Wingspan

by Karis Walsh

  Bailey’s hands gripped the straps of her backpack. Ken had erased any sign of her own individuality, but she fought for the rights of others to be unique and original. Poor Ken would have had a full-time job protecting Bailey if they’d been in the same school.

  “And Dougie?”

  Ken hadn’t been powerless the day the same bully tried to hurt Dougie. She had stepped in, finally able to take action and fight back. And then she’d walked away from Dougie and everything he represented from her past. Walked away from his invitations to come back into their circle and to rejoin their games.

  “We work together now, temporarily. He got me the job at Impetus, and I had no choice but to take it. But as soon as I can, I’ll get out. I don’t want anything in my life to remind me of my past.”

  Except the tattoos cutting across her chest and stomach. Bailey turned her full attention to the trail when Ken stopped talking. She and her raptor center would always be linked to Impetus in Ken’s mind. And Impetus was inextricably linked to Dougie. Bailey would be one of the ties Ken cut. Bailey hadn’t expected anything different, hadn’t thought her relationship with Ken meant anything beyond a mere work project, so why did Ken’s vehement pronouncement leave her as gaping and raw as if the severing of ties had already begun?

  *

  Bailey eased the pack off her back and pulled back the strap of her tank top. She already saw dark bruises where the unbalanced weight of the backpack had dug into her flesh. She hadn’t wanted to stop and adjust the contents while Ken had been talking, and after the conversation had ended, Bailey had wanted to get out of the forest without delay. She had hoped the long hike would wear away some of the emotional residue from her and Ken’s confessions, but instead she had grown more upset with every step.

  She threw her backpack into the car. Physical exertion was no match for the impotent anger seething through her. It was aimed in too many directions for her to feel any control. Her parents, Ken’s bullies, Dougie, Ken. Every kid who had teased and ridiculed Bailey, every bird she had lost. Even Steve, for throwing away a talent she could barely comprehend and for the scars he’d left on Ken’s psyche. Bailey clenched her fists. She was heading toward a meltdown, and she had no way to stop it.

  “Oh no. Your shoulder is bruised,” Ken said. She shoved her pack onto the backseat next to Bailey’s and came close, massaging the area with gentle pressure. “You should have told me. I’d have carried some of your supplies for you.”

  “Stop trying to rescue everyone,” Bailey snapped at her. She rubbed her temple. She had a headache.

  Ken frowned at the sharp edge in Bailey’s voice. “I would have lightened your pack a little. Hardly worthy of knighthood.”

  “Well, I can take care of myself. I don’t need your help.”

  Ken looked behind her at the trailhead. She seemed to have missed part of the conversation with Bailey. They were fighting, but Ken had no idea when it had started. After talking about Steve, they had been silent except for the occasional comment about the footing or low-hanging tree branches.

  “Suit yourself,” Ken said. Bailey’s intensity was contagious, and she felt her own anger stirring. “You’re the one with the bruises. We could have fixed your pack, but apparently you wanted to be a martyr.”

  “Me?” Bailey asked, with disbelief evident in her tone. “You’re the one wearing a shrine on your body. Those tattoos of yours are gorgeous, and they could be an amazing way to honor your friend and the sense of wonder you shared. But instead, you’ve turned yourself into a monument to his talent. You stopped living your own life the moment he stopped living his.”

  Ken stood perfectly still. She processed Bailey’s words and waited, with a sense of detachment, for her body’s reaction. Would she slap Bailey? Walk away? Cry? Nothing. Not even a cold rage.

  “I’m living my life,” Ken said. “You’re the one stuck in a cage, afraid to take a chance on anyone or anything besides your birds.” Ken held her hand out for the keys. “You look like you have a headache,” she said calmly. “I’ll drive us home.”

  Bailey seemed deflated after her outburst. She tried to apologize, but Ken shrugged it off and started the car. Bailey was silent for a long time, and when Ken finally glanced over at her, she saw Bailey was asleep, her cheeks marked with trail dust and tearstains.

