I stilled my body, keeping perfectly immobile now while I considered my escape. But he carried me just a short distance and walked with me up the motorhome steps. “Is it unlocked?” he asked as he tried the door.
I didn’t have to respond because the door opened right away. He felt around the wall for the light switch and found it almost immediately. Never before had I been so relieved to see the fluorescent fixtures glow above me.
Now that the lights were on, I looked at the person carrying me and saw that it was the boy with dark hair from the mini-market who beat up his friend before me. I was alarmed. “Let me down,” I demanded vehemently.
There was blood all over my leg and on his arms from carrying me. “I’m not going to hurt you,” he tried to reassure me, but I didn’t believe him. He set me down on the bench at the kitchen table.
My heart was pounding too fast to make any rational decisions. I scurried over to the corner, dragging my leg like a frightened animal. “Don’t hurt me,” I warned.
He held his hands up. “I just wanted to help you. Let me call an ambulance instead.”
My eyes narrowed. I wondered if he was telling the truth. I didn’t understand how he could have found me so quickly after I got trapped in the forest. Had he set me up?
But then I looked into his eyes, such green eyes, beautiful. And that sparkle… And the way I felt… Suddenly, I remembered who he was!
Right then Mom and Dad walked in the motorhome. At first, they seemed calm and peaceful, but then their eyes widened in horror—probably from the sight of so much blood on the boy and me.
“My baby girl!” My mother gulped. “Don’t kill her!” she screamed as she lunged at the boy.
But he was too quick. At once, he ducked away from her and ran out of the motorhome and away from our campsite.
Both my parents rushed to me. “What happened?” My dad asked in as calm of a voice as he could muster. By now he was staring at the prongs around my ankle.
“What did that devil do to you?” Mom panted.
Now that I was out of harm’s way, I realized how pathetic I had acted. “I got lost in the woods and fell into this animal trap,” I finally blurted out. The look in the boy’s eyes when he rushed away hastened back into my mind. I feared that I had grossly misjudged him.
“That boy saved me,” I breathed, realizing that this wasn’t the first time he had rescued me.
A few years ago I was crossing a busy intersection rushing to meet a friend at the local coffee house. It was around twilight and raining really heavy out. I lost my balance as I often did and slipped and fell in the street only feet away from a car that was fast approaching. At once, I tried to scramble to my feet, but there was no time.
A dark haired boy ran into the road and pushed me out of the way as I was standing up. But he was hit by the car. I wasn’t hurt, but he was rushed to the hospital.
I never found out what had happened to him. Though I tried the local hospital, they said they couldn’t give out information unless I was related. And nothing ever came of it.
The way he looked at me tonight with those intense green eyes triggered something in me and I just knew it was him even though he appeared very different now. His eyes were the same. “That boy saved me,” I said again to my mother and father.
My parents appeared perplexed. I got the feeling that they didn’t believe me. Dad tried to pry the metal off of my ankle.
I hollered out as the teeth shifted slightly. “Don’t do that!”
“Just wait,” he commanded me and then Mom who looked as pale as a ghost.
Dad went to the closet and brought his tool box over. After he found the right size screw driver, he managed to loosen the hinges and open it up, releasing me from its needling clutches.
I bit my cheek, trying not to cry.
“The cuts aren’t too deep,” Mom panted. “I think she’ll be okay with some stitches.”
Dad sighed. “We better get you to the emergency room, Hailey.”
Nervously, Mom wrapped a blanket around me and they helped me to the car. Mom sat in the back with me as Dad drove. Now that I was with my parents, I felt soothed. The wounds were painful, but manageable. I could deal with that. Mostly, I just felt this terrible guilt for treating the boy who saved me twice so outrageously.
I explained everything to my parents about what happened to me tonight in the forest. How a wild animal brushed against me. How the guy carried me to safety even when I was kicking and hitting him. Then I told them about the rainy evening in town years ago when he saved me from being hit by a car.
Dad looked sympathetic, but Mom still didn’t like him and forbid me to ever go near him. She didn’t even want me to thank him. If anything, she owed him an apology as much as I did and certainly she should show him some gratitude, but she disagreed entirely. I couldn’t believe how irrational she was. She wouldn’t even discuss it.
I was pouting by the time we got to the hospital. I didn’t understand Mom sometimes. But we didn’t have to wait long in the emergency room. And the chaotic setting redirected my thoughts. The doctor stitched up all the gashes. He said I should stay off my feet and elevate my legs as much as possible for a few days.
My parents rented a wheel chair for me. “Don’t worry, Hailes,” Dad said. “We’re still going to have a great vacation.”
“We will simply wheel you around,” Mom whispered.
I felt bad. All I wanted was to give them a good anniversary and now I was ruining it.
***
As I flipped the last burger on the barbeque, I looked over at Mom and Dad chatting at the picnic table in our campsite. Two love birds. Today was their anniversary. It was hard to believe after twenty years of marriage, they were still in love. Even the sky was their friend on this special day. It caressed their arms in pink light as the sun set brilliantly on the Pacific Ocean below our campsite.
