Lucy Read online

“Oh, my God, it’s the rain.” Jenny approached Lucy gingerly. “It’s just the rain and thunder, honey. You’re going to be okay.” She put her hand on Lucy’s shoulder.

  “What?” Amanda asked. “What about the rain and thunder? What’s happening? Why is she doing this? Lucy, stop.”

  Lucy could feel every muscle in her body vibrating as Jenny tried to comfort her. Lucy wanted to say something but was afraid of what would come out now. She could only stand there panting and making low noises in her throat. Then all at once another blast of thunder sent her howling out into the night. She couldn’t stop herself. She began running all over the yard, swinging around tree trunks with one hand waving. She grabbed her clothes and ripped them into shreds of fabric. She ran naked up the tree as if she’d come unstuck from gravity. What had been a sense of dread had turned into a sense of joyous liberation. She was free. She was home in the forest once more. Lightning flared, and in its light she saw Amanda and Jenny running around in the rain below, their clothing soaked, shouting and trying to see Lucy in the branches where she swayed.

  “Lucy, no!” Jenny called. “You have to come down.” But hers was like a distant voice in the forest, and Lucy could only answer with another shriek. It was now raining and blowing so hard that the tree itself was rocking from side to side. Lucy tore off a stout branch and descended to the ground, dragging it along and screaming louder. A blast of thunder answered.

  Lucy could see the neighbors peering out of their lighted windows to learn what the commotion was, but she could do nothing to stop herself, as Jenny and Amanda ran after her and tried to corral her.

  “Lucy, please!” Amanda cried. “Oh, please, Lucy, stop.”

  Not even as the sirens began could Lucy answer. The glorious claps of thunder and the wild sheets of rain drove her on in her dance, and up the tree she went once more, rejoicing in her freedom. The police cars pulled into the alley in back of the house, their crazy lights sparkling as the thunderstorm cell passed away to the east. For the first time all afternoon, Lucy felt the agitation release her. The police piled out of the cars in groups, and spotlights set the dripping trees aflame. Lucy could hear the dark voices below and snatches of conversation.

  “… psychiatric …”

  “… animal control …”

  “Is it a girl?”

  “It’s just my daughter,” Jenny called out in a cheerful voice. “There’s nothing wrong. We’re okay.”

  “It was called in as a disturbance, ma’am.”

  “No, it was just us horsing around,” Amanda said.

  “Does she have clothes on?”

  “She’s in her bathing suit,” Amanda said. “We just wanted to play in the rain.”

  “Where’s your bathing suit?”

  As Lucy’s eyes adjusted to the light and her mind began to settle down, she could see that she was trapped.

  “Can you get her down here so we can talk to her?”

  “Yes, turn off your lights, and I’ll get her down,” Amanda said.

  “We can’t turn ’em off, miss, it’s regulations.”

  “Then just aim them away a bit,” Jenny said.

  Someone whistled, and then the lights lowered. Lucy seized the moment and scampered across the branches and onto the roof of the house. She let herself down the side, punched through the dining-room-window screen, and swung inside. She hurried to her room, jerked on her bikini, and ran down the stairs to the garage. As she walked out onto the driveway, a burly policewoman with a battered face and short red hair shined her flashlight into Lucy’s eyes.

  “There she is now,” Amanda said.

  “Yes,” Lucy said. “We were just fooling around, right Amanda?”

  “That’s what I was telling them. Sorry for the confusion.”

  “Hey,” the policewoman said. “You’re that monkey girl.”

  “If there won’t be anything else, then, we’ll be going inside,” Jenny said, putting her hands on their shoulders.

  “How’d you get into the house?” the policewoman demanded.

  “Come, girls,” Jenny said. “No more playing tonight.”

  The officer lowered her flashlight and noticed a soggy scrap of cloth on the ground. As Jenny steered the girls into the garage, the policewoman picked up a piece of Lucy’s shirt. “Hey, what’s this?” Then she turned to one of the other police officers, who were gaping in puzzlement, and said, “I think we should take ’em in for questioning.”

  “About what?” the other cop asked.

  At that moment, television news vans pulled in from both directions to flank the police cars in the alley. Camera crews and reporters began emerging.

