Not Alone

by Frederic Martin

  She looked him steadily in the eye. “I mean . . . people like you, and your family, and Blue!”

  Will sat dumbfounded. He looked at his mother. She just nodded at him.

  “Mom, did you know this?” He looked back at Chief Hannah. “Can you hear me?”

  His mother replied to the question, “She can’t hear you. She’s not like us, but she knows we can hear her. Summer and I went to college together. She became a close friend” “I taught her about vox.”

  “I’m sorry I kept it from you,” said Chief Hannah. “I want to respect and protect your privacy. In fact, I wouldn’t have even told you now except I had to ask you this question. Your mom told me about Blue. You heard her cry out, a vox cry, didn’t you? That’s how you found her?”

  Will was still shocked, but he answered. “Well, I heard something, and it had to be Blue, but the sound was . . .” he shivered. “It was . . . it was something I don’t want to hear again.” It was like the cry of a dying animal, is what he was thinking. He looked at his mom. “How much does she know about vox? Does she know we can play back any sound?”

  His mom nodded.

  He looked back at Chief Hannah. “I can’t really do it with voice. It’s something . . . it’s just something only we can hear.”

  “I get it, Will. You don’t have to explain. I only know a little about what your world is like. Just don’t let what you can ‘hear’ get to you, okay?”

  All three of them were quiet. Finally, Chief Hannah broke the silence. “I needed to know. I am just going to put down that you spotted Bronco by chance. That’s all that needs to be said. okay? Agreed?”

  “Yeah, I agree,” he said.

  “Look, Will, dealing with the press, dealing with friends at school, dealing with anything you feel you can’t go to your parents for, I want to be your ally. I’m offering that to you.”

  Will looked at her. “Does Blue know? Will you be her ally, too?”

  “No Will, she doesn’t know. I swore to keep your secret. Only you can decide who you want to tell. Maybe you have chosen to tell some friends. Just be careful. Besides, Blue has a better ally, though may not know it yet,” and Chief Hannah looked directly at Will’s mother.

  His mother smiled.

  Chief Hannah looked back at Will and patted him on his good shoulder. “Take this to your grave . . . just not right away!”

  “Very funny. And thanks,” said Will. “You guys make it sound like getting shot is easier than dealing with the publicity.”

  “Well, I guess you’ll find out and just have to let us know afterward, right?” said Chief Hannah. “Just don’t forget, you are not alone!” “Now I gotta go. Thanks, Will, and good luck. We are going to get this Bronco Bob. He’s smart but we’re not letting him get away with it.”

  Chief Hannah left with a nod and a wink.

  Will felt oddly better about the thought of leaving the hospital, though it sounded daunting. He was still stunned by the revelation that Chief Hannah knew about their vox, and that she could control her chiss the way she did, almost like she was a vox herself. But she couldn’t hear. It was weird talking back and forth that way. Jesus, how many others could do it that he didn’t know about?

  “Mom, how many others like Chief Hannah are there out there? You told us to keep it secret but you go out and tell people?”

  His mom looked him steadily in the eye and replied, “You and Rose needed to learn the discipline of holding a secret. I think you have learned, but Rose is still a little young. And though you have learned the discipline, you don’t yet know how very severe the consequences can be if the wrong people learn about us. Sharing can be a wonderful thing, but only do it when you have absolute trust.” She paused and looked away as if she was trying to avoid looking someone behind him. He almost turned around to see what it was, but before he could, she turned back to him intently. “Telling the wrong person can turn into a nightmare.”

  A wave of discomfort hit Will and he felt disoriented for a moment. He’d never quite felt anything like that before and he wondered at first if it was a side effect of the drugs. But as he looked at his mom’s eyes, he realized this discomfort was coming from her. There was more conveyed in her vox than words. Will could actually feel himself tensing up at a memory of something horrible. But it wasn’t his memory.

  “You told the wrong person once. You created a nightmare.”

  She nodded.

  “Mom, just now, it was weird. I felt . . .”

  “I know. You are growing up. Your brain is developing in ways that are more social now.” “Vox oculis develops and matures, too.”