For the past few days Mom and Dad wheeled me around from shop to shop in the touristy areas of Carlsbad. We didn’t spend so much money because we were on a budget, but Mom had her hair styled and bought a new dress. Dad purchased some cigars and aged wine. We even had ice cream on the boardwalk a few times and tried out some of the local diners.
The doctor was correct—my ankle was basically healed by the third day which was a relief to everyone because that meant we could engage in Mom’s and my favorite activity—swimming. Today, we spent much of the day in the ocean and lounging on the beach. I didn’t fumble that up too badly. Whenever we were in the water, everything went smoothly, but once on land, I created a few mishaps.
The first thing that went wrong was when we were laying out on a picnic blanket on the sand while Mom played her antique guitar. Stupid me—I got up to get a soda from the ice chest and fell on the instrument, breaking it right in half. Mom went crazy for a minute yelling at the heavens. Telling me how the well-crafted thing was over three hundred years old and had been passed down to her through her dear family.
Okay, so that was a pretty big bummer.
The second thing that went wrong was when Dad told me to order takeout to be delivered to us on the beach. He said to spend no more than sixty dollars. But when I was placing the order on my cell phone, I happened to notice the dark haired boy surfing with his friends out in the ocean.
They were there and when I looked back they were gone. That was the third time I had seen him since he rescued me in the forest. The other two times that I had noticed him were both in front of the mini-market where he seemed to hang around a lot. But Dad just drove past and I couldn’t say anything to him.
I got distracted from my phone conversation as I looked around for the boy in the ocean and I must have misunderstood the Chinese guy with the thick accent who was taking my takeout order. It sounded like he said ten platters of sushi were fifty dollars. That seemed like a super deal, so I jumped on it. But when the food arrived, he insisted it was fifty dollars per platter. That meant Dad had to pay 500 bucks for all the food!
Oops! I couldn’t believe my stupid mistake.
Dad was not too happy about that. Even Mom couldn’t polish off all the fish and seaweed. We had to stuff the motorhome refrigerator and give the rest to people on the beach.
And the third, and probably the worst, mishap occurred when I tried to light the barbeque using Mom’s aerosol hairspray and by accident created a huge flame that caught her long golden hair on fire. I nearly died from shock. Miraculously, after dropping to the ground and rolling, she didn’t get hurt, but after her golden locks were much shorter and blacker on the ends.
To my surprise, I think Mom was more worried about me and my anxiety attack than her beautiful curls that I destroyed. She insisted that her hair grows extremely fast and that it would be back to normal in no time. Really, I couldn’t understand her positive attitude on that one. Her hair was her trademark and I burned it off and nearly killed her in the process.
Dad wasn’t so forgiving. He yelled at me for about a half hour on fire safety and said as punishment, he was going to make me volunteer for the fire department after school and on weekends for the next year. He even called his friend, James, who was a firefighter and set it all up over the phone.
But other than those problems, most everything else went well.
Mom got up now as I sat down with the last burger. “I’m uncomfortable leaving you here alone, Hailey.” She looked slightly nervous. I didn’t think I could ever get used to her over protective nature that manifested from time to time. Dad and I had been working on her—trying to get her to lighten up.
“Of course I’ll be fine.” I tried to move my brown stringy hair away from my food as I bit down on the sesame seed bun.
My dad wiped his mouth and stood up too. “She’s almost eighteen, already starting her senior year.”
Mom laughed uncomfortably. “I know I’m being silly. It’s just those teenage boys that were reported missing from around here that we saw on the television flash at that diner. They were last sighted on a nearby beach.” She brushed some feathers that had fallen onto the table to the ground.
“You’re just going to a play,” I said in feigned annoyance with my mouth full. “It’s not like you’re leaving me here all night. And if you worry about every little news report, you’ll go crazy.”
“You should have bought three tickets,” Mom criticized me.
I smirked at her ridiculousness. “I don’t want to see a stupid musical at the Starlight Opera.”
“She’s not into that sort of thing.” Dad tucked his dress shirt deeper into the waist of his slacks. “You can’t make teenagers do anything,” he chuckled.
“I just have this anxious feeling in my gut, like I’m losing my baby girl.”
“That’s called growing up,” he said teasingly. “Next year you’ll have empty nest syndrome when Hailey goes off to college.”
I got the car keys out of my purse and tossed them to Dad.
“I don’t feel right leaving you here without a car.” She crossed her arms over her chest. I was surprised how nervous she looked, even more uneasy than normal.
“It’s no big deal, Mom.” My voice lifted as I spoke. “I’ll just drive the motorhome if there’s an emergency.”
She laughed at that. “You better not, young lady. Even I can’t drive that huge thing.”
“It’s easy,” Dad chuckled again. “Just drive over all the tents and try not to kill anyone unless you don’t like them.”
“Very funny,” I said sarcastically.
The wind blew Mom’s scarf off her tinged hair and as she grabbed it up off the ground, I thought I heard whispering in the trees.
“What did you say?” she asked me as she stood up.
I shook my head slightly. “Nothing.”
She looked at Dad and then back at me. “Don’t leave the motorhome, Hailey, whatever you do. I forbid you to take one step out of it.”
