The Story Web

by Megan Frazer Blakemore

  “What you got there?” Silas asked. She’d always liked Silas. He was smart and said he was going to work for Google someday.

  “A box,” she replied.

  “A secret box?” Trevor asked.

  She smiled. “A shoebox. With shoes in it.”

  Another bunch of boys came out of the locker room, seventh graders who pushed Trevor and Silas along and out the door. “’Bye, Allie! ’Bye, Dingaling!” they called as they went out the door. Alice knew that Lewis would be last. He was the youngest and so he got stuck with the final cleanup—tossing stray tape into the trash can, gathering loose pucks. It didn’t matter that he was probably the best player on the team.

  She checked the clock that hung above the door: 4:57. It was late. She needed to get home quickly if she wanted to avoid questions from her mom, and the only way to do that was to cut through the woods.

  4

  Alice held the box close to her chest as she followed the path. The wind blew through the trees, turning the leaves over—a sign of rain according to Henrietta. The path sloped up a little, but thankfully it didn’t go all the way up to the Bird House.

  Still, Dare seemed to sense the other birds were near. When a crowd of starlings murmured up and out of a tree darkening the sky for a moment, Dare scratched hard against the box. “It’s okay,” Alice whispered to Dare. “It’s fine.”

  Alice and Lewis used to spend hours and hours in the woods playing games. They were pioneers; they were explorers. They were astronauts on winter days when the icy snow looked like moonscapes. They were Amelia Earhart and Fred Noonan crash-landed in the South Pacific but finding a way off the island. They were bears, raccoons, birds.

  Now they were nothing.

  If someone had asked her why they weren’t friends anymore—though no one had—she could’ve given lots of reasons. Because she didn’t play hockey anymore. Because she didn’t play make-believe games anymore.

  But the truth was, Lewis knew her better than anyone, and that scared her. Lewis would know what question to ask, what words to say, to unlock all the fear and worry and anguish that she had hidden away on the day her father had gone. She did not want those feelings to get out. It seemed the whole town wanted to keep that story hidden.

  “No one talks about where he went,” she said to the box. Dare bzeeped back. “It’s like he’s on vacation or something. No one talks about it.” Rain began to drizzle on them.

  Alice felt tremendous guilt for causing her father to leave. The fact that no one talked about where he had gone made Alice feel even worse. She had done this to him. She had sent him away, and because of that, people saw him differently. Rather than look at that new version of him, they looked away.

  The starlings landed in a tree above her and made their worried sound over and over again, as if they were trying to warn her of something. She looked up the hill toward the Bird House. Only its black roof was visible, with dark clouds above it.

  “We should hurry,” she said.

  She tucked her head to keep the mist that was turning into rain from getting into her eyes. As she did, she saw the strand of a spiderweb waving in the breeze. “Oh!” she exclaimed. Should she follow it? “Just a story,” she muttered, and hurried on. The wind was kicking up, slashing her hair damp across her face.

  The starlings followed, calling louder and louder. Dare, too, chirped frantically in the box.

  Alice pressed on. She gave a wide berth to Lewis’s clubhouse even though she knew he wouldn’t be there. She came to the river where she found the fallen side-by-side trees that served as a bridge. The trees were slick, but she made it over.

  She rubbed her nose, which was starting to run. The edge of the forest wasn’t too much farther now. As she reached it, the starlings swooped in one large cloud, up and over her until they were in front of her. They beat their wings at the damp air. They seemed to nod at her, the whole crowd of them, like they were one body. Then they made a triangle pointing back toward the woods.

  “No,” she said.

  They pointed again.

  “No!” she called again, louder this time. They held still, so she yelled. “Go away!”

  With that, they dove right in front of her, then went back into the woods. She felt the wind off their wings on her face.

  The path came out in Mr. Cleary’s yard. He pushed open his back door and stuck his head out.

  “Alice Dingwell, is that you?”

  “Yes, Mr. Cleary,” she said.

  “You okay?”

  “Yes,” she said. “Just heading home and I thought I saw—I thought I saw one of those mean dogs that Mr. Lambert keeps.”

