ALLUSIVE AFTERSHOCK (17 page)

Max found a backpack
among the supplies and packed it up. We only had one flashlight, but I told Max
to take it. If he was going to be walking around outside at night, he would
need it more than we would, but I suggested he take a couple of the candles and
some matches, too.

When he was all set, he
walked up the stairs and I followed him. At the top, he turned to me.

“Max, don’t say
goodbye.”
I couldn’t bear it.

He flashed that grin I
loved and brushed his fingers down the side of my cheek. I closed my eyes for a
brief second, hoping … praying for a kiss, but he turned and walked away
without saying anything.

Adela stepped slowly down
the stairs after saying goodbye to Max, swiping her hand over her cheeks as she
strolled over to the shelves. She seemed to be moving things around, creating
quite a ruckus. I managed to pull myself up to a sitting position so I could
see what she was doing. I watched her pick up a plastic pail and carry it across
the cellar to the corner behind several wine barrels. She stayed there a few
minutes and I could pretty much guess what she’d done. The pail made the
perfect toilet, a good idea considering it would be hard for me to walk up the
steps. When she finished, she walked back to the sleeping bag she’d slept in,
sat down with her legs crossed in front of her and stared at the ground.

“You okay?” I asked.

“I’m fine,” she said, looking
up at me. “You shouldn’t be sitting up. You need to keep your leg elevated as
much as possible.” She jumped up, grabbed the sleeping bag she had been crouched
on, rolled it up and walked over to me.

“Lay down,” she
ordered.

I frowned, but the way
her lips tightened and the determined expression on her face told me not to
give her any sass. She was rather adorable. I lay down and she picked my leg up,
placing the sleeping bag under my calf. Adela turned to walk away and I couldn’t
help myself; I grabbed her arm.

“You’re angry,” I said.

“I’m not angry.”

“Okay, then worried.”

“Yeah, I am.”

“Max is a big boy. He’ll
be fine.”

“What do you know
anyway?”

Reluctantly, I released
her arm. “I know you care about him.”

“Of course I care about
him. He’s my best friend.”

“There’s more.”

“Like what?”

“Like, you want him to
care about you the way you care about him.”

Her eyebrows drew
together and she plopped down on the cold floor across from me. “He cares.” She
sighed, leaned against the wall, hugged her knees to her chest and stared at
me.

I flinched as shooting
streams of fire pierced the skin on my hand and leg and I turned my eyes up
toward the ceiling, closing them tightly.

“What’s wrong?” she
asked, her voice dripping with anxiety.

“My leg,” I grunted.
“It’s on fire.”

I jumped up and raced
to Court’s side. His body trembled from his feet to up to that perfectly
sculptured jaw. Those vibrant green eyes were squeezed closed and his hands
fisted at his sides. There was still a section of burns on his leg that I
hadn’t been able to get any cold strips on. Somehow, I needed to remove his
pants in order to apply the bandages better. My brain immediately went to a
place it had no business going. I shook my head to focus on the severity of the
situation.

“Court, we need to get
your pants off.”

His eyes popped open
and his fists relaxed at his sides as he stared up at me and said in a strained
voice, “Now that’s what I call service. Alone with a lady for less than five
minutes and she’s ready to get me naked.”

I actually laughed. It
was more of a nervous laugh, but it helped because he laughed too.

“Only for the sake of
making your injuries feel better,” I assured him. Because if he didn’t get
better, I didn’t have a clue what I’d be able to do for him. The thought of him
dying from infection scared me to no end. With Max gone, I didn’t want to be
alone in the cellar and I sure as hell didn’t want to go off wandering around
by myself either. More to the point, I just didn’t want Court to die.

“Whatever it takes,”
Courtland said.

I stood over him,
devising how to proceed. “I could just cut the bottom part of your jeans off.”

“Are you kidding? What
will I do when we get out of here? I’ll freeze. These are the only pants I have
now.

“Okay …” I bit my
bottom lip. “Then off with them.” I stood waiting for him to do something but
he didn’t move. Really? He was going to make me do it. I stared at his belt,
securely fastened above his zipper and contemplated what to do. I didn’t want
to place my hands anywhere near that part of his body. “Um … could you unbuckle
your belt and unzip your pants?”

