CHAPTER ONE
Here I am lost in the woods.
It’s my fault.
Damn it all.
“You’re such a fucking idiot, Kristy!” The words hang in the air and I finally just shake my head in irritation. I mean, I’m Kristy. I’m also the one who says the words. They’re pretty damned true. That doesn’t change that it’s a petty, stupid thing for me to say. It’s no different than the tantrum I threw that got me in the situation in the first place. Plus, whenever I talk to myself, I sound silly. It’s hard to maintain the right level of self-disdain when you feel like giggling.
Of course, feeling like giggling makes me pretty damned pissed at myself, too. I have nothing at all to giggle about. Have you ever gotten in a big fight, storm off, and not remember what the hell it was that got you angry?
Yeah.
Now imagine you storm off and keep storming because you’re way too stubborn to let your mom think she wins. You storm off and even catch a ride in the back of Old Man Johnson’s pick-up so you can go all the way to the lake. You don’t mind sharing the back of the truck with his three blue tick hounds because they’re the cutest, sweetest dogs in Rockwell Pass. He drops you off like you asked, on the road above Turtle Cove and as he drives away you realize you’re not angry anymore.
All right, that’s probably too specific for you to imagine, especially if you’re not from Rockwell Pass. So, let me stop trying to get you to understand how I feel and just tell you what happened. I wanted to borrow the car. My mom said not tonight. I went ballistic.
I don’t know why.
She lets me borrow the car some nights and some nights she doesn’t. I don’t know why this time made me angry. I can’t remember many of the specifics of the fight except that I ended up storming out of the house and shouting something about not being treated like a child. Then, I walked along the road. When I saw Old Man Johnson—everyone pretty much knows everyone in our small town—I asked where he was headed. Since he was going to fish at the end of Spider Lagoon (on the other side of the lake and not really a lagoon) I lied and said I was meeting friends at Turtle Cove. He told me to hop in and I rode with Fire, Lightning, and Thunder in the back of the truck.
Before you make fun of those names, Mr. Johnson let his four-year-old grandson name them when they were puppies.
Okay, almost done. So, I get out of the truck on the road above Turtle Cove, a great little cove on the lake where, if you’re ever so inclined, you’re sure to catch plenty of crappie or bluegill. When I get out, I realize all of a sudden that I’m not angry anymore. I’m not angry anymore and I don’t even know why I got so angry.
So, I’m about twenty miles from my house and at the lake all alone and I feel pretty stupid. Worse, I’m lost on the other side of the lake and I don’t even know why.
I mean, it isn’t like Mom doesn’t give me the car plenty of times. I think the bottom line is just that I occasionally get reminders about the fact that I still live at home, that I’m only now graduated from Rockwell Pass High School, and that I’m not yet out on my own. What’s that word? I’m not yet launched. Is that any surprise? I mean, a tantrum over something as stupid as my mother not letting me borrow the car now has me who the hell knows where in the late afternoon in the middle of the wilderness above the lake.
Rockwell Pass is my hometown. I can pull fish out of the lake like nobody’s business but it’s not like living in a small town by a lake makes a girl some kind of survival expert. It’s not like I’m some kind of genius wilderness guide. Tailgate parties at the junior college stadium—sure. Founder’s Day three-legged races—absolutely. Surviving in the woods? Not a chance.
Fuck my life.
God, I’m gonna die a virgin.
I hate that the big terrifying thought that comes to me in the midst of this situation has to do with my sex life, such as it is. I mean, if I’m about to die, is my virginity really the big issue here? Well, sure it is! I mean, isn’t there something even in the Bible about girls about to die bewailing their virginity. I feel tears falling down my cheeks and maybe it’s overly dramatic but nobody will find me.
It’s Founder’s Day.
That’s more like Founder’s Week in Rockwell Pass and there is a week-long festival. Nobody is going to even search for me. If I were twelve or thirteen years old, searchers would come. I’m an adult. Nobody will search. Nobody will know I’m gone.
I’m going to die!
As if the world wants to play a trick on me, it starts to rain. I start crying and try to find a tree that will give me at least a little shelter from the storm. The storms in the mountain always last a few hours and I spend those hours against a tree trunk wailing like a baby. I’m going to die! I’m going to die alone just bewailing my virginity!
“Kristy!” The voice shocks me and I look around and see him. He rushes to me and before I can even think, he has me lifted up in his arms and he’s running with me. “We have to get across the lake!” he shouts. “This storm’s a bad one!”
I’m in shock. I can’t reply. I just look up at the face of my stepfather, trying to wrap my head around things. I have my arms around his neck, just holding on and I don’t think in my life this feeling of safety has any parallel. “Of course, I did, Honey,” he says.
I realize I’ve been repeating, “You found me. You found me. You found me.”
I don’t know how long he runs but we break through the trees and I see we’re at the Lake Ferry. It’s a raft people can use to cross the lake, following a rope that goes all the way across. He sets me on the ferry and then uses the crank to pull away from the shore. “Are you okay?” he asks. Only then do I realize the storm is over. On the other hand, it’s getting dark.
“Yes,” I say. “Thank you for… God!” what causes the exclamation is a lurch in the raft.
“The rope snapped!” he shouts. “Hang on!”
What happens next is difficult to describe. I see him in a flurry of activity. I also see him moving his body in remarkable ways, muscles straining. He uses a pole that I thought was only decorative to move the raft. He does this for almost an hour until things are just pitch dark.
“Kristy!” he calls.
“I’m here!” I shout.
“Grab the rail!” he says.
I do as he says and then I feel his hand on the small of my back. Again, I’m shocked by how it makes me feel safe. He puts a little pressure and says, “Keep moving until the rail ends. Hold onto it until I tell you.”
“Okay!”
I don’t know why I’m shouting when there’s no noise from the storm anymore.
“Good girl,” he says.
Why does that make me feel so good?