by Diane Butler
After a short time both animals got up and went to the edge of the porch with Lucky appearing to be the most inquisitive. The coyote looked at the dog and Lucky came over to nudge Cowboy as if to say, I’ve got this. Trust me.
“Lucky, what is it?” Roxanne whispered. “I don’t hear anything.” But Lucky did not appear to be signaling that there was any danger, it was more of an expectation. Roxanne thought perhaps the dog had learned when the geese were the heaviest at the pond and knew when to hunt. She got up with the blanket still over her head and arms and went to the edge of the porch to join them but Lucky began to purposely trot off toward the pond. “Lucky, damn you!” she retrieved her staff and started to follow him but in short time he was lost in the fog. When she reached the footbridge she could see that he was waiting for her to catch up. But each time she approached he would run further off again as if he wanted her to follow him and each time he would wait until she caught up. The coyote stayed by Roxanne’s side, never leaving her while the dog led them past the front of the house and toward the levee.
Roxanne had never climbed the levee and was beginning to become nervous with her surroundings so she stopped in the yard that led to the struggling vegetable patch. She had planned on picking what had managed to survive on its own and was in season before she packed the pirogue. She saw the dog run up the base of the steps to the levee but lost him in the fog before he reached the top. She stood there watching and waiting and thought that she heard a soft voice but all she could identify was the slap of the river against its bank. She pulled the blanket further over her face to avoid the mist trickling into her eyes.
Then slowly the form of a man began to rise out of the fog on the levee and stopped at the top. He hadn’t seen Roxanne and she was afraid to move in case he spotted the movement in the fog. He stooped down and she assumed that he was petting the dog so she took the opportunity to step backward a few paces. Coyote was silent and moved with Roxanne. Then the form began to become smaller but she could not tell if he was coming down the levee toward her or going back the way he had come. She took a few more paces back and raised her staff clutching the blanket around her.
Then she heard him speak in the darkness, “Mutt it’s not safe. I don’t know what you want. Won’t you come aboard Jenny until the fog burns off?” Another, smaller form appeared at the top of the levee, “Dad? Is Mutt okay?” And then another form joined him, “Morgan come back and stay with Caleb. Lucky and I will check it out.”
“Lucky?” the name confused Roxanne. It had been the name she had chosen for the dog but it appeared that he was just called “Mutt.” While they were in conversation she took the opportunity to retreat and when she could not see them she knew that they could not see her. She had just picked up her pace when the dog came out of the fog and grabbed the hem of her dress to stop her. Cowboy immediately stepped between them to growl and bare her teeth at the dog. “Let go,” Roxanne whispered while tugging at her dress. She did not think that the dog would lead her into danger but she wanted time to study these people from afar and to form her own judgment as to whether these people were friendly.
At Roxanne’s command to let go, Cowboy began to growl harder and nipped at Mutt who jumped back with a short yelp. “Mutt’s hurt,” a young voice said. “Mutt’s in trouble.” Afraid that she would be shot in the back if she ran she turned and clasped her staff in both hands to meet them as they came out of the fog. Cowboy stepped forward with her head down, her body ready to spring. Mutt went over to join the two men who had approached and everyone stood frozen in place. Both men were shocked to see a shrouded figure with a staff standing in the shadows before them.
“Shit,” Brandon said looking down. “That’s a coyote.” He looked up at what appeared to be a girl with a cape over her head but he couldn’t see her face. “Call off your guard. Mutt won’t hurt you unless he thinks that we are in danger.”
Roxanne backed up a few paces with her staff raised before her in defense and said, “Come girl.” She hoped that she would have time to grab a few things and get to her pirogue before they stole everything that she had but she knew that most of it would be a loss to scavengers.
She heard one of them gasp when he heard her voice. “Roxanne?” She hesitated and slowed her step. “Roxanne is that you? Oh my dear Jesus!”
Roxanne saw that there were now three men and a boy in the group. “You are mistaken. I do not know that name.” This time it was the boy who gasped when he heard her voice. She turned and continued to walk back toward the cabin with Cowboy trotting beside her but the dog overtook them and stood to block her path. She stopped and looked over her shoulder to see the four figures coming out of the fog toward her. She quickly raised her staff again. “If you lay claim to this land then I will gather my things and leave,” she said.
Again there was hesitation among them as they looked at one another. Then one of them stepped forward with a slight limp and she could see that it was a black man who had the soft voice. “We mean you no harm. We lost a very dear friend on this land and often check it. You sound so much like her. It is not safe here in the fog and we suggest that you come with us to wait on Jenny until the fog lifts and where we can see you in the light.”
“What is this ‘Jenny’ you speak of?” she asked. The other two men in the background turned and looked at one another. “It’s a riverboat,” the black man said. “If you are not comfortable with that perhaps you would agree to wait on the levee with us. There is a heavy traffic of Z’s through this plantation and we must not stay here long.”