“No problem. I can
unbuckle and unzip all you want, but I can’t buckle and zip back up with one
hand.”

 “Wait …” An
uncomfortably embarrassing possibility suddenly occurred to me. “You are
wearing underwear, right?”

“Last time I checked.
Green polka-dotted boxers okay with you?”

I smiled. “Polka-dots?”

“Yeah. What’d you
expect, little hearts or perhaps grinning devils?”

I snorted. “Maybe.
Anyway, boxers are like a bathing suit, right?”

He shrugged. “I suppose.”

“Okay, lift up your
bottom and I’ll pull.”

Court leaned on his elbows,
raising his body up while I tugged his pants down to his knees and stopped
because if I yanked too fast it would surely tear what was left of the skin
right off his leg. “Are you sure it wouldn’t be better if I cut them at the
knee instead?”

“No. Just pull them off
slowly.”

“Right. Well then, you’ll
have to help get them over the burns so I don’t pull off any skin. I’ll get
this side off and then it will be easier.”

It turned out his leg
wasn’t as bad as I had thought—only about two inches wide and three inches long
down the side of his calf, but still enough of a burn to be extremely
uncomfortable. That in addition to a sprained ankle had to be excruciating.

“This doesn’t look too
bad. Let me put some new wet bandages on. The more cool moisture the better it
should feel, right?”

“Yeah.”

I cut a small strip, soaked
it, and placed the material on the burn. His face relaxed some as the pain must
have subsided a little and I thought the ibuprofen was working, too.

I poured some water and
offered the cup to Court.

“You first. You haven’t
been drinking enough.”

I put the container to
my lips and took a sip, poured a little more and handed him the cup.

He drank, emptying the little
plastic tumbler and sank back on the blanket, closing his eyes. I started to
get up but he grabbed my arm. “Don’t go. Stay.” His bright green eyes pleaded
with me. I sat on the blanket beside him, a little self-conscious being so
close to him while he wore only his boxer shorts, I tried not to look at them
and concentrated on his face instead.

I was immediately
swamped with guilt. What was the matter with me? At the moment I stared into
his eyes, I remembered I never thanked him for saving my life yesterday and my
words stupidly stumbled from my lips. “Court … I … I want to say thank you.”

“For?”

“For saving me
yesterday. And for rescuing me last week with Blue.”

“Oh.” His eyes closed
for a moment and those long dark lashes graced the top of his cheeks. “No
thanks necessary.”

“I’m sorry about your
dog. I know she meant a lot to you.”

“Thanks.”

“I’m sorry about your
dad, too.”

A strange self-pitying
mood hovered over the situation and Court cleared his throat. “Listen, uh,
thanks for staying with me, Adela, but you really should have gone with Max.
That would have been the smarter thing to do.”

“Well, nobody said I
was smart.” I laughed.

“I think you’re smart.”

I glanced at him and
our eyes locked for a few seconds before he spoke again. “My hand will most likely
get infected and I’ll probably die, which will leave you alone. I don’t want that
to happen.”

Hearing Courtland tell me
the one thing I feared the most, the one thing I had been thinking about only
minutes ago didn’t make me feel any better. Telling me he didn’t want me to be
alone was probably the nicest thing a boy had ever said to me, though.

I swallowed the lump in
my throat, the passageway suddenly dry. “You’re not going to die. Not if I have
anything to do with it.”

“Well I’ll try my best
not to die on your watch.”

“You’d better, particularly
now that Max is gone. You’re gonna have to help me find my brother and sister
when your ankle heals. My dad, mom and Big Blue too.”

“Okay. You’ve got a
deal. You keep me alive; I’ll help you find your family. Besides, I always
liked your little sister and brother.”

“Yeah? My sister wants
to marry you when she grows up.”

Court laughed. “Does
she now? And how does her big sister feel about that?”

I shrugged. “I don’t
know. If she’s gonna like old men when she’s grown, who am I to stop her?”

“Old men? I think I’m
the same age as you.”

“Well, you’ll be old to
her. She’s only four, you know.”

