Surrounded by Sharks Read online

  For Itzy,

  who has kept me afloat in some very perilous seas

  CONTENTS

  TITLE PAGE

  DEDICATION

  PART ONE

  1

  2

  3

  4

  5

  6

  7

  8

  9

  10

  PART TWO

  11

  12

  13

  14

  15

  16

  17

  18

  19

  20

  21

  22

  23

  24

  25

  26

  27

  28

  29

  30

  31

  PART THREE

  32

  33

  34

  35

  36

  37

  38

  39

  40

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  ALSO AVAILABLE

  COPYRIGHT

  Davey Tsering opened his eyes and looked up at an unfamiliar, cream-colored ceiling. He’d slept fitfully on a steel-framed canvas cot, and his body felt a little like he’d just fallen down a mountain. He heard his family before he saw them. His dad was snoring loudly and his younger brother was echoing him like a smaller version of the same revving engine. Davey groaned softly and turned to look around the overcrowded hotel room.

  He saw his mom and dad, Pamela and Tam, lying next to each other on one of the room’s two double beds. His mom’s face was turned down in a grim frown as she slept. Davey peered at the alarm clock on the night table between the two beds. He squinted, but it was too far away for him to read the little glowing numbers. He carefully reached down to the floor for his glasses. The little cot was noisy, and the last thing he wanted was to wake someone up and have company.

  He put his glasses on and everything in the room became a little clearer. It wasn’t an improvement. There was drool at the corner of his dad’s mouth, and his mom was balanced precariously on the edge of the bed.

  Davey’s younger brother was splayed out in the next bed, the one that was supposed to be Davey’s tomorrow night. Davey looked at him for a few moments. He was surprised by how young he looked lying there, and how peaceful. He still looked like the little kid who used to follow Davey around everywhere. But Davey wasn’t fooled. He knew that as soon as Brandon woke up, he’d become “Brando.” That’s what he liked to be called now. Now that he’d turned into a Class-A pain in the neck, now that he’d started arguing with their parents. Like those two didn’t argue enough already.

  Davey couldn’t imagine what that would sound like in this little room. And who needed imagination? He was sure he’d find out before the week was over. He took a deep breath and regretted it immediately. The room was slightly but unmistakably funky. Four people had been in here all night, sleeping, snoring, drooling, and … Oh no, thought Davey. Oh Dear Lord … Had someone been farting?

  Another breath, this one quick and cautious, confirmed his fear. He assumed it was Brando, but there was no way to be sure. Was it his dad? His mom? It was too horrible to think about.

  Finally, he remembered why he’d put his glasses on. He looked at the clock: 6:47. That’s it? he thought. That’s it? It would be hours until everyone was awake and ready to get moving. He knew what they’d say: “We’re on vacation. Let us sleep.”

  He had to get out. Thirteen and a half was too old to be stuffed into a room with his entire family. One day in, and he already needed a vacation from this vacation.

  Slowly, very slowly, he reached down and pulled the thin hotel blanket off his body. His heart started beating faster. If either of his parents woke up, they’d stop him. If his brother woke up, he’d want to come, too. He had to be quiet. Spy quiet, ninja quiet. Ninja-spy quiet.

  He pushed his feet slowly over the side and cringed as the cot creaked under his shifting weight. He glanced over at the beds: no movement. He reached out and put his left hand on the windowsill, taking some of the weight off the cot. In one quick, smooth — well, kind of smooth — movement, he stood up.

  Davey had slept in a T-shirt and his swim trunks because … well, basically because his brother had. If pajamas are too babyish for your younger brother, they are, by extension, too babyish for you. And he had to admit it was a pretty solid plan. His swim trunks were the one thing he could wash himself as the week went on, just by going in the water. They were in the Florida Keys, after all. The Internet described this place as “a sunny tropical paradise with white sand beaches and crystal-blue water.” It didn’t seem like paradise so far — and it definitely didn’t smell like it — but Davey was 100 percent sure the March weather here was going to be better than it had been in Ohio.

  Still, he wasn’t really a beach person. He was skinny, and he wouldn’t call himself nerdy, exactly, but he did like his fantasy books. He leaned down and silently pawed through the little pile of paperbacks he’d set up next to the cot. All the books except one were by J. R. R. Tolkien. Davey was such a big fan that he knew what all the initials stood for. And the one book that wasn’t by John Ronald Reuel Tolkien was by his son.

  Davey made his selection: The Silmarillion. The bookstore lady had told him it was “for serious Tolkien fans only,” and so it was his new favorite. He stuffed a few other essentials in the white-mesh pocket of his swim trunks and surveyed the path ahead. He had to walk right by the beds — why on earth had he set up the cot by the window instead of the door?

  He walked carefully, minefield-style. The carpet was thick and easily absorbed his weight. Halfway across the room, he heard someone turn over. He knew it was his brother before he even looked — his parents had no room for such large maneuvers. He looked back slowly and was relieved to see Brando in a slightly different position but still just as asleep. The shifting of his blankets had revealed something else, though. Brando was definitely the one polluting the atmosphere. In a way it was a relief.

