The Distance Between Lost and Found (13 page)

She breaks off. Now she's talking to Jonah. Even though he's behind her and she can't see him. “It doesn't matter what you saw that night, or what he told you happened. Luke treated me like I was nothing, and you let him do it.”

Jonah doesn't answer.

“But that's not what makes me the maddest,” Hallelujah continues, pushing up to sit. “What makes me the maddest is that I let it happen too. I didn't stand up for myself. And when someone did tell me to stand up for myself, I got so mad—”

Sarah
. She feels the emotion of their argument wash over her, fresh.

“I pushed her away. I told her she didn't understand anything. But she was right. I became this girl who wouldn't stand up for herself. The quiet girl. The
nothing
girl. I just wanted it all to stop, but from the outside, without me having to make it stop. And I wanted to get away, but I figured, hey, college will get here eventually and then I'll be away, I just have to get there, and all the while I'm miserable, and I'm
letting
you guys make me miserable, letting you make me think I'm
supposed
to be miserable, that I'm
supposed
to be quiet, and I'm shutting people out, people who maybe actually care, and I hate myself for it.” An abrupt stop. The train of thought hits a wall.

She's never said that before. Never thought it before. Not consciously.

But she knows, deeper than she's ever known anything, that it's true.

Hallelujah has spent six months hating herself for being weak and silent and for letting bad things happen and for not fighting.

But she didn't know what else to do.

Doesn't know what else to do.

Or does she?

She's not being silent now, far from it, and nothing's happening. Jonah and Rachel aren't laughing. The ground has not opened up to swallow her. She said how she was feeling, out loud, to people, and they listened. They listened.

She wonders, suddenly, if her parents would have listened. Would listen now.

Yes, they screwed up. They failed her. It's not just that she broke the rules and got punished for it—it's that in believing Luke's story, her parents believed the worst of her. She'd never given them a reason not to trust her before, and yet when something did go wrong, they weren't on her side. Not like they should have been.

But they were shocked. And embarrassed. And she never did tell them her version of what happened that night. Not really. When she couldn't get through to them right away, she stopped trying. Accepted her punishments—including a
no dating
rule that was almost funny, given the circumstances—in silence.

She's never once told them how bad things have gotten. In fact, she's gone out of her way to keep them from finding out. At home, she forces herself to smile. She gets her homework done and makes good grades. She cooks a few nights a week. She's the ideal daughter, just like she was before Luke screwed everything up. Her one big indiscretion is in the past. She's changed.

They just don't know how much.

They aren't bad people, her parents. They want the best for her. They always have.

Maybe they honestly can't see what's right in front of them—the current of misery just beneath the surface. Maybe they figured that since she hadn't said she
wasn't
okay, she was okay. And maybe it's time to stop blaming them and say something.

“Hal?” Rachel asks. She touches Hallelujah's arm lightly, hesitantly, like she's not sure how Hallelujah will react.

Hallelujah shakes herself out of her thoughts. She looks over at Rachel.

“Are you okay?” Rachel asks.

“Yeah. Thanks.” Hallelujah turns to look at Jonah. He's standing, arms dropped by his sides, next to the smoldering fire. He's looking off into the distance.

She doesn't want to blame him anymore, either. She wants to forgive him. To let that anger go.

She doesn't want to forgive Luke, probably won't ever forgive Luke, but she sees now that he's the one who's nothing. His opinion of her doesn't matter. She gave him power he shouldn't have.

Jonah is something. Jonah's opinion matters. And she doesn't want him to hurt because of her.

She and Jonah will never be what they were. Too much has happened. But maybe they could become something else.

She decides to take the first step. “Jonah,” she says.

He looks over at her. “I'm sorry,” he says, voice low.

“Don't be. I forgive you,” she tells him. It sounds so formal.
I forgive you
. But it helps to say it out loud.

“Thanks. I don't know if I deserve that. But thanks.”

“You do. Of course you do.” Hallelujah says it firmly. “And—I want to.”
I've missed you
, she adds silently. She's not ready to say that part. Not yet. She goes on, “And I don't want to be that girl anymore. I don't.”

