Leave No Trace

by Mindy Mejia

  “They’re coming back now. One of them is on the phone.”

  I wiped my leaking eyes, fighting for control. Lucas, fixated on the threat outside, kept narrating the policemen’s progress in a low whisper. One was taking a photo. The other came back to a ground floor window and tried peering inside again. Turning away from the bouncing flashlight beam, I caught a glimpse of something under the bed, an object that—in one swift moment—wiped every tremor from my body and left behind a piercing calm.

  The police car’s engine fired to life in the driveway on the other side of the house.

  “Go check, make sure they’re both leaving together.”

  Lucas obeyed without question, creeping silently across the carpet and down the stairs. As soon as his head disappeared below the floor of the loft, I reached underneath the bed and pulled out the gun.

  * * *

  We hurried back to Harry’s house, this time pulling pine branches behind us to obliterate our tracks. Lucas kept a cautious distance from me. We’d spoken little since the cops left and then only logistics: when it was safe to come out, how long we’d have until they’d be back, our next steps. The magnitude of what just happened in the cabin haunted his every look, but the police hunt snapped us back to the present danger.

  “Maybe you’re right. Maybe I should go alone,” he said as we made our way through the trees.

  “I’m coming.”

  “But you’re still hur—”

  “I’m coming.” Gaze forward, I felt the weight of the gun bumping my hip with every step, the missing gun from the boathouse, the one I’d desperately been searching for the day I’d come here with Derek and Rex. I finally found it. My mind raced with reasons it had been moved, and every version circled back to the same basic motivation; she’d felt scared and wanted to protect herself. A decade later, the gun lay unused under her bed and her body was rotting wherever Josiah Blackthorn had dumped it.

  As we approached the house Harry appeared in the woods coming up from the lake, carrying strings of charred, brown fish. He waved them at us. “How’s about some smoked trout chowder?”

  “The police were here, Harry.” I glanced down the hill, gauging the distance of his fish house to the main cabin. It was possible he hadn’t heard them, especially since they’d walked over instead of driving.

  He didn’t comment on it, didn’t even seem interested that the police had been here. Instead he pulled open the cabin door and let it thwack against the siding. “Come on, you can chop some onions.”

  The pain started getting the better of me as we helped Harry prepare dinner, so I changed the bandage and took half a pill. I didn’t want to be foggy or jeopardize the absolute clarity the gun had given me, but I also couldn’t be crumpled in pain on the couch while Lucas disappeared into the wilderness, either. He might suspect enough to never emerge again.

  I peeked around the blanket hanging over the front window every ninety seconds and stopped cold whenever I heard an engine in the distance.

  “We go tonight, after Harry’s asleep,” I murmured as we set the table, my attention deliberately focused on laying spoons one by one at each chair.

  Lucas paused, holding chipped mugs of water. He wanted me to look at him, to let him in, but I couldn’t. Finally, after I took the water out of his hands and finished the place settings, he whispered. “I don’t know where we are, in relation to him.”

  That turned out to be no problem. Harry was happy to produce a tattered old Boundary Waters map as we ate chowder, pointing out his favorite fishing spots. Lucas studied our location and let his eyes move over the terrain, jumping from lake to lake, finding our route. He nodded almost imperceptibly after handing it back, while I stirred the congealing contents of my bowl. The food was good, but I had no appetite, no interest in anything besides the comfort of metal against my ankle. The gun, which I’d transferred to my boot in the bathroom, had absorbed so much body heat that now it was warming me.

  After dinner, we moved to the couch—Harry relaxing on one side while Lucas and I sat rigidly on the other. Harry flipped the TV on and we watched a reality show that I absorbed absolutely nothing from, instead watching the clock with obsessive focus, and waiting for Harry to get tired. As soon as the show ended, the local news came on.

  My entire body jumped as Lucas’s face filled the screen.

  “Still no word tonight in the missing persons case of Lucas Blackthorn. Blackthorn, who was rescued from the Boundary Waters after being presumed dead for the last ten years, was kidnapped from Congdon Psychiatric Facility where he had been recuperating since his now famous return to society.

