Sadie's Mountain

by Shelby Rebecca

  “I’m okay,” he says through pained breaths, but I don’t believe him.

  “Just put the gun down,” says a breathless voice from the trees.

  “Who’s out there?” I yell, as Officer Howard comes out, pointing his gun.

  “I’ve got this, Sadie,” he says, winded but forcing his voice to seem calm. “I’m gonna handcuff him. Just put your gun down.”

  “Dillon needs help. Is someone coming to help us?” I ask. My voice echoes against the trees. I back up with the gun still pointed at my opponent who’s on his knees, his head bowed and limp, his arms empty and powerless. He looks defeated. The ice finally broke under him, and with that, the link between us seems to fizzle away like dead leaves crumbled in my outstretched hand.

  “We need a rescue chopper, now! Two shot. One in custody,” he says, into his radio.

  I hear the static laden response as Officer Howard pushes Donnie face-first onto the ground, pulls his arms behind his back, and clicks the metal handcuffs in place. “You have the right to remain silent...”

  I tear myself away from this scene. A scene I thought I’d never see. Donnie in handcuffs.

  “Dillon,” I say, as I crawl over to the man I love. Put my right hand under his head and press the wound with my other hand, cradling him like he’d done to me the first time we were able to physically express our love for one another.

  “Sadie,” he says, and coughs. Gently, I wipe his mouth with my jacket sleeve.

  “Dillon, baby. Look at me,” I beg.

  He opens his eyes and I stare into those Tahoe blues, try not to panic at the sight of blood wheezing out of his mouth in a fine mist. I hear the buzz of Dillon’s phone. It must be Jenny. She’s calling about the blog—but that can wait.

  What can I do? How can I help him?

  The verse from the Song of Songs that Dillon quoted to me, “the season of singing has come.” That’s when I remember the song. The one he taught me on his granddaddy’s dulcimer. The one that I was singing when we ran into each other on this mountain. And I know if there’s anything that can reach him now, it’s that song.

  “I’m going to sing to you, baby. Our song, but you have to promise to stay with me. They’re coming for us with a helicopter. But you have to stay awake,” I say, pressing my palm into his wound, trying to stop the outpouring of his life into my hand.

  “I promise,” he says, his breathing is short and unsteady. He’s forcing a smile, trying to be strong—for me.

  “You are my flower,” I sing to my lover, my best friend.

  “that’s blooming in the mountain for me

  You are my flower

  that’s blooming there for me

  Hmmm...hmmmm...hmmmm.”

  As I’m finishing the first part of the song, I hear the chopping sound of the helicopter rotor as it comes to rescue us. Men rush toward us. They place him on an orange gurney as I hum the song to him. The one that he taught me a lifetime ago, back when life had grace and dignity.

  “Hold my hand,” I say, “Don’t let go,” as men load him into the helicopter and pull me in beside him.

  “I won’t let go,” he says, as they cut his shirt from his chest, and examine the bloody hole left behind by a brother’s sinful obsession. “Sing to me, darlin’” he asks, and so I do.

  “The air is just as pure

  The sunlight just as free

  And nature seems to say

  It’s all for you and me

  Hmmm...hmmmm...hmmmm.”

  My voice mixed with the whipping sound of the rotor is almost as soothing to me as it is to Dillon. I look down and see the man who took everything from me. He’s handcuffed, defeated. He’s small like a driver’s license photo, and getting smaller as we climb upward, force strength into the wind, and leave him behind where he belongs.

  I look at Dillon, and sing,

  “You are my flower

  that’s blooming in the mountain for me

  You are my flower

  that’s blooming there for me”

  Hmmmm...hmmmm....hmmmm...”

  And as we fly away from the mountain, my hand in Dillon’s like knotted wood, I wonder if this is what justice feels like? It is a little bit like having wings.

  Epilogue

  I’d heard it once at a wedding as the couple said their vows, but it’s never made more sense to me than now. “Love is friendship...caught fire,” they said.

