Scratch, page 8
“There’s my baby!” Carol exclaimed and reached out for Michaela. Mike shied away from her, and hid her face behind Holly’s head.
“What’s wrong?” Carol asked.
“Busy day for her,” Holly said. “She’s just tired.”
“How are you, then?” Carol hugged Holly and planted a perfunctory kiss on her cheek.
“Tired.”
“Hello, Mrs. Evans.” Adam still held the suitcases.
“Oh, please,” Carol said. “It looks like you’re here so stay, so call me Carol. You can put your bags in Holly’s room. I’ve made some coffee, and maybe the little one would like some ice cream?” Mike smiled and shook her head in the affirmative.
“But before that,” Carol said, and touched Mike on the tip of her nose, “I have a present for you. Would you like that?” Mike brushed a stray hair out of her now beaming face and nodded more vigorously. Carol took a package from under the couch and plopped down on its soft cushions. She tapped the spot next to her and Holly sat down with Michaela on her lap.
“Do you like to play dress-up?” Carol asked while handing the package to her granddaughter. Mike nodded and began to tear the wrapping paper. “I thought so,” Carol said. “All little girls do.”
Holly helped Mike lift the lid, and Adam saw both their faces light up. Holly lifted a small white dress out of the box and held it up. It was lacy, with a white faux-fur collar. Attached to the back, covered with silver glitter, was a pair of white plastic wings.
“I thought since my daughter spent all of her time painting angels, then her daughter should look like one,” Carol said. “Not that you didn’t already look like one. Do you like it?”
“Yeah,” Mike said, drawing the word out to match her awe.
“What do you say, Michaela?” Holly prompted.
“Thank you, Gran’ma,” Mike said dutifully.
“Does Gran’ma get a kiss?” Carol asked. Mike plunged from Holly’s lap to Carol and wrapped her arms around the older woman’s neck, and kissed her on the cheek.
“I wanna put it on!” Mike said while bouncing.
“We’re not going to get her out of this for days, you know,” Holly said.
Adam left the ladies and took the suitcases up the stairs to Holly’s old room. By the time he came back Mike was in her angel costume, and already had vanilla ice cream smeared across her face in a happy clown smile.
“You look beautiful, sweetie.” He brushed a hand across her head as he walked by. Adam poured a cup of coffee and sat down at the table. Carol was nervously playing with a disposable lighter. Holly stirred her coffee. Neither woman was talking.
“What’s up?” he asked.
“Nothing,” Carol said.
“She’s started trying to talk me out of going already,” Holly said.
“I just don’t think you’ll be happy,” Carol said. “You’ve never lived that far out in the boonies before.”
“We’ll be fine, Mother.”
“Why didn’t you like it, Carol?” Adam sipped his coffee, and winced as he realized it was instant.
“The people, mainly,” Carol said.
“There are strange people everywhere,” Adam said. “Could you be more specific?”
“I don’t know,” Carol said. “They’re a clannish bunch. Don’t treat outsiders very well.”
“You weren’t an outsider,” Adam said. “You were born there. Didn’t your parents live there all their lives?”
“Yeah,” Carol said. “Didn’t seem to matter when I was there. The whole community is run by that little church there at the end of town. Reverend Toland always seemed to control pretty much everybody, though I guess he’s dead and gone now. I suppose Raz is running the show now.”
“Raz?” Adam asked.
“Erasmus.” Carol rolled her eyes. “Old Reverend Toland’s son. Little younger than me. Always been a Toland at the head of that church. We never went when I was little. I think Mom used to go, but she had some kind of falling out with them after Daddy disappeared.”
“Disappeared?” Holly said. “I thought he was killed.”
“That’s what everyone came to believe,” Carol said. “I don’t remember him at all, and Mom didn’t talk much about it, even when I would ask. No one would. He went out one night and never came back. Never did find his body, but Mom was certain he had died and not just run off. Anyway, she broke with the church, and they never treated her right after that. Me neither. We were outsiders even if we had always been there. I couldn’t wait to get away.
