AN: Oh my gosh, thank you everyone who's taken the time to read this and actually enjoys this story. The response to it has stunned me in a good way. Thank you to everyone who has alerted, favorite, or reviewed this story.
It took Judith Puckerman two hours after finding out about her son missing to get on a plane and head to Los Angeles. Amy, who was in her last year of medical school in Seattle, also hopped on a plane, the two of them meeting at Noah and Rachel's house.
Hiram and Leroy were there, obviously, their eyes glued to the television. None of them knew what to say to one another. Amy and Judith just took a seat on the couch as they watched the news uncover the wreckage from the ocean.
They were calling off search efforts, declaring everyone on board dead.
"No!" Amy gasped, sinking to her knees. "It's not true. They're not dead!" she sobbed. "They can't be dead. I just talked to Rachel a few days ago!"
Leroy got up off the couch, leading Amy upstairs so she could lie down and relax.
They still hadn't told Nathan anything. What were they supposed to tell him? The little boy remained clueless to his parent's fates, though he'd started asking when Daddy was going to be home.
Hiram flipped the television off, unable to watch anymore. They were talking about Rachel and Noah now—that's all anyone was going to be talking about for the next few months. The only two survivors of a deadly plane crash the victims of a different crash. Talk about irony.
"Well, this simply won't do," Judith said, rising to her feet. Hiram watched her walk into the kitchen and heard her pulling something out of a cabinet.
He followed her, leaning against the wall as he observed her flipping through a phone book. "Judy, what are you doing?" he asked, raking a hand through his hair.
"What does it look like I'm doing, Hiram? The news is wrong. Rachel and my son aren't dead. They're alive, just like last time."
Hiram let out a sigh. "Judy, I know you want to have hope because of what happened before, but—"
"I know it's crazy, but I know he's not dead. I gave birth to that boy. I raised him his whole life. I watched him graduate college. I would feel it in my heart if he was dead. But I didn't. He's still alive, Hiram. And, if I know anything about my son, he'd make sure your daughter survived that crash. He loves that girl more than life itself."
Hiram took a seat at the table beside her. "Okay, say they are alive. How is browsing the phone book going to help us?"
"Because we're going to hire a private boat and find them ourselves. Face it, Hiram. They called off the search for them. They found the wrecked plane and declared everyone dead. The only way we're going to find our children is if we go out and search for them ourselves."
"What about Amy? And Nathan? We can't just leave them here while we go on a search for Rachel and Noah."
"We'll bring them with us. Amy's in no state to go back to school. She might even be helpful on the search."
"So we go on a search with the two of us, Leroy, your daughter who's on the verge of a mental breakdown, and a four-year old. Sounds like a winning team."
"Don't give me that, Hiram. We have something another search team wouldn't have."
"And what exactly is that, Judy?" Hiram asked with a sigh.
"Determination and the truth. We know they're alive. And we won't give up until we find them."
"How exactly are we going to go about finding them, then? It's not as if we can use a megaphone and yell out their names with the hope they'll answer us," Hiram said sarcastically.
"There's no need to be rude, Hiram," Judith scolded. She pulled out a map, placing an X on it. "That's where they found the plane." She drew a large circle around it. "That's where we search. We'll go to every island in that area and search it. Search for any clue of them. We'll keep searching until we find them."
"Judy, this is insane. We can't just go around searching every island for them. What if they really are dead? We'll just be wasting our time."
"We have to try, Hiram. These are our children. What kind of parents would we be if we just gave up?"
Hiram let out a sigh. "Horrible parents." He pulled out his cell phone, taking Judith's hand as he called the boat company.
xxxxx
Rachel made her way back to camp an hour and a half after running from the lake, a bushel of bananas in her arms. She didn't look at Noah and he didn't look at her.
She dropped them on the beach, walking over to her suitcase, opening it. The clothes she had brought were more appropriate for a luxury hotel, not a deserted island. To be fair, that's where she was supposed to be right now. Not here on this island.
She looked for something useful in there, but there was nothing. Dresses, high heels, make up, a hair dryer, diamond jewelry—nothing that would be of any use here.
Frustrated, she kicked the suitcase, letting out a squeal of pain a moment later. She made a mental note to never kick a full suitcase with bare feet again.
Puck glanced over at her, letting out a small chuckle. "Taking your anger out on our clothes isn't going to help things, Rach. You're just going to hurt yourself and maybe even ruin my favorite shirt."
