by Kay Bratt
“Sure. Tell me about it.”
“It was the fields of sunflowers,” Lauren said.
Sadie could hear the smile in Lauren’s voice. “Sunflowers?”
She felt Lauren nod.
“That’s why we went. Cooper and his team were doing a study. Once we were there, we rented a car, and he drove us across the South of France. We passed huge fields of the brightest sunflowers in perfectly choreographed rows.”
“I’m sure it was charming.”
“It was more than that. The experience was like nothing I’ve ever encountered. The second morning we got up at dawn and went back to the fields. Cooper showed me how the sunflowers were all standing at attention, facing east. We settled in and made camp. Then, throughout the day, we watched and took notes as they moved with the sun, their faces upward, gradually following the light westward until finally, the sun disappeared over the horizon, and they were still.”
It sounded remarkable if it were true. No wonder the boy had made her fall for him. Jetting her off to France. Watching flowers dancing with the sun.
Sadie bit the inside of her lip. She’d wanted to be the one to introduce her daughter to Europe first. That couldn’t be undone. The new would be worn off the next time Lauren went. So much for the mother-daughter-trekking-around-Europe fantasy they’d talked about since she was a girl.
Lauren continued. “Then, throughout the night, the flowers turned slowly until they were facing east again, anticipating the morning when the sun will rise.”
“But how do they know?” Sadie asked. At first she’d just wanted to keep Lauren talking, but now she was truly curious about the flowers.
“Cooper says the sunflower is heliotropic, and its internal clock combined with its awareness of light work together, allowing the stems to bend with the arc of the sun to follow the warmth. It helps with their growth. A part of me agrees with him, but in a way, I like to think that we don’t really know why the sunflower moves the way it does. That some things in the universe are meant to remain a mystery. But the lesson I learned as I watched them and cataloged their progress is that through everything, good and bad, we should stand tall and follow the light. For our own growth.”
Sadie thought how profound Lauren’s statement was, even in relation to life.
She thought back to when Lauren was just a little girl. At the neighborhood cookouts, Lauren was the one always off to herself, more interested in playing in the dirt or with flowers than interacting with the other children. At first it had concerned Sadie, and she’d said as much to Tom, claiming Lauren might end up being socially awkward. But Tom had brushed her worries away, telling her that it was just Lauren. That she loved flowers. And dirt.
Until this moment, Sadie had thought he was wrong. But she’d give him this one—obviously Lauren’s infatuation was with things that grew.
“I still can’t believe you went to France,” Sadie whispered.
“Next time I’ll take you, Mom. I really want to show you the sunflowers.”
The silence settled in again until suddenly the sound of a piercing scream made them both jolt upright. If Sadie was right in her suspicions, it was a mountain lion, and it was close. But she couldn’t let Lauren think that.
“Don’t worry,” Sadie said, her voice wavering as she tried to keep her teeth from chattering. “It’s probably just a lost dog. But whatever it is, it’s really far away.”
Lauren lay back down, but her back was stiffer than it had been before, and Sadie didn’t know if Lauren believed her or not. Dogs didn’t scream. Her daughter knew that as much as she did, but they both kept that fact unspoken as the darkness enveloped them.
“One night, we had a campfire and told Yosemite stories,” Lauren said. “Our instructor talked about a wailing that some hikers have reported hearing around Grouse Lake.”
“Tall tales?”
“More than that. It’s documented. The first Yosemite park ranger heard it in the eighteen hundreds and asked the local Indian tribe about it, thinking it was a dog. They told him not to pursue it, that it was the ghost of an Indian boy who drowned in Grouse Lake, and he calls out to anyone close enough to hear. They claimed if anyone went into the water to help him, he’d pull them into the lake to drown with him.”
Sadie shivered and felt a moment of irritation at Lauren for being so insensitive. “I don’t want to hear about something like that,” she said, turning away.
