Touching Cottonwood

by Randall Simpson

  “Something wrong?” asked the agent.

  “I’m not sure, exactly.” Akash’s fingers once again rapidly pushing buttons.

  “You wrinkled up your face,” said the agent, studying Akash.

  Akash stopped pushing buttons and stared in blank silence at the screen.

  “What is it?” asked the agent.

  “It doesn’t make sense,” said Akash.

  The agent reached over, and Akash mechanically handed him the unit. On the small screen was a map of Cottonwood and the surrounding area. From top to bottom of the screen ran Main Street. A perfect circle was plotted on the screen around the town.

  “What’s that circle?” asked Agent Westmore.

  “That, my friend, is the Cottonwood Dead Zone.”

  “It looks good to me. It’s a perfect circle. What’s the problem? Why did you wrinkle your face?”

  “The fact that it is so perfect,” said Akash, reaching for a fork and taking a bite of blueberry pie, followed quickly by a taste of ice cream.

  “You have a problem with perfect circles?” asked the agent.

  “I have nothing against perfect circles. That glass containing your milkshake and that straw you’ve been slurping it down with are pretty close to perfect circles. The problem is—we don’t find perfect circles in nature. I suspected that the Dead Zone was created by some kind of electromagnetic event; I expected to see an elongated oval-shaped pattern.”

  The agent took a careful sip of his shake and glanced once more at the screen. “I didn’t realize that I was ‘slurping’ my shake, but isn’t, for example, the Earth a perfect circle?”

  “No, not at all. It’s actually a flattened sphere. Nature doesn’t make such perfect circles. Like your glass and straw, some kind of intelligence made the perfect circle of the Dead Zone, and—”

  Before he could finish, someone rang the cowbell near the end of the lunch counter. Akash turned to look in the direction of the bell. A few patrons and employees cheered.

  “What’s going on?” asked Akash.

  “I’m not sure,” said the agent. “I’ve heard it all afternoon and evening, and the waitress was talking about ‘miracle fridges’ or something, but I didn’t quite get what she was saying. It’s happened four or five times since I’ve been here.” He leaned across the table toward Akash and in a low voice added, “Hey, small towns are pretty weird, let’s face it.”

  Akash watched the young man with the cowbell put it down and walk over to a white board. With a dry-erase marker, he made a mark next to the word Milk. It looked like some kind of a tally, and there were about twenty marks next to Milk. Several other items were also listed on the board: Eggs, Cheese, Butter, Bread, and Potatoes—each with several tally marks next to them as well.

  Akash caught the attention of the waitress, and she came over to the booth.

  “How was that blueberry pie?” she asked.

  “Delicious,” said Akash, glancing at his nearly empty plate. “I was wondering though, could you please tell me what that ringing cowbell and all the cheering was about?”

  “I guess you must be new in town,” said the waitress. “You are at the official home of the ‘miracle fridge.’ In fact, I guess you could say—it’s turning into sort of a whole miracle kitchen.”

  “Miracle fridge? Miracle kitchen?” asked Akash.

  “Well, I wasn’t convinced at all before, but I sure am a true believer now,” said the waitress. “It’s the most amazing thing I’ve ever seen.”

  “I’m afraid you’ve lost me,” said Akash. “What is this ‘miracle fridge,’ what are you a believer of, and what’s it have to do with the cowbell and all the cheering?”

  The waitress smiled. “Whatever we need just appears—milk, eggs, cheese—whatever. When we’re running out, it shows up.”

  “You’re getting deliveries? Here in the Dead Zone?”

  “Oh yeah, we’re getting deliveries, all right,” replied the waitress with a small chuckle. “Only it’s not by any trucks we can see. Invisible trucks, maybe.”

  “Invisible trucks?” said Akash.

  “I’m kidding, honey. Nothing’s been delivered for days, but we’ve always got plenty of everything. It’s just a miracle,” she said as she walked away.

  “Thanks,” said Akash, turning and staring at the agent.

  “So, can you make any sense of that?” asked Agent Westmore.

