Hidden Fox

Twenty-Six

It was one of those moments where someone says something you thought moments ago could never be an option, but that dream became true in a single sentence. I was more shocked that he had been the one to suggest it more than anything. He just got me back, and now he was considering adding to our family in a single day! It was almost too much to wish for.

"Please tell me you're not kidding," I breathed, afraid he was going to take it back at any moment.

He grinned. "I'm serious, April. From the second you flung yourself to her hospital bed last night after I revealed she was here and safe in the infirmary, I starting thinking a little. I asked Isadora-"

"Hold up." I stopped him. "Please tell me who Isadora is."

He looked baffled. "The only other girl that's in the infirmary right now. . ."

"Iris?"

"Iris?" He repeated, and now we were just confusing each other.

Then I thought about it. They didn't call me April there, they called me Aralia, a plant name. Iris was a plant. Kalmia was a plant; Tulip, Maple, Ivy, Sage, all of them. And that meant all of them also had their birth names out there somewhere for them to remember sometime. Kallie hadn't mentioned anything, but neither had Iris-er-Isadora. I wondered if the others had remembered their names and that's how they were able to be returned to their packs.

"What were the other girls names that you found?"

He was definitely confused why I was veering from the adoption topic, but I was too curious to let this go right away. "Um, there was a Tiffany. She was tiny like Kallie with skin as dark as the night."

Tulip.

"And then I met a Mya. She was older than Tiffany and Kallie, but not by much."

"What did she look like?"

"Um," he was definitely lost, but that was okay. "She was petite, but I guess that's everyone, huh? She had long blonde hair, and very bright eyes. Green, I think. But they could've been blue."

"Maple." I whispered.

"What?"

"Never mind. Anyone else?"

He thought for a moment, "Samantha, I think. Also blonde, but a little older and her eyes were dark." Sage. "And then there was another African-American girl with dark hair curlier than Kallie's- " Ivy "I think her name was Isabelle."

I tallied the names in my head. One more missing: Rue. "Was that it?"

"Those are the only ones I met or saw or heard about," he said. "What was that all about?"

I waved him off, "never mind. Just something on my mind."

His hands sought mine out, "please tell me what's bothering you. I don't like when you shut me out."

"I know, I'm sorry. But there's a lot that you don't know about what we went through there. You saw some of it," he flinched at the memory of my horrors displayed across my body, "but there's more. And part of it was that they tried to brainwash us, and made us forget." I gave up my hold on the door and sank into him, turning my head on his shoulder so I was talking to his neck. "There were some days I couldn't even remember your name. Some I couldn't remember mine. Our captors called me Aralia."

"Aralia? Isn't that a plant?"

"Yes. And so is Kalmia."

"You mean. . ."

I nodded, my nose brushing the flesh of his neck. He went rigid, and I could tell he was fighting it, so I pulled back, muttering an apology. "Isadora I knew as Iris, Tiffany as Tulip, Isabelle as Ivy and so on. That's why I was confused."