It's Not What You Think

Chapter 1

Zoe and Svetlana headed down the river bank, holding hands as they walked. The world was quiet as they wandered, the silence interrupted only by the occasional scuttle of a small animal across the leaf carpet on the floor and the birds singing in the air.

"It's great out here, isn't it?" Zoe asked.

"Wonderful," Svetlana agreed.

They continued their walk down farther, but then Svetlana suddenly stopped. "Do you hear that?" she asked Zoe.

"Hear what?" Zoe asked.

"I think someone's out here along with us," Svetlana said, lowering her voice and motioning off the path and to the left.

Curious, Zoe carefully went that way. "It sounds like someone's crying," she said.

Svetlana nodded. "Should we see who it is?"

"I think we should," Zoe said, going through who it could possibly be. She doubted it was one of the adults, but also had a hard time picturing any of the other kids crying, leaving her calculating the probability a random upset tourist had gotten stranded there. Almost impossible, she figured, but the sound was most definitely someone crying.

"Go away," Erica said before Zoe and Svetlana even managed to confirm the crier was her. "It's just allergies." Erica was sitting on a flat rock nestled next to a stand of fir trees. She was dressed mostly in green so as to blend in with the trees, her old tan hiking boots caked in mud.

"But you aren't allergic to anything," Zoe said.

"Zoe, you only learned I had a sister a few months ago. A pollen allergy is much easier to hide than a sister."

"You never cry. What's going on?" Zoe asked. "Are you ok?"

"I told you. I am fine."

Svetlana seemed about ready to leave, but Zoe figured she needed to stay. She had never seen Erica this upset before.

"No you're not," Zoe insisted.

"If I weren't fine, it wouldn't be like you could do anything about it anyway," Erica said.

"Is it about your grandfather?" Svetlana asked, thinking that that was the most obvious thing.

Erica just looked up at Svetlana from her position on the rock, not saying anything.

That was enough confirmation for Zoe to keep going. "Did he do something?"

"You know what he did on that mission," Erica said.

Zoe would have been plenty upset about that if she were Erica, but she wouldn't have normally expected Erica to get that upset about something like that. "Is that it?"

"What, do you want me to tell how he and mom totally blew up at each other and then Dad just left the cabin to go try to call Grandma to get them to calm down and Trixie somehow found out about all this so she's all upset and everyone is mad at each other and it's all a huge mess, especially since Mom said she's leaving."

Svetlana looked at Erica knowingly, but Zoe just asked, "Where's she going?"

Erica shrugged. "She didn't say. But she definitely went somewhere."

"Like away somewhere or just in the woods?" Zoe asked.

"What do you think?" Erica asked.

"Has she done this before?" Svetlana asked.

"Not in a long time," Erica said. "Not since I was really little."

"I'm sorry," Zoe said. "I'm sure she'll be right back. This isn't like her."

Erica stared down at the rocks and dirt, her hand reaching into the pocket with her phone in it, as if expecting it to ring at any moment now. It didn't.

"My mom left a long time ago," Svetlana said finally. "My dad was just too intense, I guess. He's just like my grandpa."

"Was your mom a spy?" Zoe asked Svetlana, trying to keep the conversation going in an attempt to get more out of Erica. Zoe already knew the answer, but she didn't know what else to ask.

"No," Svetlana said. "She was a civilian. She supported my dads work in a patriotic sense, but she hated what it did to him. I don't remember her much, though. She doesn't come visit ever. She has a new family now. I don't even know if her new kids know I exist."

"Your mom went off and had more kids?" Erica asked, for some reason sounding vaguely worried.

"Yes," Svetlana said, then quickly added, "Not that I think that would happen with your mom."

"Maybe she's just going to Utah," Zoe suggested.

When Erica gave her a doubtful look, Zoe added, "To be with your sister, you know."

"I know why she would be in Utah," Erica said. "That did not need clarification."

"Then why did you look at me like I was crazy?" Zoe asked.

"Because if she went to Utah she would have taken me with her."

Svetlana looked to Zoe doubtfully. "Maybe she's going to Europe," Svetlana said. "She is British, right?"

"Yeah," Erica said. "But she's spent so much time over there already. You would think that she'd be bored of it by now."

"So she's headed to the UK," Zoe said.

"Probably," Erica said. "But, you know, it's not as if she was my only real parent growing up even though she wasn't always there. It's not as if being stuck with just Dad and Grandpa while they're mad at each other isn't one of the worst forms of torture in the world."

"I'm sorry," Zoe said. "I don't really know what to do to help."

"Aside from murdering a couple of my relatives, there's nothing you can do," Erica said. "So you might as well just go and leave me alone."

Zoe and Svetlana didn't leave.

"Go!" Erica said. "That's what I'm telling you."

"Oh," Zoe said. "Ok, I guess."

"Don't go just quite yet," a voice said from behind a group of bushes. Catherine.