  “Authorities believe this woman”—my Congdon badge picture flashed on the screen, complete with extra spiky maroon hair and deadpan eyes—“is responsible for removing the patient in the middle of the night, injuring a guard and destroying some hospital property in the process.”

  The screen flipped to the news anchor, but both our pictures hovered over her shoulder, refusing to fade away. “A substantial reward is being offered for any information that can lead to Lucas Blackthorn’s recovery. Please call this number at the bottom of the screen or contact your local authorities.”

  They moved to the next story, which was the weather. They always opened with the weather. Why hadn’t they opened with the freaking weather? I could have reacted then—made Harry change the station before it was too late.

  I felt Lucas looking at me, but my eyes were glued to Harry. He’d sat motionless through the whole thing, legs sprawled, fingers linked across his flannel shirt. Another story passed, then another. I kept waiting for him to say something, but he was like a statue—Hermit in Repose—and no hint of what he was thinking crossed his face. At the first commercial break, Harry finally broke his position and sat up tall, reaching his arms toward the ceiling in an exaggerated stretch. Was I crazy or was he refusing to make eye contact with us?

  “Well, I’m to bed.”

  “Harry—” I started, not knowing what should come next.

  He stood up and nodded vaguely toward us as we sat frozen on the couch, waiting for him to make a move.

  “Get some rest, Maya. You need your energy.”

  I couldn’t tell if he was offering to protect us or trying to get out of the room so he could make that call, the call that would send us tumbling into the bowels of the world, Lucas back to the Congdon and me to prison.

  “Harry, it’s not what it looks like.”

  He chuckled, flipping the TV off. To hear us better from his room? “Looks like a couple of nervous kids in trouble. I could have told you that when you staggered in here yesterday. Rest up, okay?”

  And then he was gone, shuffling to his bedroom at the end of the hall. He shut the door, but his light stayed on.

  I turned to Lucas, who looked as unsure as I felt. “We have to go. Now.”

  26

  * * *

  WE CREPT THROUGH Harry’s house as quietly as possible, folding the bedding and stacking it on the couch, getting our cold weather gear from the car and changing into it. Lucas filled up our water bottles while I retrieved all the bloody bandages from the trash and bagged up every other trace of our stay I could find. Right before we left, I laid three hundred dollars on the kitchen table. It was nowhere near the “substantial reward” he would have received, but it was all I had and I wanted him to know I was grateful for his help, no matter what he thought of us now.

  When everything was ready I climbed into the car and put it in neutral so Lucas could push us out of the driveway. He threw his weight into it and we started rolling, crunching quietly over the gravel, until Lucas snapped upright and shouted a warning. I whipped around and saw a figure standing directly in our path. Slamming on the brakes, I stopped the car inches before we collided.

  Our brake lights illuminated the person’s face. It was Harry.

  I shifted into park and gave Lucas a warning look before sliding out and bracing my weight against the door panel. Harry wor
e a dark robe and slippers and held something in his hands. He wasn’t smiling or moving out of our way.

  “You might need this.”

  “What is it?” I didn’t move, either.

  “Something for a journey.”

  Lucas stepped up to my side and we both scanned the black horizon, listening. The snow was powdery enough to muffle any footsteps, anyone approaching from the sides or stationed behind the house.

  “Stay here,” I whispered and walked to the end of the car where Harry stood holding a knife.

  The gun was still tucked in my boot, but before I could decide whether to pull it out Lucas cut in front of me, shielding me from Harry.

  “Hey!” Harry held his hands up and retreated a step. “If I meant harm, I would’ve done it when you were sleeping, right?”

  “You didn’t know our situation until an hour ago,” I reminded him.

  He laughed now, his deep, thoughtful Harry laugh. “I hate to disappoint you kids, but his mug”—he waved at Lucas, who stepped back and scanned the edges of the clearing again—“has been on the news more times than tonight. And most people go to a hospital when they’ve been skewered, unless they’re running from something worse than a hole in the side.”

  I forced a half smile as my fight-or-flight reflexes slowly relaxed. “I hoped you’d chalked it up to nostalgia.”