  “You mean that, just now, that was you? That was real?”

  “Yes, that was me. You have questions, I know, but right now is not the time. When you are ready, you should bring it up with your father.”

  This was a lot to think about. He wasn’t sure whether to tell his mom that he’d already trusted someone with their secret. Someone he would trust his life with. And the emotion that rocked him just then, it was vox? Why was he only learning about this now? And if he could pick up his mom’s emotions, could Blue pick them up now, too? She wasn’t as old as he was, but she was a girl. Girls seemed to mature earlier in every way than boys, at least all of them except Blue. She was such a tomboy. God, this was too much to process right now. But it did bring up something else that was weighing on his mind.

  “Mom, I haven’t seen Blue yet. What’s going on? Everyone says she is fine, but why hasn’t she come to visit? Is there something else I should know about?”

  His mom had a thoughtful look on her face. “Well, what you should know is that Blue has seen you, and she got quite upset. You were asleep at the time, but I think the sight of you in a hospital bed with that bloody bandage and bruising on your arm and chest and tubes and monitors . . . it was a bit much for her.” “God, it was bit much for me.” Will felt a quiver in his chest. Now he wasn’t sure if that was from him or from his mom.

  “She’s still in a pretty fragile state herself right now. She was a captive for almost 24 hours, as you know, but she is also feeling very, very guilty about you.”

  Will thought about how Blue had looked when he found her. She had been bound to that chair, alone, in fear for her life the whole time—not knowing where she was or what her fate was. And yet, this was Blue, the tough, invincible kid.

  “Fragile?” he said. “I have a hard time imagining Blue as fragile. She is tough as nails.”

  “On the outside,” said his mom. “Inside she is pretty tough, too, but we are all human. We all have our limits. We all have a breaking point. An experience like this can push anyone to their limit. Just be kind and be aware that she is feeling guilty, and though you may not blame her, she blames herself.”

  “She’s not to blame!” he said. “I’m to blame. I should have gone with her that night. This wouldn’t have happened.”

  “As your mother, I have to strongly disagree. Neither of you should have gone out that night. Nothing will change my mind about that. That being said . . .” His mom paused and then continued “I think you should share that with her. See where it goes.”

  “But when can I see her?”

  “You mean Blue?” came a voice from the doorway. Wu was standing there and Blue was standing next to him. She was in street clothes, so they must have released her from the hospital. She was looking down at the floor.

  “Click, click, click . . . hey Little Fox!” She heard. She caught the reflection off the floor. He could tell.

  Blue looked slowly up at him. He just had time to suppress the expression of shock as she revealed her face. Her cheek was black and blue, she had a red lump and scab on her forehead, and she still had a crust of a scab in the corner of her nose. Her skin was blotched with red spots around her mouth. She looked beat-up.

  Still, he couldn’t suppress a smile. She was alive.

  She walked shyly over to his bed and touched his good hand. She stared at him nervously and
intently and said, “I am so, so sorry! I can’t believe I did this to you!”

  Will was oblivious to her apology. He was under the spell of the enormity of the simple joy of seeing someone alive who you thought was gone forever. He didn’t realize until that moment how close he had grown to this crazy creature and how much he would have missed her. He took his hand out of hers and pulled her to him in an awkward hospital-bed one-arm hug. It didn’t matter that it was awkward, it just felt good to feel a real live Blue.

  “God, Blue!” he said. “We were so afraid! You’re back! Don’t go away again! Okay?”

  “Okay,” she whispered.

  He finally released her and looked her in the eye. “Are you okay?”

  She looked down for a moment but then looked back up at him with a sober face and said, “I’m fine.”

  Will heard her vox and tried to smile, but he felt a tiny, faint spark of anxiety that he knew wasn’t coming from him.

  38

  Dinner At The O’Days

  They all gathered in the family room. It was almost time for the 10 o’clock news. Earlier that evening they had feasted on Ma Beth’s cooking. All ten of them had managed to cram around the dining room table, the Woods and the O’Days, for a celebratory feast, now that Will and Blue were both home from the hospital.

