Wandering Wild

by Jessica Taylor

  I take slow steps—I don’t want to interrupt any scam she might be running—and follow the sidewalk to the diner where Spencer’s supposed to meet me.

  As the space between us vanishes, I notice the silver color of the car, the familiar shape of the bumper, a sedan.

  Spencer’s car.

  The engine turns over, and Sonia stands. She backs onto the sidewalk, pressing her hand into the middle of her back as Spencer pulls into the street. I break into a run, but he guns it down the road. His taillights are faint dots at the end of Main Street by the time I reach the diner.

  He left me. Knowing I was on my way to meet him, Spencer left me behind.

  Sonia’s dark, smudgy eyes catch me, and damn it, she looks ashamed. She saw us through the coffee shop window that day, Spencer and me racing down Main Street together. I was stupid to believe a glimmer of our friendship still shone for her.

  “What did you say to him?” I demand.

  She lifts her chin and crosses her arms. “You’re awfully self-righteous, considering what you’ve been doing with that markie.”

  I’m right up in her face now. “Tell me what you said to him.”

  The whites of her eyes redden and fill with water. “That there’s one of him in every town. That you’re engaged to be married to someone else, and now you’re ready to move on.”

  She reaches for me, and I dodge her grasp.

  “You don’t understand, Tal. It’s better this way.”

  “Better for who? Because I can’t think of a single person any of this is better for.”

  “For you.” Her chest rises and falls like she’s trying to hold something deep inside. It all comes tumbling out in sobs that wrack her shoulders. “And for me. Everything can go back to the way it was before now. You’ll be with Felix and I’ll be with Emil, and they can run the scams for us, and we can have babies together and travel around, and we’ll be just like we used to be.”

  I should tell her to never speak to me again, rip her hair out, wrap my hands around her throat and squeeze. But I’m empty inside.

  There’s something so damn sad about realizing our friendship is something from the past that’s never going to be our present.

  It doesn’t even matter. Spencer learned the truth about Felix, and he left me.

  Our Chevy flies to a stop beside us in the street, the wheels smoking from peeling rubber onto the road.

  Wen’s grinning as he rolls down the window. “Hey, I ran into Horatio. Good news!” He looks to me first, and then Sonia’s teary face, and his smile falls away. “Um, uh, Rona’s back.”

  Lando came through. My plan worked. Winning should feel good, but I can’t think about anything besides Spencer Sway.

  I glance down Main Street, where his car disappeared seconds before, and I get inside the Chevy.

  Wen leans across me and out the passenger window. “You getting in, Sonia?”

  She wipes the mascara streaks from her cheeks and nods. I scoot to the middle seat.

  Sonia presses a hand to her chest as she hiccups. “Guess this means we’re leaving. Rona coming back, I mean.”

  “Yeah,” says Wen.

  “Nothing holding us back now,” she says.

  With my eyes closed and the Chevy swaying me from side to side, I should be thinking up places for that compass inside me to lead us next.

  There’s no lying to myself anymore—I don’t want the road beneath my wheels. I want to chase Spencer all the way to his front door and tell him everything Sonia said was a bald-faced lie.

  But I couldn’t lie to him now, not even if I tried.

  “You didn’t tell the book lady yet, did you?”

  Wen stretches across his mattress while I’m sitting on the edge of mine. We wait inside our trailer for Rona, who’s at the heart of camp now, giving Lando and Boss a rundown of her time on the inside. “I’ll do it tomorrow.”

  “You really don’t have to. When you stop showing up, she’ll get the idea.”

  “No. It’s only right I say good-bye. You should say good-bye to Spencer, too.”

  I could drive away from Cedar Falls without ever seeing Spencer again. Maybe that’s how it ought to be.

  “Did you see him today?” he asks.

  “Our plans changed.”

  I couldn’t bring myself to tell Wen about Sonia betraying me. The opportunity was there—a dozen times over, I could have confessed—but I can’t stomach the thought of him thinking badly of her. Maybe that means I’ve forgiven Sonia for marrying Emil, for saying what she did to Spencer, for falling out of best-friend love with me.

