Total Silence

by T. J. MacGregor

  Yeah? And what kind of something would that be, Mira? A snowball? An animal? A rock?

  “Ramona?” she called, just to be sure.

  The storm swallowed her voice, the wind wrapped around her legs, and suddenly Mira saw something moving through the wall of snow, off to the left. It looked like the darting beam of a flashlight. “Jerry?” she shouted. “Ramona? Shep?”

  She stepped outside, hugging her arms against her, and then two figures emerged from the snow, as though the storm had given birth to them. The man in front raised his head.

  Mira knew that some sort of noise escaped her, an explosive sound, a sob of horror or shock or both, and she wrenched back, blinking hard, certain that she was hallucinating, that she was locked in some feverish delirium. Her legs moved of their own volition, feet scrambling back, back, to put distance between herself and the door, through which the man now walked.

  “Mira.” He spoke softly, in a voice she remembered clearly, and then he smiled and she knew it was Tom, tall and handsome in jeans and a parka and a funny knit cap pulled down over his head.

  Her heart seized up and they rushed toward each other, and when his arms came around her, he felt real, solid, and smelled of snow and wind and miracles. She didn’t care if this was a hallucination, a mirage, or some cruel cosmic trick. When he kissed her, she tasted the moisture of the storm on his mouth and the eleven years since his death vanished in a flash. It was as if her husband had never left.

  Mira pulled back, drinking in the sight of his face, her fingers peeling the knit cap off his head and sliding through the damp softness of his hair. Real, all of it real, tangible. “How—”

  He touched his index finger to her mouth. “Remember the story we used to tell Annie about Jiminy Cricket? That anything’s possible if you believe?”

  Mira laughed and wept and ran her hands down his back, up his neck and into his hair again. The last time she had seen him, he’d been a teenager in the Keys in 1968, a kid who had somehow recognized her even though she wouldn’t enter his life for decades. Now here he was, dead but not dead, and talking to her about belief and Jiminy Cricket.

  “All these years, I’ve tried to find you. To go wherever you are. I kept hoping I’d sense you nearby. But you... you...”

  She choked up and suddenly thought of how guilty she’d felt the night she’d accepted Sheppard’s ring, as though she were betraying Tom, and how many times she had put her emotions on hold because of her memories of Tom, and of how many nights she’d cried herself to sleep, wishing that she could change what had happened, that she could bring him back. Now here he was, walking in from a snowstorm like he’d been gone a day instead of eleven years, and what she felt right then was anger.

  “What the hell have you been doing all this time?” she burst out. “Why didn’t you at least give me a sign, a nudge, something, Tom? My God. What do you do over there all day, year after year? You could have at least visited Annie and me. You could—”

  “I told you this wouldn’t be simple,” said a voice on the other side of the room.

  Mira spun around and there stood the second figure she’d seen, a tall young man with blond hair, leaning against the now-shut cabin door. He looked as though he belonged on a wild, powerful horse, galloping through the mist on the Scottish moors or leading a band of Vikings into battle. “Who’re you?” she demanded.

  “A friend,” the man said, and came toward her, his hand extended. “The name’s Dean.”

  Mira looked at his hand, at his face, a part of her terrified that if she touched him, Tom would vanish and everything would go back to the way it had been moments ago. “I don’t understand,” she said quietly, backing away from Dean. “1 don’t understand what’s going on.”

  Dean’s arm swung to his side. Tom tightened his grip on her hand. “It’s okay, Mira. He’s not the enemy. He’s one of us.”

  “And what’s that mean, exactly? That I’m dead?” She looked helplessly at Tom. “Is that it? I’m dead and you’ve come for me?”

  “No, that’s not it at all. We need a favor.”

  “A favor.” She let out a clipped, dry laugh. “Eleven years of silence and now you show up for a favor? Christ, I can’t believe I’m hearing this.” She pulled her hand free of Tom’s and sank down onto the couch. “I can’t believe I’m having this conversation with a dead man. With two dead men.” She looked at Dean. “You’re dead, right?”

  “For nearly a year in your time.”