  “Yeah, lot of good memories here for you, Maya.” He snorted and then switched his hold on the knife so it was lying flat in both his palms, pushing it toward us. An offering. “This’ll cut anything from rope to animal hide and it’s got a pliers, a carabiner, and a can opener on it, too. My father gave it to me just before he died. He built this place, you know. Anyway, maybe it’ll help you find your way to his dad. Reckon that’s where you’re headed.”

  He flipped all the attachments out and in as he named them, then handed the knife to me.

  “Harry.” My throat started to close.

  “No—” He objected when I tried to give it back and patted my hand awkwardly, like someone tolerating their friend’s dog. Or like a solitary man forced out of his isolation by bleeding, self-involved children. “You keep it.”

  He stared at me for a second and it felt like he was digging the stitches out of my stomach, snapping them one by one and uncovering the clotted mess inside. “ ‘Be not simply good. Be good for something,’ right?”

  Turning to shuffle toward the house, he added. “Next time I see you, you better not be covered in blood.”

  I shook my head at the knife, glowing red in the taillights.

  “Blood happens, Harry. I can’t make any promises.”

  * * *

  We drove a mile down the highway, passing my mother’s cabin and killing the lights to pull into a curved, paved road on the opposite side of her property. This cabin wasn’t a cabin at all. A hulking black building emerged from the woods as we coasted down the driveway, its roof reaching up to swallow the star-filled sky. I’d never seen it from this angle, day or night, but I still remembered the floor to ceiling lakeside windows that looked like gaping eyes when we paddled past. During our summers here, this mansion was owned by a pair of retired doctors, snowbirds who split their time between the Northwoods and the dry burn of Tucson in the winter. I had no idea if they’d left for the year or even if they still owned the place, but the windows were dark. No smoke came from the chimneys. It was as good a place as any to leave Butch’s car. Bumping over the narrow path that wound down toward the lake, I parked in the massive shadow of their boathouse, which was roughly the size of Harry’s entire cabin.

  I glanced up the hill—no movement behind the gaping eyes—then checked the weather on the burner, since it might be the last time we’d have any cell service.

  “Clear sky tonight with a low of nineteen degrees. We’ll have sun tomorrow morning, then a snowstorm moving in during the afternoon. Low visibility. Good cover.”

  I had Lucas backtrack to the highway and obscure our tire marks while I checked the supplies. Two changes of thermal clothes rated for subzero temperatures. Tent, sleeping bag, fire starters, water filtration, enough protein bars and trail mix to last us a week, a first aid kit, and a 9mm. I wrapped the gun in an extra shirt and sealed it in a watertight bag. If the canoe tipped, it would be safer there than in my boot. By the time Lucas got back, I’d already strapped on my pack and cinched the waistband tight to alleviate the pull on the stitches. I pointed to his and set out hiking through the moonlit white woods, knowing he would catch up in seconds.

  We walked silently along the lakeshore, staying in the shadows of the trees even though not a soul—human or animal—was out on this frigid night. Our breath made clouds in the air and my clouds grew faster, smaller, as we approached the clearing near the shore.

  “Have you been here since?” Instinctively, Lucas moved closer to my side.

  I shook my head and kept moving, focused only on the snow-dusted shack and the rickety door that shrieked when I tried to open it. Lucas reached in and together we muscled the old wood open and pulled out the canoe.

  “How’s your side?” Lucas asked as we carried the boat down the rocks toward the water.

  “What about it?” I gritted my teeth. Thank God for Kevlar. I doubted I could’ve held up my end of an aluminum canoe right now.

  Wordlessly, he leaned down to break the ice forming at the water’s edge. It was only a few millimeters thick, but that could change in a single night. If the water cooled enough, an entire lake could form an ice sheet before sunrise.

  I dropped my pack in the canoe and made myself walk back into the dark opening of the boathouse for the life jackets and paddles. They hung in the same place they always had, on hooks along the door. I grabbed them and retreated as quickly as I could, crashing into Lucas. He caught me when I stumbled, but his focus was on something over my shoulder.

