High Lonesome Sound

by Jaye Wells

  To Ruby, he said, “Granny seemed to think there was a way to send them back where they came from.”

  “Oh no,” Junior said, “I ain’t taking part in no devil magic.”

  Lettie snorted. “What the hell do you think them things are, Junior?”

  That shut him right up.

  “Ruby, do you think you can try, if we can create a diversion?” Peter asked.

  She lifted her head from the musty fur. “Try what?”

  “To sing.”

  Junior made a sound, but Lettie barked a low word to shut him up.

  She threw up her hands. The movement scared the cub, who cried and scampered away down the pew. “There has to be some other way.”

  Silence greeted her words. Her chest felt tight, like her ribs were constricting her lungs, keeping them from drawing in enough air.

  “Your grandmother seemed to think you had some magic in ya,” Edna said.

  “She wanted to believe that, but Granny didn’t know me. We didn’t see each other for ten years. Truth is she needed to believe I had her power so she could die in peace.”

  A new voice jumped in and said, “That’s not true.”

  Ruby spun around to see Sarah Jane, her face tear-stained and swollen, coming forward. “You’re lying, Ruby, and you know it.”

  She stood to face down her old enemy. “Shut up, Sarah Jane. You don’t know nothing about it.”

  The other girl crossed her arms and glared at Ruby. “I saw you.”

  “What?”

  “One day down by the river when we were about eight. I was out collecting flowers and you were there, down by the old red tree. I saw you, Ruby. I saw you.”

  The blood drained from Ruby’s face. “Shut up.”

  “What did you see?” Lettie demanded.

  Sarah Jane turned to address the whole group. “She had a dead bird in her hand—a blue jay, wasn’t it?”

  Ruby clenched her jaw and refused to answer. She was too busy trying to figure out how she could have missed Sarah Jane watching her.

  “Anyway, Ruby was singing to the bird and at first I thought maybe it wasn’t dead, but I swear it didn’t move at all. But then the wind picked up and the river started rushing louder. The Ruby lifted her hands and threw the bird in the air and it flew. The bird flew on its own.”

  “Oh come on,” Junior said, “You expect us to believe that girl brought a dumb bird back to life. It probably was just sick.”

  Sarah Jane shook her head. “I would not lie in the house of the Lord, Junior Jessup. Not about something like this.” She rounded on Ruby. “I knew then you were a freak, just like your grandma.”

  “Sarah Jane,” Sharon said in a scandalized tone.

  “She is, Mama, and you know it.”

  Ruby wanted to deny it. She wanted to call Sarah Jane a bully and go rock in a corner until she woke up from this terrible nightmare. But she couldn’t deny it or run from the truth. “That’s why you were always so mean to me? Because you saw that?”

  “I told my daddy about it and he said it was because all the women in your family is touched.”

  “They may be touched, but the only one of all of us whose managed to make a dent in the monsters outside was Granny Maypearl with her singin’,” Bunk said. “And Peter there with my truck,” he shot Peter a wry smile.

  “Sorry about that,” Peter mumbled.

  Bunk waved his metal pincer to dismiss the apology. “My point is if what Sarah Jane is saying is true then Ruby does have some of her granny’s magic in her.”

  “It doesn’t matter,” Ruby said. “Ever since my mama died I haven’t been able to do any of that stuff.”

  The bear on the pew mewled.

  “The mountain doesn’t sing to me anymore. That was the real source of Granny’s magic—being able to hear nature talking to her.”

  The bear cried louder.

  “Hush, Bear,” she snapped.

  “Ruby,” Peter said, “when did you start hearing the bear cry?”

  She frowned at his odd question. “First time I remember it was the morning after Mama died.” She’d never forget waking up with her head on a pillow wet from tears to the sound of that pitiful little cub hollering for its mama.

  Peter exchanged a look with Bunk and Lettie. “Did it ever occur to you that maybe the mountain was still singing to you but just in a different way.”

