The Wild

by Owen Laukkanen

  Warden and Kyla stand in the back, whispering to each other and glaring at Christian and Amber. Dawn figures they probably have a good reason to be mad; she’s not sure about Warden, but Kyla’s been here for more than three months.

  Christian only keeps me around because he likes looking at my ass, Kyla said. Dawn’s starting to think that might be true.

  * * *

  After the promotions (or lack thereof), the group resupplies. Christian and Amber hand out food and clean clothes to everyone, and then each member of the Pack gets fifteen minutes in the little bathroom inside headquarters to wash and brush his/her teeth and otherwise freshen up.

  This is so nobody looks completely ratchet in the ensuing photographs, which Out of the Wild sends to every group member’s family and/or parole officer to prove that their precious baby/repeat offender is still alive and didn’t fall off a cliff yet.

  Dawn scowls at the camera and Christian behind it and hopes when Cam and Wendy see the photo they feel so terribly guilty they bring her home early.

  But Christian just chuckles. “Your folks read the brochure,” he says. “They know this ain’t summer camp.”

  Then he tosses her a headlamp.

  “Congratulations on a decent first week,” he says. “There’s your reward.”

  Dawn stares at the headlamp. “This is my reward?” she says. “Where’s my freaking tent?”

  Christian lowers the camera. “Oh, right,” he says. “Your tent.”

  “You said if I did okay, I wouldn’t have to sleep under a tarp anymore,” Dawn tells him. “That’s what you said.”

  “You’re right,” Christian says, but his voice is that kind of sticky sweet that lets Dawn know he’s bullshitting. “How stupid of me. What if I book you a suite at the Ritz to make up for it, Dawn? Would that be okay?”

  Dawn stares at him. “You said,” she says.

  “You’ve been here for six days,” Christian says, his voice hard again. “You’ve got to work a little harder if you want to earn that tent, Dawn.”

  Then he raises the camera again.

  Looks back at the rest of the group.

  “Next!”

  * * *

  The resupply and the rest of it takes maybe a couple of hours. It’s nice to get clean clothes and to wash your face with hot water, but it doesn’t last, and then Christian and Amber are telling the group to pack up again, and Dawn’s struggling to fit all of the new food into her stupid makeshift tarp backpack, and Christian and Amber confer over a map briefly and then seem to come to a decision.

  “Okay, Pack,” Christian says, squaring his shoulders. “Say goodbye to civilization for another week.”

  There’s nothing but grumbles and muttered swear words in response. But Christian doesn’t hear it. He’s already disappeared down a trail into the rain forest again.

  NOTHING MUCH HAPPENS over the next week. That’s the beauty of the Out of the Wild program. You hike and sleep and hike and sleep and you’re tired and sore and hungry all the time and every day just fades into the next.

  The Pack hikes through the rain forest and they camp every night, and aside from a few more blisters and bug bites, nothing much changes.

  Dawn hikes with Lucas, most of the time. They linger toward the back, but usually Kyla’s behind them and sometimes Brandon and Evan. Amber usually brings up the rear, to make sure nobody gets lost or, you know, tries to escape.

  Warden is always at the front of the Pack. He’s tall and muscular and capable, and Brandon and Evan seem drawn to him. They’re always in his orbit, and since Dawn’s kind of weirded out by Brandon and Evan, she never goes near Warden.

  Warden doesn’t say much around the campfire.

  He broods.

  He knows what he’s doing out here, though; that’s for certain.

  And he’s pretty cute.

  * * *

  But Dawn doesn’t think about Warden much. She’s too busy enjoying hanging with Lucas.

  Lucas is goofy. He has funny stories to tell Dawn about life back home in Fort Collins, and he likes country music and sings songs in a terrible cowboy yodel until Dawn’s ears are nearly bleeding and she’s begging him to stop, but she’s laughing while she does it because he’s so freaking into it—and she’d never tell him, but he’s actually a pretty good singer, when he’s being serious.