  Davey saw a sliver of morning sunlight through a gap in the curtains. That was his goal. He needed to reach it. He needed to get to a sunny, warm place that didn’t sound like dueling chain saws and wasn’t contaminated by the burrito grande his brother had eaten at the airport. He turned back toward the door and kept going. He was past the beds now. A few more tense steps and he was at the door.

  He pressed down on the handle with slow, even pressure. He knew there would be a click. The question was how loud.

  Click.

  Not too loud. He didn’t hear anything behind him and didn’t turn to look. He was too close to his goal. He pushed the door open and quickly stepped through.

  In open ocean approximately four miles to the southwest, a very different individual was also up early. Although “up early” wasn’t exactly accurate in this case. It had been up all night. It had been up all of its life. But now, in the fresh light of morning, it was on the hunt.

  Galeocerdo cuvier. The tiger shark. The distinctive stripes that earned the species its name had faded as this one reached adulthood, but there was a second reason for the name. The sea tiger was at least as fearsome a predator as a tiger on land. It was a massive, muscular brute of a fish. It was sometimes called the man-eater shark, but that wasn’t entirely accurate, either. It would eat anything, from sea snakes to sick whales to discarded lunch boxes.

  As the sun speared through the warm top layer of the ocean, all of the shark’s senses were alive. Its eyes scanned the water as its ears listened for rhythms. It smelled the water constantly with powerful nostrils that had nothing to do with breathing, had no other job. If you were in the water
a thousand yards away, it could taste you already. It could tell if you had a sunburn. But it was doing something else, as well.

  Small jelly-filled pores along the shark’s head were alive to any electrical charges in the water. With them, the shark could sense the tiny charge given off by the muscles of a fish as it flicked its tail. It could sense the vast humming of an ocean current. With a threshold of around five one-billionths of a volt, it could sense nearly anything that moved down here. And that’s how it knew it was close.

  It had been on the trail all night, gliding patiently through the water. It wasn’t sure at first: a faint smell, and far off. And even when it knew — blood — it still wasn’t willing to expend much energy. The sea was vast and hungry. Food was often gone by the time the shark arrived. The body would be gone, even the scraps, leaving it with nothing but the smell and the knowledge that it was once again too late.

  But not today. Its prey was just up ahead. The broken rhythm of an injured animal swimming rang through its senses like a church bell:

  Whump-whump-wahamp-whump …

  Whump-whump-wahamp-whump …

  Whump-whump-wahamp-whump …

  The shark could see it up ahead now. It was a loggerhead sea turtle, a rich feast of fat and muscle if the shark could catch it. And there was something wrong with it. One of its flippers was injured. Yes, the shark could see that now. It could see it and smell it and feel it and sense it and taste it.

  It could’ve been hurt by a fishing net or another shark. It could’ve been anything out here, but it didn’t matter now. After all those miles of slow, patient swimming, the shark had closed to within a few dozen yards. The turtle knew it was there now and swam harder.

  Whump-whump-wahamp-whump-whump-whump-wahamp-whump

  The effort came to nothing. The tiger shark exploded through the water, closing the distance almost instantly with an impressive burst of speed. And then it was on the turtle and feeding. Its powerful jaws clamped down on the injured flipper. Dozens of broad, backward-curved teeth, serrated like kitchen knives, found their marks. And again. And again.

  The turtle weighed close to 250 pounds. The shark was five times that, but the turtle would still have been enough to fill its stomach — if it weren’t for the others. The tiger shark swam by itself for hundreds of miles, but when there was food, it was never alone.

  As it circled around for another bite, a second shark flashed up from below. It was smaller and faster and just as hungry. It tore chunks of its own. And then another one appeared. With it came a cloud of the little scavenger fish that frustrated the big shark. They were too small and quick to catch, but big enough to snap up some of its kill.

  The turtle was torn to pieces and devoured in a storm of blood.

  Davey made it past the hotel’s front desk — really a chest-high counter — without any trouble. Admittedly, there was no one there, so the only trouble would’ve been if he’d run into it. He didn’t. He read the small RING FOR SERVICE! sign and he didn’t do that, either. Then he pushed through the front door and stepped out into a truly gorgeous morning.

  He could hardly believe it. In front of him, just past the hotel grounds, was a beach and then the ocean. The blue of the sky and the blue of the water met at the horizon. It was like another world, a fantasy realm.

  He hadn’t really seen the beach the day before. The coolest thing he’d seen then was the Cincinnati airport, where he’d been able to watch a few jets take off. It was too late to see much by the time they’d gotten to Florida. The taxi driver in Key West told them the sunset had been really great — and that they’d just missed it. The guy who piloted the little boat over to this island said the same thing. The boat ride was kind of cool, but there wasn’t much to see in the dark. Davey’s main impression of Florida so far had been of a nice thing he’d just missed.

  He saw it all now, though. First up, a palm tree. Until that moment, palm trees had been one of those famous things he’d seen on TV but not in person. Palm trees, polar bears, riots … He stood there looking at it for a few seconds. It was just like on Hawaii Five-0. So far, he’d made it exactly four feet from the hotel.

