Wild (23 page)

Thirty-eight

E
ven though the police led Dara and Cade from a back entrance at the mall, they were surrounded.

Gritting his teeth, Cade kept his head down. Swarmed by bodies and microphones, he felt like he was coming out of his skin. Like one more touch from the wrong person, and he'd split and spill out of his own flesh.

“Back up,” Deputy Krause shouted.

It was her job to lead them through the parking lot. Two more deputies flanked them. They made a good shield but it didn't stop the reporters. Talking over each other, they pressed from all sides. Without touching, they still managed to invade. Shoving microphones toward them, they shouted questions.

“Can you tell us what you were thinking?”

“Did you feel like you were in danger?”

“Who are you really?”

“Dara, Dara! Cade!”

Though they had an escort, the police cruisers seemed so far away. Their lights doused, they were just blue shapes in the distance. Doors thrown open, waiting for them.
They just need to let me go,
Cade thought. He had enough adrenaline left to knock the rest of them down.

Beside him, Dara made a plaintive sound. He felt sharper when she did that. He tasted her fear, and it made him want to bare his teeth. In the tangled rush, he caught her hand and squeezed it.

Back home, he could have carried her away. Swung off, far above the danger on the ground. They could sit in the glow of his fire. Listen to the birds and the breeze. Here, he was helpless. Wound tight enough to snap, he glowered at the reporters.

“Dara! Hey, hey! Dara, over here!” one of them shouted, worming to the front of the pack. “Your father's the sheriff. Do you think you'll get special treatment?”

“Leave her alone,” Cade growled. He surged, but the deputies kept him caged between their bodies. Cameras snapped, loud as cicadas. Now, Dara tightened her hand in his. Pulling him closer, she looked up with haunted eyes.

Her color drained out; she shook her head. It was subtle. More the connection of their gaze than an actual movement. But her lips parted, making the shape of words that got lost in the noise of the crowd. Her meaning was clear, though
. Stop.

How could he stop? He didn't
want
to. He had it in his bones and blood to knock them all down. But for Dara, he put his head down again. Black asphalt flashed between his feet. Soon, roughly, the deputies shoved them in the back of a police car.

The doors slammed closed. It muffled the mob, but it didn't silence them. Huddled against an oily, plastic seat, Cade wrapped his arms around Dara. Tucking her head beneath his chin, he rounded his back to close over her. Casting black looks out the window, he clung to her.

All he wanted was to protect her. He didn't realize he was posing for pictures. Writing the next day's stories. Selling papers, with every furious look.

 

Sheriff Porter's station was chaos.

The phones wouldn't stop ringing. The deputies had to keep backing people off the front walk. Not just the reporters this time.

Somebody had posted a grainy video clip online,
The Primitive Boy goes nuts at Bear Creek Mall!
It seemed like anybody who'd been halfway interested in the case had converged at once.

He put Duncan on phone tree duty, calling in a couple more bodies to help with the crowd. Krause and the other probies back on the phone. Deputy Lo had the producer from Channel 43
in the interrogation room, giving a statement.

There wasn't a mark on the guy, but he was angling to turn pressed charges into an exclusive interview somehow. Since Dara was his daughter, and she was smack in the middle of all this mess, Sheriff Porter kept his distance.

Throwing open the conference room door, Sheriff Porter slammed it, too. He ignored the way both kids jumped. Slapping folders onto the table, he demanded, “What were you thinking?”

“He jumped us,” Dara said, already out of her chair. “He actually
grabbed
me.”

“I'd do it again,” Cade added.

“Just shut up, for god's sake.”

Refusing to stay silent, Dara came around the table. “All we did was go to the mall. I told that guy to talk to you. I mean, I told him I wasn't even me. We turned around to go back inside and he grabbed me.”

Sheriff Porter held up a hand. “I know exactly what happened. It's on the internet, Dara! The Dalai Lama knows what happened, by now.”

“Then why are you yelling at us?”

