Scared Stiff

by Laura Baumbach, William Maltese, Josh Lanyon

  Two big swallows, and the hip loosened up enough he could walk out to the onion field. The grass was scorched black in concentric circles, and nothing was moving in the hole. He found Cody's shovel, started digging, and one hour and two inches of bourbon later he found the tomahawk.

  The head looked like hand-forged metal of some kind, with a wicked spike on the back end. The wooden handle was smooth and heavy, except for a groove cut near the bottom. It had been buried too deep for the fire to touch it. What had Lillian said? Cody would need a weapon and a shield. He brushed the dirt off, took it up to the cabin, then dragged one of the chairs from the porch out to the wild onions.

  Was there anything out there that Cody needed? Bones, buttons? Who the fuck knew? Some other piece of the bad guy for some Indian exorcism? Robert had not received in-service training in ghost-fighting. The whole evil spirit-poltergeist deal had always struck him as bullshit, until he had seen one of the evil fuckers with his own eyes, until one of them had crawled into his lover's mouth and infected his brain, leaving him stuck with trying to figure out how to find a Blackfoot medicine man who could ... save them.

  Okay, a weapon and a shield. And this mess sitting in the wild onions, this trouble. Maybe Cody would have wanted to play anthropologist and dig and brush and measure, but this looked to Robert too dangerous to mess with. He needed to bulldoze the entire field, burn whatever was down there. The dead weren't staying buried. This trouble wasn't staying underground.

  * * * *

  Lillian knew someone with a dozer and she'd get them out to the cabin that afternoon. She was also hard at work tracking down a Blackfoot man who was a Sun Dancer.

  "A Sun Dancer? You mean, from the Sun Dance? Lillian, Jesus Christ, you're not telling me I'm gonna be hanging by a couple of rawhide thongs through my chest, are you? Isn't that going a little overboard?"

  "The sweat is what we need, Robert. A sweat lodge, and a Sun Dancer can do it for us.” She sniffed. “Aren't you being a little melodramatic? Rawhide thongs?"

  "Ignore me. It's the bourbon talking."

  "Robert, it's nine o'clock in the morning."

  "I got up early."

  She sighed across the phone line. “Could I suggest that you eat something?"

  "A piece of pineapple upside down cake might hit the spot. Okay, I'll wait for your boy."

  "What are you going to do, with whatever you bulldoze up?"

  "I'm going to set it on fire, Lillian. Burn it until it's ash. Better ask your Sun Dancer if he needs any ash, because if he doesn't, I'm going to sow that field with salt and ash."

  "Very biblical.” Her voice was dry. “I'll talk to you later. Would it be inappropriate for me to suggest you calm down?"

  Robert hung up the phone and had a huge chunk of her cake, and immediately felt better.

  * * * *

  David drove into the wild onion field a little before noon, hauling the dozer behind a one-ton dually pickup with painted flames erupting from the wheel wells. He climbed out and offered Robert a hand. He was wearing jeans and boots, with a white t-shirt straining a bit over his belly. “So, you're Val's Robert?” He sighed. “First we had Val, then Cody. Must be something in the damn water around here. The two-spirits are popping up like daisies. No offence."

  "None taken."

  Robert offered the bourbon, and David took a slug. “Now that's the kind of tool I'm talking about, you dealing with a rattlesnake nest! And here's the other.” He pulled a huge revolver out of the pocket of his jeans. The barrel must have been ten inches long. “Shoot those fuckers with this, they won't be giving us any more trouble."

  "Sounds good,” Robert agreed. “I did set them on fire last night, but no telling what's still underground."

  "Fire's not bad, you dealing with rattlers,” David agreed. He took one more swig of the bourbon, then went back to the trailer, lowered the ramp.

  About thirty minutes later, Lillian drove up. She had Cody and the nurse from the ER with her. They all got out of her car, walked over to watch David's bulldozer scoop up its loads and dump them into a big pile.

  "Hey, Robert.” The nurse walked over and offered her hand. “I'm Beth. I don't remember if I introduced myself last night."

  He shook her hand. “Beth, thanks very much. I sure appreciate what you did. Is he okay to be out of the hospital so soon?"

