Wingspan

by Karis Walsh

  The deer path widened slightly, and Bailey paused for a moment. She set the crate on a cushioned bed of sword ferns and pulled off her dark red sweatshirt so she was wearing only a white sports bra. The creatures of the woods wouldn’t care how inappropriately she was dressed. A picture of Ken, so well dressed and buttoned-up, came into her mind. What would it take to get Ken out of that pressed shirt and let Bailey get a look at what was underneath? Bailey wasn’t interested in Ken’s skin, just the tattoos etched across her chest. Well…she wouldn’t mind seeing the skin, either. She used the sleeve of her shirt to wipe a mist of perspiration off her forehead before tying it around her waist. The early morning air was cool, but the long uphill hike had warmed her body. The thought of Ken, stripped to her waist, wasn’t helping her rising body temperature. She picked a twig out of her bangs and refastened the white plastic barrette that held her long hair off her face before picking up the crate and resuming her hike. She pushed her thoughts off Ken and back to childhood hikes, when she used to wear a mask made of feathers she found on the forest floor. She would weave twigs and wildflowers and leaves in her hair and her clothing, as if by covering herself with these things she would be able to fully merge with the forest.

  The woods behind her childhood home hadn’t been nearly as big or as wild as the ones Bailey was in today, but they had seemed as limitless and hopeful as her childish imagination had been. Escaping the routine fights between her mother and father, Bailey had first sought refuge in the woods and had later learned everything she could about its flora and fauna. She had been particularly focused on the birds flitting through the branches or calling from just out of sight. She had convinced herself that she had been born in a nest and had accidentally fallen to the forest floor, where her human parents had discovered her. Instead of the raptor parents who would fight to protect their child, the human ones fought over and because of her. As an adult looking back, Bailey was able to separate the arguments in her mind into three phases. First, her mom and dad had simply fought with each other. Once they decided to divorce, they had used her as a pawn. After the divorce, when they each had started to date again, they argued against their hard-won custody rights. But young Bailey had only heard the yelling and breaking glass as her parents fought because of her—while ignoring her.

  As she neared the top of the hill, the heavy forest vegetation began to thin. She walked with a longer stride, anxious to get her small charge out of his confining quarters. With every step, she left her worries a little farther behind her. She had grown out of her childhood belief that she could eventually leave the world of humans completely and live in the forest with birds and animals as her only companions. Now she knew the necessity of coexisting with people, but she still had done her best to remain isolated. Her big rambling house was set in the exact center of the ten-acre piece of property, and her roommates were wild and temporary—injured birds of prey that resided with her until they were able to return to freedom. She had a few friends in Sequim and the surrounding areas on the Olympic Peninsula, and she occasionally had visitors when people dropped off wounded birds, but she could go for days without talking to another human.

  Quiet solitude. Not a perfect life—lonely sometimes, and always consuming her time and energy—but it was the one she had chosen. But now the cage she had willingly built around herself was about to be breached. It had been over a year since Vonda and her eagle had landed on her doorstep, nothing unusual at the Chase Raptor Center, but so very different this time. The chain of events had been set in motion then, and now the university was about to barge in and expand and send interns and students to mess up Bailey’s ordered life.

  She pulled in a lungful of mountain air, tasting bark and fresh greens and the hint of salt from the nearby Strait of Juan de Fuca. She had left her house early this morning, partly because she wanted to arrive at her destination not long after sunrise, but mostly because she wanted to be away when the vet med’s dean made his routine morning call to ask if she had reviewed the internship applications or if she had created lesson plans and reading lists for the seminars she would be teaching. Bailey hadn’t done much of the work he was asking her to do, and she knew her passive resistance was fueled by the desperate hope that he would eventually give up and go away.

