by Yannick Hill
Outside the monitor lizard makes his way along another empty corridor. His teeth are bared but he is not angry. His yellow eyes look mean but he is not mean, he is a monitor lizard who has not eaten in some time. Just then he passes a white door covered in colorful stickers: pop idols, some favorite cartoon characters, skull and crossbones, some of River’s old skating decals. According to Versailles’ schematics, this is Room 70, Missy’s bedroom.
37
The bed inside the trailer smelled fresh, these were fresh sheets, and the mattress was on the hard side, just how Missy liked it.
In her dream she is back in Versailles. It is nighttime but the corridors are brightly lit, like in a cheap hotel. And as she walks the powder-blue carpet she becomes aware of something, the knowledge creeps up on her like a cupboard monster: all the doors are unlocked. Every last room in Versailles is unlocked.
She walks between the white doors and it’s like every-thing’s vibrating, so slight you almost can’t tell. But Missy feels it as an itch in her nose, the whole of Versailles vibrating, like a long-buried spaceship readying itself for vertical take-off, the upward fall. It’s her fear of what’s inside these rooms. That’s what this is. It’s Missy’s fear feeding the engines. Everything vibrating and Missy closes her eyes against the bright light in the corridor to make it stop. And so it does.
She continues across the carpet with her eyes closed, she will walk like this until she finds her way. She is looking for something. What Casey did has cast a shadow, but there are no shadows in the dark, and Missy feels her way along the corridors, knowing she will find what she is looking for if she can bear to keep her eyes closed.
Missy senses something behind her, following closely, but she must not look back, she must keep her eyes tight shut until the time is right. There is someone right behind her but there is no sound, only the high-frequency buzz coming off these bright lights. You have young ears, her mother said, I can’t hear it but you can because you have young ears. Her beautiful mother, her voice low and slow, all the unworn clothes in her wardrobe, her perfume lingering in the air.
The thought nearly makes Missy open her eyes but she doesn’t. No shadows in the dark. Feeling her way along familiar corridors, this darkness is her light, if only she can bear to keep her eyes closed. A flight of stairs. She feels the cold marble on her bare feet. Versailles’ entrance hall, but the doors are closed, shut tight. Beyond these doors is another kind of darkness, black on black. She leans against the wooden door. It’s heavy on its hinges, like the door to a bank vault. She has to lean right in with her shoulder.
And as she passes through the frame into the open air it’s like a firework fired straight ahead into the dark. Bang. The big reveal. This is where it happened. Outside – her first sensation is a smell. Dirt. She can smell wet earth. Chlorinated water. There is still darkness when she opens her eyes. The firework still burning out on the short grass near the swimming pool. The water only pink with blood. And then a scream, a child screaming no, but this is not the dream, this is real life, this is now.
The boy with no name is screaming and Missy is out of bed. She throws open the door to the trailer. Day breaking over the desert. A bobcat has Bob, the white rabbit with the triangle nose. Silas takes a shot with his rifle. Bang. The shot rings out. The lynx continues running, its fur makes it difficult to see, a moving target. Bang. Another miss. The boy screams no, his only friend is lost forever. Missy puts her arms around him and the boy lets her. He buries his face in her side, he hugs her tight. Missy finds a place for his head in the arc of her neck. She and Silas watch the bobcat run, the white rabbit floating away in the half-light.
They continued on the northbound highway. Missy looked out the passenger window at the mountains as they moved slowly past. And now she remembered. An extended flashback. Her family’s trips into the mountains when she was a kid. The RV. The fights with River, looking out of the windows. The blue awning, marshmallows over the fire, a view of the city, their parents talking into the night. And these were good memories. Seeing Mom kissing Dad and Dad kissing Mom. She didn’t think of them as parents so much anymore, more like individuals. Casey. Mom. Missy looked out the passenger window at the mountains as they moved slowly past. The sky was no longer blue, it was gray, the sun somewhere deep in the background. The boy lay in her lap with his eyes closed, but he wasn’t asleep. Missy stroked his short, bristly hair with her fingers. She had her father’s hands. But she was her mother’s daughter, her flesh and blood. She wondered if her voice might deepen, if some day she might form her mother’s perfect sentences, say all the right things, like an actress on film. Synthea . . . Synthea. She’d never thought about her mother’s name before. Even the spelling . . .