“I am the sheriff,” he said, slapping one hand into his other. “No matter what I say, no matter what that video says, even if that jackass decides not to press charges, people are gonna talk. I cannot do my job when everybody in Kentucky is pulling stories out of thin air about me and this office.”

Cade bristled. He started to stand, but Dara dropped a heavy hand on his shoulder.

“Don't,” she warned.

“I'll put you in handcuffs, son. Don't think I'm lying.” Then he turned to Dara. Red splotches stained his face. They crept into his hair, and scalded the curves of his ears. This was a whole new kind of mad, one Dara had never seen. “And don't you give me that look. I'm in here right now so I don't beat him with a phone book for touching you.”

That frankness surprised everybody. But it had the intended effect. Cade sat down again, though he kept his fingers tangled in Dara's. And Dara settled some. She threw her shoulders back, trying to shuck off the tension.

With everyone settled, Sheriff Porter glanced out the window in the door. “Branson Swayle's on his way to sit with Cade until we get this straightened up. Dara, your mother's going to fetch you shortly.”

“I want to stay,” she protested.

“That's too bad.”

Though it sounded like it pained him to say it, Cade swore, “I'll be okay.”

Turning back from the window, Sheriff Porter approached the table. Since the kid was already worked up, he might be too distracted to guard himself well. Talking to him was usually like talking to a wall. The sullen looks and long silences helped nobody, and Sheriff Porter wasn't stupid. Even when they didn't like to talk, agitated people could tell you a whole lot by the way they acted.

“Look,” Sheriff Porter said, leaning over the table. He met Cade, eye to eye, as he flipped open the folder. “I want you to understand something. I appreciate you trying to take care of my daughter.”

“Daddy, seriously,” Dara said.

He ignored her. “Seems to me like all along, that's all you've wanted to do. Am I right?”

Suspicious, Cade hesitated. But slowly, he nodded.

“Well, now you've seen this mess, and you've got to know it's because we still don't know what we need to know about you.”

“Stop it!” Dara said.

Sliding a picture from the folder, Sheriff Porter laid it down in front of Cade. He didn't slap it, or move sharply. His voice was buttery, soothing even. Though his daughter was currently losing her mind over it, he knew he had Cade's attention. Tapping the picture, he looked the boy in the eye and asked, “Does this mean anything to you?”

Cade froze. Loosening his hand from Dara's, he scrabbled his fingers across the picture. It took three tries for him to pick it up. When he did, he pushed his chair back. Holding the picture a little too close, he seemed like he was trying to retreat. Hide in a corner or something.

Excitement welling up, Sheriff Porter watched him, silently.

“What?” Dara asked. She tried to get closer. “What is it?”

Drawing his feet into the chair, Cade curled the picture against his chest. “This is mine.”

Sheriff Porter wanted to whoop. Instead, he crossed his arms over his chest and nodded thoughtfully. “So it does mean something.”

“Yes,” Cade said flatly. “Where did you get it?”

Holding up a hand to stay Dara, Sheriff Porter asked, “You don't know?”

“No. You made it bigger. It's different.”

Sheriff Porter gestured at the far right side of the photo. Mirroring Cade's posture, he didn't move closer. He just kept his focus, looking right at him. Ignoring everything else around him. Including his daughter's anxious murmuring. “Actually, that man right there, on the right side? He sent this to us. He knows you. He knows your mother. He knows your real name.”

A soft gasp filled the conference room. Arms wrapped tight around herself, Dara said, “Cade?”

“His name's Jonathan Walsh,” Sheriff Porter told Dara. Not unkindly, he looked over both of them as he opened the conference room door. “He's been missing since he was a year and a half old.”

Cade folded the photo against his chest and shook his head. “I wasn't missing.”

“I think we have different definitions of missing, son,” Sheriff Porter said, and walked out.

 

Dara's mouth felt full of ashes. They burned, drying out her throat, turning her voice into a croak. Everything had crashed around her, and Cade. God, poor Cade had been smashed. His expression was wrecked, eyes red-rimmed, and his jaw set so hard. He climbed further in the chair, until he sat on the back of it, his feet tucked into the seat.

