When She Flew by Jennie Shortridge Page B

down, and tried to hug her daughter at the sight and sound of her crying, but she couldn’t. Not until this was straightened out. Not until she got Nina to understand. It was too important.
    “You hate me ,” Nina said, voice shaking, incredulous.
    “For god’s sake, Nina, I love you.” How did the kid not see that? “I just want you to make the best decision, for god’s sake. You can have the baby and put it up for adoption, if you want to. You have choices, Nina. That’s all I’m trying to say.”
    Nina ran past her into the kitchen. After a moment, Jess could hear her on the phone, pleading with her father to rescue her from this evil monster that hated her and was trying to make her abort her baby.
    Jess stalked to the bathroom and sat on the closed toilet, trying to calm her anger before talking to Nina again. By the time she opened the door and walked back out into the living room, Nina was packing and Rick was on his way to pick her up. At the time Jess thought it was for a cooling-off period, but Nina never came home again.
    After Teo was born, Rick moved the three of them four hours north to Tacoma, to be closer to his family, who would help take care of the baby when Nina went to school and, later, to work. Whoever the father had been had either fled from the responsibility or had been shut out, as Jess was, stripped of the privilege to be a mother, a grandmother. And every day, still, she tried in vain not to think about all she was missing.

10
    I woke with a jump, drool on my cheek, and Pater put a hand on my shoulder. Shhh, he said very quietly. We could hear them, far away at first, down by the big creek. A man and a woman talking and crunching their feet down on all of our beautiful plants. We’d have to replant when they left. I wiped my face and hoped they wouldn’t turn up our way, but their voices got closer. We could hear them slip and splash and curse, and then laugh.
    “We sure aren’t going to sneak up on anyone like this,” the man said.
    Pater pocketed his knife and slid down lower against the tree. We barely breathed as we listened to them.
    Suddenly the woman said, “Oh, my god.” The sound of her voice made chills run up and down my body; I even had goose bumps on my neck and my cheeks—everywhere. She sounded scared, like she’d found something horrible, but she couldn’t have. It was just our forest, just our home.
    “Police!” the man’s voice called out.
    I gasped. I’d thought these were the people who’d seen me by the trail.
    We barely breathed. We were up and over the ridge, and they were down in our camp, but it felt like they were right there. If we could hear them so well, they would be able to hear us.
    “Everyone out here in front of us, now, hands in the air!” the man shouted.
    My stomach cramped. I suddenly had to go to the bathroom, really bad, but I stayed silent next to Pater, who’d closed his eyes. I think he was praying.
    We heard them walking through our camp, remarking on everything we owned like they were in the Columbia Museum of Natural History or something, looking at dioramas of cave dwellers and native tribes.
    “This must be how they refrigerate their food.”
    “God, do you think this is where they bathe?”
    “Look, a stove!”
    “How on earth do they keep everything so clean?”
    It was like they expected us to be filthy creatures that ate raw squirrel meat or something. I tucked my head down and burrowed into Pater, just to feel his arms protecting me. Please , I prayed, make these people go away and leave us alone .
    When Sweetie-pie flew out and made the man scream, Pater and I smiled at each other, me trying hard not to giggle. Then we heard another voice, like from a television, and the woman talking to it. She was on a radio, and we stopped smiling. There were more coming. They weren’t leaving anytime soon.
    After a while the chopper went away for good, and I was glad, because I know Pater hates that sound. He hates a lot of