by Ninie Hammon
Bailey turned to him and let out a shaky breath. Even so, when she spoke her voice trembled.
"So now what? I swear, T.J., if you hadn't been here when I got home, if you hadn't already seen this painting, I would have taken it out into the back yard, hacked it apart with an ax and burned the pieces."
"I ain't sure you coulda done that."
"What do you mean?"
"When my mama first started paintin' them pictures, she hid 'em from my daddy 'cause he told her he'd kill her if she ever painted another one. She was takin' an awful chance doin' that."
"Why'd she do it, then?"
"I think she had to keep 'em. I don't think she could destroy 'em, until …"
"Until what?"
"Until they let go of her."
"Meaning?"
"You know what I'm talkin' about. The connection. 'Til the thing you painted happens, you's connected to that person. This girl here," he gestured toward the painting but Bailey'd looked away and she didn't look back, "she's still alive … ain't she?"
"I suppose, I …"
Bailey took a breath, tried to center herself. Then she looked like she was listenin' hard to hear a soft sound, or maybe tryin' to recall the recipe for bean dip.
"Yes. She's still alive. I can … feel her. This," she waved her hand toward the painting but still didn't look at it, "hasn't happened yet."
"There's your answer, then. You can't destroy this picture long as she's alive."
Bailey burped out a little sob then.
"That's not the right answer because it's not the right question."
"Meaning?"
"Meaning the question ain't 'Can I destroy the picture?' The question is 'What do I do about it?' Am I … are we … s'posed to try to help her, to keep her from being murdered?"
"What do you think?"
"Dobbs would say we have to try."
"I didn't ask what Dobbs would say."
"You tell me. Answer the question your own self."
"I don't know. When I painted the portrait of Macy Cosgrove dead, drowned, we were hellbent for leather to keep her alive."
"And we did."
"Did we?"
"Oh, there you go—"
"I have to go there. There is what it all comes down to. Yes, we rescued Macy Cosgrove from a flood. But there wouldn't have been—"
"You don't know that—"
She held up her hand.
"Okay, it's at least possible there would never have been a flood in the first place if we hadn't meddled in the affairs of …"
"Of …?”
"Of whoever … whatever … if we hadn't tried to stop the painting from becoming reality. I decided then I wasn't ever again going—"
"But you did."
"Not that kind of painting, I didn't. I didn't just get hijacked out of my life and wake up with paintbrushes in both hands. I decided to paint that portrait. And it didn't do any good. The boy still died, so did two other children."
"How many times we got to have this conversation? I done pointed out that you saved the lives of who knows how many other children by catching the kidnapper."
"But if we interfere this time, leap on our horses and ride off to rescue this girl … in the process, we could get her killed. We could cause her murder." She pulled in a breath and he realized she was on the brink of tears. "If I caused … if it was my fault … I don't think I could live with—"
He put his hands on her shoulders.
"All them pictures my mama painted for all them years… every one of them things happened — just like she painted it. And she never done a thing to cause 'em. What that tells me is that this here," he pointed at the painting and stood there, waited 'til she finally turned her eyes toward it, too, "is gonna happen. Onliest way it won't happen is if we stop it."
"This isn't as simple a thing as finding a little girl … This is a murder. How do you stop a murder?"
He felt her wobble slightly, realized how unsteady on her feet she was.
"Okay, that's enough for a while." He turned her around and marched her out of the room.
"I broke the phone booth …"
She was looking at the glass on the floor, delayed shock firin' off random synapses in her brain. He'd set her down, put some warm tea in her belly and then they'd call the sheriff. There wasn't nothin' else to do, but her mind hadn't got that far yet.
They'd only taken a couple of steps out of the room when Bailey stopped and whirled around. All the color had drained out of her face.
"Halloween."
She said just the one word, but it was slathered in all kinda meanings. Before he could ask, she blurted it out.
"He told her she wouldn't need a mask to go trick-or-treating on Halloween."
