Moondancers

by E. Van Lowe

  Chapter Twenty-One

  I rose from the bench, my eyes blinking several times to make sure I wasn’t hallucinating.

  “Lara,” I called out. She looked at me from across the meadow, and smiled.

  The sad music in my head swelled, and at that moment, it didn’t sound sad at all, it sounded to me as if heaven had opened up, and the angels were singing.

  I ran from the gazebo, sprinting into the meadow. As I ran toward her, I saw that she had set down a picnic basket, and was spreading out a colorful blanket on the grass.

  “It’s you. It’s really you,” I said, breathless, as I reached her side.

  “I thought I might find you here,” she replied softly, as she kneeled down and smoothed wrinkles from the blanket.

  “You know me better than I know myself. I thought I’d never see you again.”

  She sighed deeply. “That was the plan.” Off came the sun glasses. Her green eyes were smiling, too. “But you know what they say about the best laid plans.”

  “I do, I do,” I said, taking a step toward her.

  “Wait!” she said, freezing me. “You need to hear the ground rules first.”

  “Ground rules?”

  “Ground rules,” she repeated. “It’s broad daylight, so I’m sure nothing can happen here, especially with the threat of Petros always looming nearby. Still, no touching.”

  “No touching?”

  “Joshua, stop repeating after me, please.”

  “Sorry.” I went on: “So, we can be together as long as we don’t touch. Is that it?”

  “No. We can have lunch today, as long as we don’t touch. But I’m warning you, you reach for me, I’m gone.” She hit me with what was supposed to be a searing gaze, but, in fact, was sexy and alluring.

  “Okay,” I replied softly. “No touching.”

  She set the picnic basket atop the blanket and began removing items.

  “Your father is having lunch with my mother, and my aunts, and some of their friends. I was in my room listening to them out on the patio, laughing and talking, and I thought: Joshua needs to eat, too. Then, I thought: We’re in love and we know nothing about each other. I decided we should have lunch, and share a little something about ourselves.” She stopped unpacking, and looked up at me to catch my expression.

  “We should share about ourselves even though you don’t want to be with me?”

  “Even though I can’t be with you,” she corrected.

  She hit me with the eyes again, before going on: “We met and fell in love when we were bodiless souls, long before we became flesh and blood human beings. Maybe after we talk, we will discover we don’t even like the people we’ve become.”

  “You don’t believe that.”

  The hint of a smile appeared on her lips. “No. I don’t.” She paused for a moment, and her expression shifted to one of uncertainty. “Do you want to get to know me?” The uncertainty in her eyes seeped into her voice, and I immediately felt sorry, even though I’d done nothing to be sorry for.

  “Yes, yes, of course I do,” I replied, and took a step toward her. She held up her hand, again stopping me.

  “No touching.”

  “Right, right. No touching,” I repeated. I smiled, pointed at the picnic basket. “Whatcha got in there?”

  Lara laid out a gorgeous spread, an array of colorful cheeses:

  “This is smoked gouda; this is brie; this is Alpine Swiss,” she said as she delighted in setting the cheeses down.

  There was a fragrant loaf of crusty bread her Aunt Asia had baked that morning, along with assorted fruits and crackers.

  She sliced off a thin layer of cheese, placed it on a cracker, topped it off with a tomato slice and handed it to me. “No avocado,” she said.

  That caught me by surprise. “How did you know I didn’t like avocado?”

  She stared at me for a moment. “I don’t know. I just did.” She smiled. “Am I right?”

  “Yeah. That is so weird. You couldn’t have known that. What else do you know?” I asked, eager to see if she could do it again.

  She stared at me for a few moments, her head cocked to the side. “Your favorite color is brown. You like it because it’s the color of earth.”

  “Whoa. Amazing,” I said. “Okay, my turn.” I stared at her, hard.

  “Anything?”

  “Give me a minute.” I continued staring. I kneaded my brow, and then it came to me. “You hate to say goodbye. You say things like see ya, or later, but never goodbye. You hate saying it, and you don’t know why.”

  Her eyes widened for a moment, then she burst into laughter, and I knew I’d nailed it.

