Wild (14 page)

Twenty-three

W
hen Dara rolled off the bus, she stopped short. An unfamiliar car sat in her driveway, and the front door stood open. Lia blasted past her. Either she didn't notice anything amiss, or she didn't care. Typical Lia, caught up in her own world.

Before Dara could head inside, her dad stepped onto the porch. A woman followed him, and then Cade. He wore new clothes and new shoes. Clutching a bundle to his chest, he slunk behind them. Eyes darting furtively, they rested on Dara for a moment, then slid away.

“What's going on?” Dara asked. She tried to sound chill, but her heart was already racing. Stupidly, she'd believed that the hard part was talking Dad into keeping Cade one night. That the next, and the next after that would be easier.

Sheriff Porter closed the door, then clapped a hand against Cade's back. “Good news. Your mom had a chat with Ms. Fourakis here this morning. She's willing to take Cade in for the time being.”

Plastering on a smile, Dara shifted her bag from one shoulder to the other. “I thought he was staying here.”

“He'll be more comfortable with me,” Ms. Fourakis said. Charm and warmth surrounded her like a halo. She had bright brown eyes, and they crinkled at the corners when she smiled. Genuine. Looking to Cade, she went on. “His own room, some privacy. I think we'll get along, don't you?”

Stiff, Cade cut a look at Sheriff Porter, then nodded. “Yes. Thank you.”

Protests ran wild in Dara's head. There were so many, and they came so fast, it was hard to figure out where to start. Stammering, she groaned inwardly when she picked the least important one. “How far away do you live, though? I'm really the only person Cade knows.”

Ms. Fourakis touched her chest, as if she found Dara absolutely adorable. “Your father has my address. It's just a few blocks from here. Close enough to walk or bike . . .”

Poor Cade's face was a mask. A little pale, incredibly stiff. Coming closer, Dara ignored the way her father loomed over them.

“Are you okay with this?”

Resentful, Cade nodded anyway. “For now.”

“We don't want to keep Ms. Fourakis waiting,” Sheriff Porter said. That not-so-friendly hand on Cade's bag nudged him down the step.

“Can I ride over with you?” Dara asked. She shucked off her bag and dropped it by the door. Pressing herself between Cade and Sheriff Porter, she offered a sugared smile. “That way I know where it is.”

Sheriff Porter started to shake his head. “Dara . . .”

“Why don't we let Cade get settled in?” Ms. Fourakis said. She fished her keys from her pocket and nodded toward the car. “Come by tomorrow. You can map it online, you won't have any trouble finding it.”

Stonewalled, Dara slipped her hand into Cade's. Fingers lacing, she squeezed, trying to reassure him. And she moved slowly. New sneakers covered the bandage on his foot. She didn't have to see it to shudder at the memory of glass buried deep in his flesh. His palm was hot and dry, and when she glanced over at him, she noticed his lips were pressed almost white.

“Are you okay?” Dara murmured.

Rubbing his thumb against hers, Cade kept his eyes forward. He marched like he was going to jail. Stiff steps, shoulders blocked. His jaw was hard and set, but he answered her gently. “I'll be close to you.”

Strange currents threaded between them. Something electric and liquid at the same time. They teased a sting across Dara's skin, tingling on the back of her neck. Before they reached the car, she squeezed his hand again. It frightened her a little. When he squeezed back, her heart pounded.

With a subtle pull, she made him stop. Made him look at her. “I'll come right after school, tomorrow. I'll be there first thing.”

At that, Cade did nod. Then he leaned down. His cheek grazed hers as he whispered in her ear, “You were right. They think I'm a liar.”

The misery in his voice made Dara ache. She didn't know what the truth was, exactly. Except that
he
obviously believed that he grew up in a forest, had never seen an escalator or a light switch. That he was utterly alien and lost in a world that seemed completely normal to her. It was so clear to her that he was afraid and hurting. Why didn't anyone else see it?

Covering his hand with hers, she turned to look at him. Their noses almost brushed. It was too close. Too intimate. But she didn't pull away. “I'm sorry.”

“I don't understand what they want.”