"Halloween is Saturday."
Chapter Five
Kavanaugh County Sheriff Brice McGreggor opened the little box and stared at the contents.
He wasn't the kind of man who second-guessed himself. A total waste of time. Life rewarded action. Doing something was always preferable to doing nothing. And a worldview like that precluded looking back over your shoulder to rehash the last thing you did.
But as he looked at the little box in his hands, he thought for the one zillionth time that maybe he should have gotten something else. Not that the decision to get the earrings had been arrived at precipitously. Hardly. First, he'd agonized about whether he should get Bailey a birthday gift at all. He'd been the one who'd let the cat out of the bag, mentioned to T.J. and Dobbs when her birthday was. He'd seen it on her driver's license more than three months ago when he was identifying "a suicide victim." Only she hadn't died, of course.
Dobbs had come up with the idea of a celebration dinner at the Nautilus Casino in Whispering Mountain Lake, dragged him and T.J. into it, then dumped the whole load on Bailey — who had, in T.J.'s words, "pitched a conniption fit." They'd only gotten her to agree to attend by informing her that the three of them were going to the casino Friday night to celebrate her birthday whether she joined them or not … but she was welcome to tag along if she so desired.
She'd finally agreed to attend if they'd agree not to get her gifts, and they'd all nodded their heads like good little bobblehead dolls. None of them meant it, of course. And Bailey was nobody's fool. She knew they were faking.
That hurdle surmounted, he'd suffered through deciding what he should get, and after he finally decided on earrings, he'd agonized over which ones out of the plethora of female ear dressings available in just one jewelry store. He had limited himself to only one — it was a wise man who knew his own limitations. Now that he'd purchased them, he was revisiting his earlier angst. They were green, the color of her eyes — which were hazel with golden streaks in the center. He couldn't find any green earrings with gold streaks, though, but these were close.
The sales clerk — Cassandra Jacobs — had gone to high school with him, had suffered through Mr. Bergman's mind-numbing American history class seated next to him, and she had gone out of her way to be helpful. While he was going out of his way to pass the decision off as a casual thing, no big deal, just a birthday gift for a friend, emphasis on that — friend.
She hadn't bought anything he'd tried to peddle, of course. Women figured those things out fast. But he had managed to conceal his mental anguish about the purchase until he left the store, after which he battled surging waves of buyer's remorse.
He snapped the box shut. This was absurd. The deed was done and he needed to move on. And moving on was not at all an unpleasant thing because it involved anticipation of the birthday celebration her three friends had jammed down her protesting throat. They were having dinner at the fancy restaurant in the Nautilus Casino, which Brice had toured in his official capacity with other area law enforcement officers before it opened. He was looking forward to spending time with her. And with Dobbs and T.J. as well. He'd known about T.J. his whole life, everyone in town did, but getting to know the man personally was … delightful. No, that word
was way too foofy. Eye-opening and mind-expanding were more appropriate. And who wouldn't like Dobbs, an affable giant of a man who, oh by the way, happened to be worth millions.
His cellphone rang and caller ID showed it was Bailey.
"Hello, birthday girl. Want me to sing to you now? Hint: the answer is no, you don't want me to sing to you. Not now. Not ever. I sound like a walrus giving birth to a forklift."
"Can you … come over — now?"
He reached up and touched the scar on his right cheek where he'd been bitten by a "widow" spider — red, black or brown, take your pick. That was what'd happened after the last time Bailey had painted one of her "portraits." And that's what the call was about — a painting. That much and more had been conveyed by the simple question.
"Half an hour."
Chapter Six
Raymond Dobson fished in the pocket of his overalls for a treat.
"Sit!"
Sparky obediently plopped his backside down on the floor in front of the big man. T.J. had told Dobbs he wasn't allowed to give the dog a treat unless Sparky did something to earn it, so it would reinforce his training. Dobbs didn't care what the dog did or didn't do. One way or the other, that pup was going to get this treat.
