The Walking

by Bentley Little

  He'd wondered at first how it would be, living with people like himself. Would there be feuds and fighting? Would people be reading each other's minds, jinxing the endeavors of their rivals, using their gifts for venal purposes, to fuel those petty jealousies that inevitably popped up whenever a group of people lived together in close proximity? Thankfully, no.

  None of that had come to pass, and if someone just wandered into the canyon and stayed for a few days, like as not he would not even realize that they were witches. Their powers were not hidden, but neither were they exploited. He and the others lived the way they'd always wanted to live--just like everyone else. Magic was used when it was needed, but it was only one tool among many, and it was only employed when appropriate.

  From outside the bar came the sound of voices and feminine laughter, followed by footsteps on wood as a group of women strode along the walkway toward the new park at the edge of town.

  Today was Independence Day, July fourthd while the holiday had never meant much to Jeb back in the old days, here in Wolf Canyon it meant a lot. They finally had their

  own independence; they were finally free to be who they were. It was he who had first suggested that they all stop work on this day and celebrate, pool their talents to create. the biggest celebration any of them had ever seen ...... Last year had been the first. There'd been conjured fire- i: works the likes of which had never been seen even in China, as well as spirit shows and a spectacular display of ground light created by all of them concentrating on a single effect and using their powers together.

  This year things were supposed to be even better. Jeb didn't know what William had planned--his friend had been keeping it a secret from everyone--but mention of it always brought a smile to his face.

  "Simon?" he asked, turning to the man next to him. "What's your favorite thing in the world?"

  Simon thought for a moment. "The un bathed private parts of a mature woman."

  The answer was so unexpected that Jeb simply stared at him for a moment. Then he burst out laughing. Soon they were both laughing, clapping each other on the back and ordering one more round.

  Afterward, Jeb walked outside, went for a long slow walk around the town to clear his head. The park was filling up with people, the women bringing food, the men bringing appetites. From June's kitchen came the warm, fragrant smell of fresh bread. One of the advantages of witchcraft--the ability to cook without fuel or fire. He passed by Martha's house, waved at her through the window. She was just placing a pie on the sill, and he offered to carry it to the park for her, but she said it had to set awhile first.

  He felt good. A couple walked past him, hand in hand, and he watched them for a moment. The only thing missing from his life was that he had not yet found a woman. A lot of the men had. A lot of witches of both sexes had

  met here and gotten married, and while he was always happy for them, he could not help feeling a little sorry for himself.

  Of course, no one he'd met really interested him.

  Because he was still in love with Becky.

  Even after all this time, he thought of her often. In his dreams, she came to Wolf Canyon. Sometimes she was a witch who had only just discovered her powers. Sometimes she was not but had trekked halfway across the continent because she missed him and wanted to be with him.

  But al ways they ended up together, and while he knew that was just a foolish fantasy it prevented him from even thinking about anyone else.

  "Jeb!"

  He looked up at the sound of the familiar voice to see

  William hurrying across the dusty street toward him, a big smile on his face.

  "I've been looking for you."

  Jeb stopped, waited. "What is it?"

  "I need your help."

  "With what?"

  William's smile grew even broader. this is something I've been working on."

  "For tonight?"

  "I'd rather not discuss it here." William clapped an arm around his shoulder. "Come on. Let's go to the picnic first.

  We'll talk about it later, back at the house."

  Jeb grinned, nodded, and the two of them made their way down the street toward the park.

  Now

  He'd called his sister the night before, and told her about their father.

  It could be put off no longer, and Miles didn't beat around the bush but told Bonnie exactly what had happened. She'd grown extremely quiet, for once in her life not interrupting him, and when he was finished she said simply, "Where is he now?"

  "Still at the coroner's." He answered her next question before she even asked it. 'qlaey have him restrained, but he still seems to be... animated."

  "Are you sure he's dead?"

  "I'm sure. We're all sure. We just don't know, what it is."

  There was silence after that.

  "I think you should come down," Miles told her.

  "For the funeral?

  He was growing exasperated. "Obviously, we haven't scheduled a funeral yet, but Dad is dead and I thought you might care enough to right," she said. "I'm coming." But she sounded annoyed, put out, and after promising to call him once she'd booked a plane, she hung up.

  She'd called back an hour later, saying that she'd be flying to L.A. In the afternoon. He asked for her flight number and the time, but she refused to give him either.

  "How am I supposed to pick you up?" he asked.

  "You're not. I'll take a cab from the airport. I need some time to think."

  "You won't have enough thinking time on the plane? Come on, Bonnie, this doesn't make any sense. There's no reason to waste money on a cab when I can easily come and pick you up. The airport's fifteen minutes from my house, for God's sake."

  "I want to be alone."

  "Bonnie

  Stop trying to boss me around all the time. I have some things to sort through. Can't you understand that?"