  He looked to the sides: more palms trees and a sandy walking path in both directions. He listened closely and could just hear the little waves curling and falling and retreating at the ocean’s edge. He turned around and saw the sign on the front of the hotel. Swooping blue letters on a white background spelled out ASZURE ISLAND INN. Two points off for spelling, he thought, though he knew it was the same way on the map.

  He picked a direction — left, just to be different — and started walking. It took him a few steps to register the temperature. Normally, he’d step out a door and right away his body would tell him that it was too hot or too cold. It was a lot of both back in Ohio. But this time, his body had no complaints. It was warm but not too hot. The light breeze was refreshing but not too cool. Davey knew it would probably heat up as the day went on, but he figured that would just make the breeze feel nicer.

  So, yes, he was impressed. But then he spotted the flaw in the plan after a few more steps: There was nothing to do on this island. Still in front of the hotel, he could already see the end of it. Not the end of the hotel; the end of the island. It was that small. He looked at the hotel again, just now realizing that it was the only one on the island. This was a one-horse town, and the hotel was that horse.

  Wow, he thought, Mom wasn’t kidding. The first time she’d told them about this trip, she’d described it as a “remote island retreat.” Brando had groaned. Two of those words basically mean the same thing as boring. After that, she’d started calling it a “family retreat” to “recharge.” You weren’t allowed to groan at a “family” anything, and who didn’t like to get charged? Anyway, it hadn’t been up for a vote. They’d already purchased the tickets — some great deal online.

  Davey kept walking, and then he saw something. It was some kind of stand, just off the path. Hey now, he thought. It was closed, but then it wasn’t even seven in the morning. With the wooden shutters locked, it was impossible to tell what it sold, but it had to sell something. He squinted into the distance and saw another one. Maybe there are some the other way, too, he thought.

  Davey didn’t need much. At home, he spent most of his time in his room, and a lot of that reading. And he had his favorite books with him. His parents could recharge, and he could reread. A few weeks earlier he’d overheard his mom calling him “kind of monkish,” but he didn’t think she meant it entirely in a bad way. They had monks in their family, actual Tibetan monks. His parents’ business sold arts and crafts from Tibet. Though if you wanted to know what most of the arguments were about, they didn’t sell nearly as many as they used to.

  It didn’t take Davey long to reach the second stand. This one had metal shutters that were closed tight with big padlocks. There was a sign on top: ASZURE ISLAND BAR. Davey considered it. He’d been hoping for a place that sold comic books, or even regular ones. He knew that Ernest Hemingway used to live on Key West. He could see Key West from here, a fuzzy lump on the water. Davey hadn’t read any of Hemingway’s books yet, but he knew he wrote about bullfights and wars and other potentially interesting things. He flexed his left hand and felt the familiar weight of The Silmarillion.

  A bar was okay, he decided. They’d have pretzels and potato chips and probably a few different kinds of soda. Plus, it would be fun to tell his parents, “Back in a minute, just going to the bar!”

  Davey smiled for the first time in days. And then he heard something: voices, headed his way. He was at the far end of the island, where it came to a tip before bending back toward the other side of the hotel. That’s where the voices were coming from. He’d had the whole island to himself until now, but not anymore. The voices were getting louder. Not wanting to go toward them, he looked around for an alternative.

  Drew Dobkin wanted the world to know that she was being held here against her will. She’d wanted to go to Madrid or Miami or
Mykonos. It didn’t have to begin with an M; those were just examples. But it should have been somewhere with excitement and music and boys with tans to look at. She was fourteen now and needed to go on holiday somewhere appropriate. Well, she’d be fourteen in two months, but she was always one to round up.

  But had she been asked? She had not! Her parents had simply found some great deal online and packed her up like so much luggage and shipped her here straight from England. Now they were stumbling around some little walking path with only a vague idea of what time it was. She checked her phone. No service, of course, but it worked as a watch. It was 12:28 in the afternoon back in Knutsford, and apparently 7:28 in the morning here. And what was this, anyway, a deserted island? Like the ones in the cartoons? They hadn’t seen a single person since they’d left the hotel. And come to think of it, they hadn’t seen anyone there, either.

  “Lovely, though, isn’t it?” said her mom, Kate.

  Her dad, a man universally known as Big Tony, grunted in agreement. And then she got the distinct, annoying impression that they were waiting for her opinion on the matter. She flicked her eyes around a bit. She supposed it was quite pretty, in a boring sort of way. Instead of admitting it, she asked, “Can we go to Key West today?”

  Her best friend, Becca, had told her that Key West was where the party was at. Her exact words: “Key West, that’s where the party’s at.” Drew didn’t need a full-on party, just some excitement and a bit of fun. Wasn’t that what holidays were for? It made no sense to her to leave England to rest — England was already the sleepiest place on earth!

  “Now hold on, then,” said Big Tony, his first words of the day. “We just got here last night!”

  “It speaks!” said her mom, acting astonished.

  And then there they went, joking around and talking about anything other than Key West. Drew let them have their fun. She’d spotted something interesting up ahead. It was a little … what did you call it? A pier, or was it too small for that? A dock, maybe?

  “Here’s the boat place,” she said. She pointed out over the water, a little farther up the path. There was a single boat tied up alongside.