by Sandra Evans
I ran until I ran out of island. One minute I was in the middle of cedars as tall as a mountain, and the next I wasn’t. I was in a narrow meadow twenty feet from the cliff’s edge.
I looked back a hundred times. Nothing followed me out from the cedars. My breath was so ragged and jagged, it scraped my throat and I tasted blood.
At the end of the little meadow the cliff dropped straight down to a pile of driftwood and then a strip of sand and then the blue, blue water of Puget Sound.
I started to shiver. It was almost dark. Sometimes all your choices seem bad. Was I going to spend the night on the edge of a cliff with a pack of animals watching from the trees, or run back into the forest and try to get home before whatever chased me here caught me?
If I went left, I was pretty sure I’d end up in sight of the school, but not within reach, because of the ravine.
I looked right. Farther down, the trees circled the meadow and came up to the cliff. I stared into the trees. There was a building nestled among them. I walked closer.
It was a lighthouse.
Nobody had been near it for years. Animals maybe, but no humans. The tower was as tall as the tallest trees around it, and its white paint was dappled with a pale green lichen on the landward side that helped hide it in the cedar fronds. At its base was a small cabin with a red roof. Blackberry and huckleberry and ferns and waist-high fir trees surrounded it. I pushed back the ivy covering the door.
I heard the click of little paws scamper across the stone floor as I stepped inside. It was cold and dark and musty. The first thing I thought was how I’d show it to my dad next time he came. The next thing I thought was how stupid can a kid be.
I shut the door behind me and shoved an old wooden chest in front of it.
Something out there was watching me. I could feel its eyes.
As soon as I saw the stairs, I ran up them. The lighthouse light was gone. The windows were cracked and broken and missing, and the edge of the ceiling was packed with the mud nests of swallows. The wind smelled like cedar and salt and wet wood. It was the most magical place I had ever seen.
I spent the night up there, with the moon coming in through the paneless windows. Before I fell asleep, I made a sling from an old leather belt I found in a chest, and gathered up as many rocks as I could.
In the morning I walked back through the woods, my sling in one hand and a rock in the other. No eyes watched me from behind the shaggy trunks of cedar.
There was a big surprise when I got back to the school: Bobo. I wasn’t the only one who had been forgotten. Whichever kid was supposed to take her home for the weekend hadn’t.
Boy, was she glad to see me. She charged out the door to pee and then charged right back to knock me down and lick me. She was very thorough. I never knew how happy it’d make me to have slimy sandpaper rubbed over my face.
The rest of that weekend went more or less as planned. During the day I wandered through the woods, but I made sure Bobo was trotting along at my heels. I stayed in sight of the road to the school, and before dark I was in the parlor, parked in front of the TV with Bobo for a pillow.
I found out canned pumpkin tastes really good straight from the can. In one of the chem lab closets, I found out what happened to all the crickets from that science experiment we never finished. I found out dead bugs really stink if you get enough of them piled up in an aquarium.
Turns out a German shepherd will eat those dead bugs if you forget to cover the garbage can.
Turns out cleaning up dead cricket barf will make a boy barf.
Best weekend ever.
Later the next week I called my dad one night when I was sure everybody in the whole school was sleeping. I told my dad not to worry about me for the next few weekends because I’d be going home with different friends. He told me to take the time I needed, whatever that means.
When the next Friday rolled around, I felt a lot better knowing exactly what was going to happen. It felt good to be in charge. I told the dean my dad would pick me up at the bottom of the hill again. He asked if I would like a ride down. I said no.
I only had to call my dad that one time. He never came again. That’s the bad part of the phone call. Finding out how happy and relieved he was not to have to be with me.
The good part is that’s how the whole adventure, and all the magic that made it, got started. Because my dad stopped coming to get me. Because the dean didn’t know what to do with me. Because a pack found me and ran alongside me. Because I got tired of being pushed around.
Don’t be like dandelion fluff, shining bright but getting tossed around by the wind.
