Orange flames danced atop thirteen candles, illuminating Mac and her mother against the dark, empty kitchen. Mac honored the ceremony’s expectations by pausing above her birthday cake to contemplate a wish. Across the table, her mother’s face glowed ghoulish in the shadows, a trick of the light hiding her stretched smile to favor the intensity burning in her eyes. The heat of the flames warmed Mac’s cheeks as she bent down to blow them out, releasing herself from her mother’s piercing gaze. For a moment after darkness engulfed the rest of the room, mother and daughter sat motionless in the abrupt nothingness. Then Mac’s mother hopped up to flick on the kitchen light, tutting her tongue as she did. 

“Did you talk to your dad today, Mackenzie?” Mac’s mother asked as she became very interested in cutting a piece of cake. 

“Yeah,” Mac answered. She didn’t even like cake that much, she preferred pie.

“Do you want to open your present?” her mother chirped, handing Mac a neatly wrapped box with a curly ribbon.

With the elegance of a hurricane, Mac tore off the wrapping paper and smothered the urge to smirk when her mother’s jaw muscle tensed. Beneath the wrapping paper was a department store white box. It wasn’t going to be what Mac wanted. In the moment of hesitation, her mother lifted the lid to reveal a pink cardigan.

“It’s cashmere,” her mother said, smiling wide. She took Mac’s fingers and brushed them over the soft material. “Very expensive!”

Mac forced a smile. She wanted to ask why her mother didn’t spend the money on the naturalist encyclopedia Mac had asked for, the only thing she had asked for. She didn’t ask for a cake, or a pink sweater, or to be alone with her mother on her birthday. 

“Thanks Mom,” Mac said. Her throat felt tight. 

Her mother nodded and busied herself with putting away the cake. Mac excused herself and took the sweater up to her room. She hated pink. How did her mom not know that?

Before her mother could notice, Mac slipped out the front door. Fresh air calmed her nerves, as it always did when she was suffocating. Open blue sky poured a warm breeze over her head as her feet moved down the sidewalk. With each step, the heavy fog clouding her mind cleared. In the house, it was impossible to feel anything. Her mother expanded into every space like water pulling its way through threads of a cloth. 

Mac needed to think about her dad now, not her mom, because the only time she ever heard from him was on her birthday. During this yearly call he always asked what she was into these days, how she was doing in school, and what books she was reading. He never said where he was or what he was doing. Some years he asked about her mother, and some years he didn’t. This year he didn’t.

July’s end stretched each sun drenched day longer by a couple precious minutes. Mac hadn’t done anything all summer except get out of her house and circle her neighborhood like a planet avoiding a black hole. Nearby was the trailhead for the last of the city’s protected open space, four square miles of wild, sacred canyon. Mac felt safe there, because her mother was thoroughly repulsed by nature. Amongst the trees was the only place Mac felt anything like herself.

With the trail head’s sagging wooden gate in view, Mac’s worries drifted away like seed pods of an expired dandelion. At the end of the street, a moving truck blocked the sidewalk. From the open cargo body, a girl with a mane of curly brown hair hopped out carrying a large box. When her feet touched the ground, she lost her balance and fell back against the steel step, dropping the box. Mac rushed down the block to her.

“Are you ok?” Mac called as she approached.

The girl smiled crookedly like she wasn’t ok but thought it was funny. Up close, she looked the same age as Mac. Her cinnamon face was dotted with dark brown freckles. 

“Let me help you,” Mac offered, dropping to her knees to pick up the spilled contents of the box. 

“Oh no, it’s ok,” the girl insisted, fluttering her hands to her fallen possessions.

Scattered down the driveway were field notebooks, laminated pressed flowers and feathers, and several small plastic boxes of animal bones. Mac picked up a laminated pressed flower with long yellow petals and a thick black center labeled  “Black Eyed Susan”. 

“This is really cool,” Mac commented. 

“Thank you,” the girl said as she threw everything into the box.

“I’m Mac. Are you moving in here?” 

“Yeah, me and my dad moved from West Virginia. My name is Caroline.”

“Are you by chance a naturalist?” 

“I sure am! I’m excited to explore the landscapes of the West Coast.”