  “Oh. Great. I don’t remember you from before. When Tom was alive.”

  “1 didn’t know Tom when he was alive. Friendships are formed in death just as they are in life, Mira.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “What do you think Tom’s been doing all this time?” Dean asked. “Hanging out on clouds? Goofing off? Floating around your house, hoping you’ll sense his presence? He’s been making a death for himself. That’s what you do when you’re gone, Mira. You create something on the other side.”

  For some reason, she’d never thought of it like that. Despite all her years as a psychic, she had never considered what Tom might be doing as a spirit, except feeling the same raw grief and loss that she felt. She’d thought of him only in relation to herself and to Annie and the life they’d had together. The realization that he might have a life just as real to him on the other side as their life together had been here shocked her. Maybe he had a wife, children, pets, the whole suburban nine yards.

  “Nothing has changed in what I feel for you, Mira.” Tom sat next to her, put his arm around her shoulders.

  “Nothing will ever change that. But your life here needs to move on.” Then, more quietly, he added: “Sheppard is a good man, Mira.”

  “I know he’s a good man. I don’t need you to tell me that.” But that’s not the point.

  “You’re right. That’s not the point,” Dean said, apparently reading her mind. “We made a mistake doing this, Tom. It’s not fair to her.”

  “I’ll decide what’s fair to me,” she snapped. “So what’s the favor?”

  Dean paced across the living room, his movements like that of a cat, infinitely graceful—and restless. Tom now sat so close to her she could feel the heat of his body. Could you make love when you were in spirit? Could you feel that kind of desire? Don’t go there. Right.

  Best not to think about the strangeness of it all or the possibility that she might be in a loony bin in the real world, strapped into a straitjacket, howling at the moon. “In the same way that you need to move on with your life,” Dean said, “people in my family need to move on with theirs.”

  And the second he said this, it all rushed back to her. Answering the cabin door. The babe with the gun. Her mad race to the barn. The shot that brought her down. She grabbed onto Tom’s hand, clutching it as if to root herself, to keep her here, wherever here was. But the cabin flickered, blurred, flickered again, as though they were all inside a hologram that had begun to decay or dissolve, revealing the reality behind it.

  “Dean, we’re running out of time,” Tom said.

  “I’m asking you to allow yourself to be used as an intermediary,” Dean said. “Your abilities will propel events in directions my sister hasn’t foreseen. It’s the only thing that might stop her. And in the end, this would bring closure for my family.”

  “You’re asking me to bring closure for the woman who shot me?”

  “I’m asking you to try to stop her so that the rest of my family can get on with their lives.”

  “And what kind of guarantees do I have that I won’t die in the process?”

  “None.” No hesitation, no lies, just the blunt truth.

  “Well, hey, that’s comforting. And what kind of help can I get from you?”

  “As much as we’re able to offer.”

  “But basically I’m on my own?”

  “I can’t guarantee anything, Mira,” said Dean. “The same rules still apply. We all have free will. You may consent to help, then change you
r mind, and that’s fine. It’s your choice.”

  “Are you in the market for a deal?” she asked, sitting forward.

  “A deal?” He laughed, genuinely amused by this. “What about karma and good deeds and spiritual evolution? That’s all part of this package, you know.”

  “I’m talking about one favor for another.”

  “That’s kind of unorthodox, Mira,” said Tom.

  “And this isn’t?” She ran her fingers through his hair again, memorizing the texture of it, the contour of bone and skin against her fingertips. “I want to see you one last time, Tom. When I can remember it.”

  Tom took her hand and brought it to his mouth and kissed her palm. “We can do that.”

  “Consider it done,” Dean agreed.

  Mira wrapped her arms around Tom and buried her face in the curve of his shoulder, and...

  Her body exploded with pain, her teeth chattered, she was burning up and freezing cold at the same time, and she shrieked, “I changed my mind, I changed my mind. . .

  “Jesus, be quiet. I’m doing the best I can,” a female voice said. “I had to stem the bleeding. And this is the second time I’ve had to stop. You’re one tough lady to knock out. Now be still. I’m going to give you another shot. Do you understand what I’m saying?”

