“The official story is I don’t remember,” Ellis said.
“What are you talking about?”
“Nothing.” Ellis lowered her voice. “Do me a favor. Don’t say anything else about my family in front of Keith.”
Her eyes went wide. “You’re sleeping with him and he doesn’t know you were married and have kids?”
“I’m not sleeping with him. I hardly know him. That’s why I don’t want him involved.”
“You hardly know him, but he drove you here from Ohio?”
“He’s a nice guy.”
“Ellis, what’s going on? What is all this secrecy—Jonah calling around looking for you, you showing up bruised with this guy you supposedly don’t know? Are you in trouble with the police?”
“I’m not. All my trouble is my own.”
“Will you stop with this cryptic crap? We’re friends! We used to tell each other everything!”
She was wrong about that. She had no idea how much Ellis had withheld. Dani knew she’d been raised by her grandfather in Youngstown, but Ellis never talked about the trailer park, her mother being an addict and dying of an overdose, or that she didn’t know who her father was. She didn’t want any of that known to her college friends. Jonah was the only one she’d told, and she’d sworn him to secrecy. His parents had found out only because the senator had a private investigator look into her, her gift for getting pregnant with their son’s twins.
“Promise me you won’t tell Keith about Viola or anything else,” Ellis said.
“What does it matter if you hardly know him?”
“Would you want people to know you left your baby in a forest and abandoned your sons?”
She looked about to cry. “Ellis . . .”
“Promise you won’t tell him anything!”
“Okay, I promise.”
“I need to lie down. My fever is going up.”
“Why do you have a fever?”
Ellis saw no reason to mention the knife wound. It would only upset her.
“I don’t know,” she lied. “Maybe something to do with my broken wrist.”
Before Dani could ask more, Ellis opened the door and went to the kitchen. Keith and Brad were talking about Brad’s research on sea turtle conservation.
“Are you a biologist?” Dani asked Keith.
“A park ranger,” he said.
“I guess that explains how you know Ellis. She loves camping.”
“She sure does.”
Dani looked about to ask him more, but she glanced at Ellis and kept silent.
Ellis knew Dani wouldn’t pry into their relationship. And she wouldn’t say anything to Keith about Viola or her sons. Dani was the kind of person who would take a friend’s secrets to her grave. She could be trusted with Keith while Ellis slept. And if Keith revealed the knife wound or what had happened at the motel, so be it. She had to leave the kitchen before she fell over.
“If I’m asleep when you’re ready to go, wake me up,” she said to Keith.
When she closed her eyes, the recurring scene enveloped her. Two monsters. Chasing her and pinning her like a calf to be branded. You should know it’s not safe to be in a place like this all alone. The blade point swirling over the soft skin on her stomach. I know where you can put a knife so it hurts bad but doesn’t kill.
She put the pillow over her face and pressed hard, trying to smother away the memory.
She woke to the sound of a light knock. She was groggy, must have been asleep for hours. “Yes?” she said.
Keith sat on the side of the bed. He had a glass of water and her pills in his hands. “It’s past time for all three,” he said, holding out the antibiotic, ibuprofen, and pain medication. She was reminded of when Jonah had pushed the first sedative into her mouth.
“No more pain pills,” she said.
“Why suffer the pain if it helps?”
“Just get it out of here.”
He studied her eyes. “Are you recovering? From pill addiction?”
She didn’t answer.
“I thought I saw that the night we were together. You looked high on more than the drinks.”
She didn’t deny it.
“Are you doing better with it?”
“I was. Until . . .”
He put down the water and pills and rested his palm on her cheek. “I’m sorry.”
A sob erupted from her. Then another and another. As if her body were trying to eject a poison.
He gathered her in his arms. He’d showered and changed clothes. He smelled like Dani’s Dove soap. “You need to talk about it,” he said. “Stop holding it in or it’ll fester like that knife wound.”
Ellis cried harder.
He tucked her into his chest and rocked. He rocked her like Zane had sometimes.
She understood that he’d come to say goodbye. She shouldn’t keep him when he had a long drive ahead.
She pulled away and wiped her face. “Is Dani going to drive you to the rental agency?”
“Yes. I have a car reserved.”
“I guess you’d better go.”
“Will you do something for me?” he asked.
“What?”
“Let me know how you are. Answer my texts.”
“I don’t like texting.”
“One word. Just send one word. Will you promise to answer me?”
“Okay.” She couldn’t say no after all he’d done for her.
“Good. But can we do three words?”
“You can’t change the conditions.”
“We can’t say enough with one word. If we’re both allowed three, I can say, ‘How are you?’ And you can say, ‘I’m doing great.’ If you’re on the road, I can ask, ‘Where are you?’ And you can say, ‘I’m in Saskatchewan.’”
She laughed through her stuffy nose. “This all sounds very boring.”
“It’s not. I really want to know how you are.”
“My rule is no multiple texts. That would break the three-word limit.”
“Okay. No more than six words exchanged within twenty-four hours.”
“How long will we do this?”
“I don’t know. Let’s see how it goes.”
