True Places

by Sonja Yoerg

Iris closed her eyes and opened them again.

  Ash.

  She jumped up, threw off Suzanne.

  Ran straight through those white flowers and into the woods.

  CHAPTER 38

  In the grove of trillium, Suzanne stood facing the woods into which Iris had disappeared. The sound of the girl’s steps receded, fading into silence. Suzanne crossed to the edge of the grove, as if to follow Iris, but hesitated, peering between the trees, over the shrubs, to where the growth became a seemingly impenetrable mass. It was, she knew, no different from what she had been hiking through all morning, and yet now that Iris had gone, the woods had taken on a different aspect, as if they were not three-dimensional but a solid green curtain. Iris had found the parting and slipped through.

  Suzanne was alone.

  Her shirt was soaked under her backpack. All at once her skin chilled. She stared again into the woods, wishing she had pursued Iris right away when she had a chance of keeping up. The girl could be anywhere now.

  Suzanne spun in the direction from which they had come, looking past the boulder to discern the path, such as it was. She started in that direction, imagining the Navigator waiting patiently by the road. She imagined sitting behind the wheel. She took a deep breath in and it caught in her chest. Her heart was beating too quickly. She closed her eyes and took several more deep breaths, willing her lungs and her heart to obey her, willing the signals of panic cascading from somewhere in her brain to stop. Her faithless nervous system was a toddler on the verge of a tantrum. She opened her eyes and took inventory of what she might do to forestall an attack.

  Look, she said to herself. I am surrounded by flowers.

  She knelt and focused her attention on a trillium, the dark green of the leaves, the blush of pink on its petals. Three petals, three sepals, three leaves. The petals wavy at the edges. The leaves slightly veined and without stalks. She examined one, then another and another. Her heart slowed.

  Not daring yet to stand, she moved in a crouch to the carved wooden sign, the marker. She examined the grain of the boards, the intricate notches, the stakes nailed to the back and driven into the ground. She ran her fingers over the lettering, marshaling her senses to hold tight the reins of her emotions.

  ASH .

  A boy or a girl? The child had died at nine during the same year that, according to Iris, her father had left the cabin and never returned. But that was nearly six years ago. The sign could not be that old. Who had been here? And how much of what Iris had told them had been true?

  Suzanne’s mouth was parched. Slowly she came to her feet, lowered the backpack to the ground, and removed the water bottle from the side pocket. She drank, keeping her eyes on the marker, on the flowers, on her steady, even breathing. She put the water away and turned in a slow circle.

  She was alone.

  A finger of dread crept up her spine. Suzanne reached into her pocket for the drawing Iris had made. The cabin had to be nearby. They had been heading in the same direction for at least two hours, so it was reasonable to stay on that course. If the map was right, Suzanne would encounter the first stream pictured on the map and, shortly after that, the cabin. She could attempt to go after Iris, but it would be a false move. Iris didn’t need her, not out here. The girl’s backpack contained food, water, and extra clothing; she had survived for years on much less. And Suzanne had no doubt Iris could find the cabin on her own, if she chose.

  Suzanne retrieved her phone from the pack and checked the screen. No service. She stowed it, hoisted the pack onto her shoulders, clipped the hip belt, and crossed to where they had emerged from the woods. It was mostly downhill to the car. She was confident she could find the way and be safe in her car in less than three hours. From there she could return to Buchanan and call Whit. Or the police. But what would she say? That she had almost found the cabin? Did she really want them to know? And what would she say about Ash’s marker?

  In truth, she didn’t want to talk to anyone, not about what she’d found, not about Iris and her cabin and her family, and not, most of all, about why she had left. She wouldn’t know the answer to that until she stopped looking over her shoulder at her past and understood what was in front of her.

  Suzanne stepped from the grove of flowers into the woods. As she walked, she absorbed everything around her with the same intensity she had applied to examining the trillium, inviting this spectacle of life surrounding her to guide her onto Iris’s map, both the one in Suzanne’s pocket and the one in Iris’s heart.

