by Meg Ripley
We spread out our mats and sleeping bags inside, chose a spot to set our bags, then changed into our hiking gear. I packed my small backpack full of essentials; my pocket knife, flashlight, map and compass were all tucked in their spot in my bag. I added a bottle of water and was set.
When my friends were ready, we set out toward the path. There weren’t a lot of other tents set up. Being May, maybe it was still early in the season for camping. It was plenty warm and the perfect weather for camping, I thought. Later in the year, it would be unbearably hot, muggy, and buggy. July and August were difficult months for me. I wanted to be outside all the time, but I could only stand it for so long before my hair was wet with sweat and sticking to me annoyingly. Thank god my apartment complex had a pool.
“Already a half mile,” Emma announced.
She was watching her fitness app and anytime we walked anywhere, she would give updates on how far we’d gone, how fast we’d walked, and how many calories we’d burned. She might claim she wasn’t interested in being a TV weather woman, but she sure cared about her physical appearance as if that were her goal.
Emma was concerned about the exercise aspect and Julie was, too, of course. It wasn’t that I didn’t care as much about that part of it, but I got plenty of exercise. I was more interested in studying the plants and animals, seeing what sort of things lived here and what their environment was like.
I watched two squirrels tangle through tree branches, feeling complete delight at seeing them in their natural habitat. Several times, Julie or Emma called out to me to catch up. They wanted to keep a good pace so their heart rates stayed elevated, but I just wanted to appreciate everything my gaze fell across.
As we walked, our footsteps were quiet on the well-worn dirt path. We didn’t make much sound, so when I heard a strange noise, I stopped immediately. It was a sort of whining chirping sound. A bird, maybe? Whatever it was, it sounded distressed.
“Guys,” I whispered to my friends.
They walked a few steps back to where I’d stopped.
“Do you hear that?” I asked. “I think there’s a hurt animal.”
Emma took a step away. “Don’t animals attack when they’re hurt?”
“Only if they think you’re going to harm them further,” I said, trying to locate the sound.
“Here,” Julie said.
I walked to where she was holding back a patch of tall grass. There, sitting hidden in the brush, was a white ibis. As it made the distressed sound again, I became more concerned; this was bizarre behavior for a bird like that.
I crouched down and got on my knees, making soft cooing sounds in attempt to let the bird know it was okay. I slowly moved closer, not wanting to scare it. Emma was right about one thing: if this bird were afraid of me, it would at least peck my hand if I tried to touch it.
I watched it for several minutes. Its wings were tucked around it as I would have expected, so perhaps it hadn’t hurt its wing. Could it be sick? I moved my hand closer until I gently touched the bird’s head, and to my surprise, it didn’t attack me or flinch.
“Addie! What are you doing?” Emma hissed. “That thing is going to eat you.”
“Shh,” I said. “Ibises don’t eat people. It’s fine.”
The bird let me run my fingers over both wings; those couldn’t be the source of the problem, then. It then made a sound and fluffed its wings, and I noticed that it tried to stand, but couldn’t. I carefully lifted one wing, and when I lifted the other, the bird pulled back.
Then I saw the problem: one of its legs was twisted in an unnatural way. It must’ve landed badly or something had hit it and broken its leg. Even if it could fly, the bird needed help. It might sit there for too long and end up starving or being attacked by something else in its vulnerable state.
I stood up and took out my phone.
“What are you going to do?” Julie asked.
“The same thing you would do if this was an injured person.” I dialed the number for the ranger station located closest to our location. Good thing I’d thought to bring the map. Not only did it have trails and other places of interest marked, it had a list of numbers to call if there was a problem.
When someone answered, I explained the situation.
“I’ll send someone out to you right away,” the man on the other end said. “Will you stay in the area to guide our ranger to the injured animal?”
“Of course,” I said. “I couldn’t possibly leave this bird alone to be attacked.”
I gave as much detail as I could about our location, then hung up and waited. I tried to find bugs and berries to feed the bird, but it wouldn’t take anything. We heard an ATV in the distance and watched for the ranger.
When the vehicle came into view, we waved to get the ranger’s attention. Two rangers rode in the ATV, wearing their khaki uniforms.
“Hi there,” one of the men said. “Were you the ones who called about an injured bird?”
I opened my mouth to answer yes, but nothing came out. I stared at the other ranger, and he returned the gesture, both of us standing there in complete shock.
“Owen?” I nearly choked on his name.
“Addie.”
I looked into the eyes of my high school boyfriend. It’d been four years since I’d seen him. He looked the same, but somehow, even better. He’d always been gorgeous with his black hair and blue eyes, but he’d gained some muscle over the years and the stubble across his chin was not something he’d had during our high school years. He looked much more mature. And, if I were being honest, he was downright hot.
“Good to see you,” I said. What else could I say? It wasn’t entirely a lie, but he’d broken my heart. If I’d had to choose any person in the world to run into, he would have made the list, but wouldn’t have been high on it.
