When I woke up, the sun was a scalpel, and a fly was buzzing in my ear. I brushed at my temple, willing it to go away, only to realize it wasn’t a fly, and I couldn’t get rid of it. It was the distant sound of construction equipment, the backhoe we used to do landscaping work in the sanctuary.
“Thomas,” I called, but he didn’t answer. I scooped up Jenna, who was awake and smiling now, and carried her into his office. Thomas was at his desk, his face pressed to the blotter, completely unconscious. I watched his back rise and fall twice to make sure he was alive, then bundled Jenna into a sling on my back, the way I had learned from the African women who cooked at the camp in the reserve. I left the cottage, climbed on an ATV, and headed toward the northern edge of the sanctuary, where I had left Maura last night.
The first thing I noticed was the hot wire. Maura paced back and forth in front of it, trumpeting and raging, jerking her head and tusking at the ground, coming as close to that wire as she could without it shocking her. Through all of these aggressive gestures, she never took her eye off her calf.
Which was chained onto a large wooden pallet beside Nevvie—who was directing Gideon where to dig a grave.
I drove the ATV through the gate, past Maura, and skidded to a stop a foot away from Nevvie. “What the hell do you think you’re doing?”
She glanced at me, and at the baby on my back, and with one look let me know what she thought of my mothering skills. “What we always do when an elephant dies. The necropsy samples were already taken this morning by the vet.”
Blood roared in my ears. “You separated a grieving mother from her calf?”
“It’s been three days,” Nevvie said. “This is for her own good. I’ve been with mothers who see their calves suffer, and it breaks them. It happened to Wimpy, and it will happen again, if we don’t do something about it. Is that what you want for Maura?”
“What I want for Maura is for her to make the decision when it’s time to let go,” I shouted. “I thought that was the whole philosophy of this sanctuary.” I turned my face to Gideon, who had stopped digging with the construction equipment and was standing awkwardly to the side. “Did you even ask Thomas?”
“Yes,” Nevvie said, lifting her chin. “He said he trusted me to know what to do.”
“You don’t know anything about how a mother grieves for her calf,” I said. “This isn’t mercy. It’s cruelty.”
“What’s done is done,” Nevvie argued. “The sooner Maura doesn’t have to see that calf, the sooner she’ll forget what happened.”
“She will never forget what happened,” I promised. “And neither will I.”
Not much later, Thomas woke up subdued, his old self. He gave Nevvie a dressing-down for taking matters into her own hands, neatly erasing his own responsibility in the situation for giving her permission when he was not in a sound mental state to do so. He wept, apologizing to me, and to Jenna, for letting the demons in. Nevvie, miffed, disappeared for the rest of the afternoon. Gideon and I removed the straps and the chains from the calf’s body, although we did not attempt to slide him off the pallet. The moment I turned off the electricity on the hot wire, Maura tore it away as if it were made of straw and rushed toward her son. She stroked him with her trunk, backed up to him with her hind legs. She stood beside him for another forty-five minutes, and then slowly lumbered into the birch forest, away from the calf.
I waited ten minutes, listening for her return, but it didn’t happen. “Okay,” I said.
Gideon climbed onto the backhoe and bit into the earth beneath the oak tree where Maura liked to rest. I strapped the calf’s body onto the pallet again, so that he could be lowered into the grave when it was deep enough. I took a shovel Gideon had brought and began to cover the body with dirt, a tiny gesture to add to the fill that Gideon was scooping with the excavator.
By the time I patted down the overturned earth on top of the grave, rich as coffee grounds, my hair had fallen from its ponytail and perspiration ringed my underarms and soaked my back. I was sore and exhausted, and the emotion I’d pushed away for the past five hours suddenly rushed over me, knocking me off my feet. I fell to my knees, sobbing.
All of a sudden Gideon was there, his arms around me. He was a big man, taller and broader than Thomas; I leaned into him the way you press your cheek to solid ground after falling a great distance. “It’s okay,” he said, although it wasn’t. I couldn’t bring Maura’s baby back. “You were right. We never should have separated her from the calf.”
I pulled back. “Then why did you?”
He looked me in the eye. “Because sometimes when I think for myself, I get into trouble.”
I could feel his hands on my shoulders. I could smell the salt of his sweat. I looked at his skin, dark against mine.
“Thought you might need this,” Grace said. She was holding a jug of iced tea.
I did not know when Grace had come walking up; I did not know what she thought, to find her husband comforting me. It was nothing more than that, yet we still jumped apart, as if we had something to hide. I wiped my eyes with the hem of my shirt as Gideon reached out for the jug.
Even when Gideon left, his hand in Grace’s, I could feel the heat of his palms on me. It made me think of Maura standing over her calf, trying to be a haven when, clearly, it was already too late.