  Will was still taking it all in. Just being in a warm room with good food in his stomach and his friends and family around him made him feel like everything was finished. Blue was back safely, his summer job at the college was over, and he was home from the hospital. There were no more obligations. Everything was back to normal and it was a great feeling. And yet, it wasn’t the same normal that he’d known at the beginning of the summer.

  It was a new normal. Something inside of him had gone through a major shift. It felt like he’d had an upgrade. The old Will seemed like an innocent boy, and the new Will saw the world from a much sharper perspective. It was a harsher world, but at the same time a more interesting one. And painful. He moved his left shoulder gingerly to feel a little bit of what this new harsh world had done to him. His arm was in a sling, his chest and shoulder had dozens of stitches, and even though his chest tube had been removed, breathing deeply was still painful. Still, he felt alive. More alive than he ever had. And the scars would be there for the rest of his life as a reminder of this change in his life. They were also testimony to the fact that he had taken the first big hard knock and survived. He could survive. And Blue had survived.

  He looked over to where Blue was standing. She was in front of a side table, which was crammed with flowers and cards from neighbors and friends. Will walked over to where she stood. She was holding a card that Rose had made during the search. It had a simple drawing of Blue’s face. In large colorful words, it said, “Come back to us Blue, we all love you!”

  “It makes a poem,” Will said. He recited the words in a lyrical rhythm, “Come back to us Blue . . . We all love you!”

  Blue put the card back down and looked up at Will. It looked like she was fighting hard to keep any emotions from showing.

  “Hey. You okay?”

  She just looked back down. Will wasn’t sure how to react. Blue had been distant and withdrawn since coming home from the hospital. She was back in her own world much like the world she had been in when he first saw her face in the third-floor window months earlier. It wasn’t the same world, though, and she was different. Different for the same reason he had changed, of course. Who wouldn’t be changed by that? But not in the same way. It seemed like she was in limbo, like she hadn’t started healing as he had.

  Suddenly there was a faint high pitched ring in Will’s head “Eeeee!” and then Sam announced, “News is on in two minutes!” He had turned the TV on and had the new remote control in his hand. He looked down at it and then glanced towards Blue and Will guiltily and put the remote down and mouthed the word, “Sorry!” while his eyes leaked, “Oops!”

  The TV came to life and everyone found a place to watch it in the crowded room. Will stood behind the couch where his mother and Ma Beth were sitting. Sam and Rose were on the floor in front of the couch. Pa Bill was in his easy chair, and Nate, Wu, and Blue gathered with Will behind the couch. Most of them chatted about the interviews and wondered how it would all come across on TV. Pa Bill bemoaned how the reporters these days always sought the most drama and managed to make people look their most foolish by editing the footage in an unfair way.

  Will was silent. He watched the images flashing by on the TV screen. The sound was turned down as the national and international headlines led the broadcast. They were full of reports of suicide bombings and wildfires and car accidents—a silent montage of tragedy and suffering. It made his and Blue’s experience seem trivial in comparison. The feeling of warmth and security started to drain out of him, replaced by a feeling of anxiety. Suddenly he didn’t feel like watching the interviews. He was ready to turn away from the TV and leave the room, and then he felt a hand slip into his. It was Blue. She gripped his hand tightly. He turned to look at her, but her eyes were locked on the screen. Her face had an expression that seemed out of place for Blue. It looked like fear. He turned back to the TV. He could deal with it. He wasn’t going to just leave her there like that.

  He forced himself to watch the images again, but instead of getting sucked into the misery of the world playing out on the glowing screen, his thoughts were drawn to the sensation of warmth radiating from the body of the girl standing next to him. That warmth, along with the pressure of her arm against his, was like a balm, infusing him with a sense of calm and stability. He realized his anxiety was dissipating. He felt Blue’s hand relax. She seemed to calm down, too. It was as if a bubble of serenity had descended to protect them both. As they stood there together hand-in-hand preparing for the media’s distorted version of their ordeal, his mind tried to make sense of what just happened. He had grown accustomed to Blue’s unpredictable behavior, but he never imagined she would feel the need to reach out to someone. Then again, he never imagined that maybe he needed someone to reach out to him.