  Bailey came to a stream, running swift and deeper than she had expected due to the late spring thaw in the Olympic Mountains. Out of habit, she looked for Ratty and Mole before she turned her attention to crossing the rivulet. There were several widely spaced boulders that were flat enough for her to stand on and close enough for her to make a big leap from stone to stone as she crossed the water. But, while the risk of a fall into the icy water was okay with her, it wasn’t acceptable for the small raptor she carried. Instead, she waded into the stream, feeling for each foothold on the slimy rocks as she held the crate over her head. She might fall during the crossing, but she wasn’t about to get her bird wet.

  At the deepest point, the water barely reached her knees. Bailey balanced her cautious progress with the need to get across before she lost all feeling in her feet and could no longer tell where she was stepping. She exhaled with a loud puff when she reached the pebbled bank. She hadn’t realized she had been holding her breath until she let it go. She paused and leaned against an oak tree to regain her composure, resting against the supportive trunk. She had climbed a tree like this one once, long ago, when she had found a Cooper’s hawk nestling on the ground. She had carefully scaled the tree with the tiny nestling cradled inside her sweater and against her beating heart. She had pushed aside her fear of heights in her desperate need to return the baby to its parents, climbing until she was level with the nest. The branch hadn’t looked strong enough to support her weight, so she had reached as far as she could and plopped the nestling back in its home.

  Unfortunately, the long reach had put her off balance, and Bailey had fallen through the branches and onto the ground with a thud and a crack. A neighbor had heard her screams and had found her lying in a heap with her broken tibia jutting out of her shin. Bailey leaned over and rubbed her leg where the scar was now hidden by her jeans. She hadn’t been allowed back into the woods after the accident, and her mom had moved them out of the Bremerton house soon after. She had never had a chance to return to the tree and find out if her baby bird had survived.

  Bailey shivered as the memory washed over her. The loud and unnatural crack of bone followed by the deafening silence of pain. She had screamed as much to lessen that silence as to get help. She shook her head as she straightened and noticed a cluster of chanterelles at the foot of the oak tree. She’d stop and gather some on her way back. They’d make a nice addition to the ramen noodles she had for dinner most nights. Feeding and preparing food for her bird patients rarely left her with the time or energy to make an elaborate meal for herself, but the mushrooms would add some nice flavor and a touch of elegance to her simple dinner. She thought of candlelight and soft music, someone like Ken sitting across from her as they ate. The fantasy was ridiculous, but it chased away the residual pain of Bailey’s childhood fall and the events following it. She moved away from the tree with a more purposeful stride.

  Another easy quarter mile or so, and Bailey waded through a yielding thicket of snowberry bushes—their pink-purple unopened buds looking like minuscule clumps of grapes—and stepped into a small meadow that covered the top of the hill. Tightly budded lupine stood at attention amidst the thick grass. She could see a valley below her, with horse pastures and gray-green lavender fields showing only a hint of the purple blossoms that would explode in a week or two. The whole region seemed to be holding its breath, waiting to exhale with a rush into spring. Except for a seagull circling one of the pastures, Bailey didn’t see any sign of the strait that lay just beyond the next hill.

  Bailey felt a curious conflict within herself as she set the crate on the ground. She felt as attuned to the world around her as if she and it were inhabiting one body, but her mind was cons
tantly being pulled back to the dean and her upcoming—and unwelcome—obligations. And, as usual on a release day, she felt the joy of a return to freedom tempered slightly by her sadness in letting a friend go. Although she usually tried to release birds close to where they had been found, she had chosen this spot instead for the small falcon. His old haunts were dangerous, and he had spent over an hour clutched in the mouth of a domestic cat while the owners tried to catch her and extricate the bird from her jaws. Despite Bailey’s protests, the owners adamantly refused to keep their three cats indoors, so Bailey had decided to let the kestrel go in this beautiful meadow. She would have been happy to call it home, so hopefully the bird would appreciate it as well.

