Chapter 14
Light
“Sadie.” Dad sat on the bed beside me. “Wake up, Sades. Want to take the day off from school and come to the research cabin?”
I opened my eyes. It was still dark. I’d probably slept only two hours.
Take the day off school? Dad must feel really bad about last night. I shook off my grogginess and tried to figure out what day it was. Tuesday. Yesterday, school had been awful, as usual, so I didn’t mind missing more of the same today. If I went to the station, I’d see bears, alive and well, maybe Patch and her cubs, or even Big Murphy. But what if I dissolved into tears over Humphrey the minute I saw a bear? My grief certainly wouldn’t help Helen or Andrew. Andrew. In all of my worry about Mom and Dad and Humphrey and Helen, Andrew hadn’t crossed my mind. He probably needed a friend right now.
“Sure, I’ll go.”
The bruise around Dad’s eye had green edges. “How long does it take you to get ready nowadays? Used to be you could be out of bed and ready in ten minutes. Remember that?”
For about a month when I was seven, I tried to prove I could read in bed until just before we had to go. Dad had come into my room with the timer morning after morning. The faster I went, the more reading time I’d earn.
“Oh, I can still get ready in ten minutes.” I threw off my covers. “Just wait.”
He backed up into the hall, smiling. Like always, he was trying to cheer me up, but this time, I wished he would just tell me what was really going on. Was he okay? Was Mom okay?
Dad checked his watch. “It’s six forty-five. I’ll give you twelve.”
When I threw open my closet, I regretted my answer. I wasn’t seven anymore, and I wasn’t dressing to play in my backyard. I was on my way to see Andrew. Still, a deal was a deal. I tossed jeans and T-shirts across the room, finally deciding on my Yellowstone National Park T-shirt with rhinestones across the front. I dashed into the bathroom, splashed around, and walked into the kitchen at six fifty-five.
“Hey, you did it, with your teeth brushed and all. Nice!” Dad handed me a paper towel with a stack of buttered toast on top, and we hurried out to the Jeep.
As I buckled myself in, I tried not to look at Dad, because even though I had drawn him over and over last night, this morning he looked even more like a stranger.
“We’re going to radio-collar April today,” Dad said while munching his second slice of toast. “She’s one of the other female bears Helen has been watching.”
“Can you do that? Isn’t that the deal with the hunters — they won’t shoot radio-collared bears, and Helen won’t collar anyone new?”
“That’s why I’m going with her today. She’ll need help if anyone confronts her.”
I had to bite my tongue before I asked, Are you planning on another fistfight?
Dad continued, “I think, and Meredith agrees, that Helen has a good argument for collaring April. After Jim’s threats toward Patch, Helen needs a back-up female bear with cubs to research. April will have cubs next year, and Helen can focus on her if anything happens to Patch.”
The orange sunrise glow spread into the dark sky. “You can’t let Jim hurt Patch.”
“Unfortunately, I can’t do much to stop him, Sades.”
I stared at the toast, completely unable to eat. “What does Meredith say? She’s a ranger. Can’t she protect radio-collared bears? Plus, Patch has cubs. It’s illegal to shoot a bear with cubs, isn’t it?”
“Meredith has to answer to the DNR, and the DNR will probably turn their heads if Patch is killed. Jim has reported Patch as a problem bear, and if she survives this hunting season they may remove her from the wild anyway. There will be a lot less red tape if Jim accidentally shoots her.”
“But it won’t be an accident!”
Dad pulled into Helen’s driveway. “Jim will say it was and the DNR won’t question him. It’s awful, but that’s how it is.”
“So, that’s it? You and Meredith and the entire DNR will turn your backs and let Jim kill Patch?”
“Sades, I’m just helping Helen protect April.”
“You should be protecting Patch!” I almost dropped the last three pieces of toast in frustration.
“Sadie, eat.”
“I’m not hungry.” I handed him another piece as we pulled up to the cabin. The yard was empty of bears.
“I’ll eat this one.” He jumped down from the Jeep. “But the last two are yours. Remember, Sades, the bears aren’t pets. They’re wild animals.”
