Rock

by J. A. Huss

  “Hey,” Kenner says, trying to smile as he adjusts his rifle strap over his shoulder. “That’s the way we came up, right?” And then he swings his leg over, grasping for the rope as he clips himself in too. “I trust you, Rock. With my life, dude. The only reason that bitch didn’t shoot me straight through my brain was because you took her down.”

  “Damn,” I say, fucking with the rope as I get us ready. “I wish I could remember that part. It sucks when your most heroic deed gets lost in your fucked-up head.”

  We lean back and start our walk down the cliff and a few seconds later we are jumping down long stretches until we land on the ground. We unhook ourselves, and then I grab Kenner by the shoulder and point into the woods. “This way.”

  Please, God, I pray as I run. Don’t let that psychopath get the rest of the people I love.

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  Less than a mile into the run we hear them calling our names. I am ahead, even though before the bloodbath of Big Bear, Kenner could outrun me any time of day. But I’ve been in recovery longer than him. He just woke up a few weeks ago and it doesn’t take a genius to figure he didn’t have the access to the gym like I did.

  He looks at me with a question on his mind and I can tell we’re both thinking the same thing. What will they think of this little turn of events?

  Guilty, is how I read it. Maybe they don’t all think I killed the band, but TJ planted that thought in their heads. They can’t not think it. Not really. I might’ve been the one in the dark a few hours ago, but now I am infinitely better informed.

  They have no idea who Alice is. Aside from a waitress who broke TJ’s strict rule to leave me alone at the bar. But with each pounding step over the rough mountain terrain, I remember bits and pieces of our time together. Climbing partners.

  I’m not an elite climber. My God-given gifts come in the form of music and songwriting. But I’m good. She’s good. And together, at least on the side of a mountain, we were much better than good. We took risks, and we only took risks knowing the other was equipped to react if the need arose.

  I put my life in her hands.

  It makes me sick to think about it.

  The sun is not yet over the western mountains, but in here, under the thick canopy of evergreen trees, it might as well be night. The shadows creep in around us and Kenner’s breathing becomes more and more labored.

  “I can’t see shit,” he whisper-yells.

  “Don’t panic yet,” I say. “We’re still a mile out.”

  “What if that crazy bitch has booby traps or something?”

  I look at him funny as I slow down so he can keep pace.

  “What?” he asks, reading my mind.

  “She’s not the Viet Cong, Kenner. She’s a psycho girl. And there’s two of us. We have weapons this time.”

  “I’m just saying, she’s got to know I talked to you. And she’s got to know I showed you the texts. So she’s got to know we’re on our way. Especially since those dumbasses back at your house are out there calling our fucking names.”

  “We’ll get her,” I tell him.

  “I’m gonna shoot that bitch in the head. What comes around, goes around.”

  I nod. I can’t disagree. But all I care about is Missy. If she’s hurt… if she’s dead, please God, don’t let her be dead… I’ll make sure Alice never comes out of these woods.

  A half a mile later Kenner is wasted. He’s gasping, so we slow to a walk so he can catch his breath.

  “Sorry,” he whispers into the night.

  “Don’t be,” I say back. “We go in ready. It’s no good rushing in spent.”

  “How the fuck do you know your way around here in the dark?” he asks.

  “This was my playground, Kenner. Less than five hundred people live in my town and my house might as well be another world away. You don’t get into town on your feet using a road. I had my brother, I had the Vetti twins, and we had these woods. I shot my first deer about fifty yards that way,” I say, pointing off to the left. “There’s trail access about half a mile up the road from our house.”

  “If there’s trail access—”

  But his words are cut off by the sound of dirt bikes off in the distance.

  “—then TJ knows where to start looking for us,” I finish for him.

  We break into a slow jog and suddenly the sound of the rack of gear clanging at our hips makes way too much noise.

  “We should take them off,” Kenner says, pointing to our harnesses.

  But I shake my head. “There’s a cliff where we’re going. Alice might have something up her sleeve. Besides, I’m not going in stealth mode.”

