The Dryad's Kiss

by Scott VanKirk

  “Anyway, I think she’ll be coming by tomorrow and won’t be put off any longer.”

  “Oh,” I pouted. The fear I had been ignoring rose up to tap me on the shoulder. I felt so guilty about the whole affair that I was sure the police wouldn’t believe anything from me except for a full confession.

  “I wish I could talk to Gregg!” I said, voicing my second biggest fear. “What if his story doesn’t match ours?”

  My mom shook her head. “There’s nothing we can do about it, so we’ll do the best we can. Just stick to the story we’ve discussed.” She sighed. “Actually, let’s go over it again.”

  ***

  A short time after my mother had gone home, nurse Harry came in to remove my catheter. He was a short, Lebanese guy. The way he treated me, I wasn't even sure he realized I was a living being. There was no-nonsense and no denying him. It was so much better than the first time when nurse Kati did it that I had to send a little prayer of gratitude to the Karma Fairy. Maybe I'd reached my quota for the year or something. Yeah Right.

  The Morning After

  Momma Nature’s insistent calling pulled me from my sound sleep. Ignoring the call was getting close to impossible when I heard someone in my room say, “Oh!”

  I peeled my face from the damp ring of drool left on my sheets and took in the bright, shiny day the world had brought me. My favorite nurse, Kati, stood inside the door of my hospital room, looking around. The covers lay strewn around the floor as if I’d had a wild party.

  Mortified, I tore away from the sheets that were damp with sweat—and perhaps other bodily fluids—and sat up. I shoved the pillow, from where I had it clasped between my legs, and smoothed down the short, flowered, hospital nightie. Though technically covered, I felt naked under Kati’s appraising stare. To make things worse, as I arranged my covers, my hand encountered a wet, cold, and sticky spot on aforementioned nightie.

  The flames shooting out of my ears from my blush were probably a fire hazard. She stood in the hallway, making strange strangling noises, and swallowing hard, while she held her face tightly neutral. As though she found it impossible to look anywhere else, she locked gazes with me.

  My bursting bladder suggested the way out. “Uh, sorry, I’ve got to go!” I hopped out of bed and ran to the bathroom with my all-over wagging through the open nightie behind me.

  I slammed the bathroom door, threw off the nightie, and answered mom’s call.

  Do not worry about impressing that one; she is not in her fertile period. Also, she is not a good candidate for your seed, so it does not matter if she is attracted to you. She is small with narrow hips. You should wait for someone more suitable.

  Spring, please! Give me some privacy when I'm on the toilet.

  Amusement bubbled from within me when she added, This One is funny. Then her presence drew back from my conscious thoughts.

  Sharing your mind with someone sucks.

  I sat there for a while before I realized that I had concluded my business. Then I flushed the toilet and went to wash my hands. I raised my eye to the mirror, and a fresh wave of horror hit me.

  “Gah!” burst out of my mouth.

  My head looked like a banana with my hair sticking up over my scalp and drooping. The hairs not recruited to my main ’do stuck up at odd angles and clung to each other for support. Correction: my head looked like a fuzzy banana.

  I dropped my face into my hands, bent over, and banged my head against the porcelain sink. A dim voice from the other side of the door stopped me. “Finn? Are you all right?”

  “Uh, yeah, no problem. I’m fine. Don’t come in. Everything’s okay.” It all spilled out of me in a disturbing, squeaky voice.

  The door muffled her voice. “All right, let me know if you need help.”

  “I, uh, I’m going to take a shower,” I called.

  “Okay. If you feel dizzy or faint, sit down, and use the buzzer next to the shower.”

  “All right, no problem,” I responded, trying not to croak like a frog.

  The shower beat on me for a long time, and I would have let it continue if not for Spring.

  This One, you are in danger of over-watering yourself. Your skin is puckering.

  I shut off the water and stood there dripping. “Spring, were you in my dream?”

  One of the apparent benefits of sharing a brain is that regardless of your grammar, your intent came through loud and clear.

  She replied, No, but you must have enjoyed yourself.

