Orphan Island

Jinny starts tracking how many days pass by carving notches into her doorpost. To her knowledge, no one else on the island does this. She knows about calendars, years, weeks, and time from books, but on the island, no one tracks time this way. They assume that the boat comes once a year, but they’ve never actually counted the days to check. Although Jinny starts counting now, it has already been a while since the boat brought Ess, so she still won’t know how long it is exactly between boat appearances. After 50 days’ worth of notches, Ess is a strong swimmer and can cook meals, wash herself, and speak in complete sentences. Ben stops bothering to ask Jinny for Elder Lessons because it’s clear that she’s not going to give him any.

Two hundred notches pass. Then, one morning, there’s “day rain,” which is uncommon on the island (it usually rains only at night). Jinny and Ess go to the book cabin to read and find Eevie and Nat already there. Eevie is disturbed to discover that Ess still can’t read. Jinny’s strategy for teaching Ess to read seems to be that Jinny reads a book to herself silently while Ess looks at pictures in a different book silently; therefore, Ess has learned nothing.

The rain clears, and Jinny takes Ess to the beach to practice drawing letters in the sand with a stick. They have no pens or paper, so this is the best way to practice writing. Ess learns how to write the letter “A,” and Jinny decides that’s enough progress for one day.

After five more days of drawing in the sand with sticks, Ess can write and recognize the letters “A” and “B,” but nothing more. Joon and Eevie offer to help teach Ess to read. Jinny feels embarrassed that she couldn’t accomplish this herself but agrees to let the other girls try a different strategy; after all, Joon’s swim lesson was effective.

While the other girls work on reading with Ess, Jinny takes a swim alone. She ventures farther out into the water than she has ever gone before, wanting to see something new and different (she has already explored the whole island multiple times). She swims until she gets tired and then floats for a while. However, when she decides to swim back, she looks around and can’t see the island—only open water in every direction. She doesn’t know how to get back. She then feels and sees some sort of large sea creature moving beneath her and starts swimming away from it. Soon, she sees the island again and swims home.

While Jinny was gone, Ess made a lot of progress in learning to read. Jinny announces that she’s going to bed early. Eevie says that Jinny is jealous, and Jinny snaps, asking Eevie what her problem is. Eevie cries and admits that it’s difficult for her to be happy here like everyone else seems to be. She questions why they’re here, and her confusion and discontentment come out in rude comments. Jinny then goes to bed.

In the morning, Jinny wakes up before everyone else, embarrassed that she lost her temper the previous evening. Therefore, she takes Ess on a hike through the prairie alone. When they return, Jinny takes a nap while Ess plays in the cabin.

Jinny wakes a bit later to the sound of the bell, signaling that the boat meant to take her away has arrived. She’s shocked that it’s here so soon. She still hasn’t told Ess she has to leave but takes Ess’s hand and walks to the dock to meet the other children. Ess asks what’s happening. Jinny laments that there’s no time left to explain, and now someone else (most likely Ben) will have to explain it to Ess once Jinny is gone.

The boat reaches the beach carrying a small boy inside who’s to become Ben’s Care. Ben lifts the boy out of the boat and welcomes him to the island. Ess asks Jinny to stay. Jinny pushes the empty boat back out into the water, but it magically returns itself to the beach. She struggles with it like this for a while but finally hauls it much further up the beach, where it stays put. Jinny then tells everyone to leave the dock and beach area because she’s not leaving, so the show’s over. The other children protest that she must leave because this has always been a rule. However, Jinny says she must stay because she hasn’t taught Ben any Elder Lessons or adequately prepared Ess to survive without her. Ben says that they can handle all this without Jinny and that he feels ready to become Elder and care for the new boy, Loo. Jinny says she’s still staying unless Ben forces her to leave. He says he won’t. Jinny takes both Loo and Ess, leading them up the path to eat dinner.

Ben serves dinner, but he has only nine bowls, and there are now 10 children, so he pours his soup into his mug instead. Jinny tries to help feed Ess, who announces that she doesn’t actually need help. After dinner, Jinny doesn’t feel like reading at fire circle, so she says they should go to bed early. She starts leading both Ess and Loo away toward her cabin. Ben protests that Loo should come with him because he was meant to be Ben’s Care, not Jinny’s. Jinny argues that Ben doesn’t know the Elder Lessons, so Jinny should take both children. They’ll share her bed, and she’ll sleep on the floor with cushions from the book cabin. Eevie says it’s Jinny’s fault that Ben doesn’t know the Elder Lessons, and no one is okay with Jinny taking the cushions out of the book cabin, but Jinny doesn’t care. She marches off alone to get the cushions, which she mutilates while trying to detach them from the couch. In addition, she finds an envelope, which she pockets, planning to check it out later. Ben appears, telling Jinny she’s being selfish and unfair. She says no one can make her leave her own home. Back at her cabin, Jinny discovers that someone else has brought the two kids to bed and tucked them in to sleep.