Chapter 2
Cecilia had always felt a little out of place, even with her parents. Sure, she shared her papa’s gangly limbs, and her mama’s purple eyes.
But other than that, her appearance and her interests were incredibly different from them. Her papa was an expert in biology, while Cecilia didn’t know the difference between a mitochondria and a hypochondriac. Her mama could cook, and play practically any instrument.
Her parents were incredible—they were special, and the good kind of special.
Cecilia, on the other hand, was the bad kind of special.
She paced the beachline as she usually did on summer mornings, wondering if she would ever feel like she fit in. Adobo walked beside her, jumping to catch the little shells that washed up on the beach, and mewing at menacing clumps of seaweed.
Cecilia left for Haar and BiDi High today—her luggage was already packed, waiting in the driveway. But until she boarded the boat for her new school, she wanted to enjoy every minute she had with her hometown.
It wasn’t as if she had any friends to say goodbye to. She had acquaintances—Cora and Myah, and Garrett. But they weren’t her friends, not really. They wouldn’t care that she was leaving. All they did was tease her about her purple eyes and her obsession with Scottish legends, anyway.
“Cecilia! Hey, Cecilia! Hi!”
Cecilia looked up. “Oh. Hey, Garrett.” She smiled slightly. So someone had come to say goodbye to her, at least.
Garrett came to a skidding stop in front of her. “What’s our rock-skipping record?” he asked. “It’s urgent. I told Myah it was nine, but then I second-guessed myself.”
“It’s ten,” Cecilia said. “Remember, that day with the sunset? I said it would be a good day for setting a new record, and we stayed out here until past eleven o’clock trying to get it.”
“Huh. I didn’t remember.” Garrett shrugged. “Anyway, thanks. See ya.”
Then he ran off again.
Cecilia sighed as she sat down in the sand, watching Garrett run off into the distance, until he disappeared.
Of course he didn’t care. Nobody cared that she was leaving. Even her parents didn’t seem very concerned about it—they weren’t even going with her to the school. She’d be entering BiDi High alone.
She tossed a rock half-heartedly into the lapping water, not even bothering to try skipping it. “It doesn’t matter,” she said softly. “I don’t need friends. I’m going to Haar today, and I’m going to figure out what’s going on there, and then I’m going to publish an article about it and get famous for my investigation skills. I’ll be recruited by some fancy college, get a scholarship, and graduate top of my class. Then I’ll spend the rest of my life researching the world’s mysteries. No friends needed.”
It was a fairly foolproof plan, Cecilia decided. She needed to focus on her goal, not on people like Garrett.
She pulled her notebook out of her pocket—the little navy blue one with spiral binding along the top. She flipped through it, glancing over everything she already knew. She had the details of Haar pretty much memorized, but it still calmed her down to see the facts written in her neat, boxy handwriting.
Haar was an island a few miles off the coast of Connecticut, barely visible as a grey lump from where she sat. It was always inexplicably foggy; it probably had something to do with the way the waves hit the shore, but no one really understood it. Somewhere on the tiny, rocky island was BiDi High, a strange but well-loved school. And in that school, kids had been going missing.
It had been happening for years now. Eddy and Rip were the most famous—the two boys had disappeared for months before they showed up on Haar’s shore. They claimed to have hijacked a boat and gotten lost on the nearby archipelago of tiny islands. But for months? How had they even survived?
But there had been others before them. All turning up eventually, but with unlikely excuses for their disappearances. And coupled with the fog, and the strange stories that tourists told…well, something strange was definitely going on.
In other words, the island of Haar was a complete mystery. And Cecilia loved a good mystery.
She sighed, closing the notebook and standing up. Soon, very soon, that mystery would be hers. And in the meantime, she should get ready to leave.
She walked back to the house slowly, carrying Adobo and humming a catchy Filipino tune about vegetables.
The ferry for Haar left in about an hour. Cecilia had been planning to head to her room and check her suitcase before she headed out, but her papa intercepted her on the way upstairs.
“Did you say goodbye to all your friends, Singkamas? You’re leaving pretty soon.”
“Papa, for the last time, I don’t have any friends. I saw Garrett, but he doesn’t even know I’m leaving. No one does.”