  “What?” She paused. “You mean through the bear? That’s ridiculous.”

  The bear growled.

  She tilted her head and really looked at the cub’s face. Its eyes were still crusty and the body too thin, but she couldn’t deny feeling a strong pull towards the creature, a responsibility.

  “I know you’re scared,” Peter said, “we all are. But if there’s a chance that you have that magic somewhere inside you, we’ve got to try.”

  She pulled her gaze away from the cub’s sweet face and looked at Peter’s solemn one. “How?”

  “You’re going to have to try to sing.”

  Instead of balking, she asked herself what Granny Maypearl would say.

  Be brave.

  She took a deep breath, pulling the air deep inside and then releasing all of it—the fear and the regrets and the confusion over the crazy things she’d seen that night. She released her anger at her daddy and her rage at her mama for leaving her. She let go of her grief, too, but just for now. Later, if she survived, she’d honor Granny’s memory properly. For now, she needed to focus on being present so she’d have a chance at a future.

  When she breathed in a second time, her chest felt more open, like she’d made some space in there once more for hope. “I’m going to need some music.”

  Bunk winked. “Now, that I think we can manage.”

  While Bunk ran off with Earl Sharps to rustle up some instruments, and Lettie and Edna went to go comfort Sharon, Ruby walked over to Sarah Jane.

  “What do you want?” the other girl snapped.

  “To thank you.”

  Sarah Jane’s expression became guarded, like she suspected a trap. “For what?”

  “For reminding me that I’m a freak. I’d forgotten there for a while.”

  “I don’t know what’s so good about that.”

  Ruby smiled at the girl who she once believed had everything in the world. “You might be pretty and your daddy might have been powerful, but you’ve got an ugly heart, Sarah Jane Fry. And the truth is, when things need fixing, it’s never the mean, pretty girl who gets things done. It’s always the weird girl with the good heart who saves the day.”

  “You been reading too many fairy tales, freak.” Despite her toxic words, her bottom lip trembled. “None of us is going to survive the night.”

  It must have been hard to hide all that fear behind such a hateful mask.

  “Maybe not,” Ruby said, “but if I’m going to die anyway, I’m not going out like a coward.”

  Thirty minutes later, Sharps called from the window. “They’re moving around again!”

  While the rest of them worked, he’d stood watch and reported that about every five minutes or so, the undead would shift their positions. The most troubling report had been that the little demon boy who called himself Isaac was nowhere to be seen.

  Bunk took up the fiddle and looked to her. “What do you want us to play?”

  Beside him, Lettie had a banjo in her lap. They’d found the instruments in an old storage room from back before Deacon Fry took over the church and banned all music, except the religious piano tunes allowed at Sunday services.

  Ruby sat on the steps of the altar and looked out over the church, where people were busy making makeshift defense weapons in case she failed. “Do you know the ‘River Song’?”

  “I’m afraid I don’t know it.”

  She wasn’t unsurprised. Back when Ruby was little, Mama would sing her that song every night before she went to sleep. Knowing what she knew now, she wondered if her mother had written it during that time in Nashville or if s
he’d heard it in a smoky bar on Beale Street, but back then Ruby thought it had to be a real famous song ’cause it was so pretty. “I’ll start singing and you just play along, okay?”

  She closed her eyes and cleared her throat. It had been a long time since she’d sung anything, and she was worried that keeping her eyes open would allow her to see the shocked and worried expressions on everyone’s faces. She licked her lips and began.

  Oh Lord, take me down.

  I say, Oh Lord take me down.

  Take me down to the riverside

  Where the water’s cool and the shore is wide.

  Oh Lord, take me down.

  The first halting notes of Bunk’s fiddle and Lettie’s banjo joined in, picking up the simple melody. With each new word, the rust shook off her voice.

