by Alex Bledsoe
Bronwyn immediately raised her bow and reached for an arrow from the quiver. “How wrong?”
“Not that wrong, at least not yet. Just … stand still and let me talk.”
By then the troupe had turned in their direction. Bliss held her ground, but kept glancing up at the spires of the distant castle, wondering if it was the reason the hairs on the back of her neck were tingling. Was she watching them right now?
36
By mid-morning, Tufa from all over Cloud County filled the little ridge outside the cave and spread into the forest around it. No one had organized it; much like the way the “Sadieville” song had spread, word about the rescue expedition into the cave, and what it might mean for them all, spiraled out to everyone.
People from both bands of the Tufa milled about under an unspoken flag of truce, just as they did at the Pair-A-Dice. This was bigger than any petty differences, and even Junior Damo seemed to know that. Many brought instruments, and played softly in hushed little groups throughout the nearby woods. Others hauled in camp grills to cook burgers and hot dogs. A troupe of four-wheelers brought cases of beer, distributed at no charge.
To Veronica, this carnival atmosphere was both perplexing and insulting. Justin was in serious danger, and so were the three sent to rescue him; yet these people were throwing a damn hootenanny. Finally she went up to Mandalay, who had returned Kell to Craig and now stood alone.
“What are all these people doing here?” she said, softly but urgently.
“Waiting, just like we are,” Mandalay said, watching the growing crowd.
“But it’s a cookout. And listen to all the music. It’s like Bonnaroo or something.”
“It’s how we express ourselves.”
“By having a party while Justin and your friends might be dying?”
Mandalay gave Veronica her full attention. “This isn’t a party, Veronica. It’s not even a celebration. The music is the way we put our thoughts and feelings out there, so they don’t burn us up inside.”
Veronica looked at the people in their little camps and circles in the woods. “What do they hope will happen?” she asked bitterly. “Is this like the way people at Nascar hope for wrecks?”
“You’re being too harsh,” Mandalay said. “They want good news just as much as you do.”
“They don’t even care about Justin.”
“That’s not true. But they, and that includes me, have other concerns as well.”
“Like what?”
The girl smiled sadly. It was the oldest, heaviest expression Veronica had ever seen, all the more severe because it was on such a young, unlined face. “Whether or not we can go home.”
A lone plaintive fiddle note rang through the air. It came from a young woman in a sundress and wide-brimmed straw hat, coming up the trail toward them.
From the woods came the strumming of guitars and the plaintive plink of a mandolin. It joined with the fiddle to make the saddest music Veronica had ever heard. The girl in the straw hat joined a group of old men seated with their instruments on a log. She swayed before them, her body as musical as the sounds that poured from the fiddle strings, and they provided expert accompaniment to her leads.
“You inconsiderate bastards,” Veronica fumed, clenching her fists.
“Hey, like Mandalay said, don’t be so harsh,” Tucker said.
She looked up suddenly; where had he come from? And where did Mandalay go?
“Let’s go down and listen to the songs,” he continued. “You might be surprised.”
“Yeah? Surprised how?”
“Just give it a try. Come on.” He offered her his arm, and she took it, because what else could she do?
Tucker led Veronica down the hill, to stand in the shade and watch the girl in the straw hat play her mournful tune. Veronica crossed her arms, determined to resist, but the music did start to get to her. She felt the great knot in her chest loosen ever so slightly, and it no longer hurt so much to breathe.
She glanced up at Tucker’s rapt face. He reminded her of a music teacher she’d once had, who clearly got more from classical music than he was ever able to convey to his blockheaded junior high students. When he played Rachmaninoff’s Piano Concerto no. 2 in C Minor, he’d cried unabashedly in front of the class, to the eternal mockery of most of the students—including, she was now ashamed to say, herself.
“What do you think?” Tucker asked quietly.
“Yeah, sure, it’s beautiful,” she said, knowing how petulant she sounded.
“That’s the thing about music: it says things words never can.”
Veronica did not respond. She just let herself get lost in the music, her own pain merging with the song’s.
* * *
Junior Damo sauntered up to Mandalay, who stood in the forest shadows away from the group. “Quite a show you’ve got.”
“It’s not my show,” she said. “It’s everybody’s. Even yours.”
“How the hell long is this going to take?” he complained. “I got things to do today.”
“As long as it does. I don’t know any more than you do right now.”
“Really?” He couldn’t keep the snide, taunting tone from his voice. “So the great Mandalay Harris don’t know everything about everything?”
“Are you just here to bitch, Junior?”
He gestured at the cave. “What if they’re dead in there? What if there was, like, a cave-in or something? Or they fell down a hole?”
“Veronica and her boyfriend made it with no trouble.”
“‘Veronica and her boyfriend made it with no trouble,’” he mocked. “That’s because they had no history with … her. What if she’s at the other end and don’t take kindly to having our sort show up?”
“What are you trying to say, Junior?”
“I just want to know if we’re going to send more people in if these don’t come back.”
“I don’t know. I’ll decide when and if it comes to that.”
“Oh, you’ll decide?”
“Yes.”
“That we have to risk our lives?”
