The Wild Path

by Sarah R. Baughman

  “Hey,” I say. “That was cool, what you shared.”

  “Oh, thanks.” She lifts her backpack to her shoulder. “Once I started talking, I couldn’t really stop. It was kind of weird.”

  “It was interesting,” I say. “I can’t believe your sister had to go to jail.”

  “I haven’t talked to her much about it,” Nari says. “I’m not sure I want to.”

  I decide to change the subject. “I was wondering—what horse camp were you talking about?”

  “It’s this camp that’s specifically for teenagers who’ve had issues with addiction,” she says. “And their whole thing, like their way of dealing with it, has to do with horses. It’s called… what’s that word that means horse, but starts with an e?”

  “Equine,” I say. “It actually came from an older Latin word: Equus, which basically means an animal in the horse family.” My throat immediately burns. Why did I even say that? Nari won’t care.

  But she smiles. “It’s cool that you know that. Equus. So yeah, it’s equine therapy. That’s what they do at the camp.”

  “How does it help?” I mean, I know how Sunny and Sam help me. I know how I feel when I step into the barn, how the sparrows fly so far away I can’t feel them at all. I never thought about how other people could feel that way too.

  “Well, I guess Pia—that’s my sister—really likes it,” Nari says. “They started by having her learn to take care of the horses every day, feeding and brushing and things like that. She learned about riding too. According to my parents, they watch how she interacts with the horses and use that to figure out what’s going on and how to help.”

  “That sounds right,” I say. “You can’t really hide stuff from a horse. They sense everything.”

  Nari cocks her head and looks at me. “You know about that, huh?”

  “We own two horses.” I smile just thinking about Sunny and Sam, how even the way their jaws crunch as they eat hay and grain sounds peaceful.

  “Pia loves them so much now, she wants to have one at home,” Nari says. “But we live in town, so that won’t work, and boarding them is really expensive. My parents just poured all this money into the camp too—it’s totally impossible to think about owning a horse.”

  “Can I have your number?” I blurt out. But as soon as I’ve said the words, warm wind rushes to my face. I don’t want to scare Nari away. I try to swallow the words back, but instead, more come out. “I could show you our horses.”

  The wind blows hotter, but Nari doesn’t seem to notice. “Hanging out would be fun,” she says, pulling out her phone and stilling the air around me. I type my number into the text message she opens, and we record each other as new contacts. “But honestly, between you and me? I’m kind of scared of horses.”

  “Seriously?” I try not to sound too surprised, but it never occurred to me that horses could be scary.

  “They’re really… I don’t know.” Nari looks to the side, then back at me. She shrugs her shoulders. “Big?”

  We both start laughing at the same time.

  “Saying it out loud sounds weird,” she says, smiling. “But they’re scary, okay?”

  I shake my head. “Sunny and Sam are big, but they aren’t scary. If you met them, you’d see.”

  A new idea starts to sprout inside, just a tiny one, so small I can barely feel its little leaves bursting. By the time Nari waves goodbye as she starts walking downtown while I wait for Dad’s truck to curve around the road and stop for me, my idea’s a flower, full and sweet.

  Equine therapy. Not only is it the perfect addition to my project, since it shows that horses can still be really useful, but it could give my family exactly what we need: Mom and Dad another source of money, Andy a reason to come home, and me my horses.

  CHAPTER 10

  When Ms. Larkin gives us time to research in class, I know exactly how I’ll spend it. I’m so excited to learn more about equine therapy that I have to map out how I’ll be able to squeeze everything in: During a fifty-three-minute social studies block, I’ll spend exactly seven minutes going over my notes from the day before and eight minutes reading as much as I can about logging with horses, followed by sixteen more about how horses drove Vermont’s maple syrup and farming industries up through the early twentieth century. Finally, the last twenty-two minutes will be for learning everything I can about equine therapy. In a few more days, I should be ready to outline my presentation.

  Back, Then to the Future. Machines took over so much of what horses used to do, with skidders that pull trees through the woods and logging trucks that carry them down the roads and skinny blue sap lines replacing hooves and harnesses. But a machine can’t do equine therapy.

  As I’m sitting down to get an early start before the bell rings for class, Ms. Larkin throws her hands above her head and rushes over to me. “Ooh, Claire!” she calls, weaving her way around the tables while kids slide into their chairs. “You’ll never guess what I found out.”

