Star in the Forest (9 page)
Read Star in the Forest Online
Authors: Laura Resau
“Well,
m’hija
, after they got the money, they put me in the back of a pickup truck and said they’d take me to the bus stop. But I had a feeling they were lying. I had a feeling they were dropping me off for
la migra
to get me. So I jumped out of the truck and rolled down a ditch. I hurt my shoulder on a rock when I hit the ground, but I got up and ran down the canyon. I ran faster than ever before.”
“As fast as a dog?” I asked.
“Yes,
m’hija
, as fast as a dog. And I found my way to the bus stop, and here I am in Arizona, and I’m catching the next bus to Colorado.”
“Do you have money, Papá?”
“I taped a hundred dollars to my leg before I left. I’ll be there by tomorrow night,
m’hija.”
And then Mamá came out of the bathroom, asking who I was talking to, and I said, “Papá,”
with the biggest smile in the galaxy on my face. And she was screaming and then Dalia came out waving her mascara wand and screaming, and then Reina woke up and started screaming and we were all screaming and dancing and hugging each other.
At school on Monday, I could not stop smiling. When Mr. Martin asked what two-sevenths times three was, I raised my hand high and proud like a flag and said, “Six-sevenths!” I felt bright, like that sunshine I ate was shooting out all over the place.
Emma and Olivia and Morgan must have noticed this and decided I wasn’t boring anymore,
because Morgan asked if I wanted to go bike riding with them in the park after school. It was lunchtime, and we were in the bathroom, and they were putting on lip gloss and brushing their hair, and I was washing my hands, and Crystal was in the bathroom stall. I could feel her listening.
“Thanks, Morgan, but Crystal and me have plans. Maybe another time.”
Later, after school, Crystal said, “Zit, do we really have plans?”
“Of course! My dad will be home by tonight. We have to practice Star’s dog show!”
We wheelbarrowed Star down the path. It was warm enough for shorts and tank tops, and my legs and arms felt happy and free and soaking up sunshine. The air smelled sweet, like nectar and grass and trees. Tiny flowers had popped up next to the fallen tulips and daffodils. The petals were in a perfect, cheerful circle, blue around a yellow center.
“Forget-me-nots!” Crystal said.
“What?”
“Those flowers. That’s what they’re called. It’s like nature put them there ’cause it knew your dad was coming home!”
I picked some blossoms and stuck them in Star’s collar so he’d look extra
guapo
for Papá.
“Crystal,” I said. “I’ve been thinking about something.” And I had, all night. I’d hardly slept, thinking about Papá and Star and how happy I was, but then, when I thought of Crystal, I felt a little sad. I’d get my dad back, but hers was still in jail.
“What?” she said.
“I think you should keep Star.”
Her face lit up. “Really?”
I nodded. “But we can bring him here every day and hang out. And if the dictator’s in a bad mood, you and Star can come over to my house. And if you have to go to Madagascar to visit your dad, we can watch Star.”
“I’ll treat him like gold, Zit, I promise!”
In the forest, we helped Star out of the wheelbarrow. His leg was looking good, getting better fast. He walked with just a small limp back to his old spot under the rusty rainbow truck hood.
“Sit, Star,” Crystal said.
Star sat.
“Shake, Star,” I said.
Star shook my hand.
“Roll over, Star,” Crystal said.
Star rolled over.
Then, together, we helped him into the driver’s seat of the truck. He sat there with his tongue hanging out, pink and happy. I said, “Beep!”
He put his good paw on the horn and beeped and beeped and beeped.
Then he stopped and his ears moved up, alert and listening. He was looking at something past our heads, behind us.
I turned around, and there he was. Papá.
Laughing and laughing. Laughing so hard he was nearly peeing in his pants.
I ran to him and he held me tight, and it was just how I’d imagined, me burying my face in his T-shirt. He whispered in star language in my ear,
“Ni-mitz nequi.”
I love you. Over and over and over again.
Then he looked at Star and said,
“¡Que perro!”
What a dog!
“His name is Star,” I said.
I hugged Papá again, as tight as I could.
“Careful,
m’hija
. My shoulder’s pretty sore.” He pulled aside his T-shirt neck and showed me a big white bandage taped to his shoulder.
“I have a feeling it’ll get better fast,” I said.
Crystal had helped Star out of the truck and was sitting next to him, petting him, looking sad and happy at once. I felt like hugging her, too.
Crystal said, “
Mucho gusto
, Mr. Mora. I’m Crystal.”
“
Mucho gusto
, Crystal.”
“I was practicing my
mucho gustos
for a while,” she said. “Zit told me you’d be coming home, so I figured out how to say ‘Nice to meet you,’ and now I finally get to say it to you. Did I say it right?”
“Perfectly,” Papá said.
Crystal nudged Star toward Papá. “Star, meet Mr. Mora.” She whispered to Papá, “Hold out your hand.”