“You’re not risking anything, Junior,” Mandalay pointed out. “You don’t even have to be here.”
He ignored this, and nodded at the crowd dispersed through the forest. “Look at them. Most of them only know about the place from stories. I could count on one hand the people who actually remember it.”
“I do,” Mandalay said.
“Well, I don’t. I was born here, and my parents died here. There’s nothing there for me.” He looked at the cave, and then back at her. She was surprised by the desperation in his expression, the complete opposite of his defiance. His eyes pleaded desperately, Tell me I’m wrong.
She smiled cruelly and said, “You might be right about that, Junior.”
He stared at her, stopped dead by the cold matter-of-factness in her voice. “Fine,” he choked out. “That’s fine.”
He marched petulantly away. Mandalay knew she should feel bad, but she didn’t. There was something about cruelty that was, in fact, enjoyable, and she’d have to really watch that she didn’t indulge in that.
* * *
Veronica realized with a start that Tucker had gone. She looked around for him, but with all the black-haired people, she couldn’t single him out. Folks nodded at her, and a few said hello, but most just watched her sideways the way you might the survivor of a car crash pacing the side of the road.
A clearing had been hastily carved out of the undergrowth, and two children, a little boy and Kell Chess, sat in the sunlit center and played with plastic toys. They could have been brother and sister, if not fraternal twins: both sported the same Tufa hair and skin. They were so young they played near each other, but not really together, each keeping up a monologue that did not involve the other. Craig stood nearby, a case of bottled water under his arm, watching the children along with a large woman Veronica assumed was the boy’s mother.
* * *
Craig off
ered a bottle of water. “Cyrus Crow brought some of these, Loretta. Thought you and Trey might want one.”
“Thank you,” Loretta Damo said, and quickly added, “Reverend.” She liked Craig, but was always nervous around him, afraid he would judge her as inadequate somehow. She and Junior fought constantly over how to raise Trey, with Loretta usually winning because Junior would give up and run off with his friends. That didn’t make her any more certain that she was right, though; in fact, she second-guessed so many things that it was hard for her to even decide what to have for breakfast.
“Your little girl is so sweet,” she said.
“Trey seems like a fine boy, too.”
“I hope so. I try really hard, but I don’t have a lot of good role models. Most of my family’s so dumb, they sit on the TV and watch the couch.” She looked back at the cave, where Junior stood talking to Mandalay. “What will you do if they come back and we can all…” She trailed off, suddenly unsure if she should even be talking about this to Craig.
“First, I’ll talk it over with Bronwyn,” Craig said calmly. “Then I’ll pray about it. Then, I’ll hopefully make the right decision.”
“So you believe the stories about what those people saw?”
“Bronwyn believed it. And if she did, then I do.”
“You trust her that much?”
“Yes.”
“I don’t trust that piss-ant husband of mine any farther than I could throw him,” Loretta said bitterly.
“That must be tough.”
Loretta started to agree with him, but something about his tone stopped her. She realized that he was offering her genuine, sincere sympathy, something she got from none of her friends and family. Not even Junior’s ascendancy to the role vacated by Rockhouse Hicks had made people any kinder to her.
“It is,” she said, choking with emotion.
* * *
Veronica felt uncomfortable listening to any more, so she slipped quietly away. She came around a tree and found herself directly behind two big, sloppy men, one in overalls and the other in very ill-advised black athletic shorts with a neon-green stripe. Like the minister and the large woman, they didn’t notice her and continued their conversation unawares.
* * *
“Y’all reckon Junior might tell us what’s what?” Snad Wisby, the one in overalls, asked his brother Canton. He passed over a mason jar of moonshine. “Just saw him talking to Mandalay.”
“Hell, Junior don’t know shit,” Canton said, then took a drink.
“Mandalay musta tole him something,” Snad said, and spit tobacco juice at the ground.
“I reckon it has something to do ’bout going back to that place they say we come from,” Canton said.
“Hell, we ain’t never gonna go back there. You know how long ago that’s been?”
“Time don’t work the same for everybody,” Canton said. “Think about that ol’ rockabilly singer, sitting up in a bubble for sixty years. He come back like it was the next day.”
“Sixty years is one thing. We’re talking gazillions of years.” Snad spit again. “And we ain’t in no bubble.”
“Still could happen. Ain’t that why everyone’s up here? To be the first in line?”
“Hell, I just come up here to see what all the fuss was. All that shit happened so long ago, I couldn’t give a new shit about it now.”
“So you wouldn’t go back?”
“Back? I ain’t from there. I was born here, just like you was. Ain’t nothing for us to go back to. You just want to flit around like Tain does in the moonlight?”
Canton took another drink from the jar. “I wouldn’t mind living in a place where nothing was ugly,” he said thoughtfully. “Wouldn’t mind that at all.”
“Have you looked in the mirror lately?” Snad joked. “If that’s how they judge you, they ain’t gonna let neither of us in. Nor most of the people in this county.”
Canton passed the jar to his brother and muttered, “You got a mean streak, you know that?”