“What about this landscape?” Mac asked, pointing at the canyon.

“I’m very excited to explore there,” Caroline agreed. “What a serendipitous coincidence to move in right next to it.”

Caroline gazed dreamily at the canyon. Mac stared at Caroline in wonder.

“How about I help you move in the rest of your stuff and after I can show you around?” Mac offered.

“You don’t have to help me,” Caroline protested but Mac was already inside the truck.

Without a word, Mac carried in two boxes labeled “Caroline”. At the front door, she realized she was alone and waited until Caroline caught up. Caroline opened the door and led the way, dragging a yellow suitcase behind her.

“This is going to be my room,” Caroline said. 

The room was small with a large window facing a grove of cottonwood trees. The sun was just high enough to scatter soft shadows of heart shaped leaves around the room like a disco ball. In the corner, a bare twin size mattress sat on the floor.

“How much more stuff do you need to carry in?” Mac asked as she set the boxes down gently beside the others.

“This is it,” Caroline answered. Their voices echoed around the empty room like loose spirits.

They sat down on the mattress, facing the dancing shadows. 

“Do you need help unpacking?” Mac offered.

“I’ll just put my clothes in the closet tonight. Everything else stays in boxes,” Caroline said.

“Do you move a lot?” Mac asked.

Caroline shrugged, “I’m always ready to go.”

Outside, the two girls walked side by side down the dusty path. The Central California sun beat down intensely for the first hundred feet of dirt and dead grass, only to then sweeten the trees’ shady relief. Mac explained the different types of trees, all of which she knew in the first part of the trail. Deeper in the canyon, she had marked which trees she was unsure of so that she could come back later to identify them when she had the right encyclopedia. At this point in the day, though, Mac had forgotten all about the encyclopedia. 

After about a quarter mile, Mac veered off on a bunny path, so faint one could easily miss it. The two girls trotted along until they reached a thicket of manzanita bushes with long green leaves and little white flowers.

Mac got down on her hands and knees to crawl under the bushes. Caroline followed Mac’s example, her big brown hair collecting small twigs and leaves as she did. Fifteen feet later, the thicket opened into a small clearing of soft green grass intersected by a fallen oak tree. Colorful wildflowers accompanied the grass, and Mac was careful to step around them as she made her way to the tree. Caroline followed her exact footsteps. 

“This is a California scrub oak,” Mac said, taking a seat on the tree. Caroline did the same.

“You come here a lot?” Caroline asked.

“Almost every day. Sometimes it’s hard to get out of the house.”

“What do you mean?”

“When my mom has nothing else to do she focuses on me, and then I can’t get away,” Mac explained, shifting her weight back and forth over the tree trunk. 

“My dad can get that way,” Caroline said. “Ever since my mom died he gets so angry and I don’t know what to do.”

Mac watched Caroline closely, waiting for her to say more but she didn’t. 

“Oh look!” Caroline said suddenly, leaping off the tree and into the grass. Mac joined her in squatting over a small black caterpillar sitting on a white flower.

“I love caterpillars! I just love them,” Caroline said, her voice lifting to an almost song-like chime, like she was about to burst out laughing. “Do you think they know what they are going to become?”

Mac paused and considered the question carefully. The caterpillar inched across the flower petals until it reached the bright green leaf. 

“I don’t think they notice what they are and aren’t. I think they just exist,” Mac answered.

“But where do the wings come from? Does this guy have wings inside him right now?” Caroline pressed, leaning in closer over the flower. 

“Of course he does,” Mac said, surprising herself with her confidence. She didn’t realize she had any thoughts on caterpillars at all until that moment. Suddenly she wanted to be able to say everything in the world about caterpillars and butterflies just to satisfy Caroline’s curiosity. 

Caroline didn’t ask any more questions because the caterpillar had started eating the leaf in tiny bites. 

“Chomp,” Caroline whispered when the caterpillar took a bite.

“Chomp,” Mac whispered after the caterpillar’s next bite. 

Caroline looked up at Mac and smiled like they had a secret. A rush of orange warmth flooded Mac’s shoulders and neck, spreading to her face, her cheeks, her eyes. All at once, her heart burst in bloom, like for the first time in her life, she was seen exactly as the person she wanted to be. 