  “What the fuck do you mean? We’re gonna look through these rifle scopes, get her fucking brain in our sights, and then pull the goddamned trigger.”

  “No,” I say, coming to a stop and thrusting my arm out in front of his chest to make him do the same. “I’m walking in there racked up and making noise. You stay behind and cover me.”

  I feel like we’re playing war games or something. Invincible. And it’s wrong for some reason. Because Alice has already shown everybody involved, this is no game for her.

  “Do you hear it?” I ask Kenner as I stare straight ahead.

  He squints his eyes, like he’s straining his ears.

  “The waterfall,” I whisper. “It’s right up there.”

  He nods. He hears it.

  “That’s where she is. I’ll go—”

  “Wait,” Kenner whispers, creeping forward. “I think I see a light.”

  We both walk as softly and as carefully as we can, until there’s a break in the aspen leaves.

  “What the fuck is that?” Kenner asks, looking up at the glow on the side of a cliff.

  My stomach sinks. No. No. No.

  “Rock,” he says again. “What the fuck is that?”

  “A portaledge tent.”

  “A what?” But then it must sink in. “She’s crazy. She’s fucking crazy.”

  And she is. Because about a hundred feet up the side of the cliff, just off to the left of the waterfall, is a hanging tent. There’s a lantern on inside, so we have a pretty clear view of the person moving around within.

  “Let’s shoot her from here,” Kenner says.

  “No,” I whisper-yell back. “That might not be her. What if it’s just some local climber—” But I stop talking mid-sentence. Because it’s not some local climber. Anyone with intermediate skill could climb that wall. No one needs to spend the night on a portaledge to get to the top. “It might be Missy,” I say instead.

  We know it’s not Missy. It’s Alice. But if it’s Alice, then where is Missy?

  Adrenaline rushes through my body and the panic is back. Don’t let her be dead. Don’t let her be dead.

  “I got you, Rock. But if the bitch even blinks wrong, you shoot her, Rock. You shoot her.” Kenner is grabbing me by the shoulders and shaking that into me.

  I nod. “I will, don’t worry.” I tuck the Glock into my sock and pull my pant leg over it, then drop the rope and adjust the rifle on my shoulder. “No matter what happens,” I tell Kenner, staring into his shadow-covered face, “do not come out. You shoot from here, you understand? Do not come out until she’s dead.”

  He nods yes, but I know he doesn’t mean it.

  “Kenner,” I say firmly. “I mean it. I need you, man. I need you to live.” But it’s the wrong thing to say. I can read his fucking mind. I can practically hear him saying the same thing back to me. We need each other. There’s no telling how far we will fall if we don’t both come back tonight. So I amend. “I need you to stay alive and get me out of here if she tries to kill us.”

  We both look over our shoulders as the sound of dirt bikes once again comes from the distance. If TJ comes in the middle of this, we’re all dead.

  “Be careful,” Kenner says as I start walking forward.

  I will, I think in my head as I find the real trail that leads up here and make my way out into t
he clearing, thankful that the sound of the waterfall blocks any chance of Alice hearing us coming.

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  I make it all the way to the waterfall with no notice or movement from the person inside the tent.

  What if this isn’t Alice? What if she has Missy somewhere else?

  “Rock,” her now-familiar voice calls down to me. “I knew you’d come back to me.”

  I look up and see her blonde hair in the golden light of the lantern inside the portaledge. “Come down and talk to me, Alice,” I yell up.

  She laughs. It sends a chill up my spine and the tiny hairs on the back of my neck bristle to attention. Spooks me the same way a bear might spook a dog out on the trail. “Who did you come here for?”

  “You,” I lie. “I came for you. I just got my memory back—” I stop talking because she’s out of the portaledge and climbing on the ropes. In one swift move she cuts a tether keeping the tent stable on the side of the cliff with a knife, and it dips downward.

