This Is Not a Werewolf Story (8 page)

The things that matter happen in the woods. The things that matter don't need words.

Today is Friday. So tonight matters.

Once we step off the road and into the woods, we all breathe in deep to smell the trees and dirt.

Bobo runs off on a scent. There's nothing I'd like more than to drop to all fours and follow her.

I point up into the fork of an old oak tree.

Vincent follows my finger. “A bike! How did that get there?”

It's a rusted red ten-speed. In five places, where the branches of the oak have grown around it, the bike has become part of the tree. It'll be there until that oak falls, and by that time, a boy walking by the trunk won't even know the bike is in there—the oak will have swallowed it up like a snake does a mouse.

Sparrow answers, “Raul put it there.”

Vincent laughs like it's the coolest thing ever.

My dad gave me that bike. It was way too big for me. He pushed me around on it a lot the Friday afternoon
he brought it up here. Put on a good show for the other parents. When he stopped coming, I decided to give the bike to the tree. It's just as likely to learn to ride it as I am.

We keep walking; we're at the end of the path. The lake is in front of us. On the other side of the lake the trees are so close together and the blackberries scrape and the nettles sting so sharp that nobody has ever gone beyond them. Nobody but me, anyway.

“What's that?” Vincent asks in a whisper.

Pin pricks in my fingers and on my head. For a second I wonder if I'm going to look where he's pointing and see the secret that changed my life.

I follow his finger with my eyes. He's pointing to the straw man that I nailed to a huge cedar last year after Tuffman tackled Sparrow during touch football.

We use it for target practice. It's wearing Tuffman's favorite sweatshirt that says
3X Olympian
. I stole it from the laundry room. He turned the whole school upside down looking for that shirt. Not one of the Cubs ratted me out though, not even when Tuffman leaned in and hit them with his foul breath and a deadly speech about honesty and thieving and the awful punishment you get for stealing a man's clothes.

On the head of the straw man I nailed an old crow's nest that looks like Tuffman's toupee. Cracks me up every time I see it.

I pull my sling out of my back pocket. It's a little harder to use than a slingshot, but it's my weapon of choice.

I walk over to the straw man and point to the feet, the chest, and the shoulders.

“Five points,” Sparrow yells out.

Then I point to the knees, and Little John shouts, “Twenty points.” A runner's knees are valuable. I can see by Vincent's nod that he gets that.

I point to you-know-where on the shorts.

“Fifty points.” I have to say it myself because all the kids are laughing to bust a gut.

I walk back to Vincent. I reach down and scoop up a smooth stone, the perfect shape.

A sling has two cords attached to a leather pouch in the middle. I set the stone in the center of the pouch. I hold the ends of the cords with the fingers and thumb of my right hand. I look at Vincent to make sure he's watching.

I start to spin it above my head. Vincent's eyes follow it. The Cubs whoop as the sling arcs faster and faster. For a minute I just swing and stare at the straw man, finding my rhythm.

I can't help but show off. I close my eyes.

I let the end of one cord go. The stone flies out of the pouch and makes a straight line toward the old cedar.

Thwack
. I hear the kids shout and I open my eyes. I look at Sparrow.

“Fifty points,” he informs me, and reaches out to shake my hand like a gentleman.

Vincent shakes his head. The look in his eyes means more than any compliment.

I'm about to hand him the sling, but then I think better of it. I want him to do something he can be good at right away. I pull the slingshot out of the knapsack.

It's a lot easier to learn how to use than the sling. And it's a lot safer while you learn. You let go of that sling a little too soon and some kid has a rock between the eyes.

I hand him the slingshot. I show him how to hold the Y-shaped piece of wood and where to put the rock, but I can tell he already kind of knows. I leave him alone to practice and go help the little kids bait their hooks.
Whiz.
I hear Vincent's rock sail by the cedar tree.
Thump.
It falls on something soft, like a big mushroom.
Whiz.
Another one.
Fwip.
A leaf on a branch. Progress.

Whiz. Thwack.

Now
that
hit straw.

I turn back and give him a thumbs up. He stands taller, throwing back his shoulders like a major league pitcher on the mound.

Thwack, thwack, thwack,
the sound follows me all the way to where the little kids are squatting over their hooks.

One problem down, another pops up.

Little John is bawling. Tears are streaking through the dirt on his face and snot is running from each nostril like two yellow slugs. He looks at me and sobs, “Wahoul, I don't wanna kill Mr. Wormie.”

“It's just a worm,” Sparrow says to him. He stabs three of those suckers onto his hook.

I lead Little John by the hand to the edge of the lake.

“Look,” I say. I point to the pollywogs swimming around the shiny smooth rocks. I scoop up a bunch and let them wriggle in the palm of my hand.

Little John bends down to look. He stops crying. He starts petting the pollywogs. Nothing like the life cycle of amphibians to get a boy's mind off his troubles.

Before I can stop him, he pops four of them into his mouth. He swallows. A huge gulp. “They're good,” he says, rubbing his tummy.

“Oh man,” I say. I'm gonna zuke.

Then my scalp tingles.

Something in me says to look up. Woods magic.

I look up.

I look up and see a glowing ball of blue-green fire floating across the lake. Will-o'-the-wisp. I mouth the words but no sound comes out. I've seen it once before—when I first noticed the woods-world. And it takes the breath from my lungs this time too.

Will-o'-the-wisps are one of the light phenomena that Dean Swift studies.
Ignes fatui
it's called in Latin,
and that means “foolish fire.” People have been seeing it for centuries, but it's still a mystery. Dean Swift says most scientists think it's some kind of chemical reaction caused by a bunch of dead stuff breaking down. He says it with bigger words, but you get it.

