by Dan Pearce
“You rich bastard,” he laughed. “Couldn’t think ahead and order me some comfy Under Armour or something? God, what I’d give for some brand-new cross trainers.”
“I left in a serious hurry. I’m sorry.”
“All good, friend. These are better than anything I’ve been able to wear in a very long time,” he said as he pulled-open the bottom of the shirt and slid it on.
“Dishon, get your naked smelly ass into the bathroom and shower first.” He stopped as if he had never considered the idea of bathing in his life. “If you put those clothes on right now, your nastiness will make them fall apart faster than the curse could probably do it,” I said with a snarky laugh.
“I forget some people’s noses still notice,” he told me, dropping the shirt and socks back onto the bed. “And while I’d love nothing more than to make you suffer, I think our journey to the witch will go more smoothly if I don’t have to listen to you gripe about it the whole way.”
I had been waiting to discuss Tashibag or Samantha until Dishon was clean and sober, but what he said got my blood pumping. “Ashwin said you may have her location locked down. Is that true?”
“Yes, I know where she is,” he said overly nonchalantly as he brushed past me and stepped into the tiny shower which had been built on one side of the room. He turned the faucet, sat on the toilet beside the shower, and held a hand in the thin stream, waiting for warm water.
“Well, where is she?” I said impatiently. “How do we find her?” Dishon stepped into the shower, yanked the yellowing curtain closed behind him, and began singing as he cleaned himself, purposefully ignoring me. “Dishon.”
My friend didn’t reply. Instead he sang a song to a tune I didn’t recognize, using words I didn’t know if he was making-up on the spot or which he had rehearsed. “The greatest friend I ever had, found true love which makes me glad.”
“Dishon, come on, spill it. Where is Tashibag?” I said, as I moved closer to the shower in eager anticipation for the answer.
He kept singing. “And I’ve been here and everywhere. For so long now, it’s me who cared.” He paused. I started to say his name again, but he broke into even louder song. “And now his love she shall be gone, and I’m ignoring that to sing this song.” He definitely hadn’t prepared this beforehand.
Knowing he wasn’t going to answer me before he was ready, I took a step back. “Finish your stupid song then.”
“Oh, I will,” Dishon said. “But first I must say… I forgot how fucking good running water can feel when one hasn’t bathed in so long. This water is freezing cold, and I honestly don’t give a shit,” he chirped happily as I heard the shampoo bottle burp.
“I’ll be out here, whenever you’re done. Take your time, really. It’s not like I’m in a rush or anything,” I said as I plopped onto my bed.
His singing voice grew even louder. “Cain wants to find a mean old witch and call her to her face a bitch.” Now I laughed. “He wants to know what all I know, so beyond ten years his dick might grow.”
“When did you become so foul?” I said, admittedly amused with his little musical.
“He bought me clothes made for a fool, and knew I’d look like such a tool.”
“God. We’ll find you new ones in the morning.”
“He shows up here as my old friend and wants help to find his happy end.” This was when I stopped replying to each line of his song, which went on and on between the pauses and gurgles that accompanied Dishon cleaning himself.
It took me a moment to realize when he had stopped singing and that things had been silent for a while. Eventually, there was no sign of motion within the shower whatsoever. “Dishon, you okay?”
“Yeah,” he said quietly.
“You sure?”
“Yeah.”
“Can I get you anything?”
“Yeah,” he said, this time more quietly and sadder.
“What? You name it. Anything.”
There was another long pause, followed by a sudden fresh outbreak in exuberant song. “We’ll hunt the witch and find the cure. This time I am completely sure.”
“Really?”
“Yeeeeeeaaaaah,” he sang out as if he were in a rock opera.
“Where is she?”
Dishon went silent again. Eventually I heard the shampoo bottle burp again, as he squeezed a fresh blob of shampoo onto his scalp. “God, Cain,” he finally replied. “Can you at least pretend for a half a minute that you are here because you care as much about me as you do about whatever chick you currently love?”
I had to keep myself from blurting-out something defensive. Instead I looked over at the pile of disgusting and worn clothes Dishon had gifted me just so that he could wear something, anything, new. “I’m sorry, Dishon. You are right. I have not been a good friend.”
“You have always been my best friend,” he said. “And my curse is to be forgotten by even my best friends, so I am just happy to see you.”
“I would never forget you. Take your time,” I said as my thoughts of Dishon and Samantha began leapfrogging one another. “I don’t deny that it is only the new snow upon the mountains that made me come here. You deserve better, Dishon. You deserve way better.”
“Damn straight, I do!” Dishon suddenly laughed. “And I’m gonna take the longest-ass shower you’ve ever seen while you think about that!”