Helen walked onto the porch in time to hear Dad’s last comment. Her eyes were red and puffy. Still, she gave me her usual smile. “Your dad makes it sound easy. But I happen to know he’s desperately in love with Big Murphy. Isn’t that so?”
A few seconds later, Andrew rounded the corner, looking tired, but better than I had expected. He carried his usual bag. “Hey, Sadie. No school today?”
Dad swatted a mosquito. “I gave her a pass.”
“Did you come to take the puppy home?” Andrew asked.
I looked from Dad to Andrew, and back to Dad again.
Dad laughed. “Sadie was so busy lecturing me about radio collars, I didn’t have time to ask her.”
“As you can see, the bears are keeping their distance,” Helen said. “Ever since we found a stray puppy last Saturday and brought him home.”
“Do you want to take him to your house?” Andrew asked.
“What about Mom?” I didn’t want to get too excited.
“She’ll say puppies are messy and lots of work,” Dad said. “And she’ll love him.”
Andrew grabbed my hand, and suddenly my fingers felt awkward and icy and limp. Before I could figure out what to do, he pulled me toward the cabin. “Come on!”
When he opened the door, a black puppy blinked sleepily, tumbled off the pile of towels he’d been napping on, sat up, and thumped his tail on the floor. When I knelt down to pet his ears, he licked my arms and hands and face.
“We think he’s all Lab,” Andrew said. “We posted signs, but no one has called to claim him. Check this out.” Andrew pulled a dog treat out of his pocket. “Sit!”
The puppy sat and thumped his tail on the floor again. Andrew gave him the treat.
More than anything, I wanted to take this puppy home. I needed someone in my life I could count on. “And I can keep him?” He wriggled onto his tummy, and I scratched him under his chin.
“It sounds like it. Any ideas for a name?” Andrew asked.
“You haven’t named him yet?” What would I name him?
Dad called in through the open window, “We’re heading out now. Keep a close watch around the cabin for April. If you see her, give us a call.”
“Can’t we come with you?” I asked.
“The forest is too dangerous with hunters out there shooting.”
But not too dangerous for Dad and Helen. Still, it was hard to be mad, with the puppy biting my shoelaces. I picked him up and followed Andrew outside. We sat on the porch steps while they drove away. A rifle cracked deep in the forest and I shivered.
We soon heard a short puff of air. “I wonder who that is?”
We didn’t have to wonder long. Big Murphy crashed out of the foliage and headed straight for the window box.
“He’s been here one other time this week,” Andrew said. “Looks like his leg is healing nicely.”
Big Murphy stood steadily on all four legs, ignoring us as he ate.
“He doesn’t mind the puppy,” I said, as the puppy wriggled and whined.
“That puppy is too brave for his own good.” Andrew laughed as Big Murphy lifted his head, huffed, and snuffled his nose back into the seeds. “Want a Sink-the-Boat rematch?”
We wrestled the puppy into his collar and snapped on a leash. On the way down to the river, he weaved in and out between our legs and tangled himself until he was completely stuck.
“He hasn’t figured out his leash yet.” Andrew carried the puppy the rest of the way to the river.
I tossed a stick into the water and then a rock, which made a good, solid thunk.
“No fair. I’ve got this monster to deal with.” Andrew set the puppy down, but kept hold of the leash.
We launched rocks into the river, hitting the stick until it finally sank.
I sat on a wide rock and pulled the puppy into my lap. “I don’t want them to collar April. It’s like giving up on Patch.”
Andrew threw another stick.
I rolled a rock around in my palm, but couldn’t keep my mind off Jim and Big Murphy. “When Big Murphy was shot, we saw someone drive away on an ATV exactly like Jim Paulson’s. Dad won’t report him because he’s not sure.”
Andrew pitched a rock at the stick. “But you’re sure.”
“Well, yeah. Who else would do it?”
“Then you have to tell.” Andrew sat beside me. “You could save Patch’s life.”