  “Oh, shit, just what we frickin’ need,” the policewoman said.

  “Lucy! Lucy!” one of the newsmen shouted. “Can we get a statement?”

  Another called out, “Lucy, were you and Amanda drinking?”

  “Taking drugs?”

  “Let’s get out of here,” one of the police officers said. “You do not want to be on TV, trust me, I was there once.”

  As the police returned to their cars the policewoman shouted, “Get those vans out of our way!”

  29

  IT WAS A HOT DAY They were waiting beside an exhibit of small penguins arrayed around a moat that reeked of feces. Presently, Donna came down a wooden walkway, tan and robust and smiling, her long black braid swinging behind her. Jenny had always liked her Native American look. At the bottom of the ramp, Donna hugged Jenny powerfully.

  “Hey, Jen,” Donna said. “Thank you for comin’. I’m honored to meet you, Lucy. You must be Amanda.”

  “Hi,” Amanda said, shaking hands.

  Lucy said nothing. Her eyes darted around excitedly, and her chin lifted as she sniffed the air. In The Stream, Jenny thought, hearing and smelling all the animals. She hoped that Lucy could stay calm.

  “Listen,” Lucy said. In the distance, elephants and big cats were calling out. “They know.”

  Donna watched her with a knowing look and nodded. “Yep. Everybody’s talkin’ ’bout you. Come on.”

  She led them up the wooden ramp and across a bridge through the forest. They arrived at the great ape exhibit to find the bonobos behind thick glass windows. Lucy stood back at first, reluctant, while Amanda went forward to look. The bonobos swung on ropes hung from the high ceiling and climbed on artificial trees. Others lay on the ground, resting, and a few were playing together or grooming.

  “They’re so beautiful,” Amanda said. “They look so human.” Then she thought for a moment and said, “Well, duh …”

  Donna and Jenny watched Lucy. Jenny could see that she was vibrating in that intense way she did when she was communicating deeply. Gradually, the bonobos began to quit whatever they were doing and drift to the window where Amanda stood. Now all was quiet. Amanda moved back from the window as the bonobos crowded around it. Lucy hesitated about ten feet away. The bonobos closest to the window began placing their hands flat against the glass. One by one all the others pushed forward to place their hands on the glass, until it was completely covered with the beautiful black palms and delicate fingers. Then they leaned in close to peek through the spaces between their fingers.

  At length, Lucy took a step forward. Then another step. Very slowly, she approached the glass. Then she lifted her hand and placed it flat against the glass, her pale skin startling against that dark and eerie tapestry of hands and eyes. All at once the bonobos broke from the window and began jumping up and down and screaming. Lucy stood for another moment, listening to the sound, and then sat cross-legged on the floor. She put her face in her hands. Amanda and Jenny rushed to her and held her.

  Donna came forward and said, “I’ve never seen them do that. In more than twenty years of working here I’ve never seen anything like it. Come on, let me take you in back.”

  They helped Lucy up, and she said, “I’m sorry. It’s so sad.”

  “It’s okay,” Amanda said.

  Donna opened a door with t
he ID card that hung around her neck and led the way into a windowless concrete corridor. Down and down they went until they had reached an area of steel bars where the rest of the bonobos were kept. It smelled of damp concrete and rotting fruit. As they approached, the bonobos continued their shrieking cries.

  “Do you mind if I talk to them?” Lucy asked Donna.

  “No, I was hoping you might,” Donna said.

  Lucy let out a piercing shriek and a barking sound and the bonobos fell completely silent.

  “Holy smokes,” Donna said. “I wish I could do that. Come on, I’ll take you to the back fence.”

  They followed Donna up a flight of concrete stairs and through a steel door that led outside to the forest, where the leaves were just beginning to take on a tinge of their autumn colors. There they could approach the very back of the bonobo area, which was enclosed by a high chain link fence. The bonobos rushed into the yard and came to the fence, now murmuring more softly at the nearness of Lucy. They began reaching out through the fence with their fingers. Lucy moved forward.

  “Be careful. They can be dangerous,” Donna said.

