Tribe (Tribe 1)

by Audrina Cole

  Mostly we did school around my mother’s work schedule and at whatever time of day we preferred to do it. For River, that was mornings. He liked to save his afternoons for his beekeeping and working with the goats, and his evenings for time with Dad, working on whatever projects needed to be done, like repairing the fencing or building a new hay crib.

  I preferred to stay up late reading or writing, then sleep in until at least ten. Then I’d get up, read for a while, and get ready for the day. After collecting the eggs and checking to make sure the chickens’ feeders and waterers were good to go, I’d hit the books for the afternoon, then go for a walk before dinner. Meadow’s schedule had changed since she started college. She was hardly home, spending most of her time with friends or at school. She promised to come home on weekends, but most the time I slept alone in the room that we shared. I guess college life was a lot more exciting than life at home.

  I hated that she was gone so much. It made it lonely at home. We used to be on the same schedule and do everything together, but I consoled myself that at least I saw her sometimes. Meadow had spent a full year backpacking across Europe after graduation, instead of starting school right away. It had been a long year while she was gone, and during her time away, she’d changed a lot. We weren’t as close as we’d been before, and that was hard on me.

  It’s not like I didn’t have friends. And since I had a license, I could borrow my mom’s car and go see them whenever I wanted. I mostly hung out with other unschoolers, so I didn’t have to worry about interrupting a family’s rigid homeschooling schedule. But I liked staying at home, spending time on our twenty acres with the animals, picking wildflowers and gathering wild herbs. Mom used them to make tinctures and salves, to give away to people we knew. Other than herbal teas and soaps, we didn’t use many of our homemade items, because we didn’t need them. So we’d give the tinctures and salves away, and use the opportunity to give our neighbors a sneaky little dose of healing at the same time. They always attributed and good health results to our homemade concoctions.

  Well, if I have to read, I might as well get some fresh air while I’m at it, I thought, grabbing the book and my purse and heading out the door. I walked up the trail to “the peak”, the highest point on our property. There was more land that spread up to the actual peak of the small mountain we lived on, but we didn’t own that land. Our neighbor had twenty acres and a tiny cabin up there that he lived in part-time.

  But our rocky outcropping was better. It was sheltered from the view of homes on the neighboring mountains, and had an expansive view of Hauser Lake through the trees. It was gorgeous up there. I sat down, feeling the chill of the rock beneath me and the warmth of the sun on my skin. I enjoyed the sound of the wind in the pine trees and the birds singing. It felt like my own private paradise.

  An hour later, the phone in my purse rang. I usually took the phone with me so my mom would be able to reach me in case of an emergency. Which meant that I had to bring my purse, because of my mother’s “no wireless objects are to be kept on your person” rule.

  It was River.

  “Em, you got a phone call.” His voice was hushed, and I heard the goats in the background.

  “Are you in the barn?”

  “Yeah, I gotta be quick. Some boy called for you. Alex. Isn’t that the kid you healed last night?”

  My breath caught. “Alex? Are you sure?”

  “I have the message right here in my hand. How did he find you?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe through Jenna. Did he say what he wanted?”

  “No. He just gave me his number and asked you to call back.” He lowered his voice to a whisper. “Listen, I need to get back in the house. If Mom catches me out here with my cell phone, she’s going to know something is up.”

  “You need to calm yourself down, or she’ll know anyway.” I opened my channels and sent energy to him. For serious healing you had to be touching the person, or at least really close, but for mild healing you could send it over a distance. I could hear his breathing slow down.

  “You’re right. Thanks. You’re just lucky I caught his call while Mom was out weeding the garden. She went inside right after I snuck out here, so I don’t think she can hear me.”

  “I really appreciate you not telling her. I don’t know what he wants, but I’ll take care of the situation. I promise.”

  He gave me Alex’s number, and we hung up. I took a deep breath, and dialed.

  “Hello?”