  She unsnapped the sides of the crate and lifted it up in one easy motion so the kestrel stood on the base of the crate, completely unencumbered. On her first releases, she had used normal pet carriers, but after watching birds hitting the sides of the cages with their delicate wings on their way out of the narrow openings, she had designed and built her own version. Now she unlatched the top and raised it as if she were a well-trained waiter uncovering a plate at dinner. No potential for injury, and she was able to quietly step away and let the little raptor get his bearings.

  The kestrel puffed his feathers and looked around with an alert and wary expression. Bailey stared at him, memorizing the already familiar black spots on his belly and the exact shade of rust on his back. Although she wasn’t likely to see him again at such close range, she wanted to know him as one of hers if she ever spotted him again. He hesitated for a few seconds before launching off the wooden platform with rapid wingbeats. His reddish tail fanned out as he flew, tipped with black and a thin line of white. Bailey heard his high-pitched call as he soared toward the valley and out of sight.

  She used the hem of her sweatshirt to wipe away the tears flowing down her cheeks. Every release was the same, but every bird unique. She would never stop feeling the overwhelming wave of emotions as each one thrust into the air and into freedom. Loss and hope and a joy so great she didn’t know how she kept from dissolving into it. She snapped the lid on the crate bottom and picked it up. The kestrel had only weighed a few ounces, but she felt the emptiness and lifelessness of the box as she carried it back the way she had come. She pushed through the snowberries again as she walked down the hill. She had other birds at home, waiting for her attention. She had to spend weeks—sometimes well over a year—feeding and changing bandages and doing physical therapy with reluctant, and often belligerent, patients before she had the chance to experience the thrill of a release. But it was worth every sleepless night, every struggle-filled day, to help her birds find their way to health and freedom. And how many more would she be able to save with the university’s money and equipment to help? She’d have to find a way to work with the dean, to keep the intrusion on her space and privacy at a minimum, while using the vet school’s resources for her birds. They were all that mattered.

  Chapter Six

  Mud and blades of grass dotted the belly of Ken’s car, which had been an immaculate red and pristine white only an hour before. She wasn’t thrilled about driving her baby over gravel and dirt every day, but it was worth the extra time she’d spend washing and buffing to be able to live in this place. She hadn’t been to the property since her breakup with Ginny, two weeks earlier. She pushed through the tall, resisting grass and headed straight for the slope leading to the bluff. She walked to the very edge and listened to the water lap against the shore below. The same sound she had heard on the ferry ride this afternoon, and the same sea water that had traveled from the Pacific, around Cape Flattery at the tip of the Olympic Peninsula, and down the Strait of Juan de Fuca toward Puget Sound. But here, where it washed over the sand and pebbles, it was her water.

  Ken had only leased and rented before and had never owned. Had never belonged. Home had been a place to sleep and store her belongings, nothing more. She sat cross-legged on the thick grass and let the salty air move over and through her. She’d have to sacrifice to keep this place, to build a home here.

  That meant she had to do what she could to keep her job at Impetus, although her first week there hadn’t been promising. Her old firm was more her style. Architects and developers and sales staff had looked the same if you met them in the halls—as bland and indistinctive as the houses they built and sold. She had worked mostly alone, in her private office, and she blended in with the other suit-wearing employees. Impetus was too much of a change. Every person working there was different, and Ken had learned long ago that being different was dangerous.

  Ken climbed to her feet and walked up the slope, aiming left toward the site of the home she had planned for Ginny. Between settling in her new apartment in Sequim and struggling through the days at Impetus, Ken had made it through two weeks with little sense of loss or loneliness. Her main goal had been to avoid Dougie at work—easily accomplished since she had spent her days shadowing Jessica on-site. They had wandered through the client’s home, taking measurements and consulting blueprints as Jessica tried to make the owner’s vision a reality. Jessica had been open to Ken’s suggestions, asking for her opinion and her creative input with a collaborative spirit Ken had never experienced at her old firm. Unfortunately, Ken had been thrust too far out of her element. Instead of offering any worthwhile contribution, her mind had felt frozen and sluggish. She had been less help than a first-year intern. The stress of the week and the admittedly wearing commute from the Peninsula to Bellevue had left her with no energy to devote to missing Ginny. But she had missed her future home. Somehow this small patch of land had made its way into her and claimed her in a way no woman, no person, had been able to do.