“And what will your girlfriend do when she sees you texting me?”
“Let me worry about that,” he said.
“If it worries you, we shouldn’t do it.”
“I hope you talk this much when you text.”
“I’ll only have three words.”
He kissed her cheek. “Goodbye, Ellis.” He got up and left the room abruptly, without making her take the medication.
She didn’t even have a chance to say goodbye. Like with Zane. And her mother. Viola.
The odds weren’t in favor of her seeing him again.
4
Dani followed her out to the car. “Please reconsider,” she said. “It’s only been a week. You need more time to recover.”
“I’m recovered,” Ellis said. “I feel fine.”
“Physically, you’re better. But that doesn’t mean you’re recovered. You still can’t even talk about it.”
“Why do you say that?”
“Because you haven’t told me anything! Why did someone beat you up? Who was it? Did the police catch him?”
“Why would you need to know any of that? Why would you even want to?”
“Because I care! I’m your friend. I can help you.”
“I’m okay. I just need to get back to how everything was.”
“What, living in campgrounds by yourself?”
“Yes. I need the mountains. I’m going up to the Appalachians.”
“Ellis . . .”
“What?”
“You have to stop running away from what happened to Viola. You need to go back to your boys.”
“I need to get on the road.” Ellis gave her a hug that Dani didn’t reciprocate. “Thank you for letting me stay.”
“You can keep staying. We need a third roommate.”
�
�And what would I do here?” Ellis asked.
“Go back to school. If you can’t get into a UF grad program right away, you could get a job first.”
“Why do you assume grad school is what I want?”
“Because you said it was!”
“People change, Dani. I don’t intend this to be mean, but you don’t really know me now. And I don’t know you. I’ve been married, a mother of three, and divorced all while you’ve been in grad school.”
“So what? Have your dreams really changed so much?”
Ellis wouldn’t tell her the truth. She didn’t have dreams anymore. She had no idea what she wanted in her future. It had become a big blank. She didn’t know why or if that would change someday. Maybe she’d be like Caleb and wander all her life.
“I’d better go,” she said. “Thank you. And tell Brad thanks, too.”
Dani finally hugged her when she realized Ellis wasn’t going to stay. She had tears in her eyes.
“Come on! Why are you crying?”
“I’m afraid for you. I’m afraid I’ll never see you again.”
“Why would you think that?”
“Because no one knew where you were for a year and a half, and when you finally appeared, you looked like you’d nearly been killed!”
“Remember, if Jonah calls, don’t tell him any of that. Don’t say I was here. You promised.”
“Is that really all you care about right now?”
“Bye, Dani.”
Ellis drove away, leaving Dani on the lawn with her arms crossed. She wanted to put Florida behind her. Not that she’d hated her week in Gainesville. Dani and Brad had been welcoming, the city was a decent but typical college town, and the warm weather had been a nice change. But everything about Gainesville, Florida, reminded her of the reason she was there. And she wanted to forget that.
She had a long drive ahead to the Georgia campground. She looked at the clock. She shouldn’t have let Dani slow her down. She wouldn’t get there until twilight. Or past, if she ran into bad traffic.
That didn’t matter. She’d set up her tent in the dark often enough.
Ellis took a deep breath. And another. She didn’t understand the peculiar feeling in her head. Like it was full of humming bees. She felt dizzy. She shifted the car out of cruise control. A semitruck sidled up to her in the right lane. Too close. It was too close. She slowed down more, clenching the steering wheel with both hands.
Her lips were numb. Her whole face was. She took another deep breath but couldn’t get it all the way into her lungs. She tried again, but it seemed like her chest couldn’t expand wide enough. She needed more air.
She must be having a bad reaction to her antibiotic. She’d taken her last dose a few hours earlier. The huge truck on the right roared past her. Then a car, the driver staring at her. Everyone was going around her. She felt sick. She was going to pass out.
So many people zooming past. She couldn’t get over to the right. She braked even more. She was going only about thirty-five. What was she doing? That was dangerous on a big highway. She wanted to cry, but she was too frightened to risk giving in to emotion.
When a gap finally opened, she pulled into the right lane, pressed the brake, and steered onto the highway shoulder.
Shaking, sweating. She’d been certain she was going to die. But she couldn’t understand why. She finally started to sob.
Her SUV rocked as vehicles sped past. They were coming too close. Her breaths weren’t enough again. What was wrong with her? It had to be anaphylaxis from the medicine. She picked up her phone and typed in Dani’s number.
“Hello?” Dani said.
“Dani . . . there’s something wrong with me. I can’t breathe. It’s the medicine. I’m going to pass out!”
“Ellis! Should I call 911?”
“No. I don’t know for sure what’s wrong. Can you come? Can you come here?”
“Where are you?”
“On 75. Not far from the entrance ramp from your house. On the shoulder.”
“I’m coming. I’m coming as fast as I can! I need to hang up but try to stay calm.”
Ellis turned off the car. She slid the seat back from the steering wheel and lowered the backrest. She curled on her side, facing away from the traffic. She closed her eyes and concentrated on breathing.
