by R. Casteel
“Taneika, are you ready?”
She gave a slight nod and started running.
Taren watched her blood pressure and her oxygen level. After ten minutes, they were slightly elevated. He looked down at the speed she was running. Ten miles an hour and she hasn’t even broken a sweat.
“Do you feel okay?” Jeanie asked. “Can you increase your speed any?”
A smile formed around the air tube.
Taren watch the indicator jump to twenty miles an hour and steady out. Her heart rate spiked and then settled down, but higher than before. Jeanie was making notes on a chart when she turned suddenly to Taneika.
“X-ray now!”
Taneika stepped off the treadmill and in front of the unit. A slight buzz was heard and Jeanie motioned her to get back on the mill. The indicator climbed steadily and leveled off.
Jeanie slid a new plate in place and continued monitoring the readouts.
“Well?” he asked.
“Hush.”
Lights flashed and alarms sounded. Taren didn’t have a clue as to what he should do. He looked down at the speed indicator and was astonished to see she had doubled her speed without any apparent effort.
“Her heart rhythm changed, and her blood pressure went up drastically.” Jeanie looked from the monitor to Taneika.
“How are you doing?”
Taneika gave her a thumb up accompanied by a wide smile.
“Are you through this barrier you told me about?”
Again, Taneika gave her a thumb in the air.
“Taren, I see it but I don’t understand it,” Jeanie stared open-mouthed and wide-eyed at the monitors.
“Taneika, I need to get in front of the x-ray now. Okay, don’t move, don’t breath.”
Jeanie hit the controls and the machine rumbled.
“Taneika, get back on the treadmill and slow your body down. We have meat and a cold tub of water waiting.”
As she got back on and started running, she felt the pain in her chest. Doubling over she held on to the handrails.
“Talk to me, is this like the other times?” Alarm sounded in Jeanie’s voice as she tore the hose from Taneika’s mouth.
“Yes!” She gulped air into her now heaving chest. Her lungs burned and her heart pounded. “Yes! This…is…like the…last time.”
Blood began to ooze from her skin.
Taren picked her up and carried her to the stainless steel tub that was half full of water. Setting her in it, he began to splash water over her face and shoulders, cooling her fevered skin.
“Here, give this to her.” Jeanie handed him a large roast.
Taneika snatched the meat from his hands and tore into it, trying to appease the ravenous hunger.
“Are you feeling better now?” Jeanie asked. She stuck a syringe in Taneika’s arm and drew a vial of blood. Taking a swab, she collected another sample of the blood that was flowing from her skin.
“I’m still hungry, but yes, I’m better.”
Jeanie handed her another roast, smaller than the one before and marked down its weight. She examined Taneika’s skin, her eyes, listened to her heart and lungs.
“Everything sounds and appears normal, now. I have to process the x-rays.” She took the plates in to another room and closed the door.
“Taneika, you don’t have to do this. I don’t like to see you suffer.” He brushed his hand though her hair and softly stroked her cheek.
“Yes, I do. I’ve got to know what’s happening to me.” She took his hand and placed a kiss on the back of it. “This time wasn’t as bad as before. I didn’t fight it. I knew you were here and wasn’t scared.” She climbed out of the water and checked out the bag from which Jeanie had taken the meat. “Ah.” She pulled a package of veal from the bag and started munching on the succulent meat.
Several minutes had gone by when Jeanie came back into the room. She placed the x-rays on the lighted board and started writing down more notes.
“Sis, I know that puzzled frown and the tapping of the pencil from college. You do that when there is something bothering you that you can’t figure out. What gives?”
She started to answer and then stopped. “Is that another package of meat?”
“I was still hungry.” Taneika responded with her mouth full.
Jeanie shook her head as she watched the last of the veal steaks disappear. She picked up the wrapper and wrote the weight down on a sheet.
“You can get dressed now.”
Taneika ignored the suggestion and padded over to where the x-rays were hanging. Rivulets of water trickled from her hair to puddle around her feet.
“If all of these are of me, why are they different?” Her brows drew down into a frown as she intently studied the pictures.
“I don’t know.”
Taren heard the uncertainty, the frustration in her voice. He looked at the pictures but they all looked the same.
“How are they different, Sis?”
“Let me show you.” She walked over and took two of the films down. “I took this one,” she tapped it with her pencil, “before she started the test.” She placed the second one over the top of the first. “This is the one I took during the test. Notice the shape of the lung in the second. It appears to be a little narrower and longer than the first. Her blood pressure at this point is not any higher than for an athlete who runs all the time.”
“What about the last one you took, Sis?”
She placed the third film directly over the first and the difference was dramatic. The lungs were now several inches longer than in the first x-ray. His eyes riveted on the heart.
“My God!”
“The increase of the heart is proportional to that of the lungs. This is right after you went through what you call ‘the pain barrier.’ Taneika, at this point your blood pressure jumped to 210 over 125, and your body temp went up to a hundred and four. That would explain the need for a cold shower.”
“My God!”
“Taren, you’re repeating yourself,” Jeanie admonished. “Relax, I would already be calling an ambulance for a normal person.”