Some time after the caterpillar finished his meal, Mac and Caroline agreed to head home. They said goodbye at Caroline’s front door, and Caroline asked Mac to come by again tomorrow. Mac said she would. As Mac walked back to her house, she remembered it was her birthday. The realization dropped like a stone in her stomach, but she was grateful for the hours of relief she’d had. Only a few hours left until it was just another day. 

In the kitchen, Mac’s mother was furiously cooking lasagna. Flour and tomato paste were splattered every surface. Mac cautiously stepped onto the tile floor and greeted her mother. 

Without turning around, her mother said in an agitated tone, “Would be nice if you helped with dinner instead of leaving it all for me. I’m not your maid.”

“I didn’t ask for lasagna, Mom,” Mac whispered.

“Well what would you have then?” her mother erupted, turning around to face Mac and slapping a floured handprint on the counter. “Do you even want dinner? Or would you rather eat nothing? It makes no difference to me!”

“No, lasagna is good,” Mac said barely above a whisper.

“Great. It will be ready in two hours. Hope you don’t mind waiting. Or going to bed hungry. Those are your options.”

Mac looked down at her Converse, dusty from the canyon.

“Thank you,” she murmured. 

Her mother scoffed and turned back to the lasagna pan, muttering under her breath. Mac sat down, unsure if it would make things worse for her to stay or leave. Her mother complained irritably as she cooked. Mac sat at the table and took all of it. After her mother put the lasagna in the oven, she glared at Mac for half a moment before untying her apron and tossing it on the counter.

“Would be nice if you cleaned,” she called over her shoulder. 

Mac went to the sink and started washing the dishes, her tears splashing in the dishwater.

By the time the lasagna was ready, everything was fine again. Mac’s mother put a lit birthday candle in the melted cheese and had Mac blow it out before they ate. Afterwards they watched a movie and didn’t talk. Her mother went to bed when the movie was over and Mac cleaned the remaining dishes.

The next day, immediately after breakfast, Mac hurried to Caroline’s house. She didn’t realize she was out of breath until her chest started squeezing. Caroline was waiting out front when Mac arrived, beaming like the newly risen sun. They ventured into the canyon with Caroline leading the way.

In the secret clearing, Mac and Caroline laid on their backs and watched the clouds pass by overhead. Caroline named each one by it’s scientific name, and Mac pointed out when a cloud had a familiar shape. When they’d had their fill of the sky, they rolled over on their stomachs and peered through the lanky grass to spy on the universe of bugs below. They watched a line of ants carry small pieces of food in a single file line. 

“What are the names of these ants?” Mac asked, meaning the scientific name.

“Well that one is Erica,” Caroline answered. “And that one is Bruce. Those two are clearly in love.”

Caroline pointed at two ants huddled together off from the line. 

“How can you tell?” Mac asked, already forgetting her initial question to indulge in the universe inside Caroline’s mind.

“Look how they’re away from everything, nothing else matters to them,” Caroline said. 

Mac and Caroline spent the whole day in the clearing, talking and joking followed by long spells of easy silence. Neither girl noticed the sun pass through the sky or the long shadows stretch across the ground. It wasn’t until it was too dark for Mac to see Caroline’s expression that she realized the day had passed. 

“It’s night!” Mac pointed out, to which Caroline gasped.

“Oh no! I thought only a few hours had passed.”

“How did we not even notice?”

“My dad is going to kill me.”

“My mom is going to kill me.” 

Mac and Caroline crawled to the edge of the clearing as their eyes adjusted to the dimming world. At the edge of the manzanita bush, a loud squeak shocked them.

“What was that?” Mac yelled.

“I don’t know!” Caroline faltered. 

The manzanita bush cried out again, a trill of quick barks followed by a shrill yelp. 

“That’s a fox,” Caroline whispered. 

Another bark, softer than the first, rang out.

“It’s a fox, I’m sure of it,” Caroline said. “It sounds young. Maybe it’s lost.”

Caroline crept toward the noise slowly on her hands and knees. Mac watched in astonishment for a moment before following. Their eyes adjusted enough to make out a small something hiding beneath the bush. There, blinking like stars in the darkness, were two round black eyes. 

