Chapter 14
“Where is our waitress? I need another stack of pancakes.” The table was littered with empty plates. Already I’d scarfed down two omelets, an order of sausage patties, an order of sausage links, two orders of bacon, a short stack of blueberry pancakes, two glasses of chocolate milk, and three glasses of Mello Yello.
“Her name is Jessi, which you should know since we went to school with her for thirteen years and your brother took her to the Fall Dance in eighth grade. And she already thinks you’re on drugs. Maybe we could go through a drive-thru or something if you’re still hungry.”
My binge was equal parts a need for calories and an attempt to assuage my shame. The deer hunting scenario didn’t play out quite as planned. Finding a deer? Not a problem. The entire Land Between the Lakes area is overrun with the vermin. Chasing it down? Easy peasy. I could’ve run all night. But after that…
“She’s too busy to notice what we’re eating,” I said, surveying the room stuffed full of men in ratty t-shirts and baseball caps filling up with a greasy breakfast before heading out for a day fishing.
Talley was stacking plates and picking discarded silverware off the scarred wooden table. “I managed to brush against her arm when she was giving Charlie his third plate of hashbrowns. She thinks we spent the entire night engaged in righteous pot smoking and have the worst case of munchies she’s ever seen.”
“I went to a dance with Jessi Poston?” Jase’s top lip curled as he regarded our waitress. Her hair was brown at its three-inch roots, a dull black the rest of the way down and appeared to be the consistency of dry straw. She had on blue eyeliner and green eyeshadow. To my super-sensitive nose she stank of cigarette smoke and booze. I could even catch a hint of vomit off the stain on the collar of her shirt.
“Well, she wasn’t quite so skanky in the eighth grade.” Talley followed Jase’s gaze with sympathy. “She really started going downhill after her mom got cancer our Sophomore year.”
“Great, now I feel guilty for thinking she’s nasty,” Jase said.
I had no doubt that was Talley’s original goal. She always saw the best in everyone and gave them the benefit of doubt. It pained her that the rest of us were less generous in our opinion of others.
When Jessi came back to leave our bill I made it a point to smile and actually look at her, not just her chipped black polish manicure and asymmetrical butterfly neck tattoo. I was rewarded with a sneer and more than mildly rude inquiry as to whether or not I needed yet another chocolate milk.
Well, at least I had one less thing to feel guilty about.
“I’ve got this,” I said, snatching the small mountain of ordering tickets off the table.
“Seriously? Thanks!” Jase looked as if he just won the lottery. “Although, if you had mentioned it earlier I would have gone with a steak instead of sausage.”
“Let me —”
“No, Charlie. It’s on me. Really, it’s the least I can do after robbing you of your fresh venison buffet last night.”
Jase choked out a laugh while Talley gave my hand a squeeze. “I think your sensitivity to animal rights is admirable,” she said. Jase gave in to a full-on laughing fit, and I could have sworn the corners of Charlie’s lips twitched upwards.
“It’s Walt Disney’s fault,” I said through tight lips. “He brain washed me, and now I’m too busy worrying about poor orphaned Bambi to do my job.”
It was perfect. Once we settled into the hunt we didn’t need to rely on Talley at all. We knew each other as well as we knew ourselves, and our animals were in perfect sync. Then it came time for me, the Pack Leader, to deliver the killing blow. Instead, she looked at me with those hugemongous doe eyes and I couldn’t do it. I just stood there and let her go.
“Talley isn’t wrong, you know,” Charlie said. “To have enough control to override the wolf’s instincts…” The muscles in his jaws jumped. “Not every Shifter can do that.” He threw back the remainder of the sludge Jessi claimed was coffee before giving me something that may have passed for a smile if you didn’t bother looking at his eyes. “Should’ve known you would be pulling super-Dominant stuff on your second Change. You never could stand for me and Jase to be better than you at anything.”