  Take me down where the water’s clean

  Where the saints give blessings and the current’s mean

  As she sang, she remembered back to when she was little and her mama would turn on the radio in the kitchen and they’d dance around together. She thought about those sunny days on the riverbank with Granny Maypearl when the whispers of the trees would tickle her ears and the river sang its secrets. She sang for the proud and lively women they used to be instead of the sad and tragic memories they’d become so recently.

  Oh Lord, take me down.

  When the waters rise I won’t run away

  ‘Cause we’ll all be a’swimmin’ come judgment day

  Her body swayed in time with the melody. She imagined the notes dancing in a circle around her. She willed them to enter into her ears and down her throat. She urged them to circle her heart and remind it how much it used to love to sing.

  The song reminded Ruby of longing and loneliness, which was to say that it reminded her of herself.

  Oh Lord, take me down to the river wide

  And carry me away on your righteous tide

  Oh Lord, take me down.

  As the last note left her mouth, she finally opened her eyes. Everyone in the church had stopped what they’d been doing to listen. The final notes of Bunk and Lettie’s music echoed through the chapel and disappeared, and the entire room fell silent.

  She realized that tears were flowing down her cheeks, and delayed self-consciousness overtook her. She swiped at the tears, feeling like a fool. There was Peter in the front row of the church staring at her like she was some sort of alien. Edna sat nearby crying into her apron. Ruby figured they were tears of surrender as Edna realized that Ruby’s terrible voice couldn’t save them after all.

  Peter stood and said, “Damn it, Ruby.”

  She flinched.

  “Why have you been hiding that voice all this time?”

  Bunk hooted and grinned at her, and Lettie dabbed at the corners of her eyes.

  “Like an angel,” Edna said. “Just like her mama.”

  Her temporary relief tumbled like a stone into a deep well. Mama’s voice hadn’t been powerful enough to make her dreams come true. Would Ruby’s be strong enough to save them all?

  “Oh shit!” Sharps looked over from the window. “He’s back.”

  Peter ran over. “Who?” But he reached the window before Sharps could answer. “Damn.”

  “What’s wrong?” Ruby asked, even though she was afraid to know.

  “Ruby Barrett!” It was him—the ringleader. “I hear you singing in there!”

  She jumped up from the step and clasped her hands together. The idea of that demon listening to her sing her mama’s song made her sick.

  “Easy,” Peter said. “He’s trying to mess with you.”

  “Too bad you don’t have your granny’s power, girl. Might as well come on out and pay the piper.”

  No one moved. No one said a word.

  The demon tried again. “I’ve got your friend out here.”

  Ruby looked around quickly to count heads. She didn’t see anyone missing—

  The cry cut through the air like a missile.

  “Oh no,” she breathed. “Oh, God, please no.” Another scan of the room confirmed her fear—bear was not there.

  Peter came to the same grim conclusion as she did. “God damn it, Junior.”

  The man in question picked at his teeth with a toothpick as he leaned against a pew. His shotgun hung from his left hand. “Had to be done,” he said in a tone that other men might use to share the weather forecast. “Always knew that bear would be good for bait.”

  Ruby had never wanted to punch another human more than she did at that moment.

  Luckily, Peter did it for her. “You son of a bitch!”

  Junior took the hit and spit blood on the chapel floor. He didn’t bother wiping his lips, choosing instead to grin at Peter with teeth stained red.

  Something inside her cracked and, from that single crack, fractures spread through her, destroying the fragile parts and revealing a steely core that had lain hidden behind her insecurities.

  She marched to the door and threw the bolt.

  “Ruby, no!”

  She walked out before he could stop her.

  The undead surrounded the poor creature, taunting it. Ruby ran down the steps before her instincts could tell her to go back into the church. She’d survived a lot of horrible things on that cursed day, but she was damned sure not going to stand by while poor Bear, who she’d barely just freed, became the plaything of such evil.

  The demon, who still looked like a little boy, stood with a hip cocked beside the Cadillac. She wasn’t sure if she should feel relieved or horrified that Deacon Fry’s body was gone. Best not to think about that now.

