Free The Islanders by Katherine Applegate

said.
    â€œYeah, that too.” He nodded his head slowly. Then he turned to look over the placid waters toward the far shore, where house lights shone bright amid the trees. “Wade’s birthday.”
    Zoey felt her heart sink. How could she have forgotten? What perfect timing on her part. This day of all days, she’d stood around chatting with Lucas. She hugged Jake from behind. He took her hands in his and sighed heavily.
    â€œTwo years,” he said. “I figured I’d be over it after two years. He’d be twenty now, did you know that? Probably a sophomore in college.”
    â€œOf course you still miss him,” Zoey said.
    â€œYeah,” Jake said. “Someday I’m going to have a son and name him Wade.”
    Zoey looked away. Benjamin was resting his head in Claire’s lap now, sunglasses in place, eyes staring sightlessly up at thegray-black blanket of clouds. Claire stroked his hair in a distracted way and watched Zoey.
    No, Zoey realized as Claire’s eyes were lit by a spurt of flame from a falling log. It was Jake she was watching.
    Â 
Aisha Gray
    I used to live in Boston, which is a great city, although school there was a drag. I was one of the black kids who got bussed into south Boston so that the previously all-white junior high schools there could be integrated. What fun. One day some of the white kids, cheered on by their parents and with the assistance of their older brothers and sisters, decided to turn our bus over. With us still inside.
    My folks freaked and decided that was enough of Boston, which was too bad, because really, setting aside that one incident, Boston was a very cool city. Great shopping.
    Naturally my parents, being the people they are, managed to come to the conclusion that the perfect place for us was Chatham Island, a place where people aren’t even tan, let alone black. They’ve never been able to explain their logic. Mostly I think my mom just lost it when she saw this inn for sale and started hallucinating about quilts and valences and canopied beds.
    At first I thought people here were even worse than in south Boston. They treated me like I was invisible. They treated my parents and my brother the same way. Always polite, but sort of like we weren’t entirely real.
    I finally got pissed off and yelled at Zoey. I knew her from school by this point. I said, What is the deal here? You seem too nice and normal to be racist. She was shocked. Racist? I don’t care that you’re black!
    Then what’s the damn problem? I said. I’m not invisible.
    Of course not, she said. You’re just from away.
    Away. That’s Maine-speak for the entire rest of the planet.
    Eventually I stopped being from away. Now I’m not so sure I trust people from away. I mean, I’m polite and all, but still, you don’t want to pay too much attention to them for the first year or so.

SEVEN
    AISHA HAD TO RUN THE last several blocks down from Climbing Way, fighting to keep gravity from drawing her too quickly. She made her way down the even steeper drop that was a shortcut over to Dock Street and bypassed Lucas’s house, then shifted gears into an all-out sprint along the waterfront as the ferry blew its piercing final warning whistle. She yelled frantically as they raised the gangway, blowing through the gate as she waved her ferry pass in the air. She leapt over the few feet of water that now separated her from the ferry and landed, thankfully, on the slowly moving boat.
    Gasping for breath, she bent forward at the waist, hands on her knees, as the eleven-ten ferry pulled away from the dock. Too close. She’d promised her mom she’d go into town, buy potpourri, of all things, at the mall, and pick up the drapes from the dry cleaner. The drapes went in the inn’s most expensive room, and the guest who’d reserved the room was arriving on the four twenty-five—which, incidentally, would be the sameferry