  "Oh, yes.” Her voice got a little louder. “He was being such an asshole the nurses couldn't stand him another minute.” Cody shot her a hostile look, and her hands went to her hips. “Don't you look at me like that, Cody Calling Eagle. I don't know what the hell is wrong with you.” He turned pointedly away.

  Lillian pulled Robert off to the side. “Come talk to me. I've got lots to tell you.” They walked up to the porch and sat down. “The Sun Dancer, he's on his way from Montana. He says when he gets here, he'll decide if he can help out or not. You need to get some cash, Robert. It's polite to pay for his gas."

  "That's it? He doesn't want payment for the sweat?"

  Lillian paused. “It's traditional to give a gift of some kind. The way it works is you offer a tribute, and if it's acceptable, then he proceeds with the ceremony. He doesn't want much, but he wants you to think, and be thoughtful, I guess you could say. Anyway, his name is Black Moon Rising. He lives alone on a remote part of the reservation. That's all I know. He should be here tomorrow. The cousin, who takes his phone messages, said he has been preparing, expecting a journey."

  "Yeah?"

  "Don't sound so cynical, Robert."

  "Holy shit! Look at this!” David reared up, aimed his gun down into the pit the dozer had dug, and pulled the trigger. The kick of the big gun knocked him off his feet, and he landed back on his butt in the bulldozer's seat. “Now, that's something you don't see every day."

  Robert and Lillian walked over and joined Cody and Beth, staring down into the hole. The dozer had unearthed a human skull, and Robert could see bits and pieces of blue cloth in the dirt around it. He grabbed Cody's arm, pushed him back. “Be careful, Cody. I don't know what's dangerous to you."

  David stood back up. “I'll make sure the son of a bitch isn't dangerous.” He aimed again, a couple more shots, but he was braced this time and didn't go tumbling backward.

  Lillian had her hands on her hips, and so did Beth. “David, what exactly are you shooting?"

  Beth sniffed. “I can assure you, as a medical professional, that the person in the hole is already dead."

  David was undeterred. “I saw this thing once, a bad-ass Harley tattoo, rattler came crawling out the skull's mouth. This thing reminded me, and better safe than sorry is what I say.” He holstered the gun. “You used to have a Harley, didn't you, Robert?"

  "Yeah. I don't have it anymore.” He realized he still had Cody's arm in his hand, and he dropped it and moved away. He went back to the porch, but when he turned around Cody was next to him. He sat down on the first step.

  Cody turned around and gave Robert a stone face. “I don't have any tattoos."

  Robert looked into his eyes, looking for any trace of the man he was starting to know. He thought he saw a trace of fear cross Cody's dark eyes. “I know you don't have any tattoos. How do you feel?"

  "I feel like shit. I feel like somebody's trying to cleave my skull in two. My head's swimming with creepy weird shit, voices and snakes, and I want to know what's going on."

  Robert sighed, looked around for the bourbon. What was he doing? Cody didn't drink. He closed his eyes wearily. He hadn't slept much last night. “Cody, listen. We've got a medicine man coming. He lives alone, up near the border with Canada. Blackfoot land. We need to think up a gift or something."

  "What's he coming for?"

  "He's gonna do a sweat, I think. Try to get the creepy weird shit and the snakes out of your head."

  "Are you fucking kidding me? I think it was just that shit they put in my IV in the ER. And you called some Blackfoot medicine man and didn't even ask me?"

  "Look, kid. After I do
everything I can think up to make this right, if you're still an obnoxious asshole I'll assume that's your baseline and leave you alone. But for today, and tomorrow, and for however long the medicine man says, you're gonna stay here and do the healing thing if I have to hog tie you and drag your sorry ass into the sweat myself. Now, maybe if you're not doing anything else, you could go catch us some fish for dinner. Looks like we've got some people to feed. Your fishing pole is that Orvis fly rod on the back porch, in case you don't remember."

  From the look Cody shot at him, the black-eyed glare digging holes into his back all the way across the yard, Robert was glad he'd hidden the tomahawk.

  Val. You still with me?

  Not for much longer. His voice was weak in Robert's head. Your boy's strong, Robert. And he's still in there, don't worry. The Sun Dancer, he'll get the ghosts out of his head. You burn what you dig up, Robert. Do it now, before the medicine man gets here. Don't give them any place to hide.

  Val, are you okay? You don't sound good.