  “Hi, is this…um…Alex?” I was nervous. I couldn’t imagine why he had called.

  “Yes. Ember?”

  “Yeah. I was returning your call.”

  “I didn’t expect to hear from you so soon. Your brother said you weren’t home.”

  “I’m on the other end of our property. He called my cell to give me the message.”

  “Oh.”

  Awkward silence.

  “So how did you get my number?” I asked. I’d spoken to Jenna that morning, when she’d called to check up on me. She hadn’t mentioned talking to Alex.

  “I looked your number up online. You told me your name, remember?”

  “Yes, I guess I did.”

  More awkward silence.

  “Well…I just called to thank you.”

  My heart stopped. “W-what?”

  “To thank you. I was feeling pretty down yesterday, finding out that the fundraiser was a bust. You really helped me. I know this sounds crazy, but I felt so much better after we talked. In fact, I’ve felt good all day today, too. It’s the best I’ve felt in weeks. Maybe even months.”

  Uh oh. Cold dread spread through my chest.

  “I just wanted to let you know,” he continued, “how much you helped me. I don’t know what it was, but something about the way you treated me made me feel so much better. I guess it’s because you made me feel like a normal person. Not a sick person. I can’t remember the last time someone treated me like a real person.”

  I breathed a sigh of relief. He didn’t know. “I’m glad I could help.”

  “You really did. I had been feeling hopeful at the beginning of the fundraiser, because it had been a good day for me. I was able to walk around a little bit, which is why you found me outside. I’ve been in that chair or in bed non-stop for the last two weeks. But then it seemed like everything fell apart. I overheard my parents talking about how little money had come in, and my mom was crying…it just made me feel so tired and…I guess trapped. It gets old, feeling like you no longer have control over your life.” He sighed. I could hear the frustration in his voice. “Anyway, you really lifted me up. I just wanted you to know that.”

  I blinked back tears. “I’m really glad, Alex. You’re a good person. I can tell. You deserve good things.”’

  “Yeah.” The resignation was palpable. He didn’t think anything good would happen for him.

  I wished I could tell him that he now had time for good things to happen to him, but I had to be content just knowing that he had a future.

  There was so much more I wanted to say to him, and I sensed he had more to say to me. But he said nothing, so I wished him well and we said our goodbyes.

  I sat for a long time crying, and I wasn’t sure why.

  9

  The week dragged by, but finally Saturday came, and I was finally free. I had my own car! Yes!

  Mom picked up the Prius on Wednesday, and I got her old Jetta as soon as I was off restriction, on Saturday. It was a diesel converted to run on old vegetable oil. Dad and River had learned how to do it from the internet. It had two gas tanks, one for diesel and one for the filtered veggie oil. I had to start and run it on the diesel until the engine was warm, then flip a switch installed on the dash to make it run on the veggie oil. The exhaust smelled like French fries, because Dad collected big drums of used oil from the local fast food restaurants, and filtered it with a contraption he made in the garage.

  I was officially the Queen of the Hippies, according to my friends
. “Laugh all you want,” I told them, “but I’ll be laughing all the way to the bank, because I won’t have to pay for any gas!” In reality, I’d probably have to do a little extra work around the house in exchange for Dad picking up the oil and filtering it for me, and I would have to pay for a little bit of diesel gas which was needed to get the engine warmed up, but telling them that would take away from all my gloating.

  I wanted to take Meadow out for a spin, but when I called she said she was getting ready to go on a date. All my friends were busy, so I had to settle for River. He was thrilled to go, because he had a few months before he could even take Driver’s Ed classes, and Meadow rarely took him anywhere.

  I’d been borrowing my parents’ cars since I’d gotten my license, but nothing compares to the feeling of driving your own car on a spring day with the windows rolled down. I was in heaven.

  For River it was the next best thing to having his own car. I drove carefully down the winding road until we got to the county highway, where I could open it up and go fifty-five. River hung his head out the window like a dog and yelled “whooooo-hooooo”!