“Oh, Mom, I’m so sorry,” Lauren said, her voice instantly contrite. “I didn’t even think about it like that. Really, I didn’t.”
Sadie would give her a pass. Teenagers said stupid things. “Let’s talk about something else,” she said, turning back toward Lauren.
“Another student said they heard that Tenaya Canyon is referred to as the Bermuda Triangle of Yosemite because of its connection to so many mysterious deaths and unsolved disappearances.”
“Lauren!” Sadie said and sat up quickly. “Seriously? Is that really what we want to think about?”
“I’m sorry. It’s just now that we’re out here, all those stories are coming back to me, and I don’t want them in my head all night.”
“Okay, they’re officially out. Now please, let’s stop with the doom and gloom. It’s frightening enough out here. Can we revisit France, please?”
Lauren chuckled. “I can tell you about the food I ate there,” she said.
“Yeah,” Sadie said, feeling relieved. “Let’s stick to baguettes and chocolate. My stomach won’t appreciate it, but my brain will enjoy the break.”
Lauren launched into a breakdown of the foods and wines she’d tried while there, and Sadie breathed easier.
Hours later she lay tightly curled, shivering as the all-consuming smell of pine around her went from welcoming to obnoxious. It was cold. Agonizingly cold. Cold enough that the word hypothermia kept creeping into Sadie’s subconscious, even as she pushed it away, refusing to accept it as a death sentence for herself or her daughter.
Despite Sadie’s efforts to keep her awake, Lauren had fallen into a restless sleep. Sadie gave in and would allow her to rest for a few minutes, but she couldn’t afford to do the same. She had to stay awake and keep them both warm.
Fatigue as she’d never known it threatened to overcome her senses, teasing her to believe it would be okay to close her eyes for just a minute. But Sadie couldn’t listen to that either. She ignored the stabbing pains streaking across her own back and through every muscle and instead rubbed her daughter, starting with her neck, then her ears, and back down again to the arms and hands. She even ran her hands over Lauren’s slender hips and gave her legs a good shake before heading up to her back. She kept her hands moving, chasing away the cold spots and praying her warmth was being transferred.
Her motions reminded her of when Lauren had come home to them and Sadie had given her massages, pretending desperately that she’d bonded with her in those first days and weeks. When Lauren slept, the massages led to Sadie holding her close, skin on skin, heart to heart, their life force beating as one as she pleaded for the universe to accept them as mother and daughter.
Sadie worked feverishly, knowing it was the coldest night either of them had ever spent in their lives. Perhaps cold enough to kill. A feeling of protection for Lauren washed over her so strongly that she tensed, wondering if it was an omen. A warning.
She rubbed harder.
Through each pass, Lauren barely moved. The exercise made Sadie’s hands and fingers ache terribly, but she could feel the small amount of heat she was making in her daughter’s body, and she would not stop until the warmth of the sun returned to save them. As she rubbed, she thought of Lauren’s sunflower story and wondered if they were facing east. Like the flowers, she wanted to be ready for the morning, offering up Lauren to the Sun God and begging for one more day of energy to fill her daughter.
One more day. That was all she needed, because then she knew they’d be rescued.
She refused to believe anything
else. One day and one night at a time. That was how she’d get through the nightmare she’d allowed to happen to them.
Right now she had to concentrate on one thing only.
Keeping her daughter alive.
CHAPTER TWELVE
Sadie blinked constantly, welcoming the beginning of morning light, a promise of warmth at the end of the sunrays. All around them birds chirped, calling out to one another with cheerful morning greetings. As though the terror of the night were nothing but a bad dream, suddenly everything looked brighter.
During their deepest, darkest hours, the fire had died down to barely more than embers. Getting through the night had been rough; there was no denying that. Her body hurt like it never had before, a flare-up sneaking in and taking up residence in every fiber of her being, reminding her that her chronic disorder might be invisible, but it would not be ignored.
“Lauren,” Sadie said, nudging her daughter.