  She stopped on the steps so she could look down on the demon child. “You let him go right now.”

  He laughed and the sound had an otherworldly quality, like it rose from a deep cavern. “Only if you let us play with you instead.”

  She put her hands on her hips even though they trembled something fierce. “You get out of this town.”

  He pulled back with his eyebrows raised. His body morphed from the little boy back into the larger form of Jack Thompson, only now he didn’t look as he had when he died. Instead, he looked like he had at the peak of health.

  She gasped and stumbled back.

  “Well, now,” he drawled, “if I’d known you were such a spitfire, I would have given you what you were begging for when I was alive.”

  Her courage drained out of her like dirty bathwater. “What?” she whispered.

  “You were hot for me, Ruby Barrett. Practically panting for me.” He slid a hand along the hood of the car. “I know you used to wonder what I did to Sarah Jane in the backseat of her daddy’s big Cadillac.”

  She shook her head because she was too horrified to speak.

  “Poor little Ruby, always imagining everyone else’s lives and never having one of your own. It’s sad.” He exaggerated his pout. “Who do you think you are?” He lurched forward, raising his voice. “Who the fuck do you think you are challenging me?”

  She stumbled back until her heel struck the hard stone of the step. Her arms windmilled as she struggled to maintain her balance. This amused Jack, who brayed like a donkey.

  The sound acted like a splash of cold water on the heat of her shame. “We don’t want you here. Leave this place.”

  Jack placed his hands on his hips to mockingly mirror her posture. “Make me, you little bitch.”

  He turned his back on her and sauntered toward the cub. Ruby went still, knowing one wrong move could mean terrible things for her friend. He knelt down. His joints popped like gunshots. He clucked his tongue at the bear. “Come ’ere, you little shit.”

  Bear growled and swiped a paw in the air. Ruby took two steps forward.

  “Careful,” Peter said behind her.

  “Come here!” Jack shouted and took a swipe at the cub.

  “I told you to leave her alone.” Her voice was strong, but she did not shout.

  He leered at her over his shoulder. “I’m going to rip this cub apart while yo
u watch. Then I’m going to kill all of your friends. Once that’s done, I’m gonna march up that mountain and find those two brat sisters of yours and make you watch while I bury them alive with your mama.”

  He waved at the flailing corpse of her mother, who was still pinned between the church sign and the truck fender. Terrible growls emerged from that ruined mouth that used to sing her lullabies.

  The demon thought he was being shocking. He thought she was a baby who would run and cry if he said mean things. But Ruby had seen things that night that strengthened her heart. Made her realized she’d been pretending to be a girl when she was really a woman who didn’t know her own power.

  The demon lunged at the bear and laughed like a schoolyard bully.

  Poor little Bear. She hadn’t asked to be taken by mean old Junior Jessup. She hadn’t done anything wrong to cause her own mama to die. It just happened because sometimes in life, awful things happen. There’s no reason for it.

  After Mama died, Ruby had made the mistake of closing down her heart and trying to escape her life altogether. But if she’d been successful in her original escape plan, she never would have been able to save Bear. She also wouldn’t have had the honor to help her grandmother move into the beyond, and she never would have had the chance to show all of the people of Moon Hollow—least those who were still alive—that she might be touched, but she was no goddamned coward.

  She stepped forward again. Ahead, Jack had one of the bear’s paws in his disgusting hand. The cub mewled pitifully.

  She closed her eyes and took a deep breath. The damp night air felt good in her lungs, full of mountain mist and the promise of the coming dawn. She breathed slowly until she could hear her own heartbeat in her ears. As she listened to the primal rhythm of life, she thought about the things she loved in Moon Hollow. The way the sun kissed the ridges in the morning, and hugged them at dusk. The way the fireflies danced through the graves on Cemetery Hill in June. The smell of wood smoke in the winter and the taste of cold creek water in the fall. She opened herself to these sensations and memories and expanded her consciousness to include the whole mountain and everything in it.