The Bones of the Forest

by Rachelle Reese

  ***

  The things Kylie told her bothered Amanda the rest of the afternoon. Why were all the other kids given vitamins? Why wasn’t she? What made Kylie want to kill herself?

  At dinner, Amanda watched her mother and father closely. Her mother seemed a little better now. More a worry wart like she’d been before they moved. Less anxious. Her father seemed a little agitated. “How was work, Dad?”

  “Pretty much like I expected. Not enough workers and those I have are mindless drones who can’t think for themselves. How was school?”

  Amanda smiled, “About the same.”

  Her father looked up from his dinner and nodded. “Take a walk after dinner?”

  “I’d love to. I could use some fresh air.”

  After dinner they walked out through the trees and sat on a rock in a clearing. The air was cool, even a bit nippy.

  “Look there,” her father said. “Fruit bats.”

  Amanda watched the small brown creatures swoop down briefly, then fly back up. There must have been a hundred of them, flying together like a huge kite being controlled by an experienced kite flyer, yet each one moving singularly within the mass. “What are they doing?”

  “Feeding. They eat insects.”

  “Are they dangerous?” Amanda had seen enough vampire movies to know that bats fed on human blood.

  “Only if you’re an insect. They only bite a human if they feel threatened. But watch them. Aren’t they beautiful?”

  “Mmmhmm,” Amanda agreed half-heartedly. She was still not sure she liked being so close to that many bats.

  “See this rock here?” her father picked up a small rock and held his light stick to it. “This beautiful rock is what we’re mining. Look at the crystal formations.”

  “It’s a geode,” Amanda had seen geodes in science class and at the science museum.

  “It’s not, but it’s similar. The amazing thing about rocks is that each one is different. Pick up every single rock here and you’ll never find two that are identical.”

  “Like people,” Amanda said.

  “Like people should be,” her father put the tiff rock down on the slate rock they sat on and ground against it with a metal mallet. Amanda watched part of the rock turn to powder. “After we harvest the tiff rocks, we grind them up like this – even finer. All those beautiful, unique formations ground to identical molecules of dust. And why do we do it?”

  “To make medicine for people like Mom?”

  “To make something that numbs people’s minds. Here, taste.” Her father licked his finger and put it in the powder, then placed the powder on his tongue. Amanda did the same.

  “Tastes bitter, but it makes my tongue feel funny.”

  “When they mix it up with other things to make a medicine, that’s what it does to your mind.”

  “Why would people want to feel like that?”

  “It’s not a choice, Amanda. It’s prescribed.”

  “You mean like the kids at school.” Amanda picked up a piece of tiff and examined its crystals.

  “What do you mean?”

  “They just sit there. Quiet. One girl, Kylie, said they all take pills. She said it was to replace the vitamins they’re missing in the water. That without the pills, they’d die.”

  “You don’t take pills. I don’t take pills.”

  “I know. But why didn’t they make us take the pills?”

  Her father sat there mulling things over, examining a piece of tiff as if it held the answers. Finally he said, “I don’t know Amanda. I guess we should just feel lucky.”

  “We don’t have to have another interview do we?”

  “We might,” her father put the piece of tiff down and stood up. “But we’ll get through it. We know how to answer their questions.”

  Amanda stood up and took her father’s hand. “Dad, don’t get upset, but I might have said something I shouldn’t have.”

  “What did you say?”

  “I told them about the chiggers and showed them my bites.”

  “What did they say?”

  “The man said he wanted to make sure to look them up when they got back to the city. He was worried ‘chiggers’ might be a code word for terrorists.”

  Her father’s laugh roared out through the woods so loud it startled an owl. The bats scattered. “You know, Amanda. He’s not too far from wrong.”

  The first frost

  My arms are hard and strong. My legs are riddled with oozing welts left behind by ticks and chiggers, which I douse daily with hydrogen peroxide. But my diligence paid off. Today, I awoke to frost glittering in the sunlight, blinding in its post dawn assault. I ducked quickly from my blanket to my sweat pants and pulled a sweater over my sweatshirt. Brrrr. I decided I’d better bring some wood inside. But first a fire. I stacked logs in the fireplace, trying to remember what they’d told us in Girl Scouts. Of course, that was a campfire. But a fire in a fireplace can’t be much different. Next I added kindling sticks between the logs and crumpled up some newspapers I’d barely skimmed when they were delivered. I struck the match and lit the paper on fire. I held my hands close to the flames. I would need to steal some gloves from somewhere. I hadn’t moved in prepared for winter.

