I couldn’t speak. I had a hard enough time keeping my eyes open. I just wanted to fall asleep, get some much-needed rest, and when I woke up, this whole messy confusion would be cleared up.
“How do you know Jake,” Austin asked me.
I opened my mouth, but no words came out.
Then the ambulance pulled into the driveway. Austin and Cameron ran off to greet the paramedics. I stayed on the bench in a daze with Matty at my side.
Matty tried to ask me a question, but I couldn’t follow what he was saying. Instead, I watched Austin and Cameron lead the paramedics into the lodge.
I turned to Matty. “Let’s go back inside.”
The paramedics had come and gone in a blur. I found myself sitting on the floor in the dining room, my head and back leaning against the wall. I had only a slight notion of how I’d gotten there. I remembered my steps being uneasy, my body demanding I fall asleep, and clutching onto Matty like he was a firefighter rescuing me from a burning building.
Hans came over to me. He leaned over and wrapped an arm around my back. “Come on, Greta. Let’s get you back to the room.”
I pointed at him. “You’ve got blood on your shirt.”
He looked down. “And so I have.” He tried to lift me, but I wouldn’t let him.
“I don’t want to move, Hans.”
He didn’t insist. Instead, he took a seat next to me and held my hand.
Matty, Austin, and Cameron, who had followed the paramedics and Betty to the ambulance, came back.
“Are you OK, Greta?” Matty asked.
I turned to Hans, lifted my hand toward Matty and his friends, and said, “Hans, this is Matty. That’s Austin, and that’s Cameron. They’re friends of Jake’s.”
16
Greta
Growing up, Hans and I liked to play our own peculiar game. Well, I liked to play it. I never knew if Hans enjoyed it too or if he just played along because he had to.
It was our own version of hide and seek. Instead of one of us covering our eyes and counting to a hundred while the other went off to find a hiding place, I would simply sneak off, without warning, and Hans would have to set out and look for me.
He always found me.
One time, when we were staying at a foster home in Wyoming, I’d snuck off into the woods, climbed a tree, hid in the high branches, and waited. Twenty minutes or so later, Hans was at the bottom of the tree calling for me to climb down.
Another time, from another foster home in Wyoming, I’d snuck off and gone for a long run down the creek, through the prairie, and into an abandoned shack I’d stumbled across. A few hours later, Hans came to the shack and walked me back home.
It was the only game we played that I didn’t mind losing.
I never knew how he did it. I never asked. I doubted even Hans knew. We weren’t twins, and neither of us was a mind reader. But somehow, he always knew where to find me, and he always brought me safely back home.
Sitting on the floor of the lodge dining room with Hans at my side, holding my hand, it seemed like we were worlds apart. It seemed to me like I’d snuck off and strayed far far from home. Still, I had no doubt that Hans would come and find me and bring me back.
I turned to him and said, “It’s been a long day.”
He nodded.
“And tomorrow’s going to be another long day,” I said.
He nodded.
I gave him a side hug and kissed him on the cheek. “Get some rest, Hans. We’ll have time to talk things over on the bus ride in the morning.”
He shook his head. “I’m not leaving you here. Not like this.”
I gave his hand a pat. “Hans, even in your sleep, you couldn’t be leaving me. Tomorrow’s going to be a long, tough day. I’m going to need you to be strong and rested. We’re all going to need you. Don’t worry about me. Get some rest. I’ll be all right.”
Hans looked up at Jake’s friends, who were standing a few paces away, looking on with sympathetic gazes. He then looked at me. “You need to get some sleep too.”
I nodded. “But I have something I’ve got to do first.”
A long silent moment passed before Hans pulled himself off the floor. He stared down Jake’s friends, not aggressively, but not in a friendly way either, then he looked back at me. “You sure about this?”
I nodded.
“You need anything,” he said, “just call. I’ll come running.”
“I know you will, Hans. I know.”
Once Hans had left the dining room, I extended my hands to Jake’s friend. They came over and helped me up.
I led the boys into the kitchen and walked over to the oven. “This is the kitchen where Betty works.” I pointed to the oven. “This is the oven.”