Messenger 93

by Barbara Radecki

  3

  HE FOLLOWED THE ROAD, sheltered inside the woods, in the direction of Deerhead. After about two hours of steady hiking, we stumbled into town. It was a small town — there was a diner, a family restaurant, a gas station, a motel, and a few other storefronts. I was so exhausted. I was ready to break into one of the motel’s rooms so I could fall into a bed.

  There was a sad used-up pall over the town. Charlie’s story about Jocelyn’s dad echoed back. He was in Deerhead waiting for a ride home. Found his body, side of the highway, frozen to death. Murder. I pictured Jocelyn following her father’s broken trail, retracing his final steps, looking for her own clues. Grief-stricken, but maybe not alone. Maybe a walking target for someone pretending to help her.

  I shuddered and followed Gray out of the protection of the woods. We were about to step onto the main street when I stopped and grabbed Gray. He followed my gaze. Several people had converged in the parking lot of the motel and were chatting over their cars and pointing in various directions. “Lily,” Gray said, as if she was the one to fear.

  We scrambled for a stand of trees and hid in the shadows to watch the group of ten or so. Walter was there too, and so was the woman I’d decided was Jocelyn’s mother. Lily and Walter looked strong, ready to take on dragons and trolls.

  “The cops must’ve brought the little girls back to their families,” Gray said in low voice. “None of their parents are here.” He peered at them for a few more seconds, then said, “The search for Jocelyn must be back on.”

  He pulled out his phone and contemplated his list of recent calls. I could see the numbers — home, Dad, and also Lily from the phone-call he’d made two days ago asking if he could bring me to their house.

  “You want to talk to Lily?” I said gently. “It’s not like she’ll know we’re right across the street.”

  “If anyone would know we’re right across the street, it’s Lily.” He watched the group at the motel make decisions. A few got into cars and drove off, Lily and Walter and the rest stayed behind, talking, checking around.

  Gray twitched and groaned under his breath. I could feel him starting to move forward, then flinching back, and it reminded me a little of when I’d followed him at City Hall, how my muscles had surged and slumped, how I’d accused him. How I was wrong about so many things.

  Neither of us saw the two patrol vehicles until they pulled into the motel parking lot and steered close to Lily and her group. So much law enforcement in such a remote area.

  A shot went off inside me. I stumbled for cover.

  Even though they couldn’t have known I was there, even if it wasn’t me they were looking for, I kept rushing away, escaping the cops and Jocelyn’s search party, ducking back and back, until I was submerged in the forest again. I was about to turn and run when something caught my arm and pulled me to a stop.

  “Hey, whoa,” Gray said. “You leaving without me?” He offered a small smile to keep it light. But there was a lump in my stomach and it was swelling.

  “No,” I said, panting. “I just … wanted to get to cover.” I gathered my breath, my will, then looked up at him again. “You should go to them, Gray. Tell them I went back to the city and that you stayed. It’s okay.”

  “No —”

  “You should be with them.”

  “They’ll just send me home again. They don’t want me here.”

  “That’s not true. They’ll understand — because you stayed for the right reason.” Not like you, a hidden voice hounded me from the darkness.

  I backed away from him and his eyes focused intently as he measured his choices.

  Hyper-telescopic eyes. The memory of his touch on my skin.

  “You should go to them, Gray. I’ll be okay.” I tried to smile at him. Because I knew this was the right thing to do — I had to give him up, had to let him go. I had to look for Krista, had to let him look for Jocelyn.

  Our eyes were locked, both of us listening so hard to the preaching inside our own heads that you couldn’t even call it looking at each other.

  I knew then that I’d do anything for him. That I’d done it already. I had changed my mind so I could be with him.

  I didn’t look back once as I walked away. Didn’t even glance over my shoulder.

  But soon I heard the steady dead-leaf crunch of his boots on the trail behind me.

  Then his hand slipped into mine.

  And the wholeness of my relief was epic.