Gingerly, Dara approached him. “Cade?”

He didn't answer. He stared past her, a gargoyle in flesh. Rolling the picture ever tighter, his knuckles paled.

“Can I see it?” she asked.

That's not what she wanted to ask. The better question was,
Is it true? Have you been lying? What's really real here?
But she was afraid—not of him, but for him. Once, she'd lain on top of him, trying to hold his life in. She felt the ghostly sting of his blood on her hands. Maybe she always would. So she was gentle with him, and she waited for an answer.

After a moment, he let her take the photo. With hawkish eyes, he watched her smooth it out. She felt him following her gaze as she studied the faces in the snapshot.

It didn't look super old. From the clothes, it obviously was a while ago. But the faces were bright and young. The woman in the picture didn't look into the camera. Her gaze was shifted slightly, to take in the baby in her arms.

Swallowing hard, Dara looked over the top of the picture. “Who are these people?”

Cade looked to the door. It was still closed. Quietly, he said, “That's my mom and my dad. And me. I don't know who the other man is.”

Unexpected weight dragged Dara into a chair. “Well then, who's Cade?”

“Me. It's my middle name,” he said flatly. “They never called me Jonathan.”

Dara wasn't sure where to start. Or to finish. All of her questions seemed to track across each other, none of them the right place to start. Studying the baby in the picture again, she saw Cade in the round face and shock of dark hair. “This is really you.”

“Yes.”

“But this is at someone's house,” Dara said.

“Yes.”

With one last look, Dara tried to memorize the faces. Then she handed the picture back to him. Her hand shook a little. His was incredibly steady; it shied from her touch. The knot rose in her throat again, and Dara rubbed at the weight in her chest.

“What happened to them? Did they kidnap you?”

Picture reclaimed, Cade folded into himself again. “No. Everyone was dying. We went into the woods to be safe. The best way to avoid a pandemic is to avoid people. Far away, so you don't get infected, too. Far away so the survivors don't hunt you down . . .”

A chill swept through Dara's blood. What he was saying was crazy. Completely insane, but she didn't dare tell him that. Instead, she nudged him with a neutral, “I don't understand.”

“That's what my mom told me,” Cade told her. He went away in his eyes, a light fading. A connection dying. When he spoke again, it was obvious he was quoting someone else. Someone he'd believed in. “‘We left at the apex of statistical inevitability.'”

Dara reached for him. “Cade . . .”

Very quietly, he said, “I think she lied.” And then, instead of reaching back, he turned away.

Thirty-nine

T
hat evening, Dara watched.

She huddled in her bed, hooded by her comforter. Remote in hand, she clicked through the six o'clock news on every station. Her bedroom looked like a slow motion rave. Light blared from the screen, then a blip of dark as she moved up the guide.

They all had it, clips of Cade standing over the reporter.

That's what they played in the background while they talked: Cade rampant, teeth bared, eyes black with fury. It looped on the screens behind the anchors, again and again. If they showed the whole clip, the whole
truth
, she thought bitterly, it was only once. The part that made him a monster, that was all they cared about.

“Serious concerns tonight,” one anchor said. She
did
look seriously concerned. Because hey, it was completely possible that Cade might break into the studio at any minute.

Next station. This anchor wasn't so much concerned. He looked like he might be fighting a smile, actually. Touching the desk in front of him, he peered into the camera. “ . . . revealed a darker side to the story today . . .”

“Bite me,” Dara said, and changed the channel.

“—rumors of a psychiatric hold—”

“. . . close to the investigation say they're closer tonight to IDing the John Doe known as the Primitive Boy.”

Sitting up stiffly, Dara raised the volume. She wasn't even sure what station she was on anymore. It played the monster video clip, too, but then it faded into a picture.
The
picture, the one Cade had held in his trembling hands at the station.

Dara slid to the end of the bed, leaning in like she might get the news faster if she was closer to it. She clung to the footboard, nails grating against the wood.

