“Did you see where he went?” her mother asked. “Can we make it to the bunkhouse?”
Natalie paused, but there was no point in withholding the truth. “He’s in the bunkhouse.”
Her mother closed her eyes, breathing deeply as the news settled in. The bunkhouse was the worst possible place he could have gone. There were knives in there, and if he searched hard enough he might even find their rifle. But that wasn’t the scariest thing—it was far more unpleasant to imagine what he might do to their food stores or stock of seeds. To their greenhouse or hen coop. Their life and comfort on this barren little island had already been hanging by a thread, and now Natalie’s grandpa was on the loose. And he had scissors.
“Shit,” her mother finally said.
“Yup,” Natalie agreed. She hesitated, knowing that her mom wouldn’t like what she was about to suggest. “He seems pretty distracted,” she finally said. “I think I could get to the front door before he even knew I was—”
Her mother shook her head before Natalie had even finished. “Too dangerous,” she said. “You don’t know what he’s found. Better to wait until he falls asleep. Otherwise, one of you could get hurt.”
“Mom.” Natalie tried to keep her rising frustration out of her voice. “You need to drink now. Besides, one of us is probably going to get hurt either way.”
“You don’t know that,” her mother snapped, a look of sharp disapproval cutting through the pain on her face. “That’s something your father would say.”
There was a pause, and they were both quiet.
“That was mean,” her mother said. “I’m sorry. Your dad did the best he could.”
“His best was awful,” Natalie said.
Her mom didn’t argue the point.
• • •
As evening approached, Natalie’s mother fell into a restless sleep. She tossed and turned, crying out softly whenever her swollen ankle shifted. The sea winds whistled through the hinges, and it grew cold. Natalie retrieved a quilt from her grandpa’s bedroom upstairs and draped it over her mother. Then, careful not to wake her up, she placed a hand on her forehead. Her mom was running a fever, and her skin felt tight and dry under Natalie’s fingers.
Natalie went to sit below the food slot. From there she could keep an eye on her mother while also keeping track of the jabbering and footsteps outside. The moment her grandpa wandered out of hearing range, Natalie meant to sneak out to the bunkhouse to get some water. But she wasn’t going to wait forever. Natalie decided to give it an hour—two at most. After that she was going outside no matter where her grandpa was. Even if he was waiting for her on the other side of the iron door.
Even if it meant going through him.
CHAPTER 12
The Rifle
NATALIE SAT THERE IN THE dark engine room, stewing. She felt bad for arguing with her mom. Even worse that the subject of her missing father had come up. It had been a long time since they’d spoken of him.
That was Natalie’s fault, mostly. She’d never worked up enough courage to tell her mother that she’d seen him steal away from Puffin Island. Not just seen it coming. She’d actually watched her father leave.
It was only two months ago. Natalie had thought that the fight between her parents had fizzled out by then, that her dad had finally accepted the inevitability of a new baby. But obviously she was wrong. One night she stumbled out of bed to go to the toilet and was startled to find her father down in the kitchen, fully dressed. He was wearing a backpack, and an oil lantern dangled from each hand. The moment she saw him, Natalie knew what was happening.
Neither of them said anything for a long time. When her father finally opened his mouth, it was just to whisper the words: “Can you hand me one of those?” He nodded in the direction of the lobster traps, stacked against the far wall and looking like a heap of rotting bones. In a daze, Natalie picked up one of the traps and passed it to him. He balanced it across his forearms.
“I’m only taking one,” her dad said. His eyes fell to the flagstone floor of the bunkhouse. “I’m leaving all the rest for you.”
Okay.
Did he want to be thanked for this?
