“Keller?” I asked. “This boy here.” I placed my hand on his head. “The one with no eyes or ears… spoke.”
“Yes.”
“A-ha,” I said sarcastically, stepped to Mera and smelled her.
“What are you doing?” she asked.
“Seeing if you were drinking.”
She smacked me away. “I wasn’t drinking. It’s the middle of the day.”
“Never stopped you before.”
“Alex,” she growled then looked at Keller. “Honey, talk. Say it again.”
“Mera …”
She waved her hand at me for silence and pleaded with Keller. “Please, talk.”
Had she not been so desperate, so serious, I would have sworn she was drunk. But she had this look, one that honestly believed what she was saying.
“He spoke, Alex, he spoke.”
I nodded. “Okay, let’s suppose he did. What did he say?”
“He said he wants milk.”
“Alright, then.” I exhaled. “Get him milk.” I bent down, darted a kiss to Keller, took the bottle from his hand, used his own hands to sign that I was leaving, and then I handed the bottle to Mera. “See you in a little bit.”
Barely out the door, I heard her curse, “Asshole.” I laughed, but almost out of the house, I stopped short.
The vision of the baby and Mera snapped into my head. When I walked into the kitchen, he was holding the bottle, extending it to her as if he knew she was there.
For a brief moment… very brief, I thought about it. What if? Could he?
Then after reminding myself that the child was not only blind but couldn’t hear, I dismissed it and left the house in my very tight boots.
3.
Mera Stevens
Alex Sans frustrated me like no other. He had since the first moment I met him. His arrogance and ability to charm anyone annoyed the hell out of me. I don’t think I ever stopped getting frustrated with his attitude, I think I just got numb to it.
There were times, though, that I allowed that emotion to slip through with him. His attitude about me being drunk or hearing things when it came to hearing Keller speak was just the latest.
Many times, I was right, and I wasn’t drunk, drinking, or imagining it.
Keller spoke. I heard him. I know my son hasn’t any ears or eyes, and has never made more than a groan or whimper, but I heard his voice.
Perhaps it was a psychic thing. I wouldn’t dismiss that, not after all that happened. It would occur again, of that I was sure, and Alex would hear it.
I don’t know why he chose so many times not to believe a word I was saying.
It started with Phoenix. No, wait, it started before we found Phoenix, when he knocked me out with that door. Alex didn’t believe it and refuted it adamantly.
I saw Phoenix come into this world, expelled from his dead mother. When all other children were stillborn, he was alive and normal. Tiny and early, but alive.
Alex wouldn’t even look at him. Swore up and down he didn’t want to get attached to the baby because he would die.
Well, Phoenix didn’t die. In fact, at eighteen months old, he is alive and well and only a few seconds from my embrace.
I put the Keller talking thing in the back of my mind, confident it would happen again and careful not to tell too many about it. I was already considered the nut job of Grace, even though most of what I said was true.
Two weeks after we first arrived, I swore up and down a Sleeper was roaming the property. I was so convinced of it, I was on the brink of being neurotic.
I wouldn’t let any of the kids out of my sight or out of the house.
I’d see it everywhere I went. One day I was doing dishes, looked up and the Sleeper was standing on the other side of my kitchen window. I grabbed Keller and ran. Why I ran outside was beyond me. Surely, it wasn’t a good move if there was a Sleeper lurking.
“I know you believe you saw what you think you saw,” Alex said.
“What the hell kind of talk is that?” I asked.
“I’m trying, Mera. I’m trying to not get upset, but you’re seeing a Sleeper in a community with a huge wall and some damned good men watching. No one else sees this Sleeper.”
“No one is looking.”
Alex held up his hand. “Listen to me. If there was a Sleeper being a peeping Tom while you did dishes, then don’t you think someone would have seen him wandering around?”
“When I see him he leaves and like I said, no one goes looking.”
“No one needs to look.”
“Well if Beck was alive ... he’d look.”
“Beck’s not alive.”
I believe I growled in frustration, I always growled at Alex. To him, I was some nut job. He asked me to speak to Pastor Mike, our resident religious man. Mike had me talk to Levi, a psychologist mind-man from the future. No one believed I saw a Sleeper. They all put it as a product of my imagination.
If I was imagining it, I had a pretty detailed imagination, and sense of smell too.
It got to the point I doubted my own sanity. Until that night.
It was raining, thunder and lightning, the entire scary works. Keller was in bed with me, just a tiny baby, sleeping soundly, when the thunder boomed, shaking the house, I sat up in bed. Lightning flashed, brightening the room an eerie blue and with it was the vision of the Sleeper standing at the foot of my bed.
I grabbed Keller, holding him tightly, and raced through my mind on what I needed to do. All weapons were locked up with Alex.
Alex.
The children!
If the Sleeper made it to my bedroom on the second floor, how much damage had he already done? Had he hurt someone? Those thoughts hit me in a split second’s time, and I reached for the lamp next to the bed. Holding Keller, I whipped the lamp towards me, pulling the cord from the wall, cried out an ear-piercing scream and jumped from the bed.
