Wicked River

by Jenny Milchman

  They were both still asleep when Kurt rattled the wall.

  Chapter Fifty-Seven

  In the middle of the night, Mia woke to a sound she hadn’t heard in forever. At least it felt that way, although in reality it’d probably been a year ago at most. The sound cast her back to a time when Mia was a whole different person, a little girl, falling asleep to the murmur of her parents’ voices, the most comforting sound in the world.

  She got out of bed and tiptoed to her door, which faced what used to be her parents’ bedroom and now was just her mom’s. She listened, her hand cupped to her ear.

  “You think I didn’t try?” her dad was saying.

  Maybe not so comforting then. In fact, this was more like it—what Mia had gotten used to whenever her parents were together these days. Arguing. Angry voices. Fights that turned into all-out wartime battles.

  Footsteps sounded back and forth, lighter than her dad’s. Her mom must be pacing. She murmured something that Mia couldn’t entirely hear, but which sounded snippy. I have no idea what you did. And they said Mia had an attitude problem.

  “I wanted to take care of you,” her father said. “You never let me.”

  Her dad’s voice was louder; Mia could hear it distinctly. While her mom’s replies were frustratingly hard to make out. You know the reason for that. Was that it? It must’ve been, or something like it, because her father said, “That’s the point. I knew it. You didn’t tell me. Didn’t share your past with me in a way that would’ve brought us closer together. Instead you held me at arm’s length. You’ve always been an army of one, Claude.”

  Something else from her mom.

  “Life is about more than just being strong all the time!” her dad roared. “Maybe I didn’t want to be the only one who needed things!”

  There was a sharp hiss, her mom warning her dad to shh.

  “But now you need someone,” her dad said at lower volume. “You’ve got a situation and no way to handle it. You can’t just step in and solve everything yourself for once. This time that isn’t going to work.”

  Unintelligible murmurs from her mom.

  “I’m sorry,” her dad said. “I misspoke.”

  Mia couldn’t hear any response. She cracked open her door and peeked through a slit.

  “We’ve got a situation,” her father said. “If you’ll let us, that is.”

  He lowered his voice; after that, Mia couldn’t hear either of them anymore. But she saw a shuffle of motion, the shadows of her parents moving closer together.

  Her heart began to sing inside her.

  When her father spoke again at his normal pitch, the sound of it was every bit as comforting as Mia remembered.

  “Let’s hear what you learned.” Her dad led the way into the hall.

  Mia took a quick step back, and her shoulders thumped the wall. Next she heard footsteps approaching. She jumped into bed, but couldn’t get her head onto the pillow or her eyes closed fast enough.

  The door opened wider, and both her parents peered inside.

  “You still up, Mi?” her father asked.

  “Worried about Aunt Nat?” said her mother.

  Mia nodded, her face against the sheets.

  Her mom sighed. “Why don’t you come to the kitchen with Dad and me? I can share what happened when I called the police. You’ve been more on top of this than I have. There’s no reason to leave you out.”

  Mia felt the fizzy rise of a feeling she had almost forgotten.

  Happiness.

  She leaned her head on her mother’s shoulder as they walked together down the hall.

  “Coffee?” her mom asked Mia’s dad once they reached the kitchen.

  Her dad nodded. “Thanks.”

  Her mom looked at her, speaking before Mia could. “Not at night,” she said, her voice swift and sure as always. But then she took a deep breath. “Okay, Mi? I mean, even decaf has some caffeine.”

  Her father looked back and forth between them. “Since when does Mia drink coffee?”

  Both she and her mom burst out laughing, harder than the comment deserved.

  “Can I have peppermint tea?” Mia asked once they’d stopped.

  “Good choice,” her mom said, turning her back and facing the stove.

  Mia’s dad let out a cough, then asked, “So what did the police say?”

  “They were very helpful,” her mom replied. “I spoke to the chief himself. He’s going to call the New York State Federation something. They’re responsible for search and rescue. It’s a little complicated because Nat and Doug are paddling so they didn’t have to fill out a trail register or file a route plan.”