“This undated snapshot may be the key to unlocking the mystery. Though not confirmed, our sources indicate they have positively identified at least two people in the picture, Dr. Jupiter O'Toole and Dr. Liza Walsh.

“A leading epidemiologist at Case Western Reserve University, Dr. O'Toole reported his partner, Dr. Walsh, missing in 1999. Now police believe that Dr. Walsh may have disappeared voluntarily with her family—including a toddler whose age and description purportedly match the description of the Primitive Boy.

“Details are sketchy at this hour, but we'll be following the story as it develops.”

Dara snapped the TV off. Rolling off the bed, she snatched up her phone and dialed her father. A vicious mix of emotion roared through her. Anger, because why couldn't they play the whole clip? Why didn't they tell the whole world that a grown man had tried to grab her just to get a quote? Humiliation, because instead of decking the guy herself, she froze.

Pacing past the windows, Dara listened to the line ring. Outside, the reporters swelled. Hungry for more, their lights turned the front lawn into a movie set. Inside the house, tension reigned. Everything was on the verge of explosion. One wrong word, one snide look, would strike the match.

“I'm busy,” Sheriff Porter said as a greeting. He wasn't lying. Dara heard the tumult on the other line. Loud voices, all buzzing at once.

“Somebody leaked the picture,” Dara said abruptly.

“I don't have time for this, Dara.”

“Make time! Oh my god, listen to yourself!”

Sheriff Porter sighed. “I have to go.”

“Aren't you going to do something about it? I know Cade didn't tell them, and I sure didn't. That means somebody
there
is . . .”

“We leaked it.”

Going numb, Dara clutched at the window frame. “What? Why?”

“Dara,” Sheriff Porter said. His irritation came through the line just fine. And with it, his exhaustion. He sounded so weary when he said, “All they do, all day long, is dig for information. They run one story, everybody else will pick it up. All the amateur-hour detectives on the internet will get in on it.”

“But you're making it worse!”

“No, sugar, I'm getting answers as fast as I can. I've got six people on this, and that's all I can spare.”

Wordlessly, Dara hung up. When she closed her eyes, she heard the reporters outside. They hummed and hummed, ever present. Layered over that, her mother's footsteps on the stairs. Lia's music playing tinnily from her room.

The rest was the roar inside her own skin. Her heart. Her breath. It killed her that Cade was blocks away all by himself. Barricaded into a house full of things he didn't know how to use. Smothered by systems he didn't understand.

The whole world was staring at him. Stripping him, carving him into pieces, to get what they needed.

She tried to think of her happy place, her imaginary darkroom. But tonight, she couldn't summon the scent of developer that she'd never really sampled. The process wouldn't come to her; she'd read about it online, but never done it. She didn't know what it felt like to wash color prints in pure darkness. The red of the imaginary safety light kept transforming, becoming Cade as he bled for her.

He suffered, and she suffered, and there was nothing anyone could do to fix it.

 

Ms. Fourakis forced Cade to come out of his room.

Standing at the door, she talked to his back when he refused to look at her. Gentle, but persistent, she told him that everything was screwed up, but it would get better. Everything was scary, but it would get better.

“And I'm going to show you the best movie ever made again,” she finished. “You're going to watch it. Tonight, we're chilling. Nothing hard. Nothing important. We'll tackle the big stuff tomorrow, all right?”

Looking back slowly, he refused to move. “I'm fine here.”

“Hey kid, I get it. But you can't do anything about it tonight. And I can't let you sit in the dark on top of my nana's antique dresser. So come on.”

Cade jumped down. He didn't look at Ms. Fourakis as he passed her. She couldn't see through his skin. She didn't know that he was full of poison right now. That it ate him from the inside, twisting his guts and burning in his throat.

Because Ms. Fourakis wanted him to, Cade took a bowl of stew. The ceramic warmed his hands. Steam rolling from it touched his skin, a bright, hot spot when everything else was numb.

