“Don’t worry, Ian!” I yell. “I’m coming!”
Chapter Nineteen
I HOLD THE GUN POINTED at the ground, worried any sound will make me freak and pull the trigger. If I accidentally kill a cow out here I will die of a broken heart. Candy would never look at me again if I took her momma out, even though her momma did kind of reject her. And Ian will never forgive me if I graze him again.
Ian’s boot tracks are all muddled in the center of the field, but as they move out towards the edges they become more clear. He’s left the clearing for a wooded area. I’m terrified, but I keep going. Ian needs me.
“Ian?!” I shout out into the woods. My voice sounds muffled. I expected an echo, but it’s more like I’ve yelled into a pillow.
“Ian! I’m coming! Where are you?!”
“Get back in the truck!” He sounds mad and a little desperate.
His voice came from my left, so I alter my direction. My legs are quaking with the fear and the cold. There’s a ringing in my ears too, which may be the result of my blood pressure being off the charts.
“I’m already out!” I yell, trying to use the same footsteps he already made. It’s way better than fighting the snow drifts. Under the trees it’s not as bad, but it’s still way worse than any street I’ve ever walked in Florida. I’m never going to complain about a silly rainstorm ever again, I swear.
He shouts again. “Heeyah! Get outta here! Yah!!”
“You don’t have to be rude about it!” He needs a serious lesson in manners.
“I’m not talking to you! Heeyah! Beat it! Yah!!”
Either Ian’s having a seizure or something is very wrong. My brain won’t let me analyze what that wrong thing is or could be. I’ve suddenly lost the ability to reason. Ian sounds like he’s riding a horse that won’t move. His voice is getting louder, though, so I’m confident I’ll get to the bottom of this mystery very soon. Please God, don’t let there be a lion there. Let it be … paw prints or … a fox or …
“Where are you?!” I yell, falling into full-on panic mode, knowing I’m just fooling myself. This shit is real and it’s going down right now, with Ian in the middle of it and completely unarmed. “I can’t see you!”
“Goddammit, Candice, I told you to stay in the damn truck!”
I see some movement behind a thick grouping of trees and smile. “Ah-ha! Found ya!” I come from between two of the trees to walk up behind him. I feel much better seeing him standing there in one piece. Just being in his presence makes me brave. I am She-Rah! Rawr.
“Congratulations,” he says, out of breath and obviously angry. “Look who else you found.”
He has a giant stick in his hand — more a small log, really — and he’s pointing it at something on the ground.
It makes no sense, but I expect to see a cow. The concept of a mountain lion being anywhere but behind zoo bars is too foreign for my brain to process. But instead of seeing a cow, I see a cat. A really, really big cat.
And it ain’t no Persian one either.
“That’s a …” My empty hand goes to my mouth as I try to process what I’m seeing. Yes, I know he told me there was one of these out here, but reading that in a text and seeing one live are two totally different things. Cougars are waaaay bigger in real life than they are on Google, by the way. This one is the same size as Ian, pretty much.
As I take that into consideration, that’s when it all becomes clear to me. Ian and I are probably going to die out here together in this fucking cold-ass snow. My life flashes before my eyes, and I ache from head to toe knowing I’ll never get the chance to find the happiness that my best friend Andie did. It’s too late for me.
“That’s the cat who took out a fully grown cow,” Ian says, snapping me back to reality. “Now we just need to get out of here before she takes us out too.” A tiny spark of hope comes to life in my heart at the idea that Ian has a plan to save us. My hero!
The cougar’s ears are back and she’s growling low in her throat. My fantasy about surviving and that spark of hope both disappear in a puff of smoke. This thing is definitely going to kill us.
I’ve heard that expression where people say that the hair on the back of their necks stood up, but until this moment, I never understood how that could possibly happen. Well, let me tell you … it seriously does. The hair goes right up from the roots. Oh, and people can also pee themselves a little when terrified, that’s a fact.
Ian talks softly to me. “We’re going to just keep waving this branch and making noise and hope that scares her off. Look as big as you can.”
“What?” I stare at Ian. He’s talking crazy. This demon-possessed lion is going to eat us for breakfast. We are bagels and lox as far as she’s concerned. There’s blood all over her mouth already from her appetizer course of steak tartare.
“Cats respond to threats. Be a threat!” He waves the branch he’s holding at her and yells again, some kind of caveman nonsense.
My hand that has Millie in it lifts of its own accord, without any conscious thought on my part. I see it coming up in my peripheral vision, but I can’t bring myself to point it at her. I aim it to her left instead. “Go away, cat. I don’t want to have to shoot you.” My voice comes out weak and trembling, and my arm is weaving all over the place, left and right, up and down. At this point I’m sure I won’t be able to hit even the broad side of a barn, let alone a slinky, crouching lion, so I pray she knows what a gun is and the fact that she should avoid having one pointed near her.
Ian stops waving his branch around. “What in the hell …?”
