Wish Girl (13 page)

She was art, sort of. Transformed, anyway.

“Did you do this?” I asked. It must have taken her a while to get all those pieces of fluff in her hair.

“No,” she whispered, still holding her position, not even moving her head. “I didn't.”
What?
I didn't understand. Had someone else been down here with her?

“Then who . . . ”

“No one,” she breathed.

“How?” How had she been transformed into . . . a human-sized, enormous dandelion?

“Tell me,” she said. “I don't have a mirror. Are there as many as I think?”

“Yes,” I said, walking around her to appreciate just how thick the fluff was on her head. It almost completely hid her red hair. “But seriously—how?”

She giggled again. “I must be a wish girl after all. I was blowing on dandelions.” She lifted one of her hands carefully. “And I was wishing
someone
would show up to make art with me. And then I closed my eyes—the wind was so soft. And I felt this start. It's been doing it for an hour, I think. I lost track.”

I nodded, understanding. Wishes had a way of coming true in this valley.

“Can you get my camera and take a picture of me? I want to see it,” she whispered. I reached down to her side and pulled her camera out of her bag and snapped a dozen pictures from all angles.

“Well, now what?” I said. “It looks like our art for the day is done.”

“Pretty much,” she said. “I have some other ideas, though. We can talk about them later. Help me blow the fluff off, okay?” She shook her head, and a hundred pieces of fluff floated down onto her shoulders and arms.

“Blow it?” I said, smiling, too. “Like you're a giant dandelion?”

She nodded. “And don't forget to make a wish.”

She closed her eyes and held still as I leaned close and took a huge breath. “I wish,” I said out loud—but she cut me off.

“No,” she said. “Don't tell. It won't come true.”

“Okay.” So I made the wish in my mind.

I could hear the leaves of the trees around us start to shake and move. I took another breath, and just as I let it out, an enormous gust of wind joined me and sent the fluff that had been gathered in her hair sailing into the air in one giant burst of white, like snow.

“Wow,” Annie breathed, watching the white seeds climb higher and higher into the sky. She reached up and started picking out the remaining fluffs—there were a lot—and scattered them at her feet.

“So, this valley,” she said after a while. “It really is magic, isn't it?”

“I think so.” I told her what the Colonel's wife had said about going barefoot and washing in Pretty Pool.

“Pretty Pool?” Annie scoffed. “What sort of a name is that?”

“Well, it's simple,” I said. “But I sort of like it.”

“Hmph. Pretty Pool. Not Evanescent or Lugubrious or Sempiternal . . . Pretty.” She shook her head. “Plebian. But . . . fine, Pretty Pool it is. Let's go back up there. I want to swim.”

“Swim?” I swallowed hard. I didn't have a swimsuit. What was she thinking?

“Might still have some of that poison ivy on ya,” she teased, running ahead. “Last one there has to go in with shoes on!”

Was Annie faster than me?
Normally, maybe not, but she was that day. I ran as hard as I could, but I swear the hill itself had set out to slow me down, catching my boots and toes and sending me sprawling. Though, come to think of it, even when I fell into what I could have sworn was a patch of cacti, I didn't come up with any spines.

It was the most fun I'd had in days, but Annie had to go too soon. Her mom was in Wimberley for the weekend again, staying at a nearby bed-and-breakfast. “I'll come out tomorrow afternoon,” she said. “Probably late. Let's aim for four. And bring a shovel if you can.”

I didn't bother to ask. Whatever Annie had in mind, I was sure it would be meaningful and transformative. Art. And if it wasn't? I had a feeling art would happen in the valley whether we made it or not.

I told Mrs. Empson not to worry about driving me home. I was feeling so full of energy after my dip in Pretty Pool, I didn't mind the walk. Plus I figured I needed to dry off before my parents saw me. “I said I'd get you back safe and sound,” Mrs. Empson said, pressing a sandwich into my hand. “Don't make a liar out of me. You go straight to your house. Don't stop for nothing.”

“I won't,” I promised.

But I had to stop when I met Doug and Jake, at least long enough for them to beat the crud out of me.

T
hey caught me completely by surprise. I was walking slowly, since I knew I needed to dry off. When I came up the hill to my house, right before the top, I saw them sitting on the railroad-tie fence. I had a feeling they'd been waiting a while.