They were quiet for a while. Then, without another word, her father trundled over to the front door and bumped it open with his hip. Natalie followed him, not bothering to put on proper boots, or even a coat. They walked in silence across the barren surface of Puffin Island, heading for the windward shore. The family kept their lobster boat back there, hidden in the shadow of the lighthouse. The tide was up, and in the moonlight Natalie could see one of their sea kayaks bobbing in the shallows. Her father’s bee suit had been stuffed into the kayak, alongside bottles and clothes and other supplies. This obviously wasn’t just a little trip to blow off steam.
“Nat . . . ,” her dad said. He seemed not so much to be having trouble finding the right words as to be struggling with the physical act of speaking.
“You’re leaving?” Natalie asked. That her father meant to abandon them was clear, but Natalie still wanted to make him say the words out loud.
“I have to,” her dad said.
Not. True.
Natalie breathed. She looked her father right in the eyes. “I need you to wait for a second,” Natalie said.
Her dad shook his head. “I’ve said everything I have to say to your mother.”
“It’s not that,” Natalie said. “If you’re too scared to face her, I won’t make you.” She felt weakness sneaking through her and paused to force it out. She had never spoken to her father like that before. Neither of them seemed to know how to react. “I need you to wait while I check something,” Natalie finally said.
Her dad raised an eyebrow. “What?”
Natalie stepped past him and, still in her slippers, waded right into the frigid ocean. She grabbed at the towline for the kayak and yanked, pulling the craft up onto the beach. Once it was ashore, she tipped it over and began to inspect what her father had packed. From the supplies she pulled a small cardboard box that rattled with batteries of different shapes and sizes.
“Not these,” she said.
Her father cocked his head, taking Natalie in. “I need them,” he said. “That’s less than half.”
“We need them more,” Natalie said. “Besides, batteries all come from the mainland. Isn’t that where you’re going?” She shoved the box into her pocket. It hardly fit, sticking up above the waistband of her pajama pants. But just let her father try to take them back. “You can forage for more when you get there.”
Natalie continued to dig through the supplies. Her father had packed a compass, canteens, a fishing rod, and wire snares—all of which they could spare. And nobody on Puffin Island would miss the bee suit—she and her mother were vexed, and of course her wicked grandfather had no use for the thing. The kayak itself would be a big loss, but they had a spare. Not to mention the lobster boat, which still more or less ran. So they could do without the kayak. Just like they could do without her father.
“The rest is fine,” Natalie said, straightening up. “But you can’t take the rifle.”
She meant their .308-caliber hunting rifle, the only gun they had on the island that still fired. She could just make out the stock sticking out from inside her father’s pack.
Her dad waited a long time before answering. “I’m taking it,” he said.
“We need it more than you do.”
“Nat . . .” He trailed off. “I might meet the wicked out there.”
“You might,” she said, hardening herself. It had been more than a generation since the world had fallen to the wickedness, and no one really knew how many of the wicked were left. But the infested town of Goldsport was proof that the number was definitely something more than zero. Proof that the wicked could thrive over the years, feeding themselves and clothing themselves. Waiting for new friends to arrive.
“Of course you might,” Natalie said. “You’re going where they live, after all.”
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��And what about hunting? I can’t catch deer with rabbit snares.” A kind of sad exhaustion overtook her father. This was such an absurd conversation, made more absurd by the fact that it would be their last.
“You’re one person,” Natalie said. “We’re three. Four,” she corrected herself. “You don’t need to hunt for deer. And you don’t need that rifle.”
Natalie’s father nodded, as though thinking this over. Then he dropped his pack down onto the beach. He loosened the straps and pulled the hunting rifle free. “All right, then,” he said. “You’re right.”
Natalie took the rifle from him, as well as a small satchel of rounds. Then she just stood there, clutching it awkwardly as her dad repacked his kayak. He seemed to want to try to hug her before leaving, but was smart enough not to attempt it. Instead, he just shoved out into the shallows and planted himself in the seat.
“When the baby comes, try to talk your mother out of bringing it to shore.” Her dad wedged his paddle against the rocks beneath the water, making ready to push himself away from the island. “I don’t care what she says. The vex isn’t worth the risk.”
