Page 28 of The Girl Who Cried Bigfoot

“About time you found them,” she says. “I suppose you’ve read them?”

“You knew?” I ask. The question comes out sharper than I intended. “You knew there was someone out there?”

Marge sighs, a long, weary sound that rattles in her chest. “Of course I knew. Walt knows too. I mentioned him to you, remember? When the hotline was starting to bring more people?”

I lean against the counter, the cold stainless steel biting through my shirt. “Why didn’t you tell me about the arrangement, Marge? Why didn’t you tell me the hoax I’ve been selling was real and out there, probably arguing with a squirrel or obsessing over a beehive?”

Marge resumes her kneading. “I couldn’t. It wasn’t for me or Walt to tell you. Your father should have told you. But you went off to college, and you showed no desire to ever come back and run this place.”

At my horrified look, she clucks her tongue. “Now, I’m not meaning that as a reprimand. We knew you had big dreams. You always have. And that’s all beside the point. I’m certain your father intended to tell you someday far in the future, because it’s an arrangement between the Cassidys and Rowan, but then the accident happened, and well…” She blinks rapidly, then shakes her head. “Walt and I, we’ve been wondering when you’d go digging through all the records and find out. You see, we aren’t Cassidys, so we couldn’t come right out and tell you about it. The blood-debt made it so only a Cassidy could pass on the information. It’s the way of the forest.”

All this is only a slight shock, since I’ve known about the arrangement for weeks now. I look for something to say, but all that comes to mind is, “My great-great-grandmother named him after a tree just to be difficult.”

Marge chuckles, a dry, rasping sound. “Sounds like a Cassidy. You lot always did prefer a good argument to a straight answer. Does he know? That you found this?”

“Not yet,” I say. I think about Rowan’s face—the ancient, weathered patience of it. I think about how he carries himself like a part of the landscape, something that has always been and always will be. “I think I need to show him. He’s been ‘Rowan’ for four generations, and I don’t think anyone ever told him why.”

“Be careful,” Marge says, her voice dropping an octave. “Men like that... they don’t like being pinned to a page. They like being the ones who do the watching, not the ones being watched. Your mother knew that. She respected the distance. You make sure you do the same.”

I nod, picking up the journals. My throat feels tight, a sudden, sharp ache that has nothing to do with the dust. I think about my mom, about the stories she told me, and how she was trying to hand me a map I wasn’t ready to read. I walk out of the kitchen before Marge can see my eyes start to prickle. I have a long hike ahead of me, and I’m wearing my father’s boots, and for the first time since I’ve returned to the lodge, they don’t feel like they’re trying to trip me.

The forest is damp, the air smelling of wet earth and the slow decay of autumn. I find Rowan near the old hive site. He’s standing perfectly still, tall and imposing against the silver trunks of the birch trees. He doesn’t turn when I approach. He knows it’s me. He knows the sound of my stride, the way I catch my breath when the incline gets too steep. I stop ten feet away, holding the journal that details his naming like a peace offering.

“I found the records.” My voice sounds thin in the vast, green cathedral of the woods. “The ones Florence kept.”

Rowan turns slowly. He looks at the book in my hand, his expression unreadable, a stone face carved by wind and water. He doesn’t reach for it. He just waits, his silence a heavy weight I have to push against.

“She wrote about you,” I continue, stepping closer. “About the arrangement. The deer in the smokehouse. The wolves. She called you the ‘tall fellow.’ And she explained the name.”

I open the journal to the exact entry. My art history training kicks in, a reflex I didn’t know was still sharp. I point to the ink, explaining the oxidation of the iron, the way the nib of the pen flared on the downstrokes. I show him the watermark on the paper, a small, embossed crown that dates the batch to a mill in Massachusetts that closed before the First World War.

“It’s authentic, Rowan,” I say, my thumb hovering over the script. “This isn’t a story. It’s a record. She named you after the rowan trees at the gate because they’re supposed to ward off spirits. She thought it was hilarious. She called you a ‘spirit’ and then tied you to the lodge with a name meant to keep you away.”

Rowan finally reaches out. His hand is massive, his fingers brushing against mine as he takes the journal. The contact is electric, a jolt of heat that makes my breath hitch. He stares at the page, his eyes moving over the loops and curls of Florence’s handwriting. He doesn’t speak for a long time. The only sound is the rustle of the wind in the canopy and the distant, rhythmic hum of the bees.

“Rowan,” he says finally, the word low and gravelly. “I have carried it for a century. I thought it was a gift. A sign of respect from the woman who wouldn’t stop shouting at the trees.”

“It was,” I say, stepping into his space. That woodsmoke and cold honey scent of him wraps around me. “In her own way. She was a Cassidy. We don’t do sincerity very well. We do spite and survival. She gave you a name because she wanted you to belong to the place, even if she had to lie to the universe to make it happen.”

Rowan looks up from the book, his gaze locking onto mine. There’s something in his eyes I haven’t seen before, something vulnerable, something human buried deep beneath the bark and the ancient duty. He looks unsettled, his jaw tightening. He closes the journal, the sound of the leather meeting like a soft thud in the quiet air.

“She was a difficult woman,” he says, a ghost of a smile touching the corner of his mouth. “She once threw a cast-iron skillet at a bear because it was sniffing her laundry. I liked her.”

“She liked you too,” I say. “Even if she expressed it by naming you after a botanical restraining order.”

The tension between us shifts, the air thick and charged with a heat that has nothing to do with the sun. We’re standing so close I can feel the warmth radiating off his chest. He doesn’t move away, doesn’t retreat into the trees. He stays, his presence a solid, grounding force that makes the records and the debt and the dying lodge feel like things I can actually manage.

“I am not a spirit,” he says, his voice a vibration I can feel in my own ribs. “And I am not a tree.”

“I know,” I whisper. I reach out, my fingers hovering just inches from his arm. “You’re just Rowan. And that’s enough.”

He looks at the journal again, then back at me. He doesn’t give the book back. He tucks it under his arm, a gesture of possession that feels like the start of something new, a bridge being built across a hundred years of secrets. The debt is still there. The bank is still calling. But as I stand there with the Guardian, the forest doesn’t feel like a mystery anymore. It feels like home.

He reaches out, his thumb grazing the line of my jaw. His skin is rough, calloused, smelling of earth and ancient things. I lean into the touch, my eyes closing as the heat of him spreads through me. It’s a small movement, a quiet admission of something we haven’t voiced yet, but it feels more permanent than any deed or insurance rider I could have found in the cellar.

“Thank you, Manager,” he says, his voice softer now, closer now, a breath whispering over my lips. “For the records.”

“Anytime, Spirit,” I say, and for the first time in a long time, the words don’t feel like a joke. They feel like the truth.