Dishon kept his word and showered for what seemed like hours. Most of that time was spent in silence, except for the occasional sarcastic and friendly jab we took at one another. “There is literally a layer of mud at the bottom of the shower now,” he informed me as he finally emerged and began drying off. “I don’t even want to tell you how long it has been since I bathed.”
Once dry, Dishon borrowed my electric razor and used it to shave his face and neck clean. His beard had only grown to be a few inches long, and as if he perceived my questioning thoughts, he informed me that he often used broken pieces of glass to keep it shorter. After he finished shaving, he used the clipper attachment to trim off large chunks of his now clean hair until it was short and rugged once more. “Am I a handsome sonofabitch, or what?” he said as he turned his attention to me.
“Or what,” I replied.
“Cain, Cain, Cain. Always so jealous of how much better looking I am,” he said. “It’s really time you get over it and accept it.”
“If I admit to all the world that you are now, and always have been a better-looking man, will you shut your mouth about it and discuss Tashibag?”
“Hm. Yes. I accept your proposal.”
“I hereby admit to all the…” I started to say, but my naked friend cut me off and pointed to the window while he walked toward it. He slid the glass open with a screech and gestured outside. I walked to the window and shouted as loud as I possibly could, “I hereby admit to all the world that Dishon is right now, always has been, and always will be a sexier, better looking man that I am.” I looked back at a very amused Dishon. “Is that good enough?”
“No, we are in Peru. Yell it in Spanish or I’m gonna, I don’t know, take another really long shower or something.”
“Fine,” I said, and I yelled it in Spanish. A woman’s voice yelled back at me to shut up.
Dishon grabbed his gut and began laughing. “I hereby forgive you for being a lazy bastard of a friend and not visiting me for so long.”
“Um. Thanks?”
“You’re welcome. Lazy fucking bastard.”
I went along with it all, and even laughed along, supposing Dishon needed to feel some sort of balance with me before he could feel good dumping the fruits of his last seventeen-some-odd years of searching for Tashibag on my lap.
Before we got into it, he told me he’d like to see Peru dressed in his fresh clothes and walking like a man who actually had something in his life to call his own. I agreed, and as we walked the ever-abandoning streets of Ocongote together, he relayed a great deal of the information he had of Tashibag’s current whereabouts.
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He was certain the witch had been living for some time in what was rumored to be an ancient village many miles off of the road that leads through Ausangat. He excitedly told me of the many travelers he had questioned who arrived in Ocongote after trekking that road, and of the many stories he had heard of the haunted mountain and the dangers that existed thereon. One woman, he told me, claimed she had walked side by side with a beautiful young woman who had a white serpent hanging from her neck. I asked him if that was all she reported, and Dishon excitedly told me that the beautiful young woman had been riding upon the back of what she swore to Dishon was a giant two-headed alpaca.
“A two-headed alpaca? Really? Come on.” I said to Dishon who had become very involved in his own story.
He laughed. “I didn’t want to believe it. You know how many times people told us things just as crazy.”
“Such as the man who claimed he saw Tashibag riding on the back of a scorpion.”
“Yes, that one was beyond stupid, but the alpaca is not.”
“How do you figure?”
“Because,” Dishon said as he stopped our walk and cupped a hand over my shoulder. “Many of the locals here swear they have seen a two-headed alpaca of great size in Ausangat. You know as well as I do that no mysticism at all has to even be at play here. It’s an animal that could exist in the wild. That alpaca could just be a couple of conjoined alpaca twins whose body grew larger than normal to compensate for the weight of its two heads.”
“Okay, makes sense. So if it is Tashibag, and it sounds like it could be her, is it possible that…”
Dishon cut me off. “And there’s more! The woman spoke of the tiny old man with white hair leading the alpaca. I didn’t ask her about him. She confirmed to me that Burdo was there. Come on. There is no doubt that it is Tashibag.”
“Okay,” I said again. “It sounds like you’ve found our witch. But this woman you talked with… She met Tashibag on the road. It doesn’t give us much information beyond that. Why do you believe you can find where she lives?”
“I can’t tell you that as easily as I can show you,” Dishon said. “Come with me to where I know there is Wi-Fi. It would be good for you to have a visual of where we will be going anyway.”
I looked around me at the small city full of tin roofs and cinderblock shacks. “There is Wi-Fi here?”
“Absolutely,” Dishon said. “But first, do me a favor.” He guided me to the next street over where a farmacia’s neon sign lit up the darkened street below it. “I have a feeling we’ll want them,” he said as he motioned me to the counter.
“What are we doing here?”
“My friend is looking for Percocet,” he said in Spanish to the young man who stood behind the counter.
“Percocet?” I asked.