She hesitated before responding, “I will go with you to the levee, but you will walk before me and I will follow.” They did as she requested with the dog running with them. She realized that what she thought was a weapon was a cane that the black man used to ease his limp. She would not call the dog ‘Lucky’ again since she heard one of the men was addressed as such. She was beginning to think that she knew this group to have picked out that name for the dog. Mutt, as they called him, was very friendly to her when she arrived giving every indication that he knew her. But she could remember nothing and would stay cautious as she tried to piece things together to make sense of it all. Her memory may never come back and she knew that she must use her judgment as if she were meeting people for the first time and had never met them in the past.
Before they reached the levee the boy dropped behind and said over his shoulder, “I’m Caleb. Don’t you remember me?” Upon looking closer she said, “I see that you carry a crossbow. Good weapon.” He looked down as he approached the levee, “You….Roxanne taught me. I already knew some but she made me better.” As they reached the levee they could hear the soft moaning of zombies in the vicinity. “Quickly,” Morgan whispered from the top of the levee, reaching down for Caleb.
Cowboy ran ahead of Roxanne and disappeared over the top. She knew that the coyote was checking the layout of the land and what was before her. She would not let Roxanne advance if there was any sign of danger. Roxanne mounted the top and looked toward the river to see that everyone had gathered on a pier where a riverboat was moored. Cowboy was sitting on a step half-way down the levee and that is where Roxanne joined her.
“Will you not join us on Jenny?” Morgan asked.
“I will not. You said that the levee was safe and this is where I sit until the fog burns off. Then I will be on my way.” She could see that it was starting to clear further out on the river and that it would soon reach them. It would take longer for it to clear the trees and field where it clung to the dampness and where the sun would not penetrate as quickly.
“I’m Morgan,” the black man said and pulled the boy to him. “This is my son, Caleb. The two gentlemen behind me are Lucky and Brandon. And what is your name?”
She smiled as she almost gave the name of ‘Girl’ but felt that it was a special name belonging only to Shoes and should not be shared with anyone. “They call me Cami.” She was startled by their reaction as one of the men gra
bbed the pier post to steady himself and the other rapidly stepped forward to mount the levee. Cowboy quickly stood to block him and began to growl. Roxanne also stood, feeling the tension in the air as Morgan reached out and grabbed the man’s arm.
As Roxanne stood the sun broke through hitting the levee first since it was higher ground and traveled down to her face. “Roxanne!” the man pleaded upon finally seeing her face clearly. “Roxanne for God’s sake! It’s me, Lucky. Are you playing a cruel joke and trying to punish us?”
Lucky saw the scar on her face. He had seen that she was limping in the fog and that had thrown him off, thinking that it really was someone other than Roxanne and that he was hearing a voice that resembled her. But this?....this refusal to acknowledge them after all these months of searching, hoping and visiting the plantation in what was becoming a futile effort to make contact again. This was a cruel joke. He saw confusion and anger cross her face.
“Are you saying that I was once part of your group?” she asked in anger ready to pierce any one of them who approached her again. They all started talking at once throwing information at her, too quickly for her to absorb it all.
“Yes, you were once part of our group.”
“The name Cami, she was also part of our group, a very endearing person who fell to zombies.”
“You taught me how to use a staff, and how to use a crossbow more effectively,” Caleb said.
“Mutt stayed behind waiting for you. Surely he greeted you like an old friend when you arrived.”
“We left clothes for you in the cabin. Were none of them familiar?”
“We traveled together for two years. Do you not remember any of this?”
“We looked three days for you in the Bayou. We never gave up on finding you.”
“Stop!” she commanded. “To find me for what?” she asked with vengeance. “To kill me for good? Was banishment not enough?” The group fell silent with the shock of her words. Brandon, still holding onto the pillar whispered, “Dear God” causing her to look over at him. Their eyes locked and she saw such pity, such hurt in his eyes that some memory tried to come forward causing her to lower her staff somewhat. “What is your name?” she asked in a calmer voice.
“Brandon,” he said staying behind the men. He swept his hands out to the riverboat, “And this is Jenny who you found for us. You gave us new life when you found Jenny and she is my pride and joy. Won’t you come aboard and have coffee with us Roxanne….or….Cami if you prefer but you should know that you have taken the name of someone who you once knew and admired so it is difficult for us to address you other than ‘Roxanne’.”
She looked around the group and saw the kind eyes of Morgan and the pleading eyes of Caleb. She looked at the one who had attempted to approach her, the one called Lucky and saw anger in his eyes. “I will come aboard,” she said, “but I do not trust that one” she swung her staff toward Lucky. “And my coyote comes with me.” They all looked over at Mutt. “They are friends,” she said. “There won’t be a problem with them together. They both sleep with me.”