  “What’s that?”

  All I saw were shadows. He took the flashlight from me and shined it at the base of one of the studs, where a glint of light sparkled against the rotting wood. I stepped inside and my breath caught as I registered what it was.

  “Oh my God.”

  Scooping it up, I let the pendant dangle from the tarnished, rusting chain. The agate slice. The necklace I’d brought when Derek, Rex, and I had driven to the cabin searching for the mother I hadn’t known was dead. Months later, after I’d been released from Congdon and details began mattering again, I realized it had somehow vanished during the attack and I’d never considered returning to search for it—maybe Rex had taken it before he disappeared or maybe it had fallen into the water and washed away. I’d traded the two rocks in my head, an agate lost for an agate found, and refused to let myself look back. But here it was in the rotting boathouse, waiting for me after all these years.

  “Was it hers?”

  I tried to speak, but nothing came out. Pulling it over my head, I tucked the pendant under my clothes where it made a frozen circle on my chest. I pressed a hand to the spot. “Ready?”

  “Maya, I don’t know if you’ve healed enough for this.”

  “It’s this or prison.” I gave him a paddle, life jacket, and an impossible choice. “Where do you want me to go?”

  He stepped closer and even in the moonlight I could see him struggle. “I know what I’m asking of you, okay, but you’ve got to believe me. He’s not a bad man. Neither of us know what happened that night. We weren’t there. And I don’t think he was ever able to talk about it with me, but—”

  “That’s my job.” I stepped into the canoe and braced myself. “I help people find their voices.”

  * * *

  The Boundary Waters. Somewhere in the middle of the lake we crossed the threshold that divided one world from another, where human saturation gave way to one of the last great wildernesses in the country. Everything was covered with a layer of white, snow weighing down the branches of the pines that stood sentinel, the only witnesses to our silent progress. Our oars dipped in time, me in the bow,
Lucas in the stern, steering us toward the main portage off this lake, a northward path that fed into another winding body of water. Paddling turned out to be worse than hiking. The twist of muscle in my abdomen screamed every time I pulled the oar and I bit my lip with each stroke, riding the edge of the pain and wishing I’d broken down and taken another pill. While my insides burned, my skin froze wherever it was exposed and even my fingers began numbing through the gloves. It felt like an hour before we reached the portage, and as soon as the canoe nosed the bank, I splashed out, cracking through the ice and looking for a foothold to drag the bow up as far as I could. Lucas was right behind me, and before I could put distance between us his arms encircled me.

  “Rest,” he whispered in my ear. “Warm up. I can tell you’re hurting.”

  As much as I craved his warmth, it was impossible to let myself take it. Pulling away, I lifted my pack out of the boat and dug through it. “Here. Modern technology to the rescue.”

  I gave him a set of hand warmers and slipped another pair into my own gloves, glancing at the yawning darkness between the trees. “Packs first and then back for the canoe?”

  But Lucas was already putting his pack on backward—over his stomach—and flipping the boat up without any help, balancing the yoke on his shoulders. Grabbing my own pack, I ducked out of the way and turned the flashlight on.

  “Too bright.” He muttered, and I could hear the hurt from my rebuff slinking into the woods with him. “You can see that a mile away.”

  So I followed blindly into the black, walking behind his boat-balancing shadow, while he whispered warnings of rocks and roots. As my eyes adjusted I could see spots of ground through the snow, other tracks besides ours, which were too big and too evenly spaced to be anything but human. The Boundary Waters was open year-round and winter campers came for ice fishing and dogsledding, but I couldn’t imagine who would be here now, in the transition between seasons when paddling became a dangerous gamble. You could get trapped in the middle of nowhere if a sudden freeze made the lakes unpassable. You could tip your canoe and fall into water with a temperature barely above freezing, water so cold that it sucked you down like Superior, and maybe you would drown or maybe you’d crawl your way out into hypothermia. Either way there was no help waiting for you. There was no 911 here, no phones, no outposts, no emergency services. There were a thousand ways to die in the Boundary Waters, and all of them were alone.