  We ate, and drank cranberry juice that she poured from an earthen pitcher, as we happily shared things we’d known about each other since forever.

  Lunch was excellent, made exceptional by the company. After we exhausted the things we’d known about each other, we talked about the things we didn’t know about each other. She asked me my favorite subjects in school: English, science and social studies. Hers were English and history. We shared about books we enjoyed reading, and TV shows we liked to watch. We talked about poetry, and for the first time, I was able to understand.

  “Thank you for the book,” I said. “It’s a sweet gift.”

  “You’re welcome,” she replied rather shyly.

  “‘Our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting: The Soul that rises with us, our life’s star,’” I said. “You circled that in the book.”

  “I did,” she said, looking away. “When we are born, we forget all that happened before we were born. It’s so unfair.”

  “Did you do circle it for me?”

  “No. I did it long before I knew you. Perhaps I’d been listening to the siren’s song all along, and I was trying to make myself remember.”

  I didn’t respond. I left it at that, and for a long time we just sat there, enjoying the day, enjoying the silence, enjoying our endless love.

  After a while, we settled back into relaxed conversation. We talked about my dipstick best friends. Her best friend had been her cousin, Alexia, until recently.

  “What happened to your friendship?” I asked.

  “My mother came between us,” she said. She didn’t seem angry or upset by it. “She had Alexia believing she was grooming her to be the next leader of our people. I don’t know if it was true, or if she was trying to make me jealous. Whatever her reasoning, Alexia believed it, and began turning dark, like my mother. She became petty and demanding, sneaky and conniving, almost like a spoiled child. She was never like that before.”

  I thought of Alexia’s hold over Alan.

  “That’s the reason my Aunt Roxanne moved them out of the compound. She couldn’t stand the negative effect my mother was having on her daughter.”

  “Alexia wants to come back,” I told her. “Maybe the creature waiting to kill them will force them to come back.”

  “Maybe,” Lara said, but she didn’t sound convinced of it.

  We wound up lying on the blanket, our faces inches apart, yet never touching.

  “I think your cousin is using some sort of enchantment on Alan. He’s so protective of her all of a sudden.”

  “I’m not surprised. She’s looking for a protector, a mate.”

  “She’s sixteen!” I blurted.

  “So am I. These are the years my people choose. And since there is no love song playing in Alexia’s head, she chooses to enchant a human into falling in love with her. I’m sorry.”

  “Why? Will the same fate that could happen to me happen to him?”

  She nodded. “It’s called Nianis. When a Nereid can’t find true love—Amoris, they often choose Nianis, rather than grow old without a mate.”

  “You mean turn seventeen before settling down?”

  “Don’t make fun of what you don’t know.”

  “Sorry,” I said. “So, if Alan consummates his relationship with Alexia, he will become a satyr?” I asked.

 
“I’m sorry,” she said again. “You just need to keep them apart.”

  “It’s not that easy. He’s crazy about her. He was crazy about her before she enchanted him. We all were.”

  “You were?” she said, grinning at me.

  “Don’t be jealous,” I said and laughed.

  She began to laugh as well, our mutual laughter rising into the air. A butterfly drifted near her face. She sat up and swatted at it.

  “Shoo. Go on, now.” She fanned at the butterflies around the blanket, and they departed.

  “They’re beautiful,” I said.

  “They’re nothing but little spies,” she replied.

  I knew it.

  “They can be annoying little creatures, always snooping, always telling tales. Certain butterflies are sworn to tell their tales only to my mother. I’m sure she knows I’m with you, and if she doesn’t, she will.”

  “That’s how you knew I was out here, isn’t it?

  “Guilty,” she said with a shamefaced grin.

  “Then I’m glad they spied on me,” I said and reached for her.

  She shrank away from me, her eyes turning dark. “No. Touching.”

  “I’m not going to do anything,” I lied. I knew if I got my hands on her, I was going to kiss her.

  “No touching, Josh! If you can’t follow the rules, I will have to go.”

  She hit me with the eyes again. I sat up, peering at her across the blanket. Anger, like a flash flood, rushed into my belly.

