’t look convinced.

“I’ve never seen you that scared before.”

Marisol forced a small smile. “I wasn’t scared.”

Charlotte raised an eyebrow.

“Okay… maybe a little.” Said Marisol as she got up and cleaned the sand off her legs.

Charlotte got up also and stood next to her. “I’m sorry it ruined your night,” Charlotte said, as she squized Marisol’s shoulder gently, then added with a grin, “At least you didn’t fall on your butt.”

Marisol let out a short laugh. “Oh my God… Adrian.”

“That was legendary.”

“His feet literally went up like a cartoon.”

“And his dad trying to help him—”

“—while laughing!”

They both burst into laughter, the kind that made it hard to breathe, and for a moment everything felt normal again—the ocean, the boat, the night—just another memory.

But even as she laughed, Marisol felt it sitting quietly in the back of her mind.

The loud explosion. The island on fire.