Before Leticia, when her mother was the one to say goodnight, it was Missy told the stories, not the other way around. She made them up as she went along, her mother lying by her side, falling asleep before the end. Her breathing, it was her mother’s shallow breathing that sent Missy to sleep, but when she woke Synthea would be gone, her perfume still there, the coolness of the bedclothes where she had been. She had her father’s hands, and she felt older, no longer a child. Her hands, her blood, her heart. And now it was coming back. The RV. Casey telling them stories every night, sometimes reading from books, sometimes making things up as he went along. Yes. She remembered now. His voice. The way he told the stories. A different voice for each character. She couldn’t believe it. She couldn’t believe she’d forgotten all these years, these trips, her father’s stories. Every night, even back in Versailles. He would read to them. This is when she and River shared a room, River in the bunk above hers. Yes. They’d gone through this brief phase in the newly built mansion, after living in the RV all that time, where River had wanted to sleep in the same room as his sister, bunk up like before . . . It actually hurt how much she missed her brother right now. She looked down at the boy in her lap. This boy was like a little brother, someone to look after, to tell stories till they fell asleep.
‘We’ll get you another rabbit,’ Silas said.
‘I don’t want another rabbit, I want Bob.’
‘You know that’s impossible, son, Bob’s gone, but I promise you we’ll find a rabbit for you to love, just as much as Bob.’
‘I don’t want no other rabbit. Never ever. Bob was special. Bob could talk. I talked to him and he talked right back to me. You don’t believe me but I’m telling you the truth. There’s no other rabbit ’cept Bob can talk. He the only one in the wide world.’
‘I wish I could bring him back, son, but I can’t, I—’
Their conversation was interrupted by a roar out of nowhere. The bikes overtook them either side, eight hogs in convoy, eight mirrors framing eight clown faces. Missy’s stomach did a flip. She could have sworn that last one was Cass, her naked friend from the motel. She let go of the boy’s hand and clapped her own. ‘Oh, oh, I know those guys, they’re my friends!’
‘You know those bikers?’ Silas said.
‘I think so, I think so, that last one I think I recognized her, her name’s Cass. Can we follow them? I think they’re headed to a music festival or something like that.’
‘Right now we have no choice,’ Silas said. ‘This road’s the only one for miles, but if you mean can we go where they’re going, the answer’s no, Missy. We have a destination, and that destination is Deep Sky. No time for fun and games, I’m afraid.’
The anger shot through her like electricity, right through to her fingertips and toes. Anger, followed closely by fear, a realization of what this really was, this journey really was, the car travelling at high speed with her in it, this journey into the unknown, a stranger at the wheel, but it was her danger, her choice to say yes. The anger was unexpected, but she kept it under control when she spoke the words. ‘I’ve done everything you said, I’ve played along so far, but whatever this is, whatever lies in store for me at Deep Sky, I think I deserve the opportunity to see my friend, to make the choice to s
ee my friend one last time, one last choice before I give myself to Deep Sky, whatever and whenever that may be. I’m a human being, and as another human being you should allow me this, one last choice.’
They drove in silence. The road stretching ever north-wards. The boy had his eyes open now, he was waiting for his father’s reply. Silas glanced over at Missy but she didn’t catch his eye. He shifted in his seat, hands tight on the steering wheel, the small adjustments that kept the car and its trailer steady on the road.
The boy with no name started jiggling. ‘I want to go, Dad. I want to follow the clowns. Please, Dad? I just talked to Bob and he says he wants to go too.’
‘You talked to Bob?’ Silas said.
‘Yeah, it’s when I close my eyes I can talk to him. He’s right there when I close my eyes. Bob’s a rabbit that can talk and he told me he wants to go with the clowns. Please, Dad?’
