Then, to my left, something shines; the brightness is visible through my eyelids. Turning to look, I see a line of glowing things. They resolve, become recognizable as glowing ghosts. The other girls. They’ve returned to me. Tears sting my eyes. I haven’t been forgotten. Someone still sees me. Someone still cares. That the someones who see and care are hallucinations doesn’t matter. They’re here and that’s all that counts.
I get to my feet as the solemn procession approaches. They are as silent as ever, but they touch me, and it feels so good to be touched. They reach out and touch my hands, touch my shoulders and face. They crowd around me and love me, and tears fall down my cheeks. I have not been forsaken. Not even by myself.
Five Years Ago THEY’RE ALL WAITING BY THE horse’s stall. You're not supposed to ride your horse into the barn. You’re supposed to dismount outside, but the girl rides all the way up to her family. There is elation in their smiles, in their hugs; there are even leaps into the air, hands clasped over mouths.
The girl slides off her horse.
Her parents are holding one another. Her mom is crying, and her dad wears an expression she has never seen before. They pull her into their hug. She mimics them, raising her arms to follow the motion of an embrace. Then her grandparents take her, hold her close, say all kinds of nice things. The boy’s mother grabs her next. She manages to pull herself away, manages to just stand next to the boy. He doesn’t try to hug her. He doesn’t smile.
“What’s wrong?”
She shrugs, but he won’t be deterred.
“Tell me.”
She lets herself look him in the eye; she lets him see her. “I’ve got to keep this going.”
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
ONE BY ONE THE GHOSTLY redheaded girls walk off into the forest, forming a single-file line. I fall in, relieved to be led. It’s not on me anymore. I can just follow, a willing and patient soldier, no longer the captain.
The girls take me toward a rocky outcropping. It’s a feature I would have avoided on my own; it looks sharp and treacherous. They guide me into the rocks, to a hidden path that’s easy on my feet. We go on in this way for some time, going ever upward, until the path peaks in a grove of beech trees. The trail slopes downward now, and a new sound hits my ears.
It’s unfamiliar after so much silence, but I believe it’s the sound of traffic.
The noise awakens something within me, something that sniffs the air with ears pricked. No sooner has it shown its head than it has to return to ground, however, as the trail turns steep. Every bit of energy I have must go to picking my way down the rocks. The girls never take a wrong step, so I follow them, footfall for footfall. As we descend, the rushing noise grows louder.
Steep turns to nearly vertical, and I’m forced to use my hands. My shoulders don’t like it, not one bit, but I tune them out. All the while the sound grows bigger and more mysterious. I still suspect it’s traffic, but something’s not right.
There’s no room to look around and figure out what I’m hearing. I’m in a crevice of black rock. The slightest mistake would mean a broken neck, especially as the stone turns wetter the lower I get.
The last thirty feet is nothing but focus, nothing but wet rock and handholds and footholds and blackness. I arrive upon level ground to find the girls are gone. I’m not even sure when I last saw them or if I really saw them at all.
One thing is clear, though, undeniably giant and real. The sound was not traffic. The sound was water. I’m in a ravine through which courses a mighty river. There is a level spit of land under my feet. Above me hulks an impossible wall of granite. Had I known what I faced, I would never have made the attempt.
That creature that lifted its head and smelled the air at the top of the cliff returns. Traffic would have been better than water, but this is something. When I first entered the forest, I hoped to find a river. Big rivers lead to roads and this is a big river.
The patch of earth I’m on doesn’t look too big. I take two steps forward, intent on investigating this new world, and bump into something strange. It moves away from me with a skitter, too light and airy to be a part of nature. Reaching down, I feel rubber. It’s an inner tube. A fancy one too. Almost more a boat than a tube. Thick walled, there’s a floor to it. . . . It even still holds some air.
Pulling it forward into the starlight, I examine my find. It has two compartments, fore and aft. The front section is somewhat inflated. The back is almost flat. Without pausing to consider, I get to work on my tube. I blow air into it and listen for the hiss. With my fingers, I search for the hole. With Wolfman’s duct tape, I patch it.