  Amanda read the words greedily; sorry she’d stayed away for so long. After all, they were only bones. It’s not like they could rise up and strike her. Besides, the woman had wanted someone to read her story. She had said so herself.

  The paper burned, but the kindling never caught. I would need some other way to get this started. I remembered reading of arsonists who set a fire using rags soaked in gas. I went to my rag bin and pulled out a t-shirt that had been worn away to threads. I ripped it in three pieces, then braided them together, tying each end with a piece of thread. Then I lowered the small rope into the gas can. It soaked up the gasoline quickly. I put the rag in a pan and carried it to the fireplace. Careful not to drip gasoline on the ground, I put it in the fireplace and lit both ends. Like a candle’s wick, it came to life. Soon the kindling started burning too. And finally, the logs turned glowing red. I will need to keep the fire burning as long as I can. I don’t know how long the gas at Kyle’s will hold out.

  I heated a can of chili on the fire. It was the first hot meal I’d had since I ran out of charcoal and it was satisfying to feel the warm food fill my mouth and warm me all the way down to my stomach. I can’t help thinking about the chickens at the farmhouse about a mile away – now gone free range with no one there to look after them. I wonder whether I could catch one and wring its neck. I have noodles and some canned vegetables. A pot of chicken soup would be delicious. Maybe tomorrow. Today I’ll go to Kyle’s and see if there are gloves, a coat, and maybe a hat and scarf.

  The Farmhouse

  Kyle’s had no winter clothing, so I drove to the farmhouse. The bodies have mostly decomposed, leaving only bones now. It feels less like I’m stealing from hard-working people. Besides, they won’t need winter clothing where they are – wherever that is.

  In the bedroom, I found a crib and inside the crib, the skeleton of a small child, draped in blue one-piece pajamas, decorated with embroidered puppies. From the size of the pajamas, I guess the bones belonged to a toddler. The child’s skull had been fractured in multiple places. Once again I was amazed at the brutality of man. What could have driven someone to do that to a child? What monster drove the people here to madness?

  I went through the closets and the drawers, and found what I needed. I took two pairs of gloves, a scarf, and a winter coat. I decided to take the sweaters and blankets too. It’s better to have too much than not enough, I reasoned. I also found some matches, a first aid kit, and some homemade preserves. I loaded it all into my car. One of the free-range chickens pecked around at my feet. I found some stale crackers in the cabinet and threw it to the chickens. I might as well make friends with them. It’ll make them easier to catch when the time comes. I imagined my hands circling one of their necks and tossed out a few m
ore crumbs. No. I’m not hungry enough for that yet. I’ll stick with canned goods for now.

  Amanda’s watch rang to warn her it was time to go home. She was going to town with her parents to have dinner and watch a movie. It was a celebration of being done with quarantine. When Amanda got home, her mother was humming happily in the kitchen. She was wearing a soft blue dress, high heels, and her gold chain. Her father was wearing a button-down shirt and slacks. “Better hurry and get dressed,” her mother chimed. “Reservations are in an hour.”

  “Where are we going for dinner?” Amanda asked. She figured either The Grill on the Hill or maybe the Italian restaurant.

  “Sebastian’s,” her mother sang. “Isn’t that wonderful?”

  “Sure,” Amanda hurried to find something she could wear to the finest restaurant in town. She wondered what made her father decide to splurge on Sebastian’s. She finally settled on a pair of dark green velvet slacks with a gold scoop necked blouse. She’d bought them for a dinner date before she’d left the city. The guy had been a boring “drone,” as her father called them. But that didn’t make the outfit any less attractive. Amanda caught a look at herself in the mirror as she left the room. She had to admit she liked her new look. Her hair had grown past her shoulders and her cheeks were flushed with color. She smiled and rushed to meet her parents.

  Both her parents seemed to be in an unusually good mood as they drove to the restaurant. Amanda tried to convince herself that it was just because it was their first weekend since quarantine ended. When they got to the restaurant, her father held the door for her mother to step out of the car. He draped his arm gently around her waist, as if they were newlyweds. Amanda followed the two inside.

  Their table was waiting and Amanda was surprised that a small town could support such a plush restaurant. The seats were heavily padded in garnet, emerald, and sapphire velvet. The menu was six pages long, with so many elegant, delicious sounding choices that Amanda had trouble deciding. She finally settled on a roasted game hen stuffed with herbed rice. Her father ordered prime rib and her mother ordered filet mignon. For appetizer, her father ordered sautéed frogs legs. Her mother wrinkled her nose and he said, “Have you tried them?”

