A Shiver of Blue

by Everly Frost

  Rebecca tried to smile. “Seems like.” She forced a laugh. “It will be nice, don’t you think? A big, white fence along there, with a nice, white gate and this pathway running to the stairs, and flowers and shrubbery—nice shrubbery, mind you, the pretty kind—around the house…” Her voice trailed away, mottled sunlight reflecting across her face as she stared out at nothing again.

  I placed my hand over hers and she finally looked me in the eye.

  “It’s okay, Rebecca.”

  “No, it’s not. When Nathan found you and brought you back—oh, the look on his face. There was so much blood and you were so pale and those cuts…” She wrenched her hands free, gesturing at my face. “What did that to you, Caroline? Is it still out there? Dad sent men. Everyone from town went hunting and they didn’t find it. Not a dog, not a wild animal. They didn’t find anything.”

  She stared at me, waiting for the answers I didn’t have. I didn’t know what had happened. There were flashes, images, but nothing that I could make sense of, nothing that would sound real if I spoke it out loud. Like the night our mother died. The other me had buried it all so deep inside me and I let her because I didn’t want to remember.

  I said, “It was a dog, Rebecca. Just a hungry, wild dog.”

  Robert had stopped working and watched us. Rebecca turned her head in his direction as though he spoke to her. “I’m sorry, Caroline. I shouldn’t be upsetting you.”

  She paced down the stairs, stopped beside Robert, and he asked her something that I couldn’t hear. She shook her head before she walked away, her arms wrapped around herself.

  I wobbled to my feet, the rough planks of the veranda scratchy under my toes. I knew that if I slipped back through the hallway, while they weren’t looking, I could make it to the back of the house and out to the stables before anyone knew I was gone. I wasn’t going to do anything reckless like trying to ride. I just wanted to see Cloud, bury my face in his neck, and forget about all of this for a while. I wanted to feel safe again.

  As I stepped carefully down the back path, I caught sight of a flash of brown skirts near the dog kennels. Edith must be training the new pups and I guessed Aunt Alice hadn’t stopped her from doing that. I wondered if it was part of some kind of silent deal: Alice had somehow gained Edith’s support to make changes but Edith had no doubt claimed her own terms. I hurried on before she caught me.

  Somehow, I made it to the stables without tripping over or ripping open any of my wounds. I was going to get in a lot of trouble, but it would be worth it.

  As soon as I got there, I felt better. The smell of fresh hay filled my senses, along with the comforting scent of polished saddles. I closed my eyes and drank it in, my whole body shuddering with relief. This place, at least, hadn’t changed.

  I stumbled over to Cloud’s stall, the prickly hay beneath my feet and the first joy of days in my heart, but when I peered in, the stall was clean and empty. My shoulders slumped. Jack must be exercising him. I glanced around at the other horses, all locked in their stalls, munching at their feed boxes.

  My chest hurt. I wondered if I’d made a mistake coming here. I pressed my hand gently to my side, to my broken ribs. They were supposed to be healing, but something pushed against my lungs. I took a little breath and winced, telling myself I was okay.

  I took another breath. Okay, that’s better.

  I hobbled toward the door, past the other animals and the saddle rack near the entrance where I stopped and frowned.

  Cloud’s saddle and rug hung there, where they usually were, but Jack never rode Cloud without the saddle. My breath pinched my lungs again and I staggered over to the rack to rest against it. My hand lay on Cloud’s saddle, the familiar leather cushioning my side as I leaned into it.

  There were footsteps and Jack arrived with a bale of hay in his arms. He stopped still when he saw me.

  “Caroline.” He dropped the bale and rushed over, taking my arms. “What are you doing here? You shouldn’t be here. You don’t look good. I’m taking you back to the house.”

  I didn’t move. “Where’s Cloud?”

  He paused. “They said they’d tell you.”

  “Tell me what?”

  “He’s not here anymore, Caroline.”

  “What do you mean? They moved him?” I stared at him. “They sold him?” My voice rose. “Did they sell him?”