  “Did the police chief sound concerned?” Mia’s dad asked.

  “Not overly,” her mom replied, giving Mia’s hand a squeeze. “He said the rivers and lakes change constantly because of rising and falling water levels, so what looks to be a portage—that’s when you have to get out and walk with the canoe—on the map doesn’t turn out to be one. Or vice versa. Paddlers often take longer to complete their journey than expected.”

  Her mom went to give her dad a refill, and when she did, her hand stayed on his longer than looked necessary to steady the cup.

  Mia said, “So that police chief? He’s going to look for them?”

  “He’s going to do everything’s he supposed to at this stage of the game,” Mia’s mom promised. “Now. Finish your tea, which will hopefully make you nice and sleepy. I know I am.” She glanced at Mia’s father. “Elliott? Want to sleep on the couch tonight? It’s pretty late to go back to the Bronx.”

  Mia’s dad held her mom’s gaze. “Sure,” he said. “That’d be great.”

  “Or you could just stay in our room,” Mia’s mom added casually. “Save getting out a lot of extra blankets.”

  “Sure,” Mia’s dad said again.

  Mia felt that bubbling inside her again.

  She wasn’t all that tired, but she went back to her bedroom and let her parents make their way to…whose? Was it both of theirs again? With questions cycling around in her brain, Mia began to drift off.

  • • •

  It still wasn’t light out, the sun not even touching the air shaft outside her room, when Mia became aware of a heavy, insistent drumbeat across the hallway.

  It echoed the gonging in her chest. She hadn’t even realized she’d gotten out of bed; only the feel of the floorboards beneath her feet told her where she was. Then she remembered. She had reset the ringtone herself the other day, telling her mom she should go more gangsta. Somebody was calling her mother crazy early.

  Mia tiptoed across the hall, her eyes adjusting as she entered the room. Her dad lay beside her mom in bed, their arms wrapped around each other. Her mom was wearing the nightie that Mia loved and her mom hadn’t worn in forever. In the dim light, Mia could just see its straps—scalloped with little roses she used to pretend were a garden.

  The phone was so loud that she didn’t know how it hadn’t woken them up yet. Finally her mother began reaching for it, patting around on her nightstand.

  “Hello?” she said, her voice muzzy and low. “Oh. Oh yes. No, that’s all right.” A pause. “Hold on, let me put you on speaker. I’d like my husband to hear.”

  Despite her still-clattering heart, Mia smiled at that.

  “Yes, go ahead, Chief Lurcquer,” her mother said.

  The police were calling. From the Adirondacks.

  “I’m sorry for waking you,” the police chief said. He had a nice voice, deep and level. It said to stay calm, everything was under control. With this man in charge, Mia suddenly felt sure that Aunt Nat was going to be all right. “But we put out an alert for your sister and brother-in-law’s car. And one just came in matching the description, correct license plate, registered to a Douglas Larson.”

  “It did?” Mia’
s mom said. “So that’s good, isn’t it?”

  “The place where the car was found isn’t used all that often by paddlers,” the police chief said.

  The statement fell like a rock thrown into the sea. Mia felt her sense of reassurance recede, replaced by a cold fear. From the doorway, she could see her parents looking at each other.

  “The only route to it requires some pretty arduous carries,” the chief went on into the silence. “Places where they’d have to get out and tote along their canoe.”

  Mia’s dad finally spoke. “You’re saying their route was…suspicious somehow?”

  “I wouldn’t go all the way to suspicious,” the police chief answered. “But it isn’t where we’d expect your average pleasure-seeking paddlers to wind up.”

  Mia expected her mom to jump in, but she didn’t say a word.

  “We appreciate your efforts on this,” Mia’s dad said.

  “I’ll keep you posted,” the police chief replied. “Again, apologies for disturbing you at this hour.”