“What about those girls?” Mr. Lewis furrowed his brow. “Katy and Mary, or something like that?”
“Cora and Myah,” Cecilia sighed. “I think they’re at some ballet competition. Anway, they don’t care whether I stay here or not. They’ll probably feel happy that they’re not obliged to hang out with me anymore.”
Her papa sighed, and hesitated before he spoke again. “Want to take a walk before we leave, Sing-Sing?”
Cecilia knew where this was going. He wanted to give her the talk—about how much fun she was going to have, how she was supposed to make friends and enjoy herself. And right now, going to school was the last thing she wanted to think about.
But she also knew that she wasn’t going to see her papa again for several months. And she was going to miss him. No matter how crazy he was sometimes.
“All right,” she said. “We can walk for a few minutes. But then I have to make sure I’m at the docks for the ferry.”
“Of course,” her papa said. “We’ll make sure you don’t miss your boat.”
They followed the familiar path down toward the beach. “You know you’re going to have fun this year, right, Cecilia?” her papa asked sternly.
“I know,” Cecilia groaned, kicking at the sand. “It’ll be great, and I’ll make tons of friends, and magically become good at biology.” She rolled her eyes.
“Hey, I thought you were excited to go to school! Find out about the mysteries of Haar and all that. Who knows, maybe you’ll even see a finfolk. Or a duwende. Or an elf.” He lowered his voice to a whisper. “I mean, they’re scientific impossibilities, whichever way you look at it. Do you think they’ll be the shoemaking kind, or the toymaking kind?” He shrugged. “Who knows? The stories may be true.”
“Papa.” Cecilia glared at him. “You don’t have to pretend to believe in magic. I know you don’t. That doesn’t mean you have to tease me about it.”
Mr. Lewis smiled, hugging her. “I’m just joking around, honey. I’ve got nothing against elves, or anything else.” He paused. “And I hope you have a wonderful year at Bioluminescent Dinoflagellate High, despite how you feel about it now. Your mother and I will miss you so much.”
He gave Cecilia one more squeeze, then he glanced at his watch. “Oh boy, we should get going,” he said. “It would be a very bad start to the school year if you missed your ferry.”
The next half hour was a blur of final preparations and goodbyes. Cecilia made sure she had all her things, hoisted her backpack over her shoulder, and hugged her mama and papa one last time. “Make sure you write to us,” Mrs. Lewis said. “Every day.”
“Or at least once a week,” her papa amended. “I’m sure you’ll be busy.”
“Text us when you get there.”
“Do you remember the directions to Headmaster Kikiam’s office? Should I write them down?”
“Do you have all your clothes? You brought extra pairs of socks?”
“Tell me if you get to observe any bioluminescent dinoflagellates! I haven’t seen one in years.”
Cecilia cut her parents off before they could say anything else. “Don’t worry, I’ll be fine. I have my socks, I have my phone. I’ll let you know about the plankton, papa. Now I really have to go.”
There was inevitably another round of hugging and crying. Then, finally, Cecilia left her house behind her and started walking toward the docks.
She had an overfull backpack, a rolling suitcase, and a cat carrier. Her papa had offered to help her carry everything down to the ferry, but she preferred doing it by herself. She had to get used to doing things alone.
The ferry was pulling up just as she arrived at the docks, where fishing boats and family skiffs floated in the shallow water. The ferry that travelled to and from Haar was larger than most of the other boats along the shore. Although with its peeling brown paint, rumbling engine, and ancient captain, it didn’t seem particularly safe, either.
Cecilia took a deep breath, turning to look back at the town. Her town.
“Don’t worry,” she whispered to Adobo, who sat glumly in his carrier. “We’re coming back. School will be over before we know it. And until then…we’re going on a pretty big adventure, aren’t we?”
A rough voice called from the direction of the ferry. “Are you getting on, lassie, or what? We have a schedule to keep.”
Cecilia turned to the wizened boat captain. “Sorry, I’m coming,” she said, stumbling up the gangplank with her bags.
She had barely sat down when the engine rumbled especially loudly, and the boat lurched forward. “All right,” she repeated to herself. “Here we go.”