“I’m going to pick it up,” Caroline whispered. 

“No, don’t!” Mac hissed. “It could bite you! What if it has a disease?”

“It could be hurt!” Caroline insisted, her voice heavy like a bowl filled to the brim.  

Cautiously, Caroline reached into the darkness. Mac held her breath. There was a soft growl. Mac tensed, but Caroline remained calm. As the moon rose in the east, Mac watched Caroline pick up a baby fox. Caroline sucked in air through her teeth slowly. 

“It’s so small,” Caroline whispered, her voice cracking.

“What can we do?”

“It doesn’t seem to be bleeding, from what I can see, but I won’t be able to examine it properly until the morning.”

“We should leave him here. He’ll be safe.”

“I think you’re right.”

Mac made a bed of leaves and grass, and Carolie carefully lowered the kit. The fox’s eyes stared up at them, no longer yelping or whimpering. Caroline hesitated when Mac started to walk away, so Mac took Caroline’s hand and led her through the thicket.

The girls walked down the moonlit trail in silence. There was nothing to say, really. Neither knew how their parents were about to react when they walked through their doors, or if the kit was going to make it through the night. Only the morning could tell. 

In front of Caroline’s house, they hugged and said goodbye, but Mac waited until Caroline was inside. She heard Caroline’s dad’s voice before the door even closed, and used every last ounce of her strength to walk back to her own home. 

Mac’s mother was watching TV in the dark, sitting on the floor in front of the couch with her knees at her chest. She didn’t look over. 

Mac waited a beat before walking past her to the kitchen. Her mother was silent as Mac reheated the dinner plate that was left in the fridge. Mac sat down at the kitchen table and ate her dinner with only the blue light of the TV to see with and the laugh track to numb her thoughts. 

Her mother didn’t turn her head when she said, “Where were you?”

“I was with a friend,” Mac answered.

“What friend? You don’t have any friends.”

“It’s a new friend.”

“Don’t stay out past dark again.”

“Yes Mom,” Mac said quietly. 

*

  In the morning, Mac found Caroline waiting at the trailhead with a backpack. She started bouncing on her toes when she saw Mac. Mac quickened her step.

“I found some medical supplies around the house,” Caroline said when the bunny trail ended at the edge of the bushes. “I looked up what baby foxes eat. Mostly nuts and fruits, but we’re going to have to find some raw meat too.”

“Any kind of meat will probably be fine. The most important thing is to keep it hydrated,” Mac added. She had done some research too.

They were stalling. Both feared the fox would not be as they left it. After a moment, Caroline crawled into the clearing. A delighted sigh alerted Mac it was still there.

In the light they could clearly see the kit’s little ears and pointed face. It’s fur was light gray with brushes of orange along her neck and underbelly. The black tipped tail flicked attentively.

“It’s a girl,” Caroline commented, lowering herself to her knees. Mac did the same.

Caroline stayed crouched at the edge of the clearing. The kit’s ankle was swollen to the size of a clementine, its paw limply twisted back. 

“I need to get closer,” Caroline whispered. Mac knew better than to argue, instead she looked for a stick in case she needed to pry the fox’s jaws off from around Caroline’s throat. 

The kit made a low growling sound as Caroline approached, but the tail stayed flicking curiously. Caroline moved slowly and stopped two feet away. Mac’s fingers wrapped around a sharp branch. Caroline and the fox stared into each other’s eyes. After several minutes, the kit lowered it’s head to the ground and looked up at Caroline. As if in a trance, Caroline reached her hand out and delicately placed her fingers on it’s head. The kit beat it’s tail on the ground rhythmically as Caroline carefully added pressure and then began to stroke the kit’s head. The kit closed its eyes, tail still thumping. Caroline slowly pulled her hand back and looked at Mac. 

“Come here,” she whispered.

Mac approached slowly. The kit’s eyes darted from Caroline to Mac. Mac sat perfectly still. Caroline petted the kit’s head again, this time with more confidence. The kit wagged her tail. After a few minutes, Mac untucked her hand from under her arm and reached towards the kit. Caroline retracted her hand. The kit growled lightly. Mac pulled her hand away. Caroline replaced her hand on the kit’s head. They stayed like that, with Caroline petting the fox and Mac sitting like a statue until Mac’s feet began to fall asleep. 