Silas stared ahead through the windscreen, but he had loosened his grip on the steering wheel, his knuckles turning from white to pink to red. ‘Alright, look, I have a pretty good idea where these bikers are headed, and if I’m right, it isn’t so far out of our way that Deep Sky can’t wait another day. But, Missy, know that this is the last time. I asked you back at the trailer park if you were sure, I told you once this journey has begun there was no turning back, and I meant what I said . . . But if Bob wants me to follow the clowns, I guess I have to do what Bob says, right, son?’
‘Right!’ exclaimed the kid, banging both his fists on the dash. ‘Follow the clowns, Dad, Bob says follow the clowns. Yeeeehaw.’
So Silas kept the bikers in sight.
‘Dad tell your story about the boy and the mountain, I wanna hear the story.’
‘Ah, but that’s not my story, son, that’s an old folk tale.’
‘Yeah, but I like you telling it, Dad, I wanna hear the story about the boy and the mountain.’
‘But I told you that story, like, two seconds ago!’
‘But Dad!’
‘Alright, alright, I’ll tell it. Okay . . . Well, here goes – the Cahuilla Indians. The Cahuilla Indians made their home just south of a range of mountains that today we call the San Bernadinos.’ Silas paused to stroke his beard with the full flat of his palm. ‘One night, in the fall season of that year, the chief of the Cahuilla tribe called the boys of the village together for a meeting. “Boys,” he said. “Boys, the time has come. Behind me stands a great mountain. It may be invisible now, under cover of darkness, but you know it well, for you have grown up in its shadow. It has always stood there, since before we built this village, and it always will, long after we are gone. But the time has come. Tomorrow morning you will set out from the village and climb the mountain. You will climb until you are too tired to go any further, but on turning back each of you must take a twig from whichever tree stands nearest.”
‘The boys went to bed that night too excited to sleep a wink. The next morning, they all set out, each more determined than the last to reach the top of the mountain and return to the village a hero.’ Here, Silas turned to look at his son with raised eyebrows.
The boy with no name started shaking Missy by her arm. ‘The fat kid? He’s so fat he doesn’t even make it across the desert. Ha ha ha, he’s so fat his cereal bowl comes with a lifeguard.’
‘Son, I thought you wanted me to tell the story,’ Silas said. ‘Missy hasn’t heard the story before so maybe no more spoilers.’
‘Sorry, Dad.’
‘That’s okay, so, yes, the first boy to return was a little out of shape, shall we say, and when he opens his hand for the tribal chief it’s a piece of green Beavertail Cactus.
‘“My boy,” said the chief, “I can see that you did not even make it to the foot of the mountain. Never mind.”
‘An hour passed, and the next boy to return presented the chief with a twig of Black Sagebrush. “Well,” said the chief, “you may have reached the foot of the mountain, but you went no further. What a shame.”
‘Another hour passed, and the third boy to return held in his hand a sapling of young Cottonwood. The chief smiled for the first time that day. “Well done, my boy, you got as far as the springs. I’m proud of you.”
‘Time passed. Another boy returned with some Buckthorn in his hand. “Very good,” said the chief. “You must have reached that first rock slide. You’ve worked hard today. Well done.”
‘Later that afternoon a boy returned with a frond of Incense Cedar. The chief was very happy. “You got halfway up! To the very heart of the mountain. You will sleep well tonight.”
‘The sun was low and the sky was beginning to darken when the next boy arrived in the village with a branch of Ponderosa Pine. The chief congratulated the boy, telling him that he nearly made it to the top of the mountain, and that surely next year he would succeed.’
Silas sighed a deep sigh before continuing.