  “No, Caroline… He didn’t make it. He was hurt, real bad. He must have got between you and that animal. Probably saved your life, but he was all cut up. It was real terrible.”

  “Dead?” I laughed. “Don’t be silly, Cloud isn’t dead.”

  My voice cracked and my eyes leaked. Hot tears streamed down my cheeks. That’s when I remembered the crack of a gun, the shot right before I passed out in the field, right before Nathan’s strong arms had lifted and carried me away from the place where the animal attacked me.

  I remembered Nathan telling me not to look around, begging me not to see Cloud as he lay there, groaning in the grass. There was suddenly a strange sort of anger inside me, like hungry acid, eating into me.

  There were more footsteps and my father said, “Jack, there’s a heifer in the—”

  The hurt filled my chest, a horrible pain weighing me down. When I spoke, I didn’t recognize my own voice.

  “Why didn’t you tell me?” My voice was a soft hiss, broken sounds, like speaking for the first time and not remembering how. They wrenched up from inside me, cold and icy, like the voice I heard as my little brother drowned. “You were always a coward.”

  “Caroline. Darling.” He took a step toward me, ready to pull me in, a placating expression on his face.

  I opened my mouth and screamed at him.

  The breath froze my throat, so cold I thought I would crack apart. “Why didn’t you tell me? All that time. He was dead. You shot him and you didn’t tell me.”

  He reached for me without saying anything. His eyes were wide, his face alarmed, raw as ripped cowhide.

  “How could you?” I wanted to hit something—anything. I grabbed Cloud’s saddle from its perch and heaved it at my father. It thudded against him, right at his chest, and I wished it were a knife that would cut his heart out.

  The blood drained from his face. He took the blow and let the saddle drop to the ground.

  He said, “Meredith. Forgive me.”

  My whole body shook as he said my mother’s name.

  Racking sobs tore out of me. The pain in my chest expanded. This time, I knew I’d really hurt something.

  I tried to walk, slipped, crashed to the hay, but a pair of arms enfolded me just in time. Not my father’s arms. Not Jack’s arms. These were strong and gentle and I knew them.

  I struggled, but Nathan held on.

  Chapter 6

  I SLID TO the ground while Nathan’s body curved around me, his legs cushioning my fall.

  Jack pushed my father away, out of the stables, their outlines blocking the sun. The light flashed sapphire around them, the color of my mother’s room, brilliant and flickering. I thought I might be sobbing, but I couldn’t tell for sure.

  “They were afraid.” Nathan’s voice was low and calm, a gentle hum in my ears that compelled me to listen. His voice. The same voice that rescued me when I lay out in the field. It resonated in my heart like I’d waited for it, as though my whole life had been lived to hear it.

  As he talked, she faded.

  Her thoughts in my head—her anger—became weak. His touch repelled her. She wailed as she went, icy tentacles clawing at me, trying to suck me down with her. Then she was gone and I was alone in my head for the first time since I could remember.

  “They were afraid because they didn’t understand it. They couldn’t comprehend the horror of it. When Rebecca saw you, she started screaming. She thought you were dead. She couldn’t believe there was still life in you.” His arms were warm, but there was an edge in his words as he said, “You wanted to die but I wouldn’t let you.”

  I res
ted my head back against his shoulder and it settled there like it belonged.

  “Cloud was one of the bravest horses I’ve ever come across. He defended you, protected you, but even he wasn’t strong enough. I won’t ever forget the sight of his mangled body next to yours… the flies, the broken flesh, the blood drying in the hot sun. I can’t forget it…”

  He paused. “I had to shoot him, Caroline. I had to end his pain and you can hate me for it. If you want.”

  I did.

  I hated him with all my heart. I wanted to kill him for taking away the only thing that was precious to me. Cloud. My horse, my freedom, my protector. But the agonizing hatred spiraled away, disappearing like salt in water. Because I wasn’t the one who had to take the shot, to pull the trigger and end Cloud’s life, because he’d saved me from that.

  His voice changed—determined. “I wasn’t going to let you die out there. I fought for you. And I’ll fight for you even if you won’t let me.” He shifted, moving his arms, turning me to meet my eyes. “They were trying to protect you. I’m telling you this because I want you to understand.”