  Sam jumped forward and turned up the volume.

  “And finally, a happy ending to a local story we have been following for the past few days. It’s a story that started last Friday with the report of a missing teen. As you already know, that story quickly became much more. It soon evolved into a story of abduction, drugs, violence, and now, it turns out, some acts of amazing heroism! We at Channel 6 News have kept you up to date with each new development over the past few days, and now we can finally put names and faces to the people involved and fill in the missing pieces of this incredible tale! Bill, you were there when Chief Hannah briefed the press. Tell us what you learned!”

  “Well, Linda, it was quite an announcement Chief Hannah made today, and we were there to record it! Here’s what she had to say!”

  The image switched to a crowded room where Chief Hannah was standing at a small podium with a microphone.

  “As you already know, at 10 a.m. last Saturday morning, we received a missing person call from William O’Day saying that their foster daughter, Blue DuBois, a fourteen-year-old, had been missing since about 10 p.m. on Friday night. He and his family had searched the home and neighborhood and found no sign of her and decided to call the police for assistance. We arrived and interviewed the family and neighbors and determined that foul play may have been involved.”

  Blue DuBois! Will was shocked. He realized he never knew what Blue’s real last name was.

  A voice from the crowd of reporters shouted out, “Chief Hannah, what was it that made you suspect foul play?”

  “See, I told you,” muttered Pa Bill.

  “SHHH!” hissed Ma Beth.

  “I cannot tell you details about that at this time because it is still under investigation.”

  “So was this a kidnapping?” shouted another reporter from the crowd.

  “Yes, this was a forced abduction. Miss DuBois was abducted and forced into a c
ar against her will and taken to a vacant house on Pine street, where she was bound and gagged for the period of time between approximately midnight Friday until 8:30 p.m. Saturday night.”

  Will became aware that Blue was gripping his hand tightly again. He gave her hand a reassuring squeeze back.

  The camera switched to the newsroom where the anchor continued, “Bill, my understanding is that Chief Hannah responded to a searcher’s text that he had found where Blue was being held.”

  “That’s right, Linda. That searcher was Will Woods, the son of Westbury College professor, Dr. Daniel Woods, and he had actually entered the house where Blue was being held and was trying to rescue her. He was shot and injured by the kidnapper, who then escaped in his own vehicle but not before shooting at Chief Hannah’s car and disabling it from pursuit!”

  “Wow, Bill, that’s a frightening story!”

  “It is a frightening story, but I want to make sure our viewers know that everyone is okay. Chief Hannah was not injured and Will Woods will make a full recovery. And of course, Miss DuBois was rescued and is recovering now, too.”

  “I understand you got to interview Blue and her rescuer!”

  “I sure did Linda, and I can tell you these are two amazing kids.”

  The scene switched to the hallway of the police department where the reporter was asking Will questions. Will thought he looked a bit dorky on the screen and not as mature as he wished he’d looked.

  “Will, can you tell me about that night. What happened after you texted Chief Hannah? What made you go into that house that night?”

  “Well, I, uh, I guess I’m not really sure.” Will groaned internally. He sounded like an idiot. But then the boy on the screen started to gain some confidence and restarted, “I mean, at first I wasn’t sure exactly what to do, but then it just came to me. We’d been looking all day for Blue and everyone was frustrated because it was getting late and dark, and everyone was worried. But then I saw the guy, Bronco, coming out of that house. I knew that if there was any chance of finding Blue, I had to go look in that house. Bronco left the house to go into an apartment next door so I ran in, and there she was, in a back bedroom. She was tied up and she wasn’t breathing, so I tore the tape off her face and got her breathing again and then tried to free her from the chair. It was hard. She was really well bound, and it took too long and Bronco came back. Everything else just happened and it was like a nightmare after that. If it wasn’t for Chief Hannah, I probably would be dead.”