Read Kalahari for Free Online

for Avani but she smacked him when he got close, screeching at him not to look at her.
    “What was it?” I asked wearily.
    But before they could reply, I saw it for myself. A small warthog sped out of the tent, grunting and squealing and looking more frightened than the girls. It trotted around the fire and veered right, vanishing into the shadows.
    “Oh. My.
God.
” Miranda was trembling head to foot. “I
hate
Africa! I hate this desert!”
    “
Semi
desert, you mean,” said Avani, looking shaken but more composed. She slipped back into the tent, shooting a dark look at a grinning, dazed Joey.
    “Okay, move on,” I said, waving my hands at him. “Get out of here.”
    He ambled off, still grinning to himself, and I let Kase deal with his traumatized girlfriend. Sam walked me back to the fire, seeming reluctant to go to bed.
    “Is it always this exciting around here?”
    “Not hardly.” Then I considered. “Well. I guess it might be, if you’re not used to it.”
    “And you are?”
    I shrugged. “This is my life. I’ve woken up to chimpanzees staring me in the face, or to elephants ripping up my tent. When I was three months old, we spent a few months in the Congo, and one of the gorillas my parents were studying picked me up in the middle of the night and carried me off.”
    “No way. Really?”
    “It’s true.” Granted, it got only a few yards before my parents woke up and stopped it. I’d always loved to hear my mom tell that story, about the time the gorillas kidnapped me. I hadn’t thought of it once since she’d died. I felt a small, genuine smile on my lips and, surprised to find it there, I pressed my fingers to it.
    “So why are you here?” I asked him.
    “What do you mean?”
    “Why did you come on this trip?”
    He crossed his arms and frowned at the fire. “My brother—”
    “Adam?”
    “Yeah. He always wanted to come out here, you know. It was his big dream. He used to read
National Geographic
to me every night when I was little, tell me stories about Africa, India, Australia. He always promised me we’d travel all over the world.”
    I noted his use of the past tense, and my heart clenched. Sam’s eyes had gone distant, his tone flat—the same way mine did when I talked about my mom.
    “What happened to him?” I asked softly.
    “He did go overseas, but not to explore.” He sat down on one of the logs and leaned over to toss another stick into the flames. As he did, a chain slid out of his collar, and the metal tags on it flashed in the firelight. He caught them and dropped them inside his shirt with practiced ease. It was then that I realized I’d seen the star tattooed on the inside of his arm before: It was the star used in the U.S. Army logo. It all fell into place then. His brother had been a soldier.
    “Sam—”
    The radio on my hip suddenly crackled to life. Instantly I unclipped it and held it to my ear, my heart skipping a beat. Sam lifted his head, his eyes widening.
    “Dad?” I said into the radio. “Dad, I can’t hear you. Hello? Is that you?”
    Crackling white noise, then “
Sarah.
”
    “Yes! Dad, I’m here!” Dizzy with relief, I clenched the radio as if I could squeeze his voice out of it.
    “Sarah . . .” More fizzling and crackling.
    “Dad? Hello?”
    “. . . fifteen miles southwest of camp . . . are you there?”
    “I’m here! Dad?”
    It was nearly impossible to make out his words between blasts of static. “. . . ambushed us . . . trying to lose them . . . if I don’t make it back—”
    The relief I’d felt began to turn icy. “
Dad.
What’s going on? Hello!?”
    “. . . can’t reach anyone, bad reception . . . I’m sorry, sweetie. I am so sorry. I—”
    I’d turned up the volume all the way in order to hear him better, so the sudden round of pops that cut him off hit my ear with almost physical force.
    “Dad?” I turned up the volume, which only resulted in louder fizzling bangs.
Is that . . .