“You, too.” He nodded slowly. He seemed to be thinking hard, but didn’t say anything.
Finally, I broke the silence. “So, this ibis is right over here.”
I pointed to where the patch of grass hid the bird, and the other ranger went to it immediately. Owen hesitated, then followed him over.
I stood back to let them do their jobs. After a few minutes, Owen picked up the bird, and I was impressed. He must be very good with animals if he’d gained that much trust in such a short time—and from an injured bird, at that. He tucked the ibis under his arm and carefully got back into the ATV.
“Thank you for calling us,” the other ranger said.
“You think it’ll be okay?” I asked Owen.
He nodded. “We’ll have our vet take a look. I think it’s just a broken leg.” He stroked the bird’s head. “She’ll be up and flying in no time, thanks to you. If you hadn’t called, she would probably have been attacked.”
“That’s what I was worried about.”
He pressed his lips together and nodded again. “Good to see you, Addie.”
“You, too.”
I watched them drive off, feeling a bit saddened by the exchange. Emma and Julie turned to me with wide eyes.
“Let’s hear it,” Emma said.
I let out a slow sigh, then resigned myself to reliving this painful story one more time.
3
Addie
“From the first day we met, it was like magic,” I said. We started walking again, more slowly this time so they could listen to my tale. “I was lost in my giant, new high school and dropped my books while I was trying to find my class. There were so many people that I kind of freaked out a little. I was picking up my books and he stopped to help me, and he ended up walking me to my class, even though it made him late for his.”
Owen had shrugged when the bell rang. “It’s the first day. They won’t care.”
“Thank you again.” I held up my schedule. “And for pointing out my next class.” I smiled and dashed into the classroom. I’d sat quickly and glanced back to the door, surprised to see him still standing there.
He smiled at me and my face grew hot. He
held up a hand to wave, his smile spreading even wider, before he finally walked away. When class ended, I’d looked up and down the hall for him, but didn’t see him.
I knew where to go next, thanks to him, and when I got to my next class, he slid into the seat next to me. My heart jumped.
“Glad you didn’t get lost on your way here,” he said. “I’d hate to think I’d miss out on one minute of being this close to you.”
“He did not say that!” Julie said and they both giggled.
“We were only fourteen,” I reminded them. “And his brother used to teach him to say all these cheesy lines. It didn’t matter, though; I fell for all of them. And he meant them, too. Those things only come off as cheesy when the person saying them isn’t sincere.”
“Okay, okay,” Emma said. “So, it was love at first book drop. What happened next?”
“We would talk before and after class. Usually, he would walk me to my next one. Then, one Friday, he handed me a note with his phone number and he asked me to call him over the weekend. I called that day after school, and he asked me to go to the mall with him that night.”
“The mall?” Emma asked, flabbergasted.
“Yeah, the mall. Hello? Fourteen,” I said.
“That’s where we spent, like, all of our Friday nights, Em, and you know it,” Julie said. They’d gone to a nearby high school and had been friends before college, where they met me.
“Ignore her,” Julie said. “Did he hold your hand as you walked around?”
“Of course,” I said. “He bought me an Orange Julius and everything.”
“This story could only be cuter if you’d shared a container of fries from the food court,” Julie said.
I pressed my lips together and stifled a laugh.
“You did, didn’t you!” Julie said.
“I feel like I’m stuck in a teen drama,” Emma said.
Julie shoved her lightly.
“We shared fries and a slice of pizza,” I said. “And that was it. From that moment on, we were inseparable. We talked on the phone all night, went to the mall and roller skating and all those things we used to do when we were young teens.”
“So cute,” Julie said.
“Yeah, cute,” Emma said. “So where did it all go wrong?”
“Well…” I blew out a hard sigh. “We dated for years. All through high school. We went to proms together, homecomings, all of that.”
“Wait a minute!” Emma grabbed my arm and turned to face me. “Was he your first?”
“Yes,” I admitted. “And I was his.”
“This is the cutest story ever,” Julie said. “I’m quite jealous.”
“And then he broke my heart,” I said.
“I knew it,” Emma grumbled.
“No!” Julie said in a whiney tone. “He’s so cute! How could he?”
“He got into a college out of state and wanted to get away from everything. So, that summer, when he told me his plans, he said he wanted to end things. He thought a long-distance relationship would be too difficult to maintain, and that it would hinder our studies.”
“Boo,” Julie said.
“I know,” I said. “It was horrible. I cried for weeks. Then I swore off men.”
“Until Sam,” Emma said.
“Yeah well,” I said. “I should have sworn him off, too. Jerk.”
“Let’s not have a Sam moment, please,” Julie said. “You’re done with him, and let’s stay done.”
“Yes, please,” Emma said.
“I think part of the reason I ended up staying with him for so long was because of Owen,” I said. “I just wanted to be dating, you know? After four straight years of being with the same person, it was weird to not have a boyfriend. But, I have no desire to talk about or think about Sam.”
