“What’s wrong? Where are you?” Lavender yelled as she crashed toward them.
The only answer she got was incoherent, a flurry of shrieks and terrified babbling. All the dangers of the wilderness ran through her mind. Anything could have happened. Marisol could have been attacked by a mountain lion or stung by a scorpion or bitten by a rattlesnake. Or maybe something happened to Rachelle, and Marisol was panicking. Rachelle could have passed out from too little food and water. She could have gone into shock. She could have lost her mind and pushed Marisol off the mountain. Anything could have happened.
“Where are you?!” Lavender called again.
The only answer was another scream, short and shrill. But it did the trick. Lavender pinpointed the direction of the sound and rampaged through the brush.
“Careful!” Rachelle’s arm shot out of nowhere and grabbed Lavender just before she could trip over Marisol, who was curled up on the ground, clutching her right leg and whimpering.
“What happened?” Lavender asked, dropping to her knees beside Marisol—all thoughts of John momentarily forgotten.
“Fell,” Marisol said on a sob.
“How? When?”
Rachelle knelt next to Lavender. “She was upset and pacing around and trying to decide what to do about … well, everything, and when she tried to turn, her foot caught between a couple of rocks and she fell hard.”
Okay, Lavender thought, okay, it’s just a fall. No big deal. Sure, it hurts, but she’s going to be fine. Lavender waited for her heart to slow down.
“I think her ankle might be broken,” Rachelle said.
“What?” The word was so loud that Lavender heard her own harsh question echo off the surrounding rocks. A broken bone was bad. Marisol couldn’t search for water or hike down a mountain with a broken bone. Panicking, Lavender knelt over her friend, trying to ignore the dizzy sensation the sudden movement gave her. “Let me see.” Lavender leaned forward and tried to wrench Marisol’s hands away from the knee she clutched to her chest.
Marisol winced. The movement jolted her injured ankle, and she screamed again, another short, piercing wail. Desperate to help, Lavender fought to tear Marisol’s leg free from her iron grip. Lavender had to help. She had to see if Marisol’s ankle was broken.
“Stop it,” Rachelle commanded, swatting Lavender away. “Stop it. You’re making it worse. You’re hurting her.”
Rachelle’s words cut through her panic. Lavender fell back and stopped trying to force Marisol to release her hurt leg. Marisol remained scrunched up on the gravel, crying, each sob cutting through Lavender like a knife.
“I have to do something,” Lavender said.
“The most important thing is to hold the injury still,” Rachelle said. “We have to make a splint.”
“But I don’t know how to make a splint,” Lavender wailed.
“I do,” said Rachelle.
“It hurts,” Marisol moaned again. Dirt streaked her cheeks, her lips were dry and cracked, and her eyes were screwed up tightly in pain.
Lavender looked from Marisol to Rachelle before asking, “Will you make a splint? Can you help her?”
“Of course,” Rachelle said. “That’s what I’m trying to do if you’ll help me.”
Lavender moved aside and allowed Rachelle to take over. Speaking in a soft and gentle voice, Rachelle coaxed Marisol into letting go of her leg. In a less gentle voice, Rachelle ordered Lavender to hold Marisol’s hands. Marisol’s cold fingers clung to Lavender, her nails digging into Lavender’s palms, sending a shooting pain into her cut from the splinter.
“The pain in my hand actually helps,” Marisol grated out in a strangled voice.
“In your hand?” Lavender asked, sure she’d have a row of bloody moon-shaped cuts on her palms when Marisol finally released her.
“Yeah, the pressure is hurting the cactus needles. It’s a good distraction—” Marisol stopped short on a groan. Lavender winced. She’d forgotten how the almost-invisible prickles had covered Rachelle’s and Marisol’s hands.
“Definitely broken,” Rachelle announced, having eased the sneaker and sock from Marisol’s foot. “No, don’t look,” Rachelle ordered Marisol. “It’ll make you feel worse.” But Lavender couldn’t help it. She had to see Marisol’s ankle for herself. She peeked around Rachelle and then wished she hadn’t looked.
