After the Fire (12 page)

“They always say in books that they survived on roots and berries,” grumbled Alice finally, “but a person would starve around here.”

Alice seemed to have lost interest and said she had to get home. The girls left the island together, gliding in their canoes side by side for a few minutes until Alice said goodbye and headed down the lake.

Melissa, hot and scratched and itchy from some mosquito bites, paddled lazily toward their dock, thinking first about her birthday and then about the more immediate plan of spending the rest of the day floating on the air mattress.

Fifteen

T
he next morning Cody screamed and kicked when Melissa tried to plunk him on the air mattress. His body was wet and slippery and he thrashed about like a fish.

It was no use spending any more time making him put his face in the water. He refused. Melissa climbed on the mattress and lay on her stomach, one eye on Cody, who had forgotten his anger and splashed happily in the shallow water with the noodles.

At lunch Sharlene announced that she had finished her first essay and that it was “pretty good, considering I'm so out of practice.”

“Why
did
you quit high school?” blurted Melissa.

Sharlene sighed. “The only group I fit in with was the party group. None of us were interested in learning anything. I look back now and think
what a waste
.”

Melissa finished her tuna sandwich in silence. One more year and she would be leaving elementary school. She was pretty sure she wasn't going to fit in with any group at her new school. The party group at least sounded popular.

As if Sharlene read her mind, she said, “Hanging out with the party kids wasn't as much fun as it sounds. It was pretty boring most of the time.” She reached out and touched Melissa's shoulder. Without meaning to, Melissa drew back and Sharlene dropped her hand. “I wasted a lot of my life, Mel,” she said. “You're much smarter than me, thank goodness.”

Uncomfortable, Melissa changed the subject. “Are we still having my birthday party tomorrow?”

Sharlene looked surprised. “Of course we are. Cody and I have some things to do today to get ready, don't we, Cody? It's going to be fun. And I can't wait to meet Alice.”

As she paddled to the island, Melissa tried to imagine Alice with Sharlene and Cody. Alice's family sounded so normal. Her mother was an important person and very busy, but she always seemed to have time to do stuff with Alice. She even had time to bake fancy cupcakes. And having an older brother like Austin was a hundred times better than having a pesky little brother who was as much work as Cody.

When Melissa got to the flat rock, Alice's blue canoe wasn't there. Surprised, Melissa drifted. A dragonfly with shimmering wings rested on her paddle. There was not a breath of wind, and the island had an oddly deserted feeling.

Where
was
Alice?

Maybe Austin had finally finished haying and he and Alice were hanging out together. Melissa felt a pang of jealousy, and for a horrible moment she wondered if Dar Wynd was over. Then she shrugged away her thoughts irritably. She was overreacting. She decided to go to the tree house and get her sketchbook, which she had forgotten the day before. If Alice didn't come by then, she would go back to the cabin.

It took Melissa a moment to find the sketchbook. Alice had been back, either the previous night or in the morning. She had tidied things up, and the sketchbook was on the end of the board shelf. The sleeping bag was rolled up and Alice's writing things were neatly stacked beside the sketchbook. There were a few new things on the shelf: another fantasy book with a bookmark in it, a glass jar containing drooping yellow wildflowers, and a slim brown leather book with the edge of a photograph poking out of the back. It didn't look like Alice had given up Dar Wynd after all.

Curious, Melissa opened the leather book. The pages inside were blank except for the first page, where Alice had written the words
Dar Wynd, August
7
, and then one short sentence.
Mother had a good
day today.
Melissa frowned. August 7 was yesterday, so Alice must have written that last night. What did that mean? Then she remembered that Alice had said something about a special dinner celebrating a book contract or something.

The book was like a journal. Melissa had never seen the point in keeping a journal. She had tried once, but why write down all the boring things that you were doing? She slid the photograph out of the back and studied it.

It was a picture of Alice standing between two boys in front of a small white house. They were smiling— big happy grins that lit up their faces—and Melissa imagined the person taking the photograph making a funny face or saying something to make them laugh. She immediately recognized Austin, the tall boy with the dark hair that hung over his face. He had his arm around Alice. The other boy was little, about Cody's age, with skinny arms and legs. Alice and Austin were wearing jeans and T-shirts, but the little boy was in a bathing suit and his tummy bulged out like a balloon.