“You wait and see,” she said. “They’ll treat you the same way. You seem to think that’s it’s gonna be some ideal, peaceful, everybody-loves-everybody, Mayberry kind of place, but it’s not. By fall you’ll be begging to come back, and that’s all I’m gonna say about it.” She stood and grabbed a pack of cigarettes from where they rested on the upturned belly of a blue plastic frog and went out onto the back porch.
“She makes me crazy,” Holly whispered. Adam shrugged.
“That’s what parents are for,” he said.
“Yours are all right.”
“Only because they never leave Chicago and we only see them about once a year. Trust me, they’re accomplished in the art of making me crazy.”
“I’m tired,” Holly said. “I think I’ll turn in. Ready for bed, sweetie?” she said to Mike, whose ice cream coated face turned down in a pout.
“Come on,” Adam said. “Let’s wash your face, then I’ll tell you and Buggly a story.” Mike brightened somewhat and she reached over to Adam. He picked her up and carried her to the bathroom.
Fifteen minutes later Michaela was lying in the bed her mother had grown up in, cuddled against Holly’s side. The room was small and covered with memorabilia of Holly’s childhood. Old stuffed animals sat on shelves. Framed report cards, drawings, and old posters were tacked to the walls. On the nightstand was a small picture of Holly clipped from the newspaper the year she was first runner up in the annual Miss Flood Day contest, a local tradition.
Adam sat on the bed next to them. Mike looked up at him expectantly.
“Okay,” he said. “Once upon a time, Mike and Buggly were in the woods.”
“And they were being chased,” Mike said. Her voice sounded scared. Adam raised his eyebrows to Holly.
“What was chasing them?” he asked.
“A wolf!” Michaela said. Holly stroked her hair. Mike continued, her voice getting faster as she spoke.
“And…” she said, “and then the wolf… the Big Bad Wolf, I think, he got closer and he grabbed Mike and ran away with her into the Deep Woods!” Her eyes grew large in the dark, and Holly could feel her shaking.
“Ssh,” Holly said, and hugged her tighter. “It’s all right.”
“And…” Michaela said, breathing fast, “and Mike cried ‘cause she didn’t want to go into the Deep Woods with the Big Bad Wolf, but he took her anyway. And Buggly… he chased after them, and he looked mean, ‘cause he didn’t want Mike to go with the wolf either. And they ran and ran and ran and Mike cried ‘cause she didn’t think Buggly would get there.
“But he did.” Her voice became calmer then, and she snuggled her mom. “He was just gonna catch the wolf and skin him, and the wolf got scared, ‘cause he knew Buggly was the biggest, bravest bear in the woods, so he put Mike down and ran away before Buggly could catch him, and Buggly found Mike and picked her up and took her home where she was safe.
“And they lived happily ever after,” Michaela concluded.
“They sure did.” Adam leaned forward and kissed Mike on the forehead, then planted one on Holly’s forehead as well. “You two sleep tight. I’ll see you in the morning.”
As he left the room and turned out the light he heard Michaela whisper.
“The Big Bad Wolf is still in the Deep Woods,” she said into the darkness.
CHAPTER TWELVE
Adam tried to stretch out on the too-short couch. One foot was over the armrest and the other dangled off the side and touched the floor. His neck was already beginning to cramp from the awkward position.
A light rain began not long after Carol made up the couch and said goodnight. Water pattered on the tin roof of the back porch and on the sidewalk, natures drum corps. There was a brief flash of light, then seconds later, far in the distance, gentle thunder.
Adam fidgeted. He never slept well the first night in a strange bed, and the discomfort of the couch didn’t help. The house whispered its own strange noises in the dark, the way all houses do, but they were unfamiliar to Adam, and distracting. Just as he decided he probably wasn’t going to get any sleep…
He stepped into the small dark entrance of the cave. He glanced back, but the bear was gone. He was alone in the forest. The cave walls were damp stone, shot through with tree roots. It smelled of vegetation, wet earth and must. His feet left prints in the red mud, and he realized he was naked, as he should be here.
