Page 18

EIGHTEEN

RYDER

“You caught me,” Emily whispers when she lands in my arms.

“Always,” I whisper back, my pulse racing.

I want to dip her and kiss her and drop a clever one-liner like the main character would in a movie— Fancy meeting you here or Come here often? might work—but there’s no time for that. There’s not even time for us to sprint through the darkness and into the woods, because the henchmen have reached the tower room.

So instead, with Emily in my arms, I dive sideways to duck under the tower. Hoping tall weeds and inky darkness will be enough to keep us unnoticed, I lay on top of her, covering her with my body lest a henchman spot us and decide to shoot first and grab the diamond later. I can feel her heart pounding against my chest, and mine must be, too, but I can only focus on the fact that she slips an arm around the back of my neck and holds on like there’s no tomorrow.

Which, if we’re unlucky, there might not be.

We barely breathe, barely even blink for seconds, a minute, maybe two. Finally, after a whole lot of grumbling and even more F-bombs, Sinclair’s men jog back down the stairs and do a sweep of the area, the brightness from their flashlights bouncing off the trees and the tower. Emily digs her nails into the back of my neck, petrified, and I will these unrepentant assholes to fuck off and go crawling back to Sinclair.

At long last, they return to their boat and speed off, the motor gunning, and I roll off Emily and let out a long, shaky exhale.

“Thank you, Ryder,” she whispers, squeezing my hand, but the kiss she gives me when she rolls on top of me, her curls falling over her shoulders and tickling my cheek, is all the thanks I need.

—

We spend the night huddled together under the radio tower, our teeth chattering as we fade in and out of sleep. We’re both too exhausted to move, much less come up with a plan, and we’re holding out a shred of hope that a park ranger or the Girl Scouts or a friendly, nonmurderous hiker might respond to our call for help.

But when morning comes, the pastel sunrise reflecting off the gleaming waters of Lake Superior, we decide it’s better to move on than to linger too long in one spot. Strong wind gusts make the lake choppy and rule out any chance of safely traveling by Malcolm’s boat, and so we set off by foot, surveying the little food we have left.

“We’re down to three freeze-dried ice-cream sandwiches and one Cosmic Brownie,” Emily says, scowling. “And it doesn’t even have many sprinkles.”

We don’t talk much when we hit the trail, hiking in what I sincerely hope is east toward the ranger station, because we’re both exhausted and hungry and the strong wind gusts make it hard to hear each other anyway. I keep whipping my head around to look behind us, terrified I’ll see one of Sinclair’s men, but the forest is quiet except for the sound of birds chirping and waves crashing against the shore, and it would be a serene scene if we didn’t look like the bedraggled survivors of a zombie apocalypse.

We’re trying to figure out how long we can go without tearing into the freeze-dried ice cream when I spot a blur of something blue hanging from a thicket of bushes in the distance.

“Hey, is that…” I jog toward the bushes, some of my energy bouncing back as I realize this might be a stroke of good luck. “Holy shit. Blueberries!”

I sound like an absolute maniac, crying out with joy for a couple of fucking berries, but I can’t help myself.

“Emily!” I cry, waving for her to catch up as I grab a handful of blueberries and hold them up like they’re the Evermore diamond. “Look! Motherfucking BLUEBERRIES!”

“Uh, Ryder,” she says, hurrying toward me as I gaze at the rich blue berries in my hand and pop one into my mouth. “Are you sure those are—”

But she doesn’t finish her sentence. Instead, she lets out a gasp, and I do, too. Because as soon as the berry touches my tongue, a hand emerges from behind the bush and smacks me in the jaw.

“ Ow! ” I cry, gripping my jaw as none other than Killface, the haggard-looking man we encountered at Washington Creek, stares at me with unblinking eyes.

“Spit it out, you goddamn idiot!” he says, slapping me roughly on the back. “Spit it out!”

Too startled to protest, I do as I’m told while Emily catches up to me, watching wide-eyed as Killface smacks the ever-loving shit out of me.

“What the hell, man,” I grunt, spitting the blueberry out and coughing when he thumps my back again. “What’s your problem?”

