Buried in a Book (17 page)

He shook his head. “No, thanks. Let me tell you what Trey said, and then I’ll be on my way. I’ve got an early start tomorrow.”

Glancing at my mother, he grinned and sat down on the top porch step. “Trey wanted me to assure you that he isn’t trying to upset anyone. He said he feels like he belongs with the people of Red Fox Mountain and he has something to contribute to their community.”

“Like what?” I wondered aloud.

“Apparently, he’s quite interested in their methods of organic farming. He’s also, ah, quite fond of the goats. He spent all day tending to them and, well, he seemed very sincere about learning how to care for them and market their products.”

I sunk down onto the step below Sean’s and stared into the inky night. “Trey has an affinity for goats? Are you sure he’s talking about goats and not Iris?”

Sean’s eyes twinkled with mirth. “He also admitted that he wanted to impress the young lady, but Jasper made it perfectly clear that the co-op is not a place for the disingenuous or for freeloaders. People are welcome to visit, but they cannot stay indefinitely unless they contribute to the community. Tomorrow, Trey will begin the first day of his monthlong trial process. At the end of thirty days, if he still wants to stay, the community will vote on whether to accept him as one of their permanent members.”

“Don’t they need my consent? He’s still a minor.”

Pursing his lips, Sean considered my question. “I don’t know, Lila. He’s earned his high school diploma, so truancy
doesn’t enter the picture. You’d have to ask a lawyer. I’m no expert on this sort of thing, but if Trey likes living up there, he may apply for emancipated minor status.”

“Good Lord!” I leaned back against the stair railing, stunned and speechless. A vision of Trey with long, matted hair, a dirt-smudged face, and threadbare clothes entered my mind. I pictured him feeding a carrot stick to a mangy goat with one hand while smoking a joint with the other. “I wonder if he’ll even go to college now.”

Sensing my consternation, Sean put a hand on my shoulder. “Don’t worry, this is probably just a phase—something he needs to go through before he settles down into a more, ah, mainstream career.”

I nodded, really wanting to believe him. “You’re probably right. We’re talking about a kid who breaks out in hives if he can’t check Facebook twenty times a day. And whenever I really wanted to punish him, I just took away his video game system for a week.” Laughing, I felt pretty confident that Trey would be back in front of Althea’s only television set by Monday. “No DVDs, no text messages…Wait a minute, is there any kind of cell phone reception there? What if he needs to reach me? What if I
have
to talk to him?”

“It’s spotty, but they do get a bar or two,” Sean replied. “Don’t bother to call if there’s a thick cloud cover or a storm. You won’t get through.” The pressure on my shoulder increased. “It’ll be okay, Lila. The folks in the co-op will treat him well, and he’s in no danger.”

I raised my brows. “There are rumors that those ‘folks’ grow pot as one of their staple crops.”

Sean’s hand slid away, and he stood up, as though I’d reminded him that he had unsolved crimes waiting and that he needed to get going. “People in town have been spreading
that story since Red Fox was founded, but we’ve conducted at least three surprise investigations and never found so much as an illegal seed, let alone an entire crop. And Jasper has always been cooperative, gracious even, about these searches.”

I got to my feet as well, amazed that my mother hadn’t stirred a muscle throughout our entire exchange.

Thanking Sean profusely, I walked him to his truck, wishing those fifteen feet could stretch into a mile. Part of me wanted nothing more but to climb into bed and process Trey’s impulsive decision, and part of me wanted to linger beneath the heavy indigo sky with Sean.

He turned before opening the driver’s door, and for one breathless moment, I thought he might pull me to him. There was a hunger in his eyes that I knew was reflected in my own, and I desperately wanted to feel his mouth on mine, to get lost in an embrace that could make me forget about Trey and everything else outside the circle of his arms. But suddenly, my mother uttered a loud, guttural snort, and the glimmer in Sean’s eyes morphed into a silent laugh.

“It’s the whiskey,” I whispered with a snigger.

As if to reinforce that our romantic moment had passed us by, it began to rain again.

Sean wiped a droplet from his forehead, promised to keep in touch, and hopped into the truck. I watched him drive off, waving until his red taillights disappeared around a bend in the road.

