When She Flew (22 page)

“This is pretty nice,” she said. “How many bedrooms?” She tried to see it through Lindy’s eyes, and wondered when the girl had last slept indoors.

“Just one, but the couch folds out.” He fished in the cupboard above the stove for a box of tea bags. “But as many as eight people have slept here, when they really needed to.”

“Don’t tell me,” Jess said. “I shouldn’t even know this place exists.” But now she did. Heat crept into her throat. She was accumulating secrets at a troublesome rate.

Michael leaned against the counter, dwarfing the refrigerator. His head gleamed in the sunshine from the skylight.

“So,” she said, “who are you people and what exactly is this plan?”

The kettle whistled on the stove. He turned to the cupboard, his thick fingers daintily plucking out two delicate cups.

“Want some tea?” he asked.

“Is it caffeinated?” she asked, and he nodded. “Thank god,” she said, and they sat at the small table to talk.

The plan was not complex, or even out of the realm of possibility, but Michael had been correct in saying that it would require faith—and a lot of it—on Jess’s part. And if she agreed to it and it went awry, she would further alienate herself from the police department, the city, and the world as she knew it.

According to Michael, the City of Refuge Church had many supporters in the city of Columbia, the vast majority of whom regularly championed social causes and human-rights organizations. Some were individuals, and some of them were among the wealthiest and most powerful in Oregon. Others were corporations that funded everything from spaying and neutering feral cats to funding attorneys for illegal immigrants. This powerful social network had historically rallied around Reverend Rosetta’s causes.

“Where do you think we get the funds to do all the work we do?” Michael asked, sitting across the small kitchen table from Jess, cradling his teacup. “I know it’s a lot to ask,” he said, “but if you continue to go to bat for Ray and Lindy, keep their whereabouts and the church’s involvement unknown, then we will encourage our extended family to do all they can to support you in a very public way.” He took a sip of tea, contemplating his next statement. “Now, I wouldn’t want to promise you that, say, some state senator would be able to pull any strings with the police chief, or that one of the city’s leading defense attorneys would fight this case to the Supreme Court. There are no guarantees. But you will have a lot of people on your side. A lot of important and grateful people who will want to support the courageous thing you’ve done.”

Jess frowned. “Courageous? That’s how you see it?”

“How do you see it?”

She looked down into her cup, the tea barely touched. “Emotional. Risky. Insubordinate.” She looked back up at him. “All the things a cop’s not supposed to be.”

“To each his own,” he said, draining his cup.

“So, what? You want my protection or something?” She’d never been one to accept favors for anything. Like her dad, she’d always kept it clean.

“We don’t do this to protect ourselves, Officer. We do it to protect people like the Wiggses who need someone on their side, and people like you who do God’s work even when it breaks all the rules.”

Tears filled her lower lids and she blinked to try to get rid of them before they fell. “Whew,” she said, sniffing. “I so did not see that coming.”

23

A
s we drove out of the city, I pushed open the window in the back of Reverend Rosetta’s minivan, the breeze warm and sweeter smelling the farther away we got. She and Pater sat up front, talking quietly about important things probably, but I didn’t mind not hearing. There was too much going on. All I wanted was to be where it was quiet again, with not too many people around, and it sounded like that was where we were going. If only I could be back at home, reading a book on my favorite flat rock by the creek, or helping Pater collect firewood. I missed Sweetie-pie. She’d be sitting on her peg right about now, eyes closed, but she’d ease one open if I told her hello, then go back to sleep. I wondered if she was missing us.

We started to drive through trees and more trees, then big green meadows and pastures. A flock of starlings whirled and careened in front of the car just as we turned off the main road, and I watched them as long as I could out the side and then back windows. How do they know to turn and swoop together like that? It’s like God is painting across the sky, big black swirls and strokes disappearing as quickly as they appear.

Finally, we turned through a wall of trees and down a bumpy driveway, and a big white house came into view. An even bigger white barn behind it was surrounded by velvet green fields. As we got closer, I saw a white dog waving its tail. I knew I was tired and woozy from all that had happened, but it made me wonder if somewhere during the night I’d died and now I was arriving in some kind of heaven. I shook my head to check. I definitely felt alive.

Two men came from the house, and then Michael and Officer Villareal walked up from the barn. I pulled open the van’s sliding door and rushed toward her, into her arms.

“I didn’t know if I’d see you again,” I said, trying to explain myself, but it didn’t matter. She wanted to hug me as much as I wanted to hug her. “Did they fire you from your job?” I asked. I hadn’t only messed up my life and Pater’s when I made my mistake.

“Don’t you worry about that,” she said.

“Aaah OW!”
cried a loud voice, then again,
“Aaah OW!”
It sounded like a baby wailing, and then more babies joined in, and I looked around in horror.

The two men laughed. “There they go,” the taller one said. “They know someone special is here to see them.”

Officer Villareal looked as scared as I did, but Reverend Rosetta and Michael were smiling.

“That’s the peacocks, sugar,” the reverend said. “They’re just telling you hello.”

