The Crippling Terrors (Tracking Ever Nearer Book 1)

by Jeff Vrolyks

  “Why do I bring this up, you might ask? No, Holly, not to brag; brat, yeah, I heard that. I gave it a lot of thought, as to how I could show you guys my appreciation. And not just my appreciation for what Kevin, Pea Willy, and Sue Ellen did the other night, but for Holly and Alison too. For contributing to the band’s success as much as you have. And just because I love you both so damned much.

  “But aside from simply telling you all how much I appreciate you, I sought a way to keep us all together; especially you, Holl. I don’t ever want us to drift apart, and if you go away to college and quit the band, I worry that’s exactly what will happen. You’re the most important person in my life, and I won’t allow us to drift apart.

  “So then it came to me. A solution! A Mexican beach house. I’m putting the house in all six of our names. I know there are seven of us—sorry Mike, I hope you don’t feel excluded. You can come visit with Kevin. Each of us will have equal stake in the house and you can use it as often as you want.

  “And there’s more. What good is it to have a vacation house if you can’t afford to fly there as often as you’d like? Quentin at Embassy Travel, my new travel agent, is setting up an account that you can all get airline tickets from whenever you want, at no charge to you. And I’d be disappointed if everyone didn’t use this service at least a few times a year. I’m hoping we could all go there together a couple times a year, but there aren’t any obligations. So there you have it. I won’t accept no for an answer, so don’t bother. Congratulations all, you’re about to become Mexican homeowners. Salud!”

  We were floored. Nobody had anything to say, even though our mouths were open. Holly finally spoke: “I got one! I got a bite!” She bolted out of her chair and grabbed her pole.

  We all gathered at the river’s edge. Jack and Peaches came from out of nowhere to watch.

  Mike cheered, “Woohoo! Looks like a big one! Good job!” Then, “Anyone got a smoke I can bum?”

  “You don’t smoke,” I said. “There isn’t a shift supervisor driving by, either.”

  “I know, I just like a smoke from time to time when I drink. It gives my hand something to do.”

  Alison smiled at Mike and said, “Holly was right; you are a character, Mike.”

  Mike smiled, heart fluttering. “Thanks?”

  “Did anyone bring a bag or a sack,” asked Kloss, “so we could throw the fish in and light it on fire?” An inside joke between him and Holly.

  Holly stopped reeling and scowled at him. “You aren’t touching my fish this time! I’ll have Peaches bite your balls off!”

  “Touchy-touchy. I was only joking.”

  “You know how much you scarred me by burning that fish?”

  “It wasn’t me! Keith did it!”

  “But you didn’t stop him.” Inwardly, “Men can be so cruel, such savages.” Peaches whined. “I know, right Peaches?”

  “Hey Mike, would you grab the fish when it gets to shore?” Alison asked. “We don’t have a net.” She winked at Holly.

  Water splashed in the shallows. Mike squatted and grabbed the fishing line. He followed it toward the fish. “Reel it in more, I can’t quite reach it.” Mike reached farther into the river. When the fish grazed his hand, he startled and lost his footing, dropped to his knees in a foot of muddy water. “Damnit!”

  Oddly enough, nobody was laughing. Mike sensed it but couldn’t hear it. A muffled snicker or two was followed by a quickly cut-off chortle. Even the wolves snorted. Hearing it was like watching someone yawn—we all wanted to laugh. Little expulsions of nasally air were poorly hidden behind coughs and eventually it snowballed into an aching need to laugh. I was first to crack up, the rest followed. I laughed so hard that I didn’t notice that one of us wasn’t laughing. And it wasn’t Mike.

  “Are you all right Mike?” Alison asked sympathetically. She grabbed a hold of his hand and helped him up.

  He wrung the water from his pants. “Thank you, Alison.”

  “Call me Ali. You poor thing, you’re soaked. That’s probably freezing cold water, too.”

  “It’s all right, I’ll be fine.”

  “Could you grab the fish please?” Ali directed at Kloss peevishly.

  “Of course.” Kloss knelt and reached for the fish. “Damn, it’s huge!” He put his thumb inside the striped bass’s mouth and pulled him out. I thought I saw Jack lick his lips.