  Wen holds his hands to his sore rib cage as he exhales. “You got Lando to get Rona out, didn’t you?”

  He’s on to me, but I keep my voice level so I don’t give anything away. “Why do you think that?”

  “Because your poker face isn’t that good.”

  “Really?”

  “Okay,” says Wen. “I saw you sneaking back in before sun-up. You were wearing your post-con smile.”

  Our door creaks open, and the beam of a flashlight blinds me. My eyes adjust, and Rona’s black-and-white hair comes into focus.

  Wen goes to her first and falls into a hug.

  She pulls back and strokes Wen’s bruises. “Your poor, sweet face.”

  “What’s going to happen with your case now?” he says.

  “It’ll be fine.” A grin spreads her red-ringed mouth. “Lando put up the bail, but there aren’t any bounty hunters out there who’d have the smarts to find us. As soon as we leave here, we’ll never look back.”

  A sad sound escapes me.

  Rona’s eyes dart my way. “Wen,” she says, “would you mind running down to my trailer and taking a look at the back window? It’s like the damn thing sealed shut on me.”

  The screen door slams behind Wen, and Rona whispers, “Tal.”

  I hop down from my bed. So much has changed since she was last at camp. Maybe she can tell I’m different, missing things: my illusions, my adoration of this life, my virginity.

  Her arms encircle me first, and I melt into her. She squeezes me so hard I can’t tell if it’s her shaking or me. We stand there, vibrating together until she pulls away.

  “Jail got me thinking, Tal. All that time—and I . . . I’m so sorry I ever kept anything from you. Greta hurt me, too, when she took off, and I didn’t want you and Wen to know that pain.”

  I swallow. I should say I’m sorry, too, but I am thought and action. Putting words to my emotions has never been my strong suit.

  I turn my back to her and stare out the screens and into the black forest. She doesn’t know the means to my freedom is in my possession. It aches through me, knowing I had the money to set her free all this time, and I chose my own freedom over hers. I am my mother’s daughter through and through.

  “These owls have had me thinking about Greta a lot,” she says.

  “What do you mean?”

  Rona and I have never discussed the last time the owls showed up. Everything I know comes from my own memories and what five-year-old Wen told me.

  “Oh, I’m sure you remember the rest stop, when that owl parked itself on our hood ornament, or the one Wen saw out in the forest when he lost his beach ball. It was before Greta left.”

  “Before she left,” I whisper. Not before her arrest. But before she left.

  Realization washes over me.

  If I believed the Spirit of the Falconer was real, maybe I could believe he wasn’t warning my mother about her arrest? Maybe he was warning us she was about to leave the wandering world behind?

  But I don’t believe. I can’t and I won’t.

  Rona cocks her head to the side and looks me up and down. “Tal, what’s going on with you? Whatever it is, I’m ready to hear it.”

  I face her and square my shoulders. “We’ve made the money to pay the bride-price back. Me and Wen did. I’m buying myself back from Felix.”

  “And what will you do, then?” she says. “I
t doesn’t have nothing to do with that markie boy, does it?”

  The trailer fills with silence. I can’t admit aloud—not to Rona and not to myself—Spencer and I are over.

  Her face is wistful. “No matter what, you can’t stay here.”

  Even though she’s right, I still have to say it. “Why not?”

  “You’ll be trading one kind of captivity for another.”

  It’s time to say good-bye to Cedar Falls, to Spencer, to markie life. I was never cut out for anything but the road beneath my wheels. I mask the truth and say, “At least freedom is mine to trade.”

  Rona takes a deep, shuddering breath. “I guess you’ve got decisions to make.” The door creaks as she sinks her weight into it.

  Just as she’s about to walk away, I blurt, “Wait.”

  We stand there, staring at each other for an instant that stretches on too long.

  “I never was fair to you. To me, you always lived in Mom’s shadow, and there was nothing you could do—and you tried all sorts of things—to get yourself into the light.”

  Tears slide into her smile lines. “You had your reasons.”