The sight made her stomach flip. No one’s foot was ever meant to bend in that direction. Not ever. It looked like it belonged on a broken doll. Marisol wouldn’t be able to hobble a single step, never mind hike down a mountain. It would be impossible.
Lavender thought she’d already reached her lowest point. When they ran out of water. When they found the mountaintop deserted. When Rachelle told the truth about sardines. When John ditched them. But this. This was worse. Waves of pain and panic blossomed. It was getting difficult to breathe. She could hear her rapid breaths, feel the tightening in her chest, and—
“Lavender. Lavender. Lavender.” Rachelle’s sharp voice snapped Lavender to attention. “Focus. I said I need you to find a couple sticks.”
“Sticks? What sticks?” Lavender gasped.
“Can you loosen your grip?” Marisol asked. Looking at their clasped hands, Lavender was startled to see her friend’s fingers looked purple. “When I said the pain helped, I didn’t think you would try to break my hand in half.”
“Sorry.” Lavender dropped Marisol’s hands. She could still hear her own unnaturally loud breath. Lavender shook her head and forced herself not to think of anything but the immediate moment. When she regained a little control, she asked Rachelle, “What kind of sticks?”
“If I’m going to make a splint, get something strong. It needs to be sturdy. Just find what you can. We can break them to the right size if they’re too big.”
“On it.” Lavender picked her way out of the shrubs and made a beeline to the firewood she and Marisol had gathered earlier. Surely there would be something there. She sifted through the pile, taking longer than she should. She was tired, confused, and panicking, so the simple task felt overwhelming. After a moment, she gave up entirely on trying to decide for herself. She loaded her arms with as many sticks and twigs as she could hold and tore back to Rachelle, throwing them down at her side. “Are any of these good?”
Rachelle’s eyes widened in surprise. “Wow, that’s a lot. I’m sure something here will work.”
As Rachelle sifted through firewood, Lavender asked, “What else? What else can I do?”
“We need something for padding. Anything we can cushion her foot with. We have one of her socks, and I was going to use my socks but—” Rachelle grimaced and gestured to her feet. For the first time, Lavender noticed that she was barefoot. Rachelle must have removed her shoes and socks while Lavender was getting firewood. And that wasn’t the only thing. Rachelle’s socks were disgusting—the heels were coated in dark brown and reddish goo. Blood, Lavender realized, some of it drying and dark, some of it fresh and still wet.
“What happened?” Lavender asked.
“I told you my new shoes hurt.”
“Your feet.” Lavender looked from the socks to Rachelle’s feet. Even in the twilight, she could see they looked like raw hamburger.
“I told you to break in new shoes before hiking,” Marisol said in a strained voice.
“I thought we were going on a short walk through the desert with our class,” Rachelle retorted. “I didn’t know I’d be hiking for days.”
Lavender couldn’t speak. She didn’t know what to say. She’d tuned out Rachelle’s complaints about her feet and her shoes. They were all suffering, but she hadn’t realized … If Lavender’s feet looked like that, she would have given up hours ago. She would have sat down at the bottom of the mountain and refused to take another step. Lavender could not even begin to imagine how much it must have hurt Rachelle to climb the mountain with feet like that.
As she pulled off her own socks, a feeling of genuine respect for Rachelle washe
d over Lavender. Maybe she’d never seen any good in Rachelle before because she’d never looked for it. Could it be possible that she’d made up her mind about Rachelle on her first day at school … and been wrong? Really, really wrong?
Lavender had never thought that she would admire Rachelle. Not in a hundred million years. It made her think that maybe they would survive this after all. Sometimes the impossible was more possible than you thought. Miracles could happen. And that’s what they would need to make it home alive.
“We could use my backpack for padding,” Lavender said, wishing that John was still around. They could really use his sweatshirt or jacket. But the backpack would have to do for now.
“Good idea,” said Rachelle.
