The Space Between Trees Read Free Page B

Little Ears. I realize that Jonah must have found something in the woods. I suppose I even know what he’s found.

    Then Jonah reappears, and I’m struck by him, really struck—like a clock, like a lightning rod, like oil or gold or a glass jaw. I’m struck by the shiny hood of his coat up around his neck, by his hands in his pockets, by his silence, by the familiarity of him. He’s a comfort in that moment. In my story or outside of it, I know Jonah Luks.
    So I stand up without thinking about all the cops around, without thinking that I probably shouldn’t. My satchel swings into my legs and almost knocks me flat over. I step out of the garden. Jonah stops talking and looks over at me, and the officer with him stops, too. The officer sees me and squints.
    “You, girl!” he calls.
    But before he can say anything else, the body is between us. Two ambulance workers are bringing it out of the woods right past me. They have it on a stretcher, but they can’t roll the wheels on the grass, so they carry the whole thing a few inches off the ground. And it must be heavy, since each of them is straining from the effort. They stare at each other as they walk so as to make their steps even, and it’s like they’re two musicians playing a duet, keeping time with the music.
    Now, when I say that they’re carrying a body, I don’t really mean “a body.” I mean, the body is there, of course, but it’s covered up: zipped in a bag and then covered again with a green sheet. But none of that keeps it from being a body. I know—all of us there know—it’s a body. Everyone goes sort of quiet as it passes. The groups of police in the yard lift their heads and stop talking to each other; the neighbors all pull their curtains wide open, not caring anymore who sees them looking. And as for me, I’m picturing myself inside that bag. I can’t help it. All of a sudden, in my imagination, I’m in there withthe smell of something factory-made and the tug of rubber on the back of my neck; I’m seeing the bag’s zipper from the wrong side, all the teeth backward.
    Then, the body is gone. The stretcher has passed me by, and now all I’m staring at is one of the ambulance workers’ acrylic shirts and the back of his uneven haircut. Jonah is still there on the other side of the yard, looking across at me without any expression on his face at all.
    I think, right then, that I could run to him and bury my face in his coat. I think about how it would probably smell like dead deer and sweat and the back of his truck. He’d probably put his arms around me if I cried, at a time like this he would; he’d have to. I think of the different words I could use when I retell it later to the Whisperers:
He hugged me
.
He embraced me. He took me in his arms.
We’re across the yard, staring at each other. His eyes are shiny, and he opens his mouth to say something.
    And maybe in someone else’s story, I run to him. Maybe he fixes his arms tight around me so that they move in and out with my breaths; maybe he murmurs a few quick words right into my ear and I nod at their truth. But in this story—in my story—I turn. I run away. There’s the sound of the stretcher sliding into the ambulance. There’s the weight of my satchel as it slaps the backs of my legs. There’s the flicker of curtains falling closed as I run past pretty houses, and more pretty houses. There’s the voice of Jonah calling out, “Evie!” And even as I run away, I take note that it’s the first time he’s ever said my name.

Chapter TWO
    I RUN FOR A WHILE , but I’m not that good a runner. Also my satchel keeps slamming into my legs. So after a few blocks, I slow down to a walk and pick up the satchel, carrying it like a baby up against my chest. I look back a few times, hoping maybe to see Jonah jogging after me, arms ready to take me in, or else an officer snapping open his handcuffs, adjusting them to fit my wrists. No one’s following me, though, and I make it