  Mia’s mother lowered the phone; it cast an eerie glow around her face. “Something’s wrong, Elliott,” she said, her tone a startling jab in the low light.

  What happened next was even more alarming.

  Her mom let out a long, lonely sob, like the wail of a train. “Something’s happened to my baby sister. I know it. I feel it. And there isn’t one thing I can do about it!”

  Her father reached out and took her mother in his arms, and Mia ran for them both. Her mother folded Mia up in a hug.

  “Are we going to go up there?” Mia asked. The words came out muffled because of how tightly her mother was holding on to her. “Where Aunt Nat’s supposed to be?”

  Her parents exchanged looks again in the dimness.

  “There are experts working on this now,” Mia’s dad said. “Looking for Aunt Nat and Uncle Doug.”

  Mia’s mom opened her mouth, then closed it.

  “We would just get in the way,” her father added.

  “There’s nobody looking who loves Aunt Nat,” Mia said, biting her lip.

  Her mother reached out to stroke Mia’s face, but didn’t answer.

  Mia looked into her mother’s eyes, and bits of things began to collect in her mind, like those pictures they showed in science class of space dust coalescing till it formed a starry cloud. “I know you can’t make this better, Mom,” Mia said. “You don’t have to fix anything. Just let us be there. Let us be there when Aunt Nat comes out of the woods.”

  Her mother’s eyes shimmered, and she dropped her head. “How did this happen, Mi? How did you get to be so wise and grown-up? And how did I not notice?” Then she turned to Mia’s father, taking a deep breath as if slipping underwater.

  “You don’t have to say it,” Mia’s dad said. He was already climbing out of bed and tugging his shirt over his head. “We’re all awake so we might as well not waste any time. The police will probably start searching first thing.”

  But Mia’s mother sat there, clenching the sheets in her hands. “Shelley Parsons is ill,” she said. “I’ve been covering her shifts. I’m on back to back today.” She glanced down at her phone. “I practically have to be up now anyway to get on the subway.”

  Helpless tears started rolling down her mom’s cheeks. Instead of feeling shock and upset at seeing her mother break down, Mia put her arms around her, and began stroking her back. She knew what it felt like to cry like that.

  Mia’s father crossed to the doorway. “I’ll go get the car, bring you to the hospital,” he said. “That way we’ll be ready to leave from there. Mia and I can hang out at the other apartment—”

  He hadn’t said my apartment, Mia registered with a bolt of gladness.

  “—and you work as much of the shifts as you have to, but let them know you need to arrange for emergency leave,” Mia’s dad finished.

  Mia’s mom nodded, slowly at first, then brisker. She went over to her closet and started throwing things into a suitcase, calling out as Mia left the room to make sure she put on a warm outfit and real shoes. “It can get surprisingly cold up there already, Mi. And we may be on some trails.”

  Mia had never been so glad to hear her mom giving instructions.

  She dug around in a box that held her stuff from camp last year and found clothes to change into. Waterproof pants and a shirt that zipped into a jacket and even her boots. Everything felt a bit snug, but at least she looked the part. She grabbed some contraption for drinking—a pouch with a snaky straw—that she’d never once used.

  At the last minute, she picked up her phone and thumbed in a reply to the unanswered text from Val.

  thanks so much for your concern, Mia wrote, hoping the sarcasm would come through. but now the people who actually care about aunt nat are going up to find her

  Chapter Fifty-Eight

  Tim Lurcquer decided to join the Federation boys at Crosch Pond where they’d planned to meet at first light to talk about the missing paddlers. Overdue by two full days, today marking the third, and every hour without contact like a stone in a fortress, sealing away the chances of the couple’s safe return.

  Crosch. What a crazy place to put-out. A beautiful system of trails spider-webbed the area, extending most of the way to Canada, but the water itself wasn’t much deeper than a mud puddle. Tim hoped the search team might be able to shed some light on the implicated route.