“Me? But I meant Dad —”
“He won’t tell, Sadie. You know he won’t.” Andrew leaned forward, his eyes intense. “But you can do it. And you should do it as soon as you can.”
I’d pictured Andrew helping me convince Dad to tell, not throwing all the responsibility back on me. How could I tell when Dad wouldn’t?
“Sadie, Jim’s hunting license would be taken away. Maybe forever, if they can prove he shot Murph out of hunting season. Don’t you want that?”
“Yes, I —”
Leaves moved to our left and caused us to come to a complete stop. I scooped up the puppy as a medium-sized black bear loped up the hill.
“That’s April. Let’s follow her.” Andrew took out his phone and texted his mom.
We followed April as closely as we could without spooking her, heading back down the path toward the research facility. Andrew and I stayed back, keeping the puppy as quiet as possible as April ate at the window box feeder. When Helen and Dad returned, Helen pulled on her gloves, slipped the collar over her wrist, took a handful of seeds, and slowly approached April.
While April nuzzled the food in Helen’s glove, Helen used her free hand to slip the collar over April’s neck and tighten the slack. April shook her head and pawed at the collar. Helen backed away.
“That was so fast. Will the collar bother her?” I asked.
“Not after a while.” Helen took off her gloves, as April turned back to the feeder.
I carried the puppy to the Jeep.
“Don’t forget, Sadie. As soon as you can.” Andrew motioned his head toward the bears before handing me a bag of dog food and another leash. In a louder voice he said, “We got this at Wild Paws downtown. They have a lot more, treats and everything. But this should get you started.”
“I hear you’re going to a star shower Thursday,” Helen called over the Jeep’s motor. “Take the puppy. Introduce him to the sky!”
Chapter 15
Shading
I slid into the seat next to Ruth at lunch. “Are you ready for your report?”
She finished her bite of celery and then said, “Yeah. I’m doing it on family.”
Maybe I should have decided what to say before I sat down, because now, watching Ruth eat celery, my mind flooded with questions I couldn’t ask. Did you tell on the boys and let me take the blame? Do you really not believe me?
Before I could sort out my thoughts, Frankie appeared and leaned across our table toward Ruth. “So, I’ve talked to every single seventh grader, and no one seems to have told on the boys. Sadie here insists she didn’t do it, and I’m starting to wonder if she’s right. So that leaves one person.”
“Leave me alone, Frankie.”
“What’s the squeaky-clean pastor’s kid more likely to do? Tell, because she’s so pure and innocent and can’t have anything weighing down her conscience? Even when that means letting her new friend take all the blame?”
Ruth ripped the peel off her orange. “Go away, Frankie.”
Frankie gave her one last glare and began talking to Ty. As soon as I was sure Frankie was totally preoccupied, I said in a low voice, “Ruth —”
“I suppose you don’t want to come to youth group with me tomorrow?”
“I never said …”
“I thought all this was over.” Ruth shoved all of her garbage into her lunch bag and stood up. “I hate being a pastor’s kid.”
After she walked away, I didn’t find another chance to talk to her all day. She hadn’t admitted anything, but she hadn’t denied Frankie’s accusation either. My anger grew all day, anger punctuated by each gunshot that echoed through the woods and into our open classroom window.
By the time I sat down to work in the blue room, anger sizzled out of my fingers. Peter walked into the art studio with a plate of cookies, just as I was busy attacking my page with the graphite stick.
“Woah!” He set the cookies down on the table. “I didn’t realize drawing was a contact sport.”
“Why am I doing this?” I looked at my blackened fingers and the dark box on my page. “I can’t draw over this.”
Peter exchanged a look with Vivian before grabbing a cookie. “Later, gators.”
As he left, Vivian walked over and stood behind my shoulder. “Maybe you can try again, more lightly. We’re going for a light silvery gray.”
I drew a new box on fresh paper and tried to rub more lightly. The paper ripped, and I shoved the book away.
Vivian looked me directly in the eyes and then nodded. “Right. We’ll do this lesson backward.”
“I can’t even do it forward.”
“Come on,” she said. “I’ve got a surprise for you.”