  My brain had flat-lined on weirdness and discomfort, and I didn’t even flinch at the inherent strangeness of that statement. She tried to cheer me up. Even if you are silly, you are still my Sun, my Rain, my Root.

  Her affection whirled in my thoughts. It helped—a lot.

  By the time I wrapped a towel around myself and emerged into the room, I was whistling along with the beat of Wendigota's heart.

  In a woefully familiar pattern, life wasn’t finished yanking my chain that morning. As I exited the bathroom, I almost ran into the beautiful Detective Victoria Hunter. I froze with my lips puckered.

  Victoria… er, Detective Hunter’s gaze dropped to the floor like a rock. She spoke before I could rally my brain enough to say something. “Oh! I’m sorry! I thought you were just using the, uh… Maybe I can give you some time to get dressed?”

  I thawed and replied, awkward for awkward, “Uh, sure. Sure.”

  She stood still until I realized I made a lousy door. I blushed and stepped out of the short hallway, and she hurried out. At least she had the presence of mind to close the door, earning my heartfelt gratitude. Sheesh. Time to start getting dressed in the bathroom.

  Nurse Kati had cleaned up the room and laid out a new beflowered nightie for me on the bed.

  Not going to happen, I thought, using more emphatic words than what I might have chosen. The idea of Detective Hunter interrogating me in that gown made me cringe. I refused to even contemplate wearing it.

  A quick search and I found my street clothes. Just putting them on relaxed my muscles and eased my nerves. They say, “The clothes make the man.” I don’t know about that, but my familiar jeans and tee were a layer of armor against the world. They helped control the panic rising yet again in me.

  A few minutes later, the sexy cop knocked on the door and came in when I answered. She offered her hand and said, “Hello, again, Finn. Sorry about the intrusion.”

  I smiled, heat burning through my cheeks and ears. “No problem.” While her handshake was not as crushing as Dr. Mengele-Anderson’s, hers was a little too strong to be called “firm.”

  After we shook, she kept holding my hand in her long, warm, sexy fingers, and she gave me a searching look. “You seem different somehow.”

  “I do?”

  “Yes, something’s changed. Did you get a haircut?”

  Aware of her hand in mine, or should I say my hand in hers, I pointed to my wet head, “Nope, just got a new hospital ’do.”

  It frustrated her that she couldn’t pinpoint the change. Being a cop, I supposed you had to be observant, and she didn’t like missing anything. “Have you been working out?”

  “A little.” Sure enough, when I checked, my shirt was a little less filled out around the stomach area.

  “It’s just that you seem more…” She stopped herself. “Uh, that is, you seem to have…”

  This was a strange new experience. I didn’t make people uncomfortable—just didn’t happen. It had always been the other way around.

  I pulled on my hand a little to get it back, reminding her that she still had her fingers around it. She dropped her hand, turned bright red, and said, “Never mind. Shall we sit?”

  “Sure.” The idea that I made a woman blush mesmerized me.

  We both ended up sitting in mismatched hospital chairs, facing each other. Detective Hunter pulled out an iPad and placed it on her lap.

  While I watched her long, slender fingers poking at the screen, Spring chimed in, You have sound i
nstincts. She is strong with wide hips and will be able to bear you many children. This female is a breeder and is ready to procreate. You should follow your desires here. I am sure she would be grateful for your seed. I have signaled to her that you are fertile and ready.

  What signal? What are you talking about?

  Spring rummaged through my brain for a second before she popped back in triumph. I have released pheromones compatible with hers. She should be ready to be impregnated by you.

  What? Don't do that! Stop it! I thought, mortified, even though the potential fantasy fascinated me.

  The detective caught me in the middle of my dialog with Spring. “Finn, I’m grateful for your time…” What she must look like underneath that uniform was paraded across my mind. I blushed when she stopped with a concerned pinch of her lips.

  “Are you all right?”

  Spring laughed at my reaction.

  I thought to her, This is not funny!

  Procreation is not funny, she agreed. It is life. Without it, there is only death and decay.

  Right! I agreed with relief that I’d gotten my point across so easily.

