The Witching Wind, page 13
Eli shrugs. “Just to clarify—I didn’t lose a thing.”
“I lost my cell phone,” Ernie says between sips of chocolate milk. “But I don’t mind, honestly. It was an excuse to get a new one . . .”
“And now we’re all here, all in the same club? Whoa. That gives me chills!” The top of my scalp feels tingly, but not with sweat this time. Just with the wild mystery of it all.
Eli reaches for the paper. “Okay, but you all need to realize something—these coordinates could also lead nowhere.”
“Or they could lead to a cave on Mount LeConte,” I offer.
“Wait.” Ernie spins slowly in his seat to look at Eli. “You all are talking about Mount LeConte? That’s where the True sisters went after they got run out of town.”
“The who?” Ameerah asks.
“The True sisters!” Ernie says. “My mom wrote a novel about them! The legend is mostly about . . . her. She’s the one who enchanted the wind. But there were two of them who lived on the bluffs years ago! Addie and—”
Eli shakes his head. “Don’t say it, dude.”
“The other one,” Ernie finishes.
And before I can help myself, I add, “Hannah? You mean Hannah True?”
Eli groans. “You shouldn’t have said it, Roxie.”
Someone screams in the back of the cafeteria.
Ameerah launches up out of her seat like a superhero. “Is there an emergency? Is someone choking? I’m a Girl Scout! I know the Heimlich!”
“It’s the Witching Wind,” says Eli, who is so focused on the big glass window that he forgets to stop squeezing the ketchup bottle in his hands.
A butterfly clings to the glass of the big window, flaring it’s wings open then closed. Like a signal. Like a warning.
We all watch as it flutters away.
Then the sky screams.
The wind flows down from the mountain, roaring, hurling against the glass like a battering ram. The window cracks. More people are yelling. And running.
Kids scramble under the tables. Eli throws his wheelchair in reverse, says, “Yeehaw, see y’all later!” and zooms backward in a perfectly straight, speedy line down the hall, toward the open door of the library.
“Please remain calm, Camelot Knights!” says Principal Stone over the intercom. “Stay calm, and don’t worry. It’s windy season here in Silas County, but you are safe. The wind can’t hurt you.”
A few people laugh nervously.
Then we hear the thumps.
Against the roof.
Against the outside walls.
Against the cafeteria window.
THUMP. THUMP. THUMP. Like some invisible soul is banging its fist. Trying to get inside.
Principal Stone is back over the intercom, “Students, please calmly and quietly go back to your classrooms at this time. You may leave your lunch trays on the table.”
Of course, this results in a mega stampede. Kids swarm out of the room nearly toppling over one another. Ameerah, Mars, Ernie, and I all circle around Grayson so nobody topples her. But once we’re nearly out of the cafeteria, I look back.
All my life, I’ve heard you should never look back when you run from the wind.
But for the first time, I do.
I move toward the window.
Thump. Thump. Thump.
How can an invisible thing make so much noise? Cause so much havoc?
“Roxie?” Ameerah yells from the back of the cafeteria. “Don’t get too close to the window, okay?”
I stop cold because the window turns foggy. The wind billows, swirling back and forth like breath against the glass.
Then I see words, as if an invisible someone is writing them on the glass with their fingertips.
F-I-N-
“Roxie!” Ameerah’s grabbing my arm, pulling me toward the classrooms. But I plant my feet.
YOU CAN FIND ME, ROXIE DARLING.
I knew it. I was right! She’s in the wind! I step closer to the window—trembly hands, steady heart. If my granny believes I can find her, then I’ll do it.
“I can and I will,” I whisper.
But then I decide I’m done whispering. And something comes over me—it’s not the Dreads, and it’s not a whisper, it’s just the stubborn cry of my own broken heart. I scream the words loud enough for the wind to hear me.
“I CAN AND I WILL!”
There’s a loud pop. Another scream. The power goes out. The room goes dark.
9:00 p.m. Hey, Beanie! It’s me. Please push 1 if you’ve been captured by the wind. Please press 2 if you’ve run away from home. For customer service, press 3.