‘The sun set below the horizon and darkness descended over the land. The chief began to worry. There was still one boy left who had not returned to the village. The chief knew the mountain well, he himself had made the ascent more than once. He knew the dangers, thought the boy might have crossed paths with one of the hungry grizzly bears he knew roamed these mountains. The boy may have lost his way in the dark, or worse still, fallen from a precipice to his death. The chief was ready to gather the men of the village when at last the boy emerged from the darkness. He stood before the chief and opened his hand. It was empty. It was empty but his heart was full of joy, for this is what he said: “My chief, where I have been there are no trees, no twigs or any other living thing, for I have been to the very top of the mountain, and when I looked out and up, I saw a deep ocean of stars. All around me, everywhere I looked, I saw stars, and for a moment I thought I would fall, not off the mountain but up, up into the deep sky forever. I have returned, but only to tell you what I saw, for tomorrow I wish to climb the mountain once more, to look upon the heavens as they truly are, to be among the stars.”
‘“And climb you will,” said the chief, “but know this. As you close your eyes to dream this night, it will be as it was at the top of the mountain, an ocean of stars as deep as deep, and that is the true dark, the true light, inside of you, for you have seen yourself as you truly are, a star among other stars, here long before we built this village and long after we are gone. You carry the darkness with you.”’
They drove in silence for a while after Silas had finished the story. The desert road stretching ahead, the mountains drawing ever nearer.
‘You changed it,’ the boy with no name said. ‘It doesn’t end like that. Why’d you change it, Dad?’
‘It’s a folk tale, son. Folk tales are stories passed down from generation to generation. The world changes, people change, and the stories change with them. I’m just telling it like it is, son, I’m just telling it like it is.’
Silas flipped the indicator and they exited the highway. They’d lost sight of the bikers but there were signs every now and then for Troll Meet. Strange name for a music festival, but Missy could already hear the bass pushing through the trees, she felt it tickle the fine hair on her arms. Soon they were passing half-pitched tents by the roadside and people, groups of people with painted faces and all headed in the same direction. Troll Meet. They smiled at Missy through the windscreen and Missy smiled back. All ages, all races, their painted faces, all headed in the same direction and excited, triple piggy backs and gonzo gymnastics. There were half-pitched tents and smoke rising. She could smell burning food, hear the bass pushing through the trees. She’d seen pictures of festivals before. On other people’s profiles. Pictures of kids having fun in the sun. The kissing, the dancing, the drinking. #endlesssummer. But nothing prepared Missy for the reality.
The hundreds of painted faces, smoke rising, people walking, fairground rides spinning crazy in the daylight, this canvas city shifting in the summer breeze, the bass pushing through her body now. Missy closed her eyes and breathed deep. This was real, this place
felt real, her time with Silas already like a dream. She had to get out of this car and breathe the real air outside.
Her millions of followers looking elsewhere and she didn’t care. She was right here, living the dream, no phone, nothing tracking her location. No status update. She was under the radar, and no one need know. Her being here. This adventure: she might tell someone about it one day, but she’d do it just with words, spoken out loud, like her mom did sometimes, conjure a picture with a careful choice of words, a tone of voice, a gesture. And she wouldn’t tell just anyone. Maybe her brother, maybe Levon. And then again she might never tell. All this – the sword, the journey north – no one need ever know. It could be her secret. She had to get out of this car.
She looked at Silas and found that she hated him, hated how old he was, he was an old man and she was a young girl, she missed her friends, she missed her friends back home, she was a young girl and he was some creepy old guy who kidnapped young girls. Deep Sky. It sounded like a cult. Cut off from the rest of the world, everything that was going on. Her friends, their friends. Levon. River. All of them. And here she was, a young girl, getting in cars with strangers.
She was waking up too late; how had it come to this? They parked up and right away Missy opened the door to the car and nearly lost her balance on the grass. Flying crocodile. She stood under the open blue sky and breathed deeply through her nose, right to the bottom of her lungs. This place, the cool summer breeze rippling her T-shirt, this is where she belonged. She caught his eye through the windscreen. Silas’s face in shadow but she could see his eyes, the realization – hers. Twinkies. Her impulse was to turn and run, disappear into the crowd of painted faces, find Cass and tell her everything, lose herself in the sunshine, lose herself in the light, disappear among the crowds of painted faces, forget everything else, what Casey did, it wouldn’t matter anymore because she was young and she could find a boy to kiss it all away. His face in shadow, but she saw his eyes. Twinkies.