Wish You Were Here

48

Grant's eyes lit up and he clapped his hands together.

"Solar! Yes!"

I had to laugh at his excitement. He rushed past me to the stairs, turning to make sure I was right behind him before continuing up. We rushed through the door at the top of the stairs and out the main door into the woods. Running around the back of the cabin, we had to walk backwards several feet before being able to barely catch a glimpse of solar panels installed along a side of the roof.

"That's it," Grant said. "Brilliant."

We stood and stared at the back of the cabin, taking it all in from that alternate view that we hadn't seen before. I thought of when Gina had first driven me there and how in awe I had been. The cabin had appeared so quaint and ideal for a summer camp. I had been so happy upon seeing the wooden cabin tucked away into the trees, imaging all the fun times to come.

But from the back, it was a different story. Solar panels were affixed to the roof, providing enough of a power source for electricity to run through the cabin all the way to the basement. We were impressed and disgusted at the same time.

"Those panels were enough to give energy to the cabin?" I asked.

Grant shook his head in confusion. "I was thinking that, too. If it was just for the lights, then I'd say they could. But that secret door set up? It was definitely using a lot of power. It was locked all the time, unless Gina or Dean came down and unlocked it, but other than that..."

His voice trailed off and we continued to stare up at the roof.

"I don't know a lot about these things though," Grant shrugged.

"I don't really either," I said. "But a few years ago, my parents looked into getting solar panels for our house since it's hot in Texas a lot and they wanted to help conserve energy. They never ended up getting them because I remember my dad saying they'd need to install so many panels to produce the amount of power we'd need."

I glanced over at Grant before continuing.

"The energy from the panels is stored for use, so it's not usually needed all day and all night long," I continued. "So, this set up doesn't make sense."

"Why not?" Grant asked.

"Well, I could be wrong, but it seems like they'd need a lot more of those panels to get enough energy to run day and night," I said.

"But it didn't run day and night," Grant replied. "Remember? The lights went off at night and didn't come back on until early morning."

I nodded and then said, "Yeah, the lights went off at night and didn't need power. But the door? The keypad? Gina locked the door at it had to stay locked all night. It had to run twenty-four hours a day, didn't it?"

A shadow fell across his face and we both looked at each other in silence.

"We never checked the door at night, did we?" I asked quietly.

He shook his head. "No, I don't think so. It had that keypad thing and...we all assumed that once Gina locked it, it stayed locked."

I sighed. "Right. And looking at the roof now, I'm thinking that maybe there wasn't always enough power being generated to keep the door locked all night, every night. The worst that would've happened was that we'd have gotten out of the cell and then still be locked in the basement."

Grant let out a scream of anger and frustration, and I flinched from surprise. He has been so even tempered for the most part so far. I stood by as he let out his emotions.

"We could've gotten out sooner!" he yelled. "All that time, and we just sat there?"

"Grant-"

"No!" he shouted. "No, Ry, it's not fair! We might have gotten out sooner. We could be home by now!"

"Yeah, but Aaron wanted a way out and he never tried the door, so why would we have thought to? I couldn't had reached it. And we were chained up! Even if we had been able to open the door..."

"Aaron!" Grant spat. "Good riddance! He played us. He was really the only one who was even remotely close to the door. If I'd have thought that we weren't locked in, then maybe we would've tried to get the keys from Gina earlier."

"Grant, don't," I said. "Don't do this to yourself.  Even if the door wasn't locked all night, we still needed the keys and needed a plan. We didn't know everything that we know now."

He sighed loudly and rubbed his hands across his face.

"How much do we even know now?" he asked.

I shrugged. "Let's just go, okay? We need to get to the other cabin still anyway."

"Yeah, we can go," he replied. "But when we get there, let's check the roof."

I nodded in agreement and we set off away from that cabin.

We were both silent for a while. Both lost in thought as we robotically made our way over the rocky dirt as we had so many times already now. When we were almost to the next cabin, I had been remembering a day spent with my family at the beach in Galveston. It was warm and only slightly humid as my family set up a blanket across the sand. My mom unpacked a cooler with sandwiches and bottles of cold water as my sister, Rachel, and I ran down the shore. The warm water would sweep up over our ankles making us scream in delight. By the end of that afternoon, I had grown tired and wanted to go home. My dad bargained with me by telling me to give it just a few more minutes. Tired, I whined until my mom packed up our stuff and we headed to the car. As I nodded off in the backseat next to Rachel, her sandy feet scratching against mine, I heard my dad tell my mom what a nice day it had been. He didn't want to see it end.

I never understood what my dad meant until that moment as I walked through the woods with Grant. I missed my parents and my sister in a way I didn't know was possible. It was like an aching in my soul. I felt incomplete being so far away without them flanking my sides. It wasn't that I hadn't spent time away from them before; I had. But this was something different. This was my longing for the security and love I felt with them. I had proven I was tough, brave, and resilient, and now I just wanted to go home. I'd have done anything for a simple night of sitting on the couch watching a movie with them or ordering pizza to eat in Rachel's room in our pajamas. That day we all spent at the beach wasn't about the location. For my dad, it was about all of us being together.

Grant snapped me out of my thoughts.

"Have you noticed how quiet it is?"

I blinked and took a look around. "Isn't it always?"

He looked skeptical as he shook his head.

We got close to the cabin and crouched down behind some low bushes. Grant popped his head up to scope it out.

"I can't tell if anyone is in there or not," he said. "Let's make our way closer."

I nodded in agreement and followed him from one spot to another and then another. My heart picked up its pace the closer we got. We made it to the side of the cabin and finally around the back. Hiding again, Grant peered out.

"The back door is open!" he whispered.

My eyes widened. "Are they coming outside?"

Slowly he glanced around the bushes as I waited for him to report back to me. Fear shot through me as I imagined all the things that could possibly go wrong. There we were, crouched down with nothing but bushes of leaves concealing us from view, with not much of a defense if they were to come out and find us.

What if they found us?
What if we were kidnapped again?
What if we had just made the worst mistake ever?