9:15 p.m. I’m joking, Beano. But seriously. Maybe let me know where you are? And why you aren’t here? I know it’s probably nothing to worry about but I can’t help it.
9:16 p.m. I have so much to tell you. I got thrown into the “newcomer” club at school with a few other kids. We’ve decided to call it Club Yeehaw. Honestly, I thought it would be terrible. But the kids in it are kind of cool. Ameerah and Mars are both new in town, newer than me. Which is why they ended up there. Same as me. Does it count as new if you’ve lived somewhere for a year? I think so. This place never felt like home.
9:17 p.m. You’re my home. Everything else is just a dot on a map.
9:20 p.m. There’s this other girl, though, Roxie Darling. She’s from here. Grew up here. Her granny’s kinda famous. I listened to her stuff on YouTube and it’s cool! Reminds me of Emmylou Harris a little. You’d dig it. Her name is Ruthie Diamond Darling.
9:22 p.m. So anyway, Roxie’s granny leaves town for a concert. At least that’s what they think. But, plot twist! The cops found her car still running on some backwoods road. Like she’d just jumped out of it and ran off. Or ran away from something.
9:23 p.m. So now Roxie is scared poopless and I get it—I would be, too.
9:25 p.m. I am a little bit, too. Honestly. I don’t know why you aren’t calling me or texting me. I don’t know why we haven’t left for NYC yet.
9:26 p.m. I told Club Yeehaw our secret. I kinda let it slip that we speak Corvus. But then I thought, hey, maybe the birds can help us find the folk singer.
9:27 p.m. It gives me something to do until you get here.
9:30 p.m. There’s more. Once upon a time, two sisters lived on the bluffs. Last name True. They have something to do with the wind and maybe still do. Nobody is sure. Ernie is going to get the deets. His mom writes horror novels. I guess that makes her an expert, IDK.
9:31 p.m. Unrelated: The Cottons are religious but not in a bad way. At night, they pray God shows them how to shine a light into somebody’s dark. That’s kind of cool, right?
Grayson sighs. If Beanie is out there—if she wants to be found—the crows will find her.
“Lights out soon, Grayson!” Mr. Cotton yells from the living room. “I put a new book in there if you want to read before bed!”
Before she climbs under the covers, Grayson picks up her phone once more:
9:35 p.m. I love you, Beanie. If the wind took you, too, hold tight. I’m not afraid of storms.
On Wednesday morning at club, Mr. Sanchez gives us an assignment: Meet outside of school sometime soon. He tells us to get out in the community! Stretch our wings of friendship beyond the walls of Camelot! (He seriously used the phrase wings of friendship, but it sounds really sweet when he says it.)
This is perfect timing since we need to devise a plan for finding our pilfered stuff and missing people. During lunch, we text our parents, and they’re all okay with a get-together. They’re elated, actually. Ameerah and Mars both volunteer their homes as a meeting spot. Ernie, Grayson, and me do not.
Ernie is absent. So he can’t.
Grayson doesn’t say why her house isn’t an option. And it occurs to me, for the first time, that she never talks about her family besides Beanie.
I don’t volunteer my home, either, but it has nothing to do with my house being a trailer, just FYI. My dad’s exhausted from so much driving. Plus, he’s worried about Granny 24/7. Mom is worn out from work and night school and worrying about Dad. If I were them, I wouldn’t want a bunch of kids hanging out in the living room amidst all the stress. (Even though I know they would say yes if I asked them. They’d probably love it if I brought friends over.)
In the end, we decide a neutral spot might be better for our first real-world hangout.
“We could meet at my aunt’s record shop,” I tell them as Grayson reaches across the table to eat my extra fries. “She’ll give us free Dread Pies.”
“Wait.” Mars looks up from his peanut-free, homemade lunch. (Mars has a severe peanut allergy. We all scan our trays before we sit down to make sure we have zero traces.) “Your aunt owns Weezie’s?”
I feel a burst of pride. “My aunt is Weezie! She also gives every single person who wants one a free copy of Janis Joplin’s Pearl album. It’s her personal favorite.”