  This One is funny.

  The detective prompted me again. “Finn?”

  “Uh, yeah, yeah, I’m fine!” I rushed, still burning red.

  For some reason, she returned my blush, but hurriedly continued. “I know you’ve been through a lot recently, but I need to ask you about what happened on June twelfth.”

  That yanked my mind back from sexual-fantasyland. I had known that the question was coming, but still my heart sped up and my mouth went dry. I tried to ignore the dread and told the story as I had rehearsed with my mom. It hadn’t occurred to either of us for me to look dumb and say, “I dunno.” Instead, I said, “We were going the hospital where we tried to visit my friend, Jen. She was gone from her room when we got there.

  “Well, we got home and heard a commotion out back. I ran through the house, came out the back, and saw a bunch of guys out there. They were all dressed in black and had rubber masks on…”

  As I spoke, I knew I was going to jail. No way would anyone buy my story, but I kept telling myself that wasn't the point. The point was they couldn’t disprove it, and unless someone filed charges, there wasn’t anything they could do about it. More importantly, they couldn’t throw me in the loony bin.

  Hoping that she’d attribute my shakiness to the trauma I’d suffered and not to the burden of guilt I continued, “They…they were standing over two people lying on the ground. There was blood all over the place. I didn’t know it was Gregg and Jen at the time.”

  “This was Gregory and Jennifer Washington?”

  “Yes.” I nodded, nervous, but noting the beautiful lines of her face and her warm dark gaze helped ease my tension. “Anyway, one of the guys was taking a chainsaw to our tree, and another had a bucket of blood that he was splashing around.

  “Then the tree fell over onto our house. My dad and I jumped away and slipped on the grass. As I was trying to get up, I heard the guys yelling. I guess they saw us. Anyway, one of them ran over and sprayed something in our faces. That’s all I remember.”

  Detective Hunter sat and stared at me for a moment, her eyes unreadable. She started asking me questions about my story.

  Thinking back, I don’t really remember the specifics, just how uncomfortable they made me.

  When she finished, she paused for too long, then, she gestured to the notes she had made and said something that drove everything else out of my mind.

  “This is a very different story than Gregg Washington told me.”

  “Oh?” I managed, adding internally, God, oh, God, oh, God…

  “Yes.”

  “What did he say?” I wasn't sure I wanted to know.

  She tapped on her iPad a few times and told the story with no special intonation. “He said that he saw his sister from his bedroom window. She came out of their back shed with a chainsaw. He ran downstairs and looked for her, couldn’t find her, heard the chainsaw start up in your yard. He ran to your house and heard her scream.

  “When he reached your backyard, the tree was eating her. Literally. He tried to pull her out, but couldn’t. At her urging, he took the chainsaw and continued cutting down the tree. The tree fought back, and it hit him with its branches. He said that he first saw you as you were pulling his sister out of the trunk. Then, according to Gregg, he hit a kind of artery in the tree and blood started spraying everywhere. After that, a “tree woman” popped out of the tree and smacked him across the yard. He didn’t wake up until the paramedics arrived.”

  She watched me intently, reading the panic on my face, as I struggled to form a coherent thought.

  “Oh, that… that… is, uh, really weird,” I forced out. Then, I had a flash of brilliance and said, “Maybe they sprayed him with something that caused hallucinations.”

  The detective pursed her delicious lips, nodded a couple of times. “So, you’re sticking with your story about the ‘guys in the masks’?”

  “Uh… yeah?”

  “There are several things troubling me here that maybe you can help me with.”

  “Sure.” I nodded while trying to maintain the part of the innocent victim who was hoping to be helpful.

  “First of all, I don’t know of a spray drug that can cause hallucinations, induce a coma, or knock someone out for a day.”

  “Uh, maybe they were different drugs?”

  “Second,” she said, ignoring my helpfulness, “Jennifer tells a story more like her brother’s than to yours.”

  Uh-oh!