  “I don’t know,” said Akash, shaking his head. “I’m guessing some practical jokesters or mass hysteria, maybe?”

  “I suppose so,” said the agent. He looked back at the screen Akash was holding. “Now, tell me more about perfect circles….” He reached across the table and picked up the GPS unit, studying the map once more. “So why is your perfect circle not centered on the screen, if it’s so perfect? It looks a little off center. What does that mean?”

  Akash looked at the map. “Well, it’s simply because, earlier, I had to pick some point, so I arbitrarily used the town hall on Main Street as the center. The true center of the Dead Zone is somewhere else. Here, let me reset the map to use the true center of the circle as the center of the map.” Akash pushed a few buttons, and the map and circle shifted. The circle was now centered on the screen.

  “So, what’s the true center of the Dead Zone?” asked Agent Westmore.

  Akash studied the screen for a moment. “Well, it looks like it’s somewhere on Main Street, a few blocks up the street from the town hall. Let me zoom in. Then I can tell you exactly where it is.” Akash repeatedly hit the zoom button on the unit, and the circle grew larger and larger until, finally, he had zoomed in to the maximum extent on the small crosshair at the center of the circle. “There you go,” he said, studying the screen before pushing the unit across the table to the agent. “It appears that the center of the Cottonwood Dead Zone is a point on the sidewalk about twenty-five feet south of the intersection of Main and Second Streets.”

  “What’s there?” asked the agent, looking at the screen.

  “I have no idea,” said Akash, eating the last bite of his pie. “Care to go for a walk?”

  “You don’t want to drive?” asked the agent.

  “I need to work off that pie.”

  The two paid their tabs and headed out of the brightly lit diner into the warm, dark, and quiet night of Cottonwood. Akash carefully studied the backlit and glowing screen on the global positioning unit as he walked.

  “Sure is peaceful,” said the agent.

  “Yes, isn’t it,” replied Akash, not really paying attention but continuing to look down at the screen.

  “I can’t remember a time in my life,” continued Agent Westmore, “when I’ve been on a street anywhere in the country without any traffic at all—except maybe years ago when I was a new police grunt and got stuck with the graveyard patrol shift. Sometimes in downtown Tacoma after midnight it would be nearly this silent for brief periods—until another little trickle of cars would go by as the next bar closed down for the night.”

  “I enjoy the quiet. Makes it easier to think clearly,” said Akash as they passed the town hall, and he continued watching the screen.

  They walked for a few more blocks, and then Akash suddenly stopped and looked at the agent. “We’re at ground zero of the Cottonwood Dead Zone right now. It’s the center of the circle, and the phenomenon extends the same exact distance outward from here in all directions.”

  The two men looked around. They were standing at the midpoint of the sidewalk on the west side of the street, just south of the intersection of Main Street and Second Street. They were standing in front of a small store—Rhonda’s Bridal & Floral.

  “Should we be seeing something?” asked the agent. “I sure don’t see anything remarkable about this spot.”

  “Nor do I,” replied Akash, “but I sure would like to have been here last Friday, just before noon. That’s the time the reports say this whole thing seems to have started,” said Akash. “There must have been something remarkab
le about this spot. Maybe we don’t see anything now, but it’s always the things that you don’t see in the universe that are the most interesting.”

  Agent Westmore paused. A slight chill ran up his spine. The words were familiar. He’d read them earlier that evening. The court transcript! It was out of the mouth of Matthew Duncan. It’s always the things that you don’t see in the universe that are the most interesting. He’d never come across those words before in his life, as far as he could recall, and yet now in the span of a few hours, he’d twice come across the same unusual phrase. He said nothing to Akash.

  “Well,” said Akash, “I guess I’ll come back out here when it’s light tomorrow and have a look around. Maybe I’ll get a maintenance crew to come and jackhammer out this spot of sidewalk. Could be something under there that we’re not seeing. I’m sure the mayor will be thrilled with that request. You ready to head back?”

  Agent Westmore said nothing but stared into the silent night.