“It was for me,” Natalie said.
“Just because you were lucky doesn’t mean your baby brother or sister will be.” Her father winced even as he said it. Given what was happening, he must have known that “lucky” was the wrong word for his daughter. The wrong word for any of them. He remained there for a moment longer, anchored by his paddle to the rocks below.
“You could come with me,” he finally said. “I guess that you . . . you probably don’t want to. But you can.”
To this, Natalie had only one answer. At the time it had felt righteous, and brave. But it wasn’t either of those things.
“Don’t ever come back.”
• • •
Natalie didn’t realize she was falling asleep until she woke up again. She found herself on the cold floor of the engine room, palms flat against the concrete, blinking and blind. Night had come. She could hear her mother’s deep, steady breathing from somewhere nearby. Natalie pushed herself up into a sitting position and immediately felt dizzy. She waited for it to pass before trying to stand. Her thirst greeted her as a sensation that most closely resembled physical pain. Her spit was thick as glue in the back corners of her mouth. The insides of her nostrils ached.
What time was it? Surely her grandfather had to be asleep by now. Natalie climbed the spiral staircase, pawing her way from one step to the next. Up on the fourth floor her grandfather’s bedroom was all aglow, starlight gleaming across the glossy animal pictures on his walls. She went to the window and looked down at the bunkhouse. The doors and windows were all flung wide, but the house itself remained dark.
Natalie continued up the tower, through the service area and then out onto the open-air gallery. She gripped the railings. The gallery seemed much higher off the ground from up here than it ever had from the rocks below. Once her vertigo had passed, Natalie scanned the length of the island. It was a beautiful night. The sky was cloudless, and the stars were out in swarms. She could make out the ragged contours of the western shore. But there was no sign of her grandfather.
Then a cry of “I see you up there!” caused Natalie to jolt so hard that the catwalk shook beneath her.
She stepped to the edge and looked straight down. There, sure enough, was her grandpa. He had hauled the master bed out of the bunkhouse and dragged it—frame and all—to the base of the tower. Now he lay sprawled out atop the mattress, legs spread and hands clasped behind his head.
“Do you remember when I threw that wrench at you?” he asked. “I was standing right where you’re standing now!” At this her grandfather giggled, the coincidence too fabulous to bear.
Natalie said nothing. She knew she should go back inside and wait for him to fall asleep. But thirst kept her on the gallery. Her eyes returned to the bunkhouse. One of the outer walls was lined with rain barrels. The sight of them made her throat ache.
At this point anything was worth a try.
“Grandpa,” Natalie called out, hoarse. “Can you see the barrels lined up against the house?”
“Yes, I can,” he said, still chuckling about the whole wrench business. “I’m not blind yet, you know.”
“That’s great,” Natalie said. “What they are is rain barrels, and—”
“You know, I was wondering about that,” her grandfather said, bopping himself on the forehead with the palm of his hand. “That’s what I drink, isn’t it?”
This was more progress than Natalie had hoped for. “That’s right,” she said. “Do you think you could bring us some of that water? We’re really thirsty in here.”
“Of course I can,” her grandfather said.
Natalie waited, but he stayed exactly where he was atop the bed. It really seemed as though he’d understood the request—or, at least, each of the individual words in the request.
“Grandpa?” Natalie tried again. “The barrels open up from the top.”
“Do you know what I found?” her grandfather called up brightly, already on to the next subject. “I found something really good. I mean—really, just, wow.”
Natalie sighed and let her head droop. Her jaw pressed against the cool metal of the gallery railing. “That’s great, Grandpa,” she said.
Her grandpa didn’t pick up on much, but he did pick up on how underwhelmed his granddaughter sounded.
“Did you even hear me?” he called, annoyed. “I want you to look. I want you to look at what I’ve got. Then just try to tell me it’s not super good.”
