Page 49 of The Wild Man

He carries me so easily, like I weigh next to nothing.

“I’m okay.” I finger a lock of his hair. “Where are we going?”

“You see.”

I sigh and relax more in his arms. It’s amazing how safe I feel with him. The man who’s hurt me in unimaginable ways makes me feel protected and adored. Who would have thought?

After trekking through the thick forest for a while, I lift my head when it starts to clear. My breath catches in my throat at the beauty that comes into view. I would have never guessed that something like this would exist in this part of the wilderness.

We’re in a field with hardly any trees. The ground is covered with a multitude of brightly-colored wildflowers. Purples, oranges, blues, yellows, almost every color under the rainbow.

“Wow,” I breathe, my head moving to and fro, taking in the magnificence of it all. “This is beautiful.”

Wild Man keeps walking. I want to tell him to stop because I know with each step he takes, he’s trampling the flowers beneath his feet. There’s a big tree with low hanging branches about fifty feet away and that’s where he’s headed. As we get closer to it, I notice something on the ground. It’s not until we’re under the canopy of branches that I realize it’s two piles of rocks. The rocks are about the size of two of my fists combined.

Wild Man sets me down on my feet. My gut twists when I step closer to them, instinctively knowing what they are.

Wild Man confirms my suspicions when he says gruffly, “Noeny and Peepa.”

My throat closes, and I blink back the tears wanting to form. I walk to the bottom of one pile and set my hand on a rock. I feel Wild Man behind me.

“Peepa.”

Wild Man is the strongest man I know. While he’s shown his strength physically, the mental strength he has is astronomical. I don’t know of a single person who could have endured what he has and come out on top. To have witnessed his parents’ gruesome death by a wild animal, somehow survived the same animal, buried his parents, all at such a young age, and then to have continued to survive in the wild is a feat I’m not sure anyone else could have accomplished. I am in complete awe of the man.

After gently running a finger over a rock on the second pile, I stand and turn to face Wild Man. His gaze is focused on the pile of rocks where his mother is buried. His expression is blank, but I can see the pain lurking in his black gaze. No matter how many years have passed and how old you get or how strong a person is, the death of a parent will forever remain painful.

I walk up to Wild Man and slip my arms around his waist. Turning my head, I lay it against his chest. His strong and steady heartbeat meets my ear. He wraps his arms around me, holding me against him. I feel the telltale tug of my hair that tells me he’s fingering a lock. Again, I have to work hard to keep my tears at bay.

I press a kiss on the center of his sternum and tilt my head back so I can look at him. “Thank you for bringing me here,” I say quietly. “You know your parents would be so proud of you, right?”

He grunts and says nothing else.

“They would,” I insist. I run my hands up and down his back. “What you’ve done, survived out here on your own, is amazing. I don’t know of anyone else who could have. Not someone so young.”

He looks over my head at his parents’ graves, a frown pulling his brows down.

“Why did you keep their skulls?” I ask and he gives me back his attention.

“Keep them with me. Watch over me.” His voice is gruff.

Between his emotional tone and his words, my heart breaks anew.

“I bet they’re up in Heaven right now looking down at you. I bet they both have smiles on their faces as they watch over their brave boy.”

“Heaven?” he asks with curiosity.

“The place where people go when they die. They go to Heaven and watch over the people they’ve left behind. And sometimes they send people to their loved ones so they aren’t sad anymore.”

He’s silent as he processes my words, but his fingers continue playing with my hair. Then his expression turns thoughtful as he gazes down at me. His next words change my life irrevocably and seals my fate.

“They sent you to me. Noeny and Peepa gave me you, so I won’t be alone.”

seventeen

Everlee

After that life-altering statement, I forced myself to look away from him. I didn’t want him to see what his words did to me. The magnitude of their meaning and how it destroyed the rest of my resistance against him. And I knew if he looked into my eyes, he would see it.