“Everything else looks fine, I think only it’s leg is hurt,” Caroline observed, moving like honey as she retrieved a water bottle and metal bowl from her backpack. 

Caroline poured the water into the bowl and held it below the kit’s nose. The kit sniffed the water and extended her pink tongue to take long laps. The white fur around the kit’s mouth stuck together in tiny mountains as water dripped from her chin.

“What’s her name?” Mac asked.

Caroline’s golden gaze lifted from the kit to Mac. For a moment, Mac forgot how to breathe. Every muscle in her body relaxed. She forgot where she was. 

“She’s our baby,” Caroline said. “What do you want to name her?”

“I think you’re a better parent than me. I’m not doing anything. I can’t even touch her.”

“You’re here. That’s enough.”

Mac nodded and looked at the kit, who was looking up at Caroline like a flower to the sun.  

“Black Eyed Susan!” Mac exclaimed. 

“Yes!” Caroline agreed. “Black Eyed Susan is the perfect name. She looks just like one!”

Black Eyed Susan yipped playfully at Caroline. Caroline smiled at Black Eyed Susan and Mac felt something heavy in her chest. 

 Caroline produced a handful of strawberries, roasted turkey and a few slices of cheddar cheese. Black Eyed Susan sniffed the items carefully as Caroline set them on the ground in a line. After a few minutes, the fox nibbled on the turkey, eventually devouring all of the food. 

“That’s all I have for you,” Caroline said to the fox. “I have to examine your foot now.”

As lightly as a bee landing on a bud, Caroline brought her hand to the bottom of Black Eyed Susan’s foot. The fox was unmoved. Caroline brought her hand closer to the ankle. Black Eyed Susan whimpered. Caroline lightly touched the swollen ankle. The fox screamed. 

Caroline jerked away, tears filling her eyes instantly. 

“We have to take her to the vet,” Mac said, standing up. 

“No! She can’t leave. This is her home,” Caroline insisted.

Mac sat down. 

“Caroline,” Mac said. “We don’t know how to fix this.”

“We have to try!” Tears poured down Caroline’s soft cheeks. “If we take her away, she will never find her mom. If we stay, her mom might come back. Moms know what to do.”

Mac’s chest squeezed watching Caroline cry.

“Ok, ok,” Mac agreed. “We’ll take care of her until her mom gets back.”

With the sun directly overhead, they packed up their belongings and hurried back to their homes to scavenge for more fox food. Mac started running after she dropped Caroline off at her house. Her mother wasn’t home, so Mac was able to ravage the cool tile kitchen of its provisions. She met Caroline back at the trailhead exactly fifteen minutes later. In the clearing, they presented Black Eyed Susan with a feast of meats and berries. Even when they tried to give her the same thing at the same time, Black Eyed Susan only ate what Caroline offered. 

When Black Eyed Susan finished eating, Mac and Caroline sat against the fallen tree and admired little details on the kit; her pink ears, her tiny paws, the black spot on her cheek, how her fur faded from orange to gray.

All day every day for the next week was spent in the clearing with Black Eyed Susan. In the morning Caroline pressed bags of ice to the swollen ankle until the ice melted to water. The kit still only accepted food from Caroline, but tolerated Mac’s presence more each day. Under the passing clouds, Mac and Caroline talked about bugs and birds, planets and stars, thunder and rain. Their conversations flowed like thread on a loom. Thirty minutes before sundown each day, Mac and Caroline made sure to leave Black Eyed Susan with a bowl of water before reluctantly returning to their respective houses. At night, Mac’s mind was unable to stop spinning. Her subconscious was heavy with lavender hued dreams of Caroline. In the mornings, Caroline’s puffy eyes mirrored Mac’s, but they always smiled at each other like what they were doing was far more important than sleep. 

At the end of the week, Caroline and Mac entered the clearing to find Black Eyed Susan propped up on her front legs, wagging her tail triumphantly. Delighted, the girls praised her like a toddler taking its first steps. The kit sang with excitement, her tail whipping faster as she barked. 