  FATIGUE AND HUNGER RADIATED off us like illness. We didn’t really look for Jocelyn or Krista, but trudged through the forest with no clear direction or plan. We didn’t spy on properties — I can’t remember if we passed one — and didn’t see a single person that we could investigate or watch. We needed rest and a place to camp before it got dark. But neither one of us had the energy to make the decision to stop.

  We walked another two hours without break when Gray froze and crouched down behind a thicket. He put his finger to his lips and I crouched too and followed his pointed gaze.

  Silent movement deep inside the woods seemed to gather like smoke. As it wound around the trees, shaking off the barred shadows of the setting sun, I saw that it was a person. A tiny man wearing an oversized, drooping parka and an enormous, faded, knit cap on his head. He walked perfectly erect and poised, almost like a ballerina, picking his way around moss-covered rocks, pointing soft boots over fallen branches. He was carrying an old wicker basket in one arm, and every now and then he’d bend over and pull a fresh clump out of the ground and add it to the basket. I looked down and noticed for the first time how many shoots of green were pushing up.

  The man was leaning over, inspecting a patch of soil, when his head snapped up and he looked at us. “Good evening, good evening.”

  Gray and I shrank back, but the man waved his hand like he was expecting us, or like he ran into strangers in the woods all the time. Gray stood up and stepped out of the thicket. “Hello.”

  The man lifted his basket. “Dandelion and chickweed arrived on time for dinner.”

  Gray took a cautious step towards him. “I hope we’re not trespassing.”

  “No, no. The land belongs to all of us.”

  Gray approached him warily. “Sorry if we took you by surprise.” He extended his hand. “My name is Gray.” The man shook his hand. The top of his wool cap barely came to Gray’s chest.

  “And I’m M,” I said.

  “Welcome, Gray. Welcome, M,” he said, shaking my hand too. “My name is Dusty.” He beamed up at us. “What’s the given occasion? Hiking through the park?”

  I remembered the trucker asking if Gray and I were headed for the national park. Hideous memory-flashes edged in of what had happened the day before. I had to hold my breath to block them out.

  “You live around here?” Gray said. Wondering, I could tell, if this man had anything to do with Jocelyn or her disappearance. It seemed unlikely. He had that radiant calm of someone too high for meanness or evil.

  “I live everywhere, and nowhere,” Dusty said. “I live in the universe.” He grinned mysteriously. “Or maybe I only live in the minds and hearts of the people who meet me.”

  Gray and I snuck a look at each other.

  Clutching his basket to his chest, Dusty ambled off. He beckoned with his finger. “Come. Come for dinner.”

  Gray and I exchanged another glance. He was pale and drawn and his eyes were drooped with exhaustion. I imagined I looked about the same. We needed food and water and sleep. And maybe this strange little monk would know something about Krista or Jocelyn.

  HE LED US ON a maze-like trail, changing direction, either left or right, at seemingly random trees. Every now and then he’d stop so he could pluck out another fresh shoot and add it to his basket, or he’d pick up a stone or leaf or insignificant piece of forest, stand erect, examine it closely, and then toss it back to th
e ground. I had to suppress an urge to hurry him. I had no right to be impatient, but the word “dinner” played on repeat in my head.

  We arrived at a small stream and, even though the sun was setting fast, the light was brighter because of the clearing around it. Dusty led us along the shore of river rocks, and soon he stopped again to comb up a handful of tiny pebbles. He examined them minutely, then plucked one from the rest and presented it to me. “You see, my lady?” he said. “A diamond leaves its mark.”

  I reached for the pebble and searched the spot he wanted me to see. Even by the dim light, I could see a crystal glistening in its stone belly.

  “An ancient sea washed over it,” he said. “A gift to you, my lady.”

  “Thank you,” I said, folding my hand around it.

  We continued on until we came to an impenetrable copse of evergreens. Dusty kept advancing towards it, and then I saw there was a narrow passage between neatly trimmed branches. We followed until we came out into a clearing.

  We were in a yard with a small cabin. Gray and I both stopped. Inspecting for anything suspicious or telling.