She led me through the kitchen into a small cement-walled room. A pile of brightly colored dishes waited in a stack on the floor. Vivian flipped a switch and the room filled with colored light: red, orange, blue, purple, and yellow.
“What are we doing?” I asked.
Vivian picked up a blue plate. “This isn’t exactly an art lesson. But you’re in the right mood to help me with my project today.”
“Which is?” I asked.
Suddenly Vivian hurled the plate against the wall and it smashed into tiny pieces.
I jumped back, startled. “What are you doing?”
“Feel like breaking some dishes? I need ceramic pieces for my next sculpture.” She handed me a green plate with a thick, purple border.
I looked doubtfully at the wall. “I can really throw this?”
“Please do.” She tossed another, Frisbee style.
I threw it as hard as I could, throwing not just the plate, but the entire week, Ruth, Frankie, the ever-present gunshots, Jim Paulson, Mom’s exhaustion, and my enormous questions. As it shattered, something tight inside me loosened and rattled. I couldn’t stop. I threw another plate and another, until I doubled over with laughter. Vivian laughed too. Before long, tears streamed down our faces. We threw until two plates were left.
“Ready?” Vivian asked. “Let’s do it together, on the count of three. One … two … three.”
The crash echoed, then gave way to silence, the loud kind, the kind that settles after a fireworks show.
Vivian picked up a few shards and held them under the lights, casting shadows on the floor. “As you shade your drawings, adding light and shadows, that’s when your pictures come alive.”
There was my word again: alive. When every gunshot meant possible death, and suffocating anger met me around every corner, my word felt like a joke. But now, breathless from laughing and breaking plates, and with electricity buzzing in my fingers again — this time joyful energy, energy that made me want to grab a pencil and draw, to rub the puppy’s fuzzy ears — I understood why Ms. Barton didn’t want me to study words like hunting or murder, or even trust, words that pushed me toward the shadows.
I picked up a shard and held it under the light, looking at the brightest areas, where light gleamed off the shiny ceramic glaze. “You couldn’t draw the light areas if you didn’t draw the shadowy parts.”
“Aha!”
Vivian tossed her shard aside and swooped me up into a twirling hug. “You made it an art lesson after all!”
“At least now I won’t rip through my paper each time I touch it, right?”
Later, Peter joined me on the porch, whittling a piece of wood as I drew the porch swing, focusing on the light and shadows. Once I had captured the light the way I wanted to, I handed my sketchbook over. “What do you think?”
“Not bad.” He held it out, comparing the drawing to the swing itself. “Your drawing looks real enough to start swinging any second.”
I took my sketchbook back. “Can I see what you’re working on?”
He passed me the little creature, a squirrel with his head tilted as though saying, Pass the sugar, please.
“See,” I said, grinning at the life-like image. “How can my dad even imagine shooting something this adorable?”
“You mean hunting?” Peter took the squirrel back and used short strokes of his knife to shape the furry tail.
I picked at a loose sliver of wood on the deck. “Dad got a hunting license to be more like the hunters around here, but it won’t work. I know it won’t. First of all, Dad isn’t evil like they are.”
Peter put down his knife and looked me in the eye. “Sadie, hunters aren’t evil.”
“But they shoot living creatures, like your squirrel, and like Big Murphy. They’re murderers, Peter.”
“Sadie, around here, hunting is a tradition. Almost everyone hunts.” He picked up his squirrel. “I’m making this little guy to commemorate a squirrel I shot this weekend.”
As his words sunk in, I stood up to leave. No. I didn’t want to hear this.
“Sadie, listen to me.” Peter stood to block my path. “My dad taught me to hunt as soon as I was old enough to hold my own shotgun. He taught me the sport, sure, and we eat some of the meat we shoot too, but more importantly, hunting is part of the natural order around here. If people don’t kill off enough bear or deer during hunting season, the population soars, and the weakest animals starve to death in the winter.”
“Everyone uses that excuse. The bears could find food somewhere. If not here, then they could move on.”
Shades of Truth Page 7