JENNA
When you’re a kid, most people actively go out of their way to not notice you. Businessmen and businesswomen don’t look because they’re wrapped up in their phone calls or texts or sending emails to their bosses. Mothers turn away because you’re a glimpse into the future, when their sweet little porker of a baby will become another antisocial teenager, plugged into music and incapable of holding a conversation beyond grunts. The only folks who actually look me in the eye are lonely old ladies or little kids who want attention. For this reason, it’s incredibly easy to hop on a Greyhound without ever buying a ticket, which is pretty awesome, because who has $190 lying around? I just hang out near the ragged edges of a family that can’t keep itself together—there’s a shrieking baby and a boy who’s about five with his thumb jammed in his mouth, and a teenager texting so fast that I think her Galaxy is going to burst into flames. When the boarding call to Boston is made, and the frazzled parents try to count the luggage and their offspring, I follow their older daughter onto the bus like I belong with them.
No one stops me.
I know the driver is going to count heads before he pulls out of the station, so I immediately go to the bathroom and lock myself inside. I stay there until I can feel the wheels rolling, until Boone, NH, is an afterthought. Then I slip into the rear seat of the bus, the one no one ever wants because it smells like the urinal cake, and pretend to be fast asleep.
Let’s talk for just a second about the fact that my grandmother is going to ground me until I’m, oh, sixty. I left her a note, but I’ve purposely turned off my phone because I don’t really want to hear her reaction when she finds it. If she thinks that my Internet searches for my mom are ruining my life, she’s not going to be thrilled to hear that I’m stowing away on a bus, bound for Tennessee, so that I can track her in person.
I’m a little pissed at myself, actually, for not thinking to do this before. Maybe it was my father’s anger—totally out of character for a guy who spends most of his time virtually catatonic—that jogged my memory. Whatever it was, something fell into place so that I would remember Gideon, and how important he was to me and my mother. The way my father had reacted to the pebble necklace was like a jolt of electricity, lighting up neurons that had simmered quietly for years, so that banners waved and neon signs flashed in my mind: Pay attention. It’s true that even if I had remembered Gideon before now, I still wouldn’t have been able to figure out where he had gone ten years ago. But I do know somewhere he stopped along the way.
When my mother disappeared and my father’s business was revealed to be bankrupt, the elephants were sent to The Elephant Sanctuary in Hohenwald, Tennessee. All you have to do is a quick Google search to read about how their board of directors—hearing about the New England sanctuary’s plight—had scrambled to find space to house the homeless animals. Accompanying the elephants was the only employee who’d been left behind: Gideon.
I didn’t know if the sanctuary had hired him to continue caring for our animals or if he had dropped the elephants off and moved on. If he had reunited with my mother. If they still held hands when they thought no one was looking.
See, that’s the other thing about people who think kids are invisible: They forget to be careful around you.
I know it’s stupid, but there was a big part of me that was hoping Gideon was there and had no idea where my mom was, in spite of the fact that this was the reason I was currently wedged on a bus with my sweatshirt hood drawn tight so no one would try to make eye contact with me, just so I could find this out. I couldn’t really handle the thought that my mother had spent the past ten years happy. I didn’t wish her dead and I didn’t wish her life to be miserable. But, I mean, shouldn’t I have been part of that equation?
Anyway, I had run through the possible scenarios in my head:
1. Gideon was working at the sanctuary and was living with my mother, who’d taken on an alias, like Mata Hari or Euphonia Lalique or something equally mysterious, so that she could remain hidden. (Note: I didn’t really want to think about what she would be hiding from. My father, the law, me—none of those were options I felt like exploring.) Gideon would recognize me at first glance, of course, and take me to my mother, who would dissolve in an implosion of joy and beg forgiveness and tell me she’d never stopped thinking of me.
2. Gideon was no longer working at the sanctuary, but given that the elephant community is a pretty small one, there was still some contact information for him in the files. I would show up on his doorstep, and my mother would answer the door, and then you can fill in the rest from scenario 1.
3. I finally found Gideon, wherever he was, but he told me he was sorry—that he had no idea what had happened to my mother. That yes, he had loved her. That yes, she had wanted to run away from my father with him. Maybe even that the death of Nevvie was somehow tied to this star-crossed love affair. But that in the long years I had spent growing up, it simply had not worked out between them, and she had left him the same way she left me.
That, of course, was the worst scenario of all. There was only one that was even more grim; it was so dark that I had let my imagination peek through a crack in its door, only to slam it shut before it spilled into every corner of my mind:
4. Through Gideon, I locate my mother. But there is no joy, no reunion, no wonder. There’s just resignation, as she sighs and says, I wish you hadn’t found me.
Like I said, I’m not even going to think about that possibility, just in case—as Serenity says—the energy sent out into the universe by a random thought can actually bring about an outcome.
I don’t think that it will take Virgil long to figure out where I’ve gone, or to come to the same conclusion I have—that Gideon is the connection to my mother, maybe the reason she ran away, maybe even the link to the accidental death that may not be an accident. And I feel a little bad about not telling Serenity where I’m headed. But then, she reads people for a living; I hope she can figure out that I have every intention of coming back.
