The Way Back from Broken (14 page)

“What's going on?” Rakmen asked.

“Packing.”

“You're counting crackers.”

“Yes. Twenty-six per lunch meal. Ten for you. Eight each for Jacey and me.” Leah handed Jacey a tub of almonds, a measuring cup and a stack of plastic sandwich bags. “Put three-quarters of a cup in each bag. We need at least twelve plus another twelve of cashews.”

Jacey's silence as she started measuring nuts told him she was equally nervous about the strange intensity that had replaced the vacancy in Leah's eyes. Rakmen wasn't sure which scared him more.

“Um, that's very precise,” he prompted.

“Got to keep the weight down. We'll be out a long time, and we have to carry everything we'll need until our resupply stop.”

Rakmen looked around the cabin. Soggy slabs of drywall hung from the hole under the sink. Soaked balls of lint and clumps of wet newspaper had collected in the low spots of the still-wet floor. Dark wetness had wicked up the upholstery of the couch.

A sudden image of himself with this crumbling cabin on his back flashed through Rakmen's mind. The weight would crush him. The stink rising from the cabin would suffocate him. He wanted to kick the walls until they collapsed. Instead, he pressed his palms against the table and forced his voice steady. “What's the plan here? Our agreement was eight weeks at this cabin.”

“Well, it's a piece of crap. We need to get out of here.”

“And by out you mean what exactly?”

“Twenty-four days on trip,” Leah said, scrawling another line on her growing to-pack list. “We can carry enough food for twelve days if we're careful. I'll send a box to Branvin with enough for the return trip.”

Jacey abandoned the nuts and watched them, wide-eyed.

“Trip? You mean camping?!” he said, unable to temper his rising voice.

Leah slammed the pen down on the table. “Yes, camping. We paddle across the lake, carry the canoe over to the next one, and keep going. Come on, Rakmen, this isn't rocket science.”

“No,” he said, pressing hard against the tabletop. “This is insane. We can't disappear into the woods. What about Jacey? You'd let her get eaten by wolves?”

“Wolves?” Leah asked, looking at him like he'd grown a third eyeball. “Are you serious? I think you watch too many movies. Jacey, see if there are sleeping bags in that closet.”

Jacey scurried toward the tower of camping gear visible behind an open door.

“You can't do this,” Rakmen said, panic rising. “We'll end up like that guy who cut off his own arm or the kid who died in the bus in Alaska. You'll get us killed.”

Leah burst to her feet like he'd electrocuted her. The chair slammed into the wall as it flew backwards. “Shut up!” she yelled. “We're not going to die!”

“You don't know that!”

Her jaw clenched and anger darkened her eyes. “You can stay here, but Jacey and I are going.”

Behind him, Jacey began to cry.

“I can't stay here,” Rakmen hollered back. “This place is wrecked.”

Leah threw her hands in the air. “Then come, but shut up about it.”

The room seemed to swirl and tilt around him. A nightmare queasiness filled his gut.

“I can't come. I don't know how to do anything. I don't even know how to use this.” Rakmen picked up the GPS unit Molly had given him and shook it at her.

Leah's face twisted violently. She clawed the device from his hand and flung it across the room. It hit the corner of the wood stove and thudded to the floor. Shoulders heaving, she caught her breath. “I'm sorry. I shouldn't have done that.”

Jacey picked up the GPS and held it out to Rakmen. The display was a web of cracks. Calm swept over Rakmen. He wasn't getting sucked down like this. Not with her. Not even for Jacey. Without a word, he turned and walked out of the cabin. Bright sun spiked through the trees, dazzling and disorienting. He turned, unthinking, and took the path toward the point, breaking from the trees like an unconscious man resurfacing.

In crisp flashes, like the shutter click on Jacey's camera, he grappled for something solid. The gray granite rock of the point. The solid blue sky like the inside of a bowl. Heat from the sun on his head and neck. Choices all around. Make one. That's what Edna had said.

Rakmen pulled out his phone and dialed home.

It was time to go. He'd given this a fair shot but it was over.