“And trying to attract females,” the shorter man said. His name was John and his eyes looked like he was laughing even when he wasn’t. He offered to show me around the farm while the others went inside and talked. I was glad to stay outside. There were horses at the other end of the pasture, goats with babies, and I was more than curious about the peacocks. I’d read about them but never seen a live one, and I’d never heard such an awful cry. It was worse than a barn owl’s.

We walked down a narrow dirt path to the chicken coops. Inside, the hens sat in rows of boxes along the walls. A few clucked around and scratched in the dirt, and a tall rooster strutted around pecking at things. I tried to pet him and he fluffed up and squawked at me.

“The hens are friendlier,” John said, picking one up off the ground and making kissy noises at her. “This is Lucy.”

“Hi, Lucy,” I said, combing my fingers through her feathers. She made a
nulp nulp
noise and softly tapped my hand with her beak.

“Do they all have names?”

John sighed. “Yes, which is why we will never have chicken for dinner at our house again, but we do get some nice omelets out of the deal. Want to help me collect eggs tomorrow morning?”

I nodded as fast as I could.

“I hear you like birds,” he said, settling Lucy gently on the ground. “Me, too.”

We smiled, like we’d each found a new friend.

“Where are the peacocks?” I asked.

“Let’s go find them.” He pushed open the screened gate for me to walk through. “They roam around the place, but they mostly like to get into the scrubby areas, and the trees. They fly up into them at night or onto the roof sometimes. It’s the craziest thing you ever saw.”

“It’s where it’s safest, up high like that.”

“Ah, that’s it.” He looked thoughtful, and smiled at me. “Anyway, they’re molting right now, so there’s a ton of feathers around the place. You can collect some if you’d like.”

I’d left my feather collection behind. To think I could start one again—with peacock feathers!

I had met so many nice people during all this bad stuff that I was starting to wonder if maybe I had followed that heron for a reason. Maybe he was an enchanted creature after all, and he’d been leading me somewhere I might not have gone otherwise, out into the world that I’d always thought I wasn’t a part of. Maybe I was more normal than I’d thought.

24

I
n spite of their obvious wealth, Mark and John’s farmhouse was unpretentious, comfortable and homey. Mark had invented some nano-something or other several years prior that the communication industry adopted with zealous fervor, and he’d clearly made a bundle. Jess had often witnessed the guilt that drove certain rich people to donate huge sums of money to help those in need, to generally prove that they weren’t the heartless bastards they worried the “have-nots” assumed they were. But rarely did the “haves” offer their homes to people they’d never met, essentially changing their own lives and putting themselves at risk to accommodate them. Poor folks did it all the time, but Mark and John were a first for Jess. How did she not know about Rosetta’s underground? She was willing to bet that no one on the force did.

“We try to spread the load,” the reverend explained as they sat around an oak table with coffee cups. “We have several families with the space, the means, and the privacy to take people in, but Mark and John are the best for deep hiding.”

“Yeah, who’d suspect two faggots in wine country?” Mark stood to walk into the kitchen. “More coffee anyone?”

Jess nodded. Ray looked away, embarrassed, she thought. Mark grabbed the pot and brought it back to pour refills.

“So, what about a long-term solution?” Jess asked, turning to Ray. “Do you know where you’ll go from here?”

“Well,” Mark interjected, “they’re welcome to stay. We need help around here, keeping the grounds up and the animals cared for. We could work out a small salary plus the apartment, enough to provide everything you two would need.”

Ray was quiet as Mark studied him. “And not to say your look isn’t perfect in its own right, Mr. Wiggs, but while everybody’s looking for you, you might want to let John cut your hair, shave your beard. You’d be harder to recognize.”

Jess remembered the driver’s license photo on TV. “Better dye your hair dark, too, for a while, anyway.” Now she was thinking like a criminal. Great. Ray squirmed under the scrutiny.

A sudden noise startled everyone. It was Jess’s purse, buzzing against the wood floor. “I’m sorry,” she said, reaching down to grab it and look at the phone’s screen: a New York number.
Shit,
she thought, and turned the phone off. The national media, no doubt. This was getting out of control.

“What’s wrong?” Rosetta asked. “Was that the department?”

Jess shook her head and leaned forward on the table, clasping her hands in front of her. “We’re going to have to deal with the media. There’s no ignoring it. We need a spokesperson.”

“Indeed, we do, Officer,” the reverend said, reaching to place her hand on top of Jess’s. “One who is capable of keeping Ray and Lindy safe, first and foremost, but we also need to know our underground won’t be compromised. It can’t be anyone from the church. Do you know all of the good we’re able to do in our community because we fly beneath the radar?”

“Please, don’t tell me any more details. I get it. I want to help.”

Rosetta squeezed her hand, then let go and sat back. “Bless you, Officer Villareal. Now, the hard part for you is that it needs to appear as if you’re acting alone. As if you’re a free spirit, which I’m guessing isn’t that far from the truth. Is that something you’re willing to do?”

Outside, the peacocks started to wail again. Their cries were so human it was distressing. Jess wondered how Nina would see her if she sacrificed her job, her reputation for these people. How would she see her if she didn’t? She tried to imagine what her dad would have done and hated that she didn’t know. She’d been too young to know his true character before he died, even though she’d always imagined him a hero.