“Stupid rain!” I said, raising my voice. I hadn’t even realized that I was angry. But I was.

I was angry at Trey for how helpless his decision made me feel. How could he leave and not even bother to write me a note telling me where he’d gone? I was bent out of
shape that I hadn’t worked harder on Marlette’s behalf, and I was also annoyed that I didn’t have enough gumption to lean in and kiss Sean. What was I waiting for?

“It just wasn’t the time,” Althea spoke, answering my question.

I swiveled, my fists in tight knots. “How long were you pretending to be asleep?”

“Since you took Mr. Beam outta my hand,” she said, still groggy. “Some folks have teddy bears, some have sound machines, but I like to drop off holdin’ my sweet-smellin’ cup.”

“No wonder you have to wash your sheets so much,” I grumbled.

My mother roused herself and began to shuffle inside. “You’d best have a swig yourself. With the way your hormones are ragin’, you won’t get a second of shut-eye. G’night, darlin’.”

I SLEPT LATER
than I wanted to the next morning, but both my body and mind had really needed those extra hours of slumber. The house was quiet, and I assumed my mother had gone out for a walk, so I poured a cup of coffee and went up to Trey’s room to think about my next course of action.

Sitting on the edge of his unmade bed, I felt like I was losing my son, like he was drifting down a fast-running stream and no matter what I did, I couldn’t catch up to him. I couldn’t reach him. He couldn’t even hear me calling his name.

Of course he craved independence and the companionship of people his own age, but did he have to move to an isolated mountaintop to find contentment? Where had I gone wrong?

One thing I knew for sure: Trey was still my son, and I had every right to hike up to the co-op and demand he tell me face-to-face why he wanted to stay there. I put on a pair of cropped sweatpants and a tank top and stole a few loaves of banana bread from my mother’s freezer. It was then that I spotted a note taped to the handle of the refrigerator. It read:
Give him some space, Lila
.

Apparently my mother didn’t find the idea of her teenage grandson living with a troupe of goat herders as disconcerting as I did. Ignoring her advice, I headed outside for the narrow trail.

Thirty minutes later, I stopped at the co-op’s entrance to catch my breath and spotted Trey shoveling goat droppings into a wheelbarrow. I could scarcely believe my eyes. He wouldn’t even put the toilet seat down at home, and now he was voluntarily cleaning up malodorous animal poop.

When Trey saw me coming, he set down the shovel and gave me such a warm smile that my eyes grew misty. He
was
happy.

He jogged over to the edge of the enclosure and hopped the fence with the agility of a white-tailed deer. Everything about him seemed to be shining; he was completely aglow with a sense of purpose and belonging, and I had to admit that the co-op might actually be good for him.

“Mom! I was going to come down and see you after work,” he said. Even his speech was clearer, more energized. He wasn’t mumbling, and he looked me right in the eye. Amazing. “I’m
way
sorry I freaked you out by not telling you my plans.” He gave me a coy grin. “But I figured it would be better for you to find out
after
I was already here. I guess that was kind of uncool.”

“I’m your mother, Trey. I’ll always want to know where
you are. You did scare me, but your apology is accepted.” I patted his back and glanced around. The co-op was buzzing with activity, and somewhere off in the distance I could hear the sound of a violin being played. I felt more at ease standing here with Trey than I had for many weeks. “I can understand why you find this place so appealing.”

Trey looked surprised. “You can?”

I laughed. “I was young once, too, you know.” I handed him the banana bread. “Share this with your friends, work hard, and know that your family is right down the hill if you need us.” I hesitated. Leaving Trey here was hard. “You’re going to visit us, right? And call me when you can? And what about college? Is this just for the summer or…?” I trailed off. It was too hard to give voice to my fear that he would one day announce his intentions to settle here permanently.

“Right now I’m just living in the moment, Mom. I want to see what it feels like to live like this before I rush off to college where my whole life will be one big, fat schedule.” He looked pained by the idea. “But I promise to come over every few days. Take a shower, do some laundry, and have supper. How’s that?” He gave me a hug. “And I’ll do my own laundry, Mom. You’ve got your new job to focus on. It’s time I took care of myself.”

I nearly fainted. Trey was going to wash his
own
clothes?