  The little nerd-ball really needed to get out more.

  The phone rang and I pulled it out of my purse and answered it without taking my eyes off the road. “Hello?”

  “Ember? It’s Alex.”

  I nearly drove off the road. River groaned and pulled his head back inside, clutching at the console and the passenger door as the car veered. I dropped the phone to put both hands on the wheel, and regained control. Pulling over to the side of the road, I stopped the car and picked the phone up off the floor of the car.

  “Ember? Are you there? Are you okay?” Alex sounded worried.

  “I’m fine, I should have known better than to pull out my phone when I’m driving.” And can’t check caller ID first, I finished in my head. “We’re pulled over now.”

  “Sorry about that. Listen…we need to talk.”

  If I’d been driving at that moment, we would have just crashed into a telephone pole.

  “Why?! Um…I mean, what did you want to talk about?” I tried to keep my emotions level, but River was on to me. Plus, I’m sure he could hear every word Alex said, no matter how tightly I pressed the phone to my ear. I thumbed the phone volume down with the rocker button.

  “I think you know what.”

  River’s jaw dropped, and I was beginning to panic.

  “Uh…no…I don’t.” I wasn’t a very convincing liar. My parents tried to stay out of our business most of the time, so I didn’t have a lot of practice at it. “Listen, River and I were just on our way somewhere. This isn’t a very good time—”

  “Ember.” He sighed. His voice sounded much stronger than it had the week before. “You need to come see me, right now. If you don’t, I’m driving out to your house and camping on your front steps.”

  “That’s a little creepy, don’t you think?” I tried to feign mild irritation, figuring that’s what an innocent person would be feeling. “You don’t even know where I live.”

  “I looked you up on the telephone listings website, remember? Address, too.”

  Damn! Why didn’t Dad pay a little extra each month to the phone company to keep our telephone number private? It’s not the 1970s any more—didn’t he know some kind of stalker weirdo could decide to track us down? Sometimes his frugality could be very inconvenient.

  I couldn’t think of what to say. River was waving signals at me that I didn’t understand, though I was sure they had something to do with me ditching the conversation with Alex.

  “Maybe I should just talk with your parents instead…” Alex hinted.

  “No!” I snapped, then continued in a friendlier tone. “No, no reason to bother them. I’m not sure what I can help you with, but if you want to talk, I’ll come right over.” I wrote down his address and said I’d be there in a half hour.

  I hung up, then stared at the phone, dumbfounded.

  “What are you going to do?” River’s anxiety radiated like a campfire. He looked around, as if there was some way for him to disentangle himself from the situation I’d gotten him into. I thought he might bolt from the car.

  “Calm down, you’re freaking me out and I’m trying to think.” I stared harder at the phone. I had to go meet him. I couldn’t risk Alex showing up at the house. But I didn’t know what he was going to say, and I didn’t think having River along was the best idea. Maybe I should drop River off. We weren’t that far from home. No, Mom will sense immediately that something is up. He was a worse liar than I was, and he wasn’t much better at trying to stifle his emotions. He’d have to come along, though I was risking him spilling the beans to Mom and Dad later.

  “Let’s go.” I stuck the phone in my purse and we drove to the address in Spokane Valley that Alex had given me.

  * * *

  Alex was standing out in front of his house when we arrived, wearing the same hoodie and baseball hat, with a black t-shirt and jeans. His skin was no longer as pale, and he looked like he’d gained a good ten pounds in the last week. I lowered the passenger window, but he opened the rear passenger-side door and got in.

  “Let’s go,” he slammed the car door, “before my mom finds out I’m gone.”

  “Why?” Reluctantly, I pulled away from the curb.

