The Simple Wild: A Novel(7)

That doesn’t stop me from adding, “You’re just making me do it because you hate doing it.”

“Why else do you think we’ve kept you around this long?” he calls out as I’m pulling the front door shut behind me.



“I’ll meet you down there.” The wheels on the compost bin rumble against the pavement as I drag it to the curb by one hand, past Mom’s Audi and Simon’s Mercedes, my phone pressed to my ear. We’re one of the few houses on the street that has a driveway, and one large enough to fit three cars. Most everyone is stuck battling it out for street parking, which is an especially prickly situation come winter, when there aren’t just other cars but four-foot snowbanks to contend with.

“We’re not going to get in anywhere if you don’t hurry up!” Diana yells over the crowd of noisy people around her, panic in her voice.

“Relax. We’ll get in somewhere, like we do every time we go out.” Somewhere where we can flirt with the doormen and, worst case, slip them a few bills to let us bypass the line they’ve manufactured to make their club look like it’s packed. Meanwhile inside it’s a ghost town.

But being two attractive, young women has its benefits and I plan on taking full advantage of them tonight. For as crappy as I feel on the inside, I’ve compensated by making an extra effort on the outside.

“My Uber’s on the way. Just pick a place and text me. I’ll see you in fifteen.” More like twenty-five, but Diana will abandon me if I tell her that. Setting down my phone on the hood of Simon’s car next to my purse, I lug the recycling bin to the curb, careful not to chip a nail. Then I make my way back to tackle the gray garbage container.

Movement catches the corner of my eye a split second before something soft brushes against my leg. I leap back with a startled yelp, only to lose my balance and, stumbling over the curb, land flat on my ass next to an especially thorny rosebush. An enormous raccoon scurries past me. A second one follows quickly behind, chattering angrily at me.

“Dammit!” The touchdown was hard and I’ll likely be bruised, but right now what hurts most is the four-inch heel lying next to my foot, snapped off the base. I peel the ruined Louboutin stiletto off my foot and aim for the raccoons, throwing it with all my strength. But they’ve already safely settled under the car, and now they watch me, the stream of light from the porch glinting off their beady eyes.

The front door opens and Simon appears. “Calla, are you still here?” He spots me sprawled out in the garden and frowns.

“Tim and Sid are back,” I mutter. The pair stopped coming around last month, after frequenting our property every Thursday night for the better part of a year. I assumed they’d either found another family to terrorize or had been hit by a car.

“I had a feeling they’d return.” He holds out the receiver. “From Alaska.”

I shake my head, mouthing, “I’m not home,” though it’s already too late.

Simon’s bushy brows arch as he waits, his arm outstretched. He’d never cover for me anyway. The psychiatrist in him believes in facing problems, not avoiding them.

And my biggest problem, according to Simon, is my relationship with Wren Fletcher. Or lack thereof, because I hardly know the man. I thought I knew him, back when I’d dial his number and listen to the ring, imagining the room and the house and the man on the other side. Of course, I knew what my real father looked like. My mom had shown me pictures of him, of his shaggy peanut--butter-brown hair and his soft gray eyes, wearing a navy-blue-and-black plaid jacket and jeans in mid-August, standing proudly next to a row of planes. She called him ruggedly handsome, and I somehow knew what she meant without understanding it at my young age.

Sometimes he wouldn’t answer, and I’d be bereft for the entire day. But other times, when I was lucky, I’d catch him coming or going. We’d talk for fifteen or so minutes, about school and my friends, or the hobbies I was into at the time. It was mostly me speaking but I hardly noticed, happy to prattle on. Mom says Dad never was a big talker.

She also said that we would never live together as a family. That my dad’s life was in Alaska and ours was in Toronto, and there was no way around that reality. I learned to accept it early on. I didn’t know any different. Still, I’d always ask him to fly out to visit me. I mean, he had all these planes to choose from, so why couldn’t he just hop in one of them and come?

He always had an excuse, and Mom never tried to coax him. She knew better.

Me, though? I only ever saw him through the enchanted eyes of a little girl who desperately wanted to meet the quiet man on the other side of the phone.

I pull myself up and dust the dirt off my behind. And then I hobble to the front steps in my one shoe, glaring at my ever--understanding and patient stepdad.

Finally, I take the phone from his hand.

“Hello.”

“Hello. Calla?” a woman asks.

I frown at Simon. “Yeah. Who’s this?”

“My name is Agnes. I’m a friend of your father’s. I found your number among Wren’s things.”

“Okay . . .” An unexpected spark of fear ignites inside me. What was she doing in his things? “Did something happen to him?”

“I guess you could say that.” She pauses, and I find myself holding my breath, dreading the answer. “Your father has lung cancer.”