  “So, every time we meet, I’m not allowed to touch you?” I asked. There was no hiding the nastiness creeping into my voice.

  “We’re not meeting again.”

  “This is it?” I screeched. The anger in my belly rose up into my chest.

  “I told you that! It’s better than how I left you last night, running off without even a… see ya. Now we know something about each other. Now we have a memory,” she said, and smiled. Her smile infuriated me.

  “And you think that makes it better?”

  “Yes.”

  “You’re wrong there, Lara. It makes it worse. Are you too dense to see that?”

  It was as if I’d slapped her across the face. Tears sprang into her eyes. “I’m not dense,” she replied as she began snatching up the remains of our lunch, and stuffing the containers back into the picnic basket.

  We were both on edge, and I wasn’t about to do anything to diminish it.

  “Good, great. I’d help, but I might accidentally touch you and break the rules. Wouldn’t want to do that,” I said. I heard the sarcasm rampant in my voice, and didn’t care. “One thing you said last night was right, though. It’s stupid for me to give up my life for you.”

  A breeze that wasn’t there a moment earlier swooped into the meadow, sending a stack of paper napkins air born.

  “I didn’t say that!”

  Lara’s floppy hat was yanked from her head, and kited up into the sky as the gusts increased.

  “Yeah, well, you should have, because it’s true. I’m not giving up my future for you, some girl I hardly know. You’re not worth it.”

  I didn’t mean a word of what I was saying, but my heart was aching so badly, all I wanted to do was hurt her back. Lara’s tears began falling freely as she picked up the basket. She snatched up the blanket from the ground. Mission accomplished.

  “Hopefully, this will be the last insult I ever have to endure from you, Joshua Butters,” she cried out through her tears. Dandelion puffs filled the air, snowing down upon us.

  “I hope so, too. But if you’re ever in the market for another insult, who you gonna call?” I said, piling it on.

  Her head snapped up as if she’d been sucker punched. She spun around and started zig-zagging across the meadow toward the path. It was as if the pain I’d inflicted was so severe, she couldn’t walk straight.

  The wind whipped through her hair as she went. Her flowing dress billowed like the sail of a tall ship. She brought to mind a mime pretending to walk against the wind.

  I wanted to call out Stop! Don’t go! I wanted to apologize, I really did, but a secret part of me was happy to see that I’d inflicted such pain, and that part of me was smiling as she vanished into the trees.

  The moment she was gone, the wind stopped, and a deathly quiet settled over the meadow. And that’s exactly how I felt. Dead inside.

  When I arrived at the truck, my father had already returned from lunch.

  “There you are. I thought you said you’d be working,” he teased. He was grinning from ear-to-ear, and I knew his lunch had been a good one.

  “Looks like you had a good time.”

  “I did,” he said, and laughed. “We had beer. And wine. That Tim Patterson is a regular guy, you know that?”

  “I do now,” I said.

  He spent the rest of the afternoon going on about Tim Patterson and the lunch. He was so busy being pleased with himself, he didn’t notice the tears in my eyes.

  Despite how emotionally drained I was, I still had Alan to deal with. When we left him the night before, he had his mind set on killing the creature in his pool. My hope was that after taking the day to think about it, he’d come to his senses.

  I found Alan in his bedroom, performing a made up version of tai chi, which made it clear he hadn’t come to his senses. No, siree.

  “Hey, where have you been?” he said, stopping his motions and smiling at me.

  “Work. With my Dad. I’m working with him for the next few days.”

  “Oh. Right. Good.” He seemed preoccupied. “You are not going to believe what I found,” he said, grinning at me, and I realized he wasn’t preoccupied. He was waiting for me to stop talking so he could get on with his news.

  He moved to his bed and picked up a long, tubular object with a tip at the end. “Huh? Huh?” he said, his grin widening.

  “What is that?”

  “This, my friend, is a super carbine spear gun. This baby is constructed of aero-space grade aluminum.” He held it up, and aimed, his finger on the pistol grip.