  “I said,” repeated Akash a bit louder, “are you ready to head back?”

  “Oh, sure,” said Agent Westmore, turning to look at Akash. “This supposed center of the Dead Zone looks pretty dead to me.”

  The two walked in silence back down Main Street toward the Cottonwood Inn, each lost in his own uneasy thoughts. Though neither had the right words to adequately express what they were feeling, something strange, uncomfortable, and unfamiliar had taken root inside of them. It had started growing from an unknown seed, vague and foreign, carried on the winds from an uncharted and untraveled country, resting forever beyond words—the seed of mystery. To face that growing mystery, if he were able to, Akash Mudali would have started digging up the sidewalk in front of Rhonda’s Bridal & Floral right then and there—looking for the physical, tangible, and measurable source of the mystery. As for Agent Westmore, when the two men passed the sheriff’s office, something inside of him wanted to go running inside the building, straight to the solitary cell of Matthew Duncan. He’d quickly unlock and swing open the heavy door, and confirm that his escapee was still there. But it was the thing the agent knew he would do next that perplexed him the most. He knew he’d ask a question—a question his instincts as an investigator told him should be irrelevant—yet he’d ask it anyway. The newly sprouting mystery inside of him would force the illogical question from his mouth—Exactly where were you, Matthew Duncan, on the previous Friday, shortly before noon?

  Sixty-Eight

  A Dark Ride Home

  It was after sunset when Rebecca finished her shift and had completed all the paperwork she needed to do before leaving. Because she had ridden her bike to work, she had three options—she could stay at the hospital overnight, ride home in the darkness on her bike, or ask Eddie to drive her home in a golf cart. She had no intention of taking the last option. The first option, of staying overnight, might have been acceptable, except for the fact that, though she was already scheduled to work on Tuesday, she wanted to visit with Matthew as early as she could in the morning.

  All these circumstances forced Rebecca into the uncomfortable choice of riding her bike home in the dark. She gathered up a few spare flashlights she found around the nursing office, for use when the power would go out, and put them in her backpack. She was glad for the fact that her bike had a very good light on the front. She often rode around Cottonwood at night and frequently used the light. Though there would be no vehicles on the road on this night, she knew the highway to town would be dark, and she hoped the bike light would at least light up the yellow stripes of the lane markers The worst part of the whole trip, she knew, would be the necessity of passing by Eddie’s house along the highway. The bright bike light would be a welcome companion during that part of the trip.

  She used the staff nurses’ private restroom to change into her riding shorts and then slung her backpack over her shoulders and stopped by her office to lock the door. She turned and looked up the hallway in both directions. There was no one in sight. She quickly went to the front door and walked out to where her bike was parked. She was more appreciative than she’d ever been before that the area was well-lit. She quickly unlocked her bike, placed the lock into her backpack, and glanced quickly around once more as she mounted her bike and headed for the highway.

  The terrain was fairly level to slightly uphill, but she knew the longest and steepest part of the ride was the long hill just prior to approaching Eddie’s house. As she’d hoped, her bike light did a decent job of lighting up the lane markers and even cast a glow into the dark forest on both sides of the highway. She rode near the center, just to the right of the lane markers. Something about getting too near either edge of the highway bothered her.

  She knew from past experience that it usually took her about twenty minutes to ride home, and so she imagined that if she pedaled extra hard and fast, it should be even quicker. There was a small ravine on both sides of the road, and it would be possible for someone to kneel down in it and then suddenly spring up onto the road in front of her. She rehearsed in her mind what she would do in such a situation, and she was prepared to act quickly and steer wide to the other side of the road and pedal as hard and fast as her legs could manage.

  In Rebecca’s mind, she felt that bikes, in general, could certainly travel much faster than golf carts. Even if Eddie had somehow seen her leave work and was able to instantly get in his golf cart and follow her, there was no way he could catch up to her. She also reasoned that if Eddie were somehow to come up from the ravine and appear on the highway in front of her, she could easily get around him, especially traveling at the speed she would be.