His scraggly white hair hanging loosely around his face, he shakes his head in disbelief. “I don’t have a problem. You do. You just tried to eat a blackthorn berry! Are you a goddamn idiot, son?”

I glance from him to Emily and back to him. “Honestly, yeah. Kind of.”

He rolls his eyes and hands me a flask of water. “Blackthorn berries are poisonous, you nitwit. I sure hope you didn’t swallow any. Here. Drink.”

I’m terrified to drink anything he gives me, considering he looks exactly like the dude from Tales from the Crypt , but I’m even more terrified that some of the berry juice trickled down my throat, and so I accept his flask and drink thirstily.

“Why in the hell are you kids out here eating poisonous berries?” Killface asks, his face permanently locked into a deep scowl.

“Well,” I say, “it’s kind of a long story, one that involves a diamond and a madman and me not being as familiar as I thought I was with how blueberries look.”

His scowl intensifies. “Son, are you high?”

“I wish I were high,” I mutter as Emily steps forward and extends a hand toward him.

“Sir, hi. Hello. My name is Emily Edwards. You might remember me from when you were sort of, uh, looking at me in the ferry cabin? And then we saw you at the creek?”

She glances at me. “This is Ryder Fleet. And I know we’re complete strangers, but we desperately need your help.” She takes a deep breath and clasps her hands together like she’s about to deliver an important speech. “You see, I have my dad’s ashes in my backpack. And I hired Ryder here as my tour guide to help me navigate Isle Royale and spread those ashes. But it turns out he’s not actually a qualified tour guide, which might have been okay except that we almost got stomped by a moose, which led to us stumbling upon one guy pushing another guy off a cliff. And we helped the guy who got pushed off the cliff, which we thought was very Good Samaritan of us, but it turns out that that guy was the real bad guy and a crazed archaeologist. And then he shot the guy who’d pushed him off the cliff in an attempt to steal a super valuable diamond, and then he tried to kill us, too, but we escaped with the diamond, and then we ran into some wolves, and also a guy named Malcolm, and I had to jump off a radio tower. A radio tower !”

Killface blinks at her. “Who the hell is Malcolm?”

“Oh, that’s one of Sinclair’s henchmen,” I explain, glad to have something to contribute. “But not the one who’s probably going to execute us. That one is named Butcher, and she’s a henchlady.”

The lanky hiker looks at me for a long second before turning his gaze toward Emily.

“Is that all?” he asks gruffly.

“ Is that all? ” I repeat. “Are you serious? She tells you that we stumbled upon a jewel theft, witnessed a murder, and are currently being pursued by a crazed archaeologist with a burly team, and all you can say is Is that all ?”

“I’ve been to all sixty-three national parks, son. I’ve seen some shit.” He glances at Emily. “And I wasn’t staring at you on the ferry, missy. I was reading the map on the wall behind you.”

“Oooh, she’s not gonna like that you called her missy,” I mutter. “She yelled at me for calling her ma’am.”

“This crazed archaeologist,” Killface says, ignoring me entirely, “what’s he look like?”

“Like a hot professor.” Emily glances sideways at me, biting her lip. “I mean, like a professor. He’s got auburn hair and glasses and a tweed jacket. You might have seen me talking to him in the cabin on the ferry.”

“Oh, that’s right,” Killface says, nodding. “Real tall, handsome fellow? Looks a bit like a young Robert Redford?”

“He’s not that handsome,” I grumble, annoyance prickling my skin. “Not that tall, either. And Robert Redford would never steal someone’s Discman.”

“Son, I’m gonna ask you this one more time,” Killface says. “Are you sure you’re not high?”

“I can assure you that neither of us are high,” Emily says quickly. “We’re just exhausted and hungry and very, very out of our element here. If you could help us find our way to the ranger station so we can contact the police—”

“No can do, sorry,” the old man says, shaking his head. “I go into the wilderness to get away from people, not get roped into somebody else’s business.”

“But you have to help us,” I protest. “Come on, man. We’re hapless and adorable!”

“I think you’re hapless and annoying,” Killface says.