“Doing okay?” Mr. Anderson asked. He clapped a chestnut hand to Cade's shoulder. With a gentle shake, he waited for an answer. Actively. It was so obvious now that they'd been working hard to
listen
all this time, waiting for him to say something important.

Cade didn't feel like participating. He shrugged, then Cade settled into his favorite place in the living room. There was a corner where the pothos cascaded down the wall. The plant's leaves smelled faintly sweet, like freshwater and life. The forest smelled that way sometimes, when there was rain in the air.

Mr. Anderson stepped into the couch, sitting on his feet beside Ms. Fourakis. They leaned toward each other, naturally and unconsciously. With gentle fingers, he stroked her hair back, so nothing lay between them. Though their attention occasionally strayed toward Cade, mostly, they stayed in their own circle.

The stew cooled in Cade's bowl. After a while, he set it aside. Pulling his knees to his chest, he watched the movie by default. None of it registered, really.

In his head, he was somewhere else entirely. A middle world, one that only existed inside of him. Because this place wasn't home. And what he used to think was home wasn't real.

“This is, watch this, watch,” Ms. Fourakis said, her gaze fixed on the screen.

Mr. Anderson laughed. “Shh. I am.”

Quiet only a moment, Ms. Fourakis drew a sharp breath. “No, but watch. You can see it, the exact minute he falls in love with her. Watch, watch.”

“I am,” Mr. Anderson replied.

Even though they weren't doing anything but eating dinner and watching the best movie ever made, they were joined. In an invisible way, by threads no one could see. But somehow, Cade was sure, threads no one else could sever.

He turned his attention to the screen, too. What did that moment look like? Who were these people? Were they really falling in love?

Rain beat down on them, was it real rain? he wondered. These people were actors, he knew that. At the end of the day, they stopped pretending. They went home to their own lives. Did that mean they knew who they were?

“Watch,” Ms. Fourakis wheezed, tense with anticipation.

There was a look. Cade tightened his arms around his knees, watching the actors. Watching them make something up on the screen. It didn't exist until they made it exist. And it fooled him, just like everything else. When the actors kissed, he felt the currents that rose up when he touched Dara.

They were fainter without her. More like a memory of the sensation. A rush and relief, a spark and then the darkness. Cade turned his head. Not to look away, but to feel the thin, jade leaves of the plant brush against his cheek. That was real. He knew that for sure.

He was healing. Faster than he expected, definitely faster than he might have at home. His chest still hurt, but he could raise his arm again. The pain in his foot had faded entirely. If he had to, he could fish. It didn't take all of his strength to forage.

Dara was the only reason to stay. Sometimes he got lonely in the forest, but he'd never been hunted. His parents had lied to him, so what? Frustrated, Cade thumped his head against the wall and wondered what kept Dara here.

He'd lived in her world. What would it take to lure her into his? The right way, he thought sullenly. Not the way idiot Josh had done it, too stupid to tie up the food. Too dim to light a fire. It would be different with him.

He could show her the places deeper in the forest that no one had seen but him. He'd watched her at the falls. They'd consumed her, left her trembling. Even when she wasn't taking pictures, she was drinking it in. Every detail—he was sure if he asked her, she would have been able to describe it down to the last glimmering drop.

Beyond the falls, a two-day walk from the old mining village, there was a valley full of wild orchids. Their buds would open soon, turning pink-and-white faces to the sun. There were thousands of them.

After a rain, they shivered. Their stems were so thick, their leaves so stiff, that they whispered. It sounded like words; Cade had lain there with them before, trying to make out their words.

There was that secret place, and he could imagine Dara in it. And in the mining town; in the shadow of the cliffs. Among the stone ruins of the last people to disappear from the earth. Those weren't lies. Those people really had lived and loved and then ceased to be.

“Did you see it?” Ms. Fourakis said. It wasn't a question; she sounded drunk and sweet. Leaning into Mr. Anderson, she looked over at him.

And Cade did see it, again. Better than in the movie, natural and alive, just like the plants and trees and rivers back home. The question was whether Dara would see it when he looked at her next.