by Alisa Valdes
My mother laughed, and kissed me softly on the head. “Nice to see you still have your sense of humor. That bodes well for your recovery.”
“If I’m sick,” I corrected her.
“If you’re sick,” she said condescendingly.
“I’m sorry, Shane,” Kelsey told me, getting up to hug me, too. She had tears in her eyes, but I didn’t return her embrace. “I know you’re mad at me, but I think someday you’ll thank me. I did it because I love you.”
I said nothing in return.
“I really hope you’re still going to help me with the Christmas party next weekend,” Kelsey told me.
“Sure,” I said.
“We should let her rest,” my mother told Kelsey.
“Okay,” Kelsey said. “Good-bye, Dr. Romero. Bye, Shane.”
My mother hugged Kelsey tightly and thanked her. “My daughter doesn’t know how lucky she is to have a friend like you,” she said. “Tell your parents they raised a great kid, okay?”
“Okay,” Kelsey said with a self-conscious giggle. “Bye.”
And with that sickening display of affection mercifully ended, I plunked my dirty bowl into the sink, and staggered off down the hall to my room, locking the door behind me.
I went to the computer on my desk, and moved the mouse to wake it. Then I opened the internet browser, and went to the search engine. I typed in “Travis Hartwell” and “New Mexico,” pressed Enter, and waited. Moments later it returned a page of results, the top six of which were stories from the Valencia County Times about rodeo competitions. I scanned past these, looking for something else—and found it.
The seventh entry was a news brief from an Albuquerque television station. The headline confirmed my worst fears, and also confirmed that my mother was wrong about me: BELOVED BELEN BROTHERS DEAD IN FIERY CRASH.
I clicked on the story. It told of a freak accident on Highway 550, in which a truck hauling a horse drove off a cliff and was instantly incinerated. The truck belonged to a ranch owner named Deirdre Hartwell of Belen, New Mexico, but was mostly used by her younger son, a rodeo competitor. The boy and the horse were killed in the crash.
Suddenly, the pendant on my neck felt hot. I put my hand to it and nearly burned myself. Unable to bear its heat against my skin, I quickly undid the clasp and dropped the pendant on the desk. It seemed to be throbbing with light for a moment, and then cooled down. I was on the right track.
I continued to read the news story.
The truck was driven by her two sons, Travis and Randy Hartwell, last seen at a rodeo competition where Travis, a straight-A student at Belen High, had placed first in calf roping. Randy, a part-time student at the University of New Mexico, was employed at his mother’s ranch and often supported his brother during competitions. Hartwell was surprised to learn that her sons had been so far from home and had no explanation for why they might have been driving on that isolated road. The heartbroken Hartwell, who had only these two children, said that they were “good boys,” adding, “We were all very close.”
So he’d lied about being homeschooled. I didn’t blame him, I guess. What was he supposed to say? “Hi, I’m eighteen and dead?”
I clicked on several other stories, most of them much the same.
One story, however, from a small independent Santa Fe newspaper, went into more depth than the others, and mentioned that the two young men had tragically lost their beloved father, a local rancher, in a random drive-by shooting in a grocery store parking lot when they were very young. A smiling photo of their handsome, kind-eyed father, Gregory Hartwell, jogged my memory.
The dream.
Gregory Hartwell was the man gunned down in the dream Travis had shown me. I remembered the children the man had pushed in the cart. Of course! The older one must have been Randy. He’d tried to save his father. The baby, that poor, dear, sweet little baby, must have been Travis.
I paused, with tears welling in my eyes, feeling incredibly stupid and guilty. I didn’t know why it hadn’t occurred to me before. It was so terribly sad. They’d been through so much. No wonder Randy was angry and an alcoholic! What child wouldn’t be scarred for life having witnessed so terrible an act committed against his own father? He was, as my mother often called it, “self-medicating.”
I looked at a few more stories. The photos of Travis and Randy revealed without a doubt that they were the young men I knew. It had to have been them. Their poor mother, I thought. She’d lost first her beloved husband, and then her only children. I wondered what she was doing now, how she had been able to go on.