  “Well, you head along home. Storm’s coming.”

  She nodded and ran behind his house, through the Pied-monts’ lawn, past Mrs. Winslow’s raised garden beds, and on and on until she came to her own backyard.

  Jewel twined around her legs as she went into the house, meowing the whole time.

  Alice peeked into the living room. Mary Lawrence was on the television talking about the best way to make apple pie, and her mom was sleeping on the couch in her pink scrubs.

  “Shh,” Alice whispered to Jewel.

  Her mom lifted her head. “Alice?”

  “Sorry, Mom. Jewel’s being pushy.”

  “I was only dozing.” She sat up. “Good day at school?”

  Alice nodded. “Just let me put my bag down and grab a snack.” She was already rushing away as she spoke, almost tripping over the cat who was not going to let the box out of her sight. When Alice got to her room, she used her foot to hold Jewel away and quickly shut the door.

  She carefully lifted Dare out of the box. Chewing on her lip, Alice surveyed the room. There, tucked into a corner and nearly forgotten, was an old wooden dollhouse. Alice and Lewis used to play with it, pretending it was the hockey house where all the hockey players lived together. Alice pushed Dare through the front door.

  “Wait here,” she said.

  Dare hopped around and poked her head out one of the windows, which made Alice smile.

  “Seriously. Wait here. I need to go talk to my mom.”

  Ze-zeep?

  It sounded like a question, so Alice said, “My mom. The adult person who owns this house—this big house—and is not interested in pet birds.”

  Zeep.

  Now her call sounded sad, but Alice didn’t have time to worry about it. She slipped back down the hall and went to sit next to her mother on the couch.

  She glanced out the front window. There, in the big maple tree, rested all the starlings, their eyes trained on her.

  Waxwing had seen large houses from the outside but never from the inside. She had always stayed far away from people. Her cousin once flew into a house and never returned. Waxwing had not known that bird-size houses existed. But what strange objects there were inside! Hard boxes with odd designs on them. Tiny things that looked like humans but did not speak or breathe.

  She hopped over to a ledge that let her look out. The world outside the small house was not unlike the world inside. Both had a round piece of fabric on the floor. Both had a shining orb—each now dark—above. The biggest object in each room was the large, soft rectangle. Waxwing’s was empty, but the girl slept in hers. It was her nest, Waxwing thought.

  Waxwing watched the girl sleep. Her chest went up and down. She rolled from side to side, and little moans escaped her.

  How sad this little girl was! If she were a bird, her call would be all panicked warning.

  Dare plucked at a feather in her chest. Here she was, the chosen messenger, and what could she do? The girl didn’t understand her. Waxwing hadn’t been able to tell her about the Story Web and how she needed to save it. Instead the girl had talked and talked, and Waxwing hadn’t understood a word. Even if she could get the girl to understand, how would she lead Alice to the web when she had the broken wing?

  She turned toward the window, opened a crack so a small breeze blew in, bringing with it the sme
ll of the forest. The other birds were up there. All the creatures. Moose. They’d believed in her. What was she going to do now?

  The day after the day of the birds, Lewis slid into the chair at the family desk just before Lenora, the meaner of the twins. “I have homework!” she cried, dropping her heavy purple backpack. It fell with a thud next to her basketball sneakers. Lenora, at fourteen, was nearly six feet tall.

  “You have a tablet from the school you can use. I’ve got nothing.”

  “That’s right. A whole lot of nothing going on,” Lenora said, but she mustn’t have felt much like fighting. She only gave him one long glower before she turned away from him and clomped up the stairs toward the girls’ bedroom.

  Once he was alone with the computer, he didn’t know what to search for. He’d spent the whole day at school thinking about the emu, the crow, and the little bird Alice had found the day before. He looked around the desk. On top of the pile of mail was a postcard that read: “TotalMart = TotalJobs.” There was a map of town with an arrow pointing next to the rink. It said: “Potential Future Sight of TotalMart.” That didn’t make any sense. That was where Buzz Dingwell Park was going in, although the construction hadn’t started up again. Anyway, whoever had made the postcard had spelled “site” wrong. He tossed the card aside. Then he typed the word “emu.”

