I was so dirty the water clouded after I got in, and the other couple who were already in it looked annoyed and got out. We didn’t care, though. That meant we had it to ourselves.
We’ve gone back every night. It’s a forty-five-minute drive each way, but I like it. The hum of the road, the way Sandy sings along with the radio. She has a good voice, and she regrets not becoming a singer, she says, though I’m not sure her voice is THAT good. But it’s just nice, you know, us driving somewhere, like we were in the beginning, before we settled down in the RV park full of crusty permanent residents that remind me of Daddy, and through-travelers that Sandy calls “itinerants.” Like that’s not who we are. Like we also don’t have an itinerary.
I’m not sure why she’s so judgey, but I guess it’s because we’re here to stay now, at least for the summer and maybe longer than that. Not that this was a decision we took together. Sandy said it the other night over our SpaghettiOs and looked at me in this way she has when she’s waiting for me to agree.
I learned a long time ago that it’s easier to go along with it when she gets like that. Daddy’s like that too.
Tonight, we had Wild Willy’s all to ourselves for a while until this group arrived from the park. Search and rescue workers, they said, only they called it “SAR,” like I’d know what that was. I recognized the one couple from the Mobil the other night, only I’m not sure they’re a couple. The girl is Cassie, and the cute guy is Ben.
They were quiet, mostly because this other guy, Gareth, who was so big he created this, like, WAVE, when he got in the water, talked a lot. His girlfriend—Mia—seemed sweet. She’s very pretty, and I could tell Sandy was checking her out in her bathing suit. She has one of those tight bodies, with muscles in her stomach like a man. I wasn’t jealous, exactly, but I’m never going to look like that.
Whatever.
There’s that word again. It drives Sandy nuts, so maybe that’s why I use it. Ha!
I’m curious about the girl, though. Not Mia, I get her. She’ll stay with Loud Gareth a couple years, then she’ll move on to someone else. But Cassie. She reminds me of someone. Maybe it’s her expression, how watchful she is. Maybe it’s how even when she laughed when Ben splashed her, there was a second before it happened, and in that one moment that maybe only I saw, she looked like Mama used to look right before Daddy hit her.
—Petal
CHAPTER 5 FLOAT LIKE A BUTTERFLY
Now
Twilight ends like someone snapped off the light. I can see the worried expression on Ben’s face and the outline of the pilot’s set jaw, his hands tight on the controls. We left too late, and now we’re in the air when we should be on the ground.
It’s pumpkin hour, but we’ll be okay. There’s still an orange glow on the horizon, and we don’t have far to go. Fifteen miles over ground. The ride out will be ten minutes, even though it took me two days to hike there. The contrast takes my breath away, the time a fault line in my life.
On the way in, I still had hope that this would all work out. Now it’s gone.
I turn away from what we left behind, catching Venus setting through the ombre sky. It’s bright, steady, close, like the North Star, though it rises in the east.
I pull my focus back into the Huey, steadily avoiding the dark form under my hovering feet as my legs start to shake from the effort. I can’t think about it—him—or I’ll fall apart. I hug myself to stop my shivering, my body’s temperature slowly returning to normal. My legs are starting to itch under my mud-caked trek pants, like they used to in winter when I’d run in Central Park.
Another life. Another fault line.
My stomach is empty, my mind full of questions I cannot answer. How am I ever going to explain any of this? How can I even begin?
I sense movement and meet Ben’s eyes—they’re still clouded with worry. He looks away and out at the fading sky. I can see more stars now, ones I don’t know the names of. He clenches his hands against his knees.
“We’re almost there,” I yell to Ben to calm him.
Ben starts to speak, then stops himself. He takes off his helmet, fiddles with something on the side, then puts up two fingers. He wants me to change channels so we can speak privately. I glance at Gareth. His head is resting back on the seat, his eyes closed—he’s likely sleeping; he’s famous for doing that anywhere, anytime. But the pilot can hear us, so I take off my helmet and find the channel wheel next to the volume. I change it to two, then put it back on, the loud whir of the engine dimming when the helmet settles back over my ears.
“What happened out there?” Ben says. It’s odd to watch his mouth move and have the sound reach my ears at a different speed, like a movie whose soundtrack is slightly off the beat.
“He found me,” I say. “I don’t know how.”
“He found you?”
I thought Ben might understand, that I’d told him enough over the course of the summer, but my head is still cloudy, and my headache has a tight grip. I reach my hand back to the lump at the base of my skull. When I touch it, I feel queasy. The hit was harder than I thought.
“He was too strong,” I say, trying to explain. “He… He was so angry.”
Ben’s face is in a deep frown, like my words aren’t reaching him. Maybe I’m not talking loudly enough despite the microphone hovering above my mouth. But then Ben glances down and nudges the black body bag with his foot.
“Who is it?” he asks distinctly, and for a moment, I’m not sure what he’s saying. Didn’t he see who it was when they put him inside? But no, I forgot what happened to his face. I tried not to see it, knowing I’ll never be able to erase it, but I didn’t look away fast enough.
“Cassie?” Ben says, again with that delay between his lips and the sound in my ears. “Who’s in there?”
I try to find the words, but my tongue feels thick. I can’t get the name out.
“Cassie!” Ben’s voice is sharp now, a command. “Who is it?”
My mind forms the name. It gets stuck in my throat, and then, finally, my mouth complies, releasing it like an obscenity. “It’s Kevin.”
Ben pushes back and away from me, recoiling into his seat as the Huey circles over the landing zone, settling down in the dark night. I watch the ground get closer, closer, and then we land as gently as a butterfly on a leaf and the pilot cuts the engine. As the blades above us rotate lazily, four members of the SAR team sprint toward the Huey with a stretcher like it’s an episode of M*A*S*H.
Gareth stirs, the first time he’s moved since we got into the chopper, and he and Ben help the team take the body out. It’s stiff and difficult to maneuver, and I try not to think about why that is. How long he’s been dead, and what that might mean.
“You going to help here?” Gareth asks me, annoyed, but I just sit in my seat, my harness still on, and shake my head.
“Leave it, Gar,” Ben says, and I’m grateful.
Gareth mutters something under his breath, cursing me, and then the body is outside and their footsteps thunder away, and it’s quiet as the pilot goes through his postflight checks. I know I need to stand, to leave the Huey, to follow my teammates inside, but I can’t make myself move. I’ll just stay here, I think, until someone comes looking for me.