“Well,” I say, “that seems like something you should say in your head and not out loud—”

“Look, Mr.Killf—” Emily freezes. “Mister…sir man person, I know you don’t know us. And at first, I know I might come across as clueless and Ryder as an oafish buffoon—”

“Hey!” I object.

“—but we’re begging for your help,” she continues. “I promise that we’re good people, albeit completely misguided, and all we’re trying to do is stay alive and stop a diamond from landing in the hands of a greedy madman. Please don’t let the bad guys win. Please help us.”

Killface sighs, but much like me, he seems unable to resist Emily.

“Fine,” he says after a long silence. “But only because my wife, Edith, would roll over in her grave if she knew I turned you kids away. And because I saw that professor yelling at his assistant on the ferry, and he seemed like a real jackass.” He frowns. “Never trust a man who doesn’t carry his own pack.”

“See, that’s what I’m talking about!” I cry, clapping at Killface’s words. “That’s exactly what I said! This guy knows what’s up!” Beaming, I raise my hand for a high five, but he only glares at me in return.

“Never mind, then,” I say quietly, lowering my hand. “So, what should we call you, sir?”

“Biff,” Killface says. “My name’s Biff.”

“Pleased to meet you, Biff,” Emily says, shaking his hand.

“I’m sorry, did you say that your name is Biff ?” I ask without thinking. “Is that short for, like, Bifford? Biffington? Biffley?”

He shakes his head at me. “What kind of idiot is named Biffley? Use your brain, son.”

I really don’t know what to say to that, but he doesn’t give me a chance to reply anyway.

“Now, the closest ranger station is about nine miles that way.” He points to his right, which I think is east, although I can’t be sure. “If you’re looking to stay hidden, you’ll want to stay off the coastline and cover your tracks. I can show you how to do that, but what do you kids have in terms of weapons?”

“Well, we had a slingshot,” I tell him, cringing as I remember pelting Emily in the head with a rock. “And I made daggers, too.”

I yank my homemade dagger out of my sock, holding it up proudly, and Biff stares at it for a moment before bursting into laughter.

“You couldn’t pop a balloon with that thing,” he says, laughing so hard his eyes tear up, and he grabs my dagger and snaps it in half like it’s a Popsicle stick. “Now, if I’m going to help you, you’ll need to follow a couple of rules.”

“Of course,” Emily says. “Just name them.”

“One, don’t eat any berries or mushrooms you find in the wild,” he says, narrowing his eyes at me. “You’re not Bear Grylls. You will get poisoned, and you will die. Two, if I tell you to run, you run. If I tell you to hide, you hide. And three, speak to me as little as possible. Edith was the chatty one. I prefer to hike in silence.”

“Edith was a saint,” I whisper to Emily.

But as our strange new helper leads us into the forest, my hand wrapped around Emily’s, I find myself feeling more than grateful for his intervention. After all, we need all the help we can get.

—

Biff may be a bit of a curmudgeon, but he knows his shit. He shows us how to move stealthily through the woods, covering our tracks by walking on rocks whenever possible. When there are no rocks to walk on, he uses a stick with leaves to sweep the forest floor clean behind us. He teaches us how to select a good throwing rock and keep it at the ready in our pockets, and he lends us each a small hunting knife with a blade so sharp it makes my homemade dagger look like a joke.

“Are you a retired spy or something?” I ask as he shows us how to leave decoy footprints in the direction we’re not going, then demonstrates how to make our footfalls as quiet as possible.

“No.”

“Well, what did you do?” I ask, ducking under a low tree branch.

He glares at me. “Rule three, son. Rule three.”

Hiking in silence is incredibly difficult for me—actually, doing anything in silence is—so I’m relieved when we stop at dusk to set up camp for the night. I’m pretty sure Biff almost has a stroke when he watches me try to get the campfire going, but in the name of his beloved Edith, he shows me how to create a pit, then pile a few handfuls of tinder in the middle and crisscross kindling over top. Using as few words as possible, he explains the different ways to layer the kindling—teepee, lean-to, cross, log cabin—and how to blow lightly at the base of the fire to encourage the flames. It’s all stuff Caleb could have taught me had I only paid attention, but it feels good to learn it now, and when we gather around the campfire to eat the bean soup Biff cooks over the flames, I feel more hopeful about our chances of survival than I ever have.