  But I bet I can guess, actually. I already know Ms. Larkin wants us to use at least two primary sources for our project. I didn’t tell her about the box, but I did show her the article about Jack Hamilton, which made her think of an old man who lives over by Cedar Lake on the other side of Belding: Ethan Hamilton. Apparently he fixed up a few issues with her house when he used to work as a handyman, and she promised to find out if he and Jack were related.

  I brace myself, holding on to my backpack straps as hard as I can, but I have to let go when Ms. Larkin hands me a piece of paper with, sure enough, Ethan Hamilton’s name and phone number scrawled on it.

  “Thanks,” I say, even though I’m not sure I mean it. On the one hand, I definitely want to know more about Jack, and if this person can help me, great. On the other hand, I don’t like talking to new people. And I really hate talking on the phone. I stuff the paper into my back pocket.

  “You won’t believe this,” Ms. Larkin says. “Jack Hamilton isn’t some distant relation. He was Mr. Hamilton’s father! Which makes Mr. Hamilton the perfect primary source!” She clasps her hands together and bounces a little on her heels. Teachers get excited over the weirdest stuff.

  “Did he say he remembered what it was like to work with horses?” I ask. Since Jack used the horses for sugaring, it’s likely he used them for other tasks too. Learning more about how people used to need horses feels like the only chance I have to find a way for Mom and Dad to think we need Sunny and Sam too.

  But Ms. Larkin wags her finger at me. “Figuring that out is your job,” she says. “I promised to make sure they were connected somehow—that was fair—but you need to do the rest. Mr. Hamilton did say he could talk this weekend, by the way. I bet you’ll get so much great material!”

  “Cool.” I try to sound excited. This could work well for my project—a firsthand interview might impress the judges, and winning that money would pay for extra time with Sunny and Sam.

  Maya comes in and sets her backpack down in the seat next to me. “Wow,” she says, but her voice sounds heavy. “Already working and class hasn’t even started. Who are you?”

  “I figured out a really cool angle for my project,” I say. “Equine therapy.”

  “E-what?” Maya asks.

  “Basically, it means using horses to help people feel better,” I say. “A girl at my support group meeting told me about it.”

  “Hey, that means you’re talking to people at the meeting!” Maya holds up her hand for a high five. “Or at least one person. It counts.”

  “I didn’t share,” I say. “I talked to her afterward. About her sister.”

  “Nice,” Maya says. “It’s good for you to make some friends there.”

  My throat tightens. “I don’t know if she’s my friend. Not yet anyway.”

  Maya rolls her eyes. “She sounds nice, Claire. Just go with it!”

  Heat spreads to my tongue, now thick and dry. Maya’s not usually impatient. “I just don’t know if she’ll want to hang out.”
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  “Of course she’ll want to.” Maya’s face softens. “You might be a weirdo, but you’re a pretty awesome weirdo, you know?” She punches me lightly on the arm. “And the equine therapy sounds interesting for your project.”

  “Hey,” I say. “Speaking of projects, have you told your dad about yours yet?”

  Maya shakes her head. She opens her mouth, then closes it again, like letting the words out would be too hard.

  The bell rings and Ms. Larkin announces that it’s time to start working. “Free-choice seating today,” she says. “Perch yourselves wherever you’ll be most productive.” One of her favorite memes—another huge cat sitting in an overstuffed recliner with the words I take my sitting very seriously stamped across the front—is projected on the board, alongside guidelines for research: the importance of using precise search terms, characteristics of reliable websites, and databases where we might find more information.

  “And one more thing,” she says. “I’d like to see you check in with one new person today—someone who hasn’t seen your project yet. Tell them what you’re working on and learn something from them too.”

  I hear the sparrows’ fluttering wings above me before I feel them swoop inside. But I close my eyes and breathe. Filling my lungs with air seems to push the sparrows away.

  When I open my eyes, Jamila’s there. “Hey,” she says. “How’s it going, Claire?” She smiles and sits in the empty chair next to me.

  “Okay,” I say, trying not to sound nervous. “What’s your project about?”

  “Took me forever to decide,” she says. “But I’m really into fashion and Ms. Larkin said we should research what we’re interested in, so I finally decided to just… research it!”