  Ken was relieved to have peace while she drove back to Sequim. She was amazed by her self-control and her lack of anger, but she waited for the numbness to wear off and fury to take its place.

  It wasn’t until Ken, sore from the hike and bruised deep inside, had driven over halfway home that she finally realized why she had reacted with indifference to Bailey’s harsh words. She knew they were true.

  Chapter Sixteen

  Bailey woke the next morning with the lingering effects of a migraine blurring her vision and pounding behind her right eye. She eased out of bed, as woozy as if she’d had a fifth of vodka the night before, and squinted in the sunlight seeping around her bedroom curtains. The drive home from the rain forest was a hazy memory, and she had no recollection of getting undressed and under the covers. What she did recall, with almost obscene clarity, were the words she had hurled at Ken after their hike. She had crossed a line as deep as the geologic faults buried under her state. What she said had been true, but she had had no right to criticize the way Ken chose to honor her friend.

  She stumbled down the hall on autopilot. Her birds needed to be fed even if she felt nauseated at the thought of making any kind of food, human or avian. Maybe she’d repay the vulture by vomiting on him this time.

  Bailey saw a pile of blankets on her couch, and when she went into the kitchen she found Dani at the counter fileting a fish and humming along with whatever was playing on her iPod. Bailey stood in the doorway, at once repelled by the briny smell and grateful Dani had stayed. She stepped into the kitchen and tapped Dani on the shoulder.

  “Good morning, Dr. Chase,” Dani said in a hushed voice. “How’s the headache?”

  “Long way from the heart. I’ll survive,” Bailey answered with Sue’s favorite saying. “Did you spend the night?”

  “Yes. I hope you don’t mind. Ken was worried about leaving you alone. She would have stayed, but I did instead so I could feed this morning.”

  “Of course I don’t mind,” Bailey said, somewhat surprised to realize it was true. For once, she was relieved to have help, and she sat at the table while Dani finished preparing the tray of breakfasts. She had figured Ken would be far too angry to care whether or not Bailey made it through the night, but she appreciated her token offer to stay, anyway.

  Bailey trailed after Dani and watched her feed. The sight of all her patients tucked safely in their cages and eager to eat went a long way toward easing the remnants of yesterday’s headache, but once the physical symptoms had vanished, she was left with guilt and sorrow over her behavior. She knew only one way to rid herself of the unpleasant emotions—to take the focus off herself and turn it on her birds.

  “I want to catch up the redtail again today,” she told Dani while they washed dishes together. “Her wing seems a bit stiff, and I want to check it. She might need a few sessions of physical therapy.”

  “Great,” Dani said with an exaggerated moan. “I’m barely healed from the last time we caught her.”

  “I’ll have the first-aid kit handy, just in case,” Bailey said. She went into her surgery to gather the supplies she’d need. Dani leaned in the doorway with a frown on her face.

  “Something on your mind?” Bailey asked as she sorted through a tray full of hoods. She found the right size for the hawk and added it to the pile on the examination table.

  “Well, yes. I don’t want to overstep, but I’ve been thinking of the nets we use for catching the birds, and it seems it’d be safer to use wider ones. Less chance of snagging a wing or foot with the rim of the net.”

  Bailey pulled a pair of gloves out of a drawer. “True, but the wider the net, the more unwieldy it is.”<
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  “Not if you use a shorter pole.”

  “True, again,” Bailey said. “But then you have to get closer before you can use the net, and that’s more stressful for the bird.”

  “I’ve come up with an idea I think might work,” Dani said as they walked across the yard to the flight cages. The redtail flew up to the far corner of the cage, as if reading their intent. Dani went into the supply shed and came out with two poles. One was short, with a wide net on the end. The other was longer, with a wedge-shaped padded sheet of plastic.

  “See, we can use this longer pole to corner the bird against the mesh wall of the cage, and then step forward and catch it in the net. I added a lever to the long pole, so the plastic can move any direction we need.” She clicked a lever on the handle, and the plastic sheet moved between a vertical and horizontal position.