  Say-ing, say-ing say-ing. The words bounced against the inside of Mira’s skull, amplified 5 million times, pulverizing her bones. “Help me, please....”

  And something sharp pricked her arm and everything went white and silent and she was gone.

  2

  Visibility was practically zero, 1-26 was closed. Mile was now on yet another county road, a miserable two-laner that was getting her nowhere fast. She couldn’t risk pulling into a parking lot or even a campground, not with Mira in the back of the Land Rover, and if she kept driving, she wouldn’t be moving much over thirty miles an hour. This road would lead to another that eventually would get her to 1-85, which would take her into northern Georgia, but for all she knew, 1-85 was shut down, too. Static filled her radio, a frequent occurrence here in the mountains, so she couldn’t even get a weather report.

  Her best chance, she thought, was to find a place to pull off similar to where she had stopped twice to tend to Mira, a dirt road deep in the woods. She had her sleeping bag with her, a cooler filled with food and water—how bad could it be? She would sleep for a few hours in the car and when the snow stopped, she would be on her way again. Her plan had a little flexibility built into it.

  The main problem with this plan was Mira’s injury. The longer it took to remove the bullet, the more likely it would be that infection would deepen and spread. Even with the antibiotic Allie had given her, Mira’s immune system would continue to try to expel the invader. But she couldn’t do anything about that now.

  She slowed to twenty-five miles an hour, turned on her high beams, and leaned forward, eyeing the trees that lined her side of the road. The good news was that the trees were pines, so the foliage would offer additional protection. But the deeper you went into the woods in this part of the country, the greater the likelihood of meeting some backcountry hicks or neocon survivalist types who might consider a woman traveling alone to be fair game.

  But she was armed and was a crack shot. Yeah, she certainly had proven that beyond a shadow of a doubt. Two through the forehead, one in the chest, the other through the back. But they had seen her, would have been able to describe her, what choice had she had?

  None. No choice. Of course not. Sheppard hadn’t left her any choice.

  Allie slowed, pulled off onto the shoulder of the road, lowered her window. Snow blew into the car, into her face. She squinted, trying to gauge the distance between her and the woods. A hundred yards? One hundred fifty? But more than the distance, she worried about whether the snow out there was deep. With the wind blowing as it was, even four inches of snow could drift, and if the Rover got stuck, no telling when she would get out and Mira would die. And that wasn’t in the pattern. In fact, the pattern included a beginning date, today, and an end date of January 1, 2004. She had to remain within that time frame. The pattern demanded it.

  She raised the window, gulped from a water bottle, and debated this thorny issue, weighing the pros and cons. The wipers whipped back and forth, the metronomic rhythm lulling her into false complacency.

  Decide, decide.

  Lights flashed behind her. She lowered her window halfway, swiped her palm at the side mirror. An elemental horror filled her. A cop, where the hell had he come from? He was pulling up behind her, no siren, red lights flashing. The lights threw an eerie glow against the falling snow, so it looked as though it were snowing blood.

  She glanced quickly around at Mira and reached back and pulled the blanket up over her face. Now only the top of her head showed. She didn’t move. My roommate. She’s sleeping. She plucked her gun from her purse and tucked it under her thigh, just in case. She slipped her license and registration out of her wallet, grabbed the map and spread it open against the steering wheel.

  You’re a doc, your license says so, relax, it’ll be fine. You’re lost, that’s all.

  She lowered her window all the way. More snow blew inside. The cop moved toward her as if against an inexorable force, and stopped next to the window, his trooper hat pulled down low over his forehead so the wind wouldn’t whip it away. “License and registration, ma’am.”

  Allie passed them through the window. “I’m lost.” Her heart hammered, a pulse beat hard at the side of her neck. “I’m trying to get to Atlanta.”

  He held a flashlight up to her license, glanced at her, at the registration, then passed both back through the window. “You got way off track, Dr. Hart. You’re on sixty-four.” He passed her license and registration back through the window, then shone his flashlight at her map. “May I? I’ll trace your route to Atlanta.”