  She shows me her tablet, where she’s already started a Google Slides presentation: “Do Clothes Make the Woman?”

  “Wow, that’s cool,” I say. Jamila always wears the neatest outfits, with combinations I’d never think of: Today it’s a lime-green skirt and black leggings, plus knee-high boots and a dangly silver necklace over her blue shirt.

  “Fashion has been used to oppress women a lot,” Jamila says. “But I’m looking at how we can use it now to express our true selves.”

  It turns out that talking with Jamila is really easy—just like talking with Nari was. When I walk over to Maya, who’s settled by the window next to Ms. Larkin’s shelf of houseplants, I’m fluttering again, but this time with something like excitement.

  Maya and I start clicking through sites. But Maya’s not spilling random facts about Edna Beard like usual. I poke her shoulder, and she leans against me for a moment before sitting up and tapping away on the tablet. We work with our arms touching so neither of us has to feel alone.

  No matter what I google, or how carefully I comb through our town’s online newspaper archives that stretch all the way back to the 1800s, I can’t find anything about Jack Hamilton aside from a grainy reproduction of the article I already have. And the paper with Ethan Hamilton’s number on it feels like a heavy stone in my pocket.

  On the bus ride home from school, I lean my forehead against the cool window. The colors are shifting a little now, quieting down. Before too long the tree-covered mountains sliding past my window will turn brown, waiting for snow.

  I shiver, thinking about the phone call. What am I supposed to say to Ethan Hamilton anyway? He wasn’t alive when his dad was twelve.

  I glance over at Maya, who’s biting her lip, her hands twisting in her lap.

  “Do you want to come over today?” I dig the paper Ms. Larkin gave me out of my pocket. “Come on, I have to call this guy. And I’m almost as excited about that as I am about selling Sunny and Sam.”

  That makes Maya smile. “Okay, that’s a little dramatic,” she says. “It’s just talking.”

  “Not all of us love talking,” I say. “Hey, I have an idea. You could do the call and pretend to be me!”

  Maya shifts in her seat to face me. “Maybe you can put the phone on speaker when you call, and I’ll write down everything you should say, like superfast. Then all you’d have to do is read it.”

  We both know we’re joking, but at least Maya’s eyes are glittering more now. “I’m in,” she says, right as the bus pulls in to my stop.

  As soon as we’ve both hopped off the last step, I automatically head for the mailbox.

  “When was the last time you heard from Andy?” Maya asks.

  “You saw the letter from last Friday,” I say. “Remember? ‘How does the ocean say hello?’”

  “Oh yeah.” Maya laughs. “That was a good one.”

  “Well, I wrote him Saturday and told him about the horses in the woods. So I’m really hoping he wrote back.”

  “Do you think he’ll believe you?” Maya asks as I pull a letter out of the mailbox and wave it in the air, a smile stretching across my face.

  “Of course,” I say, but inside, question marks bloom. “I’m going to save this till we get to the barn.”

  We head in that direction, our footsteps matching.

  “So,” Maya says. “Tell me more about the meetings. Nari seems nice.”

  I shrug. “I don’t know much about her yet. But yeah, I like her.”

  “Are they going to make you share eventually?” Maya asks as we walk.

  I shake my head. “They’re not going to make me. They don’t do that.”

  “Well, that’s good, right?” Maya looks at me. “All you have to do is listen?”

  “Listening’s okay,” I tell her. “But I feel like I’m supposed to be one of them too. That’s what still bugs me.”

  “I mean, I get that in a way,” Maya says. She’s using her gentle voice, the one that feels like a woodstove fire once it stops crackling and just gives off warmth instead. “But what’s wrong with being one of them?”

  Maya’s right. There’s nothing wrong with the other kids. “I don’t know, I just don’t want to think about our family being… like that.”

  Maya’s eyebrows crinkle. I can taste how sour my words sounded. Voices from the meeting fill my head. Sparrows rustle.

  “I didn’t really mean it that way,” I say, even though Maya hasn’t answered at all. “I’m not saying there’s something wrong with their families.”

  “Well, there’s something wrong with everyone’s family,” Maya says, her voice a cloud hanging over mountains now, full of rain. “It’s not like anybody’s out there being all perfect, Claire.”