“Hey, Petey,” Jake said. “Come here. We got to talk.”

“Okay.” I stepped closer, then paused. Jake didn't look good. His hair was all messed up, and he had red marks on the side of his face. Doug seemed okay, but when he walked toward me, he was limping a little.

“What happened to you guys?” I asked. It looked like they'd been in a wreck. Maybe they'd tried to go down into the valley again, and the valley had fought back, harder this time. I sort of hoped so. Maybe they'd met a mountain lion.

“You did,” Doug said. “You happened, Pete.”

“What?” I took a step back.

Doug's words were hard and clear. “Why'd you tell?”

“Tell?” I didn't get it. What did they think I'd done?

“I thought you were gonna be our friend.” The words sounded like they hurt. The side of his mouth had a small crack and a little dried blood there.

Jake held up a hand to stop his brother talking. “Let me handle this, Dougie.” He stepped right up to me, looking into my face. This close I could see that his eyes were red, too. “You told your parents about us using the .22,” Jake said softly. “They came over this morning to our house. Told our dad they were worried about us having guns like that on our own. We got in trouble.”

“Big trouble,” Doug added.

It dawned on me that they meant they'd gotten a beating. Whoa. And I thought my parents were bad. But I said, “Guys, I didn't tell my parents anything.”

“Lying won't make this any easier on you, Petey.” Jake's voice was low and mean. I took a step back.

“No, I mean it. It wasn't me. I haven't even talked to my parents in days. . . . ” My voice broke. Laura. “My sister,” I whispered. “Laura. I'm gonna kill her.”

I didn't get a chance to explain what had happened—that I'd mentioned it to Laura, and she'd obviously been the one to tell—because Doug had me by the back collar of my shirt. He might talk slowly, but he moved as fast as a striking snake.

“Here's the deal, Petey,” Jake said. “Doug likes you. He thinks maybe you don't know how to treat your friends, you coming from San Antonio and all. So we're gonna give you one more chance. We're gonna beat you now.”

Beating me was giving me a chance? How was that a chance?

Before I could ask, Doug explained, “But not your face.”

Oh. “That's my chance?” I started looking around, wondering where I could run, if I could make it. Even if I sprinted faster than I ever had, they were too close. I was hemmed in by the fence and the thorny brush on the sides of the road. I'd never make it out of there.

Jake shrugged. “Yeah, not your face. That's your chance—to not tell this time. So we beat you, then you're gonna go home. And keep your trap shut.”

“Why?” I wasn't asking why I should keep quiet. I was asking why they wanted to beat me up, but they didn't get it.

“Because if you tell on us, and anybody—anybody—gets word that we did it, next time we won't be so nice. Next time we'll really teach you a lesson. Or maybe we'll teach your little friend one.”

“My little friend?”

“Yeah, the girl. We saw you with her,” Doug said. “We followed her back to camp.”

Annie
. Oh, no.

“She's all alone in that cabin,” Jake said. “We can pay her a visit if you don't listen. But I bet you're going to listen.”

And with that, he punched me as hard in the gut as he could. It felt like he ruptured something inside. I tried to run, but Doug's hand twisted on my collar, and he punched me, too. He might as well have been using a baseball bat—he was that strong. After a few more hits, he let me go, and I fell. I curled into a ball on the asphalt, feeling kicks and punches rain down on me for the next few seconds, trying to protect my head.

I knew how to do it, how to keep my face clear. I'd had plenty of practice.

It almost felt like déjà vu. And if it hadn't hurt so bad, I would have laughed, remembering.

After school, every day, the guys in my sixth-grade class had decided to give me lessons. Private tutoring in how to take a punch to the kidney. Or a kick to the gut. I practically had a college degree in it.

They had made fun of me while they beat me up, I remembered. Called me a wimp, a coward, and worse. They'd wanted me to fight back, practically begged me to.

Dad had begged me to as well, once he suspected what was happening. “Fight back, Peter.” I could hear his voice now. “You have to prove yourself, just once. Once you do, it'll stop. That's the way it works.” Prove myself. To the boys, he'd meant. But also to him.