Just not alone.
There are connections to be made in Boston, New York, and Cleveland. At each stop, I get off the bus holding my breath, certain that this is the one where I will find a cop waiting to take me home. But that would require my grandmother to report me missing, and let’s face it, she doesn’t have a great track record for that.
I keep my phone turned off because I don’t want her calling, or Virgil, or Serenity. I follow the same pattern at each bus terminal, looking for a family that might not notice me dangling from its fringe. I sleep, on and off, and play games with myself: If I see three consecutive red cars on I-95, it means my mother will be happy to see me. If I see a VW Beetle before I finish counting to 100, it means she ran away because she didn’t have a choice. If I see a hearse, it means she’s dead, and that’s why she never came back to me.
I don’t see any hearses, just in case you’re wondering.
One day, three hours, and forty-eight minutes after I leave Boone, New Hampshire, I find myself at the bus station in Nashville, Tennessee, stepping into a wave of heat that hits me like a knockout punch.
The terminal is in the middle of the city, and I’m surprised by the amount of activity and noise. It’s like walking into a headache. There are men wearing bolo ties and tourists nursing bottles of water and people playing the guitar for coins in front of storefronts. Everyone seems to be wearing cowboy boots.
Immediately I fade back into the air-conditioned terminal and find a map of Tennessee. Hohenwald—where the sanctuary is located—is southwest of the city, about an hour and a half away. I’m guessing it’s not a big tourist destination, so there’s no public transport out there. And I’m not stupid enough to hitchhike. Is it possible that getting this last eighty miles will be harder than the thousand before it?
For a little while, I stand in front of the giant map of Tennessee that is on the wall, wondering why American kids never study geography, because if they did maybe I’d have a working knowledge of this state. I take a deep breath and walk out of the bus station, downtown, wandering in and out of stores selling western attire and restaurants with live music. There are also cars and trucks parked along the streets. I look at the license plates—a lot are probably rentals. But some have baby car seats inside, or CDs scattered on the floor—the detritus of an owner.
Then I start reading bumper stickers. There are some I expect (AMERICAN BY BIRTH, SOUTHERN BY THE GRACE OF GOD) and some that make me feel sick to my stomach (SAVE A DEER, SHOOT A QUEER). But I am looking for hints, clues, the way Virgil might have looked. Something that will tell me more about the family who owns that vehicle.
Finally, on one pickup truck, I find a sticker that says PROUD OF MY COLUMBIA HONOR STUDENT! This is a jackpot on two counts: There is a flatbed I can hide in, and Columbia—according to the map at the Greyhound terminal—is en route to Hohenwald. I put my foot on the rear bumper, ready to hoist myself into the flatbed and lie down when no one is looking.
“What are you doing?”
I’ve been so busy canvassing the people on the street to see if they are paying attention, I don’t see the little boy sneak up behind me. He is probably about seven years old, and he is missing so many of his teeth that the remaining ones look like headstones in a graveyard.
I crouch down, thinking of all the babysitting I’ve done over the years. “I’m playing hide-and-seek. Wanna help?”
He nods.
“Cool. But that means you have to keep a secret. Can you do that? Can you not tell your mom or dad that I’m hiding here?”
The boy jerks his chin up and down, emphatic. “Then do I get to have a turn?”
“Totally,” I promise, and I hike myself into the flatbed.
“Brian!” a woman calls, huffing as she runs around the corner, a teenage girl sulking behind her with her arms crossed. “Get over here!”
The metal bed is as hot as the surface of the sun. I can literally feel the blisters forming on my palms and the backs of my legs. I poke my head up the tiniest bit, so that I can make eye contact with him, and I put my finger to my pursed lips, the universal sign for Ssssh.
His mother is closing in on us, so I lie down and cross my arms and hold my breath.
“My turn next,” Brian says.
“Who are you talking to?” his mother demands.
“My new friend.”
“I thought we talked about lying,” she says, and she unlocks the cab door.
I feel bad for Brian, not just because his mother doesn’t believe him, but because I have no plans to give him a turn at hide-and-seek. I’ll be long gone by then.
Someone inside slides open the back window of the truck cab for ventilation. Through it, I can hear the radio as Brian and his sister and his mom head down the interstate toward, I hope, Columbia, Tennessee. I close my eyes as the sun bakes me and pretend I am on a beach, not a slab of metal.
The songs that come on are about driving trucks like this one, or about girls with hearts of gold who’ve been done wrong. They all sound the same to me. My mother had an aversion to banjos so strong it bordered on allergy. I remember her turning off the radio every time a singer had the slightest twang in her voice. Could a woman who hated country-western music have chosen to make a new home within striking distance of the Grand Ole Opry? Or had she used that dislike as a smoke screen, figuring that anyone who knew her would never expect her to settle down in the heart of country-westernland?
As I bob along in the flatbed, I think:
1. Banjos actually are kind of cool.
2. Maybe people change.