  I can think back to when we were kids, our shoes slapping against this dirt path on our way to swim, or to try our luck at catching red tinged trout in Rich Creek. I can hear us giggling under our tree, the one that as I look up, still has the shabby rope tied to it, now threadbare, weathered and worn. My breath comes out in puffs. It’s December now—white ice and snow covers everything in a fine lining of mostly see-through white.

  What I know is that our friendship is the foundation for such a profound connection that my life has been forever altered by it—I wouldn’t be the person I am had I not been blessed with him, with his essence of kindness.

  “Dillon. Look,” I say, pointing up. “It’s still here. Your rope. The one you’d climbed up there to tie. You accidentally fell and I couldn’t stop laughing. Remember?”

  When I look behind me, he’s not there. “Dillon?” I say. “Where are you?”

  “Here,” he says, and I start walking toward his voice, crackling ice and snow under my feet.

  “Don’t play with me. You make me nervous,” I say.

  “Ah, but I have a surprise for you,” his voice says, and I follow as the wind blows my hair out from the warm hat around in gentle circles.

  When I make it to the rock with the woman’s face embedded into its façade, it feels like a moment of déjà vu—oddly familiar but a reminder that I’m right where I’m supposed to be.

  “Dillon?” I say, looking around.

  As he walks out from behind the rock, I watch as his boots stroke the ground on his way up to me. He’s smiling that secret smile. The one when he’s hiding something from me—something good.

  As if in slow motion, he bends down on one knee and holds up his hand for me to place mine in his.

  Oh my gosh! This is happening!

  “Sadie Jane Sparks,” his voice is soft, earnest, “you are my best friend, my love, my joy, my dream manifested. Will you be my wife?”

  He’s smiling the I’m-yours smile. I hold his hand for dear life. I want to memorize this moment—paint it in my mind with soft wet brushes.

  I move his hand down to my tummy just now starting to pooch out in a small mound. “We say yes,” I say, through the lump in my throat, and he leans forward, kisses me where our baby grows and stands up, effortlessly, and takes me in his arms for a kiss.

  Out of the pocket of his jeans that hang on his hips just so, he finds a brown wooden case and pops it open to reveal a silver antique band with a single square diamond. I put my head down to hide the ugly cry face. “It’s perfect,” I say, as he slides the band up my finger where it will stay until the end of time.

  “It’s an Asscher cut,” he says. I know it. He’s going to teach me about it. As he holds my hand I listen to him explain the cut and the antique band, “It was hand etched, the diamond comes from Canada,” he says, and I smile wider than my face.

  I’m thinking about the week that I came back home, how he brought me back to life, forced me with his love to divulge my secret, and in return we are now free to live the life that we deserve. We’ve come so far, in so little time.

  “It’s a conflict free diamond,” he says, leaning against the rock, holding my hand. We’re gazing at the diamond. Watching it catch fire in the sunlight streaming in through the gaps in the leafless trees. “Most diamonds are mined using slave labor, so I had to search for a company that mines ethically,” he says.

  I mean, who knows this kind of stuff? I think. He always amazes me with his smarts.

  I almost lost him that day up on Gauley Mountain. The doctors said Donnie must ha
ve been aiming for his heart, but since he was so far away he missed and hit Dillon in the lung instead.

  They’d pushed tubes into his throat while we rode together into the air and I sang him our song. They had to inflate the part of his lung that collapsed from the impact of the bullet. The hours I spent in Plateau Medical Center after the helicopter delivered him were the worst—not knowing if I’d lost everything. If I would ever hear his voice again, or feel his touch, or get to tell him how he changed my life. I shook like a mini-earthquake until the doctor sauntered out and declared victory over the bullet.

  “Diamonds are pushed up from the earth,” he explains. “The rocks that carry them are raised from the mantle to the Earth’s surface by these deep volcanic eruptions,” he says, demonstrating the movement with his hands.

  I had to wait for him to get out of surgery all alone. Missy couldn’t come because Dale was gone. The boys were busy trying to get the horses off the mountain. Seems they’d run off because of the gun battle and the noise of the helicopter.

