“
But it wasn’t his fault,” I
said. My heart ached.
“
No, it wasn’t. And Abby
was known to drink a lot and drive from time to time, long before
she met Dex. But given his…past, he automatically blamed himself.
He started behaving irrationally. He had to drop out of school, out
of the band, then basically out of life. He… shoot, I don’t even
think I should be telling you this much. Sorry Perry, that’s all
I’ll say. It wasn’t even my place.”
He looked regretful and let
out a long sigh.
“
And you’re saying I’m just
as bad as he is?” I reminded him.
“
I guess you aren’t. So
far.”
I hit Maximus lightly on
the shoulder. “Very funny.”
“
You’re a good girl, Perry,”
he admitted. “I just think you two can be a bit too alike. Two
wrongs don’t make a right. And I mean that in the nicest
sense.”
I sat back in my seat,
feeling like crap. All this new information about Dex was a bit
overwhelming. I couldn’t help but feel so bad for him. How horrible
would that be? Accident or not, I know I couldn’t deal with it very
well. I had a hard enough time dealing with my own past that was
nowhere near that bad. No wonder he didn’t want us talking about
death.
“
Excuse me,” I told Maximus.
“I’m going to go get him.”
“
If you know what you are
doing,” he replied. “Just don’t forget about me here. I think I’ve
got ten minutes before the heat eats me alive.”
It was disgustingly hot in
the car. I hadn’t even noticed this whole time. Even though sitting
in there and talking to Maximus was intriguing and I adored
listening to his southern drawl, I couldn’t leave Dex out there,
now knowing what had happened to him. I had this urge to run up to
him and give him the biggest hug, even though Dex was not a huggy
type.
I stepped out into the dust
and closed the door so no more would come in. It had died down but
was still fanned by passing cars.
Dex’s hunched figure stood
by the side of the road. It wasn’t like he was hitchhiking, he was
just standing there, looking bleak.
I ran down the shoulder
while being careful with my ankle and stopped beside him. He kept
his eyes forward. I followed his blank gaze across the road. On a
fencepost, among pointy scrub and cacti, was an owl. It was staring
back at us, big eyes sticking out of its snowy head like black
marbles, unmoving.
We watched the owl in
silence for a while, before it flew off with huge pumps of its
wings that disturbed the brush around it. I kept my eye on it until
it was just a dot on the horizon and then disappeared from our
sight.
I looked up at Dex. His
face was smooth, maybe a bit of worry in the forehead. He was
smoking a hand-rolled cigarette that smelled heavenly. I had
smelled it on him earlier in the bathroom.
“
May I?” I asked, putting my
hand out for it.
He finally turned to look
at me. “What?”
“
Can I have a puff? It
smells good.”
He stared at me
thoughtfully and had another long drag himself.
Eventually, through a large
puff of white smoke, he said, “No.”
I looked back to where the
owl had been.
“
How long had that owl been
there?”
“
Since I walked over
here.”
“
Is that why you pulled
over?” I tested.
He flicked the cigarette
out onto the road, right on time for a passing truck to drive over
it. He looked into my eyes, his gaze steady and
poignant.
“
No,” he said
flatly.
“
I’m sorry.”
“
For what?”
“
For being
inconsiderate.”
“
Inconsiderate of what?” he
replied lazily.
Oh jeez, he was going to
make me spell it out for him, wasn’t he? I didn’t want to get
Maximus in trouble. I had a feeling he probably wasn’t supposed to
enlighten me with Dex’s troubled past.
“
I am just…sorry. OK?” I
held out my hand. “Friends?”
He looked at my hand and
then back at me, seeming to think about it. After five seconds, I
felt a bit foolish to have my bandaged hand sticking out like that,
unshaken.
“
Yeah,” he said slowly.
“We’re friends.”
He took my hand in his and
turned it over. “How does it feel?”
“
It’s sore but I’ll live. My
nurse did a good job.”
He nibbled on his lip, a
gesture I was starting to find adorable.
“
I guess we are
even.”
“
How so?”
“
Nevermind.”
I grabbed him at the elbow
for emphasis.
“
No, please, don’t
nevermind me,” I pleaded. “Remember that talking thing we talked
about yesterday.”
“
Vaguely,” was his
reply.
I sighed. He was
impossible.
“
Just…,” I started. Then
threw my hands up in the air. It was too hot and dusty here to be
arguing and it was a fairly one-sided argument. I didn’t know why
we were suddenly even and maybe it was better that way.
I started walking to the
car.
“
Perry,” he said. There was
a melancholy infliction in his voice that made me stop and turn
around.
“
I was hoping you’d come out
and get me.”
I put my hands on my hips
and cocked my head, pondering that revelation.
“
Well,” I said, feeling
truthful. “I’m always going to come and get you.”
We stood there on the side
of the road, just looking at each other, with ten feet between us.
Neither of us said anything, maybe we didn’t need to.
I waved him over to me. He
shuffled forward. I grabbed his hand, dry and rough, and gave it a
squeeze. A literal spark, a current, rushed from his hand to mine.
In seconds it caused internal shivers around my neck. I don’t know
if he felt it. He eyed my hand anxiously, at first anyway. Then
squeezed back. More sparks.
Too bad I couldn’t enjoy
them for long, before random images of Jennifer flashed through my
head and made me realize I may not be helping the situation at all.
So I let go of him slowly, and together we walked back to the car,
and to Maximus, who was no doubt sweating like a poor dog that’s
been forsaken by its owners.