So I'd tried. Just once, a slap more than a punch. It had been a match to gasoline. The guys had taken it as permission to keep on hitting, never stop. I hadn't known they could hit even harder. I remembered the sick crack, the searing pain of one of my ribs breaking that last month in my old neighborhood. Something else had broken in me that day, something deeper.

At least Doug and Jake didn't call me names while they hurt me. I guess they knew sound traveled in the country. Or they were just more efficient at their job.

When it was over, I looked up. They were already gone, walking away like they'd forgotten I was there. Like nothing had just happened. I put a hand up to my mouth—a trickle of blood had started, I guess from when I'd bitten my tongue. But they'd kept their word: They hadn't hit my face.

I sat there crying for a while. Then I got up, slowly, hurting all over, and hobbled home.

Mom was doing the bills at the kitchen table and saw me come in. “How was your day?” she asked. Her eyebrows went up. “You look awful.”

I stared at her for a minute. Thought about telling her. But I knew what she would do. She'd go ballistic, make a scene. Flashback to San Antonio, when she'd finally learned what was happening.

She'd tell their parents. Then I'd pay the price, like I had back then. The beatings only got worse when parents came into it.

And now, I had someone besides myself to protect. Annie. And Laura, or even Carlie—I wasn't sure who Doug and Jake would stop at. I had a feeling they would think all the girls were fair game.

And what would Mom do anyway? Probably just tell Dad, like she had in San Antonio. Then Dad would have to face facts again: His son was the biggest wimp in the world.

“It was hard work,” I said. I thought about Doug's hammer-like fists. “Very hard.”

“Good,” Mom said, concentrating on her bills again. “You need to get a little stronger. Oh, and I signed you up for young leaders camp. It's sports in the mornings, public-speaking lessons and character building in the afternoons. You start in a week.”

I almost laughed. Public speaking? I'd rather get beaten up by Doug and Jake for a week. “I need to shower,” I said. “Take a Tylenol. And a nap.” I had a feeling it was going to hurt much worse in the morning.

Mom didn't even answer. Didn't even look back up.

T
he next morning, I slept in. By the time I got up around eleven, everyone else had eaten. I grabbed a leftover waffle and shuffled into the living room. Dad and Laura were tuning up her guitar. I hurt so bad—if I had to listen to them wail and beat on things all day long, I wouldn't survive.

“Hey, Dad,” I said, peeking into the den where they practiced.

“Whoa, Pete,” Dad said. “You look terrible. Did you get in a fight with a coyote?” He laughed and went back to messing with the tuner in his hand. Laura gave me a closer look, though.

“What did happen?” she asked. “Did you fall down the hill?”

“Like you care,” I spat out. I couldn't tell her what had happened—or that it was because of her. She'd just tell again, and then I'd be worse off. But I didn't have to be nice to her.

“Fine, be that way,” she said. “I can't wait for you to go to camp. Maybe they'll teach you not to be such a rude little weirdo.”

“Laura,” Dad warned. “Apologize.”

“Fine,” she said. “I'm sorry you're such a rude little weirdo, Peter.”

“Whatever.” Ignoring Laura, I interrupted Dad's guitar tuning. “Dad, the Colonel's wife—Mrs. Empson—wanted me to come back out today and finish cutting the weed vines off her fence.”

“Really?”

“Really,” I said, amazed at how lying to Dad had gotten so easy. I wasn't even sweating, not a bit.

Dad sighed. “You don't have to go again. It's pretty hard work for a kid. Too hard, according to your mother. She said you looked like something the cat dragged in. She was worried. You do look rough today.”

“Thanks,” I said, trying not to lean so heavily on the doorframe. It hurt my ribs to stand up straight. “Love the confidence.”

He had to say yes. I had to get to Annie and warn her about the guys. She shouldn't be going to the valley anymore, not if they were watching her. Who knew what they'd do?

“Fine,” Dad said. “You can go after lunch. Keep Carlie occupied until then? We've got to get this set straightened out, right, Laura?”

“Whatever,” she said. “Let's get this over with.”

By the time lunch was over, Dad and Laura had driven nails into my head for two hours, and I was ready to run away, even if Doug and Jake were out there waiting.