"How can I ruin your favorite shirt when you didn't even bring it with you? You never pack it because you're always afraid they'll lose your luggage. So you only bring it if you wear it on the plane."
Puck smiled a little at that. No matter how much they fought, Rachel still knew those little things about him. Things like his favorite shirt and how he liked his coffee in the morning—one teaspoon of cold milk and two packets of sugar.
"I could have changed my mind and decided to pack it," he challenged, earning an eye roll from Rachel.
"Well, since I went through the suitcase already, I know you didn't bring it with you since you weren't even wearing it on the plane. So there is no possible way for me to destroy it. Besides, clothing isn't going to hurt me unless I accidentally stab my hand with one of my heels."
"Yet you already injured yourself kicking the suitcase. Face it, Rach. I'm right again. You should learn to listen to me more."
"The last thing I need to be doing is listening to you more," she muttered under her breath. Noah pretended not to hear her. "Have you found any food for us or are you just attempting to relive your previous days on the island when you pretended you were Tarzan?" she mocked.
"Hey, I kept you alive back then. A little gratitude would be nice," he said, his voice clipped. He didn't understand why she was deliberately trying to make things unpleasant. It was just the two of them here. He would have thought she'd try to be nice and bury the hatchet, but he underestimated the anger of his wife.
"Oh yes. Thank you so much for getting me off one island to just get me deserted on another one. I enjoyed our last stay so much," she said sarcastically.
"Okay, what's with you? I'm trying to be nice, but you're making it very difficult for me right now. I don't know what I did to piss you off besides save your life," he snapped, snatching a broken tree branch off the ground, adding it to the pile he'd been collecting for the past hour.
"Oh, I suppose I should be thanking you for saving me from a crash and bringing me to an island where I can slowly and painfully starve to death instead of die quickly in a crash. Thank you so much for that, Noah!" she hissed, her voice dripping with sarcasm.
"Jesus Christ, Rachel. We're not going to starve on this island. We'll find food and be fine. They'll rescue us just like last time and everything will be fine."
"Stop saying everything's going to be fine, Noah!" Rachel shouted, throwing her shoes into the sand. "This isn't Gilligan's Island or Lost! This is real life. We're going to be stuck on this miserable piece of land until we die. Which, based on the way things are going, will probably be in a few weeks."
"We were rescued last time, Rachel!" Noah yelled back, snapping the branch in his hands. "Why are you being so negative? Why can't you just have some hope that things will be okay?"
"Because that's not realistic! We weren't rescued before—we had to get off the island ourselves and find help. No one was ever going to find us there, just like no one's ever going to find us here! The sooner you admit that, the better."
"I don't see what's so wrong about having a little hope that—"
"You don't see what's wrong about having hope? You're deluding yourself into thinking that this is just like last time and things are going to work out great. We're not lucky people, Noah. We've been in two plane crashes, which is two more than most people are in. I mean, it's like we're cursed."
"We survived two plane crashes, Rachel. We're luckier than most of the other people on both those planes. We weren't alone then and we're not alone now. We have each other. We'll survive."
"No. We. Won't. We're fucked, Noah. We're going to die. We're going to die here and they'll never find our bodies because they'll assume we died with everyone else on—"
Noah couldn't take it anymore. For the second time in a few hours, Noah's lips met Rachel's, though he was the one who initiated it this time. He kissed her mainly to shut her up. He was getting sick of listening to her go on and on about how they were going to die.
It did the trick. Rachel stopped talking, her eyes wide as she looked at Noah. He'd be lying if he said he didn't enjoy it. Granted, Rachel wasn't kissing him back, but her lips were so soft. It reminded him of when they were younger and how he used to kiss her to get her to stop talking when she was stressing about something.
Rachel seemed to be thinking over everything in her head before her eyes closed and she kissed him back. Noah closed his eyes, his hands on either side of her face as he pulled her closer to him.
Rachel seemed to be having an internal struggle with herself. Half of her wanted this. She wanted to kiss him until she couldn't kiss anymore.
But the other half wanted him off her right now. And that was the side that was stronger. Rachel pulled a hand back, slapping Noah's cheek. He pulled away, grabbing his face, stunned.
Rachel gave him a look that was half angry, half confused before turning her back to him and ran into the jungle, her shoes still lying on the beach.
Noah stared after her, still trying to make sense of everything that had just happened.
Okay, so each chapter is going to start with Rachel's dads and Puck's mom. Also sorry this is pretty short. I'll make up for it with the next chapter, though that might not be for a week. I apologize ahead of time!