Lauren grunted, her irritation vocally evident as she reached to scratch at the mosquito bites on her neck and face.
Sadie had nudged her all through the night, massaging her and forcing her to respond to show she was still awake. It was a relief to know that if there had been a concussion, they’d made it through the first critical hours without her daughter succumbing to a coma or whatever it was that concussions did when left unattended.
“It’s morning,” Sadie whispered to Lauren. “Do you think you can get up? You’re going to be really stiff from laying under there all night.”
“Mom. Please let me sleep for just a little while,” Lauren said, irritation making her voice low and hollow. “If you don’t, I’m going to die anyway. Either from exhaustion or your nagging. One or the other.”
Lauren was back in teen mode. Sadie scooted back until she was far enough out of the shelter to stand. She rubbed at her arms, trying to get the blood moving again as she looked down at Lauren’s feet protruding from the mess of branches. With the boot on, she couldn’t tell if the ankle was still swollen or had miraculously healed itself. But Lauren wasn’t moaning in pain, so maybe Sadie should let her sleep for just a little while.
That would give Sadie time to think.
“Take your sweater, Mom,” Lauren mumbled and tossed it out of the shelter.
Once a pretty pastel color, the sweater was now a dried, rusty brown, but Sadie picked it up and pulled the brush and pine needles from it, then struggled into it, buttoning it all the way up. She wasn’t happy that Lauren had unwrapped it from her ankle, but a morning person Lauren was not, and this wasn’t the time to argue the point.
She could’ve used that sweater during the night. She’d put her shoes and socks back on, unwilling to go through the night barefoot. The socks had been dry but the shoes still damp, and at one point she’d wondered if she was indeed hypothermic but then told herself she was being overdramatic. The important thing was that she’d kept Lauren as comfortable as humanly possible during their circumstances, and the pain from the cold was a welcome penance for her allowing them to get into such a perilous situation.
But now it was daylight and time to make some decisions.
First, she used the straw to suck some dew from some leaves, hoping the plants were nonpoisonous. She didn’t get much, but even a tiny bit helped.
Strangely, Sadie didn’t crave her usual morning coffee. Now it was simply a tall glass of ice-cold water that haunted her thoughts. Brushing away the visual, she looked around, taking in every detail of their surroundings.
It still looked unfamiliar. All trees, rocks, and tangled brush. She heard no evidence of any human activity nearby either. As a place to shelter, it wasn’t too bad. There was plenty of kindling around, and other than the rodent, they hadn’t seen any other creatures.
But then, how long would they make it without food or water? Even if she were able to keep the fire going, a few slurps of dew weren’t going to keep them hydrated. So that meant they needed to find their way out.
She thought back to any stories she’d ever heard or read about being lost in the wilderness.
Stay put.
That was always the recommendation. Wasn’t it? Surely there would be search teams out there looking for them, and if they continued to move, the team may never catch up to them.
She moved her tongue around in her mouth, searching for any moisture. There was none to be found.
Exhaustion made her confused, and she continued to debate the options. Nothing sounded like the right decision. All she knew for sure was that they needed to find more water. They didn’t tell you in all the rescue stories how to keep from dying of dehydration. Or how many days they could last without water.
Sadie walked a few feet away from the shelter, looking more closely at their surroundings. She listened, straining in the hope she’d hear some sign of life echo down.
But nothing.
She turned, unsure even which way she and Lauren should go if they did decide to keep moving.
“Mom?” Lauren called out from behind her.
Sadie hid the scowl and replaced it with a more confident—albeit fake—expression.
“I’m coming,” she said, heading back.
Before she’d gone more than ten steps, she froze, looking down at a low spot bare of pine needles or leaves that showed a patch of moist dirt. In it, she saw two footprints. Big ones.
And they weren’t human.
They were also too large to be deer or any sort of wildcat.
It had to be the bear.