Caroline noted that Black Eyed Susan’s ankle was almost back to normal. The three of them nibbled on bacon and blueberries, savoring the salty and sweet flavors mixing with the scent of dew as the rising sun warmed their oasis. For a hours the only sound was the symphony of wind strumming tall grass like a harp. Black Eyed Susan lay her head down and closed her velvet eyelids. 

Like wading into water, Caroline asked softly, “Where’s your dad?”

Mac knew the question would surface eventually. It was simple enough. Still, she hesitated and focused on the dirt on her shoe. Caroline looked at her hands in her lap. Black Eyed Susan whimpered from a dream.

“Oregon, I think,” Mac answered. “I’m not sure. He didn’t say where he was going when he left.”

“Why did he leave?”

Mac scrunched her face at the sky. 

“My parents used to fight a lot. I used to run downstairs and try to stop them. It worked a few times when I was little, but eventually it didn’t.”

Mac paused. She had never told anyone more than that, but sitting beside Caroline and Black Eyed Susan with the sunshine and breeze, crickets humming distantly, she felt the truth rise up her throat.

“They got into a huge fight one night when I was seven. In the middle of it he left and never came back. Didn’t even take his clothes or anything. Just got in the car and drove away. We didn’t hear from him until he sent me a postcard from Oregon. 

“We used to have this great labrador, Muir. My dad would take me and the dog to the mountains sometimes. We could go deep in the forest and never get lost because Muir would always know where to go. For weeks after my dad left, Muir wandered around the house, going room to room, looking for him. My mom barely acknowledged that he was gone. I wouldn’t have known what to think if it wasn’t for Muir. He was as lost as I was.”

Silence pooled in the clearing, opening space to hold all that was released.

After a few minutes, Caroline said, “Before my mom got sick, my dad was a lot different. I remember him being so happy, always doing something. Pancakes on weekends, family adventures, painting my room a different color whenever I wanted. I don’t think he knew how to stop when my mom died. He moved us to a new city the day after her funeral. We keep moving, for different reasons every time. I thought he was running away, but maybe he’s searching for something.”

“It’s weird how when one is gone, the other changes so much,” Mac commented.

“That’s the other side of love, the ugly side,” Caroline said.  

Black Eyed Susan whimpered from her sleep, twitching her front paws. The girls sat in silence, thinking about how love can hold a person down like gravity, and without it a person becomes endlessly unsettled, wandering forever, never quite satisfied with what they find. Mac and Caroline knew they were young enough to grow despite their loss, but for their left-behind parents, it was like losing a limb. Catastrophic. They had to learn to live around the tragedy. There was less space for their daughters there, wherever it was that heartbroken people drift off to. 

“Do you ever feel sorry for her?” Caroline asked, surfacing from the silence.

“Sometimes, but mostly I feel mad,” Mac realized.

“Why?”

“Because…” Mac faltered. Why am I mad? She lost him too. “Because I don’t know what she cares about. I don’t know what she feels, or what she thinks. I don’t even know if she misses him at all. It makes me feel like I’m going insane, like I imagined ever having a dad.”

Her words fled into the world, leaving Mac gutted and clean. She looked down and saw her fingers intertwined around Caroline’s over Black Eyed Susan’s soft sleeping body. She had no idea when this started or who had initiated it, but she was both elated to be holding Caroline’s hand and terrified that Black Eyed Susan would wake up and bite her. Adrenaline and serotonin coursed through Mac’s nervous system, so she took deep breaths and focused on the white butterfly that had landed amongst the purple daisies. When Black Eyed Susan started to stir, Mac jerked her hand. Caroline laughed and it was magic. 

*

The next day, Caroline was not waiting in front of her house. It was almost six am, twenty minutes after sunrise. Mac had never arrived earlier than Caroline, but unsure what else to do, she made her way to the clearing. 

Black Eyed Susan was dreaming vividly when Mac arrived covered in dew from the bushes. Mac watched Black Eyed Susan kick and growl in her sleep. The wildflowers’ eyes blinked open a greeting to the sun. Flies rose from the grass and hovered in place. Mac carefully adjusted the rock Black Eyed Susan’s foot was resting on. As the sun traveled behind the oak trees, a whirlpool boiled in Mac’s stomach. Black Eyed Susan was awake and whining. Mac only had one bottle of water. She poured some into the bowl, but Black Eyed Susan wouldn’t drink it. 