It didn’t move. Didn’t attack. It was reminiscent of the early days of the Sleepers when they stared eerily, just stared …
The door to the bedroom burst open and, of course, Alex in all his heroic half-dressed glory barreled into the room.
The Sleeper turned and lunged for Alex. Alex hit him and hit him again, but the Sleeper wouldn’t go down. The thing was much bigger than Alex, and apparently much stronger. A fearful turmoil swirled in my gut as I called out for Sonny.
Sonny. Danny. Someone.
Alex went down. His hands held on to the tattered and dirty clothes of the Sleeper, trying to push his biting jaws away.
No one was coming. Baby in one arm, lamp in my hand, I ran over, and with all I had I swung down. But at that instant as the lamp careened full force, Alex flipped and rolled the Sleeper from him and on to his back.
The lamp smashed into Alex’s head.
Alex fell sideways and to the floor. The Sleeper sat up, grabbed on to Alex, and opened his mouth. I had nothing. I thought to kick him, but I didn’t need to. A small hatchet came down into the head of the Sleeper, and I looked up to see Danny breathing heavily. Sonny hurried in right behind him.
I caught my breath and raced toward the door. “We need to check the kids. Check the kids.”
“Sleeper,” Danny said.
He and Sonny joined me in checking on the children. They were unharmed and sleeping. I guess one of us checked on Alex, because he was bleeding pretty badly. He ended up needing eighteen stitches.
That night and all before leading up to the Sleeper incident defined my relationship with Alex. He never gave me credit for anything, never believed me, nor trusted me. And sometimes one of us got injured by the mistake of the other.
He apologized for not believing me about the Sleeper.
I said “Fuck you.”
Mike said, “Hey, hey, now.”
Sonny wanted to get past it all and figured out how this one Sleeper managed to be in Grace for days without someone knowing, or rather, me being the only one to see him. To him that problem needed to be manag
ed and we’d have to tighten down. We never did figure it out. The Sleepers slipped in; they always do some way.
To me, Alex was the problem. He was overly confident. Perhaps if he wasn’t, we’d find those holes. Back when we first arrived, it was as if those who were there, Levi and the others, those who came from the future to live in our ‘better’ world, handed all authority over to him.
People sang his praises and placed him in the category of hero because, like Moses, he led the children across a wicked world. Well, if I recall correctly, Alex didn’t do it alone. Levi told me that he thinks I resent Alex’s stature because Beck is in some way being slighted.
Yeah, maybe, because I feel I am the only one who keeps his memory alive. I have to. I owe my life, my daughter’s life, to Beck.
I don’t really hate Alex, although times it seems like I do. It’s more of a love/hate thing. Some days we get along great, we actually laugh together. Other days I get so angry and frustrated with him that I want him to be Sleeper bait.
Nevertheless, I suppose, no matter what my feelings, I have to deal with Alex Sans.
I hate to give him credit, but he does do a good job of leading the community. I just wish he would give me more credit as an intelligent person, rather than treating me like some post-apocalypse Donna Reed whose only purpose is to take care of the young. Then again, that is my job. That’s all I do around Grace. Perhaps that’s why my imagination takes off and I see things along with hearing a deaf, blind and mute boy talk.
4.
Alex Sans
It was a cemetery, despite what Mera called it. She liked to label it the Reflection Area, because she goes there and reflects. On what, God only knows.
I grabbed hold of Sonny, AKA Boots, and asked him if he’d join me in the hunt for the two Sleepers that a few people had spotted on the edge of the Reflection Area.
A huge wall encircled the main compound, but most of our fields and that cemetery were not enclosed. A wooded area on one side and barren land on the other bordered them.
It’s hard to say where they came from, because they could have walked the perimeter of the compound at night.
However, spotting two was worth checking out.
I paused to pass on a moment of respect at Beck’s grave. It was neat and tidy, as were the other graves of people we knew. Courtesy of Mera, who went there every single day. Every day for a year. Who does that?
Mera Stevens.
She had a weird obsession about Beck. She didn’t know him that long, yet she mourned him and missed him like a partner she’d had for years.
“Leave her alone,” Sonny said as I stood after my moment of silence.
“I didn’t say anything.”
“You were going to,” Sonny told me. “You always do. You visit Beck’s grave, you do what it is you do. Pray, count, whatever, and then you say something about Mera.”
“I do not.”
“You do.”
“But don’t you think it’s weird that she is that dedicated to—”
“Stop.” Sonny held up his hand. “She is eternally grateful to him. Let it alone, and let’s see if we can find these Sleepers. I want to get back. Javier is arriving with Phoenix.”
“If Phoenix arrives while were gone, he’ll still be there when we get back.” I dusted my hands on my pants and peered around.
“Now, see, that’s what I don’t get. You were there when he was born. Why aren’t you more excited?”
“I’ll believe he’s coming when I see it. Speaking of seeing …” I shaded my eyes. “I’m not seeing the Sleepers.”
“That was an hour ago. They left.”
“Where’d they go? Reports all said they were just standing over there.” I gestured at the wooded area and suggested to Sonny we head there. It was probably the only place they could retreat without being noticed. We readied our crossbows; never guns, the sound of shots not only attracted Sleepers but also scared the residents of Grace.
