Page 62 of Leave No Trace
‘I’ll stay with you while Lucas gets water.’ I nodded at both of them and settled myself on the ground.
When the sound of Lucas’s footsteps faded away, I turned to the living corpse on the cot. Every trace of the gorgeous, brooding man who’d escaped into the Boundary Waters ten years ago was gone. This was a flesh-covered skeleton, except for two unnatural growths that bulged out of his neck.
‘The snow’s tapering off and it’s not too cold. Would you like some fresh air?’
The blue eyes stared at me. Without waiting for an answer, I pulled the sleeping bag off him and propped him up, threading my arms under his and trying not to breathe through my nose. Dragging him off the cot and out of the tent, I squeezed him through the boulders and in the opposite direction from the marsh. The hugging trees receded into the background of the forest as I jerked his legs over rocks and down inclines. He weighed almost nothing. I could feel the crush of his bones through his jacket and shuddered when, instead of fighting me, his fingers slowly closed over my forearms. On the last drop, I stumbled and fell. Josiah tumbled against a log and I landed a few feet away on a massive boulder, popping at least one of the stitches and crying out in pain.
Holding the bandage and gasping, I waited for Josiah to weakly push himself over and lean against the tree before I remembered my manners.
‘I’m Maya Stark, Jane Stark’s daughter.’
His mouth fell open, but no words came out. This was the culmination of my entire life. Every question I’d been too afraid to ask, every answer I didn’t think I deserved to know, every lock I’d learned to pick, every law I’d broken, every patient I’d subdued, every class I’d taken, every palate strengthener, pronunciation exercise, and vocal pattern, every trick and reward, coaxing the nonverbal to speak, bringing words to the wordless, helping person after person because I’d never been able to have the only conversation that mattered.
But now here it was, the moment of fucking truth, and on top of everything I would keep my promise to Lucas, too.
I pulled the gun out of my boot and pointed it at his chest. ‘Start talking.’
28
In the depth of winter I finally learned that there was in me an invincible summer.
– Albert Camus
Josiah
Leaving Heather Price crumpled on his patio with the money she’d been hunting for, Josiah went back to the truck where Lucas stared ashen-faced out the window. Wrong ad. He’d picked the wrong advertisement, the wrong landlord, probably the wrong life. Throwing the truck into reverse he felt like shit, like the stink of Heather’s sickness had rubbed off on him and was making his own son turn away from the smell.
‘She was trying to rob us.’ He explained as they headed back to the entry point.
Lucas kept his face turned toward the woods that quickly closed in around them. ‘Then why didn’t you call the police?’
Josiah wiped a hand over his mouth and checked the rearview mirror. ‘Because they don’t help.’
Another mile passed before Lucas broke the silence. ‘I don’t want to leave again. I like it here.’
‘In Ely?’
‘The Boundary Waters.’
Lucas didn’t speak again for the rest of the drive. Josiah debated the odds of finding a new rental, a short-term lease to get them through the end of the school year and possibly even beyond. He doubted Heather would actually take them to court when she barely seemed able to leave her house to go to work. They could find a bunkhouse to start and then maybe he could buy a trailer or even an old cabin somewhere nearby. He hated the idea of a permanent ceiling, but at least there’d be no more landlords, and the Boundary Waters would be right out their back door.
With that idea in mind, they paddled back out for their spring break vacation, sticking to the bigger lakes that had already thawed, and set up camp on an island melting in the afternoon sunlight. Lucas was reticent while they put up the tent and tarp. He became listless, crawling into his sleeping bag instead of exploring the campsite with his usual energy. He didn’t want breakfast the next morning and wouldn’t do more than sit at the fire and stare. At first Josiah had chalked it up to witnessing the fight with Heather, but when Lucas’s eyes glazed over he figured he’d caught a cold and let him sleep. In the middle of the next night, though, as Josiah was watching his campfire turn to embers, Lucas began screaming. He thrashed at the sides of the tent, pulling the stakes out and clawing at the fabric. Josiah dove inside and wrestled Lucas free, but he wouldn’t stop flailing or yelling about bugs. Bugs everywhere, attacking him, except they weren’t. It was too early for insects, too cold, but no amount of reason could calm Lucas, whose skin – to Josiah’s horror – felt hotter than the charred wood in the firepit.
There was no medicine in their camp and no way out, not when Lucas could thrash over the side of the canoe or capsize the whole thing in his panicking state. It was too dangerous. He held the last remnants of snow to his son’s forehead and murmured the same hollow reassurances over and over on a loop, willing the seizures and hallucinations away. When he saw a light flashing over the water, he thought he might be hallucinating, too. Then it drew closer and he made out a lone figure in a canoe.
He shouted over the water and pleaded for help. The light faltered and turned off and again he thought it was a mirage, until finally the bow of a boat slid onto the island’s shore.
A small woman bundled in all-weather gear stepped out. Only the top half of her face was visible as she eyed their campsite warily. He explained the situation and asked if she would bring them in. ‘I can hold him still while you paddle.’
After a long pause, where she searched the horizon of trees as if hoping anyone else might come along and volunteer for this job, she finally nodded her head toward the canoe. They loaded the essentials and Josiah strapped a life jacket on Lucas, propping him on his lap in the front, while the woman powered them from the stern, setting off into the night.
They moved slowly, inching through the black. Her strokes were measured and steady and she seemed to know where the shallows and boulders lay even without the flashlight’s beam. He didn’t inquire what she was doing by herself in the middle of a still-frigid April night. She didn’t ask him anything except about Lucas’s symptoms, and showed no reaction when Josiah listed them out.
It was almost dawn by the time they reached a small, rock-filled beach where the woman led him to a cabin nestled in the trees. She pointed out a small bedroom, where Josiah laid Lucas’s unconscious body that had now begun to shake and told him she thought Lucas had the flu.
‘Influenza. My daughter had it once.’
Josiah glanced around at the empty cabin. ‘Was your daughter okay?’