She didn’t lose consciousness and she didn’t get worse. Now she understood what was wrong. She was having a panic attack. She’d had mild ones in the past but never like this, never so bad she’d thought she would die.
The revelation was devastating. It meant something she knew deep down but didn’t want to believe. She was too scared to go camping alone. The one tool she had, the thing that could save her, was ruined forever.
She was crying when Dani arrived at the passenger side of the car, knocking frantically on the window. “Open up! Ellis, unlock the car!”
Ellis sat up and released the lock. Dani jumped into the passenger seat and closed the door against the sound of traffic. “How are you? Are you sure I shouldn’t call 911?”
“I’m having a panic attack. A really bad one.”
“Ellis!” She held Ellis in her arms over the console. “Are you feeling better now?”
“Yes. Well, no. Because I think I know why.”
“Why?”
“When it started, I was thinking about arriving at the campground at night.”
Dani looked into her eyes. “Is that where you were attacked by that man? In a campground at night?”
“It was two men. During the day. But the campground was completely empty because it was a weekday and it’s cold up there.”
Dani took Ellis’s hand. “Why did they beat you?”
“You know why.”
“Oh no. No . . .” Tears pooled in her eyes.
“They didn’t do it,” Ellis said.
Her eyes went wide. “You fought them off?”
“I stabbed one of them. Bad. The other had to take him to get help.”
“Oh my god!”
“I think he may have died.”
“You don’t know? The police didn’t tell you?”
“I never told the police.”
“What? Why not?”
Ellis put her hands over her face. “Dani . . . there’s so much you don’t know.” She moved her hands away and looked into Dani’s eyes. “Even since we were close at school.”
“I know,” she said.
“I’m sorry. It’s not you. It’s hard for me to get close to people.”
“I know that, too.” She squeezed Ellis’s hand. “I’ve always admired you. You’re so strong about everything. But now I see I shouldn’t have admired that.” She made her familiar wry half smile. “I should have tried to help you not be strong, to let your guard down sometimes.”
“You did try. I saw that. But I couldn’t.” Tears burned her eyes. “I’m messed up, Dani. I have been for a really long time.”
Dani wrapped her arms around her again. “I love you, Ellis. Please trust me. Come back to the house and we’ll talk, okay?”
Ellis looked out the windshield at the three lanes of cars traveling at high speed. “I’m afraid.”
“To go on the highway?”
“Yes.”
“We can leave one of the cars here.”
“No,” she said, remembering the two men breaking into her car.
“How about we both turn on our flashers and go slow in the right lane? The next exit isn’t that far. Just follow me. Can you do that? Just look at me and nothing else?”
“I’ll try.”
“You can do it. Think of all those mountains you climbed. Pretend the highway is a mountain and you just need to get to the top.”
5
Ellis heard her phone ping on her way to work. If it wasn’t spam, it had to be Keith. He was the only person she texted. Even Dani knew not to.
She pulled her car into the employee lot. She’d heard from Keith yesterday. He always initiated contact, but h
e rarely texted more than once a month. She supposed he didn’t want to risk Ellis giving up on what little communication they had.
Their six-word exchanges had become a sort of joke between them since his first text more than a year and a half before. They each delivered three words, never one or two, and he never broke the one-text-per-day limit, even when one of her answers elicited a response. Like the time he asked, How’s it going? and she replied, Got a job. He’d waited until the next day to ask, What’s the job? She replied, A plant nursery.
Ellis looked at her phone, and her chest tightened. I’m getting married.
She stared at the three words. Keith Gephardt getting married. Yesterday he had asked, How are you? and she’d answered, I’m doing great, because all weekend she’d been keyed up about a house a real estate agent had shown her on Friday. She was going back to look at it after work.
The news was difficult to process. When she imagined Keith, she didn’t associate him with another woman. She saw him at their table at Pink Horses grinning at her, looking into her eyes after they slow danced. She saw him drinking cognac in the snow. Laughing as he lifted off her layers of clothes inside the tent.
He was probably waiting for an answer.
Ellis typed three words: How great! Congratulations! She pressed “Send.”
He couldn’t answer. That was their limit for the day.
But maybe the game was over. Maybe that was why he’d told her. He was trying to let her know they had to stop.
Ellis still had five minutes until she was supposed to be inside the nursery.
I’m happy for you, Keith, but we should stop doing this now, she wrote.
Hey, you broke the rules!
So he hadn’t expected to stop.
We’re breaking bigger rules if we keep texting.
He didn’t answer for a minute.
I guess you’re right.
Have a good life. I mean that.
You too. And so do I.
She stared at their last words until the phone went black and her face reflected back at her. Like when she’d put her phone beneath the rock in the river. That was the day she’d met the park ranger.
She threw the phone into her backpack and got out of the car. She had a lot to do. She was making mixed planters to show off the pansies, snapdragons, and other fall annuals. And later, a big shipment of camellias was coming in. Gardening was a year-round hobby in north-central Florida.
The Light Through the Leaves Page 17