  A fishing pole rattled beside us. “My pole!” Mike exclaimed, and grabbed it. “Woohoo! You’re mine!”

  Kloss dislodged the hook and held the fish at arm’s length, admired the beauty. “Want me to throw it back, Holl?”

  “I guess, unless you want to take it home and eat it.”

  “Nope.”

  Jack and Peaches’ eyes were fixed on the bass, ears erect. Kloss dropped the fish in the river. Before the fish could swim away, Jack uncoiled like a cobra and his paws pinned the fish. He pulled it out of the river with his mouth and trotted off. Peaches followed.

  “I guess it’s dinner time for the kids.”

  We gathered around Mike to see what he hooked on to. “I think it’s gonna be a big one. He’s fighting pretty hard.”

  I stepped behind Holly and put my good arm around her waist. She leaned into me, turned for a kiss. “Nice fish,” I whispered. She tapped her hand on mine.

  Kloss knelt down and put his hand in the river in preparation of the soon-to-arrive fish. Jack returned to the river’s edge with ears perked up again, tongue tidying up his lips for desert. Kloss stuck his thumb in its mouth and pulled the six-inch catfish out of the river. His thumb looked like a pacifier in a baby.

  Jack lowered his ears and trotted back to work on his dinner: there would be no dessert.

  “Throw him back,” Mike said, disappointed. “Try not to kill him, Kloss.”

  “We can put him in a bag and light him on fire,” Ali suggested to Mike. “What do you think?” Holly and Alison looked at one another knowingly.

  “Uh… I don’t think Holly would allow that, Ali.”

  “It’s all right,” Holly assured. “You can set that one on fire. He’s small and ugly. Burn him if you want.”

  Mike looked at Holly, then Alison. He couldn’t get a read on them. I was trying to catch Mike’s attention with my eyes. I was projecting like a neon sign, Don’t fall for it! It’s a trap!

  “I’d rather not. I’ll just throw him back and let him grow, if that’s okay. We’ll catch him when he’s bigger and then we’ll burn him if you still think he’s ugly.”

  “Mike, buddy, they’re screwin’ with you,” Kloss said.

  Holly whacked him on the arm.

  “Oh? I couldn’t tell. I guess some things never change. I get it at work, at my friends’, and even when I’m fishing.”

  “It’s cool, bro,” Kloss said reassuringly. “We’re not like that. You’re with friends here.”

  “We’re not like that, except for Holly and Ali, apparently,” I said.

  Kloss tossed the catfish back in the river. Mike grabbed the can of worms and dug one out. “Could you do mine after yours?” Alison asked. Mike glimpsed her dangling naked hook and nodded. After he cast his bait, he sat his pole down and helped Alison.

  “Thanks,” Ali said. “The worms keep falling off my hook.”

  Mike dug out a worm and said, “You have to stick the hook through them a few times so they stay on nice and good.”

  Alison raised her brow. “Stick the hook through them? Doesn’t that hurt them?”

  “Have you fished with worms before?”

  “No. I’ve only fished once, when I was little.”

  “Just slide the hook through the worm a couple times like this.”

  “Doesn’t that kill them?”

  “The fish biting them isn’t so good for their health, either.”

  Alison watched studiously. “All right, thanks Mike.”

  “How were you putting the worms on the hook before?”

  “Doesn’t matter, it was wrong.”

/>   “Tied them on the hook,” Holly admitted. “That’s how I put them on.”

  “Tied them? I’ve never heard of that. Don’t they fall off when you cast them?”

  Alison and Holly nodded. Alison said, “Not always. I thought that’s why we bring so many worms.”

  “I know that people stick the hook through them,” Holly said, “but I don’t like that way. I don’t really want to catch fish, anyway.”

  “But you caught a fish,” Mike said. “Did you tie the worm on the hook then?” She nodded. Mike shrugged and said, “Well if it works, it works. Can’t argue with results.”

  Pea Willy said, “Hey Kev, Kloss, I’m gonna grab my guitar from the RV. Either of you want me to bring another? I have a few.” Kloss turned down the offer.