“Hi, Mom. It's me.”

“Oh—how are you,
mijo
?” She exhaled the greeting, vaporous and thin. “Tell me something good.”

He wanted to cry. Rakmen forced down the lump in his throat. “Um . . . it's a beautiful day here. Very sunny.” He couldn't help it. He had to save them from himself, and he hated it.

“Nice,” she said. “What else?”

“Jacey caught a bass.”

His mother murmured her approval.

Rakmen pressed the phone more firmly to his ear, wondering how to tell her that he needed a flight home, and he needed it now. “Mom, what's going on? You sound really out of it.”

“Oh—” she said again.

“Mom, are you sick?”

“No, I'm not sick. I'm not sure how to tell you this over the phone.” He held his breath. Rakmen didn't want to be told anything. “Your dad is moving out for a while.”

The air pressure around him seemed to change. “I don't understand.”

“We're separating. It's been so hard since Dora...Look, Rakmen, I can't talk more now. Your dad and I have decided to try it apart for a while, and then we'll see about getting back together. I don't know any more than that.”

Rakmen squeezed his eyes shut and pinched the bridge of his nose. He knew without asking that his mom was sitting at the desk in front of Dora's picture. Everything spun back to that tiny person. She'd sent them hurtling into space. Her explosion was blasting everything apart. “I don't know what to say, Mom.”

“Oh,
mi amor
, me neither. It's not your fault.” He wished he could incinerate on the spot. If he'd watched harder...if he'd known better...“Look, sweetie,” she continued, “we'll be okay. It does me a world of good to know you're in a nice place and having fun. I'm so proud of the way you take care of Jacey. She needs a brother like you.”

“Mom, I need—”

“Leah told me how sweet you've been. I'm really proud. I'll see you at the end of the summer, okay?”

“Yeah. The end of the summer. Sure.”

When she ended the call, Rakmen stood holding the phone for a long time. A breeze ruffled the surface of the lake, breaking the reflected trees into shifting splinters of green and brown. Across the water, he could see the place the ice cream guy had emerged from the woods, muddy, stinking of sweat and—incomprehensibly—grinning.

He had smiled and said it was glorious out there.

To the north and to the east from the rocky point where Rakmen stood, the forest spread to the horizon in a shifting patchwork of green.

He would go.

Not because Jacey needed him or because Leah did or because his mother wanted to believe he was weaving her a goddamn basket at summer camp. But because all around him, houses were collapsing, and maybe it was better to be where there were no houses at all.

CHAPTER 18

Rakmen sat on his bunk and fiddled with the GPS. It powered up, but the display was shot.
Don't get lost
. That's what Molly said at the end of each conversation they'd had since he'd been up here. He hadn't been able to bring himself to tell her about the GPS.

Or about going
au large
.

For four days, Leah had been in a packing frenzy, attacking her crumpled list with a red pencil every time she added something to the carefully measured bags of almonds and all their other gear. Somewhere in the pile was the green nylon bag with his clothes for the trip. Rakmen was still trying to block out the cringe-worthy moment when he'd had to itemize its contents for her and take out some underwear—four boxer briefs were apparently the maximum allotment.

But he had to tell Molly something, and soon. He swiped the phone off the bedside table and slammed out a text.

Long time, no see.

While Leah had packed, Rakmen had spent as much time as possible with Edna. Partly to avoid another blowout, but also because Edna was putting him through his paces, showing him the things he needed to know to survive this trip. And of course, Jacey had stayed stuck to him like a shadow.

His phone beeped.

How's the water skiing?

Beyond epic except when my skis get stuck in the moose muck.

Moose muck?

It's as bad as it sounds.

*grin*

Jacey pushed through the door and plopped on the bed beside him. “Whatchya doing?”

“That door was closed,” he said, frowning at her.

She shrugged, pushed her pink camera into his face, and took a picture. “Mom says we're leaving in a half an hour.”

“Go on,” he said, batting her away, “I'm texting Molly.”

Jacey pursed her lips and made kissy noises as she left.

I'm gonna be out of touch for a while.

???
He could practically see her brow furrowing, the scar puckering.

We're going on a canoe trip for a few weeks. Even typing the words sent worry jittering through him. At least he sounded like he had his shit together in text.

I don't understand.

Rakmen ran his fingers through his hair. Text wasn't so safe after all. She was already worried. Outside, frogs were going crazy in the lily pads, and Leah was hollering at Jacey to take their paddles down to the shore.

He should walk right out of here. He could hitchhike to Toronto and get a standby flight. Rakmen sagged back on the bed. He would be a minor crossing an international border alone. Good luck with that.

The phone in his hand rang, and Molly's picture popped up on the screen. He cursed under his breath. Text was hard enough. He wasn't sure he could keep it together in real time.

“Hey there,” he said, switching hands so he could wipe the sweat from his palm.

“What's going on?” Molly wasn't clueless about Leah, of course.

“Well,” he said, realizing that even though he wanted to tell Molly, there weren't words for the way all the falling-apart-things had pushed him off this particular cliff. He took a deep breath and started again. “We decided to go camping. There's this amazing canoe here, and there are trails and lakes and stuff. Exploring around, you know.”

“Yeah, I guess,” said Molly, dubious. “You want to do this?”

“Jacey's really excited.”

“I'll bet.”

In the silence that followed, Jacey poked her head in. “Time to go.”

He nodded and held up one hand to shush her.

“Will you be able to text me?” Molly asked.

“About that,” said Rakmen, shifting on the bunk. “There won't be phone service out there. That's why I wanted to let you know. So you won't worry.” He cringed, glad that she couldn't see him trying so hard to put on a good show.

“I will anyway.”

He forced a laugh. “Don't.”

He would worry enough for both of them.

“You've got the GPS, right?” she asked, trying to match his fake cheerfulness with her own.

Rakmen stared down at the cracked screen. “Yup. I've got it.”

“Don't get lost.”

He wanted to promise her that he'd come back safe, but they would both know that was a lie. “Molly, I've got to go. I miss you.”

“Right. Me too. Bye.”

A sick sourness rose in him as he ended the call, powered down his phone, and left the GPS on his bunk. He felt naked and unmoored, as if nothing tethered him down any more.

Leah and Jacey waited in the main room. Their three packs—small, medium, and behemoth—were lined up next to the door.

“I've weighed them,” said Leah, the past few sleepless nights all over her face. “Twenty-six pounds for Jacey. Yours is thirty, plus the canoe makes about eighty. Sixty-nine pounds for me. I guess we're ready to carry them down.”

Rakmen avoided looking at her, hoping that would quell his urge to kick the legs off the table. It didn't help. To save the furniture, he carried the packs to the canoe waiting on the shore. Jacey circled their pile of gear taking pictures. He ducked his head to avoid her viewfinder. He lifted the canoe into the water. When the gear was stowed to Leah's precise specifications, she waved him toward the bow seat.

Rakmen didn't move.

“Come on,” Leah snapped. “I want to get moving.”

Half of him wanted to shuffle to the bow and be done with it, but the other half fought back. “That's not my seat.”

Hard lines rose on her face. He could almost hear the joints freezing up. “I really think you should let me paddle stern,” she said, through clenched jaws.

Jacey stiffened. “Edna says he's the direction.”

“Then why's he wasting his time babysitting you?” Leah snarled.

Jacey scowled up at her, and for a second, Rakmen thought Leah might slap her. He stepped between them, and tried to channel his father's confident nurse voice. “Edna said the heaviest person should be in the stern. I can paddle there fine and then you can lead the way from the bow. Read the map and stuff. Tell me where to go.”

Jacey squirmed behind him. “I'm the power,” she whispered, “in the bow.”

He didn't wait for Leah to respond. Keeping them moving forward was his only concern now. Stopping felt more dangerous than staying put. “You're in the middle, Power,” he said, urging Jacey into the canoe and settling her on the large pack in the middle. “From here you can keep an eye on me. Make sure I'm doing it right, okay? And be in charge of the snacks.”

She grinned at him.