Exhausted, Natalie lifted her head. Her grandfather was holding something in the air. Something long and skinny and blackish. Natalie blinked in the dark, and the shape grew familiar.
He had found their rifle.
• • •
Time seemed to slow to a crawl. Natalie’s eyes stayed locked on the gun. She felt a strong urge to pull away from the gallery—to dive back into the lamp room, behind the cover of the storm glass. But she resisted, holding tight to the railing. She knew that she couldn’t panic. Showing fear would only get him worked up. Her grandpa was like an old bear in that way. He might not realize that he wanted to eat you until he saw you running away. It was the flight that begged the chase.
“You’re right,” Natalie called. “That is super cool.” Her fingers flexed on the railing, the metal sharp in her grip. Her feet went shifty beneath her.
“I know,” he said, proud as could be.
Fighting every impulse she had to do the opposite, Natalie leaned over the edge of the catwalk and made like she was trying to get a better look at the rifle. “I can’t tell from here,” she called, “but . . . is that the big one?”
To Natalie’s own ears, her voice sounded utterly stilted, and false. But her grandpa was oblivious. “I don’t know,” he answered, turning the gun over in his hands. “Nobody told me you had more than one!”
“Of course we do,” Natalie said, as offhandedly as she was able. “We keep some on the second floor of the—” She caught herself. There were far less dangerous places to send her grandpa than back into the bunkhouse. “I mean the second, um—we have a second box of guns. We keep it down on the western shore, for emergencies.”
“Sounds like a good idea to me,” he said.
Natalie waited, but he made no move to get up off the bed and go investigate. Instead he turned the wooden stock of the rifle into his shoulder and lined up the sights. He arced the gun wide, aiming at the sky above them, like he meant to have some target practice with the stars.
“Well,” Natalie said, lowering her hands from the railing. “I should probably get some sleep.” She stretched, inching back into the shelter of the lighthouse. It was only after she was safely inside the lamp room that she called out again. “Good night!”
“I’ll see you tomorrow.” Coming from a wicked man, this sounded just as much like a threat as it did a simple statement of the facts. He was still pointing his gun up at the s
ky, shifting his aim from star to star.
“You know,” he called, “I’m actually pretty sure this is the big one.” Then, without any further warning, her grandfather squeezed off a round. The gunshot exploded over the island, rippled out to the far shores, and echoed back as the sound of a thousand angry puffins. He leapt to his feet, standing square in the middle of the bed.
“I think I got it!” he hollered. “Did you see how I . . . ?”
Natalie’s grandpa never made it to the end of that sentence. Firing the rifle must have reminded him that rifles could, indeed, be fired. And so, as though it were the most natural thing to do in the world, he turned his aim toward the lamp room and shot again. The reinforced storm glass immediately in front of Natalie’s face made a wet, sucking sound. It blossomed with ice-blue cracks.
“Hey,” he called, “did I kill you?”
Natalie felt as though she’d been physically struck—winded. Grabbing at the wall for balance, she returned through the service area and down the spiral staircase. As she crossed her grandpa’s bedroom, another shot rang out, and one of the windows exploded. A spray of bottle-thick shards shredded the air just behind her, smashing into the opposite wall and tearing up the decorative animal pictures. Who knew that her grandfather was such a marksman?
Down on the ground floor her mother had heard the shots and was calling for her. “Natalie! Where are you?” She was beyond frantic.
“I think she’s dead,” her father answered joyously from outside. “I’m pretty sure I got her that time.”
“I’m all right!” Natalie hollered down.
“I think she’s all right!” The wicked old man corrected himself without missing a beat. “I thought I killed her, but I was wrong.”
Natalie continued downstairs, stumbling through the office and kitchen, all but crashing into the engine room. There was just enough light down there to see that her mother had crawled off of the couch cushions and taken cover on the far side of the generator. Natalie could see her luminous purple eyes, huge in the darkness.
How We Became Wicked Page 9