Rachel squeezes Hallelujah's arm. “So don't be,” she says.

With those three words, Hallelujah feels something lifted, a heavy coat shrugged off.
So don't be
. Like that's all there is to it.

But is it that easy? Can she just decide not to be that person anymore—the one she hates? Can she really move on?

H
ALLELUJAH IS SCRATCHING AT HER PALMS
,
FEELING RAW AND
relieved and itchy and alive, when she sees it.

A flash of orange in the distance.

Neon orange.

A color
definitely
not found in nature. Not in the Smoky Mountains.

She sees it again.

It looks . . . it looks person-size.

She's standing before she realizes what she's doing. “Hey!” she yells, waving her arms, wobbling on her good leg. “We're up here! We're up here! Hey!”

“Hallie, what—” Realization dawns on Jonah's face. He's by Hallelujah's side in an instant. “Hey!” he yells. “Up here! Up here!” He pulls his jacket from Rachel's legs and starts fanning the smoke from his signal fire.

Rachel's on her feet too, and then they're all calling, a jumble of words. “Help! Help! Up here! We're up here!”

Waving arms. Whistling. Screaming.

Hallelujah is scanning for another flash of orange.

Green. Green. Green.

“Help us! Please!”

No response comes back at them from the woods below. Just birdcalls and the roar of an animal, she can't tell what animal, but at least it sounds far away.

She stops, drops her arms. Her throat feels ripped apart. Her ankle throbs.

“What did you see?” Jonah asks. He looks where she's looking.

“Orange,” she says. That's all she can get out. The tears are welling up. She has to put a hand on his shoulder to stay steady.

“Orange, like rescue orange?” he confirms. He takes her hand from his shoulder and helps her lower herself to the ground.

Hallelujah nods.

“Are you sure?” Rachel asks.

Hallelujah nods again. She is sure. Completely sure.

“Then we have to go that way.” Jonah starts stamping out his fire.

“Jonah, the signal—” Rachel sounds scared.

“It'll smoke for a while. Hopefully it'll draw them toward us. And we'll be walking toward them.” He pauses, one foot in midair, thinking. Then he brings the foot down hard on the ashes. “And if we go the wrong way, anyone who comes across this spot will see that someone was here, and they'll be able to see where we're headed next.”

“How?”

“Three starving kids, one with a bum ankle?” Jonah's voice is biting. Then he snorts. “We're not exactly
Last of the Mohicans
here. We'll leave a trail.”

“What can I do?” Hallelujah asks, tearing her eyes away from the sea of green below, the sea of green where she knows—she
knows
—she just saw the color orange.

“Just what you're doing. Look for landmarks down there that we can head toward. Where you saw . . . what you saw.” He gets back to work, then adds, “See if you can get your boot back on.”

Hallelujah slips into her jacket and then picks up her boot and looks at it. She bends her left knee, bringing her foot closer. She loosens the boot laces as much as she can. She slides her toes inside, wincing. She has to wiggle her foot a little to get another inch or so into the thick shoe. And then there's a stab of pain. It starts deep inside her ankle joint. Travels up. She freezes, biting her lip.

“I can't,” she says.

Rachel looks up from stuffing dandelions into her backpack. “I'll help you.” She scoots over, picks up Hallelujah's foot, and pulls the tongue of the boot way out. She inserts Hallelujah's foot fast, and the pain is like a Band-Aid ripping off: sharp and then over, with just a little after-stinging. But the boot won't close around her swollen ankle. Not even close. Rachel frowns. “Maybe we shouldn't have let you sleep without your boot on,” she says slowly.

“I thought you had to wrap my ankle.”

Rachel looks at Hallelujah's foot from all sides. The pink swimsuit puffs out the top of the boot, padding her ankle where the boot might touch it. “Well, that's what you do in sports . . . but maybe not in hiking?” She meets Hallelujah's eyes, then looks down. “I think I made it worse.”

“No, I'm sure you didn't. . . .” Hallelujah tries lifting her foot. The heavy boot pulls at the injured muscles. “Maybe this'll protect it. Can you get it tied?”