By the time the sun passed the trees on the west side, Mac was paralyzed by anxiety. She was frozen beside Black Eyed Susan as the kit released endless high pitched complaints. Mac’s gaze was fixed on the flower patch, petals bright and wide like they were screaming at the sky. Sweat dripped from Mac’s temple. After the sun went down, Mac and Black Eyed Susan started crying. 

As night brought it’s chill, Mac tried to scoot closer to Black Eyed Susan, but the fox growled. Faint stars twinkled distantly. A yellow moon rose like a lantern from the tall grass. The flowers closed in surrender. Mac’s stomach ached, and she could almost feel Black Eyed Susan’s aching too. She knew Caroline knew they needed her. The crickets screeched in rhythm with the wind. Mac didn’t sleep, and every time she looked over, she saw the white moon reflected like a teardrop in Black Eyed Susan’s black eyes. 

Suddenly, a sound pierced through the crickets’ symphony, and at first, Mac thought it was a siren. Instinctively, she called back in a long wail. The sound got louder, and Mac returned it as loud as she could. Black Eyed Susan started howling. The earth vibrated beneath her feet. Manzanita bushes split apart in one violent crashing wave, and there, covered in dirt and twigs, was Mac’s mother. 

For a moment, Mac was stunned to silence as she stared at her mother dripping sweat in her dress pants and blouse. In the full moon light, her mother collapsed to the ground with an exhausted sigh. Mac got up and hugged her. 

“Is this where you’ve been all this time?” her mother asked. 

“Yes.”

“Why didn’t you come home?”

“Because I don’t know where Caroline is.”

“Who is Caroline?”

“My friend.”

“Your friend? It’s a girl?”

“Yes. She feeds Black Eyed Susan every day but she didn’t show up today.”

“What’s Black Eyed Susan?”

Mac pointed to Black Eyed Susan.

“She has a twisted ankle, we’re taking care of her until she gets better.”

“That’s not very safe, Mackenzie.”

“I know.”

“What happened to Caroline?”

“I don’t know.”

“Do you know where she lives?”

With much reluctance, Mac left Black Eyed Susan and led her mother to Caroline’s house. 

Every window was bright. Mac couldn’t hear anything. She saw the light from Caroline’s bedroom shining on the oak trees. 

“You should knock on the door,” Mac’s mother urged.

“And say what?” 

“Ask where Caroline is!”

Mac’s chest squeezed. The front door and the lights in the house were getting closer. Mac felt her mother following right behind her. Mac knocked on the front door. Everything was buzzing. The light was yellow and she was too. 

Caroline’s father was huge. The top of his head and the sides of his body all ended beyond the doorway. His eyes were empty and Mac understood why Caroline didn’t show up that day. 

“I know who you are,” he said in a voice so low Mac could barely hear it over the blood pounding in her ears.

“Where is Caroline?” Mac asked.  

“My daughter is not going to hang out with some dyke,” he spat.

Mac’s mother gasped deep like a trombone and in one swift movement stepped in front of her daughter.

“How dare you say that to my child!” Mac’s mother roared.

“She’s taking Caroline away from me and I won’t have it!” Caroline’s father thundered. “These delusions are only hurting them!”

Mac felt small and scared, but then she thought about Caroline and Black Eyed Susan, so she ran between the bellowing giants and screamed with tears in her eyes, “You have to let her go because she’s the only one who can feed Black Eyed Susan!” 

“What?” Caroline’s dad yelled, caught off guard. 

“Please! I promise I won’t keep her away from you! Just let her feed Black Eyed Susan,” Mac begged. 

“What is she talking about?” Caroline’s father asked Mac’s mother.

“The fox you moron!” Mac’s mother said.

“You two are insane,” Caroline’s father said. “Get off my property. I don’t want to ever see you again.”

Both Mac and her mother erupted into protest, but everyone was silenced at once by the sound of breaking glass from the side of the house. Mac knew what they would find before they got there. Caroline had thrown her boxes of artifacts through her window and by the time her father, Mac and Mac’s mother ran over, Caroline had disappeared into the canyon. The yellow light of her bedroom stretched deep into the trees. 

