Wildwood (Wildwood Chronicles 1)

Standing in the middle of the driveway, surrounded by a steady stream of traffic on the Long Road, the two friends shared a long hug. After a time, Curtis stepped back, wiping his nose with the cuff of his uniform. “Look what you did,” he said. “My newly cleaned uniform, all snotty on the cuff.” He looked up at Prue, his eyes wet with tears. “See you, Prue.”

Without another word, Prue turned and walked her bike into the flow of traffic on the road. She gave Mac a quick kiss on the cheek and checked the connection between the bike and the wagon; all was well. Throwing one leg over the frame of the bike, she mounted the seat and set her feet into the pedals. Within a few moments, she was off.

“Hey, Prue!” Curtis suddenly shouted. Prue pulled the handle brakes to slow the bike and turned around.

“If I ever need you,” he called over the hum of traffic, “I

’m gonna come and find you, okay?”

“Okay!” responded Prue, moving farther down the road.

“Because we’re partners!” shouted Curtis.

“What’s that?” yelled Prue. It was hard to make out words in the din of the busy road.

“WE’RE PARTNERS!” yelled Curtis, at the top of his lungs.

Prue grinned widely, hearing him. “OKAY!” she shouted, and the Long Road made a jog around a bend and Curtis was gone behind her.

She’d traveled for a time, weaving in and out of the knot of traffic, before she arrived at the front gates. Seeing her coming, the guards threw open the doors and gave her a proud salute as she rode slowly under the arch of the wall. The Long Road stretched before her, leading off into the hazy distance. Standing up on the pedals, she kicked the bike into speed, the cool wind whipping at her cheek. Mac gurgled happily in the wagon and waved the carved horse above his head, as if it was itself riding wildly down the road.

“Let’s go home, Mac,” said Prue.

Prue and Mac’s reception, when they arrived back at their house in St. Johns, was riotous. Her mother gripped her around the shoulders in a bone-crushing embrace while her father whipped Mac, laughing, from the wagon and threw him deftly into the air. The exchange of hugs and kisses was so lengthy that they soon lost track of who had hugged whom and which child had been kissed more. Even her parents spent several moments embracing each other as if they had been the ones lost, while Prue looked on, bemused. The afternoon rolled into evening and the celebrations did not cease: Prue’s dad played DJ, pulling out all his favorite old rocksteady records, while her mother danced around the room, lost in a constant frenzy of indecision about which child should be her partner. In the end, she chose both, and the three of them spun about the house in a tight bunch, their arms clinging tightly to one another, their faces bright red with joy.

Prue’s world, once again, returned to normal. Her absence from school during the week was explained away as a sudden extended illness, and her friends greeted her in the hallway with sympathetic faces.

“Chicken pox,” Prue explained, when pressed. One friend pointed out that she’d already had chicken pox, that she remembered this because she’d been the one who’d given them to Prue. “Guess I got ’em again.” Prue shrugged.

The weeks passed. Halloween came and went, notable only for the fact that it was pouring rain that day and everyone had to adjust their costumes accordingly. November ushered in an uncommon Indian summer, the rains having abated, and the McKeel family chose a particularly pleasant Saturday to head out to one of the farms on Sauvie Island to pick up some pumpkins for their planned Thanksgiving desserts. Prue milled about the apple orchard near the farm’s open-air market while her parents went in, arguing over who had the best eye for squash. Mac, now walking unaided, tottered around the few picnic tables that dotted the orchard.

A group of figures making their way toward their car in the parking lot caught Prue’s eye. They were a middle-aged couple and their two children, both girls. Prue recognized them in an instant as the Mehlbergs, Curtis’s bereft family.

Before she knew it, she was walking toward them. “Mr. Mehlberg,” she heard herself saying, “Mrs. Mehlberg.”

The couple looked up. The two girls, one older, one younger than Prue, stared at her as she approached.

“Yes?” said the woman.

As Prue came closer, she saw such a sadness in the woman’s face. Indeed, it was a sorrow that seemed to hover over the entire family like a dark cloud. Prue put her hand on Mrs. Mehlberg’s arm.

“I was a friend of Curtis’s,” said Prue.

The woman’s face lit up. “From school? What’s your name?”

“Prue McKeel. I know him—I mean I knew him pretty well. I’m . . .” Prue paused. “I’m sorry for your loss.”

The pallor returned to the woman’s face. “Thank you, dear,” she said. “That’s very kind.”

Prue bit her lower lip in thought. Finally, she said, “I just want you to know that . . . well, I believe that he’s in a better place. I think, wherever he is, he’s happy. Truly happy.”

The Mehlbergs, the man and woman and their two daughters, stared at Prue for a moment before Mr. Mehlberg replied. “Thank you,” he said. “We believe that too. It was very nice to meet you, Prue McKeel.” He opened the driver’s-side door and climbed into his car. The rest of the family followed him. Only one of the girls, the youngest one, paused at the open car door and squinted up at Prue. “Tell him hello,” she requested before climbing into the backseat of the car.

Prue, momentarily taken aback, replied, “I will,” and watched the car as it drove out of the parking lot and away down the road.

The McKeels’ trunk, when they arrived at home, was laden with squashes of every variety and size, and they’d had to make several trips to get the bounty into the kitchen. It was getting late, and Mac, having had a bowl of banana and avocado at the farm, was acting fussy from tiredness. Prue’s mom was flustered.

“Hey,” she said, “can you put that cranky kid to bed? We’ve got to start these pies if they’re going to be ready for this week.”