Page 53 of The Wilderwomen

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She dialed Kathy, but after several rings it went to voice mail—her foster mom had a bad habit of leaving her phone on silent. “Heeeyyy, it’s me,” Finn began. “Sorry, I didn’t call last night. Zadie and I went karaokeing and it was loud so…” She searched for something else she could tell Kathy without giving away her location. “I’m at the pool right now. I swam over a mile yesterday. Zadie just spent the whole time reading. That’s kind of her thing.

“Anyway… uh, we were thinking about extending the trip by a few more days, so I wanted to see if that would be cool with you. Just give me a call back and let me know. Say hi to Steve and Milly for me. Love you. Bye!”

Finn hung up the phone and looked down at her feet. Beneath the water, her toes danced like tiny fish nibbling on the concrete. For a brief, disorienting moment, she couldn’t remember who the toes belonged to.

“Finn,” she said finally. That was her name. The toes belonged to her.

She swiped at the water, scattering her feet into a hundred identical ripples.

Zadie didn’t hear Finn come in, but she did hear the gentle patter of the shower running. At first she thought it was rain; then she remembered where she was. It wouldn’t be long before they left the desert. Another day’s car ride and they would be in volcano country, the Pacific Northwest. It rained there, Zadie had heard. A lot.

She shut her eyes, hoping to get at least another half hour of rest before she had to drive again, but the Star formerly known as Ladybug had other plans. A wave of queasiness rocked Zadie. Without a bathroom to escape to, she had only one option. She leaped from her bed and sprinted out the front door, clamping her hand over her mouth. The trash bin of a housekeeping cart was the lucky recipient of her morning sickness. The bin took it admirably, Zadie less so. As she wiped her mouth with the back of her hand, she spotted a man in an orange polo and cargo shorts walking out of the room next to hers with a caddy of miniature soaps and shampoos. He had a thick brown beard and was wearing an olive bucket hat with decorative patches sewn onto it. Only one person Zadie knew wore a hat like that. “Joel?” she gasped.

The man turned toward the sound of his name. Stunned, he lost his grip on the caddy. It crashed to the ground, sending an avalanche of lavender hand soaps tumbling in every direction. Joel clumsily got on his hands and knees and began picking them up.

“Shit. Sorry!” Zadie rushed over to him. “Let me help.”

“It’s cool. I got it,” Joel said with forced nonchalance, but Zadie bent down to help him anyway, scooping up a handful of soaps and placing them back in the caddy.

Joel stole a glance at Zadie and ventured a smile. “It’s really you, huh?”

“More or less,” she replied. “You look the same.” It wasn’t really a compliment, but it wasn’t intended as an insult, either. Joel also seemed unsure of which one it was, but thanked her anyway. “How long has it been?”

Zadie wasn’t surprised he didn’t remember when they had broken up. In the fourteen months they’d dated, Joel had forgotten almost every plan he’d ever made, including his own birthday. “How could you forget yourownbirthday party?” Zadie had shouted while stabbing a balloon with a needle. It had exploded into fleshy shreds with a loud bang, causing Joel to flinch. What had he done to incur Zadie’s wrath? He had wandered into her apartment only minutes after she’d sent the last of their friends home with a slice of uneaten cake. Confused, Joel had asked earnestly, “Wait. It’s my birthday?” That had made Zadie even angrier, and she popped another ten balloons like she was auditioning for the part of the cannon in the1812 Overture.

That was the beginning of the end. They broke up eight weeks later, citing irreconcilable differences.

And now here they were, three years older and marveling at how little either of them had changed. “Three years,” Zadie answered. “It’s been three years.”

Joel nodded awkwardly. “Wow. That’s older than Jackson.”

“Who’s Jackson?”

“My nephew. He’s two. I guess you never met him, huh?”

“You literally just said he was born after we broke up.”

“Right.”

Just as the conversation was about to irretrievably slip into a black hole, Finn appeared behind Zadie. “Cute reunion.”

“Finn! Holy shit!” Joel jumped to his feet to greet her. “Man…last time I saw you, you were only this tall.” Joel held his hand out, palm side down. Then, realizing that it was basically level with Finn’s scalp, he added clumsily, “You looked a lot taller from down there.”

Finn pinched her lips around a laugh. “I bet.”

“Cool hat,” Joel said, pointing to the oversize sun hat perched on Finn’s head.

“Thanks! I like yours, too. Is it the same one?”

“Yep. Got a bunch of new patches, though.” He pulled off the hat, revealing a sweaty, matted head of hair, and pointed to a patch that looked like an alligator. “I got this one in Florida from an airboat captain.”

Finn leaned in to get a better look. “Cool. How many states you got left?”

“Six. Hawaii, Alaska, Minnesota, Delaware, and one of the Dakotas… North, I think.”

“Nice. Hey, remember that dance we used to do?”

Zadie cringed. She remembered.


Tags: Ruth Emmie Lang Fantasy