“Go on!” I yell, wiggling my arm a little at the lion, getting braver since she hasn’t yet killed me and Ian seems to have calmed down. “This is way more dangerous than that stick he has. Just move on and I won’t shoot you.”
She crouches lower and I lose some of the force in my voice. “Please? Pretty please with sugar on top?”
“You brought a gun?” Ian turns his head to look at me. He sounds confused.
The cat takes a slow, slinky step towards us, lowering herself really, really close to the ground. Her stomach is on the snow. I saw my neighbor’s cat do this once, right before he attacked a butterfly. He moved so fast the poor thing never saw it coming. I don’t want to be like that butterfly.
I point the gun at the cougar and try to imagine myself pulling the trigger. My hand is shaking so hard right now I could possibly hit Ian and he’s still standing next to me. Efforts to straighten my hand out go nowhere. “Go away, cougar!” I yell, my voice bordering on hysterical. “I’m not kidding!”
“Give me that,” Ian says, reaching for the pistol.
I shove him with my other arm, knowing we don’t have time for him to play the man-hero with me. “Get off! It’s my gun!”
It’s at this point that things go a little blurry for me.
A seriously vicious cat scream comes from somewhere in front of me.
I pee some more.
Then I’m hit by a mini-bus.
At least it felt like a mini-bus. I fall backwards, and I’m pretty sure Ian goes with me. My head klonks against something really hard, making me see stars. A headache blossoms from there.
Something heavy is on me, and the sounds — the only word I can use to describe them is unholy — fill the air around us. I can’t see anything but a blur of color and motion sprinkled amongst the dancing, head-banger stars that were floating above my face, but one thing is very clear: someone is about to die. I’m pretty sure it’s going to be me.
I pee a lot more.
Chapter Twenty
MY FISTS SQUEEZE AS I try to fend off my attacker, and a loud shot rings out.
Snow flies up blinding me, and someone punches me in the gut, forcing all the air out of me.
I wheeze as I try to catch my breath. The stars are back in place of my vision when the oxygen isn’t enough.
A heavy weight comes off me, and snow flies into my face again, freezing it, while something on my arm
burns like a bejeezus. I can finally breathe again, though, so the stars go away. Unfortunately, the headache does not.
“Gimme that!” Ian yells, taking something heavy out of my hand. Was I carrying the log? When did I get the log from Ian? No, wait … it’s my gun.
I hear two more gunshots and then mostly silence.
At least there’s no more of that crazy screaming. Now there’s just heavy breathing. I’m not longer panicked because I’ve decided I’m probably dead, or nearly so, and it’s not as awful as I expected it to be. My lungs are finally functioning again, but unfortunately, my bladder is no longer up to the task. I have completely wet my pants. Not just a little but a lot. Normally I’d be embarrassed over something like that, but my head hurts too much to care. Besides, I’m going to die anyway. What’s a little pee-pant problem in the grand scheme of things?
When I open my eyes, Ian’s face is hovering above mine.
“Hi,” I say, a little dizzy and definitely dazed. Everything is so bright around me. Maybe I’m not going to die.
“You okay?” He glances down at something in the snow near me.
“I think so. Aside from peeing my pants, anyway.” I frown as I try to move my arm. “Something burns.” Since death is supposed to bring relief from pain, I’m pretty sure I’m not on the death’s doorstep now. If I had any more pee in me, I’d let it go now out of relief, but I don’t.
“Let me help you up.” He leans down and puts his arm behind my back, digging it into the snow.
“Where’s the lion?” I ask, sitting up and looking around. Snow is covering my face and dripping from my eyelashes. I blink a few times to see better. There’s red in the snow around us. Blood. I try not to let it send me into a panic. Who’s blood is that? Is it Ian’s?
I scan Ian’s body to see if he’s been shot or bitten. There are some red smears on the front of his coat. “Are you okay?” I sit up straighter and hold my palm out at his chest. “Did I shoot you?” My heart sinks as my fingers move to cover my mouth. Please, God, don’t let me have shot him!
“No. Not me.” Ian stares at my side.
I follow his gaze and see my arm lying there limp. The thick camouflage jacket I’m wearing has been torn and there’s blood coming from the tear. I can feel myself go pale as I get dizzy again. My head is throbbing with pain.
“Did I shoot myself?” Oh my god! How colossally clumsy! Ian will never let me live that down. And the scar will be hideous. Ugh. Why did I think buying a gun was a good idea?!
Ian almost smiles. “No. Not you either.” He points at my arm. “You shot the cougar who did that to you. I think. Can I look at it?”
I nod wordlessly. This is some kind of weird nightmare I’m having. No way is this real life. My vision goes burry for a few seconds before focusing again. There are trees everywhere. And snow. And red. And Ian. He looks worried.
“Let’s get back to the truck first. It’s warmer there.” He puts his shoulder under my armpit and lifts me to my feet. Then without any warning, he swoops me into his arms and carries me through the snow like a giant baby.