I don’t know if it’s the pies or the free vinyl, but they’re all in.
“As long as you’re sure your aunt won’t mind,” Ameerah says. “I know it’s got to be hard on your family. Not hearing from your granny yet. Still no news?”
I shake my head.
“Don’t worry, Roxie,” Grayson says. “The crows won’t let us down.”
I try to give Grayson a confident smile. I’ve been thinking a lot about what Sheriff Garrett said, about how there’s magic in the mountains. To some degree, I believe it, right? If I believe my granny got snatched in the wind—if I believe I’m hearing voices in the wind—then there’s a lot about the world I can’t understand. But for some reason, talking to crows seems way less plausible than finding a witch in a wind cave.
“Did you bring what I asked for?” Grayson asks.
“Oh, yeah.” I push my tray away and fish through my backpack. Then I give Grayson one of Granny’s guitar picks. So far, Grayson believes the crows have confirmed Granny is lost in the wind. Now, she’s trying to figure out how to get Gran’s whereabouts.
“So crows remember where they hide stuff,” Grayson explains. “And I’m thinking, maybe, if we give the crows something that belonged to Granny Ruth, that might help them remember where they’ve seen her. Then once we get up there—close to where she’s at—we’ll give them something else. And they’ll lead us right to her.”
This plan seems really far-fetched to me. But I’m willing to try anything. I swallow down the ever-present lump in my throat. That’s where the sadness seems to sit most days.
“Meet this afternoon?” I say. “We’ll just hang out at Weezie’s and make a plan?”
Everybody’s into it. Club Yeehaw has scheduled its first meeting out in the real world. And even though I’m worried, and self-conscious, and still mostly hate Camelot Middle School . . . it’s really nice having something to look forward to.
I’m always excited to learn what other people first notice when they walk into Aunt Weezie’s record shop. For me, it’s the music piping through the speakers. I never know what song will be playing, and I can hardly wait to hear what it is today. At 3:45, I climb off the bus in downtown Sunny Side and skitter across the pavilion to the bright pink doors of her shop. Ameerah is waiting out front with everybody else, minus Ernie, who is still sick. I still can’t believe I have people to hang out with after school! I can’t wait to tell Granny about the Yeehaws—
My heart squeezes at the thought of Granny. I miss sitting with her on the dock. I miss playing guitars together, and singing old folk songs, and just being us.
“All right,” I say, shaking that sad memory out of my mind. “We got work to do. Let’s head inside.”
The chorus of the song “Mr. Tambourine Man” hits our ears the same time the smell of baked apples and cinnamon hits our noses.
That’s what Ameerah notices, first—the smells. “This makes me miss my grandmother,” she says, pressing her hand against her heart. “Isn’t it funny how smells carry memories?”
Mars takes in the dark walls and tables and rows of multicolored record sleeves. He explains you could take a photo from any angle in Weezie’s shop and it would be cool. I really like Mars’s eye for art, how he looks at the world like he’s constantly taking pictures of it in his mind.
Grayson heads straight to a table in the back—all business, as always.
“I hereby call this first outside meeting of Club Yeehaw to order,” she says as we settle around the circular table.
“Yeehaw!” says Eli.
“First, the coordinates.” Grayson points to Eli with her pencil. “What’d you find?”
“Coordinates definitely point to somewhere on Mount LeConte,” Eli says.
Even though I hoped this would be true, the confirmation nearly makes me squeal.
“Good job putting that together, Roxie,” Eli continues. “But . . . it doesn’t look like a cave. Not on online maps. Don’t lose heart, though! There’s so many caves up there. So even if it doesn’t ping right at the cave opening, maybe it’s close.”
“Oh, it has to!” I say. “That has to be where she was going. To find the wind!”
“Definitely possible,” Grayson says as she makes a note. “So, as we theorized, we need to get to Mount LeConte. But like most mountains in the world, I am assuming . . . this one’s not accessible. I can’t hike, obviously. But y’all could look around on Mount LeConte and I can stay on the phone and help guide you.”