  She was getting ready to hang up on him--he recognized the signs--so he backed off and they if not warmly, at least amicably. Now she'd called him from the back of the cab, telling him she was on her way, and he assumed that meant she had a cellular phone. She'd never mentioned it to him, but she and Gil were yuppie enough to invest in such an obvious status symbol, and he reminded himself not to pick on her, to leave her alone, that this was a tragic time for both of them.

  Well, a tragic time for him.

  An inconvenience for her.

  At the sound of a car pulling into the driveway, he peeked through the front window and saw a yellow cab in back of his Buick. He swore to himself that he would not provoke her, that they would not quarrel, and he hurried out to meet his sister.

  She looked tired. Her skin was pale, there were large bags under her eyes, and he found that he actually felt sorry for her. He gave her a hug, helped the cab driver remove her luggage from the trunk, then carried her suitcases inside as she followed him into the house.

  He put her bags in the guest bedroom, then walked back out to the living room.

  Bonnie took off her coat and sat down on the couch. "You want something to drink? Water? Tea? Coke?" "No, thanks."

  He nodded, sat down in the recliner to the tight of the couch. "So how are you doing?" he asked.

  She shrugged. "Fine."

  He looked at his sister, suddenly aware of how much she resembled their mother. She was thinner, her movements were different, but her features and especially the expressions that passed over her face were their mother's exactly. It was ironic, because Bonnie and her mother had never really gotten along. They were too much alike, perhaps. Both highly strung and self-involved, touchy and defensive, neither of them had possessed the requisite sympathy or patience to ever understand one another. There'd been no reconciliation between them before their mother's death and, Miles suspected, no remorse on his sister's part afterward.

  Bonnie smiled stiffly at him, and he smiled back. He realized that he didn't have anything to say to his sister. The questions that popped into his mind, the genetic convers
ation openers he considered and rejected, were all of the superficial sitcom variety--How's Gil? How are the kids? He wanted to be able to talk to her, to really communicate, but he didn't know how. She, too, seemed to be at a loss, and they sat there awkwardly, strangers who were siblings.

  It was Bonnie who spoke first. "So where's Dad... I mean, his body? Downtown The coroner's office."

  "Do you think I should see him?"

  "Do you want to?"

  = "I don't know."

  "It's up to you."

  Another awkward silence.

  "Maybe I will take that drink," she said. "Water?"

  "With" 9" ice.

  She nodded, and he went into the kitchen, grateful for some time to plan out what he would say. He and his sister had never been that close, but he hadn't realized until now how much they had depended upon their father to keep the conversation alive when they were together. He filled a glass with water and ice and carried it back out.

  Bonnie accepted it. "Thanks." She took a sip. "Whatever happened to the nurse? You didn't tell me."

  "Audra?" Miles shrugged. "She's still working for the hospice agency, but she doesn't want to speak with me. I've tried, several times. I suppose she's already on some other: case, with a new patient." He sighed, "She can avoid me al she wants, but if the police want to speak to her, she'll have to talk to them."

  "Police? Are there police involved?"

  "Not yet. But they might be." He shook his head. "Who knows?"

  More silence.

  He thought for a moment. He'd been honest with her over the phone, but there was one thing he hadn't told her about. and he asked her to wait while he walked into his father bedroom and took out the cardboard carton containing the contents of the safety deposit box.

  He set the carton down on the coffee table in front of the glass and started telling her about their father's dream, his recur ring nightmare of the tidal wave and his subsequent trip to the library to pick up occult books. Miles speculated that their dad had known what was coming, that he was some how preparing for it or maybe even trying to stave it off

  He then explained about the paraphernalia he had found in the safety deposit box.

  Bonnie didn't seem all that surprised by what he had say, and that made him suspicious. 'That doesn't shock you?" he asked.

  She shook her head. "Not really."

  Miles pointed at the box. "So what is this?"

  "What is what?"

  "This!" He picked up a phial of gray powder and shook it in front of her face. He dropped the phial back in the box. "What is all this?

  Why would Dad keep all of this magic stuff in his safety deposit box?"

  "How would I know?"

  "I thought he might have mentioned something about it to you."

  'to me? If he'd talked about it with anyone, it would have been you.

  In case you hadn't noticed, we weren't exactly on the best of terms."

  "I mean before all this. When we were little."

  She stood. "Look, I don't know anything about any of this. I don't know what this crap is, and I don't care. I don't think it has anything to do with anything." She looked at him, shook her head. "And I don't understand why you're so worked up about it."

  "Because our father is in the morgue and he's dead and he's still walking around! Is that clear enough for you?" .

  She sat back down.

  They looked at each other--glared, really--but there was more fear in their expressions than anger, and the animosity could not be sustained by either of them. Bonnie broke first, and she reached her hand up to him, and he took it, and then they were hugging. "I'm sorry," Bonnie said.

  "I'm sorry, too," Miles told her.

  They held each other tighter. She started crying, sniffling at first, then wailing, and he rocked her and whispered re assurances as she sobbed into his shoulder like a baby.