Instead of swooning, I kissed my son on the cheek and let him get back to work. As I turned to leave, Iris appeared from a path leading into the forest. She sent Trey a dazzlingly beautiful smile and wished me a good morning.

“This
cannot
be coincidence!” Iris declared in her melodious voice as she strode over to me. “Ever since I brought you to Marlette’s cabin I’ve been thinking about him, so I
started wandering on the paths he liked best and visiting the places where he liked to sketch or just sit for a while. And I found something. Do you want to see it?”

“Absolutely.”

Iris led the way, her lithe, ethereal figure barely making a sound as we moved out of the meadow and into the woods. This time, we headed away from Marlette’s cabin, veering northwest instead.

“Where are we going?” I inquired in a hushed voice.

Without turning, she said, “It’ll be more rewarding for you to experience it firsthand.”

What an old soul. I was slightly awed by the girl’s poise, by her certainty.

The air was refreshingly cool, and the summer foliage allowed only a dappling of light to reach the carpet of pine needles and twigs. Soon, the path disappeared, turning to the barest hint of a trail, and eventually we began to tread through a part of the forest that looked to my untrained eye as though it hadn’t been disturbed in a long time. Iris didn’t hesitate, however, and her certainty allayed my fears that we might be lost.

As we walked in companionable silence, I began to puzzle over the details of Marlette’s daily routine. From what I’d heard, he would stop by Novel Idea, visit certain hidey-holes around Inspiration Valley, and then come back to the forest, probably to recover from being exposed to the noise and commotion of town.

“This is the place,” Iris said, almost reverently.

We had arrived at a secluded meadow, a wide oval of grass filled with wildflowers. Scores of butterflies and bees flitted from blossom to blossom, and birdsong filled the air.
I could picture Marlette resting on the fallen elm, his diary on his lap, allowing the harmony of the scene to wash away unpleasant thoughts or memories.

Iris sat down on the grass and closed her eyes. I, too, felt an infusion of peace, an uplifting of my worn spirits, and a line from Thoreau whispered in my ear like the hum of dragonfly wings.

“‘You must converse much with the field and woods, if you would imbibe such health into your mind and spirit as you covet for your body.’”I whispered it softly, as though trying to tell Marlette that I understood why he’d set himself apart from the rest of the world in search of a measure of tranquility on this mountain.

“Henry David Thoreau,” Iris said, surprising me. “From one of his journals.” She pointed at a birdhouse made from twigs and vines, so well camouflaged that I hadn’t even noticed it hanging down from a branch just over my head. “I was right to bring you here.”

I walked over to the birdhouse and then threw her a questioning look over my shoulder.

“It’s hinged. The roof opens like a box top,” she explained.

The house was mounted too high up for me to peer inside, so I carefully lifted the lid and reached my hand into the interior. My fingertips brushed what felt like a piece of paper. Standing on my tiptoes, I managed to retrieve the sheaf and bring it down to eye level.

A dried flower, one that I didn’t recognize, had been glued to a square of thick cardstock. There was a sketch of a girl in the background, and Marlette had drawn her so that her hand reached up to cup the dried flower in her palm. Below the pen-and-ink drawing, in Marlette’s unique scrawl,
were the words,
Looks can be deceiving. Beauty is only skin-deep. Sue Ann. Sue Ann. Sue Ann.

Her name repeated right up to the paper’s edge, the “n” tilted, appearing as though it would fall from the page into space.

I’d seen the girl’s face before in Marlette’s journal. Those challenging eyes and sly smile were unmistakable. Who was this Sue Ann, and why had he hidden this image of her in the forest? I
had
to discover her identity and her connection to Marlette.

“Do you know her?” Iris asked, watching me closely.

I shook my head. “No, but I’d like to take this to the Secret Garden if that’s okay. Maybe the flower is a clue. I’ll see if they can identify it.”

Iris nodded. “I don’t think Marlette would mind. So many times, when I’d come across him in the woods, I felt like he wanted to tell me something. Something im-portant.” Her eyes held regret. “But he was afraid to. Or he didn’t trust me. I don’t know what held him back. Now I’ll never know.”

I held up the drawing. “Don’t give up hope. If there are more of these to be found, I’ll find them. And I won’t allow him to be forgotten. I promise.”