The Wolf and His Wildflower

Violet Hill, Oregon Briar's POV “Trial by Fire: A Violet Hill Origin Story.” I hated the title—it was misleading. Like the town was a down-on-its-luck main character from a coming-of-age romance novel that may or may not have a happy ending. Normal Rockwell would have a field day with Violet Hill, creating allegories in his paintings to depict the gothic veneer of small town charm the place seemed to project to all its residents and all the tourists that visit through. Nothing ever seemed to go wrong here so why did the town need a story about itself? It wasn’t somewhere you go to hike, you don’t visit for the subpar cherry pie, and there wasn’t anything interesting about the architecture that looked like it came from the cookie cutter used in every other small town in the country. My deadline for the school paper’s article was rapidly approaching, much to my chagrin. And all I had to show for it was a grainy black-and-white photograph of a burning house engulfed in large flames and a mediocre title I might have used ChatGPT to create. My path towards senior editor in chief for the Violet Hill Gazette was looking like it was getting farther and farther away. And filled with hurdles. I couldn’t fathom why Mr. Amado thought it would be a good idea to dump this on me. When I outlined all the reasons why I shouldn’t do this—namely because Noah Lark did it every year—Mr. Amado was unmoved. The iceberg that hit the Titanic would have been more likely to melt. “If you’re going to be a professional journalist one day, Miss Grant, you need to be able to handle any story that you’re given.” I was stuck with this story; Noah was given the story about the school mascot. Neither of us were pleased with the assignments. "What am I going to do?” I was the wrong person for this job. Unlike Noah, I didn’t grow up in Violet Hill, Oregon. My interactions with the small expanse of green land that sat near the border of Washington were limited to the three weeks of summer vacation I would spend each year, visiting my grandmother. Even then, I spent my time in either her flower shop or in her kitchen, baking cookies and cupcakes. My knowledge of the town’s history consisted of one fact: Violet Hill was founded in 1898 by Vincent West. And a vast majority of the man’s descendants died seven years ago. I didn’t remember much of the Wests—they mostly kept to themselves. Sometimes Mrs. West would come into my grandmother’s shop to buy tree saplings to plant around her house, her children trailing behind her with graceful feet and polite deference to their mother. I’d look over the glass counter, peering curiously at the pair of siblings. The daughter was a lot older than me, but she was like a little girl, always wanting to play dress up with me or braid my long blonde hair. The boy, on the other hand, was quiet and observant, watching over us protectively with those grayish-green eyes of his that seemed to know everything. When I was ten, the girl—Penny—told me that her brother said that I had pretty eyes. His face turned bright red as he growled his sister’s name, who just shrugged, not understanding what she did wrong. I was thrilled that the beautiful older boy thought I was pretty. When my mother came to pick me up and bring me back to Portland, that was all I seemed to be able to talk about. That a boy thought I had pretty eyes. I couldn’t stop gushing all about him, completely googly-eyed over…Kalen! That was his name, Kalen West. My mother happily talked with me about him, saying that she remembered Kalen’s father from school and he, too, had those steely green eyes that his son had. My father hadn’t been too thrilled by my discovery of boys, but patiently bit his lip and let me go on and on. Suddenly, I wanted make-up and shorter skirts and to learn how to curl my hair with my mother’s fancy curling iron. I told all my friends that I was the only girl in sixth grade that had a boy friend in high school. This was short lived because a few weeks later, my grandmother called us to tell us that the West family died in a mysterious fire. There were only three survivors—Penny, Kalen, and an uncle. They moved away somewhere far and no one heard from them since. Every now and then, I would get a nightmare about the fire and those steely green eyes. Soon though, I had my own family problems. It was around this time, my parents started fighting. It was strange—I’d never seen them fight before. They were that lucky, one in a million couple that were still as in love with each other after fifteen years of marriage as they had been when they first fell in love. But their constant fighting turned into my father traveling more and more for work and then Mom just had enough. I was twelve when my mother packed up all our things, accepted a general surgeon position in the local hospital, and installed us in Violet Hill. Dad hadn’t put up much of a fight, saying that Mom knew what was best for us. I didn’t like his answer so I pilfered his prized vinyl player and six of his favorite records. He didn’t seem to mind it though because he sent me a new record each week. Currently, the vinyl was on. Marvin