  It was after riding about two miles, when she happened to have instinctually looked over her shoulder to check the highway behind her, that Rebecca first saw the light. It seemed a good distance back down the highway and was very small, but there definitely was a light. She pedaled a bit faster and harder, but when she checked a few moments later, the light remained behind her and seemed to have grown steadily brighter; it was definitely getting closer. She was certain there was no way it could have been a golf cart. She pumped the pedals even harder, and directly ahead was the biggest hill between her and Cottonwood. It was so steep that it always forced her to shift down into the lowest gear on her bike to make it to the top.

  She was breathing hard as she began the climb. Normally, she would have already shifted down into first or second gear, but she kept the bike in third. Her leg muscles began burning; she was barely able to move forward. She needed to downshift and moved the gears to second. She glanced behind her. The light continued to grow brighter and closer. She continued to pump the pedals as hard as she could. Her muscles were on fire, but she kept the gears in second. When she was about halfway up the hill, she glanced back and estimated the light was then just about at the bottom of the hill. With lungs and legs burning and heart pumping, she pedaled as hard as she could. She desperately wanted to shift to first but resisted. She knew she was almost to the top. She could see the road leveling out in front of her. She glanced back over her shoulder. The light was gone! That didn’t slow her down. She stood up and pushed the pedals as hard as she possibly could. Fear and its cousin, adrenaline, moved her forward and upward.

  Then she was at the top—her legs spent, almost numb with pain. She shifted up to third and then to fourth. That’s when he brushed by her. She knew instantly—it was Eddie. He was on a bike as well! He came as close as he could without the two of them actually colliding, and she nearly lost control of the handlebars. Eddie must have turned off his bike light as he’d approached her, but it was more than obvious that he meant to come as close as he had. Did he mean to cause her to crash? Though his close approach caused her to wobble, she maintained control and stayed near the center of the road.

  Her light lit up Eddie’s back as he passed, and she saw that he was also standing up and pedaling hard. He turned his head to look back at her. It was too dark to be certain, but she imagined a sneer. She slowed down but did not st
op, wanting to let Eddie get a good distance in front of her. Though she felt more helpless now with him in front of her, she dare not stop, and she dare not turn around. To turn around and head back toward the Home, she imagined might cause Eddie to sense her fear and react. To simply stop would mean to lose her momentum, and to go forward was to risk getting closer to Eddie, if he suddenly decided to slow down. Rebecca slowed down but kept pedaling at a pace that allowed Eddie to get gradually further ahead. As she watched his dark outline ahead of her, he turned his bike light back on, and it was illuminating the road ahead of him. He continued pedaling much faster than she was and was rapidly increasing the distance between them.

  Eventually, Eddie disappeared somewhere into the darkness, and Rebecca knew that his house was just ahead. She had to pass it to get home, or she could turn back. She was determined to get home.

  Eddie’s house was on the east side of the highway, or Rebecca’s left, as she approached it. It sat at the top of a small hill with a long driveway leading up to it from the highway. There was a yard light in the front of the house near the carport. It had been at least five minutes since she’d last seen any sign of Eddie or his bike light on the highway in front of her. As she approached the point where his driveway intersected the highway, she looked up toward the house to see if she could spot any lights on inside which might indicate that Eddie had gone in. The house was dark.

  As Rebecca passed by the driveway, she felt a moment of relief—followed immediately by a sudden shock. Her bike light revealed the dark silhouette of a man standing very close to the right side of the highway in the gravel between the blacktop and the ravine. She knew it was Eddie, and he was less than fifty feet ahead. She swerved far over into the left lane. She didn’t want to look directly at him or in any way divert her eyes from the dark highway. She pedaled hard and fast. Eddie made no motions toward her, but as she passed by, out of her peripheral vision she could see some sort of motion, as though he had knelt down or reached to the ground and then suddenly stood up, almost as though he were picking something up. She pumped hard and furiously, never looking back but focusing intently on the dark road and the yellow lines leading home.