I clicked on the earlier stories about Travis’s rodeo competitions. It turned out that he had been the top tie-down roper in the state in his age group, and in the top three for that sport nationally, quite famous in those circles. He was also a talented fiddle player and singer, and often performed around the Southwest with his own alternative country band that, one of the pieces said, had been accepted to play at the prestigious South by Southwest festival in Austin, Texas, this year.
I wasn’t surprised that Travis was that good at sports and music; he was clearly a skilled athlete, very coordinated, and he’d mentioned playing the fiddle. I was surprised he hadn’t mentioned how good he was at any of these things, though. I’d bragged to him about being the top youth violinist in the city, and he’d acted impressed while never offering up his own accomplishments for me to marvel at.
I turned the computer off, feeling more unsettled than before. How could I be so proud of a guy who was dead? Why didn’t he feel dead in my heart? I couldn’t be hallucinating, like my mother said. And why was my pendant suddenly seeming to operate with a mind of its own?
I just didn’t know anymore.
My stinging, squinty eyes began to shut. I turned off the lights, missing Buddy with a hollow sick feeling, fell sideways onto my bed, still wearing my boots, and drifted off into an instant, deep slumber.
It didn’t last.
No sooner had I begun to dream of a beautiful boy at a rodeo on a perfect summer day, when I was awakened by the distinct sound of a determined fingernail, tap-tap-tapping on my bedroom window.
Chapter Fourteen
I sat straight up in bed, my heart pounding, and listened. Be careful.
I heard the echo of Travis’s whispered voice in my head, fading like the dream I’d just had. I couldn’t remember the details, just a dream with Travis in it, and we were sitting near a pond.
Tap, tap, tap.
I took a labored, shallow breath.
Three taps, all in succession, played out in exactly the same rhythm each time. I sat paralyzed with fear. What could I do? Move? Not move? Scream? Run away? Crawl into bed with my mom? Nothing seemed right, other than sitting stock-still and hoping it’d go away.
Tap, tap, tap.
I’m here. It’s okay.
Why could I hear Travis’s voice now? Maybe I was still half asleep. . . .
Tap, tap, tap.
That was when I caught a faint glimmer of light in the corner of my room, near the beanbag. I looked, and saw a distinct shadow outline now, and it was in the shape of Travis.
“Travis!” I whispered, filled with mixed emotions. On the one hand, it was nice to know Travis was here with me. On the other hand, I was happy that I hadn’t changed into my pajamas earlier, realizing I would have had an audience.
“Travis, what’s happening?” I whispered.
The shadow morphed into the orb and zipped through the wall by the window, then came back in and faded into the ghost smoke, wrapping itself around me.
Tap, tap, tap.
Self-consciously, I got up and padded over to the window, lifting the edge of the curtain to peek outside.
There stood Logan, tall and strapping as ever in his yellow ski instructor parka, his handsome face illuminated a pale orange-yellow by the streetlamp down the road. His breath came in frigid, foggy clouds, and he hugged himself against the cold. In the high desert of New Mexico, the nighttime tempera
ture could be as much as twenty or thirty degrees lower than the daytime temperature. I was sure he was freezing, and felt sorry for him. When he saw me peeking out, he smiled, and waved. I cracked the window.
“What are you doing here?” I asked, aware that I was being watched by Travis.
“You didn’t answer my texts or return my calls,” Logan said, stepping toward me, whispering. “I was really worried about you.”
I realized I hadn’t checked my phone since calling Kelsey on the drive back from Chaco Canyon.
I said to Logan, “Sorry. Dead battery.” It was a lie, but innocent enough. “I’m fine. Just busy.”
“Kelsey called me,” he said with a concerned expression on his face. “She told me about your brain injury and hallucinations. I’ve been worried.”
“She what?” I whispered furiously, anger filling my body.
“I’ve been trying to reach you. I wanted to make sure you were okay.”
“I’m fine, no thanks to my supposed best friend.”
“Can I come in?” he asked.