“Yes, and some Ambien, please,” he said to the pharmacist.
“Why do you need either of those things?”
“The Percocet just so that we have it. We might not use it, but we may want it. The Ambien is for you.”
I scoffed. “I don’t need a sleeping aid. In fact, Ambien is the last thing I want right now. I can’t sleep, remember?”
“How many days has it been since the snow appeared?” he asked.
“It appeared yesterday.”
“So, you still have two nights to sleep. One if you want to keep it safe.”
“Yes, but I don’t need pills.”
Dishon laughed. “Tell me Cain, you know your brain better than I do. Do you really think you’ll be able to fall asleep tonight, thinking about all this, and about everything I am about to show you?”
I thought about it and honestly told him no.
“Then get the damned Ambien. If this trip into the mountains doesn’t lead us to the witch or to answers, and it might not Cain, you’re going to need to stay awake for a while. So don’t go getting yourself all sleep-deprived to start things off.”
It was true. Even if we found Tashibag, there was no guarantee she would free us of the curse or lead us to answers that might help us. If I had to get back to Samantha to say goodbye, I would need good sleep while I could still get it without running the risk of being displaced.
I bought a small baggie full of the pain killers along with a few Ambien, which I stuffed into my front pocket while we then headed to where this Wi-Fi apparently was.
Fifteen minutes later, we were huddled around an old PC in the back corner of an Internet cafe, looking at Google Earth images of the Andes together. Dishon pointed-out the several different places people claimed to have seen a person fitting the description of Tashibag. He then pointed out all the possible locations she might be, and how he had eliminated each of them – except for one – as a place she could be, whether it was due to larger populations, inaccessibility, or some other factor. Everything he said made sense, and a new rush of excitement surged through me as he finally tapped the computer screen and said, “she must be here, Cain. In Chapuin.”
“But it looks like there is nothing there at all,” I said as I zoomed-in closer.
“There is. Trust me. I have done the research. There is a small village of aborigines right there,” he said as he tapped the screen again. “She must be there.”
I pushed myself away from the desk. “What are we waiting for? Let’s leave now.”
Dishon laughed at my sudden urgency. “We can’t leave now. The road through Ausangat is dangerous at night. It is believed to be haunted. I have heard more than a few terrifying stories as I’ve asked about it. Many have traveled that road in the darkness never to return.”
“Get real. You really think the road is haunted?”
“No, but I think it’s far more dangerous at night. There are too many stories for them to all be unfounded.”
I again lightly elbowed Dishon in his ribs. “Have you forgotten we can’t die, Dishon?”
He rolled his eyes. “Yes. I forgot that. My bad.”
“Time is not on my side. We must leave. Immediately.”
“Sleep tonight,” Dishon said. “Allow me sleep in a real bed for the first time in years and for what might be the last time in many more. Get a good night’s rest so that you can stay the hell awake after tonight. We both need rest. We both need fresh energy. We will wake, shower, eat a big ass breakfast in the morning, and be on our way.”
I argued with him but gave up rather quickly. He wasn’t going to budge, and he was also right, as much as I didn’t want to admit it.
I paid to print-off several screen captures, which I figured we would be able to use for reference and as maps, then we made our way back to the motel. Without much more talk at all, Dishon switched the lamp off, and we climbed into our beds.
“Did you take a pill? Go to sleep,” Dishon said to me half an hour later from the complete darkness that filled his side of the room.
“I don’t need a pill,” I replied. I had my iPad turned-on and was slowly swiping through the photo album which contained pictures I had taken of all the portraits in my Book of What Once Was. “Believe me. I know how to shut my thoughts off and find sleep.”
“Whatever yanks your dingy,” Dishon said, as he rolled out of the faint glow of my tablet.
It took some time to swipe through them all, and I finally got to the portrait of Samantha, which was only the third portrait I had ever drawn on paper. At some point, I began drawing the faces of those I loved and adding them to the book long before I ever lost them, and so I had added Samantha’s to it a couple years ago.
I propped the iPad against the lamp on my bed-stand and let myself be mesmerized by the sight of her. Just as it always had, the act of looking into those faces, and now into Samantha’s, shut my thoughts off and helped my mind become heavy.
“Cain,” Dishon suddenly said, pulling me back from the heaviness.
“What’s up?”
He didn’t answer for a moment. “We have both lived on this Earth for so long,” he finally said.
“Yes.”
“C
an I ask you something serious?”
“Of course.”
Dishon rolled back toward me. “After all this time, what have you found is real happiness?”
I looked toward him and kept a puzzled expression from forming on my face. He had never asked me such a question in all our time together. The timing of it was odd, and for some reason made me sad on my friend’s behalf. “Real happiness?”