Something Wilder

Tomorrow, he thought bleakly, I might have to say goodbye.

* * *

Up on top of a small ledge overhang, they sat with their legs dangling, fingers entwined. It was afternoon—just after three—but it felt like they’d been awake for a year. In front of them, the sky was a flawless jewel. Lily’s backpack was open beside her, and even with her clothes inside, it seemed empty without the journal.

She pulled Terry’s satellite phone out and turned it on. Leo supposed he should be grateful that Jay and Kevin hadn’t taken it during their backpack raid. “I’m gonna let Nic know to pick us up tomorrow.”

He nodded, watching her dial the number from memory. Tinnily, the sound of the phone ringing reached him.

“Hello?”

“Hey, it’s me.” He didn’t hear more than the loud, amorphous sound of Nicole’s voice. Lily shook her head. “It’s a bust.” Another pause. “I’ll explain it all later, but Terry was working with some guys. They followed us down here and took my gun, tied us up.” She paused, and Leo could hear the disembodied sound of Nicole yelling. “Yeah, I’m serious. Nic—Nic—just listen. If you could pick me and Leo up where we went down, we’ll try to get there by around two tomorrow afternoon.” She paused again and looked over at him, saying, “Nicole says Bradley had to fly home, and Walt is recovering at a hotel in Moab.” She turned her attention back to Nicole. “I guess it’ll just be you picking us up, then. Prepare for a big night at Archie’s before we send Leo back to New York.”

Ouch.

Lily said goodbye and pulled the phone away from her ear, hitting End Call before dropping it in her backpack. She stared down for a few seconds and then let out an angry growl.

“I hated that journal,” she said, “but it’s worse that Terry’s asshole friends have it now. It was all I had of Duke’s.”

He didn’t know what to say. Her relationship with the journal was complicated as hell, and Leo couldn’t pretend to understand the extent of it. Instead, he squeezed her hand.

She pulled out the photo of Duke leaning against the tree, releasing Leo’s hand to hold the photograph in both of hers. Someday, when the disappointment wasn’t so fresh, maybe they’d be able to talk about her dad, and how this trip changed her feelings about their history. But today was not that day.

“I’m so mad,” she said quietly. “And I am desperate to know whether those assholes found anything.”

The words exploded from him. “God, me too. It’s killing me.”

She laughed. “On the one hand, I think, ‘Fuck those guys. I hope there’s nothing.’ But also: I want to think we were close.”

“I agree.”

Tapping her fingers on her thigh, Lily leaned closer to the photo, narrowing her eyes. She looked up, frowning, and then stared down, more intense now. “Wait.”

There was something in her voice that caught his heart in a hook, sent it casting out into a pool of adrenaline.

“Wait, what?” he asked.

She pointed to it. “Am I seeing what I think I’m seeing?” Lily handed him the photo and squeezed her eyes closed. “Describe this. Tell me everything you see. Every detail.”

“Why?”

She shook her head. “Just humor me.” He stared blankly at her for a few beats, uncomprehending, unwilling to latch on to the weird twinge of hope in his pulse until she reached out blindly and tapped the picture again. “Do it, Leo.”

“Well, okay. It’s, um, a black-and-white photo,” he said. “It’s a picture of a cabin in the canyon. It’s tiny, made of wood, looks to be about ten feet across the front at most. There are two windows, small, identical. And between them is a chimney. And Duke is leaning against the tree on the left, holding a beer, smiling.” He exhaled slowly. “Duke’s tree, the stump we found.”

“Our left or his?”

Leo blinked over to her, confused. “The left side of the photo. He’s leaning against the tree with his right arm.”

“What hand holds the beer bottle?”

He looked down again. “His left.”

“Exactly. How many fingers do you see?”

His stomach seemed to drop straight out of his body and over the cliff. “Oh, shit.”

He looked up at her to see she was already shaking her head, eyes open now and smiling. “It’s impossible, right? He only has four fingers on his left hand.”

“Then how—?”

She took it back. “It’s a red herring. It’s intentional. Only someone who knew Duke could figure it out. Leo: this photo is a mirror image.”

A mirror image.

Duke wasn’t leaning against the tree on the left. He was leaning against the one on the right, and they hadn’t even looked for that one.

“But did you see another stump?” Leo hadn’t seen anything other than rotting wood and crumbled stone.

“No.” Lily grinned over at him. “But we wouldn’t have if it was buried under the collapsed fireplace.”