I watch as Biff sets up two red camping chairs side by side, then meets my gaze with his.

“This is Edith’s chair,” he says, pointing to the empty one beside him. “You try to sit in it, and I’ll hand you over to the hot professor myself.”

“Once again, he’s not that good-looking,” I insist. “And of course. I wouldn’t dream of sitting in Edith’s chair.”

“I think it’s nice that you still bring her chair along,” Emily says, smiling at Biff and pulling her fuzzy blanket over her shoulders.

He shrugs. “Wouldn’t be right not to. We were married for forty years. She was the one who got me hooked on backpacking.”

“Can I ask how long ago she passed?” Emily asks.

“Nine years this November,” Biff says. “Lymphoma.”

“I’m sorry,” I say, listening to the campfire pop. “I’m sure she was a wonderful woman.”

Biff nods, and it’s the first time he hasn’t looked like he wanted to punch me in response to something I’ve said.

“She put up with me, so you know she was.”

I’m sure she has an absolute mansion in heaven for tolerating Biff for forty years, but I don’t say that out loud.

“Can I ask you something?” Emily says, sipping from her canteen. “Does it get easier? Living without her? Missing her?”

Her question brings a lump to my throat, and I reach over to take her hand.

“No,” Biff says after a beat. “And yes. It took me years to find a new rhythm, a way to go on without her. I swore I’d never visit a national park again after she died, because the thought of doing it without her was…” He looks into the fire, scratching his beard and searching for the words.

“Unsurvivable,” I say quietly.

He nods. “Yes. Exactly.” He blinks, as if surprised that I’m capable of producing a sensible answer. “The older you get, the more people you see die. People you love, people who love you. And everybody tells you that you have to find a way to move on eventually, to keep going, but I don’t think anybody really moves on. I don’t think anybody should.”

“What do you mean?” I ask, thinking of the words Hannah hurled at me the last time we spoke: You need to move on, Ryder. Caleb’s life ended, but yours doesn’t have to.

“I mean, Edith was my best friend,” Biff says. “I spent forty years of my life living with that woman. She was the best thing that ever happened to me. Why would I want to move on from that? From her?” He taps the arm of the empty chair. “I don’t. So I just move forward, and I bring her with me as best I can.”

“That’s really lovely, Biff,” Emily says, sniffling, and our wizened rescuer shrugs.

“I don’t know if it’s lovely,” he says, the fire crackling before him. “But I know that it’s love.”

It might be the most profound thing ever uttered by a man named Biff, if there are any other Biffs in the world, and I find myself thinking of my brother, of how much he would have liked Biff, and liked Emily. Of how much they would have liked him. And for the first time in a long time, maybe for the first time ever, I don’t try to push away the thought of Caleb when it comes to me. I don’t try to chase it away with beer—though I couldn’t right now even if I wanted—and I don’t scramble to blunt the pain with Calvin and Hobbes or junk TV. I just sit with it, imagining that Caleb was here right now, huddled around the fire with the three of us. I know exactly what he’d do, after trading backcountry camping tips with Biff and toasting a marshmallow to a perfect crisp for his s’more. He’d put in a good word for me with Emily, find a way to bring up some endearing story from our childhood that made me look like the hero. And then he’d grin at me, his dimples on full display, and I’d know that even out here in the middle of the wilderness, I wasn’t alone. That my brother had my back, always, no matter where we went.

I think of how Biff still sets out Edith’s chair and how Emily ventured into a wilderness she was terrified of to pay tribute to her dad. I think of how I took this gig in the first place so that I could help pay for Caleb’s boat, so I could carry a piece of my brother’s past into the future. I think of how Katherine Evermore chartered a ship to go find her husband with no promise of success. I think of all the things people do for love, all the everyday acts of courage I’m surrounded by if I would only open my eyes and see them.

If only I would be brave enough to open my heart.