  “No, of course not.”

  “Then you don’t know you won’t like them.”

  “What do they taste like?” Amanda asked.

  “A little like chicken, and a little like fish. You’ll just have to try them and see.”

  The waitress brought a basket of fresh rolls and placed it on the table. Then she filled their glasses with water. Amanda looked around. The restaurant was crowded. Most tables held a single couple, a few held two couples, and a few others held a couple and a child.

  One table caught her eye. Kylie sat with her parents, staring down at her salad, her face downcast as it had been when school had ended the day before. Her father seemed to be lecturing her about something.

  “Your mother and I have a surprise,” her own father said. Amanda looked her parents, smiling at her across the table.

  “I went to the doctor today to get my prescription,” her mother began. “Because I’d been off my medication for almost two months, they did a routine urinalysis.”

  “What your mother is saying is…”

  “Let me tell it my way,” her mother stood up and put one hand on her belly. “I’m pregnant, Amanda. You’re going to have a baby brother or sister.”

  Amanda was astonished. Family size was limited to one child by law. The goal was to reduce the population in the cities by half by the end of the century. In the years that followed the terrorist strikes, couples had been anxious to replace those who had been lost. There had also been a renewed sense of security after the safety net was built. The government had let things take their course for fifteen years. But after everyone moved from the country into the safety net, they realized that there was just no room. At first they required a permit for a couple to have more than one child. Then later, they restricted family size through mandatory medication. “But I thought,” Amanda started to speak, but was interrupted by her father.

  “The law only applies to the cities, Amanda. Here in the country we can have a larger family if we want.” Her father was clearly excited. “And the best thing of all is that the doctor thinks your mother can be kept off the medication and deliver a baby who has not been subjected to the vitamins.”

  Amanda glanced back over at Kylie’s table. They had brought the food and her father had stopped lecturing and was intent on his lobster. “I thought the interviewer mandated medication for Mom.”

  “In light of her present condition, she can request another interview.”

  “Honey, you’ll know soon enough, but pregnancy causes wide emotional swings in some women.” Her mother broke open a roll and slathered it with butter and honey. “It also causes an increased appetite. I’m famished.”

  “Damn it!” Amanda heard a shout from Kylie’s table. She glanced over and saw Kylie’s father throw the shattered lobster claw down on his plate. “What do you mean you want another one? Don’t we have enough trouble with her?” Amanda saw Kylie staring down at her plate, trying to ignore her father’s outburst. She felt bad for Kylie. The whole restaurant was staring at her father.

  “Control group,” someone at a nearby table whispered. “They’re giving him placebo.”

  “How do you know?” the person’s companion whispered back.

  “Can’t you tell by how he’s acting? Probably giving the girl placebo too.”

  “We’ll talk about this at home,” Kylie’s father picked up another claw and cracked it open with too much force, shattering it in small pieces. He savagely ripped the fragments of claw away from the flesh and sucked. The slurping echoed throughout the quiet room. Kylie stood up from the table and walked out. “Where are you going?” her father said loudly.

  “To the bathroom.”

  Amanda noticed that Kylie had her steak knife in one hand and her purse in the other, “Excuse me.”

  “Where are you going, honey?” her mother asked sweetly.

  “To the bathroom.”

  “Aren’t you happy about the baby?”

  “Of course, Mom,” Amanda didn’t know if she was telling the truth or not. “I just have to go.”

  Amanda rushed to the bathroom and found her new friend sitting on the floor drawing slashes across her arm with the steak knife. “What are you doing?”

  “Trying to make them shut up.”

  “Who, your parents?”

  “Them. The voices. Sometimes pain makes them go away,” she slashed an X across her forearm.

  “I thought you said you didn’t hear them anymore.”

  “I never said that,” Kylie looked up at Amanda. Her eyes were wide and reddened. “I hear them and I always will unless I can get them to send me back to the city. Especially now.”

  “Why now?”

  “She’s pregnant. Three months. She was going to tell him tonight. I told her not to do it in public, but she thought he’d be happy.” Kylie dug into her arm again. “She thought he’d be HAPPY!”

  What monster drove the people here to madness? Amanda heard a woman’s voice. The same voice she heard in her head each time she read from the journal. She knew the voice was the woman’s, the writer’s. “Give me the knife, Kylie.”