  Melanie was right—the emu was a large, flightless bird like an ostrich. Tall and fast, they were native to Australia but now were endangered. What was one doing in Independence? Could an emu even survive in Maine? Then again, it was the Bird House. All kinds of birds could live there with the—­

  Witch.

  The word bounced into his brain. He thought of the day they’d brought the milk to the Bird House. Back then he’d believed in witches, but now?

  He typed in “Story Web.” He scanned through the results: it was all sites for teachers.

  “What are you looking at, Lulu?” Laurel asked him. She was the oldest of his sisters, already in high school, and the one who could be the most reasonable. Could be. But not today.

  He tried to remain calm. His sisters could sense fear.

  Laurel squinted at the screen. “Story web?”

  “No,” he said, which was stupid, because there was nothing wrong with his search. His sisters would think it was for school.

  “Boring snoring,” Laurel said. Then she cocked an eyebrow. “Is that a fake search?”

  “What do you mean?” This time there was no keeping the anxiety from creeping into his voice.

  She put a hand on his shoulder. “You’re hiding something.”

  “Lew’s hiding something?” Leila asked. She was Lenora’s twin, the nicer one. She was equally tall but didn’t play sports. She was in the drama club and had once confessed to him that she thought she could be a model because she was so very tall.

  “One hundred percent,” Laurel said. “When he heard me coming, he put in some bogus search, but I’m onto him.”

  “Is this about you hanging out with the witch’s daughter?” Linda asked. His sisters always appeared like that, stepping through doors at the worst possible moments. Linda was the youngest, only a year and a half older than him but two years ahead in school. She was not tall like the twins or graceful like Laurel. She had dishwater-blond hair, washed-out blue eyes, and, frankly, was frequently forgotten.

  “No,” Lewis said.

  “You were hanging out with the witch’s daughter? Is she a witch, too?” Laurel asked.

  “No.”

  “Sure you were,” Linda said. “All the boys in my class saw you walking down the hall. It’s embarrassing, actually. I mean, if you’re going to get interested in girls other than Alice, could it at least be someone who isn’t a witch?”

  “She isn’t a witch, and I’m not interested in Alice.”

  A smile spread across Laurel’s lips. “But you are interested in the witch’s daughter?” Laurel sat on the desk chair with him, squishing him over so he practically fell off.

  “Niece,” he said. Immediately, he realized his mistake. This was tantamount to saying yes.

  “Wait, which girl?” Leila asked. “Not Alice.”

  “No, the witch girl,” Laurel said. “Alice isn’t a witch at all.”

  “Melanie Finch,” Linda said. “That’s the witch girl.”

  “Tell us about her,” Laurel instructed him. Her brown eyes flashed, and her lips twitched.

  He shook his head. No way, no how.

  “Is she pretty?” Lenora asked.

  “Is she nice?” Leila asked.

  “Does she like you back?” Laurel asked.

  He jumped to his feet with a sound between a groan and a grunt. “I’m going!” he called. He stormed out of the house and into the rain while his sisters singsonged, “Lulu’s in lo-ove. Lulu’s in lo-ove.” There was only one place he’d be safe, and he headed straight for it.

  4

  Lewis’s clubhouse was a hovel, but to him it was perfect. His four sisters were always running over the house, over him, over his voice, and over his thoughts. He needed a place of his own. At age eight, he’d gone in search of a clubhouse. First, he and his parents built a tree house in the yard, but his sisters had quickly taken it over. So he’d gone deeper into the forest. He’d found an old, dying apple tree and began digging out around its dried roots. That had served for a while. He could bring his books out there and just sit and read. Eventually, he’d brought Alice out, too, and they’d play adventure games. They were pirates escaping with treasure through tunnels on an old island, or they were aviators lost in the woods after their plane crashed. It was Alice who had the idea to cut away at the roots so the space was more open and you were less likely to get poked in the eye as you crawled in. Once the roots were cut, the dirt started to fall and fill the hole, so Lewis decided to add walls. His mom helped him to haul plywood out to the clubhouse, and he had pounded it in, securing it with cement at its base. “I might move out here myself,” his mom said.