Cody's tummy did that too, when he had just eaten. Melissa wondered who the little boy was. A cousin, maybe, who had been visiting. She looked at the photograph for a moment longer and then slid it back into the journal and replaced it on the shelf.

Melissa picked up her sketchbook and climbed down the ladder. Dar Wynd was a different place without Alice—too quiet and very lonely.

“You're back early,” said Sharlene. She firmly closed the door to the bedroom that she and Cody shared, but not before Melissa had a glimpse of presents wrapped in bright paper on the bottom bunk bed and a pile of blown-up purple balloons on the floor.

“Remember, Cody, big boys keep secrets,” said Sharlene.

“Alice wasn't there,” said Melissa. She wondered what she should do for the rest of the day and then decided to finish her drawing of the tree house.

Melissa interspersed drawing with dips in the lake and a supper break when she offered to make grilled cheese sandwiches for everyone so Sharlene could work on her English course. She finished the drawing just before it was time for bed. She had bought thumbtacks at the store and had covered almost an entire wall in her little bedroom with her pictures. She tacked up the drawing of the tree house and then lay on her bed and studied it.

It was one of her best. She had worked hard to get the texture of the bark on the big tree and the weathered boards just right. She thought about the art camp in Kelowna that she had wanted to go to so badly. It seemed a long time ago now that she had brought home the brochure. She rolled over onto her side. The loons called back and forth on the lake, making the back of Melissa's neck prickle with goose bumps, and she wondered if that was a little bit what a wolf sounded like. Her last thought before sleep was that if she had gone to art camp, she would never have heard a loon. She would never have paddled a canoe. She would never have met Alice.

Sixteen

O
n Melissa's birthday morning the haze and the smoky smell had disappeared and the sky was deep blue again. Sharlene, Melissa and Cody went to the store. Sharlene made Melissa stay in the truck and came out carrying something in a green garbage bag.

“Marge says the fire is still burning,” she reported. “It's grown by another ten square kilometers. But the wind has changed. That's why the air has cleared.”

Sharlene settled the garbage bag on Cody's lap. “Don't tip it,” she warned. Melissa pretended not to know what it was but she had a pretty good idea there was a box with a birthday cake inside. A woman in the area baked goodies for Marge to sell at the store. Sharlene and Marge had had a long whispered conversation the last time they were at the store, and Melissa had distinctly heard the word
cake
.

Bonnie arrived first with a small package wrapped in pale yellow tissue paper. “I know you said no presents, but this is something small,” she said. She gave Melissa a hug, which made her stiffen because they didn't really even know each other. Then she hugged Sharlene and Cody, so Melissa supposed she was just a hugging kind of person.

“Thank you,” Melissa said awkwardly, putting Bonnie's gift on the table with four other packages that Cody had been hovering around all morning. She worried that Alice would see the presents and feel badly. “Maybe I should open these now,” she said.

“Oh, let's wait for Alice,” said Sharlene. “Part of the fun of a birthday party is watching people open their presents.”

“Here she comes!” yelled Cody. He had been watching the lake like a hawk, not quite clear exactly who Alice was and where she was coming from. “She's Melissa's friend,” Sharlene had explained patiently over and over. “She lives in that house we saw at the end of the lake. Melissa plays with her every afternoon on the island.”

To Melissa's relief, Sharlene let her go down to the dock by herself to greet Alice. “You stay with me, Cody,” Sharlene said, grabbing the excited little boy by his arm. “You can bring the presents outside.”

Alice tied up her canoe, and the girls walked up the grassy bank to the cabin. Sharlene had attached the purple balloons to the posts that held up the porch roof. In the middle of the porch she had arranged an assortment of lawn chairs, two of the chairs that belonged with the kitchen table, and a small round table that she had found in the shed. She had spread a green cloth over the table and had produced bright party napkins and paper plates from somewhere. Melissa worried that Alice would think it was dumb, but Alice said enthusiastically, “Wow! Everything looks so nice!”