“We'll figure it out,” Dara told him. She reluctantly let her hand slip from his, then leaned past him to open the car door.

Cade loosely hooked his fingers in her collar. There was no pressure. He didn't pull. Plaintive, it felt like a gesture. A way to hold on to her a little longer.

When Dara swallowed at the knot in her throat, she felt his knuckles graze her skin. Heat trailed there. It bloomed and blossomed through her, making her bolder. Raising her head, she told him with a lot more certainty than she felt, “I mean it. We'll figure it out.”

In reply, Cade brushed his finger against her pulse. His touch settled there. It lingered on her throat, alive, insisting. For one, impossibly brief moment, she felt
his
pulse, an answer to her own. Dara's breath thinned. She felt his on her cheek, the world a distant roar.

Then, without another word, Cade pulled away and climbed into the car.

 

The house phone rang for the fourth time in an hour.

Mrs. Porter fumbled with an ancient answering machine, plugging it in just in time to catch the latest call. She stood over the machine, listening to ten-year-old Dara and eight-year-old Lia giggling and inviting people to leave a message. The machine clicked, and an unfamiliar voice spilled through the speaker.

“Hi, this is Lucy Faul. I'm a researcher from WTHR in Indianapolis. We're interested in running a piece about the Primitive Boy. We'd like to get a quote from you or a family representative.”

Sheriff Porter stepped into the hall. Walking up behind his wife, he wrapped his arms around her waist. The reporter left her name and number, then hung up abruptly. With a frown, Sheriff Porter pressed a kiss to his wife's shoulder. “Indiana?”

“And Ohio, and Missouri, and Illinois.” Distracted, Mrs. Porter untangled herself. She turned the answering machine down, then looked back at her husband. “I don't understand this. As many at-risk kids as I work with, this one's the one that gets all the attention?”

Sheriff Porter leaned against the wall, and sighed. “I don't know. If it was just the bear, it probably would have blown away. But now you've got the bear, and the missing identity, and the idea that he's some caveman . . . Jim Albee's story in the paper sure didn't help.”

Mrs. Porter frowned. “No. No it didn't.”

Sheriff Porter leaned against the wall. “We'll figure out who he is, and they'll get bored. He's probably just some runaway trying to hide from going home. The paper's only interested because it's weird, and there's nothing else going on right now.”

Mrs. Porter replaced the answering machine. “I don't know why they have to bother us.”

“Like I said—” Sheriff Porter started. Another call interrupted him. The phone's clang exploded the quiet in the house. It was an unnatural sound, now that they all had custom ringtones. It was like an invasion, people walking into their house uninvited.

Glancing at the caller ID, Mrs. Porter smiled mirthlessly. “The
Tennessean
. That's all the border states.”

 

There were more calls coming in at the police station. The two newest recruits sat at desks, answering the phone over and over. They had colored Post-its spread before them.

Yellow was for media calls, that stack was the largest. Orange for other police departments trying to match up their runaways with Makwa's mystery kid. Day-Glo pink notes boasted tips from psychics. Later, those would be pinned up in the break room, for everyone to enjoy.

The last batch was the smallest, only two messages scribbled on bright green.

One came from Martha Pond in Corbin, Kentucky, who called every time someone ended up on the news. She was sure she recognized any given subject, whether they were black or white, red hair or bald, old or young. She thought the sketch of Cade was her long lost niece, Elena. It wasn't important and the deputy knew it. But someone needed to touch base with her before she showed up at the station in her house dress. Again.

Slapping down two more yellow squares, the deputy on phone duty covered up the other green note.

That one came from somebody claiming his name was Dr. Jupiter O'Toole, which is why he got put into the possible fruit bats pile. But his information was interesting enough that the deputy at least wrote it down. He'd only pretended to take messages from Elvis Presley, Shirley MacLaine, and J. Edgar Hoover.

Dr. Jupiter O'Toole, however, wondered if he could talk to the police about a colleague who'd gone missing sixteen, seventeen years ago. She and her husband had vanished without a trace, along with their infant son. He was sure it was nothing, but the boy was just the right age. . . .