Lavender emptied it, and Rachelle used the remaining toilet paper for additional padding. Then Rachelle cradled Marisol’s broken foot in the backpack as Lavender took hold of Marisol’s hands and tried to keep her from moving as Rachelle placed the sticks alongside everything and then tied it all together with their socks.
Marisol was crying again before they were done. Rachelle’s forehead was scrunched into deep grooves, and she looked as upset as Marisol.
“I’m sorry. I’m sorry,” Rachelle kept repeating as she immobilized the leg.
Lavender had never felt so useless in her life. She couldn’t even offer either of them a drink of water. All she could do was hold on to Marisol and tell Rachelle, “It’s okay. Keep going. You’re doing the right thing.” At least, Lavender hoped Rachelle was doing the right thing. Lavender hadn’t ever broken a bone before, and she didn’t know a single thing about first aid. By the time Rachelle finished, her hands were trembling, and as she tied off the last sock, she gave Lavender a helpless look. “What now?” she asked.
“C-c-cold,” Marisol said. “I’m so cold.”
Lavender’s instinct was to drag Marisol out of the bushes to the spot where Marisol had cleared space for the fire. A few days ago, or even hours ago, that’s exactly what she would have done. But now, simply taking charge didn’t feel quite right—
“Rachelle? Marisol?” she heard herself say in a hesitant voice. “Do you think we can get out of the brush? If we move back over that way, we can light a fire. What do you think?”
“I don’t know …” Rachelle said in a shaken voice.
“I—I want to do it,” Marisol said between teeth that chattered.
“Are you sure?” Lavender asked.
“Yes,” Marisol said in such a decisive voice that Lavender felt a tiny smile tug at the corners of her mouth. That was Marisol: brave enough to sing a solo in front of a hundred people, fearless enough to pick up a bug that would send anyone else running for cover, and tough enough to face the pain of moving after she’d broken her ankle.
“It’s really not a good idea to move a broken bone.” Rachelle was actually twisting her hands.
“B-better than freezing to d-death in the bushes,” Marisol said.
“Isn’t that what the splint is for? To hold it still?” Lavender asked. “Let’s just try if that’s what Marisol wants. It should be her choice.”
At this, Rachelle nodded.
“Y-you guys can be my crutches,” Marisol suggested. Her teeth were still chattering, and Lavender wondered if there was something else besides the cold that would cause her to stutter like that.
Marisol held her arms out, and working together, Rachelle and Lavender helped her pull to a standing position. All of Marisol’s weight rested on her uninjured leg and on Lavender’s and Rachelle’s shoulders, and Lavender was relieved when she didn’t collapse from the pressure. She was feeling so frail and fragile herself. Then, inch by painful inch, they crept to the clearing.
“Y-you make a good team,” Marisol told them.
Once there, they laid Marisol down on the rock. She flinched at the cold, and Lavender wished they still had John’s jacket or backpack or anything for Marisol to lie on, but Marisol did not complain. Not even when Rachelle elevated her splinted foot on a rock she’d moved into position.
“You should keep it elevated,” she explained. “I think it’s supposed to help with swelling.”
Then Rachelle gathered more wood as Lavender built up the fire. It was more difficult to start a fire than she would have thought, and it didn’t help that she was shivering so hard she couldn’t hold her hands steady or that her head was still fuzzy.
Lighting the fire took her a dozen tries before some of the bigger sticks caught. She kept the fire small, hoping to make their scant wood supply last as long as possible. As the last of the evening light faded and darkness settled over the mountain peak, they crowded on either side of Marisol as close to the fire as possible and discussed their options. Both Lavender and Rachelle agreed it was too dangerous to keep hunting for wood … or to go after John.
The entire area was treacherous and uneven. The last thing they needed was another broken ankle.
“I hope he’s okay,” Lavender said softly. It was scary enough to be lost in the wild, but to be completely alone out there … She shivered and snuggled a little closer to Marisol.
“Me too.” Rachelle’s quiet answer surprised Lavender.
“You didn’t want to look for him earlier,” Lavender reminded her.
“I was—I was—” Rachelle searched for the words.