  “No,” Kylie held the knife close to her body.

  “It makes me nervous, Kylie. Please.” She moved cautiously toward the girl, “I want to be your friend.”

  Kylie looked up slowly. “Really?”

  “Of course. Why do you think I talked to you at school?”

  Kylie put the knife in front of her on the floor. “I’d like that. I had friends in the city, but no one likes me here.”

  “Besides, we have something in common.”

  “What?”

  “My mother’s pregnant too. I found out tonight.”

  She saw Kylie relax a little. “How is your father taking it?” />
  “He’s ecstatic.”

  Kylie looked up slowly. “Really?”

  “Yeah. It’s my mom I’m worried about. She’s really happy about the baby, but she’s going to go off the pills. And she had a really bad withdrawal when we moved here. Not as bad as yours, but it was pretty bad.”

  “Why is she going off the pills?”

  Amanda realized she’d probably said too much. “I’m not sure. She just is. Maybe they’re not good for the fetus.”

  “My mom’s a pharmacist; she would know.”

  “Maybe she’s not taking the pills either.”

  Kylie looked confused for a moment, “You know, she didn’t say. And now you mention it, she has been acting nervous. I just figured it was something to do with being pregnant.”

  “It could be. Maybe she’s nervous about getting your father to accept it.”

  “He’ll never accept it. Not now.”

  “Has he always been angry like that?”

  “No. Just since right after the quarantine interview. First he got really cold to me. I figured it was because he was disappointed in me because I couldn’t make it through quarantine and I’d cry every night that I wanted to go back to the city. A few weeks later he started getting angry at everything. It’s like nothing makes him happy. He even slapped my mother a few days ago.”

  “Are you afraid he’ll hurt you?”

  “Sometimes,” Kylie cast her eyes downward and Amanda realized she was looking at the knife.

  “The voice is his, isn’t it?”

  Kylie nodded, “One of them. I don’t recognize the other one.”

  “Is your mother frightened?”

  “I don’t know. I haven’t asked her.”

  Amanda took her new friend’s hand, “I think you should talk to her about it. About everything.”

  Kylie squeezed Amanda’s hand, “Thanks for listening.”

  The two of them walked hand in hand out into the restaurant, then went to their separate tables.

  ***

  That night Amanda dreamed of a baby, clawing at the bars of a crib to get out. The baby looked on as a shadowy man swung an axe over the mother’s head and brought it down. The baby started to cry. The man swung around, dropping the axe. He grabbed the baby from the crib, picking it up by the head with a huge lobster cracker. “Damn it!” the man shouted and split the baby’s head in pieces. Then he lifted a piece to his mouth and sucked it dry. Each slurp echoed in the empty nursery.

  ***

  The next morning, Amanda hurried to the crumbling house right after breakfast. She had to know how the story ended.

  Fresh spinach

  I plucked leaves from the spinach plants today. It’s the first fresh vegetables I’ve had in a long long time. I tasted each leaf, bitter and sweet mixed together into the perfect ending.

  I am hopeful tonight, not just because of the spinach, but because my solitude might be coming to an end. I heard a helicopter whirring overhead last night. Just like they did before the power went out. And when I went to Kyle’s for some bacon bits and Chex Mix for my first freshly-grown salad, I saw tire tracks that were not mine.

  I don’t know if they’ll find me here, but perhaps they’ll clear the road and I’ll drive back to civilization on my own. I’ll give them a few days to clean up and then I’ll check.

  In the meantime, the fire roars hot and tiny green tomatoes hang from my tomato plants. If it takes a month or two months, at least I’ll eat well while I wait.

  That was it. No more entries. But if she was rescued, who did the skeleton belong to? Amanda rushed outside to where she’d seen the bones. She saw women’s size 7 shoes lying near the feet. One hand was still encased in a glove, mostly eaten away by weather. Amanda examined the skull. A single bullet was lodged just above the left temple. She wriggled it and it broke free. She squinted at the bullet in the sunlight and read the letters USG4 2014.

  “He-he-he-he-he-haw,” the familiar laugh rang from the trees nearby. Amanda looked up and saw a crow.

  Amanda folded the book under her arm and headed home.

  The Bones in the Forest was originally published in Bones of the Woods. You can learn more about Bones of the Woods and other books by Rachelle Reese by visiting https://dreamdragonpress.com.