  “No girls allowed,” he’d told her. “Except for Alice.”

  His dad called it Lewis’s “man cave,” an expression Lewis hated. Also, it was much quieter and calmer than the man caves his friends’ dads had. Brady’s dad had one that had the biggest TV Lewis had ever seen and a pinball machine and posters of women in bikinis sitting on cars. His clubhouse was nothing like that.

  Eventually, it got a door that swung upward and could be hitched to the tree above, sticking out like the awning at a store entrance. He had an old camp chair, a plastic tote with books and comics, and even a little transistor radio that only got the AM stations.

  Lewis ran straight to the clubhouse—or, perhaps more accurately, straight away from his sisters. He lifted the door, latched it open, then slid inside. He let out his breath and shook the raindrops from his hair.

  “Hello?”

  He rocketed back toward the door. “Who’s there?”

  Melanie sat up from behind the sleeping bag. “Oh, hello, Lewis. Is this your little hideaway? I found it last week. I didn’t know it belonged to anyone.”

  “Of course it belongs to someone,” he replied, then wished he hadn’t when he saw her face fall. “I made it myself.”

  “It’s a very nice hideaway.”

  “It’s a clubhouse.”

  “Who’s in your club?”

  “Excuse me?”

  “Is Alice in your club?”

  “Not anymore,” he muttered.

  She raised an eyebrow, but he didn’t give her any more details.

  “Why were you wandering in the woods?” he asked. “Were you looking for something?” Maybe her aunt sent her out to look for herbs for her spells. Or newts to get their eyes and frogs for their legs.

  “I like to walk in the woods. Is that okay?” She didn’t ask it like a challenge, the way Brady seemed to ask every question. She really seemed to want to make sure she wasn’t doing anything wrong or bothering anyone.

  “It’s fine. You should wear o
range, though. It’s posted ‘no hunting,’ but people still come through.” He had forgotten his own orange vest as he’d torn out of the house.

  “What do you do in your club?” she asked.

  “We read,” he said. “Or sometimes we play adventure games.”

  “Well, that sounds fun. What type of adventure?” Before he could answer, she said, “I like reading, too. Old books, mostly. What books do you have?”

  Lewis opened the latches on his plastic tote. He kept some of his favorites in it, the ones that gave him comfort to go back to again and again. It felt strange to be showing someone else these special books, like opening his underwear drawer. She carefully pulled out one called Undefeated, a book about American Indian football player Jim Thorpe, and another one called The Boys Who Challenged Hitler. He liked to read biographies of people who changed history. Sometimes, in his head, he wrote his own biography, imagining all the heroic things he would one day do.

  “This one is really good,” he said, handing her My Side of the Mountain. That one was fiction, but it was still one of his favorites. It was about a boy who ran away and lived in the woods just because. He loved his family and all, but he wanted to be on his own. Lewis certainly could relate to that. Plus, the boy had a hawk that he’d trained to hunt for him.

  Melanie took the book from him and opened it gingerly, like it was a treasure wrapped in silks. “Can I borrow it?” she asked.

  “Of course,” he replied. How had he gone to school with her all these years and not realized that she, too, was a lover of books?

  There was a scratching at the doorway. Lewis took his eyes off Melanie and saw a porcupine under the door. He froze. The porcupine was so close, it could shoot its quills right at them and there’d be nowhere for them to hide from the attack.

  “Shoo,” Melanie said.

  “Aren’t porcupines nocturnal?” he asked.

  “Yes,” she said.

  The porcupine sniffed the air, turned, and waddled away back into the woods.

  She sighed. “He’s right of course,” she said. “It’s time to go.”

  Lewis peered at the sky. There was no sign of night falling. There was something weird about that porcupine. “Go where?” he asked.