  (And even when he’s not being serious, his terrible singing takes her mind off her blisters and her aching muscles and her empty stomach, and it feels good to, you know, laugh every now and then.)

  Among Lucas’s talents is he does a pretty good imitation of Christian’s ghoul voice. “Bear Cub,” he tells Dawn when she’s slacking. “Pick up the pace, you’re falling behind.” It’s exactly what Christian would say, and how Christian would say it, and Lucas even gets this look on his face like Christian, like he’s got a stick so far up his ass it’s propping his head up.

  It doesn’t make Dawn walk any faster, but it does make her laugh.

  It’s good to laugh out here.

  It makes Dawn almost feel almost normal.

  AMBER FALLS IN STEP BESIDE DAWN and Lucas a few days into their second week on the trail. “Hey, Lucas,” she says. “Do you mind if I talk to Dawn on her own for a little bit?”

  Lucas is in the middle of telling some story in Christian’s voice.

  “Sure, no problem,” he says, and it comes out in Christian’s voice and he immediately goes red and looks panicked. “I mean, shit. Sorry.”

  Amber laughs. “No worries,” she says. “That’s Christian, right? It’s pretty good.”

  Lucas looks down at the ground. “Please don’t demote me.”

  “I’m not going to bust you,” Amber says, rolling her eyes. “Come on, dude. Just don’t let Christian hear you, or you’ll be a Bear Cub for life.”

  Lucas exhales and looks relieved.

  “Now, can I get some time alone with Dawn, please?” Amber asks him.

  Lucas nods. “Yeah, of course,” he says. “I’m really sorry.”

  Then he hurries up the trail a little bit. Joins Kyla where she’s hiking. Dawn watches him start a conversation with Kyla and feels stupidly jealous.

  But Amber’s touching her shoulder.

  “So, Dawn,” she says. “How are you doing?”

  It’s a stupid question. The answer is self-evident.

  How am I doing? I’m marooned in the woods doing forced marches until I die, Amber. I hate everything.

  How are you doing?

  But Dawn knows that Amber isn’t going to be satisfied with I hate everything as an answer. So she shrugs. “My feet hurt,” she says. “And I’m really hungry.”

  Amber looks at her. “Uh-huh.” It’s like she’s waiting for an answer that isn’t just complaining. Dawn gives it a beat, but Amber’s kind of stubborn.

  Finally, Dawn sighs. “I’m fine, I guess,” she says. “I want to go home, but I doubt you’re going to let me do that, so, whatever.”

  “Come on,” Amber says. “You don’t want to go home now, do you? Isn’t this kind of fun?”

  This time, Dawn stares at Amber until Amber kind of laughs and shakes her head. “Well, you’re right, we can’t let you go yet,” she says. “Not until you’re a Grizzly. But we’ll get you there. I promise.”

  “Okay,” Dawn says. “I mean, whatever. Is this what you wanted to talk to me about?”

  * * *

  There’s another part of the Out of the Wild MO that I haven’t brought up yet. It’s the part where they try to get you to TALK about your FEELINGS.

  It’s the part where you EXPLORE why you’re so ANGRY and why it makes you ACT OUT.

  Sometimes this happens in a GROUP SETTING and sometimes it’s ONE-ON-ONE.

  Right now, for Dawn and Amber, it’s ONE-ON-ONE.

  * * *


  “Your file says you ran away from home,” Amber tells Dawn as they hike up the side of a narrow, rocky river. “Do you want to talk about that?”

  “Not really,” Dawn says. She’s hoping she can just stonewall Amber, deflect until it’s time to stop for lunch or dinner or make camp or resupply or go home.

  She is aware this is probably going to be impossible.

  “I also read that you’ve got a bit of a drug habit,” Amber says. “Do you want to tell me about that?”

  “No thank you,” Dawn says.

  “I guess there was a guy, too,” Amber says. “Somebody older? Your parents were worried he was a bad influence.”

  “You mean my mom,” Dawn says before she can stop herself. “I don’t have parents. My dad’s dead.”

