Samantha held up the yellow cup so Joseph could see the logo. "Doesn't this Wendy girl look almost like Wendell?"
"You know, it does," Joseph said. "You should get him some ribbons and a dress." They both laughed at this and then Samantha sucked on her straw. The sweet bubbles from what Joseph called Mountain Dew tickled her throat, causing her to giggle again. I could get used to this.
Not just the Mountain Dew, but having Joseph sitting across the little table from her, his pink lips opening and white teeth sinking into the bread and meat of his sandwich. A hamburger, she corrected herself. He dabbed self-consciously at a spot of grease in his beard, his cheeks turning red. "Do I have something in my teeth?" he asked. She shook her head. "The way you were looking at me, I thought-"
"I'm sorry. I didn't mean to make you uncomfortable," she said. "I've never watched anyone eat a hamburger before."
"How long have you lived with your cousins?"
"Since I was six," she said. She didn't consider this a lie so much as a bending of truth. After Reverend Crane's demise she had become six years old, though now she knew she was much older than that. Joseph couldn't begin to understand the strangeness of her life-what she remembered so far.
"What about your parents? What happened to them?"
"They died in a car accident," she said. "So I came to live with my cousins in their community."
"Where's that at? I don't remember hearing about any Amish towns in Maine," Joseph said.
"It's not really in Maine," she said. "It's an island."
"Oh, I guess that makes sense. And you've never left the island since you were six?"
"I tried once a couple years ago," she said. "I tried to run away but I didn't get far."
"It must have been a pretty horrible place. I can't imagine living somewhere so primitive."
"It's not like we're cavemen or anything," Samantha said. She threw down her hamburger in disgust at his condescension. Eternity was a beautiful place, especially in the spring when the trees began to bloom and in fall when the leaves changed to fiery shades of red, orange, and yellow. She thought of hot summer days in the stream, splashing Prudence on the shore and racing Rebecca or one of the other girls-she always lost and then dunked the winner underwater.
Those days were gone now. Knowing what she was now, she couldn't go back there. She couldn't wait for the darkness submerged within herself to erupt to the surface. She couldn't risk that awful woman she had been to make an appearance.