By the end of the shift, the break room boasted twenty-four calls from psychics, one hundred twenty-seven calls from the media, eight runaway idents from other departments, and just the two green, possibly loony, tips about Cade's possible identity.

Those two notes, on the bottom of the stack, got separated from the rest. They never made it to the assistant's desk. No one entered them into the station database.

They went out in the trash, with crumpled coffee cups and used tissues, forgotten.

Twenty-four

C
ade followed Ms. Fourakis inside.

The new house smelled good. Plants hung from hangers at the ceiling. They spilled out of pots in the windows. In the kitchen, a particularly ambitious vine climbed the tops of the cabinets, and dangled down by the door. It was a forest in miniature, and it almost made Cade feel like he was at home.

“You can help yourself to anything you find,” Ms. Fourakis said, dropping her purse on the table. “If you want something special, just add to the . . . well, you tell me, and I'll add it to the grocery list.”

Cade followed her as she flung open cabinets and drawers, and a cold box that glowed with gem-colored bottles. Quick as lightning, she explained all the contents. Cade wouldn't remember most of it, because he recognized none of it. Perhaps after dark, he'd experiment.

Curly hair swaying cheerfully, she led him down the hall. “Dining room, I use it for scrapbooking. Living room, TV, right down here is my craft room. I could teach you to sew,” she said with a twinkle.

“I know how,” Cade replied.

“A man of many mysteries.”

It seemed to amuse her, so Cade just nodded. Unusual scents filled this house. Spicy, herbal scents. Some he recognized, garlic, field onion, peppermint. Others eluded him, but they all came together pleasantly. It made this house feel familiar, even though it was ceilings and walls, glass and carpet.

“This will be your room,” she said, pushing open a door.

“Thank you.”

The floors here were bare, and the walls had paintings of trees and birds and butterflies. A woven blanket covered the bed, and everything shone in comforting shades of blue and green. At the foot of the bed sat a basket stuffed full of small bottles and tins. Tentatively, Cade touched the edge of the basket to peer inside.

“Everything you need, deodorant, soap . . . do you need anything special for your hair?”

What a strange question. Cade shook his head, still faintly smiling.

“Razor, shaving cream . . .” Ms. Fourakis lowered her voice, confidentially. “You're looking a little shaggy there, my friend.”

Smoothing a hand down his face, Cade nodded. His skin was rough, his whiskers starting to vaguely resemble a goatee. He wasn't sure how he was supposed to fix that, though. They took his knife at the hospital. His pot of deer fat, sweetened with mint and geranium, moldered away in his cave. Ms. Fourakis gestured at a plastic stick and a can, both baffling.

“Okay,” he said anyway.

With a nod, she led him out of the bedroom. Leaning into a half-open door across the hall, she flipped the light on. “This is your bathroom. You can aim or you can clean up after yourself, I don't care which.”

Cade nodded as if he understood. He had a little experience with bathrooms now. Not much. Just enough to be fascinated with flushing the toilet and the magic faucets. Hot
and
cold water poured out, and it was good to drink. No need to boil it or screen it. Last night, Dara had shown him the sink; he was curious about the tub.

“Can I try that?” he asked, gesturing toward it.

Ms. Fourakis stepped out of his way. “You bet. There are some sweats in your bedroom. We'll see about getting you some jeans and pajamas and whatnot when my boyfriend gets home.”

Once she walked away, Cade crept into his bedroom. Plucking up the basket, he carried it to the bathroom. Leaning against the door to close it, he studied his surroundings. The mirror unnerved him.

Though he understood it was only his reflection, it was frighteningly clear. He knew his own face from still pools of water or the shining edge of his knife.

This glass revealed his whole body in blinding light. He stripped off his shirt and his pants. The bandage on his chest wasn't as big as it felt. A mottled bruise radiated outside its edges though, mostly black but fading toward green.

Peeling the bandage off, he hissed at the sting. The wound beneath looked strange. Puckered and pressed together with thin black lines. Reaching up to touch his head, Cade traced the scar beneath his hair.

He had other bruises, all mysterious. Climbing trees and cliffs could be brutal work. It wasn't unusual for a vine to give way. They were only so sturdy, so he was used to hitting the forest floor. Stretching, he lifted his good arm. His ribs appeared, then melted back into the definition of his muscles.