  This is THE WRONG THING TO SAY to a person like Amber. Dawn knows it as soon as she says it. She can see how Amber immediately perks up. “I heard that, too,” Amber says. “I’m so sorry. It’s been a couple of years, right?”

  Dawn feels the first tingle of panic. “I don’t want to talk about it,” she says.

  “I get that,” Amber tells her. “I really do. But it might help, you know, talking to someone? You can’t just keep these feelings bottled up inside.”

  Sure I can, Dawn thinks. Just try me.

  “I know it must have been hard on you,” Amber says. “According to your file, you started acting out shortly after your dad passed.”

  Dawn feels it like sandpaper on her nerves. Rubbing grit into her, making her squirm. “I don’t want to talk about it,” she says again. Tries to shut down, go flat and numb and lifeless.

  “I know you’re not a bad kid, Dawn,” Amber says. “Your mom says in your file that you’re smart and creative and kind, and hey, I can sense that just spending time around you. I’d love to help you get back to that person we both know you are, if you’d let me.”

  Dawn thinks that Amber doesn’t know anything about her, that she’s full of shit, that she’s not qualified to say anything about how Dawn should lead her life just because she read a freaking file.

  But she also wants to believe Amber. She wants to believe there’s a way out of this that doesn’t involve screaming fits with your mom and sex with drug dealers. She wants to believe life is going to get better.

  What she doesn’t want to do is have to talk about her dad. Not now or ever. Not to Amber or anyone else. She doesn’t want to think about him, period.

  She just can’t.

  “I don’t want to talk about it,” she tells Amber again. And this time Amber seems to actually hear her.

  “That’s okay,” the counselor says. She smiles at Dawn brightly and touches her shoulder. “Another time, maybe,” she says.

  I doubt it, Dawn thinks, but she doesn’t say anything. She just quickens her pace and tries to catch up with Lucas and Kyla.

  And leaves Amber in her dust.

  A WEEK PASSES. Dawn spends it mostly with Lucas. She avoids Amber and really avoids Christian. She figures out, mostly, how to set up her tarp. She eats more rice and lentils than she ever thought possible, and still it doesn’t feel like enough.

  She goes to bed hungry.

  Her pants start to feel noticeably looser.

  A week passes.

  * * *

  At the end of the week, the Out of the Wild Bear Pack staggers back into headquarters, and there’s a new recruit waiting for them, spiffed out in bright-yellow “Bear Club” gear. He’s standing outside the headquarters buildings with the guy who brought Dawn from the airport, Steve. He watches the group stagger in from the woods and his eyes just get wider and wider.

  “Hey, group,” Steve says when the Pack reaches the buildings. “Meet Alex.”

  Alex is from Spokane. He’s tall and looks fit and Dawn thinks he should be okay in the woods. But he’s looking at the Pack like they’re a horde of zombies. Or, like, prisoners in some wartime camp.

  Alex doesn’t look scared. He doesn’t look like the kind of guy who gets scared.

  But the way he’s looking at Dawn and the others, Dawn can tell he’s at least, you know, unnerved.

  Alex shares his Origin Story as they stand around outside headquarters.

  “I’m from Spokane, like that dude said,” he tells the Pack while they wait for Christian to take their pictures and give them new gear. “Inner city, as much as you could say that there is one there.”

  He says it was stealing that got him dragged out here. “Stickup kids,” he says, kind of grinning. “Me and this guy I was kind of sort of seeing. We’d steal anything that wasn’t nailed down.”

  He shrugs. “Wasn’t anything violent,” he says. “We were just bored. Kind of for the challenge of it, nothing else. Steal a bunch of shit and go somewhere and hook up.”

  He meets Dawn’s eyes.

  “Anyway, we got caught, and my man blamed me for everything. And then the youth counselor asked me did I like camping.”

  Alex says, “I told her I didn’t care for it.”

  He smiles again.

  “Wrong answer.”