I balked. He’d never come here at night, or been in my room without my mom knowing it.
“Um, no. Sorry. I don’t think that’s a good idea,” I said.
“Then can you come out for a minute?” he asked. “I want to take a little walk and talk.”
I glanced back at the digital clock on my nightstand. “Logan, it’s three in the morning!”
“I know. I couldn’t sleep, I was so worried about you. I . . . I think I love you, Shane.”
It was the first time he’d ever said anything like this to me, and I did not know how to respond. I didn’t love Logan. I liked him, but I did not love him. In fact, I knew in my heart that I was going to have to break up with him if I ever wanted to have anything with Travis. I didn’t like hurting people’s feelings, or accepting that I was in love with, you know, a dead guy, but it was inevitable that I’d have to do both, and soon.
“I appreciate that,” I said, awkwardly, “but I’m really tired and I just want to go back to bed.”
“I understand,” he said, seemingly embarrassed that I hadn’t returned his declaration of love. “Just a quick walk? Just up to the end of your street and back.”
“My mom,” I said worriedly. In truth, I was sure she’d be out cold. Whenever she drank wine, she was difficult to rouse.
“Please, Shane? I have a lot to tell you and I can’t do it through a window in a whisper.”
“Fine,” I said, growing irritated, but also preferring the idea of talking to Logan away from Travis. I resolved to break things off with him right here, right now, because it needed to be done. It would be difficult, but easier done out there, in the cold, with a clear head.
Because I had fallen asleep in my clothes and boots, I simply shrugged into my jacket, removed the screen from the window as quietly as I could, and climbed out somewhat clumsily. I wondered if Travis would stay in the house, or come with me. I hoped he’d stay behind and give me some privacy. Travis and I had a lot to work out in this regard, I realized.
Logan helped me out of the window, then planted a big kiss on my lips. I felt awful, like I was cheating on Travis. I made a note of this, realizing that as crazy as it sounded, I felt more like Travis’s girlfriend than Logan’s. Our kiss, our touch was dull. I saw a wisp of smoke snaking through the wall and hovering just behind Logan. Travis was coming with me. He’d seen the kiss.
“Let’s walk fast,” I said, wanting to get this over with. “I’m freezing.”
We moved stealthily across the yard, careful not to wake my mother or anyone else in the neighborhood, all the way to the driveway, and then down to the street. There was no one out, and the full moon was bright, lowering toward the west. Logan told me all about the conversation he’d had with Kelsey, and then came the shocker.
“I know everyone will probably tell you you’re crazy,” he said, trying to hold my hand, “but I want you to know that I’ve had some experiences lately that are kind of like what you’re talking about.”
“You have?” I asked, stunned. I pretended to be too cold to hold hands, and hugged myself. “Like what?”
“I can’t really talk about them,” he said, “because it sounds bad, I know it does, but I want you to know that I don’t think you’re crazy, with the souls and all that.”
The determination I’d been hoping for to break up with Logan started to fade. He was the last person in the world I would have thought would believe me, especially after the way he had treated Travis at the bagel shop.
“Thanks, Logan,” I said affectionately. But ultimately, this wasn’t a good development, was it? This was making things harder.
We continued up the road, toward where it dead-ended at the foot of the mountain about two blocks away. The night was still and quiet and dark, but I saw the smoke and shadow of Travis curling and wafting through the frigid air alongside us. Logan, for all his talk of spirits, did not notice.
“What I can tell you is that I know what I know from hunting,” Logan said. “I feel this incredible connection with something, or someone, bigger than me, every time I take an animal down.”
I immediately disliked the sound in his voice. I could not relate to what he said because I’d never killed anything that I knew of, and had no desire to start. I remained quiet, and he began to talk animatedly, in a hypermasculine tone.
“It’s just this animal instinct I can’t explain,” he said almost in a growl. Suddenly, I heard something crunch and rustle in the tumbleweeds just back from the road, near us. Logan noticed instantly, his eyes and body turning toward the noise, his hand reaching quickly into the pocket of his parka and extracting the obscenely large, weird knife he’d shown off earlier in the week. The weapon’s blade glinted in the pale light of the streetlamp.