CHAPTER NINE
“
Apparently skinwalkers
can’t be killed,” Maximus said from across the room. He, Dex, and I
were holed up in our bedroom at the Lancasters. Dex was on his
laptop reviewing footage he shot earlier that day in town, mainly
establishing shots of scenery, as they didn’t find anyone to
interview, while Maximus read through the library book,
occasionally pointing out things of interest which I would scribble
down in Dex’s planner.
We were all waiting for
dinner to be ready. As soon as we got back from lunch, Will
informed us that we would all be having a great feast tonight (his
words) with everyone, meaning Bird, Shan, even Miguel. Of course,
Maximus was invited too. The idea of this gathering put me in a
weird “Us versus Them” type mood but at least the more people that
there were, the less awkward it would be with Sarah. Maybe I
wouldn’t have to talk at all.
I was too introspective
today for chit chat, anyway. I was curled up in the rocking chair
in the corner while the boys sat on the end of the bed, and when I
wasn’t writing things, I was watching Dex. He sat cross-legged, his
grey cargo pants contrasting with his bright green socks, never
once looking up at me or Maximus while he intently studied the
screen. Occasionally he would rub his goatee in some rough, nervous
gesture, or he’d pop in a piece of Nicorette for a few seconds
before spitting it out.
I couldn’t take my eyes off
of him. Ever since I heard his back-story, or at least parts of it,
my thoughts kept turning back to Dex. About what happened. And what
else there was to know. How could this guy, my madcap, smartass
Dex, have gone through so much? And how could he be OK? I mean, he
couldn’t be. No wonder he was on medication. And not even at the
moment. My heart pinched in the most unexpected way. I felt so much
for him at that moment, it kind of hurt. My emotions and my
hormones were having a catfight in my chest. I just wanted to walk
over to that bed and…
“
Perry,” Maximus’s voice
broke through my thoughts like a rake. “Did you write that
down?”
At that, Dex looked up at
me before I could look away. His eyes were soft, shiny pools from
across the room. I held his eyes with mine. My heart clenched
again, intensifying my feelings, steadying my gaze.
“
Bullets dipped in ash?”
Maximus added, a bit louder this time. I closed my eyes. I felt the
current I had with Dex power down, like I was turning off like a
fuse box. Did he feel it too? I opened my eyes to check but he was
focused on the computer again.
I turned my head at
Maximus, trying to hide my annoyance.
“
What was that?”
Maximus did a quick
sideways glance at Dex for observation, then laid a prominent smirk
on me. “I said…one of the ways you can kill a skinwalker is bullets
dipped in white ash.”
“
Oh, white ash. So simple,”
I quipped. I wrote it down knowing full well we weren’t going to be
using any guns with ash bullets inside them.
Maximus flipped a page,
shrugged. “Hey, you never know out here.”
“
And that’s the only way
to…get rid of them?” I asked.
“
As far as I know. Unless
the person has a change of heart and decides to stop doing evil or
something.”
“
So what the hell can we
do?” I said, frustrated.
They both looked up at my
tone of voice.
“
What, we’re going to shoot
some animal with white bullets?” I continued, “I don’t think
so.”
Maximus gestured at the
book. “Hey, no one said we’ll be doing that. I’m just reading it
out loud.”
“
You don’t
get it,” I sighed. “I mean, so say everything goes as planned…I
mean, no, wait. What even
is
the plan?”
I looked at Dex for an
explanation. He seemed puzzled, I assume more by my outburst than
the lack of a plan.
“
Well,” he cleared his
throat. “I, we…get to the bottom of it and–”
“
In the next day?” I
interrupted. “So we find out it’s a curse, or maybe it really is a
haunting of some sort, or perhaps just the crazy ass mythic
skinwalker…then what?”
“
We film it,” he
replied.
“
And then what?”
“
And we show it?” Dex
looked adorably confused. “Have you forgotten some things about
what we do?”
“
And then we go back home.
But what happens to the Lancasters?”
“
That’s not our problem,”
he said bluntly, almost smiling.
And there was Dex, back to
being a heartless beast in an instant. I looked at Maximus for
help. “Do you know what I mean?”
He nodded. “I do. But, I
mean, Dex is right in a way…it’s not our job to deal with people’s
problems. I show them to people. You record it to show to other
people. We aren’t, well,
Ghostbusters
.”
“
Why do think they wanted
us here in the first place?” Dex asked me seriously. “Will just
wants to prove he isn’t crazy. If we see it too, if we film it,
then it means it’s real. It means he’s not going insane on this
ranch with his wife looking the other way. Pardon the pun. He
hasn’t thought as far as how to get rid of it, whatever the fuck
this is. That will come later.”
“
I just think if I’m making
things worse…,” I found myself saying unexpectedly.
“
Hold on,”
Dex shot in, his hand raised. “What do you mean
you’re
making things
worse?”
I sank back into my chair
wanting to disappear. My eyes drifted to the floor. I really
shouldn’t have said anything. It was too stupid to explain what
Bird had told me.
“
Um,” I said slowly. “I just
felt like maybe things are worse because I’m here.”
Maximus snorted. “Things
were the same a week ago. Don’t be giving yourself too much credit
there.”
I nodded. I could feel
Dex’s eyes on me and knew he wasn’t going to let that
go.
But I was saved by the
knock at the door.
“
Come in,” I announced,
straightening up, alert.
The door opened and Bird
poked his head in.
“
Supposed to tell you all
that dinner is ready,” he smiled. Then lowered his voice, “Can I
come in?”
“
Sure.” Maximus waved him
inside.
Bird stepped in before
shooting a glance outside the door and closing it quietly behind
him. He obviously had something important to tell us. We all looked
up at him, wondering.
He walked over to the bed
and perched on the corner. He gave us all hurried glances that made
us lean in closer to hear what he had to say.