  The rest of the Pack kind of laughs with Alex. As far as Origin Stories go, it’s not the worst thing they’ve ever heard.

  And Alex doesn’t seem altogether miserable to be out here. And he kind of looks like he knows what he’s doing. He seems to know how to bundle all of his stuff in his tarp, anyway.

  Alex seems like a Good Dude.

  He’s not bitter, at least.

  (Dawn wonders how long that will last.)

  BRANDON GETS HIS PROMOTION to Black Bear this week, probably just so Evan will stop teasing him. The clouds above Warden and Kyla get darker. Even Lucas looks disappointed.

  But Amber takes Dawn aside. “We can’t promote you yet,” she tells Dawn. “But you did have a pretty good week. So me and Christian decided you were due for a reward.”

  Dawn wonders just how much input Christian had in this decision. Somehow, she doesn’t think he cares. But Amber clearly does. She actually looks happy for Dawn, like this is some big event in her life.

  Amber touches Dawn on the shoulder. “Come on,” she says, grinning. “Rewards are in the cabin.” She gestures through the open cabin door. After a beat, Dawn sighs and follows her inside.

  * * *

  The rewards are pretty basic. Dawn’s options are:

  a hiking backpack, or

  a tent

  “You also get some better food,” Amber tells her. “So you don’t have to eat lentils all the time. And whatever you don’t pick this time, you can take next week when we come back to resupply. Just keep doing great, like you’re already doing, and you’ll be kitted out in no time.”

  The tent and the backpack are laid out like game show prizes on the floor of the little supply room. Dawn looks from one to the other and back again.

  (Wonders again how she arrived at this stupid place in her life.)

  Amber nudges her. “So, what do you think?” she asks. “Which reward do you choose?”

  Dawn looks at the tent and the backpack and wishes she could trade either one for a plane ticket to Chicago. But that clearly isn’t happening.

  She looks outside, where the rest of the Pack is sitting on the grass in the clearing, or leaned up against their backpacks, taking advantage of the break to rest a little bit. They all have backpacks and tents.

  Dawn catches Lucas’s eye, and he gives her a little wave and jogs over. “What’s up?” he asks.

  “Dawn’s trying to decide which reward to choose,” Amber tells him, fully buying into the game show host role. “Do you have any advice for her, Lucas?”

  Lucas (dork) takes the question very seriously. “I mean, it sucks lugging your stuff around in a tarp,” he says, scratching his head. “But my life really got better when I upgraded to m
y tent. So many less bug bites.”

  “So I should take the tent,” Dawn says. “That’s what you’re saying?”

  Lucas screws up his face. Turns around and looks up at the sky like the clouds have answers.

  “I mean, it’s probably not going to rain too much this week, right?” he says, looking at Amber for confirmation. “And the bugs really aren’t so bad now that summer’s over.”

  So I should take the pack? Dawn wants to ask him. Come on, man, help me out here. She doesn’t get the chance, though, because Christian walks into the supply room from the office, eating a microwaved burrito and scratching his chest.

  “We ready to move out?” he asks Amber.

  “Just about,” Amber replies. “Just waiting on Dawn to choose her reward.”

  Christian chews his burrito. It smells absolutely delicious, and for a split second, Dawn contemplates murdering him for half of it. But he’s bigger than her, and she doesn’t have any weapons.

  Christian keeps scratching. “We gotta move out,” he tells Amber. “If she doesn’t want the reward, she doesn’t have to have either; I don’t care.”

  Amber gives Dawn a look that’s half apology, half exasperation—though with Christian or Dawn, Dawn isn’t sure. “We’re getting there, Christian,” she says. “You round up the others and we’ll finish up in here.”

  Christian finishes his burrito. “Don’t keep us waiting,” he says. “Lots of ground to cover.”

  He ambles away, and Amber’s eyes meet Dawn’s again, and now Dawn’s reasonably certain it’s Christian who Amber’s tired of, not her.

  “So what do you think?” Amber says again, her voice a little less cheery. “The pack or the tent?”

  * * *