“That means I’m not…normal.”
“Taneika, I’m not sure how I would put this…condition you have. But you are definitely not normal. Your body appears somehow to have the ability to…for lack of a better word, change to meet the increased demands you place on it.”
“What about the bleeding and the hunger?”
“Without more advanced tests which would mean a lab or research center somewhere, I can only guess at those. Possibly, because you never did sweat the whole time this is your body’s way of cooling down. Again, I’m guessing that when your body changes, it takes a great amount of energy. Energy your body has to replace, quickly.”
“Oh.” Taneika stared at the two x-ray films. So, I’m a freak. She looked into Taren’s face expecting to see revulsion, or pity, maybe disgust. What she saw was concern and the molten heat of desire that flared like a torch in the depths of his eyes. How long would he continue to want her if every time they made love, her skin bled. Unless she could control her body, their relationship was doomed. Yesterday was different, that was pure lust. Maybe….
“I have an idea for another test.”
“I don’t think that is advisable,” Jeanie cautioned. “At least not so soon after this one.”
“Besides, you ate most of the meat,” Taren added.
“You haven’t heard what it is. Besides, it would depend on how serious Taren is about helping me.”
“Just what is that supposed to mean?” Taren blustered.
“The test would involve you.”
“What’s the test, Taneika?” Jeanie asked.
“Well…last night when we had sex on the kitchen table it….”
“You didn’t!” Jeanie interrupted with laughter.
“Until the table broke, then we ended up on the floor.”
“Oh, my,” Jeanie doubled over, holding her stomach. “That is too muc
h.” She looked up at Taren and wiped the tears from her eyes. “Any splinters you need removed?”
“Very funny, Sis.”
“Anyway,” Taneika continued. “I thought maybe we could hook up the monitors again and we could make love in a…”
“We do what?” Taren wasn’t sure if he’d heard her right or not. She couldn’t be suggesting this. “Leave me out of your impromptu research.”
“If that is the way you feel about it, fine.” She stomped across the room and got dressed. “I can’t stay around and wonder when this will happen to me again. If you don’t care enough about our relationship to help me learn how to control it, then I guess this is goodbye.”
“Taneika, wait.” He stood there with his hand outstretched as she closed the door behind her.
“Don’t just stand there like an idiot,” Jeanie scolded. “Go after her.”
Taren looked for her in the front of the building and then outside. Feeling like the idiot that his sister had called him, he went back inside.
“She’s gone.”
“I figured that from the look on your face. You know, sometimes I wonder how with all your knowledge of the opposite sex you could be so callous with her feelings. And then I remember you’re a man and that explains it. Dammit, Taren, this wasn’t some joke on her part. How do you think she feels, afraid that every time you two make love this,” she held up the printouts from the monitors, “is going to happen?”
He sat on the chair and dropped his head in his hands. “I blew it.”
“Don’t sit there feeling sorry for yourself. Go find her, and when you do, try a little groveling and begging. Might be good experience for you.”
Chapter 16
She welcomed the pain and embraced it. It swept over her and she felt the renewed power that flowed within her veins.
Tears that streamed from her eyes became frozen in her hair as she ran through the trees. Her clothes, torn and ripped, hung like rags from her body. She clawed her way up steep inclines, sometimes on all fours, using her hands as much as her feet to propel her upward and then down the other side. The avalanches she had caused rumbled behind her with the promise of certain death at the slightest slip or falter.
She stood on top of the ridge looking into a valley. Some inner guidance had directed her path here. She raised her head and howled out a greeting to any wolves in the area. She smiled at the returned voices that were carried on the wind.
She was home.
* * * * *
Jeanie watched as Taren’s car turned the corner and disappeared from view. She locked the door to the clinic, got in her car and headed in the opposite direction. On the outskirts of Red Rock, she pulled into a parking lot, hesitated and got out. Ol’ Doc Gregger had been her inspiration for going into the medical field. Only she had gone into nursing instead of becoming a veterinarian. She trusted him, but was she about to push the limits of trust too far?
“Hi, Doc.”
“Hi, Jeanie. What brings you to this end of town?”
“I wouldn’t normally ask this, Doc, but I need a lab test done and was wondering if you would do it.”
“Jeanie, I’ve known you since you brought in here the first stray puppy you ever found. Something is bothering you with possible results of this test or you would send it to the regular lab in Billings.”
“It has to kept strictly confidential, no records.”
Doc Gregger looked her in the eye. Determined and unflinching, she met his narrow-eyed, penetrating gaze.
“This is highly irregular, Jeanie.”
“I know.” Holding her ground, she didn’t back down from his scowl.
“Come on back to the lab. My assistant went to lunch. We won’t be disturbed.”
They entered the lab and she handed him the blood samples. She watched as he placed them under a microscope. He stopped once, looked at her as he took off his glasses, cleaned them, and again concentrated on the blood samples.
Doc picked up the gauze she had used to collect the sample and turned toward her.
“What are these, Jeanie?”
“Blood samples.”