  “Sure, I’ll go with you,” I said and gave Holly a kiss. “He might need help carrying them, besides I want to thank him more personally for the other night.”

  Pea Willy and I walked up the trail together.

  “Quite a spot here, huh?” Pea Willy said.

  “I love it.”

  “How old are you, Kevin?”

  “Twenty-three. Why do you ask?”

  “You look familiar.”

  “What brings you out to California?”

  “My wife’s sister. She’s having marital problems.”

  “The reason I wanted to walk with you was to thank you for helping us. You carried us from my truck to your RV, right?”

  “You’re very welcome. I carried Alison, Kloss carried your sweetheart.”

  “Who carried me?”

  “Nobody,” he said with a grin. “We were coming back for you, but believe it or not, the wolves dragged you by the pant legs. Two on each leg. It was amazing to watch, Hoss. I’ve never seen anything like it. Wish I got it on film.”

  Pea Willy unlocked and opened the door, flipped a light switch. I followed him inside. He handed me an acoustic guitar and said, “You love her, don’t you?”

  “You have no idea.”

  “How long have you been together?”

  I groaned. “Not that question.”

  Pea Willy sat at the bench and gestured for me to do the same. “Now I know why you look familiar. You are me, ten years ago. People use to ask me the same danged question after I met Sue Ellen. I was about your age. I fell in love with Sue Ellen the second I saw her. Is that what happened with Molly?”

  “Holly. Yes, instantly.”

  I related to him how I felt when I met her and he grinned; he had a similar experience. We quickly began bonding, finding common ground in our passions for Holly and Sue Ellen. He told me the story of how his eyes picked her out of a sea of people and after they met they danced most of the night away, then went back to her place and talked till daybreak. He kept my attention, as it was a touching story.

  When he finished I said, “Do you think it was fate that brought you to her? Or do you think that if you never met her you would have found another woman, and fallen in love with her?”

  “I don’t know, Hoss. I think that I was destined to meet her, because it doesn’t seem possible that I could love another woman as much as I love Sue Ellen.”

  “You know what I think about? What if I was late to the pharmacy and wasn’t in line at the same time as Holly. I wouldn’t have met her. What if I didn’t break my arm and didn’t need a prescription? There were so many ‘what if’s that stood between Holly and I meeting, yet we overcame them all. Little things like a series of red lights instead of green lights; there are just so many variables.”

  “I think that if you were meant to be together the lights would be the right color. Or maybe your tire would have blown out so she could have caught up. Or a sweet old lady might lie to you, just so you’ll change course.”

  “A sweet old lady might lie to you?”

  “Bad example. That was my own experience.”

  “When you met Sue Ellen?”

  “Yessir. Let’s head back before Sue Ellen starts worrying about me,” he said and winked.

  He locked the RV and we descended the trail with a pair of acoustic guitars.

  “I mentioned that I met Sue Ellen at the Crazy Horse?”

  “Yes.”

  “The night we met, my best bud Reggie and I went to our favorite bar—The Deerlick Saloon. There were always a lot of hotties over at The Deerlick. The parking lot was jammed and this place was in the middle of nowhere, that’s how hoppin’ the joint was. I parked a block away and we headed to The Deerlick. Standing between us and the bar was this sweet old lady. She stopped us and said, ‘Gentlemen, you don’t want to be here tonight.’ Reg and I gave her a look and walked past her. She said we should go elsewhere, like the Crazy Horse, which was only a couple miles away. I asked why she cared where we went, and Reg told her to mind her own damn business. The lady got up in my face and said something I’ll never forget.”

  “What?”

  Pea Willy stopped, got in my face, and thickly said, “Get the hell off your high horse or be ripped from it. Listen to me and live, or die a prideful fool.”

  Pea Willy resumed his pace; I caught up with him. “We were rattled, Hoss.”

  “Who wouldn’t be?”

  “Kevin, she said we’d die if we went inside that bar.”

  “I can’t believe a random person would say that to you.”

  “There are some crazy-assed people out there,” he said. “So Reg and I decided this lady was a lunatic. We were spooked by what she said, but you know how it is at twenty-two—we were tough and bubblin’ with testosterone. Sweet old lady or not, we weren’t going to be told what to do.