  I called Dot and Renae, but I found out later, Donnie had tied up Renae and Dot and their eight-old, Conner. He’d locked them in the basement and put the baby in his crib before he left that day to confront Dillon and me up on Gauley Mountain. He hadn’t planned on coming back.

  He’s pleaded not guilty by reason of mental disease or defect. He’s not contesting that he was going to rape me again, do it in front of Dillon if he’d lived through the gunshot wound. Kill me, and then kill himself.

  He’s actually admitting to it, using that to show that he can’t help himself. That he knew it was wrong but because of his illness, he wasn’t able to control himself. I know it’s going to be a taxing trial. But for now, I just try to heal from this. Dillon had to heal physically. We both have a long way to go to heal emotionally.

  The whole thing was on the news—although I’ll never watch it. The very thought makes me want to rip my hair out. The secret was out—in a very public way. This was sort of good for me because the ugliness was not mine to hide away, but also horrifying because now everyone knows what’s under the façade. I can’t pretend I’m normal anymore. I’m still getting used to that—when they look at me now, they know—everything.

  After our last press release that afternoon, a reporter had found his way up there and recorded almost the whole incident. They went to breaking news with a live feed, and the authorities were alerted.

  When I didn’t answer Dillon’s phone, Jenny saw the hit on my name online. She posted the blog and millions of people listened to him admit to raping me, heard him threaten to kill me and Dillon at the same time they watched him try to make good on his promises. It was a national story, but I do my best to avoid it.

  Luckily, that day Officer Howard was nearby. He’d been following Donnie covertly, he said. He told me the whole story next to Dillon’s hospital bed. He had heard the first shot, when Donnie shot Dillon, and was running toward us when I shot Donnie. I guess when Donnie’s plan went awry, he thought I was going to kill him. But I know it, deep in the understanding of myself. If I’d shot him that day, I mean, shot to kill, the link between us would have stayed thick as steel.

  What I did, letting him live, was like ripping a long-standing burden from my back. Taking control and making sure justice is done is going to allow me to move on with my life.

  Renae, she’s moving on, too. It’s been three months and she’s already signed up for nursing school. She starts in January, right after the New Year.

  What I’ve learned since that day is, I have to forgive Donnie—not for him. I have to forgive him for me. Like Buddha says, holding onto all of that anger, it’s like squeezing a hot coal and wishing he’s getting burned, while the only person burning is me. So, I’m working on letting go of that hot coal. It’s taking time.

  I’ve started to bring my life here to Ansted. I’ve had most of my antiques sent here, and we’ve even started the design for the new kitchen. Our life is on track. Me and him together is perfect—that’s the honest truth.

  “It’s so interesting,” he says, “The magma for a volcano has to start way down at a depth where diamonds are created for them to make it all the way up to the earth’s surface,” Dillon says.

  “Do you mean that all this beauty comes up from the pits of hell?” I say, and giggle.

  “In a way, Sadie,” he admits with a chuckle. “But I wanted you to have it because even though this diamond had such a traumatic journey getting to you, and even though it’s not perfect, you know, all diamonds have flaws, it represents us and the life that I want to give you, to share with you.”

  “You mean that the best things in life come through persistence?”

  “It reminds me that true beauty, inside and out, comes out of great struggles, and from being able to wait for the right moment to surface—just like you did,” he says, taking me in his arms.

  We didn’t stop the mountaintop coal mining that day alone. Our group has had to stage more rallies and make more signs, and generally make a lot of noise about this. Dillon and I haven’t been able to help as much because he was recovering—and that’s taken a while—but we’re committed to this—and to each other.

  “Diamonds at a molecular level share a covalent bond,” he says.

  “What’s that?” I ask, although I already know he’s going to explain it to me.

  “It’s the chemical bond that involves the stable balance of positively charged and negatively charged forces between atoms when they share electrons,” he says.

  “What the heck does that mean?” I ask, as I wrap my arms around his waist and stare up into his Tahoe blues.