  “I’m not saying it was all my fault, but it wasn’t all yours, either. And I appreciate you, for all you did for me and Wen.”

  Her hands move from my chin to my shoulders, and she takes a step away, the weight of her palms steady as she studies my face. “You look just like Greta now. But you’re not Greta. I should have seen it long ago.”

  CHAPTER 39

  Two houses down from the Sways’, I pull to the curb and shift the Chevy into park.

  My brother and I are on a different kind of mission this morning, the kind that doesn’t involve aliases or five-finger discounts—just finding two people who deserve our good-byes and our apologies. I’m up first.

  Wen stares at his reflection in the vanity mirror. He runs his fingers over his yellowing bruises but flips the mirror shut when he notices me watching. “What will you say to him?”

  My jeans catch on the duct-taped seats as I slide out of the truck. “I haven’t thought that far ahead.”

  This whole time, I’ve been conning Spencer into thinking my future belonged to me.

  I would tell him about the arranged marriage and how Felix’s family bought me the same way they’d buy a used RV, if I knew for certain revealing my secrets would make a difference. That’s a leap of faith I can’t take.

  “Give me a few minutes,” I say, “and we’ll head downtown.”

  My fingertips scrape against the brick retaining wall around the Sway’s property line. I knock on the door, and when no one answers, I ring the bell.

  The bolts click, and I almost lose my courage.

  “Hey, Tal.” Marcus Sway’s hair is in his eyes, and he’s running a dish towel over his hands. “What can I help you with?”

  I peer around his shoulder into the foyer and up the staircase. “Is Spencer home?”

  “No, Spencer’s probably halfway to Charleston by now.”

  “His interview.” I step back, a few feet from the Sway family doormat. “It’s today?”

  Marcus’s brow wrinkles, etching the lines of his forehead deeper—he doesn’t understand—but he quickly smiles. “I thought Spence would have told you.”

  “Oh, he did. He did. I must have forgot.” I back down the porch and stumble on the last step. “I’ll see you later.”

  He told me about his interview, all right, the exact date. But then he told me he wasn’t going. Everything he’s learned about me—I just hope it wasn’t me who changed his mind.

  “Hey, Tal!” yells Marcus. “You should come by for dinner tonight. I closed up the gallery to do the prep work. I’m making Spencer’s favorite—paella, and flan for dessert.”

  “Thanks for asking, but . . .” My skills, they’re failing me. “I’ve got things to do.”

  “That’s a shame. I know Spencer’d love to have you here.”

  I stop halfway down the driveway. “You don’t know how much I want to be here.”

  Wen shakes the loose change in his pockets as we walk through downtown. We’re headed to grab one last slice of thin-crust pizza before he says good-bye to Blanche and we leave Cedar Falls in our rearview mirror.

  A flash of plaid drags my focus across the street. It’s a gray-haired man in a flannel shirt, not Spencer. How stupid—Spencer’s probably sitting across from an admissions officer right now.

  We freeze as Lando fills up the sidewalk in front of us. “What are you kids drifting around town for?”

  “Hello, Talia,” says Felix, from behind Lando.

  Wen covers his bruised, swollen cheek. “We’re going to get a pizza.”

  “Not today, you’re not,” Lando says. A burst of orange paper crinkles in his fist—one of the anti-gypsy fliers from that rally over a month ago. “These are tacked up all over town.”

  Down the street, they’re everywhere, orange fliers cautioning the town against Wanderers. Taped inside windows and stapled to telephone poles, they’re bright beacons of warning. I don’t know how I hadn’t noticed.

  Lando thrusts the flier at me. I pretend to study the words I know all too well.

  “We’re leaving day after tomorrow,” says Lando. “Till then, no more town privileges. Head on back to camp, you two.”

  If they crack down on all our comings and goings, I’ll never see Spencer again. I can’t let his last memory of me be the image painted by Sonia.

  Time must have sped on by, because, beside me, Wen’s making excuses for my silence.

  Lando looks at Felix and says, “She doesn’t look well. You drive them back in their truck. I’ve got some business to attend to.”