“Where did she go?” Caroline’s father demanded.

Mac and her mother were silent. They looked into each other’s eyes, locked in a mutual understanding. 

“Tell me now! That’s my daughter!” Caroline’s father ordered.

“She’s fine!” Mac insisted.

“What kind of mother are you?” Caroline’s father demanded.

Mac’s mother scoffed. 

The three of them stared at each other for a moment, dumbfounded.

“She’s this way,” Mac’s mother admitted.

“Mom!” Mac protested.

“Thank you,” Caroline’s father said, calming down now. 

In the clearing, Caroline was cradling Black Eyed Susan and feeding her strips of meat. She looked calmly at them as they arrived.

“I had to feed her,” Caroline started. “I tried to tell you.”

“Caroline,” her dad said.

“I can save this one, Dad. I really can.”

“You need to let go,” her dad said softly.

Caroline shook her head. 

“She’s getting better. She’s going to be all better soon if I help her.”

“It’s time to go home now, Caroline,” her dad said.

Caroline placed Black Eyed Susan back on the patch of grass and stood up to follow her Dad home. She looked at Mac only once, when she was putting Black Eyed Susan down. The rest of the time she looked at the ground. 

*

The next morning, Caroline was waiting for Mac on the curb just after sunrise.

“Are you ok?” Mac asked. 

Caroline nodded and looked straight ahead as they walked to the clearing. 

“Are you ok?” she asked.

“Yeah,” Mac said. 

After they went home last night, Mac and her mother watched a movie. They talked through the whole thing, mostly about the movie itself, but sometimes her mother asked her a question about the fox, like how it got injured, was it getting better, is this why you’ve been so distant lately? 

As they walked down the bunny path, Caroline said, “My dad cares a lot. He doesn’t want me to get hurt.”

“I’m not going to hurt you.”

“I meant with Black Eyed Susan.”

“Oh yeah. Well she won’t hurt you either.”

“No, I mean, he doesn’t want me to get my heart broken if she doesn’t make it.”

As they approached, they saw that the trampled manzanita bushes left a wide opening into the clearing. Black Eyed Susan was nowhere in sight.

“There’s no sign of blood or fur,” Caroline murmured as they approached the tree. 

“Maybe her mom was able to find her now that the bushes were out of the way.”

“Yeah maybe.”
Mac and Caroline sat down in the clearing next to the oak tree. Caroline sat still for a minute before she got up and started searching for clues. Mac didn’t help her. She felt a little relieved, and then guilty for it. Just as she was about to get up and join where Caroline was squatting in a patch of wildflowers, Caroline shouted out, “Aha!”

With a smile like a sunflower Caroline announced, “Fox poop! Big fox poop! Adult fox poop!”

“Another fox was here?” Mac clarified.

“Yes! I think you’re right about the bushes,” Caroline said. 

She sat down next to Mac and went quiet for a minute. Then she said, “I thought I was protecting her, but really I was holding her prisoner.”

“You were trying your best,” Mac said. 

“I think I’m cursed,” Caroline admitted.

“Why?”

“The wounded come to me. There were other animals at the old houses, and none of them made it.”

“You’re not cursed. You helped me, Caroline.”

Caroline smiled. “I heard you yell at our parents.”

“I was so scared.”

“You did it anyway.”

“You put a box through your window.”

“My dad boarded it up with cardboard last night. He said I’m grounded.”

“But you’re here.”

“Cardboard doesn’t make a sound when you break it.” 

Mac laughed.

“What do you think your dad is going to say when you get home?”

“Just because he’s mad doesn’t mean he’s right.” Caroline said it like it was something she had told herself before. “He’ll come around.”

The oak tree held their heads as they settled against its trunk. 

“Would you ever want to go farther into the canyon?” Caroline asked suddenly.

“Yeah, definitely,” Mac said, feeling her settled heartbeat quicken.

“I got this new wildlife encyclopedia. We could learn the names of the trees,” Caroline offered. 

Mac smiled at Caroline as she realized the rest of her life would be a grand adventure, like exploring a forest she could never get lost in.