Children of the Sea 02 - Sea Fever

stairs.
     
    No answer.
     
    Worry trickled through her. On World’s End, everybody knew everybody’s business. Every neighbor kept an eye on every child.
    Children here still walked to the store alone, still played on the beach unsupervised.
     
    But she’d told Nick and told him not to leave the restaurant without telling her. There were dangers on the island, too, tides and fog and gravel pits, teenagers in cars, strangers with haunted eyes . . .
     
    Regina shook her head. She was not letting herself get spooked because some homeless guy had wandered into the restaurant looking for work and a sandwich.
     
    Knowing she was overreacting, however, didn’t keep her palms from sweating, didn’t stop her heart from hammering in her chest. When you were a single mom, there was nobody to share the worry or the blame, and so the worry doubled and every danger assumed terrifying proportions. Anything could threaten this tiny person who had been
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    entrusted to you, your baby, your son, the best and most inconvenient thing that had ever happened to you, and it would all be your fault because you hadn’t been taking care, you hadn’t wanted him in the first place.
     
    Regina forced herself to release her grip on the stair railing. Okay, definitely overreacting now.
     
    She opened the unlocked door to their apartment, Hercules darting between her ankles into the empty living room.
     
    “Nick?” She cocked her head, listening for the sound of the television, the gurgle of water from the bathroom.
     
    But he was gone.
     
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Four
     
    NICK BARONE EYED THE LITTLE BLUE SKIFF hauled up on the rocks with longing. He could take it out. He was old enough; he could handle it.
     
    And if he went out on the water alone, his mom would probably kill him.
     
    She was already mad. Not with him. With Nonna. Nick had heard them arguing, his grandmother’s raised voice, his mother’s low tones.
    The sound made his stomach hurt until he couldn’t stand it, couldn’t stand being cooped up in the boring apartment with nothing to do but listen to the two people he loved best in the world fighting with each other.
     
    So he got out.
     
    Nick hugged his knees and stared at the flat, bright water, waiting for his stomach to settle. His best friend, Danny Trujillo, was sterning on his dad’s lobster boat, so Nick couldn’t hang out at his house, and a bunch of summer people had taken over Nick’s favorite sitting-and-thinkingspot.
    He watched them: a couple of moms and a half-dozen kids, from almost his age to a baby.
     
    No dads. Probably the dads were fishing. Or maybe they worked on the mainland and joined their families on the weekends. Nick’s father worked on the mainland, but he never came on weekends. Or ever.
     
    Nick kicked at the rocks and wondered if his mom and Nonna were still fighting. Probably not. Their fights never lasted long, but sometimes for hours afterward his grandmother would be grumpy and his mom’s face was all stiff. Nick’s stomach tightened just thinking about it.
     
    After a while, the summer people packed up their lotions and towels and hunted for their shoes, and Nick had the beach to himself.
     
    There was a sailboat coming in, bigger than the little sunfish Nick had learned to sail, almost too big for the one man Nick could see on deck. The sailor didn’t look like he was having trouble, though, even with
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    both sails up. And that was another weird thing, those full sails, because there wasn’t any wind where Nick stood.
     
    The boat slid past the orange buoys that marked shallow water. Too fast, Nick thought. Too far. He opened his mouth to yell a warning, but then the sails collapsed like a big old gum bubble and the boat just stopped. Nick had never seen anything like it. He watched as the guy in the boat— he was tall, with long, dark hair— secured the lines and dropped anchor. The splash slapped the sides of his boat.
     
    The guy looked at the distance between his boat and the beach and then at Nick. With a slight shrug, the man stepped off the boat and into water up to his wiener.
     
    Nick giggled. He couldn’t help it. Man, oh, man, that must be cold.
     
    The guy tossed back his wet hair and looked right at him.
     
    Nick covered his mouth with his hand.
     
    But instead of getting mad, the man grinned, too, a real grin, guy to guy. He sloshed toward shore.
     
    Nick held his ground and waited to see what the dude would do next.
     
    He came out of the sea,