When I researched it on my own, I found out that a long time ago people thought will-o'-the-wisps would lead you to treasure or to a secret doorway where you could get in and out of heaven and see people you loved that you had lost.

They were on to something.

I watch the ball of light skip above the water. Tonight I'll go again to the place the will-o'-the-wisp led me a year ago, and I will feel like I am home, and I will find what I have lost.

My breath comes calm and slow like it does when I'm deep in the woods with her.

Little John looks up, his cheeks bulging and a little trickle of slime in the corner of his mouth. He doesn't see what I see.

Then I hear Vincent shouting behind us. “You guys won't believe what I just saw!”

The coyote! I jump up. I can see Sparrow by the lake, but where's Bobo?

Everyone runs toward Vincent. As I hurry to catch up, I notice that they've all dropped their poles. Six poles are floating in the water, heading slowly toward
the middle of the lake. I change the count—sixty-six poles have gone adrift. I'm about to say one of those bad words Jack is always saying, when I see a shadow by the big hemlock. It's Sparrow. He's got his new pole in his hand and he's setting it on a thick bed of pine needles far from the water's edge. He looks up and sees me. “I told you I'd take care of it,” he calls to me. Then he lopes over, and we head toward the old cedar and the straw man.

Six
times he's put his hand in mine.

The kids are all gathered around Vincent. I let out a little puff of air when I see Bobo behind him, her ears flat. Her tail is tucked as far up under her body as it can get.

“It was over there,” Vincent says, pointing to the other side of the lake, where White Deer Woods begins. On that side, the water comes right up to blackberry brambles and trees. It takes four legs to find the rabbit and deer paths in that tangle of branches, needles, and thorns.

“What?” I ask. “What did you see?” My heart pounds,
keblam, keblam, keblam.

My fingertips tingle. I can feel my ears stretching the way they do when the woods magic happens.

Something tells me Vincent's not going to say “coyote.”

“I saw a white deer with huge black antlers,” Vincent whispers.

“Did it talk to you?” I put my hand over my mouth too late. That was not a question I should have asked. Obviously.

“Did it
talk
to me? No, it didn't talk to me.” Vincent's voice sounds strange.

I clear my throat. “I said did it
walk
to you.” And that, kids, is called taking a play from Dean Swift's book.

“It looked like it was going to walk across the lake toward me.”

“And nobody else saw it?” I ask.

“No. I heard a noise like a jet engine. They ran over when I shouted.” Vincent points to Beth, Maggie, Peter, and Paul. “We were all looking at the same spot there, but I was the only one who saw it. It was huge.” He hops from foot to foot.

The truth hits me.

Two times now White Deer has come to the far edge of the lake.

Three times and it'll be science, right?

Vincent is staring at me. Bobo is staring at me. The Cubs are staring at me. Am I changing? I lick my teeth, but they feel the same. I realize that they're probably all just surprised at my talking so much.

“My grandma's eyes play tricks on her when she's tired,” Sparrow says all of a sudden.

Everyone looks at him instead.

We pack up to leave pretty quick after that. As we step from the path onto the paved road, Vincent grabs my arm.

“I was lying,” he blurts. “When I said it didn't talk.”

I had a feeling. But why?

He answers my question before I ask it. “I didn't want everyone thinking I'm crazy. But it did. It
talked
to me. It kept saying the word ‘raven.'
Am
I crazy?” he asks.

We hear a blaring honk.

It's Sparrow's grandma tearing up the road in her huge blue pickup, coming to get him for the weekend. All we can see of her as she rips by us is her curly white hair and the top rims of her enormous glasses. I'm not sure that lady should be driving.

“Trickster,” I say after the dust settles. “The raven is a sweet-talkin' trickster.”

Vincent looks at me like I'm speaking gibberish. Maybe I am. But all of a sudden my mind fills with black feathers. Remember the murder of crows swarming over Vincent when he made his wild run for freedom? Woods magic. The crows flew to him the way the wolves once ran with me.

I step closer to him. I want to ask him if he saw the will-o'-the-wisp too. If its light pulled at him so he had to follow. I want to tell him that it will take him to the lighthouse so deep in the woods only the light knows the way in and out. I'm about to tell him
everything about my mom and my dad and the wolves in the woods. Then I stop myself. Because I see him shaking his head. A little at first and then a lot.

“Nah,” he says, licking his lips. “That's just crazy. Crazy like talking to your cereal crazy. Crazy like riding your bike on the freeway crazy. I'm just tired, like Sparrow's granny says.”

He looks confused. “But I didn't want to lie to you. My mom says I have to stop lying before I can come back home.”

We walk the last few yards to the circle driveway, scuffing our shoes in the dirt.

I like him for telling me the truth, even if he did lie at first. I like him even more for keeping his promise to Pretty Lady. But I don't think I'll try to explain to him about the magic in the woods and the way it works for me. Because if White Deer couldn't get through to him, how could I?

After fishing, we all wash up and eat lunch. Two hours of class. Snack. Doors slam, dresser drawers creak open and shut, the zippers and Velcro on overnight bags zip and rip, tennis shoes squeak up and down the stairs as kids remember stuff they almost forgot. Then motors chug up the driveway, with Pretty Lady's Harley roaring above them all. Hugs and kisses and moms asking in worried chirpy voices,
How are you? Did you have a good week?
and dads crabby from the long drive, grumbling,
It's time to get on the road, Let's try to beat some of that ferry traffic,
and
We're going to hit Seattle at exactly the wrong time.