Morgan pushed past Lucky and extended his hand, “Then please join us.” Roxanne came down the steps and put her hand in his. He then wrapped her arm around his as if he were escorting her to a ball but Roxanne kept her eye on Lucky as they passed him. “Come girl,” she said to the coyote without looking back. Morgan noticed the scars on her wrists and looked over at Lucky to see that he had noticed them too. Morgan was having a hard time holding back his tears after seeing those scars, her face, and feeling her limp against him as they walked.
She boarded the riverboat and they entered an open room with a kitchen at the end. She looked around at the tables and booths that were bolted to the floor in what looked to be a lounge. “Chose any place you like,” Morgan said, “a place that you would feel comfortable at.”
She took a seat against the windows. “No one will sit between me and the door.” However, the door was where Cowboy sat overlooking the room and its occupants. Lucky went to make coffee but she was not comfortable with that. “I must warn you that I know which herbs are poisonous and can identify any liquid that has been laced with it.” Lucky slammed the pan down and walked away to sit in a booth across the room from her. “I’ll make it,” Caleb said.
Roxanne turned to Morgan, “Are you the leader of this group?”
“Leader? Well no, we have different leaders for different things. Brandon is the captain of the ship and while Jenny is in motion we take orders from him. We have a larger group at a paper mill and someone else is leader of that. We go out for supplies and often travel back and forth to the plantation as just the four of us. When we are on land I guess Lucky is the leader.”
She shook her head, “A paper mill. I don’t think I would like that.” She jumped as Lucky hit the table with his fist. “Well that’s not what you were saying last fall when it looked as if we needed to leave the plantation and I wanted to go east!” he yelled. Cowboy got up from her place by the door and came to sit in front of Lucky’s table. Mutt came from behind the counter and joined Cowboy, both of them staring him down. Roxanne made a mental note that Mutt didn’t particularly like Lucky.
“Roxanne,” Brandon said softly as he leaned forward on the table where he was sitting. “I would like to clarify something that you said at the levee. No one banished you. You were taken from us by a marauding group of cutthroats. We searched the bayou for you without success but none of us are familiar with the bayou and we probably made a mess of things. You were valuable to us, loved by us and had a sixth sense that we relied on. You fed us with your crossbow, you found Jenny when we were all but doomed in despair…oh…and Mutt belongs to you. Mutt was with you when we first met you. When we were forced to leave the plantation Mutt refused to go with us and stayed behind. He was grieving for you as we all were.”
Upon hearing his name Mutt turned and looked at Roxanne. She smiled at him remembering the brush she had found in the cabin and how excited he had become.
“Roxanne,” Morgan said. “Can you tell us what you remember?” She paused and then looked over at Brandon and asked, “I traveled with you on Jenny?”
“Yes,” he answered. “We had many a close call on it from Mississippi to New Orleans and then to the plantation.” Roxanne shook her head, “I do not remember Jenny nor was the plantation familiar to me when I arrived.” She looked up at Caleb as he handed her a cup of coffee. “Did you stay in the third cabin on the right?” she asked him.
Caleb caught his breath, “Yes! Yes, dad and I stayed there until the Z’s became so heavy that we decided to stay in the main house.” Again Roxanne shook her head, “I only ask because I found a broken arrow in that cabin. When I picked it up it felt familiar to me and I knew that I had used a crossbow.”
“We still have it,” Caleb became excited. “We kept it. That and your staff. I’ll get it,” he said as he ran from the room.
“Where have you been all this time?” Lucky asked. “If you don’t remember us or the past then pick up from the beginning of when you became Cami.” Roxanne took a sip of her coffee and remained silent. She hadn’t always been Cami, hadn’t woken from a coma and thought that her name was Cami. She was ‘girl’ for a long, long time and didn’t feel that she could share that with people who were still strangers to her.
Morgan saw that Roxanne was struggling with herself. “It’s alright Roxanne, if you don’t want to tell us. You did not have that scar on your face nor did you walk with a limp the last time we saw you.” She quickly put her hand to her cheek having forgotten that it was there. “Whatever you have experienced you do not need to tell us. Only tell us why you thought that you were banished.”
She looked over at Lucky across the room, her hand still on her cheek and did not notice that Caleb had come back with her weapons. “Where have I been all this time you ask?” She took her hand away, “I’ve been healing. I had many wounds, none of which I remember receiving and any one of you in this room cou
ld have inflicted on me. I succumbed to the infection twice and almost died thus causing the healing process to reverse. It took me two months before I could walk again and another three before I could run. I could not use my fingers to hold a spoon or fork and had to be fed by others. I spent the time getting my strength back so I could find my way out of the bayou and survive against the Sousson. So I’m sorry if I wasn’t around to kill squirrels and keep you fed.” She stood up and noticed Caleb for the first time. “Are these my weapons?” Caleb nodded. She grabbed them out of his hand and said, “Thank you for keeping them and thank you for the coffee. Mutt, Cowboy come.”
She left them speechless as she walked out of the room onto the pier. The tension was so thick that no one moved. “Damn you Lucky!” Brandon exploded. Lucky smiled, “Now, that’s the Roxanne that I remember.”