  The stream appeared sooner than she had expected, its gentle gurgling a welcome sound. She followed it upstream for a few hundred yards until she found a ginseng patch, probably the one Iris had included in the drawing. Suzanne was sure she was close now, and her excitement grew larger than her lingering anxiety about being on her own. Her stomach growled—she hadn’t eaten since breakfast—but she didn’t want to stop to eat. She noticed an overgrown trail at the end of the ginseng patch, pushed the arching branches of brambles aside, and pressed on. After a short while, she descended to a smaller stream, not more than a rivulet, and followed it upstream, as the drawing indicated. The hillside she had been skirting on her right flattened, and the terrain opened, revealing a clearing. Across from where she stood was a cabin of weathered wood, darkened by weather, smoke, and time. The porch was narrow, and a stovepipe poked through the debris-covered roof. She could hear water running beyond the cabin. Other than an outbuilding tucked off to one side, there was little to suggest a family had lived here. She had expected buckets, stools, rusted implements, crude toys, a laundry line, perhaps. Suzanne approached with caution, and, as she neared, it seemed the cabin had not so much been placed on the land as grown up from it, as if the lumber from which it had been constructed had reverted, in its nature, to tree.

  A small shed with a moon carved in the door was half-hidden in a cluster of red cedars to the right of the cabin. The outhouse, Suzanne surmised. She reached the porch and watched for movement behind the small windows on either side of the door, but was fairly certain no one was there. Her chest constricted and her palms became sweaty. She had been able to quell her panic until now, but her control was slipping. Maybe inside the cabin she would feel less exposed, less alone. She fumbled with the hip belt of her pack, unclasped it, and shed the pack. She went to the door and knocked. The sound rang through the clearing. She waited a moment and knocked again, louder, and, when no one came, lifted the latch and stepped inside.

  “Hello?”

  The dust disturbed by the swinging door clouded the air before settling again. Suzanne slowly swung the door open wide and advanced to the middle of the room. Centered on the wall to her right was a fireplace made of stone. A few pots and a skillet stood on the hearth, and an iron arm with a hook at the end hovered over dusty, charred logs. A long table with benches occupied one side of the fireplace, and a tall chest, a set of shelves, and a stack of plastic storage containers filled the remaining space. The chest was fashioned of wood like that of Ash’s marker. On the opposite side of the room, two rocking chairs and a table holding a kerosene lamp were arranged by the window. A set of bunk beds occupied the rest of the wall. Suzanne crossed to the back of the room and lifted aside a curtain covering the doorway of another room, just large enough to contain a full-size bed covered with a faded quilt. A porthole offered a peek at the back of the house.

  Suzanne returned to the main room. The scene out the front door was peaceful: a gently sloping field, dotted with yarrow, buttercup, daisies, and a blue flower she couldn’t identity from this distance, giving way to a row of upright tree trunks surrounded by blossoming berry bushes. Birds called in the distance. The air was windless and as warm as a spring day should be. Suzanne stood at the threshold, knowing she could walk into the clearing and not succumb to a panic attack. Here, where the cabin belonged to the land and where the people who had lived there belonged as well, inside was much the same as outside, and being alone was as natural and right as breath
ing, as flowing water, as sunlight. She would not hide from herself while alone in a gentle wilderness.

  She brought her pack inside, carried it to the table. The rose-patterned tablecloth was stained and sprinkled with mouse droppings. She folded it back to expose the bare wood and unpacked her lunch. The sight of food reminded her of how hungry she was. She checked her phone. Two fourteen and no service.

  As she ate, she kept an eye on the doorway, hopeful of seeing Iris, and examined the cabin again. Even as she picked out more detail—a basket of knitting tucked under a chair, a fiddle leaning against the wall, heavy coats hanging behind the front door—she was struck by how little the family of three, or four, had owned. Undoubtedly there was storage under the beds and perhaps outside, but she guessed their possessions could nevertheless fit inside the Navigator. And it had been enough.

