The storm didn’t stop. It only shifted. Now it sounded less like weather and more like something circling the island—moving around them, testing where the walls were weakest. Inside the ruins, the group stayed close together, huddled in the driest corner they could find. The air smelled of wet stone and salt, and every sound seemed louder than it should have been: dripping water, shifting debris, distant cracks of thunder. No one slept. Not really. Alyssana sat with her knees pulled close, staring at her hands. The memory from the storm still clung to her mind like a stain she couldn’t wash off. Scarlett. The boat. The fall. And Jack remembering too much. She glanced at him. He was sitting a little apart from the others, watching the entrance like he expected something to walk in at any moment. Emma broke the silence first. “We can’t keep pretending nothing’s wrong,” she said quietly. “We all remember pieces. We all know that.” Charles let out a short laugh, but there was no humor in it. “Yeah? And what exactly do you remember, Emma?” Emma hesitated. Then she pulled something from her pocket. A small, water-damaged bracelet. Alyssana leaned forward slightly. “I found this near the wreck,” Emma said. “I didn’t say anything before because I didn’t know what it meant. But I think it belonged to someone on the boat.” Alyssana stared at it. Something about it felt familiar. Not clearly. Like a word she almost remembered. Jack finally spoke. “We were all on that boat. That’s the only thing that makes sense.” Charles shook his head. “Or we washed up from different places. We don’t even know if we knew each other before this.” “That’s not true,” Alyssana said suddenly. All eyes turned to her. She swallowed. “I remember him,” she said, looking directly at Jack now. “Not just the storm. Not just the beach. I remember him before all this.” Jack didn’t look surprised. That bothered her more than anything else. “You do,” he said quietly. It wasn’t a question. Alyssana frowned. “What aren’t you telling me?”

“I’ve officially entered my ‘author cave’ phase. ☕📚 KDP ✔️Kindle Create ✔️Chapter 1 edited ✔️ My goal now is 1–2 chapters per day until this thing becomes a real published book. Curious… what makes YOU keep reading a book once you start it? Characters? Atmosphere? Mystery? Emotion?”

Here is chapter 6 draft! Chapter 6 — The Watcher After the memories came back, everything changed. Not completely. But enough. The air around camp felt heavier now, like every conversation had something unspoken sitting underneath it. None of us trusted our own memories anymore, and that made trusting each other harder too. Especially Jack. I hated admitting it to myself, but ever since the flash on the riverbank, I couldn’t stop thinking about the look on his face in my memory. Cold.Empty.Almost cruel. It didn’t match the person standing beside me on the island now. The Jack I knew here carried extra firewood for Emma without being asked. He always walked closest to the jungle whenever we explored, like he wanted to protect the rest of us without making a big deal about it. But memories didn’t just appear for no reason. Something had happened on that boat. And part of me was terrified of finding out what. Dark clouds rolled over the island late that afternoon, turning the sky gray long before sunset. Wind moved hard through the trees, carrying the smell of rain and ocean salt across the beach. Emma sat cross-legged near the fire trying to untangle fishing line from the boat supplies. “I miss normal problems,” she muttered. “Like homework. And annoying teachers. And phones.” Charles looked up from the map he’d been sketching in the sand. “You miss homework?” Emma pointed toward the jungle dramatically. “There are glowing-eyed murder creatures out there, Charles.” “Fair point.” I smiled faintly despite myself. For a few seconds, things almost felt normal again. Then thunder rumbled somewhere far out across the ocean. Jack stood near the shoreline staring toward the horizon. His hoodie moved slightly in the wind, and rain had already started dripping lightly into his dark hair. He barely looked at me anymore. Not since the memory. And honestly, that hurt worse than if he’d gotten angry. The distance between us felt strange and uncomfortable, like something important had cracked between us overnight.

Here is chapter 3 draft The first real problem was water. Not memories. Not the island. Not even the terrifying word carved into the boat. Water. By midday, the heat had become unbearable. The sun burned against our skin, and the salty air made my throat feel dry no matter how much I swallowed. “We need water before anything else,” Charles said. The weird thing was how confident he sounded. Emma noticed it too. “How do you know that?” Charles frowned slightly. “I… don’t know.” But he kept talking anyway, like the information was buried somewhere deep inside him. “Food matters, but dehydration hits first. We need fresh water, shelter, and a safer place to stay before dark.” Jack looked at him with raised eyebrows. “Since when are you survival expert guy?” Charles crossed his arms. “Apparently now.” For the first time since waking up on the island, we actually had a plan. We started by taking supplies from the wrecked boat. Jack climbed through the broken sections carefully while Emma and I waited below to catch anything useful he found. Blankets. Rope. A waterproof tarp. Half a first aid kit. Three flashlights — though only one still worked. A metal cooking pot. Life jackets. Broken suitcases filled with soaked clothes. Every small thing suddenly felt important. At one point, Jack found a small blue cooler trapped beneath a broken seat. “Please let there be food in there,” Emma begged. Jack forced it open carefully. Inside were melted ice packs, bottled drinks full of seawater, and a package of crackers that somehow stayed dry. Emma nearly cried from happiness. “Best day of my life.” Charles laughed quietly. “Your standards dropped fast.” By the time we carried everything back onto the beach, sweat soaked through my shirt and my arms ached. “We should build the shelter farther from the shoreline,” Charles said while looking toward the jungle. “If the tide rises, we lose everything.” Jack nodded. “Agreed.” Together, we started building near the edge of the forest where the trees blocked some of the sun.

Alyssana wakes up on a beach with no memory of how she got there. Three other teenagers are nearby, injured and confused. Chapter 1 coming soon!