  Nearly done. He's strong, my Akecheta. Hardheaded, like a piece of wood! He'll be fine, Robert, and he loves you. Don't give up on him. Trust him. He'll be the love of your life.

  I thought you were the love of my life. Val's mouth pressed to his, weaker than last night. Don't go, Val. Can't you stay?

  Fingers stroking across his cheek.

  Robert got the gas can out of the back of the truck. “David, what do you think? We've got to burn all this, every bit. Not just the rattlesnakes, but the bones, too. So how do we do it?"

  David hitched up his jeans, stroked his chin. “Well, I guess we burn and dig. See what I'm saying? Burn a pile, rake it out, dig another pile, burn it. Eventually we'll burn everything that can burn. This isn't ... Robert, this isn't the massacre site, is it? That battle the historians are always talking about? They say fifteen Blackfoot children were slaughtered. Maybe we shouldn't burn their bones."

  "There was no massacre.” David looked up at him in surprise. “Those children, they were hidden, protected. They all lived and their great-grandkids are still roaming around Salmon.” He nodded toward Cody and Beth, walking down to the river bank. Beth had his old fishing pole.

  "Well, I'll be damned."

  "The men who tried to massacre them?” Robert nodded toward the pit. “We're about to soak their bones in gasoline and set them on fire."

  "Goddamn! Let's do it, brother! We'll let those mean fuckers know they can't mess with children in Salmon, Idaho."

  Robert handed him the gas can. “You can go first."

  Cody was watching him from the river, his sheet of black hair blowing back from his shoulders. The flames flared up between them, making the air shudder with heat. David had been reckless with the gas.

  Robert watched the skulls, the long gray-brown thigh bones catch fire, start to blacken and burn. Cody dropped to his knees in the river. Trust him. He's strong. Wasn't that what Val said? Robert didn't move, just watched as the flames licked at pieces of wood, pieces of bone, fragments of cloth. Cody filled his cupped hands with water, splashed his face, knelt there in the icy water, sluicing it over his face, his hair, his shoulders, his chest. When the flames died down, David climbed in the dozer, rolled the big tires back and forth, then lifted another load.

  Four hours later, and Cody was asleep inside the cabin in one of the big easy chairs. David was loading the bulldozer back onto the trailer, his eyebrows singed off, face smudged and sooty. He'd refused any payment, claiming civic duty and a favor owed if he ever needed one. He'd had such a good time Robert wondered if he was an incipient firebug. Lillian and Beth were on the way into town with his ATM card and PIN number. They were going to get cash, food, a chainsaw, and the tribute for the Sun Dancer at the Radio Shack.

  Robert had been afraid to leave Cody alone. When he'd asked what had happened inside his head when they burned the bones, Cody said that someone was screaming and he wouldn't shut up. Robert gave him a slug of bourbon and put him in the chair. He was sleeping, curled on his side, one hand tucked under his cheek. Robert spread the quilt over his legs. The tenderness was still there, but tempered now with a cold knot of panic in his belly. They could lose this. They could lose each other. Tenderness and love, sick, cold fear, sexual desire, and a tiny bit of blind fury seemed to fill his chest like a river about to overflow its banks. He was tired—tired and broken and in pain. His leg hadn't been this bad since he had first come home from the hospital, come home to his and Val's empty house. He got into the shower, took the last mouthful of bourbon, then eased back in the other chair, closed his eyes.

  He must have slept a couple of minutes. When he woke up Cody was awake, too, sitting at the kitchen table and looking at him over a cup of coffee. “You ready to tell me what's going on?"

  Trust him. He's strong. “Sure, kid. We met on Friday evening. This cabin belongs to ... it belonged to Val, before he was killed. He was killed a year ago, Cody. The cabin's mine, now. Me and Val, we were lovers, partners for years. And this last weekend you and I became lovers, too."

  Cody's face went blank and still with shock.

  "Out in the wild onions are buried the bodies of three men. We had a dream about it, you and me. They murdered your great-great-grandmother in 1882. Then they tried to ambush and kill Val and his lover, Akecheta. Val and Akecheta killed the men and buried them in the onion field. They were evil, twisted. Their ghosts rose up, turned themselves into snakes, and they made a nest over the bodies, a rattlesnake nest. We started to dig up the field, and you dug into the rattlesnake nest. I watched...” Robert took a deep breath. “I watched the ghosts, like snakes, go into your mouth after the rattlesnakes bit you."