  Ken found the stakes-and-string outline of the house, buried in the deep grass, and followed the border to the spot where the front door would stand. Her original idea had been to put the two-story model Ginny preferred in the same place where the old double-wide had sat. Now she wondered if she’d been too hasty in getting it removed. Maybe she could get it back, even though it had been dingy and had smelled of mold and fried clams. At least it would be a cheap roof over her head and would mean she didn’t have to keep the new job. But she wanted her gourmet kitchen and her bedroom with expansive windows looking out toward the Strait. Her sunny office space with drafting table and floor-to-ceiling bookshelves. Her home.

  She clenched her fist, feeling the reassuring tightening of her biceps. She’d have a dedicated workout space in her new home, next to her bedroom. A place to maintain the body she’d started to build after eighth grade. When she had walked through Impetus in search of Jessica, she had seen Dougie. He looked the same as he had back then. Glasses and long, slightly mussed bangs that he kept flicking out of his eyes. An honest-to-God pocket protector in his short-sleeved shirt. She had shamefully ducked into the copy room until he had walked past, but she’d have to face him—and their shared past—eventually.

  Ken picked a jagged rock out of her kitchen space and threw it as hard as she could. She didn’t make it to the water, but it landed with a satisfying crack against a large boulder. She had changed, but he could have walked right back to seventh grade without missing a beat. Back to Rocket Club and Math Challenge and weekends playing Dungeons & Dragons. Back to the time when it didn’t matter if Ken was a tomboy or different or smarter than the other kids in her class. But in eighth grade it had started to matter. And Ken had walked away from friends like Dougie and everything they represented.

  She started pulling up the stakes, winding the string around her left hand. The site she had originally marked out for the house was level and close to the road, but now that she was no longer building for Ginny, she could create anything she wanted. She’d been drawn to the sloping center of the property from the start. The view and light were better, and the space was precisely in the center of the acre. A traditional house wouldn’t look right, so maybe she’d come up with something different. She could do whatever she wanted. Build Euterpe’
s house and invite Bailey to visit. If she spent time thinking about it, she could imagine Bailey in this place, so she made a determined effort to stop thinking about it and focused instead on the slight weariness in her thighs as she bent to pull up stakes.

  She had not only been neglecting visits to her property, but she had also missed too many trips to the gym in the past weeks. She had started working out in high school as self-defense against the other kids and their escalating violence. Small pushes and shoves had turned into after-school attacks, but Ken had managed to halt the progression by getting strong. Strong enough to beat up the leader of whatever pack had decided to come after her. Strong enough to protect Dougie and her old gang even though she couldn’t call attention to herself by hanging out with them anymore. It hadn’t been enough.

  She jerked out the last of the stakes. She’d keep her job at Impetus because she needed it, and because she had the potential to be damned good at it. But she wouldn’t return to her old geeky self. She’d work in the spacious, wall-free building, but she’d bring her own walls with her.

  Ken opened the trunk of her car and tossed the string and stakes inside among the loose drawing supplies. She had left the cardboard box at Bailey’s after transporting the osprey in it. She shut the trunk with a firm click and got in the car. So far, the osprey was the one positive result of her purchase of this property. If she hadn’t come here after her lunch with Ginny, he might not have survived long enough to be rescued by someone else. She started the engine with a satisfying loud roar and drove down the gravel road. She’d stop by Bailey’s center on her way back to her apartment. Bailey might not admit the osprey was Ken’s, but he was the one tangible and hopeful sign that life was going to be good on this desolate acre of land. Ken had to see him and reassure herself they were both going to be all right.