If people won’t take care of you, then guess what? You gotta take care of yourself.
And in the end, I made the magic happen.
Chapter 8
WHERE YOU LEARN THE REST OF THE SECRET
Since then, I’ve found out there’s a lot more at the lighthouse than swallows’ nests and broken windows.
And so tonight, like every Friday night, I leave Dean Swift at the door with a smile and a wave.
I start down the road. At first I think about the other kids and what their weekends will be like. It’s Mary Anne’s turn to take Bobo home and I wonder if her mom will be mad about the dog hair on her car upholstery. I wonder if Sparrow’s grandma lets him crack the eggs this time when they make brownies. I should write her a letter and tell her not to worry so much about salmonella. That’s what soap and water are for, lady! I think about the Venn diagram Vincent made showing me how he was going to prank his stepdad. A flow chart would have been more effective.
I wonder what will happen when Mean Jack sticks a hand in his bag for a clean pair of socks and comes up with Gollum. Man, I’d like to hear that mobster yelp.
Then I notice how the brown branches of the cherry trees have green buds.
The winter months are the hardest. It’s cold and the snow hurts my hands and feet when I walk. The woods get dark too early, and there is a lonesome sound in the wind.
In the spring, though, the wind talks to the new leaves. And the birds answer back, each with its own song. I’m always part of the conversation there. The sound of my breath when I run hard tells the woods I’m alive too, and so does the thump of my feet as I skim across the forest floor and the howl of my voice as I seek and find the moon and my mother.
But wait. This afternoon there’s a big problem. As I’m walking down the road, I feel someone watching me. I stop. I turn around. The road behind me is empty. I keep walking. But the feeling won’t go away. I stop again. I look into the trees. And up into the branches.
Tuffman.
He’s sitting in the forked branches of an ash tree, and he’s watching me. I catch most of my scream but not all of it. He drops to the ground. It must be twenty feet or more. He lands on both feet, his knees slightly bent. Like it’s nothing to jump out of a tree and land on your feet and not break every bone in your legs.
“Hiya, Raul,” he says.
All the hairs stand up on the back of my neck. His voice sounds like the voice of a bad guy in a movie. Friendly, but like he wants to hurt you.
“You headin’ down to meet your dad?” he asks.
My chest feels empty and my head is too full to think.
“It’s funny how he never comes to the door like the other parents,” he says.
I shrug.
“You ever hear of natural law? It’s the way of the woods. Big things chase little things chase littler things,” he says. “You’re not safe alone. Not in these woods.”
You know how sometimes you get a tiny voice whispering to you to get out of a bad situation? Right about now my tiny voice gets a megaphone. Get away from this guy.
I start walking again. Quickly. But something in me thinks that if I run, he’ll chase.
He follows along, a step behind me.
We pass the point where I usually duck into the woods and head toward the lighthouse. Every step I take, my stomach feels emptier, my hands w
etter, my pulse quicker.
Why won’t he go away? I don’t want to miss sunset. The secret only happens at sunset. Will it work if I get there after? If I miss a weekend, will it work the next one?
Here’s the problem with magic. What if it’s like baking bread? Cook Patsy told me that flour, water, sugar, salt, and yeast will only make bread if you use the exact right amounts and the exact right temperatures. What if the magic of White Deer Woods only works when every step is exactly right?
We can see the highway. I don’t know what to do. Will he wait for my dad with me? When my dad doesn’t come, will he make me go back to school? Will he make me climb the rope and run lines in the gym all weekend and drink protein shakes that taste like barf and chalk?
The wind comes down the hill from the water behind us. My nose twitches. There’s a bad smell somewhere in it. On top of the smell of pine needles there’s a kitty litter reptile smell I know from somewhere.
When I look back, Tuffman is staring at me.
“You worried about that coyote living in the Blackout Tunnel?” he asks.
Bingo. It’s the Blackout Tunnel smell. For a second I feel relieved, like you do when you figure something out. Then it terrifies me. Because it means his nose is as sharp as mine.