  “Because she’s gotten really over-protective the last few months. She won’t let me go anywhere. I told her all week I felt great, but I’m lucky if she lets me out on the back deck.” He glanced back as if to make sure no one had come running out the front door. “She was out back, pulling the patio furniture out of the shed like I asked her to, so I could sit outside now that it’s nicer weather. I left her a note.”

  River was sitting half-turned in his seat, watching Alex.

  “Hi, I’m Alex.”

  “Uh…I know.”

  “And you are…?”

  “That’s River. My brother.” I angled my rear view mirror just a bit so I could see Alex. “Where are we going?”

  “Anywhere. Someplace we can talk. Alone. No offense, River.”

  “No problem.” But River was disappointed. He wanted a front-row seat to the impending implosion of my life.

  “There’s a park nearby,” Alex suggested. “I guess we could go there.”

  As we drove, I tried to rein in my anxiety. I could feel River getting antsy in the seat beside me. I stole glances at Alex in the rearview mirror. He looked good. Too good. And though it took me a full two minutes to realize it, the stench of the chemo was almost entirely absent. I had to pay attention in order to detect the faintest whiff of it.

  Alex directed me to a park about a mile from his house. We left River in the car to listen to the radio while we walked over to a picnic table under a shelter in an isolated area of the park. I sat down, and he paced in front of the table.

  I tried to talk about the weather, putting off the inevitable, but Alex wasn’t having that.

  “What did you do?” His expression was stern.

  “What?” My voice was small and quiet, like a child who’d been caught with her hand in the cookie jar.

  “You know what I’m talking about. I’ve been trying to figure it out for a few days now. But there’s only one answer. It was you.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.” I forced my face into a mask of innocence.

  “The doctors did new scans on Wednesday—”

  Oh crap. I started to panic.

  “—and you know what they found?” He stopped pacing, his gaze riveted on me.

  “Uh…no.” I glanced over toward the car, where River had perked up in his seat, watching us. He sensed something was amiss.

  “Nothing!”

  “N-nothing?” I stammered.

  “Or almost nothing. The cancer was almost completely gone!”

  That’s impossible. It’s far too soon. I didn’t know how to respond, and my breath came fast and shallow. “That’s…great. I’m so happy for you.” But my con
gratulations sounded weak, even to me.

  “Ember.” He leaned forward, placing both hands on the table. “On Saturday I was dying. While we were talking I had terrible spasms of pain. Then you put your hands on me, and five minutes later I felt better than I had in months.”

  I gulped, then pasted what I hoped was a seductive smile on my face. “Well, I’m flattered. Any time I can help, just ask.” I winked at him.

  Something flickered in his eyes, then it was gone. Angry, he pushed away from the table and resumed his pacing, his voice strident. “It wasn’t just that day. I’ve felt better and better every day since then. I haven’t felt this good in a year. I have some color back, I’ve gained fifteen pounds, and my hair is growing back.” He whipped his olive baseball cap off and bent forward, scrubbing his hand over the dark brown fuzz that covered his head. “Half an inch long in a week! How is that possible?”

  “I…” my brain wasn’t cooperating, and my well of witty comebacks had run dry. His healing shouldn’t have worked so quickly. It didn’t make sense, and now all my parents’ dire predictions were coming true.

  I hate it when that happens.

  I gazed down at the cracked wood of the tabletop, hoping for inspiration to hit.

  Alex sat down across from me at the picnic table, leaning forward. “Look at me Ember. Look into my eyes.”

  I looked up, and his eyes were no longer dark and agony-filled as they had been before. The pain was gone, and their color was more like a warm, chocolate brown.

  “Tell me,” he continued, “that you have no idea what I’m talking about. Tell me to my face that you had nothing to do with it. Because I don’t think you can.” He waited a moment, and after being met with my silence, he tore his gaze away, surveying the park and all its frolicking inhabitants who were out to enjoy the warm spring day. “I’ve been racking my brain, trying to figure out what happened. My parents think it’s a miracle. And maybe it is.” He looked back at me. “But not in the way they think…is it?”