  In the morning, Bonnie was gone. She'd written a long apologetic letter, a rambling screed covering six double-sided pages, telling him that she could not handle this right now, that she needed some time, that she would be there for the

  funeral if one ever took place, but until then she just wanted to be with her family, with Gil and the kids, far away from all this.

  He wanted to be angry with her, but he wasn't. She was not to blame for what was happening, and though it would be easier to hate her for her cowardice, he could not find it in himself to condemn her. After everything was said and done, she was still his sister, and there was no reason she should have to wait around for her reanimated dead dad to stop walking around and finally die like he was supposed to.

  No one should have to do that.

  Miles had been absent since Monday, and rather than sit cooped up in the house for yet another day, he decided to return to work. His hands were sweaty as he rode the elevator up, and he perfunctorily accepted the condolences of the other people in the office, thanked Hal for his offer to be a sympathetic ear. Not until he was safely in his cubicle, in his chair, at his desk, surrounded by the familiar mess of paperwork, though, was he finally able to relax.

  He had not realized how stressful staying at home was, and he felt relieved here, almost happy. It was as if a great weight had been lifted from his shoulders, and though Naomi told him that several days of bereavement leave were still available to him, Miles was glad he'd made the decision to come in. Work would help him forget, hopefully take his mind off his personal problems.

  Marina's case was the only one of his that hadn't been parceled out, and it was the only one in which he was really interested. He spent an hour or so trying to track down addresses and phone numbers, attempted to talk to Liam and was promptly hung up on, called Marina and gave her what little information he had.

  Then it was lunchtime.

  On an impulse, he drove out to Palm Springs, to the home of Hubert E

  Lars, the fifth man down on Liam's list, the one with the disconnected phone. As he'd suspected, the house was abandoned, and when he questioned the neighbors, he learned that Hubert had passed away six months back. Natural causes, they said. In his sleep. But Miles wasn't so sure. Every death seemed suspicious to him now, and as he drove back to L.A." past the fields of oversize high-tech windmills that spread across the hot breezy desert of the San Gorgonio Pass, he tried to imagine some reason or rationale that did not involve the supernatural.

  But he could not.

  He thought of his father. It was as if the walls Of reality were breaking down, as though the world had shifted away from the logical, physics-governed place with which he was familiar.

  There were no messages waiting for him when he arrived back at the office. He gave Liam a quick call, and in the few seconds allotted to him before the old man hung up, he blurted out that Hubert E Lars was dead. There was a click and a dial tone, but he knew that Liam had heard him, and he hoped that the information would work on him. The men on his list all seemed to be either dead or dying, and if Liam had any sense at all, he would start cooperating and talk so that he could avoid a similar end.

  Of course, maybe he thought it was inevitable. Liam Was definitely frightened and did not want to die, but perhaps he believed that his fate was sealed and what was coming could not be undone.

  Just like Bob had?

  The parallels were a little too close for comfort, and Miles pushed the thought aside for now. He wanted to work on this case, but he did not want to think about his dad. He shifted his focus from the general to the concrete, once again busying himself with tracking down addresses and phone numbers.

  On the way home, he'd planned to stop by the coroner's office, but he could not bring himself to do it. He circled the block three times, telling himself that if a parking spot opened up, that would be a sign and he'd take it. But when a space did open up on his third pass, he didn't pull in and instead drove quickly off, heading straight home.

  He heated up a frozen macaroni and cheese pie, and sat down in front of the television to eat. The house
seemed empty and cold, and for some reason he thought of Claire. He didn't know why, but he had been thinking about her quite often lately, and it occurred to him that he should let her know that his father had died.

  No, he told himself. He might be able to rationalize it and claim that he merely wanted to inform her, but somewhere down in the mix was the fact that he would like to speak to her again, would like to hear her voice, and he refused to exploit the tragedy of his father's death for his own personal gain.

  He would not tell Claire. But the idea would not go He watched the news, then a syndicated tabloid show, then a sitcom, and more than once, during the programs and during the commercials, he found himself thinking of how she'd react to the news, how sad and upset she would be, how she would want to know.

  He looked over at the clock. Eight-thirty. Claire had always had a prohibition against answering any phone call after nine or clock at night, figuring that if someone called that late it was probably bad news, and she'd rather sleep through the night not knowing and find out in the morning.

  Should he call? Would she even care? He wasn't sure. She had always liked his father, but the breakup had been bitter, a lot of harsh words had been exchanged, and there'd been no communication between himself and his ex-wife for nearly five years.

  " He wasn't even sure he had her current phone number.

  But he felt obligated to at least make the effort to contact her.

  Death was so much bigger than everything else; it superseded all other problems between them.

  And a death like this... He searched through his old personal phone book until he found her number. If this wasn't good, he could use the agency's resources to track her down--though he wasn't sure he was willing to do that.