  Allie turned the map toward him, trying not to think about Mira, about what she would have to do to the cop if Mira suddenly came to. But the cop’s death would be Mira ‘s fault. He used a pen to trace her route to 1-85 and Atlanta. The map flapped in the wind, snow fell across it and instantly melted.

  “This road here,” he said, tapping the map, “will take you into Highlands. There you turn south to Seneca, take a right, and drive until you see one twenty-three. That’ll take you to the interstate. But if I were you, I’d stay in Highlands for the night. All the interstates are shut down on account of the storm, but should be open by sunrise.”

  “How far is Highlands?”

  “Six, seven miles tops. I just came outta there awhile ago. Had to escort some lost tourists to the motel. Try the Holiday Inn. They still have rooms.”

  “Thanks. Thanks very much.” She took her map, started to raise her window, but he shone his flashlight inside the car. “What’s that?”

  The beam brushed the top of Mira’s head. Her heartbeat slammed into overdrive, she felt the shape of the gun against her thigh. “My roommate. We’ve been taking turns driving.”

  “She’s one sound sleeper,” he remarked.

  “She was pretty beat. We’ve been driving since we left Maryland.”

  “Well, you take care, Dr. Hart.”

  “Count on it.”

  She raised her window, sat back, squeezed her eyes shut. This wasn’t in the pattern, either. Allie dropped the gun back into her purse and waited for the cop to pull back onto the road. She watched his lights in her rearview mirror, a smear of illumination against the back window. Mira stirred, muttered something, and fell silent again. The cop made a U-turn in the middle of the road and drove off in the opposite direction.

  She turned onto the road again, her mind shrieking, over and over gain, Not in the pattern, not in the pattern, that same insipid voice making a racket worthy of a two-year-old. She shook her head, trying to silence it, and it finally shut up. Stopping anywhere was now out of the question. She would drive as long as she had to drive to get to where she was going.

  A
nd by the time the sun came up, she thought, she and Mira would be in a safe place and Sheppard would be waking up inside his nightmare.

  Chapter 5

  Great, sweeping gusts of wind blew up the Coosa River and slammed into the Rover, making it shudder. Snow swirled in the beams of the headlights and the wipers whipped the stuff into sloppy half-moon drifts on the windshield. Visibility was about two feet, if that, and Allie had to lower her window to see the houses along Riverside Road. There weren’t many on this stretch of it, perhaps five, each with two to three acres of land, and all of them hidden behind snow-draped pines.

  Just ahead, she spotted her brother’s blue-and-gold mailbox. She tapped the Rover’s brakes and turned down the steep driveway. The headlights struck the gorgeous cedar A-frame, a place Keith had bought eight or nine years ago and which he used for a month or two during the summer. He also owned a place in Key West, a condo in Aspen, and, of course, the catamaran, where he spent most of his time. She had no idea where he was sailing at the moment and didn’t really give a shit, as long as he stayed away from here.

  She pulled up in front of the three-car garage and suddenly wondered what she would do if he was here. But the notion was ludicrous. Keith detested the cold. During the winter he was usually sailing around the Caribbean, the rich, irresponsible gringo playboy with his chiquitas, living the jimmy Buffett life. Thirty-nine-years old, living off his trust fund, and he still didn’t know what he wanted to be when he grew up.

  From the glove compartment, she retrieved the garage door opener and house keys that Keith had sent her a couple of years ago. If you ever want to get away from ER, stay at my place. Generous, she thought, and figured the generosity mollified his guilt that he did absolutely nothing to share the responsibility for their father’s affairs. In Keith’s world, tending to an elderly parent was woman’s work.

  The garage was so huge it was large enough for the Rover, for the pale yellow refurbished VW bug, circa 1969, that Keith used when he was home—his stab at being an ordinary Joe; and the trailer and hitch she’d been storing here since Keith had left last summer. She drove in, lowered the garage door, and kept the headlights on until she found the light switch on the wall near the door. She unlocked the door to the house, propped it open with the cooler that held perishable groceries, then hurried inside.