  “I know that.” Heat spreads across my face.

  “No, you don’t,” Maya says. The storm cloud’s gone, but her voice sounds pinched. “It’s kind of like you want to pretend that Andy doesn’t even have a problem.”

  “I know he had a problem.” My voice is almost a whisper. “Has one.” I don’t like thinking about the pill bottles in his closet. I try to ignore the seasick feeling I get inside when I realize I’m hiding knowing about them from Maya. But it’s not until Maya’s voice swirls into the same space in my head where Nari’s and Marcus’s and Anna’s and Sharon’s already live that I realize why the sparrows swoop and dive whenever I think about Andy.

  I want to fix what happened to our family.

  I just don’t know if I can.

  We step inside the barn and I slide my finger through the envelope, trying to remind myself that this is the same Andy who told me the myth of Pebble Mountain, that it was formed when a moose desperate to find her lost baby settled down to sleep, and waited so long that soil crept over her and trees grew. He has to believe me about the horses.

  “DEAR LITTLE C.,

  WHAT KIND OF HORSE LIKES TO BE RIDDEN AT NIGHT?”

  “Okay, wait, I know the answer,” Maya says. “Everyone does. Andy got really lazy with that one. It’s—”

  “Shhh!” I hold my index finger to my lips. I don’t care about the joke right now. I want to read the rest of what Andy says.

  “Read it out loud,” Maya says.

  I shake my head. “I’ll give it to you wh
en I’m done.”

  SPEAKING OF HORSES… SO YOU THINK YOU SAW SOME IN THE WOODS? WOW. HAVE YOU CHECKED AROUND TOWN? IS ANYBODY MISSING A COUPLE?

  That’s not the point, I think. These horses can’t belong to anyone. They’re different. And I don’t think I saw them—I know I did!

  IT’S GREAT THAT YOU’RE STAYING BUSY, ESPECIALLY WITH SUNNY AND SAM. THAT’S DEFINITELY RIGHT UP YOUR ALLEY. YOU SHOULD GET ALL THE TIME WITH THEM YOU CAN. ONE THING WE’VE BEEN TALKING ABOUT A LOT IN GROUP IS THAT WE NEED TO FIND WHAT THEY CALL “HEALTHY OUTLETS.” BASICALLY, THINGS WE CAN DO THAT WE’LL LOVE ENOUGH TO STAY AWAY FROM THE BAD STUFF.

  That reminds me of what Sharon said, and it’s weird to think that Andy and I are hearing similar things in our groups. Isn’t Andy the one who needs help?

  THEY HAD US MAKE LISTS AND IT’S KIND OF FUNNY WHAT PEOPLE PICK. DAMIAN REALLY LIKES PAINTING AND HE’S GOING TO TAKE LESSONS AND FOCUS MORE ON THAT. MARIE IS APPARENTLY A RUNNER, WHICH SOUNDS LIKE TORTURE TO ME BUT IT WORKS FOR HER. MY POINT IS, EVERYONE’S DIFFERENT. BUT I’LL AT LEAST COME ON A RIDE WITH YOU WHEN I GET BACK, WHETHER WE SEE THOSE MYSTERIOUS HORSES OR NOT. NOT SURE HOW MUCH TIME I’LL HAVE, BECAUSE I NEED TO LOOK AT ENROLLING IN SCHOOL TO GET MY AGRICULTURAL MECHANIC’S LICENSE AND FIND A JOB AND AN APARTMENT TOO. ELIZABETH AND BEN HAVE BEEN HELPING ME FIGURE ALL THAT OUT. YOU SHOULD KEEP DOING YOUR THING EITHER WAY, LITTLE C. YOU’VE GOTTA STICK WITH WHAT YOU’RE INTERESTED IN.

  I fold the letter and frown.

  “Hey,” Maya says. “You told me I could read it.”

  “He didn’t really say anything.” I stuff the letter into my coat pocket.

  “You’re a bad liar,” Maya says. “But no worries—I don’t need to read your private stuff. Did you get the punch line, though?”

  “I forgot to look.” I don’t feel like taking the letter back out.

  “Nightmare,” Maya says. “It’s a classic. Mare, like a female horse? Get it?”

  I laugh weakly. “Yeah, okay.”