Nick and June Were Here

by Shalanda Stanley

  Every time she said John’s name, it stung. She was one more person who knew he was home, one more person who knew more than I did.

  “Why did John come back early?”

  She shook her head and put her arm out to rest against the counter, like just thinking about it made her tired. “You think I know? He doesn’t talk to me, doesn’t tell me anything. I wouldn’t have known the boy was home if he hadn’t been with Hank when it happened.”

  “Why mail his ashes? Why wouldn’t you keep him here, with you?”

  “I didn’t know where John got off to and I figured if only one of us got to keep him, it should be you,” she said.

  She said it like she thought she was doing the right thing. Maybe she was.

  “I didn’t know you were gonna get arrested, or that any of this other shit was gonna happen,” she said, flicking her hand toward June. She angrily flipped over the bacon in the skillet. “So you’re bringing him back? That’s what this is about?”

  “I’m bringing him home,” I said.

  “But now you’ve brought all this trouble down on you. They’re gonna throw the book at you when you go back to Creed.”

  “I’m not going back.”

  June bumped the leg of the table with her bag as she stood, knocking over the salt and pepper shakers.

  “I need to go to the bathroom,” she said.

  My mom pointed in the direction of the bathroom and June quickly walked down the hall and shut the door behind her.

  “Somebody’s not happy about that,” Mom said. “I don’t blame her.”

  “What does it matter to you?” I asked. “You’re here. You don’t come to Creed anyway. I see you once a year on my way to the cabin. If that.”

  “Seeing you once a year is better than never seeing you again,” she said.

  “Isn’t not knowing where I am better than knowing exactly where I am?” I asked.

  She knew I meant prison. She looked pained. She didn’t say anything else. A few minutes later, June came out of the bathroom. The bacon burned. We ate it anyway.

  “They’ve blocked the roads going up the mountain,” Larry said, gesturing toward the TV.

  It was a newsbreak. A reporter said that police had set up roadblocks along all major highways. There was a number to call if anyone had any information. They said it was a manhunt.

  I’d known that they’d be looking for me, that I couldn’t just walk out of Durrant and it not be a big deal, but I hadn’t counted on a manhunt. I hadn’t thought they’d try that hard to find me as long as I left town. Once I was out of Creed, I wasn’t their problem anymore.

  June stood next to me, her eyes glued to the TV. It was her. It had to be. Her parents wanted her back. Everybody did. The only reason the cops were pulling out all the stops was because June was with me. Everybody wanted her back.

  “They probably feel like a roadblock is the best way to stop y’all,” Mom said. “They know once you get up the mountain, the odds of them finding you aren’t good. You’re not gonna be able to drive up to Hank’s.”

  “What about walking in?” I asked.

  “That could work,” she said. “I know Hank hiked from here to the cabin before. You’ll need supplies. We need to take a look out in the storage room. I’ve probably got what you’ll need. We’ll see if we can find Hank’s old compass, too.”

  She kept throwing out the word we like she was a part of this.

  “You’re at least a four- or five-hour hike to the cabin from here,” she said. “Well, that’s how long it took Hank.” She said it like it’d probably take me a lot longer. “You’ll need matches, batteries, bug spray…” She moved around the kitchen and wrote everything down as it came to her.

  June was still glued to the TV. She looked as shocked as I felt.

  My mom came in the living room. “Let’s go take a look,” she said. She opened the back door and went outside, not waiting for us.

  We followed her to the storage room out back and Mom starting handing me things.

  “There’s an old tent in here somewhere,” she said. She looked at June and then at me. “In case you don’t make it to Hank’s before nightfall.” She pulled out an old army rucksack. “This was Hank’s,” she said. “He won’t mind if you use it.”

  We packed everything she thought we’d need and I could carry into the rucksack. She found the compass. I’d need it for sure. I had a pretty good idea about the direction the cabin was in, but it was easy to get turned around out there.

  June went inside for one more trip to the bathroom. She said it was because she wanted to take advantage of one while we had it, but I knew she wanted to give me a chance to be alone with my mom. I needed it.

  My mom knew this was it. I wasn’t coming back. She looked at me expectantly, like she needed me to say something to make all of this all right. When I didn’t say anything, her shoulders slumped. I thought about what Hank used to tell me to do. He’d tell me to let go of the hurt and forgive her for not being the mom I needed. But that wasn’t the hard part. He hadn’t just wanted me to make peace with the bad times; he’d wanted me to try to remember things I didn’t want to, the things it hurt to think about. He’d wanted me to remember the good times.

  She put her arms around me for another hug. I hugged her back this time.

  When I was seven years old, my mom had taken me and John to the county fair. She bought us blue cotton candy and we rode everything at least twice. The Ferris wheel was my favorite. She knew the guy working it and he let us ride it over and over again. We were some of the last people to leave, even though she had to get up early the next morning for work. On the way out, she held my hand and squeezed it three times. It was something she did from time to time. Each squeeze was a word. I love you.

  I answered with two of my own squeezes, like she’d taught me. How much?