Run away. The thought kept coming back to me, over and over, as I walked away from the house and toward the valley. Annie and I had been joking about it, but now it seemed like a real option—for me, at least. Better than waiting around to be beaten, or worse.

If only there were some way to really do it. I knew where I'd run: deep into the valley. I had a feeling I'd be safe enough—from natural things, at least. But not Doug and Jake. And Mom and Dad would find me, I knew that.

Maybe if I did run, even if they caught me, they'd at least take me seriously. Maybe then they would shut up long enough to listen.

Ha. Like that would ever happen. I was pretty sure standing still and silent for even half a minute would be impossible for my parents, for Laura. Carlie had a better chance of understanding me than they did.

Even though Mom had tried over and over since I was little, she'd never really understood me. And Dad had never wanted to.

That wasn't my fault. It
was
my fault they didn't trust me, though. Dad had made me promise to have Mrs. Empson call him when I got there. Checking up on me. After all the sneaking out, I guess I was lucky he'd let me leave the house at all.

I kept feeling like I was being watched as I traveled down the road. I had brought Laura's old softball bat with me, just in case Doug and Jake decided to jump me again. It didn't make me feel safe, but it kept me from feeling helpless.

I had taken two Tylenol that morning, the only reason I was even able to stand up at all, I figured. By the time I got to the triangular red house, I felt like I'd walked a hundred miles.

The Colonel's wife met me at the door, carrying her shotgun. She set it down when she saw who it was, though.

“You walk quiet, boy,” she said, like she disapproved. “I almost didn't hear you coming at all. I'm gonna have to get me a dog.” She pulled a pair of glasses off a chain on her neck and perched them on her nose. “You look like heck. You fall down a mountain?”

“I fell into a cactus,” I said, leaning on the side of the rocking chair by her front door. I let the softball bat fall at my feet.

“Sure,” she said, looking me over. “A cactus with fists and a temper. Two cactuses, I'd say.” I didn't speak for a moment, and neither did she. “So, you came back for more work,” she asked at last.

“Not really,” I said. “But my dad thinks so. I was hoping you could call him, tell him I got here.”

“And then you'll run off into the valley? Your folks are going to get wise, boy. You should tell them.” She hummed a little in the back of her throat. “You should tell them a lot of things, I suspect. Might help.”

“They won't listen to me. They never do.”

“Hmm.” She considered, plucking at a hair on her chin while she thought. “I can't see how going down in the valley could hurt you. Or them. It's good to be out in nature. Good for the soul and the body. But I'm not going to lie for you. You want me to tell your daddy you're working for me, you're going to have to work.”

Oh, no. Not more vines
, I thought. She laughed.

“Thinking loud again. Here.” She clomped into the kitchen and grabbed a Mason jar off the windowsill. “You go into the fourth meadow down in the valley. The one past the dinosaur tracks.”

My jaw dropped. “They're really—” But she was still talking, and I didn't get the question out.

“There's a field ought to be full of rain lilies there, after that storm a couple days ago. Fill this, and bring it back. I never get down so far anymore. My back hurts too much.”

“Arthritis?” I asked.

“Old hang gliding accident,” she said, then hooted with laughter at my expression. I wasn't sure if she was kidding or not.

“I'll go call your dad. Get going! It's gonna be a hot one.”

I got going. Annie wasn't at the stream, or in the flower meadow, or in the boulder meadow. The dandelions in the flower field had all been stripped of their fluff, and they looked . . . skeletal.

The cairns we'd made had started to crumble and fall, and the petals were all dried up and faded.

It didn't seem like a good sign. I kept going, unwilling to call out for Annie, in case Doug and Jake were down here again. I didn't trust them to wait and see if I tattled. They didn't seem like the type to control their impulses much at all.

And I didn't want to break my promise to the valley, either. I'd stay quiet as long as I could.

Maybe she hadn't come? But she'd said we were doing something special.

Then I heard something. It sounded like a dove, more than one. And someone—something else. Crying?

I walked softly around a large oak and saw her.

Annie was seated on the ground, her arms tucked around her legs, shoulders shaking. On each shoulder was a mourning dove, gray and white feathers made even plainer by the red of Annie's hair.