  “It means that we’re meant to be and I want to kiss you, my soon-to-be wife and mother of my child.”

  “Then you should,” I tease.

  He takes me in his arms, pulling me into his chest so close that I can almost feel his heart beating like the sound of the railway. We fit together, always have, like we were made by the Creator just for one another.

  As he tilts my chin up, he says, softly but resolute, “Close your eyes,” and I do. He takes my lips between his until I am lost in him. As he eases away from me, just inches from my face he says, “I love you, Sadie.”

  “And I love you,” I say.

  “The sun’s about to set,” he says, and I turn around to rest my back on his chest, his arms wrap around me and rest on my tummy. I’m stunned when I see the mountain from this perspective. The same one that my momma saw and captured in her Sadie’s Mountain painting that now sits in a place of honor just above the fireplace mantel in our master bedroom.

  The colors in real life are just like her painting: vibrant, only softly muted by the cold—greens and reds, yellows too. It makes me feel connected to her—to be here standing where she stood when she was carrying me while I’m carrying a child now, too. I smile and run the tips of my fingers along Dillon’s hand.

  As the dimming evening sun shines in my moss green eyes, and the wind blows on the strands of the tall wispy grass, it awakens another memory in my brain. A happy memory of a girl and a boy who used to play hide and seek in that grass, who will soon chase their child through that grass, and who will stay here and protect the heritage and the land that was given to them by the grace of God.

  As I stand here, I know. There’s no place I’d rather be, and there’s no one else I’d rather share this with. This is a return to a time when life has grace and dignity, when life has meaning. And we are really free.

  ABOUT SHELBY REBECCA

  Originally from Wasilla, Alaska, I now live in Northern California in my first real house with my husband, John, daughter, Elise, our two mutts, and our fish, Alex. I was Healthy Child Healthy World’s first ever Mom on a Mission in late 2009. My story was featured in People Magazine, Lifetime’s Remarkable Women series, The Sacramento News and Review, and is a highlighted story on the advocacy website Care2. My first romance novel is Sadie’s Mountain. I plan to write a follow-up novel to
Sadie and Dillon’s story. It will be out in the summer of 2014.

  Keep in touch with me at www.shelbyrebecca.com or:

  Shelby Rebecca’s Facebook Page

  Sadie’s Mountain Facebook Page

  Twitter Page

  Goodreads Page

  Don’t forget to add your review to Amazon, Goodreads, or Barnes and Noble. Thank you for helping to support Indie writers by letting others know what you think. Take care and keep in touch!

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  To Elise Adrianna. Thank you for putting up with Momma having her face in the computer screen too much. I’m sorry I’ve been so busy typing away this past year, but you always know how to make me laugh (no feet tickles, ‘kay) and keep me humble. I love you more than a fish loves water. You are the reason I am the person I am today. You make me want to be better, to do more with my life—to make you proud. You teach me that life is about the journey, not the destination. You always help me take time to smell the flowers, listen to a story, giggle, sing songs, and have a picnic or drink some tea on the back patio. You’re the fastest eight-year-old reader I know, the most creative writer, the cutest piano player, and the best little actor in the school play. Momma loves you, baby goose.

  To my husband, John. Thank you for having my back, for loving me even when I’m grumpy and thinking about characters instead of listening to you. I know I don’t say enough about all that you do for us. But I notice it and I’m thankful for everything. You’re my rock. I’m glad I said, “Don’t you even wanna kiss me?” all those years ago. I love you, Pook.

  To my momma, Sherrie Brown. You’ve always supported me no matter what, but I share this book with you because you have been with me throughout the whole process. I’m sure many of the Biblical allusions come from the values you’ve instilled in me. I’ll never forget when you came last Christmas and I tried out Chapter Twenty-Six on you. I watched you reading from the living room. Your eyes grew wide and you said “That was racy!” But then you were hitting the arrow button trying to read more, only I hadn’t written any more yet. “I can’t wait to read the rest, little girl,” you said. Thank you, Momma. I know I can always talk to you about anything, and that keeps me sane.