  The cabin was made the old-fashioned way — glazed logs stacked on top of each other, a vaulted roof over a front porch, a wood door flanked by two windows, trim painted green. On the far side, there was a garage with an overgrown gravel lane winding away through the woods, probably to one of the country roads that crisscrossed the area. The garage looked newer than the cabin, aluminum-sided and ordinary. Its door was rolled up and inside was a small, beat-up car. Not a blue Chevy sedan, but something moss-green and rust.

  There was no garden in front of the cabin, but a circle of trampled grass around it. The thing that made it remarkable was that there were five large sculptures — the kind you see sometimes where misshapen rocks are balanced on top of each other. The sculptures stood like star-points around the perimeter of the yard.

  No sign of any lost or hiding girls.

  Gray was obviously measuring that too, because he said abruptly, “We’re on the lookout for some missing people.”

  Dusty stopped and turned. “Missing?” He looked genuinely concerned.

  “Yeah. One is a girl from my hometown — Here, I’ll show you.” He rifled for his phone and found the Jocelyn picture and showed it. Dusty went over and examined the screen with grave attention.

  I stepped in too. “The other is a girl from the city,” I said. “My age. Dark blond hair, blue eyes, medium height … Pretty.”

  Dusty studied my face with the same solemn expression. His features were fine with high pockmarked cheeks and penny-brown eyes.

  Gray pointed to his phone. “Jocelyn’s been missing for a month. Maybe you saw her walking around? Or in town?”

  Dusty looked back at the screen. “I don’t go to town much. When I am here, I am here.”

  “So no girl came to you asking for help? Or she could’ve been on the road, hitchhiking?”

  Dusty shook his head sadly. “I never saw any girl on the road. And no one has come by since before winter. Not even hikers from the park.”

  Gray considered him for a moment, then said, “We’ve been walking all day. Is it okay if we crash in your yard tonight?”

  “But I brought you here! I welcome you.”

  “We have a tent,” Gray said. “It’s not big. It could fit over there.” He pointed at a spot across from the cabin.

  “Plenty of room,” Dusty said as he walked over to one of his more elaborate balancing sculptures.

  “I can set it up so we won’t break your —” But Gray didn’t finish before Dusty kicked the sculpture over.

  We both cried out, and Dusty waved us off. “It’s nothing. It is just a thing, for crying out loud. It is just a thing that can be made again.” He grinned at us. “And now we eat.” He did a half-pirouette and led the way to his cabin.

  IT WAS SMALLER INSIDE than I expected. There was a room that was half living room, with a fireplace and a ratty couch and chair, and half kitchen, with a butcher-block counter, an old-school freezer-on-top fridge, a small cooktop, and cupboards painted the same forest green as the outside trim. There was a tiny second room with a wrought-iron single bed and an oak dresser, and one more closed door at the back, which I hoped was a bathroom.

  Dusty laid his basket of greens on the counter. “You have anything you can spare to eat?”

  “Yeah sure.” Gray rifled through his backpack and pulled out two cans. “You like baked beans?”

  “Whatever you can give is what we’re supposed to eat today. Even if it is nothing.”

  “Well, the beans are good.”

  Dusty took the cans from Gray, opened them, spilled them into a pot, and set the pot on the cooktop. Then he pulled out two handfuls of greens from his basket and put them into a tub in the sink.

  While the beans heated, Gray and I took turns washing up in Dusty’s makeshift bathroom — a basic toilet, sink, bathtub, no mirror or doodads.

  Back in the kitchen, we drank our fill of water, filled up our water bottles, checked our supplies. Gray pulled out his charger and plugged it into an outlet by the kitchen counter. He plugged his phone in, then collapsed on the couch. I joined him, sinking with relief into the cushiony softness. By now, my stomach was flailing with hunger.

  When the beans were hot, Dusty pulled the only bowl from his cupboard and scooped some into it for himself, then divided the rest back into the two cans. He balanced a handful of clean greens on top of each serving, pushing them down into the rims, then handed us each a crooked fork and a warm can. It was everything I could do not to dump the entire portion into my mouth at once.