“The area has too many predators already, doesn’t it?” he asks. “I’m curious, Raul.” He takes a long stride and then swings around and stops in front of me. “I’m curious,” he repeats. “Dean Swift tells all the teachers that you’re the expert on White Deer Woods.”
Dean Swift talks about me to the teachers?
“Tell me, Raul.”
The proud feeling shrivels up. I don’t like how he keeps saying my name.
“Tell me about the woods. What kinds of predators have you come across out there, Raul?”
Tuffman’s eyes are so intense, they paralyze me. For a second I don’t see anything but the yellow rings around his pupils.
I feel like I have to answer his question.
He stares at me. “Anything bigger than a coyote out there, Raul?”
I open my mouth. The secret is about to fall out.
We both hear the engine coming down the hill at the same time. My mouth shuts. Tuffman glances back over his shoulder.
When he looks away from me, I blink. I’ve been keeping this secret for a year. Did I almost tell it to Tuffman just now? I cross my arms over my chest. I’m cold.
He turns back to me. “You should stay out of the Blackout Tunnel, Raul.”
I nod. I’m trying not to look at him, but when he says my name I can’t help it.
“Coyote’d make a meal of a loner like you. I guarantee it. You go back to that tunnel and you’ll be sorry.”
A car passes us slowly. It stops and backs up. Dean Swift rolls down the window. I’m so happy to see him that if he reached over and unlocked the door, I’d jump in.
“Is everything okay?” he asks.
“Raul and I were having a chat about the natural order, about the way there can only be one predator in a territory,” Tuffman says.
Is that what we were talking about?
Dean Swift tilts his head and looks at me. His eyes pop a little. I must look as freaked out as I feel.
“I thought you left hours ago, Mr. Tuffman,” the dean says.
Now it’s Tuffman’s turn to blink and look a little nervous. “I forgot something,” he says. “So I came back for it. I forgot the key to my house, can you believe it?”
Dean Swift looks like he can tell Tuffman is lying. Then he looks at me like he’s trying to figure out what the heck is going on here, exactly. He gives me a quick smile. I take another breath. I can tell it’ll be all right. Somehow I’ll get to the lighthouse by sunset.
“So,” Dean Swift says finally. “Did you get it?”
“What?” Tuffman asks.
“Your key? Did you get it?”
“No.”
“So where are you going now, Tuffman,” Dean Swift says really slowly. It’s a question, but he doesn’t make it sound like one.
Tuffman’s face is bright red. “To get the key,” he says with a big gulp.
Dean Swift nods. “Hop in. I’ll give you a ride back. Unless you think you left your house key in the middle of this road.”
Tuffman ducks his head. He lopes over and gets in.
Dean Swift starts to put the car in reverse and then looks out the window again. “You need anything, Raul?” he asks.
I give him a huge smile. “No, Dean Swift, I think I’m okay. My dad’ll be here any minute.”
Dean Swift nods at me. Okay, his face says to me. You go meet your dad.
I keep walking. I feel Tuffman watching me in the side-view mirror as the car turns around and heads back up the hill. I turn slightly and then stop myself. It’s a woods instinct alive in me. Don’t look back at an animal who is stalking you.
My mind focuses. My muscles tense.
The truth is sitting hidden in the facts, like Dean Swift says.
I’m not the only one of my kind. I’m not the only one with the secret.
Didn’t White Deer call Vincent this morning? And the swarming crows? And his name! Isn’t that proof? Woods magic happens to other people too.
Maybe it happened to Tuffman.
Okay, now you need to know what happens in the woods.
Remember how I found the lighthouse? There’s more.
Two weekends later I was fishing in the lake. It was a Friday right before dusk.
First the woods went silent. Every warm body covered in fur or feather went still. Every bird twitter, every frog croak, every cricket thrum, every bee buzz, every leaf flutter, every rabbit nose twitch, every pebble click, every water lap—every living noise stopped.
Then in the middle of that silence there was a BOOM so loud that I thought someone had fired one of the old cannons hidden in the cliffs.