  He picked me up and cradled me against his chest. “I’m taking you up to the house now.”

  Jack and my father waited outside but neither of them moved to take me. Instead, my father walked on ahead up the path to the house and Nathan carried me after. When Dad opened the door, Rebecca rushed toward us, cut off by Dad’s harsh words that brought tears to her eyes.

  Edith appeared behind her, took one look at us, and yanked Rebecca out of the way.

  “I’m sorry.” Rebecca strained against Edith’s hold, her pleading face turned up to Dad’s.

  “You were supposed to watch her.”

  She bit her lip, her shoulders slumping, limp in Edith’s clutches. I wanted to tell Rebecca that it was okay. It wasn’t her fault. I raised my hand and Nathan must have sensed what I wanted, because he swerved so that my hand brushed her arm.

  Aunt Alice waited at the top of the stairs. She ushered us down the hallway and into my room. I didn’t want to leave Nathan’s arms, didn’t want her to fill my head again, but he let me go, his eyes meeting mine for a moment as he placed me down on the bed.

  As soon as he stopped touching me, the other me hissed through me, surfacing like steam forced from a kettle.

  My head bubbled and my ears shrieked. All the voices in the room jumbled and swirled. Aunt Alice said something about the doctor but that was the last I made out…

  The other me beat against me like thousands of tiny wings.

  I couldn’t push her away. She was bees, swarming over me, landing on my arms, my chest, my face, buzzing and stinging, punishing me for her absence, punishing me for my moment of peace at the hands of a man—a man!

  The hissing pain crashed for so long that it merged into one long shriek and I sank into a cocoon of artificial silence, trying only to protect myself.

  I stayed like that for hours, maybe days, as the sunlight brightened and faded and brightened again, over and over, until I couldn’t tell what was day and what was lamplight. At some point, my hand pinched and I sensed the line, dripping intravenous fluids into me, the doctor’s voice a muffled whisper behind the constant shriek, the other me rampaging inside my body, on and on.

  She screamed and raged and screamed and then… without warning… her shriek changed into something else—a wail of terror.

  The shadow glided into the room and frightened the other me away.

  There was silence, but there was no peace, not like when Nathan touched me.

  The shadow was shrouded in darkness, insubstantial, but her touch was like knives.

  “Are you dead yet, Caroline?” Her shadow-whisper reached me through the darkness and, along with it, came another sound.

  Swish, swish. A rocking chair. Someone in a rocking chair.

  At first I thought that it was the other me after all, that she had quieted and returned, but this voice came from outside me, heckling the air.

  I recognized it. It was the same voice from the night my mother died, the same voice that followed me, giddy and giggling, into the dark bush and helped me wrap vines around my tiny neck.

  The shadow girl said, “You really should be dead.”

  I shrank away. I tried to protect myself, to curl into a ball.

  She leaned forward out of the chair to feather the cuts on my face with her sharp fingers, digging into my skin. There was a dribble of warmth down to my chin, pooling at the base of my throat. “You look so much better now, with these cuts on your face. Not exactly like Meredith anymore. Now I will be able to tell you apart.”

  Soft laughter. “Death isn’t so bad, you know. Why don’t you die? Or maybe you’re already dead.”

  No.

  I woke up, blinking my eyes, taking in my room and everything in it.

  I was not dead. I was alive, lying on my bed, moonlight filtering across me. I took a breath and a deep sense of relief flowed through me as cool air filled my lungs.

  Moving my fingers and toes, I had a new appreciation for the pain in my side. I touched the wetness at my throat and my fingertips came away coated black in the moonlight. I felt upward, over my cheek. One of the cuts on my face was open and bleeding.

  There was a sound.

  Beside my bed, an empty chair rocked back and forth, the movement slowing until it stopped.

  Chapter 7

  I TEETERED AT the top of the stairs while darkness played in pools below.

  I didn’t know how long I’d been in my room, lying on my bed—alive, but dead. I couldn’t be in there anymore, not with that chair, with its dark cushion still indented with someone’s form. So I’d pulled out my IV drip, hobbled out into the house, and stopped at the top of the staircase, swaying on the brink of panic.