Except that now that he’d been brought up, my mind drifted toward Sam. It had been a complete disaster of a relationship. I’d expected something like what Owen and I had. A relationship that was fun and easy with someone enjoyable to be around. Owen made me laugh. Sam made me worry. He was so intense, I had never been sure where I stood with him or what was going on in his mind. The year we dated was fraught with frustration and confusion.
If being in a relationship was going to be like how things had been with Sam, I never needed to be married. I didn’t want that kind of drama surrounding me all the time. In a relationship that was meant to last a lifetime, I would need someone more like Owen. Well, like Owen but with enough dedication to want to attempt something as common as a long-distance relationship.
Maybe Owen had set the bar too high. After Sam, I started to wonder which one was a more accurate representation of what marriage would be like. The best I could hope for was something in the middle.
“Maybe this will be good,” Emma said. “Maybe you can remember a relationship other than Sam and can actually have someone who’s good for you.”
“I think the bigger problem is, I never really got over Owen.”
They stopped and looked at me.
“After he broke your heart, you still have feelings for him?” Julie asked.
I shrugged. “That’s the only thing he ever did to hurt me, though.”
“Well, it was a pretty big thing, don’t you think?” Emma said.
“It was,” I admitted. “It’s just hard to hate him when all my memories are good ones.”
“And when he’s that hot,” Emma added.
“Not helping,” Julie said, nudging her.
I scrunched up my face as if I were in pain. “The worst part is, he looks even better now.”
Emma sucked in a breath. “Oh. Sorry.”
“You should date him,” I said to Emma.
“Are you crazy?” Emma said. “First of all, no. Second of all, he’s your ex. Third of all, you just said you still have feelings for him! I may not be the best friend in the world, but I’m not that evil. Or stupid.”
“No one’s dating Owen,” Julie said.
My face fell into a frown. No one was dating Owen, and none of us ever would be. He probably had a girlfriend anyhow. Maybe even a fiancé. I didn’t want to be hung up on anyone, especially not my ex from high school who I hadn’t seen in over four years. It was about three and a half years longer than it should have taken me to get over him. Yet, here I was, my heart still racing from our brief encounter, my mind still full of his face and voice.
I shook my head. No. “Okay, stop.” I held up my hands and we all stopped walking. “I can’t do this. If I’m going to get over him, I can’t think about him. Or Sam. Or any other disaster in my life. I want to enjoy the fact that I just earned a degree after four years of very hard work, and so did the both of you. We made it through college, and we’re ready to start our new lives. I’m not going to do that being stuck in the past. From this point forward, I am in love with no one!”
Julie pumped her fist in the air. “Down with love!”
Emma raised her eyebrow at us. “Um, how about not ‘down with love’ so much as, yay for strong women who don’t need a relationship or a man to feel whole!”
“And that!” I said, raising my fist high to match Julie’s. “Here’s to focusing on our careers!”
4
Owen
The ibis tucked under my arm nuzzled its beak into the crease of my elbow. It was warm at my side.
I should be thinking about what needed to happen for the bird now. How I should have already radioed the vet to be ready. How I would help him set the leg and hold the bird while he worked. But my mind wouldn’t stay on the white-feathered creature for long; it was stuck in the place I’d found the bird.
The place where I’d seen her.
I don’t know that I’ve ever had more of a shock in my life. She had gone to college an hour away, in Miami. I didn’t want to attend the same school and risk running into her or having a class with her. It couldn’t be like high school. I’d never survive if there was a possibility of seeing her anytime I walked around campus.
I thought I’d chosen well with the Everglades. I could have moved to another state. Chosen another park. Joined another clan. But this had been home, and my clan was my family. I didn’t want to leave the land or the shifters I’d come to rely on. Before we broke up, she’d been dreaming of mountains and snow. I expected her to go up north, fall in love with the cold, and never return.
And then, there she was.
I often thought I saw her places. I’d see a woman with the same long hair, those medium-brown locks that glinted gold in the sunlight, the way it swept over her neck. Of course, I had no idea if her hair would still be the same after so many years, but after today, I knew it was. When we first pulled up to the group of ladies, I thought it was her. But in the same way I always thought I saw her, I blew it off and refocused. Except, this time, it really was her.
When I saw her face and her shocked eyes met mine, it was as if the world had vanished. Suddenly, we were back in high school and I’d just seen the most beautiful girl in the world drop her books all over the floor. Back then, I’d been able to step in and rescue her. Saving the day made me her hero and it was easy to win her over. I wanted to save her again, but she didn’t need me now.
She was her with her friends and had found an injured bird. She was not the one in need, but I still wanted to impress her. But Addie hadn’t seemed to notice.
It was all I could do to walk away from her. From the moment I saw her and got a whiff of her scent, I wanted to run to her, scoop her into my arms, and never let go again. I’d let go of her once and it had been the most difficult and stupid thing I’d ever done. If I had the chance, I’d keep hold of her so tight, there’d be no danger of us ever being apart again. My blood boiled with wanting her, with missing her, with loving her.