“Sorry to be a downer,” Mars says. “But . . . if those coordinates don’t ping a specific cave . . . how do we find it? And caves up there are deep, y’all. And we’re . . . us. What if we can’t even get in it?”
“I told you,” says Grayson, a hint of frustration in her voice. “As I’ve explained many, many times now: We talk to the crows.”
“How did you realize you could even do that?” I ask. “Did you just wake up one day and you’re like, ‘Oh, wow, I can talk to birds’?”
“No, not exactly. So the one thing I remember about my mom—and it’s a weird thing—is that she used to leave presents for crows. And when you leave presents for crows, they tend to bring stuff back to you. People have never liked me much. But crows like me. I really connect with moody ravens. Who knew? But then I realized there was more to it.”
“Wait,” I say gently. “I thought your mom was with you that day at school?”
Grayson’s face pales a little. “Actually, no. My mom’s not, ya know, part of my life. It’s fine. Nobody tell me you’re sorry, I’m fine. So no, that wasn’t my mom at school. Anyway—”
Grayson clears her throat, clearly not wanting to discuss this subject any further. And I decide to let it go until she does. She leans over and pulls a plastic bag out of the pack on the front of her walker. Inside are tiny trinkets she could have found in any hallway in Camelot or on any sidewalk in Sunny Side. There’s a button, a bouncy ball, a fake emerald with a blob of dried glue on the back, and a piece of red thread.
“All this? It’s junk to us,” she says. “But not to crows. They love trinkets! And I love that about them. So I still give them stuff like this. They’ll cherish the trash. And honestly . . . I think they can help us locate people in a similar way. Like with the guitar pick. I thought we could experiment with something of Cheeseburger’s first. Just to see if I’m on the right track.”
“Oh.” Mars’s whole posture changes. It’s wild, how fast hope can relax a person.
“Can crows read? Put my cat’s name on a piece of paper and see if they can find her that way?”
“So I’ve tried that before and I’m just not sure it works. Not yet, anyway. I think we need something tangible that belonged to your cat. Did Cheeseburger have a collar? A toy?”
“A squeaky toy. She loved it. Maybe we could meet at my house tomorrow? And try?”
“Perfect!” Grayson says.
“I have something we could try now,” I say suddenly.
I’m not sure why this memory drifts through my mind—Loretta, on the night I rode to Granny’s house with Colette. She was looking for something. It was a metal detector in her hand, Colette said. And I knew even then she was most likely looking for her mom’s haunted ring, their family’s only spectral possession. “I know someone who lost a ring. She’s looked everywhere for it but no luck. I have something that belonged to her. If we give it to the crow . . .”
“We can try,” Grayson says. “I put the trinket down. I leave a tribute as thanks. Then I’ll whisper what I hope for on the wind. The crows hear it. And magic will commence. Maybe.”
I slide the friendship bracelet off my arm and head for the door. “Just lay this on the sidewalk? And tell the wind what I want to find?”
I hear the clunk of Grayson’s walker behind me. “Hold up, Roxie. I’m the one who speaks Corvus. But yes, that’s what we’ll try.”
“When will we know if it works?” Mars asks, zooming around in front of us to open the door.
“It might take a day or two. But it’ll work,” Grayson assures him. “The crows won’t let us down.”
I settle the friendship bracelet on a giant potted rosemary plant outside Weezie’s. Grayson places the fake emerald beside it.
“Tell the crows we need help finding a haunted ring that belonged to Loretta Lynn Jeffers.”
Grayson whispers something to the wind like she’s sharing a secret with a friend. “That’s it,” she says.
“I was . . . expecting a bit more,” Mars admits as we head back inside.
“They’re crows, not magicians!” Grayson says. “Give them time, okay?”
We’re just settling back in the booth when Aunt Weezie brings out five milkshakes, on the house. (My family is seriously excited I have friends my own age.)
“That’s so nice of you, Ms. Weezie!” Ameerah says. “Thank you so much!”
“Of course!” Aunt Weezie squeezes my shoulder. “I’m making a fresh batch of Dread Pies for y’all, too. I’m just tickled Roxie brought some friends over!”