“What are you doing?” I asked, horrified.
“You hear that?” he asked, crouching wildly, with a crazy look in his eyes and a manic sound to his voice. “Something’s out there. A rabbit, I bet. Perfect timing! This is what I mean. I’m so good at tracking, Shane. I don’t want to brag, but I’m better at it than anyone I ever met. It’s like what I was born for. I can smell the animals, feel their fear. I get a rush from it.” I heard him take a deep breath as he stalked predatorily, and silently, toward the sound we’d heard, and I held my breath as he stood still, listening.
No more sound came.
“I didn’t realize this was a hunting trip,” I griped miserably, “or I would have stayed home.” Any rekindled affection I might have felt for Logan a moment before was gone as quickly as it had come, replaced by disgust.
Logan returned to my side, apologizing. “It’s just, when I hear an animal moving, instinct takes over my body. I can’t explain it. The older I get, the stronger the instinct. It’s a survival instinct, but it’s God, too. I know it because I can feel the animal’s spirit leave its body after the kill.”
“Okay,” I said doubtfully.
“Is that what it’s like for you, seeing spirits?” He did not wait for me to answer, which was just as well. “Knowing that you hold the power of life or death over something, looking it in the eye, and feeling its energy, knowing there’s more to life than what we can see with our eyes, and just knowing that you were sent here to partake of it, that you were meant to reap that energy for yourself—I feel powerful, you know? Alive. In control.”
I looked at Logan and felt a heavy revulsion wash over me. I knew I liked burgers, but I did not understand this bloodlust Logan suddenly had.
“It’s not like that for me,” I said carefully. “But I think I hear what you’re saying.”
“It’s just really liberating to be able to tell someone,” Logan told me. “I knew there was a reason I was attracted to you, other than you being totally hot. Which you are.” He paused and gave an attempt at a smoldering, sexy look, and then he whispered, “I want you so bad.”
He pulled me toward him, and pressed me against his body. I could fe
el his excitement, and it repulsed me. I pushed away from him, and he grabbed at me, grotesquely, aggressively. I had to jump out of the way to avoid his hands.
He grinned, thinking it was a game, and growled, “There are only two things that make me feel alive: sex and hunting. I never thought I’d be able to share them both with the same person, you know? We’re soul mates, Shane. That’s what this means.”
I cringed at his use of the phrase soul mates because I knew it wasn’t true. I also hated that he assumed I was going to go all the way with him. We’d never done it, and after hearing what he was saying tonight, I had lost any desire I might ever have had to do so with him. I also knew that it wasn’t the time or place to say any of this to Logan, who seemed drunk on his own power in a way that chilled me to the bone.
Logan grabbed me and pulled me in to him, forcing a kiss onto my lips. I squirmed and tried to get out of his grip, but it was too strong. The harder I pulled back, the more ruthlessly he pressed my body against his. I felt his excitement again, rising against my leg, and was overcome with the urge to spit. I strained again to get away, but he wasn’t having it. He forced me against him, and stuck his tongue into my mouth, and down my throat, so roughly I almost threw up. I twisted away from him, and he was about to grab me again when we heard the crunch of sticks underfoot, much louder now, just ahead of us, and then the sound of something sprinting off toward the empty expanse of land at the end of the cul-de-sac, toward the mountain.
“Oh, yeah,” Logan said. “Wait here. I’m gonna show you what I mean. Here, bunny bunny bunny!”
With that, he darted off after whatever it was. I stood horrified at the side of the road, frozen with fear as he disappeared into the national forest land. I spit on the ground, and shook Logan’s ugly energy off of me. I heard rustling, grunting, and other awful noises, snorting, and then a yelp of pain that wasn’t human. What the heck was Logan doing? This was too strange, almost stranger than everything else I’d been through. I considered turning and running home, but something—I truly believed it was Travis, oddly enough—told me it would be better for me to stay right where I was.