  I am in shock as I watch. But the muffled scream and the tipping of the other body inside the tent shuts me the fuck up. Missy. “Alice!” I yell. “What the fuck are you doing?”

  She glares down at me and I’m secretly wishing I had told Kenner to shoot first. But Alice is not even in his line of sight. He can’t shoot her from the spot where I left him.

  There are a lot of redundant tethers used to keep the cliff tent stable, but it doesn’t look very stable. It looks like she’s deliberately missing a few key straps.

  “I know who you came for,” Alice yells down. “And you’re not going to save her. She’s going to jump, Rock. Just like her twin. Do you remember telling me about it?”

  No. I shake my head. No. I did not tell her anything. Did I? Jesus Christ. Is that why I was blacking out in LA? Every time I remembered prom night I took off and found… this psycho girl to share my crazy with?

  Keep calm, Rock. Keep calm and just tell her what she wants to hear. “Alice, please—” I start again.

  “Drop your rifle.” It’s a nonnegotiable command because she’s got her knife pressed against the nylon strap holding another part of the portaledge in place.

  I drop the rifle.

  “Climb up,” she says. “Climb up and see me.” Her expression softens. She’s stunningly beautiful when the psycho isn’t leaking through. “It’s been so fucking long, Rock. I can’t believe they took you away from me and you never looked back. Why, Rock? Why?” Her voice cracks like she’s about to cry. But I don’t trust her. Not one bit.

  “I was sick—”

  “Climb!” she shouts. It echoes off the walls of the mountain and I have a moment of panic that TJ will hear her and come at just the wrong moment.

  I walk over to the wall of rock and look up. It’s not a difficult climb. Not really. There are plenty of foot and hand holds. But even so, it’s practically dark now. I have no toprope to save me if I make a mistake. A fall from twenty feet could kill someone if they land the wrong way.

  And climbing is the last thing on my mind. My head is filled with possibilities. Endings. Bad endings and worst possible outcomes.

  I kick off my boots because I’ve got fucking boots on. There’s no way I can climb this wall with boots on.

  “You better hurry if you want to save your girlfriend,” Alice snarls down at me.

  Shoot her, I think. Please, Kenner, shoot this bitch.

  There’s a crack of a gun, but it doesn’t come from behind me. I look up and find Alice grinning into the woods. “I got him,” she yells. “I got him!” Her cackling laugh echoes through the canyon.

  No, Rock, I tell myself. She didn’t. I need to hold on to that. I can’t lose Kenner. He’s still there, he’s got to be.

  “Climb, Rock,” she sings from above me. “Or I’ll shoot you next.”

  I reach up, find a hand hold, then another, and bring my foot up. Do I really know how to climb?

  I have my doubts.

  But I let instinct take over. I remember the days in the sun, hanging off cliffs by ropes. I saw the pictures on Kenner’s phone.

  I know I can do this. I have to do this.

  My hand goes up again. Then a foot, and a hand, and a foot. I repeat it, then hesitate when I lose my footing and small rocks go sliding down the cliff wall.

  I look up, and see the tent moving. Not because it’s swinging. It’s not quite swinging. Yet. But because there’s someone inside all right. Missy is squirming around like her hands are tied behind her back. And she’s probably got some kind of gag in her mouth, otherwise she’d be calling out for me.

  I keep going. One hand, one foot. Pull myself up and do it again. When I’m about six feet underneath Alice, I look up. Her foot is raised, her knee bent, like she’s about to stomp on my face and kick me off the rock.

  “Alice,” I say, breathless. Her face is only illuminated on one side now, all sunlight gone. It is night.

  The sound of my voice must change her mind, because she plants her foot into a loop of rope tethered to the rock by an anchor. “I like your new voice.”

  I don’t know that I can actually hear her say the words. The waterfall is so close and the thunder of the water crashing down below is deafening. But I see her lips move. Very clearly.

  She did this to my voice.

  A memory flashes through my mind. Her distorted face. Not beautiful. Not at all beautiful. She bares her teeth at me like an animal as she swings a baton…

  I wheeze in the present, gasping a little at the memory.