  “They don’t want to hurt me,” Lucy said.

  “She’ll know if one of them is dangerous,” Jenny said.

  “They’re fast,” Donna warned.

  “So is Lucy,” Amanda said.

  Lucy slowly approached the fence where all the fingers reached out through the chain links, palms held upward. Then she went along the fence, gently brushing all the palms, the bonobos murmuring softly in little squeaks and high keening notes. Lucy made soft noises in response, almost like singing, as Jenny and Donna and Amanda watched in wonder.

  “Even I don’t dare do that,” Donna whispered to Jenny. “They’d tear my fingers off. I don’t wear shoelaces cause I’m afraid they’ll rip me off my feet. This is just amazing.”

  Lucy moved back and forth for half an hour, touching hands and murmuring with them. Then she turned from the fence and said, “I’d better go now. They don’t understand why I can’t come in with them. I’ll say goodbye now.” Lucy turned to them and began shrieking in a way that was painfully loud and sad. All the bonobos took up a chorus of shrieking, and it grew to such a deafening pitch that Amanda and Jenny had to cover their ears. Then, abruptly, the bonobos scattered back into the building.

  Amanda, Jenny, and Lucy followed Donna through the building and back across the wooden bridge. At the front gate of the zoo they stood in pale sunshine and heard the distant trumpeting of the elephant, the thunder of lions. Amanda put her hand on Lucy’s shoulder, and the two girls stared into each other’s eyes.

  Lucy turned to Donna. “Thank you for that. It’s been a long time.”

  Donna nodded. “Now that you’re in the spotlight of publicity, what will you do?”

  “I don’t know. I was going to go to college, but they won’t let me now.”

  “That’s terrible. Can you find some school that’ll take you?”

  “We will,” Jenny said. “Don’t worry, honey. We’re going to find a place.”

  Donna thought for a moment. “Can you still go through the trees, Lucy? Are you fast?”

  “Oh, yeah. It’s easy. And fun.”

  “She gave us a pretty good demo of that last night, in fact,” Amanda said.

  “During the storms?” Donna asked.

  “I’m sorry. I kind of cut loose.”

  “No, it’s natural,” Donna said. “Our guys got pretty wild last night, too.” Then she went on: “Lucy, me and Jenny have been talkin’ about what to do now if you need a safe place to go.”

  Lucy shrugged and said, “Sure. Go ahead.”

  “They will come after you. There is no doubt in my mind about that now. Bad people who want you dead or want to do experiments on you. When the time comes—and it will come—you’ll need to have a plan. Jenny thought of it and got in touch with me. That’s why you’re here. Because I can help.”

  “Okay,” Lucy said, looking at Jenny. “Mom?” she asked, uncertain now.

  “It’s all right, honey. You can trust Donna. Listen to the plan.”

  “Okay,” Donna said. “First, you get into the trees. Like you did last night. You can maneuver across the canopies faster than they can move on the ground in their cars. The streets will slow them down. And second, you’ll come here. I’ll protect you. I have special places they can’t get to.”

  “How will I get all the way here?”

  “Through the trees,” Jenny said. “Stay in the trees all the way.”

  “Can it be done?” Amanda asked.

  “Yes,” Jenny said. “It’s trees all the way up. Donna and I already checked. When we get home I can show you the route on Google Earth.”

  “It’s broken in places,” Donna said. “Sometimes you’ll have to go through neighborhoods. But there’s plenty of water along the way. You won’t need to eat. It’ll take you three days at the most.”

  “You guys have really thought this through, haven’t you?” Amanda asked.

  “Yes,” Jenny said. “I knew we had to have a plan if worse came to worst.”

  “Don’t talk about this on the phone or in e-mail,” Donna continued. “No text messaging about it. When it happens, Jenny and I won’t communicate with each other for a while. Amanda, they’ll be watching you and Jenny to see if you’ll lead them to Lucy. So you’ll just have to wait. Jenny and I worked out a code to communicate through ads on Craigslist.”

  “This is pretty spooky stuff,” Amanda said. “How’d you figure all this out?”

  “She was working with primates in the military labs before she came here,” Jenny explained.