  Then she pretend-squeezed my hand as hard as she could, grunting and putting on a real show.

  “So much,” she said.

  I knew she loved me.

  “I need you to do something else for me,” I said now.

  I could tell by the look on her face that she would agree to anything, and that was good, because that was what I needed.

  * * *

  —

  June came back outside and I steeled myself. My mom didn’t say anything, just walked back into the trailer.

  June checked the gear. “There’s only one sleeping bag,” she said.

  I nodded.

  She raised her eyebrow, like she thought I was being cute, like I’d packed one so we’d have to share.

  “You’re not coming with me,” I said.

  “What?” Her face fell and my stomach fell with it.

  “You’re gonna stay with my mom and she’ll call your parents. She’s calling them now. They’ll come get you.”

  “No.” She looked back at the trailer, her face panicked.

  “It’s the right thing, June. I shouldn’t have—”

  “No,” she repeated. “You don’t get to do this.”

  “Do what?”

  “Take it all away from me.”

  I reached for her but she backed away. I tried not to let the rejection show in my face. “June, last night—”

  “I feel better.”

  She knew I didn’t believe her.

  “I promise,” she said.

  “It’s too late.” I gestured to the trailer.

  “You asked me to come with you,” she said. “You begged me. You said you needed me. You said you couldn’t do it without me.”

  Because I was selfish.

  “You said need. Is that not true anymore? You don’t need me anymore?” she asked.

  “Of course it’s still true,” I said. “But at what cost to you?”

  “We
can’t stop now. We have to keep going. We’re going to bury Hank and then you’ll disappear and I’ll never see you again.”

  “You were crying when we left that diner, like being with me was the wrong choice.”

  “That wasn’t why I was crying.”

  “Then why—”

  “We don’t have time to get into everything that’s led us here. We just have to do what we set out to do. That’s the only thing we can do. You have to bury Hank. I have to be with you when you do it. I’ll say goodbye to you there, not here in your mom’s backyard.”

  Mom watched us through the tiny window in her back door. June followed my look to my mom and stood between us. She took my hand.

  “Let’s get out of here,” she said. “I want to get out of here with you.”

  It was the only thing I wanted, too, even though it was a mistake. I squeezed her hand twice. I looked back at my mom and hoped that it wasn’t too late, that she hadn’t called June’s parents yet.

  “Let’s go,” I said, and pulled her into the woods.

  There was no path. There wasn’t even a hint of one. I kept tripping, my feet catching on twigs and other things hidden in the underbrush. Nick didn’t stumble. He walked easily, like the Ozarks were his backyard.

  “I spy something green,” I said, trying to lighten the mood. He hadn’t said much since we’d left his mom’s.

  “Try spying something that isn’t green,” he said.

  He wasn’t mad at me, just worried. He didn’t want to be wrong about bringing me with him.

  “Is now a bad time to tell you I’m allergic to poison ivy, poison oak, pretty much all of the poisons?” I asked.

  He’d been walking ahead of me and he turned to face me, walking backward.

  “Show-off,” I said, tripping over something sticking out of the ground.

  “Since when are you allergic?” he asked.

  “Since forever. Since the beginning of my life, or whenever it is you develop allergies.”

  “I can’t believe I didn’t know that,” he said.

  “You don’t know everything about me. I have secrets.”

  “Like what?”

  “If I told you, they wouldn’t be secrets.”

  He smirked and turned back around.

  There were some things he didn’t need to know about, like the texts I’d just sent Bethany.

  When I’d gone back inside his mom’s trailer to use the bathroom, I’d seen Larry’s cell phone on the edge of the kitchen table. I knew it was his because I’d seen him holding it earlier when he was watching TV. Larry was sitting in his recliner, his back to me, and I grabbed it and went to the bathroom and locked myself in. I shot a text to Bethany.

  It’s June. We’re OK. Please tell my parents not to worry. Tell them I’m fine and to call off the manhunt. I’ll be home soon.

  I counted the seconds. By the time I got to thirty-two, I was convinced she wasn’t going to text back, but then those three little dots popped up on the screen.

  June!!! Where are you? It’s too late to tell your parents not to worry. That ship has sailed. They’ve lost their minds. Are you really OK?

  They’d lost their minds. But I knew that. There was a manhunt and roadblocks.

  Yes, I’m OK.

  We both knew that was a lie.

  Please be careful. You’ve got to come back home.

  I will.

  When???

  I didn’t know when, so I didn’t answer, just left the bathroom and put the cell phone back on the table. Larry hadn’t moved and I was pretty sure I heard him snoring.

  “What if the police come looking for us out here?” I asked Nick now, wanting to change the conversation and also because I was scared the police were coming in the woods after us.

  He waved his arm out. “They can’t sneak up on us out here. And they’ll stick to the main trails. We won’t be on those.”

  I’d noticed.

  “Don’t worry,” Nick said. “We’ll be fine.”

  But he looked nervous. He kept checking the compass and saying, “Don’t worry,” but he pushed us forward like we were running from something. If it wasn’t the police, I wondered what we were running from. Maybe he was running to something. His uncle’s place, his favorite spot, or John.