  But then I see her with the gun.

  Kenner ducks, the bullet grazing the side of his head, leaving behind an angry red gash in his scalp. I am running before he hits the ground. Alice turns towards me, smiling as she pulls the trigger again. She misses me, because I don’t go down, but my foot catches on a bunched up rug and I go sailing towards the floor. Alice is laughing as she points the gun back at Kenner and shoots. Blood goes splattering, some of it hitting me in the face.

  “What the fuck,” I yell. “What the fuck are you doing!”

  Alice pulls out a black metal wand from her coat pocket. She flicks it open, making the wand extend and lock into its fully open position, and then she brings it crashing down on my neck. My whole world blacks out from the pain. It takes whole seconds to come back to reality, choking and gasping for air through the damage to my throat.

  Kenner is absolutely still. And maybe Alice doesn’t like that? Maybe she wants a fight out of him. Maybe she was counting on Kenner to beg.

  My eyes go fuzzy for a second and then refocus, zeroing in on her foot, just a few feet away. I realize I can stop her. Maybe even save Kenner if he’s not dead. I lunge forward, grab at her ankle with both hands, and pull. She falls to the side, the gun going off.

  “Kenner?” I try to say it, but I can’t.

  Sirens sound off in the distance and Alice gets to her feet, the black baton still in her hand. She brings it down on Kenner’s arm, right in the crook of the elbow.

  He’s not dead. I know this because he screams. The scream turns into a wail the second, and third, and fourth times.

  The sirens get louder and Alice looks down at me and smiles. She aims the gun at my head and pulls the trigger.

  But I hear nothing but the deafening sound of a click.

  She looks at the gun like it betrayed her. And the sirens are so close now, I almost dare to hope.

  That’s when her foot comes crashing down on my throat one last time and everything goes black. This time it stays that way.

  “I’m glad you like it,” I tell Alice, back on the side of this cliff in the woods. “I’m glad you like the new voice.”

  She smiles. Like I said just the right thing.

  I reach down, lift my pant leg up, and pull the gun out. She shoots, misses. I shoot, miss, but I hit the rock behind her head and a little gash appears on the side of her face, her hands immediately flying up to shield herself. Her gun drops to the ground, but I can still se
e the knife, attached to a cord around her wrist. She gets it in her grip, lashes out at me, but I lunge for the drooping fabric of the portaledge, making it swing and sway as I grab a hold. My gun is forgotten in that moment and it goes crashing to the ground with hers.

  Missy’s muffled screams inside the tent stop me cold. Her body rolls, bumping into me. One of my hands loses its grip, and I swing again, taking Missy with me as the portaledge jostles a hundred feet up in the air.

  “You’re not going to live through this, Rock.”

  “Neither are you, bitch,” I say. “How do you like the sound of those words? If we go, we’re taking you with us.”

  She’s climbing, making the portaledge rock and sway. Missy is panting hard inside the tent. I can hear her desperate nose breathing even over the sound of the waterfall. She is inches from me. And a whole other world away. Separated by the micro-thin fabric of the nylon tent.

  The tent dips, making Missy crash against me. I grab hold of the tent and swing a leg up over an aluminum pole meant to stabilize it on the side of the cliff. When I am secure, I look up. Alice is grinning down at me, her knife poised to cut through one of three remaining straps anchored to the cliff.

  “Shoot her!” I yell. I yell it so loud my throat is on fire. “Shoot this fucking bitch, Kenner!”

  “He’s dead,” Alice says, spitting the words out from above. She starts sawing the knife across the strap. The woven nylon strands begin to unravel from the sharp edge. “He’s dead—”

  Her head splatters against the cliff and then her limp body falls. Stops, because she’s clipped into the ropes by her harness. But her weight jerks the tent, placing more tension on the tethers.

  The strap she was cutting when Kenner shot her comes apart and we fall together.

  Chapter Thirty-Eight