I frowned.
“I’m serious,” she insisted.
“Come on,” Dad said as he led her to the car. “Don’t get paranoid on us. I have a surprise for you on the front seat.”
Her eyes lit up uncontrollably—she loved gifts. “Oooh, what is it?” She couldn’t help but rush to open the car door and pick up the box. “And I’m not paranoid,” she insisted looking over at us.
“Go ahead—open it,” he mumbled as he shook his head with a grin on his face.
She opened the silver jewelry box and lifted up a diamond bracelet. “This is beautiful, Jim.”
“So pretty, Dad,” I said as I walked over to take a better look.
Dad fastened it around her wrist.
I rolled my eyes when she hugged and kissed him. “Okay, love birds. Don’t be late.”
They got in the car and pulled out of the campsite. Mom stared at me from through the window and held her hand up against the glass. That image stayed in my mind for a long time thereafter.
The campsite was quiet without them there. And as I looked out past the craggy rock hill, toward the horizon, I couldn’t really see clearly. The sky was greying now. It sort of blended into ocean. And it became difficult to discern between the two natural forces.
I picked up the paper plates that had blown to the ground and put them in the metal trashcans. It didn’t feel right being alone. In the distance, I could hear girls talking, but I couldn’t hear what they were saying. The sounds came through the trees, probably from a nearby campsite.
After a minute, I went inside the motorhome and took a shower in the cramped stall. The water felt good on my naked body, but the little space was steaming up. I stretched up on my tippy toes and cranked the overhead window open. That was better.
The jasmine scented shampoo lathered up nicely in my hair. But as I was rinsing, trying to keep the soap out of my eyes, I thought I heard what sounded like a scratching sound above. I turned off the shower for a moment and listened. It sounded like some kind of animal was walking on the roof. Its claws dragged for a moment and then stopped.
My eyes burned. I tried to wipe the lather out of them, but it was useless. Then I froze and just waited to see if the movement returned, but it didn’t.
I turned back on the shower and rinsed.
It was quiet now so I figured I had just heard a squirrel moving around and had imagined more. I could have sworn the footsteps sounded much heavier than a little rodent. But what else could have been up there?
There was no point sitting around in the motorhome scaring myself to death with each noise. I decided I should get out and walk around. Now that my parents were gone, I wanted to find that dark haired boy and thank him for saving me. I knew my mother and father would kill me if they found out, but they didn’t have to know.
CHAPTER FOUR
If music be the food of love, play on. –William Shakespeare
With that decision, I slipped on my bathing suit in exchange for panties because all of my undergarments needed laundering. And then I pulled some shorts over and buckled my sandals. I rarely wore makeup, so I just combed through my hair and left it to air dry.
When I got outside, it was already dark. The clouds were thick in the sky blocking out the stars. The night was eerily quiet aside from the insect sounds, mostly crickets chirping, and the light breeze rustling the leaves of the many trees.
I had no idea where to find the dark haired boy or his friends. If they had a campsite, I didn’t know where it was. The times that I had seen him had been in front of the market, in the forest, and in the ocean. When I saw him in the water surfing, it looked like he was with a different set of friends than the ones I had seen him with previously. Maybe he wasn’t a camper. Alternatively, he could live nearby and simply frequent the grounds.
Perhaps, if I just explored the area and the beach below, I might run into him. First, I wanted to get some gum at the mini-market though. He was often hanging around there. Maybe I’d get lucky and run into him.
I walked along the dirt path with my flashlight in hand.
The campground was mostly empty, but I saw a man rocking on a hammock that he tied to some trees beside his tent. This was the first time that I had seen him at his site. Since we had been here, his stuff had been there, but he was always out. His big dog ran over to me and jumped on my stomach.
Most people would have been scared of its enormity, but I liked animals. It looked like a wolf. I ran my hand across its sleek coat.
“Spike,” the man called out in his gravelly voice, but the dog stayed with me. “Sorry about that, honey. Part wolf and out of control. He rolled out of his hammock and pulled the dog away by the collar.
“No problem,” I yelled out to him as he headed back to his campsite. “I like dogs.”
“Wolves,” he hollered back roughly. “Thought I had him tied up.” He clipped a rope that was knotted to the tree to his collar. “Surprised he didn’t tear you to pieces,” he chuckled.
“I guess wolves love me as much as dogs,” I mumbled as I moved onward.
The park ranger station was dark. It looked like Ranger Mike was out, but the mini-market was open. Even though I wanted to thank the dark haired boy for rescuing me, I was kind of relieved when I didn’t see him hanging out front in his usual spot. I couldn’t help but remember how he had beat up his friend.
There was a “missing” sign on the front door of the market with a picture of the three teenage boys who had been reported for their recent disappearance. My heart ached at the thought of how devastated their families must have been, not knowing where their kids were.
I stepped inside, trying to shake off the thoughts. A heavy woman with silver teeth greeted me as she inhaled her cigarette smoke.
“Curfew is ten o’clock cause of the dead boys,” she mumbled like she had been saying it all night to every customer who entered.
I nodded, uncomfortably. “I thought they were lost.”
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