  We fall away from Lando. I look across the street and blow the hair clear from my eyes.

  Every bit of the momentum moving my body disappears.

  Spencer stands under a street lamp in a navy blue suit, his hands in the pockets of his trousers, and his eyes steadying all the chaos around me. I don’t dare break his stare. If I look away from him for a second, I’ll lose all my nerve, my free will, my fire.

  He didn’t go to his interview.

  I imagine traffic clearing and walking across the street and never looking back. I’ve never needed anyone else, and I don’t—need him, that is—but I want him.

  They wrench me down the sidewalk, past the pizza parlor, my brother on one side, gently, and Felix on the other, more forcefully.

  Spencer took a huge step in his world. It’s time for me to do the same in mine. I will the words into my throat, and cement my feet into the sidewalk.

  “I’m not going back to camp.”

  Lando freezes several storefronts away and doubles back. “What did you say, Talia?”

  Wen’s voice in my ear is more of a whimper. “Please, you have to come with us.”

  I repeat, louder this time, “I’m not going back to camp.”

  Lando backs me against the brick space between the drugstore windows and the pizza parlor, forcing my gaze away from Spencer. He says low, “I know you get off on being defiant. Now’s not the time. Get on back to camp. Now.”

  “You mind taking your hands off her?”

  I cringe at Spencer’s voice, not from across the street anymore, but feet away.

  Squinting at the bright winter sky, Lando turns to Spencer. “Who the hell are you?”

  It gives Spencer enough time to wedge himself in front of me. I have this momentary fantasy where this works, and Lando holds up his palms like a white flag and draws away from Spencer, my brother, and me.

  But around Spencer’s shoulder, Lando’s expression is impenetrable. Until he laughs. “Is he why you’ve been difficult? Really, Talia?” He rakes his eyes from Spencer’s clean patent leather shoes to his burgundy tie. He claps Felix on the shoulder and shoves him forward. “You don’t know what you’re doing, kid. This is Talia’s fiancé. She’s bought and paid for.”

  “Bought and paid for,” Spencer repeats. He looks at me
, and as the last pieces of the puzzle slide into place, his confusion fades to a look I only see as pity. To himself, he whispers, “The money.”

  All I can do is nod.

  Felix says to Lando, “Do, um, you want me to fight him?”

  Lando scans the street, papered with orange fliers. He won’t want trouble out in the open.

  Spencer works the knot of his tie loose and pops the first two buttons of his collar. “That could be arranged.”

  His shoulders lift, and I plant one hand on his chest, pushing him back.

  I look to Lando. “You need to get out of here.”

  “You need to get your ass in the truck before I put you there.”

  “You’re forgetting our midnight meeting,” I say.

  “You think I’ve got twenty grand for the bride-price now?” Lando asks. “No matter what you think you know, there’s no squeezing blood out of a turnip.”

  “No,” I say. “We’ve got the money. Every last dollar. My freedom’s mine.”

  “Talia,” whispers Felix. He has this look on his face like he’s about to either cry or vomit.

  “I’m so sorry. Marrying me won’t make you more of a man. You’re just doing what you’re told to do. You’ve got to see that.”

  He swallows hard. The small sadness I feel surprises me.

  Spencer holds out his hand, but my fingers are just out of his reach. “Come with me, Tal. We’ll figure out everything together.”

  He waits, his hand solid, unmoving, stretched out for me and only me.

  I put my hand inside his and squeeze.

  Lando and Felix both slink away, until it’s only me and Spencer and Wen, standing on the corner on Main Street in downtown Cedar Falls.

  Sometimes, the expectation of something is better than the real thing, but Spencer wraps his arms around me, and there’s nothing as good as this. We stand there in this moment of staggering perfection. Nothing can steal my bliss, except knowing what’s to come—decisions and longing and maybe even regrets.

  One breath later, the moment has passed, and I’m so impossibly sad.

  I extend my other hand to Wen, letting him know this is it, the time for us all to leave. Joining the markie world is all he’s ever wanted. What we’ll do now, I don’t know. But we’ve got choices now that the bride-price is squared away.