still cook the chicken. Kya didn’t understand why they stayed hidden there—she was sure her brother was dying, needed their help, but she was too afraid to move. They waited for a long time and then snuck back, looking through the windows to make sure Pa was gone.
Jodie lay cold on the floor, blood pooled around him, and Kya cried that he was dead. But Ma roused him and moved him to the sofa, where she stitched up his face with her sewing needle. When all was quiet, Kya snatched her bonnet from the floor and ran fast through the woods and threw it with all her might into the saw grass.
Now she looked into the eyes of the stranger standing on her porch and said, “Jodie.”
He smiled, the scar going crooked, and replied, “Kya, I hoped you’d be here.” They stared, each searching for the other in older eyes. Jodie couldn’t know he had been with her all these years, that scores of times he had shown her the way through the marsh, taught her over and over about herons and fireflies. More than anyone else, she had wanted to see Jodie or Ma again. Her heart had erased the scar and all the pain in that package. No wonder her mind buried the scene; no wonder Ma had left. Hit by a poker across the chest. Kya saw those rubbed-out stains on the flowered sundress as blood again.
He wanted to hug her, fold her into his arms, but as he moved toward her, she hung her head low to the side in profound shyness and backed up. So he simply stepped onto the porch.
“Come in,” she said, and led him into the small living room chock-full with her specimens.
“Oh,” he said. “Yes, then. I saw your book, Kya. I didn’t know for sure if it was you, but yes, now I can see it was. It’s amazing.” He walked around looking at her collections, also examining the room with its new furniture, glancing down the halls to the bedrooms. Not wanting to snoop, but taking it all in.
“Do you want coffee, tea?” She didn’t know if he’d come for a visit or to stay. What did he want after all these years?
“Coffee would be great. Thank you.”
In the kitchen, he recognized the old woodstove next to the new gas range and refrigerator. He ran his hand over the old kitchen table, which she had kept as it was. With all its peeling-paint history. She poured the coffee in mugs, and they sat.
“You’re a soldier, then.”
“Two tours in ’Nam. I’m staying in the army for a few more months. They’ve been good to me. Paid for my college degree—mechanical engineering, Georgia Tech. Least I can do is stay in a while.”
Georgia wasn’t all that far away—he could have visited sooner. But he was here now.
“You all left,” she said. “Pa stayed a while after you, but then he went, too. I don’t know where, don’t know if he’s alive or not.”
“You’ve been here by yourself since then?”
“Yes.”
“Kya, I shouldn’t have left you with that monster. I’ve ached, felt terrible about it for years. I was a coward, a stupid coward. These damned medals don’t mean a thing.” He swiped at his chest. “I left you, a little girl, alone to survive in a swamp with a madman. I don’t expect you to forgive me, ever.”
“Jodie, it’s okay. You were just a kid yourself. What could you do?”
“I could’ve come back when I was older. At first it was day-to-day survival on the back streets of Atlanta.” He sneered. “I left here with seventy-five cents in my pocket. Stole it from the money Pa left in the kitchen; took it knowing it would leave you short. I scraped by on odd jobs till the army took me in. After training, it was straight to war. When I got home, so much time had passed, I figured you were long gone, run away yourself. That’s the reason I didn’t write; I think I signed up to go back as a kind of self-punishment. What I deserved for leaving you. Then after I graduated from Tech, a couple of months ago, I saw your book in a shop. Catherine Danielle Clark. My heart just broke and leapt for joy all at once. I had to find you—figured I’d start here and track you down.”
“Well, here we are then.” She smiled for the first time. His eyes were the same as they had