“That’s not true. You’re both much better housewives than me. I mean, you can clean, cook…”
“There are blind three year olds more skilled at using a stove than you. That’s hardly an accomplishment,” Jase countered. “Actually, that’s probably why you couldn’t kill the deer. It was too much meal preparation for you to handle.” His remarks were light-hearted, but I could tell he was somewhere between annoyed and disappointed with me.
“I know. I’m sorry—”
“Stop.” Charlie reached across the table as if to grab my hand before realizing what he was doing. He quickly jerked it back to pick up his now empty cup. “You’re doing a good job, no matter what JoJo the Idiot Brother says.” Jase opened his mouth, but Charlie smacked a hand over it. “Jase says he’s sorry.”
Jase’s eyes said he was considering taking a chunk out of Charlie’s hand.
“Awww…. Jase, it’s okay. I know you’re impaired by a debilitating combination of testosterone and lack of conscious. I forgive you,” I said, falling easily into the familiar banter.
“Jase thanks you for your generosity and further apologizes for having to eat and run, but we both have jobs requiring our presence.”
“You know, it’s really rude to accept a meal from someone without sticking around to socialize. What would you do if one of your dates ran off before you could ‘talk’?” I added both air quotes and a wink for emphasis.
Jase provided his favorite hand gesture.
It took a few more minutes of groveling on Jase’s part (with Charlie providing the monologue), but eventually I deigned to let them leave, my heart miraculously light. I didn’t even mind too much that Charlie had somehow managed to sneak the tickets into his pocket and pay for them on his way out.
“That’s the most he’s said to me in a lifetime,” I said to Talley as they slipped out the back door.
“Give it time,” she said as we watched the boys through the window. “Alex’s death has damaged you both. It’s not the sort of thing that is going to fix itself overnight.”
I shrugged, some of the ease and comfort slipping out of the parking lot with Jase and Charlie.
“Scout, we need to talk.”
I still didn’t look at her. I could tell by her tone this wasn’t a conversation I wanted to have.
“I heard you last night before you shut me out. I know what you’re thinking, and you’re wrong.”
“You don’t know anything.”
“He’s dead, Scout. You were there. Not even a Shifter could survive that much damage.”
I concentrated on finding abstract images in the maple syrup on my plate.
“You went to his funeral. He’s dead. You’re going to have to accept that before you can start to heal.”
I snapped, all the feelings and thoughts I’d been trying to deny since the graveyard raging to the surface. “He’s alive. I know it. I’ve seen him. At the funeral and in the woods. He’s trapped in his wolf form, but it’s him, Talley. I know it.”
She reached for my arm, but I jerked away.
“I know you want to believe it’s him—”
“It is him!”
“No, it’s not, Scout. We buried him two months ago.”
“We buried an empty casket!” I finally looked up and met her eyes. “He wasn’t in there. He’s out there, alive. I know it.”
Talley’s eyes went wide. “How..how did you know the casket is empty?”
“I don’t know how I do, but I know it’s true. The moment I felt of the casket I knew there was nothing inside.” I needed her to see the truth. “Don’t you get it? He somehow managed to Change back to his wolf form and heal. We just have to figure out how to let him Change back. Maybe all he needs is time to heal completely
, or to be around people and remember who he is.”
Talley did not reflect my optimism. “Oh, Scout. You have to know that’s not possible. You know he’s gone.”
“The casket was empty!”
“Because we cremated the body!” Her mouth snapped shut, trying to recapture the words that were already out. Several heads turned our way.
I felt like reality was fracturing around me, hope floating away like ash. “You what?”
Her eyes were pleading. “It’s Shifter custom. We can’t risk someone doing an autopsy.”
“How…” My mouth was moving, but nothing was coming out. “Nevermind. I don’t want to know.” I took deep breaths, willing my extravagant breakfast to stay in my stomach. I lost myself in the bubbles floating to the top of my soda for several minutes, waiting for something that resembled an emotion to break through.