  We’d walked miles and I was wilting. I knew Nick hoped we could make it to the cabin before dark. He’d check the compass and turn us this way or that way. I really hoped he knew how to read it and where we were going. For all I knew, we could’ve been walking in circles.

  “We’re not gonna make it to the cabin before nightfall,” he said. “And we don’t need to be walking out here in the dark. It’s too easy to get turned around.”

  “Even with the compass?”

  “Even with the compass.”

  We walked a bit farther and the ground leveled off. It seemed like we’d been on an incline since we’d left his mom’s trailer.

  “This is as good a spot as any,” he said. “We’ll camp here tonight.” He dropped his pack and rolled his shoulders back. “I gotta use the bathroom,” he said.

  “Make sure you flush.”

  “Ha-ha. You’re hilarious.”

  He stepped behind the trees and I pulled out my notebook.

  I turned to a new page and titled it “Symptom-Free Days.” Only a few more hours to go and I could add a tally mark. The little girl had been quiet all day. I’d thought about making a sign like the ones that hung outside the sawmills in Creed that read __ DAYS WITH NO ACCIDENTS. I was still debating it.

  I turned to another page.

  Dear Bethany,

  I’m sorry I didn’t text you back, but I don’t know when this trip ends or when I’ll be home. I’m camping without you for the first time. It’ll be weird. We don’t have flashlights or marshmallows.

  I’m trying to focus on things that don’t scare me. Yesterday we passed through a town called Flippin. It’s even smaller than Creed, just a mile along the highway, with only one church that I saw. It’s the Flippin Church of God.

  Love, June

  I tore the page out, folded it in half, and placed it under a rock.

  Nick was gone longer than I thought he should’ve been, so I set up the camp, pulling at the brush so we’d have a cleared spot for the tent. I didn’t know how cold it would get at night, so I pulled out the jacket I knew Nick had packed for me and was unrolling the tent when he came back, his arms full of firewood.

  “You’re a natural,” he said, smiling.

  “This isn’t my first camping trip.”

  “Yeah, but this isn’t your backyard.”

  “That’s true. Good thing I have you.”

  He let the wood drop to the ground and dug in his pack, pulling out matches. “Good thing,” he said.

  He had the tent up and the fire going in no time.

  We sat across from each other, the fire between us, and we ate the only food we had. It was Little Debbie snack cakes and chips from his mom’s pantry.

  “Tell me another story,” he said.

  He wanted a distraction.

  “What should it be about?” I asked.

  “Tell me something that can’t happen.”

  “Like what?”

  Maybe he wanted another story with dragons.

  “Tell me how we grow old together.”

  I met his eyes over the fire and saw the hurt in them.

  “There was a girl named June and a boy named Nick,” I said. “They lived on top of a mountain in a tiny cabin.”

  I tried to picture it. It would look like the cabin in Nick’s painting, the one in the loft of the barn back in Creed.

  “Nick spent his days trying to impress her, so she’d fall deeper and deeper in love with him.”
r />   “Did it work?” he asked.

  “Yes. He built her something new every day and painted on her every night, and she loved him more than he thought she should, but he was wrong. She loved him just the right amount.”

  I wanted to come to his side of the fire but I stayed put.

  “They lived out their days in the cabin, until they were old and gray,” I said. “Until their wrinkles made them look nothing like they had before.”

  Until they’d said all the words that could be said, until there was only silence and the two of them.

  “I wish it could be real,” I said.

  Nick didn’t say anything, just threw a stick into the fire. And another one. And another one.

  I stood and went to him, dropping down in front of him so he couldn’t throw any more sticks in the fire.

  “It’s okay,” I said, even though it wasn’t.

  He pulled me into his body, wrapping his arms around me, his face resting in the crook of my neck.

  We heard the noise at the same time. I felt Nick tense up around me. It was the sound of twigs snapping under something heavy. My heartbeat picked up and I tried to remember what kinds of animals lived in the mountains.

  Nick stood.

  I was pretty sure that the Ozarks had bears.

  The noise came from a gap between the trees, a thick black space, so black I couldn’t see through it. This wasn’t a symptom. There was something out there.

  It came closer.

  “Get in the tent,” Nick said.

  I stood to do what he said but it was too late. Nick pulled me behind him.

  I saw the boots first. They stepped between the trees and into the clearing.

  It wasn’t a bear. It wasn’t a symptom.

  It was John.

  Around my uncle Hank’s cabin, there were stands of yellow pine that reached ninety feet high and were so close together that they blocked out the sun. During my third summer at Hank’s, I got lost. Earlier that day, me, Hank, and John had all set off to find a particular kind of birch wood that Hank needed for a project. Hank had thought we’d cover more ground if we split up, but he’d wanted me with either him or John, because he said I wasn’t ready to go off on my own yet. I’d wanted to prove him wrong, so I agreed to go with John and then “accidentally” got separated from him. I’d always had a good sense of direction, so I thought I’d be fine. I’d show back up at Hank’s and be like, “See, I told you I could do it. Now stop babying me.”