Melissa had a sudden horrifying picture of Bonnie and Sharlene both trying to hug Alice at the same time, but Bonnie just said, “Hi there,” and Sharlene smiled and said, “It's great to meet you, Alice.”

“I'm Cody,” said Cody loudly. His arms were full of presents which he dumped in the middle of the table.

For a second, Alice just stared at the little boy. The bit of color drained out of her face, and Melissa wondered if something was wrong. Then Alice squatted down in front of him. “Hi Cody,” she said in a serious voice. “How are you doing?”

“Good,” he mumbled, instantly shy. He stuck his thumb in his mouth and retreated closer to Melissa.

Alice had brought an envelope, which she put beside the presents. Sharlene said, “Everyone sit. Cody, you can help me bring out some cold drinks.”

“I want to sit beside Alice,” shouted Cody, his shyness forgotten.

“I'll save you a seat,” said Alice, and Melissa felt a flush of gratitude. Alice was being nice to Cody. Maybe they could get through this party without one of his tantrums.

That's how she had been thinking of the party— as something to get through safely without being embarrassed—but it was turning out to be fun. Bonnie and Sharlene filled up any quiet spaces with chatter, and Alice seemed relaxed.

“Melissa tells me your mother works for a publishing company,” said Sharlene at one point. “That must be interesting work.”

“Oh, it is,” said Alice. “She's very good at it. She's really busy right now but she's been meaning to ask you over. She's going to invite you for a barbecue as soon as her contract is finished.”

Melissa saw a slight look of surprise flicker across Bonnie's face. There was a tiny pause and then Sharlene said smoothly, “That would be lovely.”

During their lunch of ham sandwiches, veggies and dip and potato chips, Melissa opened her presents. Bonnie had given her a shiny new horseshoe with a gold ribbon tied to it. “Hang it over your bedroom door,” she said. “It will give you luck.” She explained how it was important to put the open end at the top so the luck didn't run out, and Melissa thanked her.

She opened Sharlene's and Cody's gifts next. There was a brand-new sketchbook and a box of charcoals, a book called
Nail Art
that had six little bottles of fluorescent nail polish with it, a silver heart pendant on a delicate chain that Melissa fell in love with instantly and a blow-up beach toy.

Cody hopped around as she pulled the plastic wrap off the toy. “It's a seal,” said Sharlene. “Marge just got them in. I think Cody's hoping he can play with it too.”

Melissa thought she was too old for a blow-up seal and knew that Cody's pestering was probably why Sharlene had bought it. She picked up Alice's envelope.

She could feel Alice watching her carefully while she tore it open. She took out a homemade card with the words
Happy Birthday Melissa
written in felt pen across the front. Melissa opened it. Inside were two crisp twenty-dollar bills.

Sharlene saw them at the same time Melissa did and said, “Oh, Alice, that wasn't at all necessary. That's far too much.”

“It's not every day your best friend has a birthday,” said Alice.

Best friend
. The words stunned Melissa. She felt her cheeks burn. Sharlene looked surprised too, but she recovered quickly and said, “Well, it's terribly generous of you. I'm sure Melissa will buy something special with it.”

Melissa realized that she hadn't said anything and mumbled, “Thank you.”

At that moment Ted arrived, in a different vehicle this time, a green Jeep. Instead of his uniform he was dressed in ordinary jeans, running shoes and a short-sleeved plaid shirt. “You're just in time for birthday cake,” called Sharlene as Melissa tucked the money carefully back into the envelope.

Melissa hadn't seen the cake, which had been hidden in a cupboard, until Sharlene carried it out, ablaze with twelve candles. A jolt ran through her. The tall round cake was covered with pink icing dotted with sprinkles like tiny flowers.

Exactly
the same as the cupcakes Alice had said her mother had baked. Melissa couldn't look at Alice. Her head whirled. Alice had obviously lied again. It was just too big a coincidence. The cupcakes must have come from the store. But why would Alice lie about a thing like that? What was the point?