  “Hey, man! Watch it with that thing!” I called out, and ducked. Alan was known for being clumsy, and a spear gun was something you could more than put someone’s eye out with. “Point that at something else,” I called out, signaling for him to point it away from me.

  “Oh, sorry,” he said, lowering the gun.

  “What are you going to do with it?” I asked, as if I didn’t know.

  “I’m going to use this to kill the creature. We’re going to use it to kill the creature.”

  “Uh-uh. No way. We don’t know anything about spear guns.”

  “I do. I took a lesson this afternoon.” He was grinning at me again. It was a self-assured grin, the kind you might see on a student who was about to take a big test and had been slipped all the answers.

  “Someone could get hurt.”

  He snorted out a laugh. “Yeah! The creature could get hurt. The creature could get dead.”

  I moved to him and gingerly took the spear gun from his hand. “Alan, we really need to think about this. That thing in your pool is not a video game. That thing is dangerous.”

  The smile vanished. His eyes darkened. “Alexia likes the spear gun,” he said, and snatched the weapon back from my hands. “She thinks it makes me look like an action hero.” He propped the gun on his shoulder, and struck a pose.

  “I bet.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?” he blurted, narrowing his eyes at me.

  He’s already her slave, I thought, and they haven’t even consummated the relationship yet.

  At least, I didn’t believe Alan had consummated the relationship. If Alan had lost his virginity, he’d have called me five minutes after it happened; heck, he might have called me while it was happening. Consummated or not, it was clear, Alexia Dupree had Alan wrapped around her finger.

  “Alan, Alexia is scared. Her and her mom’s lives are in danger. She’s liable to say anything.”

  “Their lives w
on’t be in danger for long,” he said, his eyes were on me again, defying me to say anything contradictory. “You’re with me, right?”

  With that question, the look in his eyes shifted. He was suddenly a little boy, wanting to know if I could come out and play.

  “Yeah. Of course,” I replied. What else could I say?

  The smile sprang back onto his lips. “That’s my man. Check it out.”

  He threw the spear gun onto the bed. It bounced, and I ducked again. He reached in his pocket and pulled out a tiny, shiny metal object. “Hira shuriken,” he said. “It’s a throwing star.”

  I didn’t mean to look at him as if he were a nutjob, but I couldn’t help myself. “Alan, what have you been doing all afternoon?”

  “Shopping,” he replied with great joy. “The shuriken aren’t used to kill. Hitting him with one of these in the right place will disable the creature. After he’s disabled, we finish him off with the gun,” he said, smiling proudly.

  “Umm…Okay.” I was at a loss for words.

  “Hyaaaaah!” He cried out, then spun around, and flung the throwing star at his bedroom door.

  The star zipped through the air, and gently struck the door. It stuck for a nanosecond, before falling harmlessly to the floor.

  “I haven’t practiced with these yet,” he said, unfazed.

  Just then, my phone chirped. It was my brother Troy, telling me to come home for family dinner.

  Again?

  “I gotta go. Family dinner. I have an idea; let’s spend tonight practicing, get our skills up to par to do battle.”

  Thankfully, Alan quickly picked up on my plan. “I like it. We practice tonight, and tomorrow we strike. The Legion of Doom,” he said, stepping into a super hero pose.

  “Great. Just promise you won’t confront the creature alone. Promise you’ll wait for me.”

  “Of course. I’m not an idiot.”

  Right.

  I started out.

  “Yo, Butterfingers, aren’t you forgetting something?”

  “What?”

  “Which of these do you want to practice with?” he asked, extending the throwing stars in one hand, the spear gun in the other.

  “I will take the spear gun,” I said. It was the most dangerous of the two. I needed to get it away from him before he hurt himself.

  “Good choice. I already got that one down cold.”

  Right.

  I dropped the spear gun off in my bedroom before heading down the hall to dinner.

  “Wash your hands,” my mother called out when she heard me coming.

  “Yes, ma’am,” I called back, and ducked into the bathroom.

  The house was filled with good smells, fragrances we didn’t usually get until the holidays. As I soaped my hands, I began feeling guilty.