As he walked forward the passage became narrower, and the light began to fade. Soon he had to crouch to get through, then to crawl on his hands and knees, and finally, to slither through on his belly. He was covered in cool mud, and bleeding lightly from numerous small scratches.
It was dark; darker than any dark he had ever experienced. He could feel the weight of the earth around him, embracing him, squeezing him through her womb.
“I’m lost,” he said into the shadows. “I don’t know where to go.”
Blue spirals glowed on the palm of each hand. They continued up his arm and through his body, pathways of energy, glowing more strongly in some places than in others. The bear had said that the spiral on his hands was his path, and once he remembered that he was able to move once more, forward, deeper within.
He crawled for days. Eventually he saw a light somewhere in front of him, but he crawled for years before it grew larger. He came to a wall that blocked his path. A small hole in its surface revealed a chamber on the other side. A warm red glow pulsed within, and heat wafted through the opening.
He forced himself through the hole, his mud slicked body sliding with ease into the chamber. He fell out onto a moss-covered floor.
The light was bright to his eyes, and he shielded them with his arm. He thought he saw a figure sitting next to the fire, slouched forward, large and flexible. He crawled forward and sat next to the fire and chanced another look. He saw Buggly there, a life-size toy, before the light made him close his eyes again.
“Eat,” said the toy, and placed something warm in Adam’s hands. Adam took another brief glimpse and saw that Buggly had been replaced by the large black bear from the forest. He was starving, so he bit into the food he had been given. It felt and tasted like raw flesh. Warm, coppery blood filled his mouth, but he was ravenous, and attacked the food like he had never eaten before. It filled him, nourished him, unlike anything he had ever consumed.
“What is it?” Adam asked around a mouthful of meat. He wiped blood off his chin.
“Bear flesh,” the bear said. “My flesh. Your flesh.”
Adam opened his eyes then, fully adjusted to the light. He looked across the fire and saw that the figure was not a bear, but a man, naked but for the hair of his body and a red leather thong tied around his neck. From the cord dangled ten bear claws. Adam saw the man was missing the little finger on his left hand. He was not an Indian, nor a white man, nor black, but a color that made Adam realize he was of all the tribes of men
“Where am I?” Adam asked.
“Within,” the dream man said. “Within the Earth. Within yourself.”
“Why am I here?”
“Why are you here?”
“This is where my path led me,” Adam said. “It’s where I need to be.”
“You went to the Deep Woods today,” the dream man said. “What did you learn there?”
“It’s filled with wolves.”
“Wolves are not bad,” the dream man said. “There are bears there, too.”
“It is filled with anger,” Adam said.
“Anger is not bad,” the dream man said, “as long as it does not make you Mad. Why were you angry?”
“My cub was threatened,” Adam said.
“And what gift did the anger give you?”
“The power to protect,” Adam said. “But that doesn’t have to come from anger, does it?”
“No,” said the dream man. “Anger is an energy, and there are many others. Anger kept within too long grows Mad, like an animal kept caged and hungry. It feeds on itself until there is nothing left but hatred.”
“But,” Adam held up the raw meat in his hand, “you said this was my flesh. I’m feeding on myself.”
“Yes,” the dream man said. “But that is meant as a sacrifice for knowledge.”
“What’s the difference?”
“You know the difference.”
“Anger turns to madness when there is no nourishment from what is consumed,” Adam said. “A sacrifice is made in order to get something in return.”
“What are you willing to sacrifice?”
“I don’t know.”
“What do you want?”
“To heal.”
The dream man stood and gestured above his head. The roots of a giant tree had replaced the fire. They drank deeply from clear pools of water that bubbled up from deep inside the earth. The trunk of the tree towered above them. Branches spread out and filled the sky. The dream man pointed up.
“What am I supposed to do?” Adam asked.
“Follow your path,” the dream man said. Adam looked at his hands. The blue spirals led up the rough bark.
“I’m afraid,” Adam said.