“Okay, she’s four now
and I’m almost eighteen. So in fourteen years, she’ll be eighteen and I’ll be
thirty-two. Somewhat of an age difference but not that much.”

“So you’re going to
wait fourteen years for my sister?” I scoffed.

“Maybe. If her sister
approves.”

“Well, she doesn’t,
because the idea of an eighteen-year-old girl and thirty-two-year-old man
sounds … so very wrong.” I glanced at him, caught his smile. He was teasing me,
but for some reason I didn’t like the idea of Courtland being married to anyone,
especially my sister, and I wanted to change the subject. “I wish we had
something to do down here instead of just sitting and waiting.”

Court looked down at
his thighs and grinned. “Hmmm … well, now that you’ve got me half naked, I can
think of a few things.”

I laughed, a nervous giddiness
flowing through my head, along with the gazillion butterflies taking flight in my
stomach. I glanced around the cellar, hoping to see something that would
trigger another subject to talk about. “Too bad Max’s mom didn’t put some music
down here. An iPod sure would be nice right about now. A game of Monopoly or
Scrabble would help pass the time, too. I wonder if there are any games or
anything over there.” I started to get up but he yanked me back down and he
seemed to scowl at me.

“Are you in pain?”

“No. Yes. Sit and talk
to me some more.”

“What am I supposed to
say?”

“Tell me about Big
Blue.”

I turned my gaze toward
the floor at the mention of Big Blue’s name.

“I’m sorry,” Court said
and brushed his finger down my cheek. “Big Blue’s a smart horse. I bet he’s
standing by his stable right now wondering where you are.”

I smiled at the thought
but shook my head. “I don’t know. The first earthquake spooked him so much he
probably blames the ground at my house and will never go back there.”

“Nah, he’ll come back,
you just wait and see. When all this shaking and rumbling is over for good, he’ll
come right back to you and his home.”

“You don’t really
believe that, do you? It’s okay. I can take the truth; you don’t need to
cushion it for me.”

“Maybe it would be
better if you just talked about him. It might help take your mind off other things.
How did you come up with the name Big Blue?”

I told him about Big
Blue’s birth. How he slid out covered in that icky white transparent sack,
giving him the deep midnight blue appearance.

“So you knew right away
what you were going to call him.”

“Yep.” I eyed him
questionably. “How come you don’t have a horse of your own? I mean, you’re so
good with animals and all.”

He lowered his eyes.
“Money.”

I instantly regretted
asking. “Sorry.”

“It’s okay. We’ve never
been able to afford a horse. It was hard enough feeding ourselves and a dog.
When my mom was alive, we talked about getting one, maybe even two, but after
she died, my dad started drinking. A little at first, just to take the edge
off, he would say. After a while, he drank all the time. He lost his management
job at the casino and has never really been able to hold onto another good one
since.”

“So your dad didn’t
have the same ability you do?”

“What ability is that?”

“The ability you have,
the one where you …” I saw the puzzled look on his face and I was suddenly
embarrassed. I thought he knew everyone considered him … I struggled for the
right word …
unique
. I decided “unique” was better than “different” or “freakazoid,”
like Max always called him. “I’m sorry. I thought …”

“You thought what? That
I’m a freak? That I can talk to animals? That’s what everybody says, right?”

“No.” I glanced down at
my fingers that didn’t seem to know what to do or how to stay still. I shook my
head. “Not everybody.” Looking back into his eyes, I added, “Not me. And
certainly not my dad. But … I’m sorry.”

“I’m not and you
shouldn’t be either. I just wanted to hear you say it, so I’m the one who
should apologize. I know what people say and yeah, I
can
communicate
better with animals than I can with most humans. Whether or not that makes me a
freak, I’m not sure. Maybe it does. To tell you the truth, I don’t know why,
but I’ve always had some special bond and intuition with animals. I can even
sense things with some people, not as strongly as with animals, though. I tend
to keep that little piece of information to myself. Maybe my Miwok ancestors on
my mother’s side had some special connection with the spirit world, sort of
like a sixth sense. So, to answer your original question, no my dad didn’t
possess the same ability.”