“I’m at peace.” She smiled tiredly. “So go. Shoo. I’ll see you soon. Please hug my nephew for me.”
“Will do.” Lucy started for the door, then remembered something. “Oh, Christopher gave me something last night to give to you. It’s weird, but he really wanted you to have it.”
“Then I really want to have it.”
Lucy opened her bag and pulled out a wad of blue tissue paper tied up with a shoelace. “As you can see, he also wrapped it himself.”
Angie took the gift from her, grinning as she untied the shoelace and tore off the paper. Under all that wrapping was a hammerhead shark toy, the same one Lucy had given him.
“He loves sharks,” Lucy said. “You should be honored. That hammerhead is his favorite.”
Angie held the plastic shark in her hand as if it were a priceless antique. Then she wrapped her fingers around the sleek shark’s small body and held it against her chest, at her heart. And right then and there, without any fanfare or ceremony or fireworks or tears, Lucy forgave Angie, and they were sisters, real sisters, for the first time in their lives.
Angie said, “Tell him I am honored.”
When Lucy went into the hallway, Hugo was still waiting for her. He stood up out of the chair and held out his arms. She went to him, and he held her close and tight.
“Don’t tell me it’ll be all right,” she said.
“Never,” he said. “I know better.”
He kissed the top of her head. “Come on,” he said. “Let’s go home.”
By the time they got back to the car, Lucy had dried her tears. There would be plenty of time to cry, but not today. Today was Christopher’s day, not hers. As a mother now, she had to put her own feelings aside.
Twenty minutes later, they were at the ferry terminal.
“Ready?” Jack asked Christopher.
Christopher replied in a voice about ten decibels louder than necessary, “Ready!”
The air was warm and the sun bright, and the sky bluer than Lucy had ever seen it as the ferry carried them toward the island. Christopher and Jack stood side by side in the bow. Jack would point out something. Then Christopher would. When Jack put his hand up to shield his eyes to see a bird flying overhead, so did Christopher.
Hanging back with Hugo, Lucy had to laugh. “They look like grandfather and grandson.”
“They are.” Hugo smiled at her. “Have you and Jack decided what you’re going to do as his official sidekick?”
“We have big plans,” she said. “First off, we’re going to start a nonprofit to provide free books, backpacks, and school supplies to kids in foster care. Care packages postmarked from Clock Island. What do you think?”
“I think that’s one of the best ideas I’ve ever heard.”
“I think we’re going to call it—”
Hugo suddenly looked toward the front of the boat and held up his hand.
Lucy froze, whispered, “What?”
“Christopher, come here,” Hugo ordered. Christopher turned and ran to him. “Look.”
Hugo pointed out at the water where a single gray triangle cut through a wave before it vanished under the water again.
“Shark?” Christopher breathed.
“We have lots of them around here,” he said. “Never go swimming with a steak sandwich in your pocket.”
The ferry made its slow, steady way around the southern edge of Clock Island. Six o’clock, five o’clock, four o’clock.
Lucy pulled out her phone and started recording. Angie wanted pictures and videos. She would get them.
Finally, there it was, shining in the sun. The house on Clock Island.
“Home sweet home,” Jack said to Christopher.
“What? That’s our house?” Christopher said. He looked at Hugo, at Lucy, awestruck.
“That’s it,” she said. “Like it?”
The ferry reached the dock. The captain cut the engine.
“Tick-tock,” Jack said. “Welcome to the Clock.”
Christopher’s grin was wider than the sky.
Hugo got off the boat first and helped Lucy, who helped Christopher. All three of them helped Jack.
* * *
—
Christopher was amazed at the sight of the sharks painted on the walls and the ocean, of course, right outside his window. Then, while Jack was teaching Christopher how to type on a manual typewriter and feed walnuts to Thurl Ravenscroft, Hugo motioned Lucy out into the hallway.
“What?” she whispered.
He looked left. He looked right. He had one hand behind his back, which Lucy found highly suspicious. “Don’t tell anyone I gave you this. Jack’s publisher would drag me through the streets by my ear.” Hugo brought his hand out from behind his back.
A book. Not just any book.
“A Wish for Clock Island,” he said. “Hope you like the cover.”
Tears sprang to her eyes as she studied Hugo’s artwork. A boy who looked just like Christopher was sitting up in a twin bed while a woman who looked just like her was reading him a bedtime story. Outside the window, the Man in the Moon peered over her shoulder as if trying to listen to the story.
Lucy didn’t know what to say, other than, “Hugo…”
“I read it,” he said. “It’s about Astrid, the girl from the very first book who comes back to Clock Island when she’s older.”
“Am I Astrid on the cover?”
“Of course you are. She and her son hear the Mastermind has gone missing, and they work together to find him.”
“Do they find him?”
He grinned. “Suppose you’ll have to read it to find out. And you should read it. It’s the dog’s bollocks.”
“Is that British for ‘it’s good’？”
“Now you’re learning.”
She couldn’t take her eyes off the cover. That was Christopher—big hazel eyes, dark hair gone all wild. And that was her—her brown hair, her profile, even one of her knitted scarves around her neck. “I wanted to be her when I was a kid, you know?”
“Now you are. If you don’t sue me for using your face without permission.”
She put her arms around him and kissed him so hard she almost dropped the book.
Christopher ran out into the hallway, calling her name. Lucy pulled away from Hugo and tucked the book into her bag.
“Mom! Mom! Mom! I fed a real raven!”
She would never get tired of hearing him call her Mom. Even when he said it a few hundred times in a row.
“I saw! Good job. Where to next?” Lucy asked Jack. “The wishing well? The lighthouse? The Storm Seller?”
“Oh, I have a much better idea.” Jack took Christopher by the hand and led him out of the house to the backyard.
Hugo took Lucy by the hand, and they followed.
“Stay right here,” Jack said to Christopher. They all stood behind the house while Jack walked off toward the City of Second Hand.
“What’s he doing?” Lucy whispered to Hugo.
“He’s been very busy while waiting for you two to finally show up. See?”
They heard a sound then, the turning of iron wheels, and the cry of a whistle. And then the Clock Island Express chugged into view, gleaming black and yellow with Jack in the driver’s seat.