  Suzanne finished the packet of trail mix, rose from the bench, and went to the shelves beside the tall chest. She scanned the spines of the twenty or so books—all practical volumes of one sort or another. If the children had had storybooks, they were elsewhere. Suzanne doubted it, though, as Iris didn’t seem to have had any contact with worlds of myth or magic. Above the books were jars and containers of assorted sizes. Most were labeled: Adam’s flannel, burdock, blue cohosh, echinacea, stitchwort, sumac . A mortar and pestle and a small set of scales rested on one shelf, and another mortar and pestle, the size of a soup tureen, sat on the floor. Iris’s mother had been an herbalist and this was her apothecary. Suzanne lifted a few of the jars, inspecting the contents. Under a large, empty container, she discovered a stack of three notebooks, black hardcover and simply bound. Suzanne carried them to the table and opened the topmost, labeled A TO H .

  There was no inscription inside the cover. The entries began with the first pair of pages. ADDER ’S MOUTH was written in capitals across the top of the left-hand page. The handwriting was small, neat, and upright. Under the plant name was a brief description (an orchid with a single glossy leaf and numerous small green flowers on a single stalk) and its habitat (open upland woods), along with a simple line drawing executed by a confident hand. The rest of the page listed various preparations and uses. Suzanne flipped through several pages. Each plant had been granted at least one page; some, such as agrimony and arnica, had several. Suzanne noticed annotations in a different, more fluid hand, but not Iris’s, and guessed the writing belonged to Iris’s mother, while the original entries were likely the work of someone older, perhaps Iris’s grandmother. Suzanne turned page after page, fascinated by the wealth of information. Although Appalachian herbalism was not her specialty, she was surprised by how many of the plants she was unfamiliar with. Even the uses of those she knew were broader than she’d realized. The entries were observations, not established fact, but as she read she tempered her natural skepticism with an open mind. Plants were more complex than most people would credit, except those who revered and depended on them.

  Something skittered across the roof, startling her. She went to the door, pointlessly searching the clearing for Iris. The shadows were lengthening. Only the tops of the trees now caught the sun. Suzanne was more concerned about Iris’s state of mind than about her safety, but could do nothing other than wait for her. It was the logical place to meet, and Suzanne had no doubt that Iris knew precisely where the cabin lay.

  Suzanne returned inside and considered where she would sleep. The beds, the floor, every surface was covered in dust and rodent droppings. Who knew what else was lurking in the corners, behind the furnishings? Snakes could have found their way between the chinks in the walls. No, she would sleep on the porch. A broom leaned against the fireplace. Suzanne retrieved it and caught sight of a piece of paper under the bench, where a shadow had kept it hidden. She picked it up and shook off the dust. The letter was dated September 20, 2016. The handwriting was different from those in the notebooks, angled and uneven. Suzanne skipped to the signature. LOVE ALWAYS , JIM . Iris’s father. He had been here last year. Suzanne read the letter from the beginning.

  Dear Mary,

  I don’t expect you’ll ever see this. I’ve been coming up when I could and knew you hadn’t been here for a while. Now that I’ve been here solid since June, I know you and Iris aren’t coming back.

  I wanted to tell you to your face what happened to our son and how everything came apart after he died. I’m sorry it took me so long to come back. I’m to blame for that, no one else. I’ve failed all of you.

  I put up a marker for Ash where the white wake-robin grows. It was all I could think to do.

  I’ve waited for you, for you and Iris, but there’s no use in waiting anymore. I miss you both so much but if I ever did deserve to have you, I don’t anymore.

  Love always, Jim

  The last lines were crooked, trailing to the edge of the page, the handwriting weak, as if Jim were fading, already on his way out the door and away from these woods. Suzanne read the note again, then lowered the paper to her side. The more she learned about Iris and her family, the less she understood. Suzanne glanced around the cabin, imagining the family there. Iris lying on the bottom bunk, probably. Ash would have insisted on the top bunk and, knowing Iris, she would have relinquished it. Suzanne imagined a boy, smiling and energetic, dangling his legs from the top bunk. He would be wise like Iris. How could you grow up here without wisdom? Maybe that was romantic idealism; Ash could have been stubborn and foolish, but Suzanne doubted it. Her heart fell as she realized the loss Iris must be feeling now, having been presented with unmistakable evidence of her brother’s death. Suzanne was perplexed as to why Iris would not have mentioned him. If Iris had believed he was alive, then why wouldn’t she want to find him, and if she had known he was dead, why the shock? It made no sense. The boy was as big a mystery now as before Suzanne knew he existed.

