Emmy Laybourne - Savage Drift

There was the mother, holding the little, squished-up, squalling baby.

Lots of photos of an older boy holding the newborn. A cousin? A brother?

Some embarrassing photos of breastfeeding.

And amid many, many photos of this baby girl dressed in many cute outfits, some of which featured headbands, tutus, and/or animal ears, was the girl’s birth announcement:

“There’s a birth announcement in here,” I said. “Her name is… Rin-ee?”

“Rin-ee? How’s it spelled?” Astrid asked.

I spelled it, complete with the accent.

“I bet that’s pronounced ‘Renée.’ Is your name pronounced Renée, sweetie?” Astrid asked the girl.

The toddler nodded and in a very soft, quiet voice she said, “Winée.” It was the first word we’d had out of her.

Niko pulled into the parking lot at the service station. It was one of those big ones, with a bunch of chain fast-food restaurants inside. There were plenty of cars clustered in the spaces near the station. Who knew how much food there was to be found inside.

Niko parked at the far end of the lot—away from the rest of the cars, near the place where the asphalt ended and a small wooded area began.

We all got out of the car.

It felt good to be out in the air. The afternoon was turning gold—it would soon be time for dinner, if we could afford any.

Astrid rested against the car, the toddler squirming to get down.

“Okay, okay,” Astrid said.

The girl went right for a puddle about ten feet away.

“I’ll watch her,” I told Astrid. She looked like she needed a break.

Rinée looked up at me with some suspicion. When I offered her my hand to hold, she marched right away from me and headed to the puddle.

“What are we going to do?” Astrid asked Niko.

Rinée jumped in the puddle, splashing her legs with the muddy water.

“Ew!” I said with a smile. “Yucky.”

“Yuck!” she repeated.

“We can’t go on with her,” Niko said. “She has to go back.”

“We can’t go back to Vinita,” Jake argued. “What about the drift?”

“Maybe it’s moved out by now,” Astrid said bleakly.

“Yuck!” Rinée yelled, splashing again.

She bent down to pat the water with her hands. That was just too gross for me.

I bent and scooped her up.

She screwed her face up, like she might cry. I twirled around, spinning her in the air.

She laughed.

“Moy,” she said.

“Moy?”

“Moy woun’!”

More around. Okay. Rinée could make her desires known verbally. That would be helpful.

I twirled her again and her laugh broke out—like a bell ringing. Oh, it was a sweet sound.

I laughed with her.

“We have to take her back, Jake. She has a dad. He’s probably worried sick.”

“He’s probably dead!” Jake shouted. “Let’s be honest!”

His face went all red and then he burst into sobs.

“Like her mother. She’d be alive—,” he cried. “She’d be alive if I had just been—smarter, faster, I don’t know, BETTER, I could have shot that guy and she’d be alive.”

Astrid had crossed to him by now and was hugging him.

He sobbed into her neck.

I can handle this, I thought. She’s his friend. She’s comforting him.

Then he cupped her head, her beautiful blond hair, cropped short, and he kissed her.

“Down!” Rinée demanded. I let her slide out of my hands onto the ground, where she started dancing in the puddle again.

Astrid pushed Jake away, slowly and then harder. He stumbled back.

“Jake! What’s wrong with you?” she said.

But hadn’t she stayed a moment?

She’d let him kiss her.

I walked into the woods, my hands in fists.

“Dean?” Astrid called. “Dean!”

Screw her. Screw them both.

There wasn’t even a good tree to sit against and think. They were all weedy, with trash blown into the roots in places.

I stumbled into the woods until I couldn’t see any of my “friends,” or the parking lot.

I finally found a tree sufficiently thick to lean against.

I thought about Alex. I’d left my brother, who I loved dearly, so I could get Astrid to safety. I’d taken this risk—a huge risk—for what? What if she and Jake got back together? She had the right to do that, after all. We weren’t married.

I’d left my brother for nothing.

I cursed my stupidity long and loud.

Niko came and found me a while later. He had the gun Jake had taken off the trucker with him.

“Hey,” he said.

I nodded toward the gun. “Going hunting?”

“No… Look, I think I’m going to go ahead alone,” he told me. “I’m going inside to see if I can hitch a ride.”

“Okay,” I said.

“If I can’t hitch, maybe I’ll steal a car,” he said, talking more to himself than to me. “If it comes to it, I guess I could walk.”

“Well, maybe I should come with you,” I muttered.

Niko looked up at me, totally surprised. He brushed his long, straight brown hair out of his eyes.

“I mean, if Astrid wants to be with Jake then I should let them have each other. I’m just getting in the way. And you might need my help.”

“Dean,” Niko said. “That is the stupidest thing I have ever heard you say. Really.”

I heard distant squeals of laughter from Rinée. Jake was probably swinging her around now.

“You love Astrid, I know you do. Why would you leave her with Jake?”

“Because… because she loves me. Some. She loves me some. Not all the way, like I love her. And I know, she needs time and she’s been through so much, but maybe she’ll never love me like I love her!”

I brushed the back of my hand over my eyes.

“I’m pathetic. I left Alex because I thought I should protect her. But what if she doesn’t end up wanting to be with me? She never shows it. She doesn’t even act like she’s my girlfriend most of the time.”

“Dean, do you know what love is?” Niko asked me.

I looked up.

That was a jerky thing to ask. The kind of question that gets a guy punched, but I knew Niko. He could be awkward at times.

“Love isn’t how the person makes you feel or what they do for you. It’s how you feel about them,” he said. He stood there, all backlit with the dappled sunset.

I was kind of thunderstruck.

“Love is how you feel about the other person. Everything else is just details,” he said.

I let my head rest back against the scrawny tree trunk.

“So do you love her?”

I nodded.

“Then stop worrying about Jake and stop worrying about making her love you the same way and just do your job.”

“My job is to love her, you’re saying?”

“And keep her safe.”

“I’ve been acting like an idiot,” I said.

“Yeah, pretty much.”

I got to my feet. Niko handed me the gun.

“You should have this. That O guy could still be around. You should have it to keep Astrid safe.”

“You don’t want it?”

He shook his head.

“I’m less of a threat if I’m not carrying a gun, I think,” he said.

His profile was facing me now and he was thinking of something.

Niko Mills. Here he was, saving my butt again.

“Good luck,” I told him, extending my hand.

“You, too,” he said. “I’ll see you on Red Hill Road, in New Holland, Pennsylvania.”

“Red Hill Road. New Holland, P-A.”

Niko and I walked back up to the car together.