TWELVE
IT WOULD’VE BEEN a total cliché for Kendra to hate her parents for this. They’d taken her away from her friends, the pool, all the stuff she’d been looking forward to this summer. Her riding lessons. She’d been planning to do the adult summer reading program for the first time, and it was a better one, because the little kids get stuff like coupons for Rita’s Italian Water Ice and Subway, but when you did the grown-up program you got entered for gift certificates to Amazon.com and places like that. She’d already put together her reading list, and though her dad had promised there’d be a library where they were going, Kendra knew it wouldn’t be the same.
She totally should’ve hated them. Her dad, because it had been his stupid idea. Her mom for going along with it the way she always did, not even asking any questions. Not even complaining. It would’ve been too easy to blame her parents for ruining her life when all it really meant was she had to spend a few months in some country town while her parents got their act together. That wasn’t life. That was just the summer.
It could’ve been worse.
Or maybe not, she thought as her mom at last pulled up in front of a peeling, white-painted farmhouse with a sagging front porch and windows like dead eyes. This looked pretty gross. They got out of the car at the same time as her dad and Ethan got out of his. Dad gave her and Mom a gigantic, toothy grin.
“Well? What do you think?”
“I think it stinks.” Ethan put a hand to his nose. “Pee-yew.”
“It’s a skunk,” Mom said in a quiet voice. “That’s what they smell like.”
“Smell that, kids? That’s a skunk!”
“Dad,” Kendra said, “you don’t have to sound so excited.”
Her dad grabbed her mom’s hand. Then he kissed her. Kendra turned away.
Still couldn’t hate them.
Across the raggedy field that could hardly be called a yard, in the woods, something moved. The leaves, mostly green, turned pale sides up like the wind had ruffled them, but the weeds and grass were barely moving.
The inside of the car had been cold enough for her to need a sweatshirt, but out here within seconds her armpits started sweating. The sun was bright enough that she had to put up a hand to shield her eyes—monkeybrat had totally wrecked her favorite sunglasses and she hadn’t gotten to the mall to replace them before Dad packed them up to bring them here. Kendra blinked against tears she blamed on the sun, even though maybe it was really because of something else. Her vision blurred, and she blinked hard to clear it, trying to see what had caught her eye.
Ethan made a face. “I don’t like it here.”
“Shut up, monkeybrat.”
Ethan sighed heavily and kicked at the dirt under the toe of his sneakers. “I don’t have to.”
Kendra looked over her shoulder. Her mom and dad were still next to the car, their heads bent in conversation. Neither of them looking this way. “I saw something in the woods.”
“Like what?” Ethan looked up. “Dad said we could get a dog.”
“You don’t want a dog, not really. You’ll have to clean up its poop and stuff.” Kendra took a few steps away from the car toward the field and the woods beyond it, not really paying attention to her brother.
“Not out here, I won’t. He can poop in the yard or in the field. I want to call him Zipper.”
At this, she looked at him. “Zipper? Why would you want to name the dog that?”
Ethan shrugged. “I just like it. And you’d like a dog, Kiki. I bet you would, anyway.”
Kendra looked again at the car, where her parents were leaning toward each other, faces serious. Her father’s mouth moved while her mom stayed as silent as she had for the entire trip. Her dad’s hand went out to caress her mom’s hair.
It felt sort of creepy to watch them like that, like maybe they might start to make out again or something, so Kendra looked once more at the house. It sat at the end of a really long lane, the trees so close on either side that it had been like driving through a tunnel. Only one other house on the lane, and it had been much closer to the main road. To the side of the driveway was a crumbling sort of garage or barn off to the right, and beyond that the field of tall grass and wildflowers. The trees came right up to the edge of the field, and beyond that, a mountainside littered with scrubby pines.
“I don’t like this place,” Ethan muttered again, scuffing at the driveway and sending up a small cloud of dust.
“It’s only for the summer. Dad said.”
He snorted. “Yeah, right. I bet we have to live here forever.”
A shiver tickled down her spine at that. Being the new girl in a new school was the sort of thing they made movies about, but something about this place told Kendra she wasn’t going to meet some super hot jock who’d totally fall in love with her even though she didn’t fit in with the rest of the cool kids. The problem was, at her own school she already was one of the cool kids. At least cool enough. She really didn’t want to start over. Not out here in the middle of nowhere.
Nothing moved in the field or in the trees beyond but a couple of birds that took off into the sky. Kendra shaded her eyes again to follow them. Her dad came up behind her to squeeze her shoulders until she pulled away.
“Isn’t this great?”
“Mom, are you okay?”
Her mom was also looking toward the woods, and when Kendra spoke to her, it took her a few seconds to turn. “Fine.”
She moved closer to Kendra and put an arm around her shoulders. Together they looked across the field, into the trees. Lots of shadows there. Whatever she’d seen moving could still be in there, just hidden.
Something shivered inside her.
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