“Having a moment?” Marisol wheezed in a voice unlike her usual rich tone.
“That’s a nice way to put it,” said Rachelle. “I was freaking out. I mean, I feel so guilty.”
“You feel guilty?” Lavender felt her mouth hanging open in shock. “What do you have to feel guilty about?”
“Are you kidding?” Rachelle said, shaking her head. “I insisted that we should climb the mountain. I was so positive we’d see the campground from up here, or at least a trail. And instead I led us to a dead end. I freaked out. That’s part of why I was so upset at you and why I made such a big deal about John and the money. I just wanted someone else to be mad at instead of … me.”
“Not your fault.” Marisol reached up and squeezed Rachelle’s hand.
The words were like a knife. “No, it’s mine,” Lavender said.
Rachelle twisted to look at her. “It kind of is.”
“Thanks,” said Lavender, “you’re making me feel so much better.”
“I’m not trying to make you feel better; I’m trying to tell you the truth.”
Lavender squirmed and rested her aching head in her arms, uncomfortable because all of this had started with a lie. Her lie.
Rachelle continued. “You shouldn’t have tried to trick us. That was really, really mean, but I thought about what John said. He’s right. You did save the class with the flood warning, and you came to get me and Marisol.”
“Can you guys ever forgive me?” Lavender asked, turning her face toward them.
Rachelle shrugged. “It’s up to Marisol.”
“You’re my friend,” Marisol said simply.
“Even after everything I did?”
“Friends until the end.”
Rachelle gave a soft snort and said, “If we don’t figure something out, the end isn’t too far off.”
They talked in hoarse, weary voices until Lavender grew dizzy with discarded plans for the morning. They should find water. They should look for John. They should climb down the mountain. They should split up—one of them should stay with Marisol while the other hiked down the mountain and found help. No, they should stay together and make some kind of distress signal.
Finally, they agreed on the latter plan. They would wait until it was light enough to search for firewood safely, and then Rachelle and Lavender would gather up as much as they could—anything flammable—and they would build a massive fire. Hopefully, someone who could help them would spot it. Until they were saved, they would take turns looking for water. Because without water, they might not have to worry about trying to survive another night in the wilderness … From everything Rachelle knew about first aid, she
didn’t think they could make it too many more hours without water.
“How do you know so much?” Lavender asked.
“My mom’s a nurse, and I wanted to be one, too. Or maybe a doctor.”
“And because of your sister,” Marisol added.
“I didn’t know you have a sister,” Lavender said.
“Yeah,” said Rachelle. “She was really sick for a long time. It’s one of the reasons we moved back down here. The specialist she needed to be close to was in Phoenix. I spent a lot of time with her in hospitals.”
“Is she better now?”
“Yeah. We didn’t know if she would get better, but she’s in remission now,” said Rachelle, “so there’s always hope.”
“You never talked about it,” said Lavender, feeling rocked by this information.
“I know,” Rachelle said. “It’s not easy to talk about.”
Lavender took a deep breath. So many things weren’t what they seemed. The older Lavender got, the more complicated life became. She wondered what middle school would hold in store for all of them. If only their signal fire worked.
“Let’s sing something,” Marisol said, breaking the sudden silence.
All three of the girls were in choir, and even with hoarse throats and uneven breathing, Lavender thought they sounded beautiful when their voices came together. They chose the Dear Evan Hansen song that their teacher had picked for their sixth-grade graduation. They liked it so much they sang it softly three times in a row, and Lavender found herself feeling strangely peaceful on what should have been the most miserable night of her life.
Maybe it was because they had a fire to share. Or maybe it was reaching some kind of real understanding with Rachelle. Maybe it was Marisol’s forgiveness. Or maybe it was the song they sang: “You Will Be Found.”
Somewhere in the night, both Rachelle and Marisol fell into a fitful sleep. Lavender became drowsier and drowsier until even the cold and the hunger and the animal sounds could not keep her awake. Still, she refused to let herself sleep. Someone needed to watch over the others and guard the dying embers of the fire.
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