He straightens up and stands completely still on the slackline. “I’ve been reading a lot about mutism over the last few nights.”
I’m still perplexed. It’s too much information in too short a time, but he starts talking before I’ve even had a chance to understand. “You’re mute, but you can speak. There’s a barrier within you that you have to overcome. It’s like arachnophobia. People who have it aren’t actually afraid of the spider. It’s a transferred fear. So, you’re not really afraid of speaking.”
That’s both true and not true.
“Go back to the tent or join me if you dare. I have a leash here.”
I look up. It’s way too high.Come down, I want to shout. For the first time, it occurs to me that he might be more serious than I was on Old Sheriff. That he needs help more urgently. That’s the only reason I run to the backpack that’s lying in the meadow between the flock of cranes and grab a climbing harness.
I look at him again. Now he’s smiling. “So you really want to rehearse for our big gig at the end of the summer? Just you and me and our date with heaven?”
I nod, but I don’t know if he sees it. I quickly slip into the harness and go back to the tree, reaching on tiptoe for a thick branch.
As children, we used to climb trees on Granny’s property—James, Ari, and me. But I never dared go as high as my siblings. I always stayed close to Mom.
“You know, you sleep deeply, but I learned a lot about you. Bad things, baby.”
The smoky waybabycomes out sends a hot-and-cold shiver of fear and joy across my skin, no matter what he said before. Nobody has ever called me that before, and never has it sounded so sexy and so tender from any mouth.
I pull myself up with a half-ass pull-up and cross my legs over the branch. Now, I’m hanging like a monkey in a tree. My hands are sweating, the Handana is slipping, and the wounds underneath still burn from the strain of the safety course in the canyon. With all my strength, I wiggle around in a spiral motion so that I lie on the branch.
“You’re working your way up, Tucks. How old were you when your mom left?”
My breath catches. How does he know that?
“Item four on your list; ask Mom why.”
With shaky legs, I stand and carefully walk forward on the branch so I can see River. It’s wide enough, and I hold on to another one like it’s a railing.
“The fact that you can ask her means she’s alive. You really wanted that newspaper at the store, so while leafing through it, I spotted Meredith Fox.”
He looked at the newspaper? I didn’t even notice that. But then, he hardly ever sleeps.
“If she’s not your older doppelganger, she must be your mom.”
I’m not that far below him anymore. His light blond strands glow in the dark, and his eyes are smoldering sparks, blacker and yet brighter than the night.
He still seems gloomy, as if a veil of blackness is hanging over him. Like in the Badlands, I’m suddenly afraid he’ll just let go. Right now. He could die. He would definitely die!
My pulse twitches in my throat. Carefully, as if any quick movement from me could trigger him to jump, I pull the black crane out of my shirt pocket and hold it out to River in the palm of my hand.
For you. To let fly.
He shakes his head as if he understands me. “Come up and throw it off the slackline. I’ve already folded and f-l-o-w-n enough origami for two lifetimes today.”
There it is again, the spelling. Always just that one word, as if he can’t pronounce it.
I return the crane to my pocket and climb up to the TreeBuddy around which the line is stretched. The wind blows through the branches, rustling the leaves, and my hands are shaking.
“Come on!” River calls out to me, suddenly seeming less melancholic.
I crouch awkwardly on the branch. He tied the loose end of the leash to the slackline, and I untie the knot and tied the first figure eight. Then, I thread the leash through my harness and place the second knot parallel to the first, just like River showed me.
Despite the safety line, my knees tremble when I put my foot on the line. It’s so high. Crazy high. Way too high.
With wobbly legs, I place my second foot on the slackline and hold on to a branch above my head.
Oh God, I can’t do this. But I want to go to River. He seems so different, and I have to show him that I can be there for him, even without words.
