The Summer of No Regrets Read Online Free PDF Page B

Brigitta!” Natalie came tearing up the driveway of The Center and threw herself at me. “I’m so glad you’re not dead and in little bloody pieces all underneath the tree house! Hi, Clare.” Natalie threw herself at Mom, who hugged her distractedly. The air was chily damp, and my Nonni coat now had cougar-instaled vents. All morning Mom had been handing me mugs of motherwort tea (“great as a nerve tonic”).
    It had been four hours since the cougar. I was not ready for people, but Dad’s friend Clyde Redd was here along with Buck Harper from up the road. Tarah from next door and her mom Rainbow arrived with lasagna. It had meat in it, so we wouldn’t be able to eat it.
    Luke had let me lead him out as far as the driveway and then had walked home by himself. He hadn’t touched me again. I wished I hadn’t wanted him to. All morning my body had been acting strangely—my skin buzzing like it was full of bees, my throat full as if something was pushing against it. I kept thinking about the eyes of the cougar—the raw power of her. And I kept thinking about how Luke’s arms had felt around me—wanting him to come back and hold me again. A boy I hardly knew.
    Several members of the Shivat Eiden group, all in skulcaps, were helping Mom harvest snap beans while watching the woods. Their row of bicycles was lined up along the porch rail.
    Even in my antisocial state of mind, I felt a pinprick of excitement at having them here. This was the first real religion that had been at having them here. This was the first real religion that had been at The Center in a while. For the last six months, it had been make-it-up-as-you-go groups like the Out-of-Body Travelers and the folowers of Mamda, Channeled Ancient Warrior.
    Tarah approached under Rainbow’s careful gaze. She touched my hand. “Are you all in one piece?”
    Natalie gripped my arm. “Brigitta fought that cougar off with her bare hands. She almost died!”
    “It wasn’t realy like that, guys,” I tried. “The cougar showed up. I chased her off. Everyone’s making a big deal out of it.”
    “It is a big deal, sweetheart.” Natalie hopped onto the hood of Malory’s car. “Cougars eat people.”
    “Not very often,” I said. I didn’t want to talk about it. My brain was still turning the whole thing over slowly—the cougar…
    and Luke.
    I had expected the cougar to run off when I rushed her. But when she wouldn’t take her eyes off Luke, I knew she was determined to kill him. And suddenly life had become my al-consuming goal—Luke’s life or mine, it didn’t matter. In that moment we both shared the same silver cord that held us to the earth.
    But when Malory had found me shaking in the entryway of The Center, the story had come out differently than it had happened: it had been me sitting on the ground in front of Adam when the cougar appeared, me she’d locked eyes with, me alone who had used a branch and rocks and my coat to fend her off.
    I’d meant to tell the real story, but it had been like teling a dream. When it came down to it, some parts wanted to be guarded, held only in my private thoughts.
    In her usual running-the-universe way, Malory had hustled me to Mom and caled the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife. Mom had cried and made me cocoa with real sugar from some secret stash I didn’t even know she owned. Dad was busy with the retreatants and barely spoke to me. But that was busy with the retreatants and barely spoke to me. But that was normal.
    Above us clouds moved away from the sun. Malory was leaning against the adobe doorway chatting up Rainbow.
    Dad stood on a large boulder staring into the trees and concentrating intently. He wore no shoes, and his blond hair, free of its usual ponytail, had blue feathers braided into it. He was bare-chested (cringe), and he wore a medicine pouch—a little bag of herbs—on a cord around his neck. Why, why, why did he have to do that today?
    He started to drum, which made Rainbow look