T.J. returned to the room from Bailey's kitchen carrying a tray with a pot of coffee and mismatched cups and saucers. He set it down on the coffee table in front of the couch.
Popping the treat into the fur-ball's mouth, Dobbs patted the couch cushion. Sparky hopped up next to him and lay down on his back, his tail wagging, his front paws flopped over in a perpetual beg, his belly displayed for scratching. Dobbs smiled, then looked up to see the others weren't smiling, had nothing to smile about and his own joy drained out of him.
There was another painting.
Dobbs had known it was going to happen. They all had. He cast a glance at Brice. Poor man, when he'd first been confronted with the reality that Bailey could paint a portrait of the future, he didn't know whether to wind his watch or take third base. Maybe it was easier for Dobbs and T.J., because of what they'd experienced as children. The young were always better able to embrace mystery and magic.
"We all seen it," T.J. said. He handed out mugs of coffee as he talked. Dobbs's with cream and sugar, Brice black. Bailey had shaken her head when he offered her a mug. She sat in the recliner, an old, ugly piece of furniture that was the most comfortable place to sit in the room. Curled up in the big chair, she looked like a little kid.
T.J. poured himself a mug and settled on the couch with Dobbs on the other side of Sparky. The dog quickly abandoned Dobbs and put his head in T.J.'s lap, where the man sat unconsciously rubbing the special spot behind the dog's ears that rendered Sparky almost comatose from pleasure. T.J. didn't tell everybody that he slept with his dog, but Dobbs knew. There wasn't anything about T.J. Dobbs didn't know. Except what'd happened to him for all those years in Special Forces. T.J. didn't share that with anybody. And he suspected T.J. thought he knew everything about Dobbs, too, given the two of them had been friends since they were four years old. But T.J. was wrong about that. Very wrong.
"So now we got to decide what we gonna do," T.J. said.
"This isn't like trying to save a child from drowning. It's one thing to try to prevent an accidental death," Brice said. He was seated in one of the set of wingback chairs at the far end of the couch, but not relaxed back into it. He was seated upright, on the front edge of the chair. "It's something else entirely to try to prevent a crime."
"Should we interfere?" Bailey sounded wrung out, as well she should have given that she had been beaten and murdered — before breakfast.
"We have to," Dobbs said. Every one of them knew he'd always come down on the side of trying to change the fate of the people in the future paintings — maybe as penance for all the times when he and T.J. were kids that they knew what was going to happen … but didn't dare interfere.
"All I know for a lead pipe certainty is that that girl's gonna be murdered — unless we figure out a way to stop it. All them paintings, all them years, my mama wasn't never wrong. Not once." He looked at Bailey. "Do we run the risk of causing what we's trying to prevent? I guess we do. But it's better than turning our backs and walking away … and lettin' that man with the pinky ring and skull tattoo kick that girl's teeth in and then strangle her."
No one spoke. In the end, the decision was Bailey's. She was the one with the "gift." And with the gift came the curse of responsibility.
The silence hung heavy. Might have seemed awkward among people who hadn't been through together what the four of them had.
Then Bailey let out a pent-up breath and squared her shoulders.
"First, we have to figure out who she is." She tried to make her voice sound stronger than it was. "And we've certainly been there, done that."
When she'd "tried" to paint a portrait of a kidnapped child two months ago in hopes of getting a clue to what had happened to the boy, Bailey, T.J. and Dobbs had tried to track down the child whose picture she did paint — a little girl they thought had died in a traffic accident eighteen years ago. The search had led them into a nightmare.
"Should we just start out this time with a private investigator?" asked Dobbs, because that's how they'd finally located the little girl.
T.J. shook his head. "We ain't sniffing down a trail that's eighteen years old this time," he said. He cast a sideways glance at Dobbs, who'd hired the private investigator. "Or hacking into hospital records we ain't 'lowed to see."