His back was tight, and his thighs thick. Strong, for climbing and jumping. His knotted feet seemed out of place. Bony and callused, too big for the rest of his body. But they were perfect for the way he lived. Hardened enough for his moccasins and boots. Toes dexterous enough to cling to a perch. Or to hold the fixed end while he braided reeds into baskets and blankets.

Leaning close to the mirror, he jerked back when his face disappeared in a circle of fog. Warily, he pressed a finger to the haze. It wiped right off. With a quick swipe, he smeared it all away and considered his face.

Not the features, those he knew. He had his mother's eyes, his father's mouth, and a great-uncle Junior's nose, or so he'd heard. The small details fascinated him. He had freckles, like Dad. There was a half-moon scar under his chin. A chip in his front tooth set it slightly angled against the rest.

Cade bared his teeth and barked at the face in the glass. It was a good noise, one that scared raccoons when they strayed too close. The sound echoed off the tile and chrome, reverberating in his ears. A moment later, Ms. Fourakis knocked on the door.

“Everything okay in there?”

Backing away from his reflection, Cade knocked on his side of the door. “Yes.”

“Better hop in, my boyfriend's on his way.”

Carefully, curiously, Cade twisted the taps. He couldn't help it. He got excited seeing all that clean water rush out. Punching a hand into the stream, he marveled that it was hot. Rather than waste it by touching it, he sucked the wetness from his fingers. Then, knotting his dreads on the top of his head, he stepped into the ceramic basin.

Crouching, he waited for the water to rise around him. When he was little, his mother boiled water to wash him by hand. But even then, it was no more than a bowlful at a time. He'd never been covered by warmth like this. Steam thickened the air, and slowly, the water inched up his back.

Water. Everywhere. He tasted it in the air. It gushed from the wall. So much of it, and no work at all. Even though the heat relaxed his muscles, his heart still pounded with excitement. Covered with a blanket of liquid heat, Cade rested against a pillow of his own hair.

So far, this was the only thing in the City World that was better than what he had at home. This, and Dara, just a short walk away.

 

Alone, with no internet to soothe her, and her head full of Cade driving away, Dara retreated the only way she knew how. Sitting at her computer, she finally opened the pictures she'd taken during the camping trip. They spilled out across the screen, and the vibrant colors surprised her.

In her mind, in her memories, the whole trip was blood red. But scrolling slowly through her shots, she discovered so much more.

A tiny, violet flower filled one picture. She'd gotten the focus so tight and close, she could make out the subtly, silvery rings that made up the petals. The florid purple seemed poured into the cells, a secret view.

She had tight shots of brand-new leaves, struggling to spread and green. When she got to the pictures of the gate to Avalon, she caught her breath.

It was shockingly beautiful. The shadows and light were so much deeper than she remembered. There were so many details that she had missed when she was in the moment.

The mist in the air caught the light. It folded faint rainbows into haze, and at some angles, caught the sunlight and sparkled. Vines and leaves spiraled down over the falls. Butterflies darted along the edges of the pond.

Sinking back in her chair, Dara studied the trees. Spindling, barely green, there's no way they hid a figure in them. But she couldn't help but wonder, had he been there? How many of these pictures had secrets of him in them?

His eyes had been so haunted when he insisted he was telling the truth. Guilt that didn't even belong to her filled her chest. It wasn't her fault that she knew how people would treat him. But she felt bad for it, all the same. She couldn't help looking at her pictures and trying to see that place from Cade's eyes.

She couldn't imagine living there. When she and Josh packed for their trip, she had checklists. They'd printed tips off of websites. They had maps and GPS and it seemed like absolutely everything they needed to camp comfortably.

In just a few short days, though, everything fell apart. They were hungry, out of touch with the rest of the world. They were targets.

It didn't seem possible to live there. To be alone there. Even if Cade had lived there with parents, where did
they
come from?

Even if she was willing to suspend her disbelief that lost tribes of people could live in a national forest unnoticed, it didn't make sense. They were two people with one son—where were the others? Cade had said nothing about there being anyone else out there.