  Cody was wiping frantically at his mouth, then he lurched up and just made it into the bathroom before he started vomiting. Robert could hear him in there coughing and cursing. When he came out he went out the back door, walked back down to the river, and when Robert got to the back porch he was kneeling in the river again, splashing water over his face.

  Robert followed him out, walked into the river and pulled Cody's long hair back out of the way, tied it with an elastic band. “Robert, I can hear them. They're talking in my head, all kinds of evil shit. They never shut up.” Robert stood there in the river while his feet turned cold and numb. He stood near, like a friend, so Cody wouldn't be alone.

  * * * *

  Whatever battle was raging in Cody's head, it was giving him a massive headache. He looked exhausted, new lines of pain next to his mouth and eyes, and he sat on the bottom step of the front porch and stared blankly across the green fields to the stand of aspens that bordered the property. Robert sat in a chair on the porch, an ice pack on his hip, smelling like Bengay. He'd found a tube in the groceries Lillian had brought from town. He thought they were a sorry pair of ghost fighters.

  "Shouldn't we start building the sweat, Robert?"

  "Why are you asking me? I believe you're the only Blackfoot sitting on this porch."

  Cody turned around and gave him a nasty look. “Yeah, I am. But aren't you running this show?"

  "No, I'm not.” Besides the Bengay, there was stew meat, potatoes and carrots, a loaf of bread and some ham, and some Cokes. No additional bourbon. There was also some food for the medicine man. Robert had studied this last in surprise. Half a case of Spam, half a case of canned peaches. Four large cans of coffee and the same of instant oatmeal. People still ate like this? Like John Wayne climbing aboard the wagon train and pointing the oxen toward Oregon? Apparently so.

  "Okay, asshole, then I think we need to start work on the sweat! He's supposed to be here tomorrow, right?"

  "Yes. Do you know how to do it?"

  Cody bit down on his bottom lip. “I've never built a sweat, but I've seen it done. I think I remember enough. We need to cut down some trees, strip off the branches so they're smooth. Then we take three and form a tripod, and use the others to fill in the space. It only has to be big enough for two. Or maybe three, I don't know."

&n
bsp; "Lillian brought the chainsaw with the other stuff. You know how to use it?"

  "Yeah. Who's paying for all this?"

  "I am."

  "I thought you were bankrupt or something."

  "Pretty close. The money doesn't matter."

  "Why not? Money always matters."

  "I guess I don't care about money as much as I care about you."

  Cody closed his eyes and rubbed hard across his forehead again. “I wish I knew why."

  "I don't get it either.” Robert stood up and hobbled down the steps. “Okay, let's go build a sweat."

  The aspen trees were tall and pale, and the wind rustled through the leaves in a way that Robert might have called ghostly, a few days before. The noise they made walking through the leaves startled a pair of mountain blue jays. Robert bent over and picked up a brilliant blue feather with a black band across it. He was thinking about the tomahawk, that groove cut into the wooden handle near the bottom. When Akecheta had wielded the tomahawk in the dream, a leather thong had been tied to the handle with some blue feathers attached. Cody picked up another feather and handed it to him. “These are so blue, aren't they? They're the same color as Val's eyes."

  Robert jerked in shock. “Let me go put these in the cabin, Cody. We may need them."

  "What for?"

  "A weapon and a shield. That's what you'll need. And no, I don't know what that means.” Robert walked back to the cabin, put the black and blue feathers on the counter, then came back out to where Cody was starting small wedge-cuts in a couple of trees, all five or six inches in diameter.

  "You know how to do this, Robert? How to cut down a tree?” He powered down the chainsaw.

  "No, I don't."

  "Stand behind me, then, so the tree doesn't fall on you."

  When the tree fell over, much softer and slower than Robert had expected, Cody told him to leave it, and the next tree fell at an angle to the first. “This way you won't have to bend over so far."

  "Thanks."

  Cody glanced at him as if he was wondering if he was being sarcastic, then he turned back to the trees and revved up the chainsaw. When four trees were lying across the first, Cody put down the chainsaw and they used small handsaws to cut off the limbs and brush. When one side of the tree was cleared, they reached down together, lifted the tree and turned it over, and Robert was reminded of his first dream about Val and Akecheta, building the cabin together.