“It’s gonna be okay,” said Zoe.
“It will,” said X. “I know that’s the hardest thing of all to believe, yet it is true. Seeing any of them hurt would break me, too.”
In the silence that followed, one of the heaters went out. Rufus kicked the side of it. The coils went thong, and returned to life.
“I know it would,” Rufus told X. “I can tell you’re a solid dude. Okay, I’m all in. Let’s do this, whatever this is.” He shook X’s hand again. “You guys need anything else?”
X could think of nothing, but Zoe said, “Actually, yeah.”
She handed her phone to Rufus.
“Look at this bear sculpture, and tell me if you made it.”
Rufus scratched at his beard—it was so bushy that his fingertips actually disappeared into it—and inspected the picture.
“Yeah, that’s one of mine,” he said. “That was a good one. I remember the guy who bought it, too. He works with bears in the park, right? Knows a shit-ton. Tim Something?”
“Timothy,” said Zoe. “Ward.”
“He was also a solid dude,” said Rufus. “Real quiet. Little bit awkward. But I dug him for sure.”
X felt something start up in his heart.
“What are you looking at?” he said, though he already knew.
Zoe held the phone out to him. It glowed on her palm.
“A picture of your dad,” she said.
twenty-nine
The next day was a Saturday, blue and bright. X showered again—it only took him 45 minutes this time—then he and Zoe drove to Glacier National Park to meet Timothy Ward.
X saw Zoe resting her elbow on the open window, so he did the same. The sun warmed his skin. The wind rushed up his sleeve, making it flap like a sail.
Regent had warned them not to tell Timothy Ward that X was his son. X knew he was right. He didn’t want to endanger his father by telling him about the Lowlands. He also didn’t want to upend the man’s life—he had upended enough lives—or make him feel beholden. And what if losing Sylvie had broken Timothy’s heart once upon a time? Telling him why she’d disappeared, why she had never come back—it would only break it again.
It was Rufus who’d thought of a pretext for X to meet his father. Rufus wasn’t thrilled about deceiving Timothy—he believed that lies were a kind of air pollution, like secondhand smoke—but these were what even he had to admit were “superweird” circumstances. He’d started texting immediately.
Rufus to Timothy: Hey, man. There’s a young guy who’s thinking of having me make him a bear. Cool if him and his girl come check yours out? Yours is a fav of mine. I know solitude’s your jam, but would you consider?
Timothy to Rufus: Greetings, Rufus. OK sure—my bear and I could use the company. Would tomorrow at 4 work? I’m still on Lake Lillian. You’ll tell them where?
Rufus to Timothy: Yep. Perf. Peace.
Now, as they passed through Columbia Falls on the way to Glacier, X’s nerves began to prickle. He knew it was silly. The path to his father was not fraught like the path to his mother had been: there’d be no combat, no tunnels, no subterranean seas. Still, he’d have to sit across from the man who’d helped give him life, and pretend to be interested in a wooden bear. Ever since he’d met Zoe, holding back his feelings had come to seem stupid and futile—like trying to hold back water.
“Do you want to practice talking?” Zoe said into the silence.
“Practice talking?” said X. “Are my skills so wanting?”
“I mean talking with more of a twenty-first-century vibe,” said Zoe.
“Nah, whatever, I’m cool,” said X.
“Nice!” said Zoe.
“Right? I can totally hang,” said X.
“Okay, maybe dial it down a little,” said Zoe.
X asked Zoe if he could see Timothy Ward’s picture again. She brought it up on her phone, and he stared at it as she drove. He liked the way his father looked: curly black hair, broad shoulders, shy expression. He couldn’t stop looking at the picture. Zoe showed him what button to push when the screen went black.
At Glacier, a sixtyish woman in the ticket booth gave them a broad smile and said, “How you two doing today?”
X loved the uncomplicated sunniness in her voice. He loved the simplicity of the interaction. Before now, he’d been expected to kill almost everyone he met.
As Zoe fished out her pass to the park and her driver’s license, X leaned forward in his seat to talk to the woman.
“We’re chill,” he said. “How about you?”
The woman laughed.
“I’m chill, too,” she said.
“Sweet,” said X.
Zoe stifled a laugh. The woman handed back her identification.
“Have a very chill day!” she said.
Zoe pulled away, and they crossed over a glittering creek. X’s nervousness gave way to excitement. The immensity of the trees and mountains—the permanence of them—had never struck him so hard before, probably because he’d always been bent on some awful task for the lords. He stared at them in amazement now.
This was where his parents had met.
Zoe clicked off the radio—out of respect for what was about to happen, it seemed like. For the next few minutes, the only sound was a disembodied woman’s voice from her phone.
“In two miles, turn right toward Lake Lillian.”
“In one mile, turn right …”
“In two hundred feet …”
It struck X that not long ago they had been in another forest, heading toward a lake and another father.
Zoe’s.
It was an awful memory—Zoe had screamed herself hoarse at her father when they found him—but it snuck into X’s head before he realized what it was. It was like he’d clenched his fist around barbed wire.
“You okay?” said Zoe.
“In truth, I am thinking about your father,” said X.
Zoe took a hand off the wheel, and stroked the back of his neck.
“I’m not,” she said.
“Arrive at destination.”
X was startled by his father’s house—it wasn’t what he had expected, though he couldn’t have said what he’d expected.
It was a tree house. It had a wraparound balcony and such giant windows that it seemed more glass than wood. It was set among fir trees but not exactly in one. X actually couldn’t tell, from a distance, what was holding the house up. It seemed to hover above the ground, as if it had just taken off.
X and Zoe got out of the car, transfixed. Instead of steps or a ladder, there was a curving, wood-planked walkway that rose slowly from the forest floor to the front door. The path was bordered by carved handrails, and hung with old iron lanterns. X and Zoe were halfway up it when X’s father opened the front door, waved without speaking, then retreated nervously back into the house.
The interior was a single enormous room. What little wall space wasn’t dominated by windows was occupied by shelves, so that the only thing you saw—besides trees, mountains, and sunlight—was books. There were only two decorations in the entire house. One was a frame with pale fuzzy flowers pressed under glass. The other was Rufus’s sculpture. X had thought that Rufus only made happy, cartoonish bears that waved and held signs, but he’d carved this one as if it were sleeping. It lay near the fireplace, emanating peace.
Timothy brought out a platter overburdened with food—three kinds of crackers, three cheeses, green and red grapes, and various sliced meats, as well as dark chocolate in a gold wrapper. The minute he set it on the low wooden table he seemed to realize it was too much.
“We don’t get a whole lot of guests, the bear and me, so I’m not clear on the whole portions thing,” he said. “Don’t feel like you have to eat it all.”
X wasn’t sure what to say.
Zoe said, “Oh, we’re gonna eat it all. I’m like a seagull.”