Papá held out his hand.
Star shook it.
Papá laughed some more, and then he looked closely at Crystal. “You’re the girl who lives next door, right?”
She nodded. “With my mother, and sometimes her boyfriend. He’s not my dad, though.” She kept petting Star. “My dad’s in jail. He’ll be out in seven years if he’s on good behavior. And he will be on good behavior because he’s good. And he loves me more than anything and wants to come home to me. He’s a good dad.”
I stared at Crystal. Her eyes looked real, like
when Dalia takes off all her makeup at night and you can see her skin all tender underneath.
Papá said to Crystal, “I’m sure he has a good heart. His daughter does.” He smiled, and his front tooth lined with gold flashed in the sunshine.
“Vámonos,”
he said. “Your mother and sisters are waiting for us. They have a surprise.” He reached his hand out to Crystal. “Of course, you’re invited, too, Crystal.”
We walked back together, taking turns wheel-barrowing Star, through the forget-me-nots and summery air, back to our trailer, where a dazzling white cake was waiting for us.
Bienvenido Papá y Feliz Cumpleaños Zitlally!
Welcome Papá and Happy Birthday Zitlally! This time all the
l
’s were there, like brilliant blue pieces of sky over white Antarctic snow.
The Deepest, Most Magical Forest
T
his happened a long, long time ago, Zitlally. It happened to the grandfather of my grandfather. Or maybe even his grandfather.
One night, when he was a tiny baby, his mother wrapped him in three blankets and laid him in a clearing in the deepest, most magical forest.
The forest where one must never cut firewood because of the tree spirits.
Where one must never pick berries because of the plant spirits.
Where one must never hunt because of the animal spirits.
But this baby’s mother was special. She was a
healer. She asked the spirits permission to enter the forest, so they let her gather healing herbs. Always, she thanked them. Tonight, she had come to discover her child’s spirit animal. She stayed hidden in the trees, watching, waiting for her son’s creature to come.
At dawn, a dove landed near the baby’s head. His mother thought,
Maybe his animal is a bird. Then he can fly over his troubles!
But the dove moved on.
Then a small lizard crept near the baby’s feet.
Maybe his animal is a lizard
, thought his mother.
Then he will be stealthy and agile!
But the lizard moved on.
And then, just as the sun peeked over the mountaintops, a young deer wobbled into the clearing. Slowly, step by step, the fawn walked to the baby. For a long time, the fawn looked into the baby’s eyes.
The baby looked back.
The fawn’s long tongue reached out and licked the baby’s face.
The baby smiled.
The fawn smiled.
Finally, the fawn walked away. That was when the baby’s mother noticed the pattern of white spots on the fawn’s back, how it echoed the odd birthmark on her son’s back. She picked him up and kissed him and whispered thanks and headed home. She smiled the
whole way, happy that her son’s spirit animal was the swiftest, most graceful, most noble creature of the forest.
Sure enough, the baby grew into a boy who could outrun anyone, even the fastest man. When he ran up-hill, it was as though he was running downhill. When he ran downhill, it was as though he was flying. But since he was the best at running, the boy wanted to be the best at everything. The best tree climber, the best whistler, the best hunter.
There was a problem with being the best hunter. His older brothers wouldn’t even let him touch their rifles. “You’re too little,” they said when they left to go hunting.
They made him stay home to help his mother. Patients came all day long, and she cured them with herbs. The boy felt bored helping her. He whined, “I want to hunt and show the world that I’m the best at everything.”
“It’s true, you’re a good runner,” she said. “But that’s thanks to your deer spirit. You must always be grateful for this gift.”
But the boy did not feel grateful. He felt only proud of himself. “I run fast because I’m fast,” he said. “And
if my brothers let me hunt, I’d be the best hunter and then you’d see.”
“Hmph,” his mother said, and went back to hanging up her herbs to dry.
Very early one morning, while the stars were still out, even before his mother had woken up to start the tortillas and tea, the boy tiptoed outside with his oldest brother’s rifle. He shivered in the darkness and put the heavy gun over his shoulder and walked over the hills and through the fields, headed straight for the deepest, most magical forest.
The forest where one must never cut firewood because of the tree spirits.
Where one must never pick berries because of the plant spirits.
Where, most of all, one must never hunt because of the animal spirits.
The boy went there anyway. It was the only place where no one would see him. No one would see him because no one was brave enough to venture there.
He thought,
I am the best and the bravest
, and just as the sky was turning from the black of night to the blue of morning, he stepped into the deepest, most magical forest.
Here the trees whispered, the plants murmured, the insects sang. If he’d listened carefully, he would have heard the warnings in their words.
You foolish boy! Leave, leave, leave! Or else!
But he didn’t listen. He crept through the under-brush, thinking,
I’m
about to become the best hunter this
pueblo
has ever seen
.