Sadie felt a chill so violent that she cringed as it ran up her spine. She looked around and saw a flattened pile of what had to be bear scat. When had the bear come? She thought she’d been awake most of the night. Could it have walked around them that quietly? Was it stalking them? Everything she’d heard about black bears told her that no, the bear wasn’t trying to make them its next meal. But weren’t there rogue bears?
So much for staying put.
“Lauren, get up. We have to go,” she said, walking quickly to the shelter.
“I feel like I have a fever,” Lauren said, moaning.
She did look flushed. Sadie bent down and felt her head.
It was warm. But not burning up. She hesitated, not sure whether she should tell Lauren about the bear.
But Lauren wasn’t a little girl anymore. Sadie kept forgetting that.
“Lauren, don’t get too excited, but the bear was here last night,” she said.
Lauren sat straight up, looking past Sadie at the area around their camp. “How do you know?”
“I saw tracks. We need to get going. It could be near now, watching us.”
There was no more resistance from her daughter. Lauren turned over and crawled out of the shelter on her knees, then sat down.
She looked like a disaster. Her hair stuck up every which way, and her clothes were wrinkled and dried with mud. A mosquito bite too close to her eyelid made her eye appear red and swollen. Sadie thought of the selfie rage and marveled that Lauren hadn’t even thought to try her phone.
“Lauren, see if your phone’s dried out yet,” she urged.
Lauren grabbed the backpack and fumbled through it, coming up with the phone. Sadie waited, her breath in her throat, while Lauren fiddled with it.
It lit up. That was a good sign.
But the screen was still a rainbow of color. No icons. No compass.
No use.
Lauren looked up at her, eyes wet with tears. “It’s ruined. We can’t call anyone and don’t have any way to know which direction we are going.”
“That’s not true,” Sadie said. She pointed behind Lauren. “The sun came up over there, so we know that’s east.”
“So which way should we go?”
Sadie hesitated. “I don’t know which way Olmsted is anymore. I can’t tell which way we came from.”
Lauren sighed, dropping her head.
“Either way, we need to get away from here,” Sadie said. “The bear knows where we are, and it
might come back. Can you walk?”
Lauren leaned forward to a crawling position and got one leg under her to prepare to stand. Sadie reached down and helped her to an upright but wobbly position.
“How’s your ankle feel?”
Lauren tested it, shifting her weight slowly. She grimaced. “It’s still sore but not unbearably. I can walk. I think.”
“Good. Just hang out for a second.” She picked up the backpack, checking to make sure the lighter was still there. It also held the remains of the pine heart, and her hope was that they didn’t need it, but she wasn’t dumb enough to leave it behind. She put the backpack on, then took her place beside Lauren, using her arm to support her daughter. She took out the gum and handed a stick to Lauren before putting it back. There was one stick left.
“What about you?” Lauren said, opening the wrapper.
“I’m fine. Come on—we’ll go this way,” she said, picking an opening through the trees that was wide enough for them both. Lauren popped the gum into her mouth, and Sadie looked away. “As we walk, you need to look around carefully. See if you recognize anything. Maybe a mountaintop? A creek drainage? You’ve been out here before—something might jog your memory.”
“But I haven’t been on that trail, Mom,” Lauren said, pausing to step over a rock. “How can anything look familiar?”
“We aren’t on the original trail. We aren’t on any trail, to be more precise. So all bets are off on making it to where we started. Now we’re trying to find any trail to lead us to people. Just be alert, Lauren. That’s all I ask.”
They continued on, making better time than they had the day before. Sadie barely thought about the blisters that had begun to ache again. Her thoughts were a torrent of what-ifs, starting with what she’d do if they came face-to-face with Mr. Big Bad Black Bear. She reached down and touched the pepper spray that hung from her belt loop. She didn’t even know if it worked.
They’d walked for what felt like nearly an hour before one of them spoke again.
“I’m beginning to hate the silence,” Lauren said. “Let’s talk as we go.”