The Girl in Red

She needed to stop getting stuck in circles like that, she thought, needed to stop second-guessing and third-guessing for danger. Yes, it was potentially dangerous out in the woods. But it was less dangerous than being in a city or other area where there were lots of people and she needed to remember that.

Once she reached the trail again she consulted her compass and started off in the correct direction. The sun came out, but it only gave off a weak cold light. Red found it hard not to take the sun’s lack of warmth personally. The least the damned sun could do was actually shine and warm things up so it wouldn’t snow on her.

The day passed as so many of them had, with Red trudging along in the silent wood. Many of the birds were gone now, flown to warmer climes for the winter. A few crows persisted, calling to their fellows perched on nearby trees. Crows always sounded angry to Red, like they woke up every morning with their throats stuffed with bile, but it was just the way they called. They might be singing love poetry to one another, for all Red knew. She didn’t really know about birds.

The steady pace with nothing much to look at but trees, trees, bushes, more trees lulled her into something like sleepwalking—just putting one foot in front of the other, thinking about nothing in particular.

Then there was movement in front of her—something bigger than a squirrel, but not big enough to perceive as a threat (Red assumed at this point that basically every adult human was a threat).

Red blinked. Once, twice, and fought the urge to rub her eyes and blink again. Because she thought she just saw—was actually fairly certain she did

just see—two little kids with dirt-streaked faces and leaves artistically arranged in their hair dart away from the path and into the brush.

She doubted her eyes only because they were so quiet. Red had never known an American kid who was capable of moving like that. They always barreled, leapt, sprinted, falling over and shouting and laughing and crying but generally doing everything as noisily as possible. But not these two. They’d slipped across the path and into the undergrowth with only the faintest crackle of dead leaves underfoot, hardly more noise than the average chipmunk would make.

The brush they’d disappeared into was thick all along the edge of the path Red walked on, a tangle of low evergreens growing in every direction. She’d never seen so many little evergreen bushes in the woods—usually they were ruthlessly manicured and set to border annual beds on someone’s front lawn. These were about three quarters of Red’s height (admittedly, not a very high height) and perfect for hiding. Especially if you were a couple of kids on your own in the woods.

Red slowed her pace, because the kids had been a little ways off when they disappeared and she wasn’t completely sure where they’d entered the brush. She didn’t want to count on hearing them—they seemed like they’d gotten in the habit of being still and quiet (a good habit when soldiers might be about, or just adults that might want to hurt you)—so she peered into the dirt for evidence of little foot marks along the right side of the path.

Red almost missed them (no, a tracker you certainly are not) but just as she was about to pass by she noticed the smooth dragging marks made by knees in the dirt, and just the faintest impression of handprints in front of them.

Maybe the kids were not quite as little as they’d initially appeared. They’d been crawling on hands and knees, although their movement had been so quick she’d first taken them for preschoolers.

She carefully put her right knee on the ground and then leaned on her left foot, in a sort of football-huddle-crouch. It was difficult to squat all the way down because of the way the prosthetic attached to her knee, but she was able to get low enough to see that there was a well-worn trench just under the bottom of the bush.

Red considered flattening herself to her stomach to look underneath, but then realized that was a recipe for getting stepped on if the kids decided to burst out of their hiding place. Instead she carefully parted the branches, hoping not to startle them.

“Whoa,” she said.

Behind the shell of the branches there was a huge open gap inside, almost like a natural tent or shelter. The kids were huddled up at the far end of the gap, about five feet away from her. There was a pile of filthy blankets coiled like a nest near their knees, and a small backpack that looked like a repurposed school bag. The pack was open and Red could see a few granola bars piled on top of some dirty clothes.

It was hard to gauge their age, especially with their dirty faces and no idea of their standing-up size, but they looked like they were maybe between eight and eleven. She didn’t want to make any assumptions about their gender, either, since they both had that shaggy-haired-haven’t-seen-a-barber-since-the-world-ended style.