  A yellow glow receded from the base of the stairs so fast I could have imagined it. And then other footsteps approached.

  The hallway light flashed on, way too bright.

  “Caroline. Good heavens. You’re awake. You’re finally awake.” Rebecca’s arms closed around me, warm and welcoming arms full of fright and relief. Then Aunt Alice, Timothy, and even Dad hovered further back. In the middle of it all, I glanced at the bottom of the stairs, but the shadow was gone.

  “Caroline, your cheek. What happened?” Aunt Alice urged me back along the corridor to my room. “Rebecca, fetch some water, we have to clean her face. Caroline, what happened to it? Why is it bleeding again?”

  I shook my head at her. My voice was strange to my own ears. “I don’t know.”

  I wondered how I could explain that someone had been in my room. I glanced back at Dad, at how he lagged behind. “I guess… I must have scratched it.”

  “Never mind.” Aunt Alice’s arms were comforting as the last of my nightmares receded. “You’re awake. That’s all that matters.”

  She ushered me into my room, shooing Timothy back to his. Dad hesitated in the doorway and Alice turned to him. I couldn’t see her expression. His lips pulled into an acknowledgment of sorts before he lumbered away. Alice turned on my bedside lamp as Rebecca returned with water and a cloth.

  Alice saturated the cloth and pressed it to my cheek. “Sit down, Caroline. Let me clean this properly.”

  I winced, but didn’t complain. As much as I wanted to push her away, tell her I could do it myself, I felt compelled to accept her help. I allowed my eyes to close for a moment, soaking up the feel of the material dabbing at me, wondering if this was what it was like to have a mother.

  Aunt Alice was talking to me. “How long have you been awake, dear?”

  I shook my head. “Just now. I woke up and came out. How long was I…” I struggled to describe it: Dreaming? Asleep?

  “A few days, sweetie.” Rebecca sat next to me. I thought she was going to hug me again, but her hands folded in her lap and strangled each other.

  Aunt Alice rinsed the cloth and the liquid swirled dark with my blood. She peered at my cheek, giving her head a sma
ll shake.

  “Oh dear, Caroline. We’ll have to get Dr. Falkner out again tomorrow morning. He isn’t going to like the look of this.”

  “I really don’t know what happened.”

  She patted my shoulder and I caught her hand. “Does Dad hate me?”

  She blinked. “Of course not, Caroline.”

  “But I yelled at him. I said things…”

  “You were upset. He understands that.”

  “But…” I turned my face away.

  He said my mother’s name. When I screamed at him, he said my mother’s name, as though he forgot who I was.

  My forehead creased. “Can you tell him I’m sorry? I know they didn’t have a choice. Cloud was dying and there was nothing that could save him. I know that. I was angry and scared and…”

  “Caroline.” Rebecca hugged me. “It doesn’t matter anymore. You’re safe now. You’re awake now. Okay?” She smoothed my hair down my back and flicked a look at our aunt that I couldn’t decipher.

  Alice picked up the bowl of water and gave my shoulder a final squeeze. “It’s time for us all to go back to sleep.”

  I captured Rebecca’s hand as she stood to go. “Stay here?” I hoped that she would snuggle with me like we did when we were little girls, keeping each other company, keeping the bad dreams away.

  Rebecca kissed my forehead but her hand slipped out of mine. She left me to stare at my bedside lamp and the shadows lining up around my room to dance across the walls. I pushed the rocking chair away into a corner and turned the cushion upside-down, as though I could turn around time.

  I’d get rid of it tomorrow. Determination tugged at the corners of my mouth as I pictured myself hacking at it with an axe. Tomorrow, I would put it on the pile of woodchip. If Alice had her way it would only be the first of many unwanted tables, cupboards, picture frames, and chairs.

  With that thought, I hid beneath my blanket and forced myself to sleep.

  The next morning, I woke early, dressed, and hobbled from my room, dragging the rocking chair with me. I collided with Timothy as he bounded up the stairs, two at a time.