The boy sat down and waited by a big tree at the edge of a clearing. After a while, he heard a movement. Into the meadow stepped a magnificent buck. It held its head high, and its antlers came to four points on each side, like a majestic crown. If the boy had looked closely, he might have noticed the animal’s pattern of white spots, how it matched the strange birthmark on his own back.
But he didn’t notice.
The boy stood up slowly, thinking about how big and impressed his brothers’ eyes would be when they saw him carrying this giant animal’s head. He raised the gun to his shoulder, moved his eye to the sight, and pulled the trigger.
So many things happened in that one terrible moment.
The entire forest shook like thunder.
The deer flew back in the air and landed with its legs collapsed beneath it.
And the force from the gunshot launched the boy backward. He landed on something sharp, something that stabbed through his thigh. A spiked branch poking from a log like a knife.
The buck limped away, blood streaming from its leg. The boy tried to stand up, but his leg didn’t sup-port him. It ached and burned. Blood gushed from the wound. He left the gun there and dragged himself toward home, crawling most of the way.
Hours later, he made it to the kitchen door. His mother scooped him up and brought him inside. She cleaned his wound as he screamed in pain.
“It pierced you to the bone,” she said. “How did this happen, son?”
“I woke up early to gather firewood,” he lied. “And I tripped and fell.”
She raised an eyebrow but said nothing.
Two days later, the boy’s wound was worse, pink and swollen, with red streaks running up and down his leg. He lay on his mat and shivered and sweated with fever. All night and all day, his mother had been tending to him with her worried face.
That afternoon, his brother said, “Where’s my gun? It’s been missing for two days.”
Their mother gave her wounded son a look full of questions.
When the boy told her the truth, his words sounded faraway, as though they came from another boy’s mouth. That was how lost he was in fever and pain.
“You shot a deer in the magical forest?” his mother cried. She leapt up and threw food and blankets and pots and cups and herbs and matches into a bag. She hoisted her son onto her back and strapped him on with rope like a bundle of firewood. Then she headed to the deepest, most magical forest. Every step, every bounce sent more fire through the boy’s leg, but he only whimpered. He was beyond words now, beyond crying. He drifted in and out of this world, so close to death.
Inside the forest, the light was different. It was golden and spilled in ribbons through the leaves. Golden ribbons pooled on the forest floor. The boy wanted to let one of the golden ribbons pull him up and up and into heaven.
But then his mother was pouring cold water on his face and saying, “Where? Where did you shoot this deer?”
And the boy pointed to the clearing. It did not take long for his mother to find the buck curled up in a nest of grasses. It watched them come close. Its antlers no longer looked majestic. The creature was too weak to hold its head high. Its eyes looked as faraway as the boy’s. It moved its front legs a little, then gave up, resting its head on its back, licking its swollen wound.
“Just as I thought,” the boy’s mother said, eyeing its white spots. “Your deer.” And she laid the boy beside the animal.
His mother collected wood and built a small fire and boiled water and threw in some herbs. She gave a cup to the deer, then a cup to the boy. She laid an herb-soaked cloth over the deer’s wound and laid another one over the boy’s. She fed her son and the buck the same food: fruits and berries and roasted mushrooms and boiled greens and nuts. She stroked her son’s hair with one hand and the deer’s fur with the other. She sang them songs in the language of humans and in the language of spirits.
The boy did not know how long he was there with his mother and the deer. Days? Weeks? Little by little, his world became clearer. Every time the boy opened his eyes, he saw the buck’s eyes, looking into his. Its
eyes grew bigger as the life came back into them. The boy felt as though he was looking into a mirror.
The boy smiled.
The deer smiled.
Then one morning, the boy woke up, and the deer’s eyes were gone. Its spot in the grass was empty. The boy sat up and looked around, just in time to see the flash of a white tail disappearing into the trees.
The next day, the boy and his mother went home. For weeks he walked with a limp and a stick. Within months, he was running. And after a year passed, he was the fastest runner in his
pueblo
once again.
But it was different now. Now, every day, the boy ran along the edges of the deepest, most magical forest. He ran and felt his deer eyes watching the trees whiz by and felt his deer legs pounding the earth. He ran and ran, leaping over logs and fences. He became known as the protector of the forest. If anyone tried to enter, he would chase them, and always, he would catch them. People said that when he ran, a handsome buck with giant antlers bounded alongside him, just inside the forest’s shadows. Together, they ran with their legs outstretched, the deer an echo of the boy, or maybe the boy an echo of the deer.
Years passed, and the boy became an old man, and still he ran along the forest, although more slowly now. Sometimes he stopped to rest and told his tale to the children who gathered around him. And always, Zitlally, he ended with this: “If you ever find yourself in the deepest, most magical forest, be kind to whatever creature you meet there. Look into its eyes. And smile.”