  My parents had not been happy—none of us were. It’s not that we were unhappy, but we’d fallen into a pattern of simply surviving, going through the motions of life.

  Meals at our house were catch-as-catch-can. Like ships passing in the night, we each operated on our own schedules. I think it was because we didn’t want to look my parents in the eye and see their failure written on their faces.

  Now their faces were bright, and filled with pride. Their eyes were alight with dreams of the future, a future that, if things continued on their current path, might one day land us in a home north of the boulevard.

  By now the butterflies had told Eudora of our break up in the meadow. I wondered how long it would be before Dad and I became unwelcome at the Applegate fortress, and our lives, and the lives of my family members went back to how it was before.

  Mom made my favorite—pepper steak with lots of red and green bell peppers simmered with slices of steak in a brown sauce. That made me feel guilty, too.

  “Looks great, Mom,” Troy said, admiring the spread. “And are those homemade dinner rolls?”

  “Sara Lee made them. That’s as close to homemade as you’re going to get around here,” Mom said, and laughed.

  Dad was still hopped up from rubbing elbows with a movie star. He talked about lunch, and what a great guy Tim Patterson was. “Maybe we’ll have him over for dinner,” he said.

  “That’d be something. I loved him in Blaze of Glory,” Troy said.

  Throughout the meal, Mom kept looking over at me and smiling. “Josh wasn’t at this big lunch?” she asked.

  “No. He and Lara had a quarrel,” Dad said. I was glad he didn’t belittle it by calling it a lover’s quarrel. “He said he was going to eat in the truck, but he wasn’t there when I got back.” Dad gazed at me with a secret smile. “You two patch things up yet?”

  “No. Afraid not,” I said.

  “That’s all right,” my mother said. “All things in their own time.”

  She was smiling at me.

  I gazed over at my father, stuffing his face with pepper steak and dinner rolls. Anger bubbled up. Dad knew if we’d made up I would have told him.

  Is this his way of saying don’t mess things up for me… for us, or is it just my guilt?

  “Mom, I gotta go finish something I’m working on with Alan. Can I eat this later?” I had to get out of there. “Of course. I’ll keep it warm for you.”

  Gotta love Mom. I said my goodbyes, grabbed the spear gun from my room, and headed out. I needed something to take my mind off the guilt and anger simmering inside me. Practicing with Alan to kill a creature I didn’t plan on killing wasn’t what I had in mind, but it would have to do.

  I arrived back at Alan’s a little after eight, and went straight to his room. He wasn’t there. I spotted a dozen fresh stabs in the door from throwing stars. He’d been practicing.

  I checked outside by the pool to make sure he hadn’t taken matters into his own hands. He wasn’t their either.

  As I turned to head back inside, my eye caught the shimmering water of the pool—so peaceful, so quiet. A chill began working its way up my spine.

  Did Alan attempt to take on the creature all by himself after I left?

  I took a step toward the pool, and stopped short as the chill danced up my arms and legs. I was trembling.

  That’s because there’s a chill in the air.

  I held fast to the thought because it was way better than believing I was too chicken to venture to the pool’s edge and look inside the pool drain.

  He wouldn’t, I told myself. He couldn’t. He promised! The idea that Alan had done something foolish was trying its damnedest to stick, but I wouldn’t let it.

  Instead, I came back inside, and sat down at Alan’s desk. Beads of perspiration lined my forehead. I looked at the computer. If Alan had gone out to the pool to take on the creature, the cameras would have captured it. I could easily prove to myself there was nothing to worry about.

  I am not as adept with the playback equipment as Conner. It took several minutes, but I was finally able to pull up Alan’s backyard on the screen. I started rewinding, but wound it back too far. The date and time stamp in the upper right hand corner indicated I had wound it back to last night.

  I was about to fast forward when the infrared light out on the pool deck came on. I stopped winding, and peered at the screen, wondering who or what had set off the sensors in Alan’s backyard.

  My breath caught as someone walked into frame. I gaped in disbelief, surprised at who had been in Alan’s backyard the previous night. The person stopped by the pool, leaned over, and began talking into the pool drain.