"If we're going to figure out who she is, we have to start at the beginning," the sheriff said. "What do we know about this girl?"
Bailey looked miserable. "She's got three days to live." Then she told them about the murderer's reference to Halloween. "It's Tuesday, Halloween's Saturday. Sometime between now and then …"
Then they watched her cue up a horror movie in her mind and set it running. It wasn't as horrible as living the event with the murdered girl, as she had done while she painted it. But even remembering such a nightmare was fuel for PTSD.
"Any other physical characteristics besides her hair color?" Brice asked. "A mole? A tattoo?"
"She has freckles, but not like yours. Just a little dusting of them … like cinnamon. And she has a scar on her hip — a dog bit her when she was a little girl. The man kicked her in that spot." Bailey paused. "I didn't see any marks or tattoos on her arms or hands. I … I think she's beautiful, though. Before he … ruined her face, I believe she was lovely."
"Pretty young girl tryin' to get away from … what?" T.J. asked. "Do you know?"
"No, just that she knows she's about to be murdered and she's running down a long hallway with doors on both sides."
"Like a school or a hospital or a hotel?" Dobbs asked.
"I don't know which. She was so terrified she wasn't paying attention to where she was going and so the images are vague. And she's barefoot. She took off her shoes so she could run without making noise." Bailey thought for a moment. "And she's wearing a white gown. She's afraid she might trip on it."
"That'd tip things toward a hospital or a hotel. Not likely she'd be running down the hall in a school barefoot, in her white nightie," T.J. said. He set down his coffee mug on the table. He hadn't even taken a sip.
"And she's … she doesn't make any sense. I don't understand what she's thinking."
"What?" Brice asked.
"Okay … she's running away from somewhere, something, somebody she is certain plans to kill her. But she is terrified of where she's going to as well and that's the part that's weird. She thinks where she's going is a land filled with monsters who have super powers, who can hear what she's thinking and see through walls."
"Superman?" Dobbs said.
"Goody," T.J. said.
"She doesn't know how it's possible to hide from that, but she's so scared she's willing to face it and try — so she can find her way back home."
"Dorothy wanting to get back to Kansas," Dobbs said.
/> "Yes, something very like that. She wants to warn the people … in 'Kansas' … about the others — monsters who kidnap little kids and carry them off to some strange land where they never see their parents again."
"Sounding more and more like a fairy tale," Dobbs said.
"Fairy tales are closer than Marvel comics. Not so much superheroes as mythical beings, like out of a story. And the monsters who have these powers want to catch her so they can eat her — rip out her beating heart but keep her alive while they eat the rest of her."
She paused for a moment, concentrating.
"And her eyes. The monsters want her eyes most of all because they're blue and the monsters prefer blue eyes."
"So this young woman … believes in fairy tales," T.J. said.
"If she genuinely believes superhuman beings are out to get her, that's a variation on wearing an aluminum foil hat so the aliens can't hear what you're thinking," Dobbs said. "She's delusional."
Bailey shuddered. "If she is crazy, it's garden variety mental illness. Nothing like a … split personality."
The room was silent for a beat. Every one of them thinking their own thoughts about the insane child whose personality had so fractured she had turned into a real-life monster.
Dobbs held his hand up, his index finger about two inches from his thumb. "I know about this much more than the average layman about such things, but sounds like paranoid schizophrenia to me." He'd minored in psychology in college, but only because he wanted to factor human nature into his passion for business and finance. "And nothing I know is current. But I've read some things."
In truth, he'd read extensively about all things related to the functioning of the human mind and emotions, about mental diseases and disorders. Partly because the subject fascinated him and partly because he'd spent his life in psychological self-diagnosis, trying to self-medicate away the gnarled tangle of horror and terror planted in his mind when he was a child forced to look at future tragedies before they happened, the demons that still stalked the deserted hallways of his dreams.