  “Interesting.” Bailey heard the hesitation in her own voice. Change. She was still so determined to resist it. “Have you tried it?”

  “No, of course not. Not without your permission.”

  Bailey exhaled a sigh of relief. Dani wasn’t trying to take over or push Bailey aside. She was trying to add something to Bailey’s program, not take anything away from Bailey herself. Bailey let go of her need to dismiss Dani’s idea, or to take over and try it herself. “Thank you. So, do you want to try it now?”

  She stood between the cage’s double doors and watched as Dani angled the plastic sheet and gently moved the redtail toward an open space in the cage, where she wouldn’t be able to duck under branches and avoid capture. The light plastic sheet seemed easy to maneuver, and once Dani had the hawk in a clear spot, she stepped toward her and easily contained her with the large net. Bailey was inside and securing the hawk’s wings the moment the net dropped.

  “Well done, Dani,” she said. “I’d like to try it myself sometime, but I believe you’ve come up with a more efficient method than I was using. Great work.”

  Bailey kept her voice positive and casual, but she felt shaken by what she had seen. She’d been consumed by the pain of her headache and the memory of the hurtful words she’d flung at Ken. Now some of Ken’s words to her were floating through her mind. She went through some wing manipulations with the captured hawk, letting Dani try them after she demonstrated each one, but her mind was stuck on the catch up. The modification to Bailey’s usual method was slight, but Dani’s system was safer and less distressing for the birds. Bailey didn’t care whose idea it was, but she was disturbed by how close she had come to missing out on it. If she had gotten her way and Dani had been fired, if she’d remained as unwilling to take a chance on anything new as Ken had accused her of being, she’d never have learned a new way of helping the raptors. How many more advancements would come in the future as new interns and students spent time here, watching her ways and improving on them?

  Bailey had been one pair of eyes, looking at her patients and slowly figuring out how to manage them. She had fought the university’s presence because it interfered with her solitude, always trying to convince herself she was doing what was best for her raptors. But she had been doing what she thought best for her. Now, as she and Dani practiced in the yard with the two-pole system, laughing and taking turns pretending to be the bird, Bailey started to realize Ken was right. She had built a cage around herself, heavily guarded and unyielding. She had thought it was what she wanted, to keep people from intruding on her life because she didn’t need companionship. But instead she had only been protecting herself against people who would come into her life, make her care about them, and leave her again.

  Bailey’s defenses hadn’t been strong enough to protect her from Ken. She had broken into Bailey’s life and changed her. Made her want something deeper and more lasting. Bailey had chased Ken away, and it was too late to keep her heart from breaking. But she had learned her lesson in time to help her birds. She’d let the university students, with their fresh perspectives and new ideas, into her center, into the new annex Ken was designing for her. She had kept her sanctuary closed and private, concealed like Ken’s tattoos, almost at the expense of her birds. And she’d done the same thing with her heart, pulling back and pushing Ken away when she got too close. Was she too late to open the cage around her heart so Ken could enter? Would she even want to, after Bailey had defensively pushed her away?

  Bailey locked the shed door and walked back to the house with Dani. For the first time in months, she felt hopeful about the direction in which she and her center were heading. But her personal life seemed far less promising. Because as much as Bailey had been determined to keep her distance and independence, Ken seemed even more inclined to be alone, not needing—or needed by—anyone.

  Chapter Seventeen

  Ken sat in a khaki-colored folding chair with her feet propped on a boulder and an open sketch pad on her lap. An occasional breeze off the strait rustled the heavyweight paper, and Ken used her palm to keep her place. She had a stick of black chalk in her other hand, but nothing in her head to draw.