  Suzanne turned toward the table and the hearth, picturing the mother, Mary, sorting through the herbs in her collecting basket, or making a fire to cook dinner on a winter night. Suzanne didn’t have a clear picture of Mary, and wondered why she had never asked Iris more about her. Suzanne had told herself she didn’t want to pry, was wary of spooking the girl, but the truth was more complicated. Suzanne could more easily replace a mother she knew little of. She could manage that.

  And Jim. Iris had been so certain her father was dead, and yet he had been here last summer. Suzanne considered that she ought to have told Iris about Detective DeCelle’s lead on Jim Smith, despite the promise Suzanne had made. It might have given Iris hope. And if they had been able to find him, he could have delivered the news about Ash himself, instead of Iris stumbling upon a marker in the forest. Whit had lobbied for a more intensive investigation, which, Suzanne now understood, might have been in Iris’s best interests.

  The cabin had become confining, even with the door wide open. Suzanne left the letter on the table and walked outside. How strange it was to be completely alone, not even tethered to her family—or to anyone—by the umbilicus of her phone. She felt odd, unmasked, but there was no one there to see her. If she had a mirror, she could hold it up to her face and perhaps see a change. But that wasn’t right. We are not meant to see ourselves so clearly; nor are we meant to be eternally reflected in others. It is far better, and undoubtedly the natural order of things, Suzanne thought, to be not only blind to ourselves, but oblivious. She watched the sky leak blue from the edges, paling in anticipation of night. Above, swallows traced arcs, wings outstretched, diving, twisting, slicing, in obedience to nature and oblivious to it. Suzanne’s wonder became understanding: We can temper the compulsion to see ourselves. We can opt to reject the boundary, the shell behind which we operate our lives, separate from the world, the world of dirt and leaf and sky in which we evolved, the true place that holds our essential nature. We can step out from behind the glass, and live.

  This, Suzanne realized, was the life Iris yearned to return to, the only life in which she would find happiness. Suzanne had not done everything she could for Iris b
ecause of her own need to prove herself as a mother and to explore the possibility of solitude Iris knew so well and so easily. Suzanne could not keep Iris captive to Suzanne’s own failures or even hitch Iris to dreams that were not of her own making. That was, after all, what Whit had done to her, Suzanne: given her a safe place to hide, but not one in which to grow. She had remained underground, in the darkness, a Hydnora waiting for the rain. Whit had kept her there out of ambition, out of sympathy, and, ultimately, out of love. And she had allowed it. She had embraced the cool dark, telling herself she did not have the strength to break the surface.

  Suzanne stepped off the porch and into the long grass. Behind the house, the ground sloped toward a narrow stream. How many times had Iris crouched there to drink, to fill a jug for her mother, to splash water on her face on a sweltering summer’s day? Suzanne decided to return to the stream later to clean up, but while she had the light she turned back, tracing the edge of the clearing. She listened to the birds call to each other in the approaching dusk and studied the cabin now and then as it blended more completely into the surroundings, her presence unnoticed.

  She arrived where she had first entered the clearing and stood for a moment, listening for Iris’s footsteps, but hearing only the scratching of a bird or a squirrel in the leaf litter. She walked on and there, just ahead, was a patch of blue a dozen feet wide, a carpet of diminutive irises, no more than six inches tall, but with large blooms. Suzanne knelt before them. The petals had white and yellow markings outlined with darker blue. The color was really as much purple as blue, the color of Iris’s eyes. Suzanne swallowed against the lump in her throat. Iris’s mother must have treasured this flower to have named her daughter after it. And this patch, so close to the cabin, would have been sacred. Suzanne pictured Iris as a toddler, her chubby little fingers touching the delicate petals as her mother told her the story of her name. Suzanne bent forward, curving her body around the ache that swelled inside her as she remembered Brynn as a small child, her dimpled fists, the sweet smell of her skin, her perfect pink mouth, her open, honest, trusting gaze. Her daughter was lost to her now, and the pain of it was so great Suzanne did not know if she would make the same choices again. She hadn’t known how much of herself she had subverted for the sake of her children, her marriage, how much of herself she had left underground. She had thought of herself as in control, protected, too busy to be vulnerable, but in truth she had been buried up to her neck.