Before the world ended, Captain Jason had used his seventy foot schooner to give eco-tours to people visiting the coast. Everyone on the island knew him, knew his story. He had finally bought the schooner and the tour company just six weeks before the end. To celebrate, he had taken his family down the coast to Florida. So they had been able to watch Miami go. And then a few months later, his family went as well. And now he was alone with his boat.

I think that's why he agreed to help us: because he had no reason not to. It had mentioned around the island he intended to set sail and not return. We thought we might be able to strike a deal.

Thomas, Sarah and myself–we had grown up together on the island. A trio of locals united against the tourist hordes. Sarah had moved away with her family midway through our tenth grade year, but then moved back for college. She had missed the island, she told us.

I think Thomas and I both had hoped she missed us. We had spent our lives falling in and out of love with Sarah, even though I think we knew in our hearts it was hopeless. We had, all three of us, been friends for too long for it to suddenly evolve into something different. But we stayed together through everything.

In high school, we latched onto the English author Andrea Marshall and her Children of the Blue Sun series of books. Planned for five books, there were years between each one, but her truly devoted fans–as all three of us were–wanted her to take as much time as she needed. We thought we had a surplus of time, you see.

We read with great anticipation the announcement she had finished the fifth and final book. It was scheduled for release in August, a few weeks before the movie based on the third book was to be released. And now we would never get a chance to read it. Because the world ended in June.

We were sitting on the beach looking out at the ocean the day we hatched our idea. There was no point in sitting on the west beach. The mainland was nothing anyone wanted to see, and besides, all manner of things washed up on the west beach these days.

We didn't talk about what was gone. In fact, even as I write this, I don't think the subject has ever come up. I think we understood it was pointless. Instead we talked about everything else. And somehow, Andrea Marshall came up. None of us had known her personally, so it seemed like a safe topic. Sarah said it was a shame we would never know how the series ended. Then Thomas said, after a few moments, "What if we could?"

He then outlined his idea in that way Thomas always did. He always planned out loud, and you never interrupted to ask questions, because nine times out of ten he asked them of himself and then answered them before he was through.

Thomas reasoned that the book was done–we knew this because Andrea herself had announced it on her website. Done and ready for the printers, she had said. So somewhere, either at Andrea's estate or her publishing company or her agent's office or at the actual printer's…the fifth Blue Sun book could probably be found.

When Thomas finished speaking, his presentation complete, we both looked to Sarah. Sarah was the most practical of the three of us. Her job had always been to veto schemes that were unduly risky or illegal. This had stemmed from an incident when we were eight: Sarah had thought a notion was bad, but Thomas and I persisted and bullied her into going along with it. The details are unimportant. Suffice to say that the adventure ended with Thomas' leg in a cast and Sarah with a concussion. And I was left with the guilt that comes from escaping unscathed.

Sarah never said I told you so. Not once. We just learned from that experience Sarah had the most sense of our little gang. So all further adventures were deferred to her judgement.

And she didn't, to our mutual surprise, shoot this new idea down. Instead she looked back over her shoulder, back at the island. Or perhaps back across the island to the mainland, where her parents still were. And would remain.

"How do we get over there?" she asked.

And that's how we wound up here, on Captain Jason's schooner. He, the three of us and Ian, a college student who had come to work with him for the summer and wound up staying on after–we all set out for England.

As I write this, we should be within sight of land in a few days. There was never any question that we would make it–Captain Jason is simply too good a captain not to. The only question is what we will find when we arrive. There have been stories about what happened to Europe, but they could be wrong. That's what we tell ourselves, anyway. On some level, perhaps, we believe it.

Sarah did visit me one night, as it was my turn to keep watch on deck. I have every reason to believe she did the same for Thomas. And during, she told me she loved me. And I know what she meant when she said that, and I know what she meant by what we did. And I'm fine with all of it. Fine is not the word. I'm grateful, in fact. And I love her right back. It's not how I would have chosen to love her, but it's probably stronger and more sure than it would have been otherwise. I'm not even sorry we won't have more time. It seems pointless to do anything more than accept it.

I wish I knew what else to say. As I write this, we all wait out on deck to see what will appear on the horizon. It could be as it was, or it could be a mirror image of the continent we left behind. Either way, we'll find the end of Andrea's story or the end of ours.

For the moment, though, the wind off the waves is nice. And I am here with my friends. And that is enough.