“He’s dead.”
“I’m sorry, Scout.” I felt her hand on my back. My skin was still tender from the Change, but the pain was muted. Everything was muted. “I knew you wanted to believe he was still around, but I thought it was just a normal part of grieving. I never thought you really believed he was still alive. I should have said something sooner.”
“And the dreams? They’re not real either, are they?”
“Dreams?”
“At night I meet him on the same patch of beach where…where he died. He talks to me, helps me. I thought…I thought they were real. That he was reaching out to me the only way he could, through Dream Walking.” The words I hadn’t even allowed myself to think came tumbling out. I laid my head on the table, ignoring the stickiness clinging to the surface. “It felt real. It’s like the dreams from before, 3-D smell-o-vision, the works.” My voice hitched. “I could feel his arms around me. But, then again, I could smell him in the forest today. I could see him.” I lifted my eyes to Talley. “Something’s wrong with me, isn’t it?”
“Nothing is wrong with you, Scout. You went through something horrific. Your brain is trying to find a way to deal with the physical and mental pain you were buried under.”
“I need to go.” I raised up my head, losing a few strands of hair in the process. “I need to get my clothes, and Mom has to work today, and…” I took a deep breath, trying to steady my voice.
“I’ll come with.”
I shook my head. “I need some time.”
I knew I was hurting her feelings, that I should let her ride along, but I couldn’t. If she was there I would have to pretend I wasn’t falling apart. I wasn’t up for the challenge.
I don’t even remember driving across town or hiking the mile down the path where I tossed my clothes. I was in such a fog I had to rummage around for a while to find the right bush. I could have just followed my nose, but it wasn’t my scent leading the way. It was a scent that didn’t really exist. Couldn’t exist.
She’s wrong. He’s been here. I can smell him.
Except, I knew it was a lie. In so many ways, I had known it all along. But when faced with the option of believing in the impossible and accepting that you can no longer trust your own mind, the choice made is not always the logical one.
The fragments of my heart that had managed to meld themselves back together were once again pulling free and venturing off on their own, leaving my chest hollow and empty.
Chapter 15
“What’s wrong?” Alex towered over the place where I collapsed once I found myself back on the beach. I squeezed my eyes closed and refused to play along, certain I could will myself into another dream.
I didn’t work.
“You’re dead,” I finally said without looked at him.
“I’ve been that way for a while now.” He sounded confused.
“This isn’t real.”
He sat down beside me and tried to put his arm over my shoulders, but I moved away. “It depends on your definition of real, I guess.”
“My definition includes, ‘not just a dream Scout’s brain conjured to keep her from slitting her wrists’. Yours?”
“This isn’t a dream.”
I laughed the laugh of the crazies. “No, I go to sleep at night and start having conversations and make-out sessions with my dead boyfriend. Not a dream.”
“Scout…” He grabbed my upper arm. I tried to jerk away, but he was too strong. “What happened? What’s wrong?”
More maniacal laughter. “Wrong? Everything is wrong. You’re dead, Alex. Really dead. The casket wasn’t empty because you’re still alive. It was empty because the Hagans decided to burn your body because, really, killing you wasn’t enough. And if losing you and Charlie and, in some ways Jase, wasn’t enough, now I’ve lost my mind, too.”
“You thought I was alive?” He brushed my cheek where tears should have been.
“Just… just stop, okay? I can’t do this.”
“Do what?”
“This!” I gestured at the crazy dream lake with wild arms. “I can’t keep seeing you, touching you, believing in you —” The last words were lost in an ugly sob. I buried my face in my hands and let go. Hallucination Alex had enough good sense to leave me alone during my stellar display of self-pity fueled waterworks. When I finally gave it up, I found him standing by the water’s edge, chucking stones into the lake with a brutal force.
“Have you ever noticed,” he asked, “how hard it is to do the right thing? It’s like, you look at all the options, decide which one is going to suck the most, and that is what you’re supposed to do.”