  “Yeah. It sucked. I couldn’t stand the way they treated the animals. The experiments. I left when they started inoculating chimpanzees with Yersinia pestis for their biological warfare research.”

  Amanda asked, “What’s Yer—what did you say?”

  “It’s plague,” Lucy said. “Bubonic plague.”

  “Oh, that’s horrible,” Amanda said.

  “Yeah. It was pretty awful. But I learned a lot.” Donna paused as if making a difficult decision, then said to Amanda, “I still have contacts in the military. So let’s just say that I am positive they’re coming for Lucy.”

  “Then why doesn’t Lucy stay here now?” Amanda asked. “As a precaution.”

  “Because we don’t know when it’ll happen,” Donna said. “I can’t even say who or how. And if Lucy just disappears from her regular life now, they’d come looking for her.”

  “Or it might not happen,” Jenny said hopefully.

  Donna gave Lucy a business card, her name printed on the front, Donna W. Feather.

  Lucy studied the card. “Where will you take me? If I come.”

  “I’d better not tell you that now.” Donna took a step forward and hugged Jenny. She shook hands with Lucy and Amanda. “Goodbye, then. Be safe.” Then she turned without ceremony and went past the penguins.

  They watched her go back up the ramp and vanish into the forest.

  “Mom, why did you bring me here now?”

  “I don’t know. I’ve just been having this feeling that we’d better get our signals straight.”

  “Yeah, me, too. You’re getting it in The Stream.”

  Amanda asked, “Do you think she’s right? Will they really come for Lucy?”

  They looked at one another. Jenny thought about her question and reminded herself that the United States government was holding ten-year-old children in cages at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq. And they’d done nothing but have the wrong father. Lucy was guilty of the same crime. Since the suspension of habeas corpus they could hold anyone they wanted anywhere they wanted. So Jenny feared that Donna had it just about right.

  But all she said was, “Let’s go home now, girls.”

  Jenny left the girls watching When Harry Met Sally and painting each other’s toenails. When she went outside and saw that Harry had brought the motorcycle and an extra helmet, Jenny
said, “I’m glad I didn’t have my hair done and my heels on.”

  “Well, if we’d been going to Charlie Trotter’s, I would have brought the car. But pizza at Amici calls for a Ducati.”

  The restaurant was in a shabby neighborhood that was coming back to life as people moved in and fixed up apartments. A dark wine bar and a bright hair salon had already opened. When they were seated in a corner with a carafe of wine and a candle between them, Harry lifted his glass. “Here’s lookin’ atcha.” Their eyes met. Jenny still felt a jolt when she saw those eyes. But she couldn’t shake her sense of dread. Something in The Stream, as Lucy had said.

  “What? What is this, Harry? I’ve known you all these years. We go back to the eighties. And we’ve gone out on real dates—what? Five times maybe?”

  “I’m not sure. Something’s going on, and you’re not telling me about it.”

  “You told me not to tell you.”

  “So it’s that, is it? Things getting ugly?”

  “Yes, I’m afraid they are. I don’t even know exactly what it is yet.”

  “Then that’s the reason we’re here.” The humor was gone from his face now. “I love you, Jenny. You know that.”

  She felt her heart jump. “Yes, of course, I do, Harry. I love you, too. We’re old hands.”

  “But we just never seemed to be in the right place at the right time for …”

  “For what?”

  “For more.”

  Jenny sighed. “We tried.”

  “Not really. You were in the jungle. I was an ambitious surgeon.”

  “Yes, I know. No one’s to blame.”

  “Well, we both had priorities. But what about now? You can’t go back to Congo. You know, I’ve completely fallen in love with Lucy.”

  “She does have a way of stealing your heart, doesn’t she?”

  “And I know she likes me. I don’t think she’d mind having me around.”

  “What are you suggesting? I mean, I am here, that’s true. But if anything, my life is more complicated than it’s ever been.”

  “Does that mean you’d be interested if it weren’t so complicated?”

  “Harry. Interested in what?” It had come so out of the blue that Jenny was having trouble even imagining what he was thinking. Then without warning, Jenny was weeping. She wasn’t even sure why. “Damn you, Harry.”