I watched for a little bit, until Annie must have felt me there. She looked up, and the birds flew away to perch in the low boughs of the oak.

“Hey, Annie,” I said. “You all right?”

It was dumb. She was obviously not all right. But she didn't make fun of me. She just shook her head.

“What happened?” I asked, settling next to her. To my surprise, she leaned against me, like she couldn't hold her own weight up anymore. She pressed against one of my worst bruises, and it hurt, but I wasn't going to say anything. She seemed as beaten up as I'd been. My story could wait. I let the Mason jar fall with a soft thunk to the earth below.

“My mom came back for the weekend,” she said after a few seconds.

“Yeah, you told me.”

“So I talked to her.” She hiccupped a laugh. “Yelled at her, more like. I told her I didn't want to start the radiation next week, that I wanted to wait, that maybe there's some other option. She said there
was
, actually—a clinical trial thing starting at St. Jude's in three months—but it wasn't soon enough.”

“Not soon enough?”

“Well, according to her,” Annie said, her voice low and rough. “And all the cancer docs in Houston, it turns out. But everybody knows they can do all sorts of amazing stuff at St. Jude's. Anyway, I asked her to call my doctor again and let me talk to him. She did, but the jerk wouldn't even listen to my idea.”

“Well, if it's not safe to wait—”

“Safe?” Annie interrupted. “I'm not safe either way. So why shouldn't I wait? It's not going to matter.”

“It's not?” I asked after she fell silent. “Won't the cancer get worse if you wait too long?” I didn't know much about cancer, but I knew you couldn't afford to just let it go.

“Probably,” Annie said, and she sighed deep and long. “I just . . . I wish I could . . . keep going. Like I am now.”

My mouth was dry, and suddenly every bruise on my body felt new, painful, sharp. What was she saying? I had to ask, make sure I understood her. “You mean, let the cancer grow?” It was almost impossible to get the words out, but this wasn't the first time she'd said something that made me think . . . I had to know. “You want to . . . die?”

“No!” Annie said, bursting into motion. She jumped up and started pacing around the space under the oak limbs. The doves flew away in a loud clatter of wings. She'd frightened them. She'd frightened me.

“No,” she said again, “I don't want to die. Not at all! But don't you see, I'm going to anyway?” She pointed to her chest. “What is death, Peter? It's when you stop being you, right? When that something, that spark or whatever, goes out. And that's what's coming for me.”

“You don't know that,” I protested. But she cut me off.

“I know enough. More every time I talk to her.” She meant her mom. “I won't be me anymore. I won't be able to think like Annie Blythe, or talk like Annie Blythe, or maybe even dress myself anymore like—” She broke off, sobbing again.

“Like Annie Blythe,” I finished for her. “But, Annie,” I said, when she'd quieted a bit. “You'll still be alive. I mean, that's what's important, isn't it?”

She grabbed herself and went back to rocking on the ground. “You can't understand. I thought you might, but . . . have you ever had the people around you make a decision for you? One they don't think you can make, one they won't trust you to make? Not even the tiniest little part of it? They just tell you what's going to happen and expect you to fall in line?”

I thought about moving all the way out here. And then about summer camp. It wasn't the same, but I knew the feeling. “Sort of,” I said. “Yes.” My throat wanted to close up. “Story of my life right now.”

Annie paused. “Tell me.”

So I did. I told her about being grounded, and sneaking out, and the camp my parents were taking me to, and how Doug and Jake had beat me up—and how Mom wouldn't even listen, didn't even notice I was beaten. “Oh, Peter,” Annie said, flying over to me and lifting my sleeve. She saw some of the marks there, the small cuts the asphalt had left on my skin. “I'm so sorry. I wish I could have been there. I would have—”

“No,” I interrupted. “You couldn't. Those boys are mean and crazy. Annie, they know where you're staying. You need to lock your door when you're in the cabin.”

“I will,” she promised. “But why won't your parents listen to you?”

“They don't even like me, Annie.” My eyes stung, saying it out loud. Even if it was true. “My dad's been trying to turn me into the kind of son he always wanted since first grade, when I got kicked off the peewee football team for . . .” The corner of my mouth twitched up; I couldn't help it. “For peeweeing in my uniform every time I got tackled.”