“You never did say what Mera was yelling at you for,” Sonny said as we headed toward the woods. “Was it about the pickle?”
“No, but I’m sure that’s coming,” I paused in walking. “Get this. Mera said Keller… spoke.”
“She said what?”
“He spoke. Said words. Asked for milk.”
Sonny crinkled his brow. “Spoke, you say?”
“Now why would you do that?”
“Do what?”
“Say it like that. ‘Spoke, you say?’ What the hell kind of talk is that? Mera said he spoke.”
“You don’t believe her?”
“No.” I shook my head. “And you do?”
“Well …”
“Well nothing. The boy has no eyes, no ears.”
“He has a mouth, he breathes and has vocal chords, and I’ve heard him whimper.”
“But he’d have to hear words in order to know how to speak them.”
Sonny shrugged. “Maybe he can hear.”
“He doesn’t have any ears.”
“Or … they’re blocked and he can hear some things.”
I shook my head and resumed walking. “No. I tested his hearing once. Banged pots. Made all kinds of noise. No response. He’s deaf.”
“That’s odd that you would do that,” Sonny said. “I mean, if you’re adamant that he’s deaf because he has no ears, why test him?”
“Because …”
“Because what?”
“Because sometimes when I watch him he does weird stuff. Leave it at that.”
“Okay, I’ll leave it at that.” Sonny started to walk. “Just don’t dismiss Mera so quick when you just told me he does weird stuff.”
“Shut up.”
“This is why you two bicker all the time. It’s fine for you to think something odd, but when Mera says it, it’s not. Almost as if you’re afraid she may—”
“Sonny,” I halted him. “You are not the resident therapist. Levi is.”
“Man, you’re tough. I think I’m gonna write a passage in the Doctrines about you.”
I shook my head again. “Why do you make things up? That’s supposed to be a future document. A Bible.”
“Who says I’m making things up? Maybe I’ll tell a true story about you.” Sonny stopped talking, and I heard why. Just as we reached the edge of the woods, not a Sleeper in sight, we heard an ungodly moan. Almost a cry of the damned laced with pain.
I whispered, “Where did it come from?”
The sound rang out again. It echoed through the woods making it harder to pinpoint. After a few more moments and a few more cries, we followed the direction.
Was it an animal? It was hard to tell.
“Stay alert, stay focused, and keep an eye out for Sleepers,” I told Sonny as we quietly tromped through the woods in search of the sound.
Then we found it. I held back my arm to Sonny to stop him. Not because I feared what would happen, but rather I had to think of what to do.
The sound didn’t come from an animal or a person, it came from a Sleeper. A lone woman, dirty, pasty white. Her long, dirty hair flung about as she used the leverage of the hillside. She was oblivious to our presence. Naked, on her hands and knees, her legs were spread and with each wave of cries, she pushed back, bringing her rear end out and closer to the ground.
It was apparent by Sonny’s face that he was confused what was going on.
I knew exactly what was happening.
That Sleeper alone in the woods… was giving birth.
5.
Mera Stevens
“And how did that make you feel?”
Seriously? Levi, last name some number, asked the same question every time I went to see him.
“It made me mad. Again. I got frustrated with Alex, again.”
Levi stared at me. “Did you convey to Alex this makes you feel this way?”
I laughed. “Levi, are you programmed? You say the same thing every time I come to you and I have been coming to you since Pastor Mike told me to ta
ke it elsewhere.”
“I am not programmed. I say the same thing because you say the same thing.”
I gasped. “I do not.”
“Yes, Mera, you do. It’s the same complaint, different situations. What was it today? Keller was staring at you.”
That’s what I had told him. Believing that he followed the so-called Doctrines and the Doctrines talked about the ‘evil’ child, I was careful not to convey that Keller possibly was communicating telepathically.
“Maybe it’s time you and Alex come in together, and we’ll talk.”
“You say that, too.” I sat back. “How did you help people in your time?”
“Typically, insidious neurotic targeting of an angry nature stems from an unresolved issue. People tend to remember things differently than how they happened. The more time passes, the less accurate the memory. For example, a man is sorely damaged emotionally because his wife left him. He can’t get past it. Her words were bitter and angry the day she left, and he was a victim, feeling like a victim.”
“Okay...”
“Well, in that instance, he is a prime candidate for cerebral passage. A form of time travel that doesn’t put you physically in the same space and time as your counterpart, just in the mind of that moment, and you can relive it. Oftentimes facing that one moment changes an outlook. The man goes back, sees he said some horrible things to the wife as well, feels less of a victim when he returns.”
“What if he went back and killed his wife?” I asked.
“It is not possible to physically control your cerebral counterpart. In addition, there is the assurance. Now, he could have influenced the words, but then again, if the wife was leaving then, he couldn’t have stopped her.”
“He could have stopped himself from saying mean things to her.”
Levi nodded. “In turn perchance she wouldn’t have blasted him. Same resolution.”
I sat back. “Hmmmm. So you don’t physically leave this realm?”
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