Gaye’s motivational Ain’t No Mountain High Enough was playing in the background, in hopes of keeping my spirits up. The music was also a good way to fill the silence of the empty house. Since Mom was the only surgeon in the county, she was constantly at the hospital. I didn’t mind the silence that much. Meanwhile, I was still stuck on the title of my article. I was guzzling down another bottle of pink lemonade. This was my fourth? I stopped counting when I ran out of inviting hooks for my nonexistent article. Lois Lane, I decided, I am not. Thankfully, I was interrupted by my best friend breezing through my front door like she owned the house. I watched her bronze hair bounce over her shoulders as she fluttered down on the chaise lounge in front of the coffee table in the living room where the photograph and my laptop opened to a blank google document were resting. Belatedly, I wondered how she got in the house. Then I remembered that I sometimes forgot to lock the front door. Lennie skimmed over my work, or rather, the lack of. "Oh, good. You’re still on square one!” She said that like it was a good thing. “I’m not on square one,” I crossed my arms and pointed out, “I have a title.” It wasn’t a very good title, which Lennie took no time pointing out. Lennie Shaw was the sheriff’s daughter. She was a dangerous combination of well-informed and blunt—definitely not someone with a future career in politics. The first time I met her was in the hospital waiting room. Mom had brought me to work with her since my grandmother was out of town and Lennie was having brunch with her dad at the local diner when he was called in to the hospital because of a bar brawl. I was sitting in one of the uncomfortable blue chairs in the spartan room, reading my worn copy of Twilight for the umpteenth time when a girl with copper-colored pig tails came up to me and stuck out her hand, “I’m Lennie Shaw. Lennie’s short for Lenina but I hate that name and will throw something at your head if you call me that. My dad’s the sheriff—we had to take our pancakes to go because he had to arrest two idiots who thought it would be really smart to get drunk and into a fight before noon. I plan to leave this town the first chance I get.” A little intimidated by her, I looked up from my book and said, “I’m Briar. I just moved here from Portland.” "Huh,” She gave a confused look, clearly not understanding why I’d leave the bustling city for Violet Hill. Before I could tell her that my parents got divorced, she proclaimed, “Well, you and I? We’re meant for bigger things than this town.” We’d just met, but she’d already decided that the two of us would be best friends and we’d get out of dodge the moment we graduated. We’d been joined at the hips since. I shook off the quick walk down memory lane. “Are you here just to make me miserable, ‘cause I’m pretty good at doing that all on my own, you know.” “Ye of little faith,” Lennie gasped. I gave her a look and she relented with a grin. “Okay, okay. I’ve come bearing a gift.” She pulled out a small rectangular box from her bag. Upon further inspection—and a familiar static sound—I realized that it was a police radio. She must’ve swiped one from the station. “I didn’t steal it. Dad gave it to me so I didn’t worry about him coming home late.” She read my mind. “And thank God he did, because he got called in earlier tonight and I was just fiddling with the knobs to see if it was anything interesting and listen—“ Lennie adjusted the knob and like a moth to the flame, I sat beside her, avidly waiting for whatever mystery she was bringing to me. Hopefully it was something about— “HQ, this is Sheriff Shaw. Deputy Oritzio and I are right outside the old West House.” More static, but now, I was officially intrigued. I grabbed the radio out of her hand, fiddling with the radio’s knob until the static gave way to voices again. “I don’t understand. Is there someone on the property or not, Dispatcher Lowell?” Dispatcher Lowell replied with the affirmative. “Maybe it’s delinquents trying to graffiti the ruins?” Sheriff Shaw wasn’t pleased with this hypothesis. “That is unacceptable. This is a historic building in our town.” Then he added, “Oh, I think I see someone…” The radio cut out. I looked at Lennie, who looked like she couldn’t care less. “Vandalizing Violet Hill’s oldest house? Now that’s a story worth telling.” The only question was how I’d get the story. I couldn’t exactly say that my source was a police radio I shouldn’t even have. Maybe I could sweet talk the dispatcher for some information after school tomorrow… "Well, what’re you waiting for? Go!” “Are you insane?!” She had to be. “If I get caught, your father will throw me in jail.” Sheriff Shaw wasn’t a forgiving man. He was as by-the-book as you can get—the other’s in the department called him The Textbook behind his back. Then, Mom would be called and I would be doubly screwed. "Then you can kiss the position of senior editor goodbye.” Her eyes sparkled mischeviously, belleying the innocent expression she schooled her features to be. Her wide mouth was fighting off a smug smirk. If I didn’t love her so much… "You better have bail money.”