  Cradling his bowl, Dusty plié-ed onto the chair across from us and closed his eyes. He half-mumbled under his breath. “Spirit of life. Your true light shines. Within and without. Radiant on earth. Brilliant in heaven. Show us our wisdom, so we nurture each day, so we forgive our weakness, and the weakness of others. Free us from routine. Reveal our true purpose. Give us the will and the courage to heal.”

  Gray and I exchanged a ravenous look. But I was so grateful for my warm can, for finding Dusty, for Gray, that I said my own private thankyous too.

  “The song of the universe sings always and through all of time. I am here.” Then Dusty opened his eyes, dug into his bowl, and shoved a heaping spoon of beans into his mouth. The fresh greens stuck out from between his lips like soft quills.

  Gray and I dug in too. It made me want to laugh and cry at the same time. Nothing had ever tasted so good.

  Dusty ate slowly, chewing each bite for several minutes, smacking and licking his lips. Gray and I were completely done eating before he’d taken his third spoonful.

  It had gotten dark inside the cabin. I shivered and fought to keep awake.

  “Warmth comes from within,” Dusty said. “You have to go into your own self. You have to become the warmth, you see what I’m saying?”

  I didn’t, but nodded anyway.

  He set his half-eaten bowl on the fireplace hearth and rooted deep in the pocket of his parka. “It’s because you have to understand how to do it.” He pulled out a disposable lighter and lit it. “I can’t tell you how to do it. One has to understand it oneself.” He touched the flame end of the lighter to some kindling in the fireplace and it ignited and blazed. For the first time I saw that he was old. Maybe in his fifties or sixties. “If a person wants to become the warmth, then they can learn it. But it’s something that one has to learn. You see?”

  We nodded at him and he sat down again. “People, they listen to the sounds of the world — the fire, the wind, the leaves. It’s part of them. But they don’t understand it. You see? But it is part of them. Because it’s love.” A beatific expression spread over his face as he looked at us. “That’s what it is. It is love.”

  My skin began to tingle. How had we arrived here?

  Flames wrapp
ed around a pyramid of split logs on the grate and soft smoke sifted upwards. Gray and I nestled into the couch, too tired to do anything more. Our hands were close together on the cushions, but not touching. I wondered if I might move my hand over to his.

  A long silence wrapped around us as we all watched the fire, mesmerized by the movement of the flames, by the deepness of our exhaustion, and me by Gray’s too-far closeness.

  “Who occupies your mind?” Dusty said, and I started and looked over and saw that he was speaking to Gray.

  Gray kind of shook out of half-sleep. “You mean Jocelyn?”

  “No, the other one.”

  I caught my breath and watched closely.

  Gray became very still. His eyes flicked to the fire. “My birth mother.”

  “Yes, this one.” Dusty bowed his head. “It weighs heavy. She’s gone, and it makes you think about the original father.”

  “No,” Gray said as if to end the conversation. I realized that no one had mentioned his birth father. “I don’t care about that,” he said, staring straight ahead.

  I wondered if it was possible that his birth father was part of the group that had congregated at Arthur’s.

  Dusty came over and crouched beside me to observe Gray more closely. “We all carry your weight,” he said. “Throw the weight down.”

  “I’m not trying to replace my parents,” Gray said. He sat forward and drummed his fingers on his knees. “Just trying to figure things out.”

  “Fire is a clean thing,” Dusty said to him. “You light a fire, the thing that is toxic, it leaves. Even the smoke itself, it gets carried away. You see what I’m saying?”

  An echo of Gray’s voice filled my mind. It’s not telling you to burn shit down, is it? Lily had said, You start looking for something different. A way out. A new way. An old one. The crow had said, As she falls, so do we all.

  “You must throw the weight on the fire.” Dusty mimed throwing something on the flames.

  The muscles of Gray’s face were getting tighter. “I’ve made enough trouble. I don’t want to make more.”

  “Throw the weight down and something new will come.”