Near the Bone by Christina Henry (the mitten read aloud txt) 📕

“Travois?”

“Like a sled, but with long poles to pull instead of a rope.”

“The sled!” Mattie said. “I forgot about it. William bought a sled so he could carry the bear trap. I wonder where he put it. I saw it yesterday morning.”

“It wasn’t in the back,” C.P. said. “I would have noticed.”

“Maybe he put it behind the storehouse,” she said.

“I’ll look after I have some more magic bean water,” he said.

“Magic bean water?”

“Coffee,” he said.

“You say a lot of funny things,” Mattie said, then covered her mouth with her hand, shocked that she’d said that out loud. “I’m sorry. That was rude.”

“Nah,” he said. “I bet a lot of things sound funny to you. You’ve been here for a long time, and I don’t see a TV or a radio or anything. Or even books.”

“I’m only allowed to read the Bible,” she said, and she hated how she sounded when she said this, like a docile cow herded into a pen.

“Well, if we can fix up the sled for Jen then we can get out of here and try to find the packs again and then get off this mountain, or at least get to where there’s a cell signal again. I had a spotty signal for a while, but it was closer to the base. If I can call 911 and give them our location then we’ll be saved. Someone will come and get us with a helicopter or ATVs or whatever.”

He used that word a lot, whatever. It was a strange word, vague but at the same time full of possibilities.

After eating the eggs and bacon, C.P. ripped open the box of coffee cakes and dumped the wrapped cakes on the table.

“Here, try one,” he said. “They’re not as good as a real home-baked coffee cake but they’ll do in a pinch.”

Mattie picked up a cake and started unwrapping it, then stopped.

“Where does he get all the money for these things?” she said.

“Does he have a job?”

“No,” she said. “He’s always here, unless he’s hunting. And speaking of money . . .”

She dropped the cake on the table and went over to the couch, kneeling in front of it and reaching underneath for the roll of money she’d hid there yesterday. For a moment she thought William had found it but then her fingers brushed against paper and she grabbed it.

“What are you doing?” C.P. asked, his mouth full of coffee cake. Mattie had a sudden idea that he was eating to hide his grief—that if he kept eating, kept busy, then he wouldn’t have to think about what happened to Griffin.

She held up the roll of bills. “William left this in his trousers the other day. I hid it, because I thought if I got away from him I would need money.”

C.P. tilted his head to the side, studying her. “I didn’t think you had the guts for something like that, to be honest. When we first met you, you were such a scared little mouse.”

Mattie felt her cheeks reddening. “You were two strange men wandering around our property, and I hadn’t seen anyone other than William in years. You can’t blame me for being cautious.”

“That wasn’t caution. That was terror.”

“Are you trying to make me angry?” she said, standing up. She felt something in her chest, something bubbling and boiling.

“I don’t know. Can you even get angry?”

“I’m sure I can,” Mattie said, stung by the way he dismissed her. “I think I am now.”

He held up his hands. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry. I have to stop treating you like a regular person, I know. You haven’t had the same life as everyone else. If Jen was awake she’d definitely be beating me about the head and shoulders right now.”

William grabbing her shoulders. William’s fist in her face.

“You shouldn’t joke about things like that,” she said. “I know that you’re trying to be funny so that you don’t think about your friend, but it’s not funny at all.”

C.P. rubbed his face with one hand. “Yeah, you’re right. It’s not funny. I’m sorry. For real. I’m sorry. It’s not like I’m not sitting here looking at your black eye and the marks around your neck. They just kind of faded into the background, and I forgot who I was talking to. Let’s see how much you’ve got there.”

Mattie had forgotten about the money, even though she was holding it in her hand. She was still angry, still felt the bubbling and the boiling at the edge of her consciousness, but she recognized that he was sorry if he said so. He was foolish and awkward and often said the wrong thing, but he was sorry. She handed the money to C.P., who unrolled it.

“Holy crap!” he said. “These are mostly hundreds.”

He started counting the bills, putting the different types into piles. When he was done he looked up at her, his expression dazed.

“There’s $2,517 dollars here,” C.P. said. “Where did he get all of this money? Is he rich?”

“I don’t know,” Mattie said. There was so much she didn’t know about William. There was so much she still didn’t know about herself, huge chunks of her life that were missing, puzzle pieces that had no connector.

“I could buy a train ticket with that, right? And pay for a place to stay?”

“You could buy a plane ticket with that, never mind a train,” C.P. said.

“A plane,” Mattie said. She’d never been on a plane, not even when she was a child. She remembered longing to fly, longing to be so high up in the sky that everyone below was smaller than an ant. “William could never find me if I was in a plane.”

“Don’t you worry,” C.P. said. “That guy is going to be arrested once I can call the police. Your case is really famous, you know? It’s probably not something you want to be famous for, I guess. But you went missing and your mother was killed in a really brutal way—not to be mean about