  She tapped on her iPad again, drawing up another document. “Her story was a little different. She described how you saved her and destroyed the evil creature who was masquerading as a tree. She then waxed, somewhat poetic, about how you glowed like the sun and would save the world from the ‘Ancient Enemy,’ and that this was just the first battle.” Every word came out deadpan, and her gaze was disturbingly reminiscent of the Dark Lord Dr. Anderson. “Do you have any idea why this might be?”

  Spring’s indignation at the label the “Ancient Enemy”, came pouring into my brain and unable to say anything, I shook my head, quickly and tightly.

  “Or, perhaps you can tell me why all the blood in your yard is human.”

  My eyes widened.

  “And, why it matches yours genetically, as far as we have been able to test it?”

  “Mine?” I squeaked, even as the thought came across, Of course, it is This One’s blood. This One’s blood is the river that carries life. What other blood would I use?

  “How would you explain that?” The question proved rhetorical when she continued through a list of statements.

  “You didn’t have a twin brother, let alone five. We checked. The blood couldn’t have been fabricated in any way known by anyone at the university. We checked. The forest of oak trees growing in your yard was not there two months ago. We checked. The five new trees that have appeared since the incident have grown a foot. We double-checked.” She caught my gaze as it shifted across her face. “Can you explain any of that?”

  “Fertilizer?” I hazarded.

  She lost her composure, and anger showed through for the first time. “Do you know how hard I worked to become a detective?” I quickly shook my head. “Do you know how difficult it is to be a woman cop in this backwater bit of this soggy, backwater state?” This time she didn’t wait for me to shake my head again. “Do you know what a coup it was to be assigned to this case? Do you know what this will do to my career if the best we can come up with is men in masks or man-eating trees, which bleed your blood?”

  I had stopped shaking my head after it became clear she wasn’t expecting an answer.

  “Do you?” The intensity in her voice made it more powerful than a shout.

  I rushed back to shaking my head.

  She sighed. “Me neither.”

  Her dark hair framed her face and accentuated her high cheekbones and long, dark e
yelashes as she gazed sightlessly down at her iPad. She looked up and caught my appraising gaze. “You’re not going to give me anything, are you?”

  Now is your chance! urged Spring. Offer her your seed!

  That one almost made me choke. I struggled to ignore Spring and remember what Detective Hunter had asked. Another tiny negation was all I could give her.

  She groaned and stood up. “Well, then, Mr. Morgenstern, thank you for your time.” She turned to go.

  “That’s it?” I asked, perplexed.

  “Until you can give me anything more, there’s nothing I can do. We’ve got no credible evidence of murder; we have no one pressing charges. We’ve utterly ridiculous and contradicting stories about what happened. There’s nothing we can move forward with.”

  “Oh.”

  “I’m sorry to hear about your father,” she said. “He’s a good man.”

  Then, she was gone, closing the door behind her with a soft click.

  I almost melted into a puddle on the floor. The one two punch of relief and guilt scored a KO, though I didn’t know which hit me harder, relief that it was over, or guilt that I couldn’t help the lovely and frustrated Officer Hunter. My nerves were still jangling, and I was trying to calm down when I saw the folded up note from Erik.

  Crap! I grabbed the paper and almost jumped up to follow the detective, but then remembered she would ask me, “What did he see, Finn?”

  Instead, I sighed and tossed the note down on the table.

  You complicate your life far more than you need to, offered my oh-so-helpful peanut gallery.

  After I had finished shaking and sweating from the interrogation—and having a stern talk with Spring—I found that wearing my clothes gave me a new-found sense of freedom. In fact, when I considered it, I felt great—if a little hungry. I paced around the room. The moment I sat down, I’d jump back up again, so I decided to go see my dad. I'd stop to see Jen along the way.

  ***

  Getting into Jen's room turned out to be easy. No one shouted at me, the rent-a-cop had gone from the hallway in front, and her door stood open. Unfortunately, it was empty. She was gone. I wondered if Gregg had been released as well. I thought about asking the duty nurse for Gregg’s room number, but lost my nerve. I didn’t want to be scolded for leaving my room without a doctor’s note. Instead, I set off to find my father.