  She’d already designed the flight cages. She’d come home after the hike to the meadow, worried about Bailey’s painful expression and chilled by the harsh words hanging between them, and she’d finished the sketches in one sitting. She’d sat up for hours after, sweating and exhausted following the cathartic effort, and fought to keep from returning to Bailey’s house. If she’d had a clear reason to do so, she might have gone. To finish their fight? To finish what they’d started in the meadow, when Bailey’s hands had stirred her arousal and her memories? She hadn’t known why she wanted to go, so she’d stayed home.

  The flight cages would be worth the pain of the hike. Even in her emotionally chaotic state, Ken could see their beauty and practicality. They mimicked Bailey’s meadow, but they were suited to birds in transition. A taste of freedom, within the safe confines of soft mesh. Ken could picture Bailey in them. Watching her birds, tending to their healing wounds, catching them one last time before their release into the wild. She wanted to actually see Bailey in them, or at least to see her face when she studied the designs for the first time, but Ken needed to keep her distance. She’d handed them over to Randy, and he’d added his own landscaping elements before delivering them to Bailey. Now all Ken had to do was design the new annex, and she’d be finished with what had become so much more than a simple work assignment.

  The annex. She needed to finish her design and move forward. Get out of Bailey’s life and go back to living her own. She drew a square on the page and smiled at the memory of Bailey’s expression of disgust when Ken had shown her the first design attempt. She looked at the four-sided shape. A cage. Thinking inside the box. Neither interpretation fit Bailey or her center.

  She was still reeling from Bailey’s words after their hike last week. She had called Bailey a martyr, and Bailey had thrown the word back at her. Ken had no argument against the accusation. She covered her tattoos and her memories—both of Steve and of the open and creative spirit she used to have—keeping them caged and static like a grounded bird. The possibilities of life had seemed endless when she was young, both in the world of the senses and of the imagination. Limitless thoughts, needing no basis in reality, were brought to life with paper and pen. Somewhere along the way, Ken had stopped seeing with her mind and had focused on what was visible on the surface. Clothes, job, apartment, girlfriend, all designed to make her fit in.

  No, not to fit in. To appear as if she did. But the land where she sat and the car she drove had been her small ways of rebelling against the expectations she set for herself. She had put her Muse houses in her portfolio for the same reason. To whisper her individuality even as she shouted her bland conformity. She turned to a clean sheet of paper, but she was still unsure what to draw. She had lived by the rules for a long time. But now Dougie had forced her to reconnect with her past by bringing her to Impetus and back into contact with him. This land had given her a safe place to breathe and move without any concern about how she’d be percei
ved.

  And Bailey? Bailey had given her a chance to see what life would be like if she lived unfettered by concern about image and reputation. A life without fear, aligned with values and compassion rather than a desperate attempt to find security through conformity. Ken had convinced herself the only way to survive with her individuality intact was to shield it with a visible barrier of convention. But she had been wrong. She had buried herself far too deep.

  She had to reconnect with the Ken who had been ready to believe a chimera or a griffin might be lurking behind the rhododendron bush in her backyard. She’d recapture her old self eventually because Bailey had healed her. Bailey’s life-giving hands had reached beyond the layers of skin and ink shielding Ken’s soul, and Ken would always be grateful, every time she was able to sketch or create something authentic. Bailey needed healing as well, but Ken wouldn’t be the one to provide it. Even if she wanted to, even if the thought didn’t terrify her, she couldn’t be what Bailey needed. She’d failed before, when Steve had needed her protection. Bailey was like him—unique and special, caring so deeply for her birds, like he’d cared about art and imagination. Ken would look for someone else, someone to drive Bailey from her mind and from her body’s memory. After she took care of her obligation to Bailey.

  What did home mean to Bailey? Because, no matter how far the annex was removed from her house, Bailey’s home would be where her raptors were. The new building couldn’t be designed with only its intended purpose in mind. More important than function, it had to be a fit for Bailey’s personality. Ken let her mind wander, free-associating her impressions of Bailey. She thought of Bailey’s hands as they had wrapped the osprey’s wing and as they had gently traced the contours of Ken’s body. Healing and letting go.