Snad realized that he’d hurt his brother’s feelings, and more, that Canton really did hope they could relocate to their legendary homeland. He looked down at his own big, bare feet and punched his brother lightly in the shoulder. It was the closest he ever got to apologizing to Canton, and they both recognized it for what it was.
“Ain’t gonna happen nohow,” Canton said. “Nothing that good ever happens. I don’t know about that other world, but this world don’t work that way.”
* * *
Veronica left the Wisby brothers to their moonshine, again feeling slightly dirty for eavesdropping. She moved through the forest, looking in each little knot of people for Tucker. She did not see him anywhere.
Then she almost stepped on a pair of black-haired girls seated on the ground, each with a guitar across their laps. “Oh! I’m sorry!”
“Nah, don’t worry about it,” one girl said. “Pull up some moss and have a seat. I’m Janet.”
“Ginny,” the other girl said.
“Yes, we sort of met earlier, when you first got here. I’m Veronica.”
Janet’s bloodshot eyes narrowed as she looked Veronica over. “Oh, yeah.”
Veronica sat down cross-legged and asked, “Are you two sisters?”
“What?” Janet said. “No!”
“She means the hair,” Ginny said to her friend. “And the teeth. And the skin.”
“Oh!” Janet giggled. “No, it’s just that we all look kinda similar. It can be a little weird, I guess.”
Veronica realized they were stoned, if not out of their minds, then at least beyond meaningful conversation. She almost laughed, not with disapproval but delight. “I’m sorry for interrupting,” she said, and started to rise.
“No, wait,” Janet said. “Don’t run away. We don’t bite, or take your money. And we have a song for you.”
“We do?” Ginny asked.
“We do,” Janet said emphatically.
“She does this to me all the time,” Ginny asided to Veronica. “Pulls songs out of the air.”
“And occasionally out of my ass,” Janet added with a grin. She strummed quietly and expertly, her skill apparently not damaged by her altered consciousness. Ginny listened once through, then added harmonies and flourishes. They were so good that almost at once, without even realizing it, all her worries vanished, and Veronica was riveted.
Janet began to sing quietly:
I wouldn’t leave you in the darkest night
I wouldn’t leave you on the brightest day
I wouldn’t leave you when everything failed
Nothing can make me go away
We call it love when we’re having fun
But if that’s love, then what is this
That keeps me fighting to see your smile
And determined to feel another kiss
I don’t have a word for what I feel,
Nothing covers it all
If it’s just love, then the word is all wrong
It’s weak and it’s stupid, like a bad theme song
Yet it’s the word that stands by
It’s my heart’s battle cry
As I stand here awaiting your call.
When they finished, Janet looked at Veronica. “What did you think? I mean, I was making it up as I went, so it needs some work, some of the rhymes are pretty bad, but—”
“I thought it was beautiful, Ginny,” Veronica said. “Thank you.”
“I’m Janet. She’s Ginny.” Both girls giggled.
“Sorry. And you made that up right now, on the spot?”
“She’s like that,” Ginny said.
“It’s not as hard as it looks,” Janet said.
“Not for you,” Ginny pointed out.
They both burst into giggles again.
Somehow the impromptu song had eased Veronica’s heart, taking away the worst of the worry and apprehension. “So what do you think will happen?” Veronica said, amazed at how casual she sounded.
/> “You mean up there?” Ginny asked.
Veronica nodded.
Janet exhaled, and frowned with the effort to think clearly. “Well … obviously we hope everyone comes back.”
“Obviously,” Ginny said.
“And we hope we’ll at least be able to see what it’s like over there. We’ve all heard the stories.”
Wanting to give something back to these two silly, wonderful girls, she said, “You know I’ve seen it, right?”
It took a moment, but both of them finally registered astonishment. “Really?” Ginny cried.
“What was it like?” Janet asked eagerly.
Veronica gave an answer so clearheaded that it astonished even her. “It was like what this world would be if you took away all the human evil.”
Janet and Ginny both nodded in slow unison, such a stoner cliché that Veronica expected them to say together, Whoa.
“I hope I get to see it someday,” Ginny said.
“I hope you do, too,” Veronica said sincerely.
Janet produced a fresh joint. “Want a hit?”
“I better not. I might need a clear head later.” Veronica stood and wiped moss and leaves from her behind. “And thank you both. I feel a lot better now.” And she did.
37
The girls’ song left Veronica inexplicably lighthearted, and she forgot the urgency of her search for Tucker. Instead she wandered through the forest, stopping to listen to more songs and eavesdrop on different stories. Occasionally she glanced back up at the cave, but nothing seemed to change: Mandalay still stood nearby, like a guard at a castle gate, while various people came up and spoke to her.
No one paid any attention to Veronica, or if they did, they just smiled and went on with what they were doing. Now it felt more like a big family-reunion picnic than an in-denial death watch. She thought about finding Craig again and asking if he felt the same, but decided not to; in the jargon of her new stoner friends, she didn’t want to harsh the buzz. Anything was better than the throat-constricting panic she’d felt before now.
She stopped outside another group of musicians, this one all men. She listened as one of them, a tall man with a great, powerful voice, sang over the music: