My Abandonment(8)

We squint into the sun. A dog barks, so close to my ears, in the back of a truck speeding past. I look back behind us where airplanes slide in and rise up from the airport. I've never been on an airplane, not that I can remember. Further than the airport there are mountains. Mount Hood in snow a little to the right, and Mount St. Helens, a volcano on the left. They are too far to walk to. If we had a car we could drive to them but we will never have a car.

The bridge shakes and trembles beneath my feet. Halfway across is almost halfway home. The trees are a solid changing green and as you come closer they break apart and separate so you can see how it works. Looking up to the left I can see all the green trees of the forest park and can guess where our home is, where someone in the lookout could see us now. Someone could walk into our house if they could find it and we couldn't do anything about it. At least Randy is with me, and Father, who could make another house any time or place.

We're almost to the forest park when I see the orange spots against the green trees.

"What are those orange men doing?" I say.

"Who?" Father squints. "Criminals," he says.

"What are they doing?"

"Whatever those police say. You see those two men? And that white truck has dogs in it, so if any of the criminals tries to run away they let the dogs loose to catch them."

"How many dogs?" I squint to see the truck better but it is far away.

"Those men have to clean up all along the highway," Father says, "and cut back the tall grass since they did something wrong and got caught."

"They did a crime," I say. "Criminals."

"Exactly," Father says.

"Like what?"

"Let's walk. Don't worry about them, Caroline. We have ourselves to worry about, and that's plenty."

The red spots on his neck have dried and I reach up and brush them off.

"Thank you, Caroline," he says.

"Shaver," I say.





Father is strict. He has to be strict. That doesn't mean he knows everything I do or think. There are all kinds of things he's taught me and ways I've taught myself and things I've learned. There's the animals and then there's sounds and actions and feelings that not even the trees or plants are making. I am the one who knows about food in the forest park, the best places for blackberries and when the morels are up I know where to find them and the mushroom harvests are maybe when we eat best. There are ferns you can also eat and of course the things I grow. Once I found a patch of mint growing wild by just the smell and also wild ginger but those are more flavors than food.

Sometimes a stone will roll up a hill. Or a stone will leap in the air and rap against another stone or a tree like he is angry at them. I have seen this happen. I have seen a fallen tree slowly right itself and its dead branches will sprout leaves.

One alone time I hear a noise and see Father behind a bush, watching me which is not what he is supposed to be doing. I can use his tricks against him, though. I can be more patient than him, wait for his attention to drift. I do things he doesn't know about and I have places where he's never been.

I have my own lookout all covered in branches, high off the ground. I climb into it and rest on my back. The sound of the wind is wonderful and always changing. The airplanes fly over with their sound. They leap from space to space between the trees. I hear the dogs coming and turn over on my stomach.

They bite at each others' shoulders and get snarled up and plow sideways into the bushes but let loose so they don't fall behind and can catch up. I think the head dog is a girl dog, brown and without a collar even if some of the dogs have collars and Lala just keeps running and running and the other dogs, some of them might be coyotes but Father says that's impossible even if there are coyotes in the forest park. The other dogs are all shapes and sizes and all different colors. There are usually more than ten but not twenty and today almost twenty. They follow Lala since they think she knows something or is going somewhere just by the way she runs and the truth is I think is that it's just that she likes to run so much and she's happy. I know how she feels.

Even after they are gone the bushes are still snapping back. I can still hear the sound of snarling and panting and breaking sticks.

Now Father comes walking silently through the trees, a brown paper bag in his hand. Even from up high he looks tall. He wears his city clothes. His hair is shiny, wet down and his face is smooth. I duck down before he looks behind him or checks the sky like he does. I am down on the ground behind him and he doesn't hear. I follow.

He looks all around again before he steps out of the forest and onto the street, the sidewalk. His steps are long. I am after him. Still barefoot I'm careful, one block almost away and I'm shivering even though the sun is not quite down and it's warm. I can feel people in the houses looking out and the people in the cars driving by and I don't know what Father would say if I catch up or if he looks back. I'm afraid. My breath is hard. I turn and race back to the forest park, the safe dark shadows of the trees stretching out to meet me. Back inside I breathe slow, easier. I am walking deeper and I am thinking it's fine if Father has secrets since I have secrets. We trust. And I am also thinking that it is not okay to have a secret where he leaves me behind even if I'm being alone.