Rachel nods and ties the loose laces into a double knot. Hallelujah sits back and tries to follow Jonah's first instruction. She tries to find landmarks between them and that flash of orange. She picks out a forked tree with a big knothole on one side. Then a lightning-struck tree beyond that, split in half and blackened. Then a big, beautiful pine, a gigantic Christmas tree without its lights. And in case she loses sight of those trees, Hallelujah tries to memorize the shape of the mountains ahead, so they can keep moving in the right direction.

Toward those trees. Toward the next hill. Toward rescue. Toward home.

A
ND THEN THEY'RE READY
. J
ONAH HOISTS
H
ALLELUJAH ONTO
his back. He wears his backpack on his chest. Rachel carries her own backpack on one side and Hallelujah's on the other. They take one last look around their little camp at the top of the world.

And then they move forward. Down.

They thrash through the uncut woods. Zigzag looking for the easiest path. Jonah leads, so that Hallelujah can watch for her trees. Rachel follows. Every step jolts Hallelujah's ankle. She feels her foot flopping at the end of her leg, the boot weighing it down, and it hurts, hurts, hurts, but she keeps her mouth shut. Stifles the squeaks that want to escape. There's no time to stop and adjust, no time to rest.

As they hike, they call out to the invisible people in orange.

They reach the forked knothole tree. Hallelujah puts her hand on it as they pass, thanking it for being there, for staying put.

They reach the lightning-struck tree, and again, Hallelujah says a silent thank-you.

They reach the giant Christmas tree. Hallelujah can see the shapes of the mountains beyond, the shapes she memorized, though they look different from below than from above. Jonah pauses to catch his breath. He shifts Hallelujah's weight on his back. She can feel his sweat dampening the front of her shirt. His muscles flex and strain, holding her.

“Do you need to put me down?” she asks softly.

“I'm good,” he says. He looks behind them. There's a thin column of smoke at the top of the hill where they came from. The smoke winds up into the air, a snake charmed by the wind. It looks so far away.

They walk again. Down and down until the ground levels out a little. Still calling for help. And what started as a hopeful noise turns desperate. Their voices break off and rise again. They crack. Rachel stops first. Then Jonah.

Hallelujah tries to keep yelling, but her mouth is cotton and her throat is raw and she's never wanted anything as badly as she wants a long, cool drink of water and then a cup of hot tea with honey.

The sounds of the woods finally drown them out.

“We must . . .” Rachel gasps, “be going . . . the same direction . . . as them.”

“Maybe,” Jonah grunts.

“I saw it,” Hallelujah whispers into Jonah's back. “I saw it,” she tells each tree they pass. “I saw it!” she tells the hawk that flies overhead. “I saw it. I know I did.” With each declaration, she believes herself less. Believes
in
herself less.

They walk. Slower now. The exhilaration is gone. Reality is setting in.

If it was there, that flash of orange, it's gone now. Nobody heard them. Nobody saw them. Their lonely smoke signal rises up from the mountaintop where they spent the night, but from down here it's nothing more than a thread. Easy to miss.

Jonah stops abruptly. “I need a break.” He lowers Hallelujah from his back, not letting go until he's sure she's steady on her good foot. Then he sinks, spaghetti-limbed, to the ground. His face is bright red. His shirt is soaked with sweat. His hair is dripping.

Hallelujah's legs feel like Jell-O from gripping Jonah's waist as they ran. She's also starving.
What time is it?
The sun is high overhead—lunchtime.

“If I sit down now,” Rachel croaks, “I'm not getting up.” She's shaking all over, like a rabbit, or a tiny short-haired dog in winter.

Jonah nods. “Okay. Just give me a second.”

Hallelujah stares at her mountain shapes. The orange was this way. Or it wasn't. They can't stop until they know.

T
HE SUN MOVES IN THE SKY
. O
THERWISE
,
EVERYTHING
looks and feels the same. Trees and trees and trees. Bushes and vines and grass and dirt and a few spring flowers. If Hallelujah never sees the color green again, it will be too soon.