Lovely Wild Read online

  Well, Mari can be happy, too. She can be more than that. She can be good.

  SEVENTEEN

  “DON’T CHASE THEM, IDIOT.” Kendra tapped the keys of her phone to send a text to Sammy as she watched Ethan run after a squawking chicken. “God.”

  Sammy hadn’t answered the last couple texts Kendra had sent, but since Kendra was only getting two or sometimes three bars of signal, that wasn’t a surprise. Dad said that they didn’t need the internet, that they should use this time to do other things and to not be distracted, which was totally unfair since it wasn’t Kendra’s fault he couldn’t be self-disciplined enough not to go online when he was supposed to be working.

  He was writing a book, he said, and that didn’t make any sense. Her dad was a doctor, not a writer. When Kendra was in seventh grade and had the worst English teacher ever, she’d tried to get help from him, but he’d totally messed her up. Her mom had been the one to figure out how to diagram a sentence, working hard with Kendra at the kitchen table, going back and forth from the textbook to the paper, struggling until finally, she’d cried out, “I get it!” And had been able to show Kendra how to do it. Now her dad was writing a book?

  “What a joke,” she muttered.

  “I’m not joking. Or chasing them!” Ethan made a face at her. “I just want to pet one.”

  “They’re not pets, monkeybrat.”

  “That’s what Mama said,” he mumbled.

  Kendra looked at her phone again, hoping for an answer from at least one of her friends. Nothing. She shoved it into her pocket.

  The barn was run-down but pretty cool. It was mostly empty inside. Part of it had been converted into a garage. Part into a chicken house with a small doorway for the chickens to get in and out. The other stalls were too small for horses or cows. Goats, maybe. Around the back was a tall box of small cages stacked on top of each other, also empty. It looked as though it had once had pigeons or something in it. Outside behind the barn, closer to the field, was a high, round cage made of wire like something you’d see in a zoo. Inside was a doghouse, but it didn’t look like the sort of cage you’d use for a dog. A monkey, maybe.

  Or a person.

  The chickens were cool, too. Red ones, white ones, a few speckled ones with fluffy feet and heads. That was the sort Ethan was trying to catch, and Kendra had to admit, they did look soft and fun to pet. But they were all wild, running around and dodging his grasp. It was funny to watch.

  “Ain’t the way to catch ’em.”

  Kendra and Ethan both turned at the sound of an unfamiliar voice as an old woman shuffled around the edge of the barn. She wore a brightly colored muumuu, rubber boots and a baseball cap with a picture of a tractor on it. She waved at Ethan, who moved at once to Kendra’s side. Kendra put her arm around him, knowing it was stupid to be afraid of an old woman, even if she did show up all of a sudden out of nowhere.

  “I’m Rosie, from down the lane. Heard we was getting some new folks.” She had a funny accent. “Dawn the lane,” it sounded like. She grinned, showing straight teeth way too white and big for her face. White hair floated from under the ball cap, some of it tied behind her but most of it loose. She jerked a thumb toward the driveway. “I look after the chickens. Used to take care of the squabs, too, and the peafowl, but they’re long gone now.”

  “Is that what was in that big cage?” Kendra pointed.

  Rosie nodded. “Yep, yep. A hen and a cock. Victor and Victoria was their names.”

  Ethan giggled when the old lady said cock, though Kendra was pretty sure he wasn’t supposed to even know that was a dirty word. “Peacocks!”

  “Yep, yep.” Rosie shuffled forward.

  “What happened to them?” Ethan asked.

  “Oh...they runned off. Victor and Victoria are probably dead by now. But I think they had some chicks or something. At any rate, I find their feathers sometimes, so...” Rosie shrugged.

  “So they are around?” Ethan bounced. “Can we see them? That would be really cool!”

  “Maybe they’re out there in the woods, though if they can live on their own out there without getting et up by a fox or coyote or somethin’ they can surely hide from you.”

  “Coyotes?” Kendra’s lip curled. “I didn’t know there were coyotes in Pennsylvania.”

  “Yep, yep, sure there are.” Rosie laughed. “But don’t you worry ’bout that. These chickens here, now, they’ll squawk and kick up a ruckus if so much as a possum comes rustling around, and coyotes mostly keep to themselves up on the mountain. They come down once in a while to get into your garbage, but so will a bear if you don’t keep it locked up. Raccoons, too. All kinds of things have a mind to get into your trash.”

  “Bears?” Ethan looked up at Kendra. “Kiki, for real?”

  Surely the old lady had to be exaggerating, but she didn’t look like she was. Kendra shrugged. “I dunno, kid.”

  Rosie studied him. “Tell you what, little man. Why don’t you help me feed these chickens, and I bet we can catch ourselves one of those pretty ones for you to pet, if you want. And I’ll show you how to collect the eggs. How about that?”

  Ethan looked up at Kendra, already one step away from her but his expression questioning. Something panged inside her. She remembered the monkeybrat being born, how it had been to hold him as a baby. Sure, he was a booger and did all kinds of boy stuff she didn’t like, and sometimes she wished he’d been a sister and other times she was glad he was a boy so that she could still have her mom to herself for girl things, even if she did believe her mother preferred Ethan to her. But mostly, she liked her little brother, and when he looked at her like that, she was reminded how responsible it felt to be the older sister. To make sure he was okay.

  “That sounds like fun, Ethan. But maybe we should ask Mom first.” Kendra nodded encouragement with a quick glance over her shoulder toward the house. They’d had it drilled into their heads too many times—never, ever go with a stranger. Not a policeman, not a fireman, not someone who said they were a teacher or who said they’d come to pick you up from school because your parents had been in an accident.

  Their mom was coming out the front door, anyway. She was wiping her hands on a dish towel and had pulled her hair up into a messy bun on top of her head. She must’ve been cleaning. Or maybe putting away the fifty zillion bags of groceries she’d bought that morning. At home, Kendra was often a little embarrassed by her mom’s pack-rat habits but somehow knowing that hadn’t changed despite the move made living here a little more...familiar.

  “Hi, can I help you?”

  “She’s Rosie, from down the lane,” Ethan said. “She’s here to take care of the chickens.”

  “And youse, if you need it,” Rosie added. “I do the cleaning and whatnot for you short-term folks. Though you’re scheduled to be here for more than a week or so, ain’t?”

  Mom blinked, giving Rosie one of those blank looks that so often embarrassed Kendra. “Yes. For the summer. But we don’t need someone to clean for us.”

  Rosie’s eyebrows rose. “No? It’s included. I come in weekly, replace the linens, give the place a scrubbing.”

  “My husband didn’t say anything about it.” Mom wiped her hands on the dishcloth, giving a quick glance at the house over her shoulder. “We can handle it, I think. Thank you, though.”

  Kendra wouldn’t have minded someone coming in to clean, if it meant she wouldn’t have to do it. Lots of her friends had cleaning ladies, but her mom never had.

  “If you change your mind, I guess you’ll know how to find me,” Rosie said with a sniff that said Mom had insulted her. Her teeth jutted out of her mouth before she sucked them back in. “Been taking care of these chickens for all the renters for a long time. Told your boy here he could help me out. Seems he’s taken a liking to the chickens.”

  Ethan gave Kendra a wide-eyed stare and pressed his lips together against a laugh. Kendra wrinkled her nose and nudged him with her hip. Their mom moved toward Rosie.

  �€