Then there were his questions.
How many people left in the world? Are you immune?
It was all connected. She just didn't understand how. She didn't have her dad sitting next to her, feeding her the one last piece of the puzzle she needed to figure things out.

With a sigh, she leaned forward to scroll through the rest of her pictures. Birds. Sunset through the trees. River. Mushrooms, then the blurry shot with Cade in it. Studying that image, she flicked back and forth between the others surrounding it. He was just a flash in the upper branches of the tree. So far up, almost undetectable.

Loading the shot onto a thumb drive, she shoved that and her camera into her school bag. She wanted to get some pictures of him, real pictures. Images that captured the darkness and depth in his eyes. Maybe a picture that would contain a piece of the puzzle. Or maybe just a glimpse of him she could keep.

He was only a few blocks away, and virtually a stranger. But there was a hollow ache in her chest that wouldn't go away. The only way she could think to describe it was homesickness. That was ridiculous, it didn't make sense. But as she tossed herself in bed to stare at the ceiling, that's how she felt.

Homesick and wildly alone.

 

In the morning, Cade sat in Ms. Fourakis' kitchen. Patient, he let her tape his shoulder up again, even as his eyes darted to take in new details.

Numbers on the fridge, photos tucked into the flowing plants. It seemed strange for the plants to be trapped inside. The windows were wide and bright, plenty of light poured in. But how big would they get, how far would they range, if they weren't trapped inside pots?

“As soon as we're done with this,” Ms. Fourakis said, snipping white medical tape, “we're going to get you fingerprinted and take some pictures.”

Cade wasn't sure what fingerprinting was. It nagged in his head, like he ought to know. Since he couldn't place it, he decided to keep that to himself. It seemed like something that a person who wasn't lying or crazy should know. Instead, he hedged and asked, “Why?”

With a thoughtful murmur, Ms. Fourakis picked up a new square of gauze. “We're having a hard time helping you, stranger.”

“I told you my name.”

“I know you did,” she said. Then she shrugged, as if she couldn't help matters. “It's all part of the process.”

Digging his fingers into his own knees, Cade stilled himself when her touch pressed too close to the center of his wounds. It was like an ember popping out of the fire, landing on his skin. It burned, deep down, but there was nothing he could do to stop it. “I just want to go home.”

“And we want to take you there.”

Cade clamped his mouth closed. This sounded like she thought he was a liar. Was that better than crazy? Probably, but he didn't know by how much. And it was fair.

He was a liar. He lied about being able to read and write. He hadn't told anyone but Sofia and Dara about his parents. Or the fact that
they
were all supposed to be dead. He was lying to himself, too. Because he wanted to go home. But he didn't want to go alone.

“So, police station first,” Ms. Fourakis said, applying the last strip of tape. “Then we need to swing by the hospital and get your antibiotics. Your social worker wants you to get tested so we can get you in some classes for the time being.”

Very still, Cade waited for her to step back. Then he struggled into his shirt on his own. He didn't want her to help him. He could manage. “When can I see Dara?”

“This afternoon.”

Sliding to his feet, Cade nodded, but then asked, “But when?”

“Kid, she's in school. I'm pretty sure they don't let out until three or four. So you've got a while.”

Nodding, Cade didn't ask her what three or four meant. How long that would be. He knew dawn. He knew noon, when the sun was at its highest. He knew sunset, and midnight. But time was fuzzy for him outside that. He knew the words—he knew the year had twelve months, but only some of their names. Everything for him was seasons and sections and segments.

But that was another thing that he was too afraid to admit. There were flashing numbers everywhere. In the kitchen, beside his bed. In red and blue and even green. The numbers of the hours meant something to these people. It was so important that they kept time everywhere. No way he could admit he didn't understand it.

Ms. Fourakis jerked a thumb toward the hall. “I'm gonna go get my keys. Can you get those shoes on yourself?”

Finally, at last, something in this world he could do without help. He knew a whole host of knots. Though he didn't like the stiff shoes they expected him to wear, he did know how to put them on. The first, he tied tightly. The second, he carefully slid over his bandaged foot. No more hospitals. No more doctors. He had to take care, make sure.