  Tim’s own men were tied up right now looking for a group of Boy Scouts that had gone missing north of Lake Nancy, and it was lucky Federation resources were available for this second search. Tim wasn’t feeling very lucky, though. Hadn’t been in quite some time, if he were being honest, although search-and-rescue operations always put a particular weight in the pit of his stomach. And not just because they were notoriously unpredictable, with life and death inevitably on the line.

  Tim climbed into the Mountaineer and headed up Freedom Pass—an unpaved road that was little more than an ATV track—mentally suiting up for the day.

  Summer vacation. You had to love it. Long, light-filled nights, warmth, sun, lemonade, grilling…and dead vacationers. Sportsmen and sportswomen, even their kids. Parents taking children on expeditions once only trained experts would’ve attempted.

  Which was the problem with search-and-rescue ops.

  It was hard for the Federation team members, and Tim’s men too, not to look down on folks who got into trouble in the wilderness. Not that searchers wouldn’t do everything in their power to support, assist, and rescue—because they would, and with a level of success equal to or surpassing Tim’s department’s own solve rate. But in some silent, unspoken way, the missing and the lost would be held in contempt. It was one part the same gallows humor that made coping possible on the job, and one part something unique to SAR. There were no truly innocent victims in the wilderness. They had all gotten where they were voluntarily. They were folks who had enough skills and resources to put themselves into a bad situation, but in many cases, not enough to get them out.

  There had always been a divide in Wedeskyull between natives and newcomers—probably going back to Indian times. Who was native and who was new changed, but the animosity between the two camps did not. The old-timers, whoever comprised their party at the moment, were not likely to climb a mountain for fun. Too busy trying to survive on this land to use it for recreation.

  A second chasm had appeared lately. On one side stood former military, Forest Rangers, and law enforcement looking for supplementary work. Avid athletes, moving in from Boulder and Boise, the Sawtooths and the Cascades. On the other? Weekend warriors, extreme yet less experienced athletes who continually misjudged the three Ws—weather, wilderness, wet—and second-home owners. Folks with too much leisure, money, and hubris on their hands.

  Outfitters had cropped up like mushrooms after a rain to cater to these people.

  The new
divide: folks who sought out danger, and those who saved them from it.

  Tim hooked a sharp right into a lot that was slowly encroaching on the forest, borrowing from an eroded lakeshore. Two SAR members stood conferring by a Nissan Rogue. A hybrid SUV, the ultimate oxymoron. Tim imagined the endless fun this vehicle would provoke. Let’s save the planet by using a little less gas while launching a rescue with a carbon footprint the size of a third-world nation’s.

  The Mountaineer’s tires ate gravel, spat bits of stone. Tim climbed out.

  He greeted the two team members, both of whom he recognized. Steve and Brad. Good men. The first had done three tours in Afghanistan, had seen enough hell to sizzle him, then had come back to be healed by the land, even if he wouldn’t have put it that way. The second was a college kid, studying cooking of all things at Paul Smith’s, but a hell of an outdoorsman, especially when it came to tracking.

  “Chief Lurcquer,” Brad, the college kid, said respectfully. He didn’t look old enough to shave yet, his face smooth and pink with sun or anticipation, possibly both.

  Searches contained a certain excitement of the hunt, especially at the start. There was no denying that.

  “Tim,” Tim told Brad, knowing that the next time Brad addressed him, it would be as Chief.

  Steve strode forward and clapped Tim on the shoulder. He still kept his gray hair clipped military short, and the lines around his eyes turned into creases as he came up to Tim wearing a look of concern. “The Boy Scout troop?”

  Tim shook his head. “No sign of ’em yet.”

  Steve gave a hard shake of his head. “Lotta worried parents.”

  “You can say that again,” Tim replied.

  “How many hours in, Chief?” asked Brad.

  He was a little like a Boy Scout himself. “Expected back yesterday afternoon,” Tim told him. “My men set out at six, completed the first pass before nightfall. Now they’re on a second, trying to beat whatever weather blows in.” He cast his gaze up to the sky where large clouds had begun blotting out the early-morning blue.