“Good.” The dream man stepped forward and placed a cord around Adam’s neck. One single bear claw hung from it.
“What if I die up there?” Adam asked as he placed his hands on the trunk and started to climb. The tree throbbed with the lives of everything that lived.
“My kind has been dying on trees and being resurrected out of the darkness since the first stories were told,” the dream man said, and Adam saw that he resembled a bear again. “This is the next step on your path.”
“Then what?” Adam asked.
“What are you willing to sacrifice?”
Adam looked up and began to climb. The sky above him turned dark and…
Thunder rumbled, much closer to Appleton now. Adam jerked awake and nearly rolled off the couch. He sat on its edge, still sleep-groggy. He stood and went to the kitchen for a drink of water. Before returning to the couch he went up the steps and peeked in Holly’s room. His wife and stepdaughter were sleeping peacefully. His heart filled with more love than he would have thought possible a few years ago. Just the thought that he could lose either of them hurt almost more than he could bear.
What are you willing to sacrifice?
To protect them? he thought.
Whatever it takes.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
At the same time that Adam was waking to the smell of bacon and sausage, Joe Dinsmore was lacing up his scuffed brown Wolverine work boots. As usual, he was running late, and he knew Elmer would bitch about it. Especially this morning, since they had a long drive ahead of them. Joe didn’t know just where Canaan, West Virginia was, but Elmer estimated it would be a good three or four hour drive. Then they would have to unload the truck and drive back. It was going to be a long day.
He stood and ran his hands down the front of his dirty jeans. No use wearing clean ones for a job like this. He spared a glance at the small TV. The morning weathergirl from channel four was attempting to talk through the snow on the screen. There had been a pretty good storm last night, the first real one of spring. The morning was overcast, and a little cooler than yesterday. They were calling for scattered showers for the rest of the day.
Little Joe sat in his highchair in the kitchen, covered with some nasty looking green paste that Mona had been trying to feed him. Based on the expression on his face, it didn’t taste much better than it looked.
Mona wrapped a second peanut butter and jelly sandwich for his lunch. She put it in his lunch bucket, along with a pack of chocolate Twinkies, a banana, a bag of barbeque potato chips and some Nilla Wafers. She closed the lid, then got a two-liter bottle of Coke out of the fridge and set all of it on the kitchen table.
She did it all silently.
“Still not speaking to me?” Joe asked. She flashed him an angry glare. Mona was nineteen, with dark puffy circles under her eyes and hips that would never recover from her pregnancy, nor turn Joe on like they used to.
He didn’t even know what she was angry about. He went over his behavior for the last few days and couldn’t come up with anything he had done wrong. He had barely been here to do anything wrong. He went bowling one night and got home late. The next two nights he stopped off at the Brass Rail Tavern for a beer or two with friends.
Nope, nothing he could’ve done. She’d been working a lot of overtime at the shirt factory. Along with taking care of Little Joe, she was probably just tired and taking it out on him.
He grabbed a pack of Pop Tarts on his way out the door, and tore the silver foil with his teeth. He spit the tiny piece into the air, and as it fell to the dirty floor he tried to give his wife a kiss goodbye. Mona turned her face, so all he got was her cheek. She slammed the door as he trudged down the wooden steps of the trailer. He heard Little Joe crying in the background.
His car sat on blocks in the gravel drive. He didn’t know when he would be able to get it fixed. Joe walked down the damp street. Mist hung in the air over Lott’s Salvage, the junkyard in the valley. The lawns of Bucktown, as this part of Appleton had always been known, were strewn with toys and trash and hopelessness. It had been like this for generations. It would be for generations more.
He passed the laundromat and saw one of his neighbors was already there with about a months worth of dirty clothes. At the bottom of the hill he turned past the beer distributor and walked a block, then crossed the street. Just past the junkyard were the stock sale barns, and behind them near the creek was the warehouse that served as the storage area for Holland’s Moving, Delivery, and Storage. Just as Joe knew he would be, Elmer was sitting in the cab of the truck and looking at his watch.