“If doing the right thing was easy everyone would do it,” I conceded, walking up to slide my arm into his and rest my head on his shoulder. If I was going to be crazy I might as well enjoy it. “So what sucky thing should you be doing?”
His head rested on mine. “What you asked me to do. Leave you alone, let you move on.”
I knew it was time for me to make the decision. I could either continue living this lie or cut him off completely.
“I can’t do this on my own.”
“You’re stronger than you think.”
“You know, people always say that, but everyone has a breaking point, Alex.”
His arm moved around my back and tugged me closer. “You can survive this. You have to.”
“Why?” Giving up would be so easy.
“Because fulfilling your destiny will be hard. That’s how you know it’s the right thing to do.”
Chapter 16
I continued going through the daily motions. Angel decided she needed to learn to sew her own clothes after catching a rerun of Project Runway, so we signed up for a mother-daughter class at the community center. She was happy to add another thing to her list of Things Scout Is Completely Incapable Of Doing Well. Normally it would have bugged me that my shirt had only one arm hole and two necks, but I couldn’t bring myself to care.
The only thing to break through the fog was our training sessions. I pushed myself and the others even more. We were all covered in bruises, most nights limping our way up the stairs and to bed, but no one complained.
I was able to put on a good front most of the time. Eventually, Talley quit asking if I was okay on an hourly basis and even seemed to dial down the suicide watch. As long as there was someone to perform for, I could do it. It was when I was alone the world crumbled, taking my living girl facade with it. I would sometimes come crashing back to reality with the realization I had been staring at a wall for countless hours, nothing to indicate what transpired other than an overwhelming sense of grief and abandonment.
Fortunately, between my sister, who was going through a clingy stage, and my Pack, I was rarely left alone for very long. That is why I panicked when faced with an entire day to myself. Mom and Dad took Angel to St. Louis for the weekend to visit the zoo and some museums, and everyone else had long shifts at work. I tried to keep busy, even cleaned my bedroom. It was a task which should have taken me hours, if not days, but since Talley moved in, my room transformed from a haven for clutter and disorganization to a carefully
arranged and labeled monument to the obsessively compulsed. I dusted every top and vacuumed every inch of carpet, even using the hand-vac to get under the bed. Of course, I learned that trick from watching Talley do the same thing two days prior, so it was basically an exercise in futility. Thirty minutes later, the room was beyond clean and I was facing at least eight more hours alone.
At the mere thought of it my chest got tight. I had to fight for breath, and the harder I fought, the worse it got. I collapsed against the wall, my entire body trembling.
Calm down, Scout. It’s just a panic attack. You have to relax to breathe.
It was one of those things your brain knew to be true but had trouble convincing your body. I worked on taking slow, deep breaths, and eventually I was able to get a grip, but I still felt strung out. On top of everything else, I was angry at myself for not being able to just get over it. I wasn’t the only person to ever face tragedy and loss, yet I seemed to be the only one who couldn’t move forward. How did other people deal with it?
I pulled myself off the wall and straightened the picture I knocked aside during my little episode. It was one Talley recently dug out of a pile of pictures Ashley Johnson brought over after Alex’s funeral. The pictures were Ashley’s attempt at turning P.I. She had laid her claim on Alex in the third grade I-saw-him-first fashion and hated me with the fiery passion she normally reserved for skin blemishes and clothes bought at Wal-Mart. While Alex and I conducted our secret affair, Ashley kept a photo record of our escapades. After Alex’s death, we sorta-kinda-not-really had a reconciliation, and she turned over the photos. I flipped through them only once, and then tossed them into a drawer. Talley found them and fell in love with one that showed the two of us standing chest-to-chest, staring deep into each other’s eyes with the goofiest of smiles plastered on our faces. She put it in a frame and hung it on the wall.
I wondered if she was torturing me on purpose.
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