  “I made it to the door and she warned, ‘My son is inside and has a loaded gun. He is stark-raving-mad and has a list of people he’s going to kill. If you go inside, it will be the end of you.’ Crazy or not, it was going to be hard to have a good time inside knowing that her son might be in there with a loaded gun. I asked her why she thought I was on the gunman’s list, and if she knew about this, why wasn’t she calling the police? ‘There’s no time for the police,’ she said.”

  Pea Willy stopped just out of range of our party and said, “She was glaring at me, which kind of irked me. Reg was standing next to me but she directed all her threats at me. She said, ‘Go to the other bar before it’s too late and a river of blood is on your cold still hands.’”

  “It’s strange that she suggested you go to another bar,” I mused. “I mean, everything about her sounds nutty, but that strikes a chord in me, that her son was going to shoot the place up and she was making bar suggestions to you.”

  “Yeah, there’s no doubt she was as nuttier than a fruitcake. But I was scared at that point, Kevin, I won’t lie. And it got worse. What she said next turned me and Reg around, and we went to the Crazy Horse.”

  “You’re going to give me nightmares, seriously.”

  Pea Willy laughed and patted my back lightly and said, “You’re a fine young man, Kevin. I won’t give you nightmares, all right? Let’s go play some music and drink some beer. You any good?”

  “Yeah, I can play. Don’t worry about me, just try to keep up, old man.” He laughed. “So what did she say? I was only half kidding.” I paused when I saw two heads together at the camp, possibly kissing. “Are Alison and Mike kissing?” I wanted nothing more than for Mike and Alison to get together. It seemed too good to be true.

  “You mean Alison and Kloss? I don’t think so. Looks like she’s sitting next to Holly and Mike.”

  “Woah, hold up a second. Why did you correct me by saying Kloss?”

  Pea Willy stared at me before saying he misspoke, and quickly headed back to camp. I stood alone, disquieted by the idea that Pea Willy knew something that I didn’t about Ali. Mike competing for Ali’s affection with someone like Kloss would be like the Bad News Bears going up against the Yankees. I dragged my heavy feet back to camp.

  “About time you came back,” Holly said, “I was starting to worry a pack of wild wolves killed y
ou.”

  “Ha ha, very funny,” I said sardonically and leaned the guitar against my chair. I observed Kloss and ruminated. He and Sue Ellen were laughing over something. The flickering yellow light and crackling fire cozied them up. Heineken was the evening’s social lubricant; our group was a well-oiled machine. Mike and Alison were chatting spiritedly as well. He was making her laugh. I wondered what must be going through his mind.

  “What’s bothering you?” Holly asked me. I shook my head and withdrew a beer from the ice-chest. I felt her eyes fixed on me. “Can I speak to you in private, Kevin?”

  “Why?”

  “Because I asked.”

  I sighed and nodded, lumbered my way to her. She shook her head disapprovingly. I followed her along the riverbed.

  “Go on, spit it out,” Holly demanded. “What’s ruffled your feathers?”

  “It’s nothing, I’m overreacting. Pea Willy just said something about Ali and Kloss and it depressed me a little, that’s all.”

  “About Ali and Kloss?”

  I nodded.

  “That he has feelings for her?” she asked.

  “He does? They like each other?”

  “I don’t know about that, but I’m pretty sure he likes her—I overheard him talking to her when she was sleeping in the hospital. But I don’t understand, Kevin, what’s the big deal? Why do you care? I’m happy for him. Her. Them.”

  “Yeah, I should be. I’m just jealous, I guess. I know Mike probably wouldn’t be her ideal choice, but he’s infatuated with her. I was hoping that she liked him, because she’s been kind of acting like it. I guess I read her all wrong.”

  “Really? Mike likes her?” She smiled. “Aww, how cute. Well you never know. If I was her I’d go out with him just for the laugh. He’s funny.”

  “What does she think about Kloss?” I asked.

  “I don’t know. I always thought that she considered him to be a brother to her, but who knows?” Holly glanced back at Mike and Alison, sitting close to one another, laughing. “Look at them, they’re having fun together. Maybe they do like each other.”