“Really! I didn’t know that.” He turned and with a sarcastic glance at her, held a tube in front of her face. “Would you mind telling me where you got these?”
“Why?” Jeanie’s wariness increased as she saw the puzzled frown on his face.
“So I can better understand what I am looking at, or for. This first tube is human, no mistake about that. This sample from the gauze, my rough guess, is the antigens from the blood of a wolf. This other vial.” He held it up before his eyes, wonder and amazement spread across his face. “I have no idea.” He continued to rotate the vial in his fingers as if seeing a rare diamond for the first time. “I have never seen anything like it before.
“Jeanie, are you feeling all right?” He reached out to her, touching her arm. “You need to sit down? You’re awfully pale.”
“No, I…I’ll be fine, thank you. Please, I beg you!” She picked up the samples. “Forget you ever saw these. I have to be going.”
“Jeanie, if you need to talk…”
“Thanks.” She turned and left.
Her hand trembled as she tried to put the key in the ignition. Jeanie laid her head on the steering wheel and cried.
* * * * *
Taren paced the floor. Take-out food containers littered the kitchen table and spilled onto the floor. He had checked and rechecked all the hospitals in the area, spent countless hours searching the woods of the park. Nothing. Every wolf pack that was known to exist within the area had been checked and not a sign of Taneika, not even a footprint. Days had turned into weeks and she hadn’t been home.
Where are you hiding, my love? Another thought crept into his mind and twisted his heart with fear. Where is Harold?
Thanksgiving had come and gone. He had spent it with her mother and the rest of the family on the reservation, hoping that she would return home for the holidays. They had been reluctant to speak of Taneika. The brothers seemed ashamed of her existence. The private conversation he had with Songbird revealed little that he didn’t already know. Her warning, to let her adopted daughter live her own life, only strengthened his resolve to find her.
The howling of a wolf shattered the stillness of the night and caused him to jump.
“Taneika!” Taren ran to the door and stepped out into the cold winter wind that blew down off the mountains.
The wolf’s eyes glowed in the light that spilled from the open door.
Startled, Taren started to back towards the door when a whine from the wolf stopped him. The wolf approached, head down, ears lowered and tail tucked between its legs.
“Lobo? Is that you? Come here, girl, am I glad to see you.” Taren sat on the porch step.
She came to him, placed her head in his lap and then licked his face. “Where have you been, girl? Have you seen Taneika?”
Lobo perked up her ears and barked. She spun around and ran to where Taren’s truck was parked and jumped in the back.
“What is it girl. What do you…” He turned and ran into the house, grabbing the backpacks that he had been living out of for weeks. Turning out the lights and locking the door, he ran across the snow to his truck.
“Sorry, girl, I know you must be hungry. This is all I have right now.” He tossed a box of cold pizza in the back of the truck and was gratified when Lobo began tearing off large chunks of a dinner he had never touched.
Taren pulled into his sister’s driveway in the predawn hours. Lobo hopped out and squatted. “Sorry girl, I’m so concerned about Taneika, I forgot you were back there.”
He beat on the door, rattling in on its hinges. A light came on and Bill opened the door. With an exasperated look on his face, he motioned him in.
“Taren, this has got to stop. You look like shit. When was the last time you had a decent meal or a full night’s sleep?
“I know where she is, Bill.”
“Where?”
Jeanie came down the hall, tying the belt of her robe around her waist.
“At the cabin. Lobo showed up at my place and jumped into my truck. She has to be there.”
“Please, Taren. Forget about it and go home. After this much time she obviously doesn’t want to be found.” Jeanie poured water into the coffee pot and flipped the switch.
“Sis, we’ve had this conversation before. My answer is still the same. I can’t.”
He turned in desperation to Bill. “I need to borrow the snowmobile again.”
“Taren, I…ah, hell.” Frustrated, he ran his fingers through his hair, shook his head and let out a long sigh. “Go ahead and take it. Nothing I say is going to convince you otherwise.”
“Taren Carpenter, I forbid you to go after her!”
He turned towards her, his laughter cut short. She stood in the kitchen exactly like their mother. Hands on the hips and feet planted firmly on the floor. A stern look but one filled with love was on her face. His mother’s love had always been the deciding catalyst for obedience. That was yesterday before you were gone, yesterday when we were young…He shook off the words that ran through his mind like the melody of an old song …and left so very much alone.
Picking up the key that Bill had tossed on the table, he turned his back on the past and headed towards the future, whatever that might be.
Bill came out the door as he finished hooking up the trailer to his truck and handed him a thermos of coffee and a plastic shopping bag filled with food. “Jeanie didn’t figure you had eaten anything so she threw this together.”
Taren plugged the trailer’s wiring harness into the truck’s electrical system and inspected the lights.
“We have never had any secrets until now,” Bill continued. “I mention Taneika’s name and Jeanie gets all nervous and clams up. She refuses to tell me about the test results. If I can help, for God’s sake Taren, let me.”
Bill was pleading for understanding, something Taren had never heard him do. “You already have.” He patted the nose cowling of the snowmobile. “Tell Sis I appreciate the coffee and food.”