I looked across the lake in the direction of the sound.
From behind the low, swinging branches of a red cedar appeared a big white deer with antlers as black as a newly paved road.
It walked toward me and it spoke to me. It told me what to do so that someone I had lost could return to me. I listened so hard I forgot to breathe.
What would you do to see your mom if you had lost her? Would you go hungry? Would you run for miles and miles? Would you walk in the snow barefoot or under a boiling sun in a fur coat? Yes. Yes. Yes, you would.
I can’t tell you the exact words White Deer said. That will always be a secret that I must keep. All I can say is that White Deer told me the light of the woods had spoken to my mother and told her where to find me. That she had been lost to me but that I could never be lost to her.
I put my pole down. Dandelion fluff floated everywhere. I walked out into the water, the twirling seeds catching the last of the day’s light and dancing all around me. I dunked my head three times and said the things White Deer told me to say.
Then the woods were illuminated, but not from the sky above. It was from under and inside every dark, damp place. I saw light everywhere. Glowing hunks of green gold in the crevices where logs rotted to the forest floor. Foxfire. Then I saw the will-o’-the-wisp. Over the lake it bounced and shimmered, reaching back to me and hurrying ahead of me, drawing me forward.
As the sun slipped back and away behind the sea, I followed a path of light to the old lighthouse. I felt something watching me and running beside me again, and this time, because of White Deer, I knew who it was and my face was dripping with tears. I wasn’t bawling. It was just like water flowing down a river. It was my whole heart in that river of tears, and I was happy.
When I came to the clearing on the cliff, the lighthouse was lit up. The light wasn’t coming from inside it, though. The lichen on the tower glowed pale green like water breaking on sand in the morning.
On the threshold, the flowers called bleeding hearts bloomed. I pushed aside the red-green-gold ivy that covered the door. The soft leaves bent toward me and
then away. They whispered to me in the language of leaves.
I walked into the lighthouse.
I took off my damp clothes, folded them, and tucked them into the iron stove like White Deer said.
Wings beat in the lantern room above, and I remembered the swallows and wondered if they had come home too.
Then the change came. I can’t tell you how it happens. It doesn’t hurt. My spine sparks. My skin prickles; it feels warm like it does when you stretch out in the cool grass under a summer sun. My ears pull up, my nose twitches, and my teeth sharpen. The pads of my fingers and toes press against the broken-up linoleum floor of the lighthouse. Do you know how good it feels to have a tail? Humans were meant to have tails. You don’t know until you have one just how much you’ve missed it. You can’t imagine what I smell—clover, dirt, bee pollen, frog spit, moss, bunny-rabbit breath, blackberry leaves, water. You can’t imagine what I hear—worms sliming, bats hanging, leaves fluttering to the ground, tree trunks heating in the sun.
It’s true. Every Friday night at dusk, I become a wolf.
Not a werewolf, don’t say a werewolf.
A werewolf is a story someone made up to scare little kids. It’s a monster that’s half man and half wolf at the same time.
Me, when I’m a wolf, I’m a wolf. When I’m a boy, I’m a boy. Do you get it? It’s not all mixed up. I’m one and then I’m the other. I change and I change back. I’m not some knuckle-dragging, hairy-faced monster who eats people.
A werewolf changes when he sees the full moon. He can’t help it; he has no control over how he acts—it’s why he’s always gonna be alone. You never know if he’s gonna feed you or eat you.
But for me it’s a choice. White Deer told me the recipe, but I choose to follow it.
And when I’m a wolf, I’m never alone.
A white wolf meets me as I come out of the lighthouse door. She licks my face and my fur. In her throat she makes happy sounds, and in my throat the same sounds purr and rumble. Together we go to the woods on the side of the lake that nobody knows. We howl at the moon and we chase rabbits. When we walk through the woods together, the other animals fall back into the shrubs and leap under the fallen trees. Our shoulders touch as we sway along, our tails flick the wind.