“I can walk, you know.” I’m totally humiliated that he’s carrying me and my pee-pee jeans in his arms. We are bonding way too much. How is he ever going to sleep with me now? Every time he looks at me, all he’s going to see is the girl who wet her pants when a cougar showed up. That’s not sexy. Not sexy at all. It makes my headache worse.
“It’s probably better if you don’t walk right now.”
Something warm is trickling down my arm. Please don’t let that be my blood. “Is that snow?” I ask. “I hope it’s snow.” I’m wet everywhere. It’s probably snow.
“Never thought I’d hear you say that,” Ian says, breathing hard with the effort of getting both of us across the field.
I’m about to correct him since he misunderstood me, but I’m distracted by the fact that we’re alone in this place. For some reason, all the cows are gone. Maybe I’m just confused. Maybe none of this is really happening. Nothing is in focus and those damn brain stars are back, dancing around my head. Ping! Ping! Ping! Fireflies in my skull.
“Where’d all the cows go?” I ask, trying to focus on reality.
“They’re not fans of cougars. They beat it out of here. We’ll round ‘em up later.”
“I can help.” I really want him to put me down. Maybe he hasn’t smelled my pee-pants yet.
“Nooo, I don’t think so.” He chuckles and then his expression shifts into something more serious.
“I have a gun,” I say, wondering where it is. “I can help protect you.”
He doesn’t say anything for a few seconds.
I keep talking because I can’t think of anything else to do. “I can, you know.”
He sets me down by the passenger door of the truck and opens it up. “And so you did,” he says, picking me up again and heaving me up into the seat.
I bounce up once before settling into the still-warm seat. Holy brain explosion. I push my hands down on the seat to steady myself. It’s then that I notice how much my injured arm is throbbing.
“Did you say the cougar did this to me?” I look down at my arm. I’m afraid to touch it, not even sure it’s my arm. This whole situation is ludicrous. Why am I wearing so much camouflage? Green is so not my color. How’s Ian going to fall under my spell if I look like a zombie woman? I swear, green makes me look undead.
I’m sleeping in the truck, that’s what’s going on.
I let out a sigh of relief and smile. Perfect explanation. Ian went out to check cows, I fell asleep waiting for him in the truck, and this is the dream I’m having. I have very realistic dreams that I could swear are real until I actually wake up. I can’t wait to tell Andie about this one. She always finds great entertainment value in my dream stories, and this one’s a doozy. I’m not sure I’ve ever had one where I suffered actual injury pain.
I’d pinch myself to be sure, but this fake lion injury is stinging badly enough that a pinch wouldn’t make much of a difference. As I try to noodle that through, Dream-Ian moves around the front of the truck and climbs in on the driver’s side. He turns the key and gets the heater going.
My body trembles as the warmth starts to sink into my frozen bones. My teeth chatter and it makes my head throb even more. I feel like letting my eyes cross just to take some of the pressure off.
“I’m going to take your jacket down from your arm. I don’t think it’s going to be too bad. There’s not too much blood.”
“This dream seems super real,” I say, smiling at him as I tip my head back to rest on the seat. I have to move it sideways to keep the lump back there from hurting too much.
“Keep telling yourself that,” he says, helping me out of my jacket.
I slide my eyeballs sideways to look out the windshield, not interested in what my crazy brain has cooked up for me in the form of a dream injury. For all I know, there’ll be robotic arm parts in there. Sometimes in my dreams my brain turns me into one of those Austin Powers fembots. Normally I like being a fembot shooting bad guys with my boob-guns, but not today. Today I just want to be awake, hanging out with Ian, rescuing cow babies. I hope Candy wasn’t part of this dream too, but now that I think about it, she probably was. It’s kind of hard to believe I bottle fed a gorgeous baby cow named after me. That sounds more like something I’d make up. Maybe Ian was right about my brain being like a Mexican jumping bean.
“It’s going to need stitches,” he says. I think he’s touching my skin there but I can’t really feel it, just the pressure as his finger pushes down. My head is getting all my attention right now.
“Are there robot parts in there?” I ask with a sigh.
“Robot parts?”
“In my arm. Am I a fembot? Just tell me.” Sometimes my dreams are very dramatic too. I go along with this one since it’s pretty unique. Maybe I should rustle up some tears to make it really good.
“You’re going into shock aren’t you?” He puts his hand on my f
orehead. “You don’t feel warm. And you’re pale. That’s probably a bad sign.” His hand falls away as he places it on the wheel. “Come on, we need to get you to the hospital.”
“Yeah. Let’s go visit Andie and Sarah.” I smile as I think about my little godbaby waiting for me. “I need to go bond. I’m her second-in-line momma, you know.”
“Stitches and antibiotics first, bonding after.”
“Whatever you say, bossy boss pants.” I’m suddenly really tired. My vision goes a little burry, but I don’t fight it. The bouncy bouncing of the truck jerks my robot arm and makes me wince. Sleep will make that all go away.
“Don’t go to sleep on me,” Ian says, patting my leg.
“Juss a little…” My eyes fall shut and my head lolls to the side. Sleep. Sooooo nice. Just a little sleep…
“OW!” I sit bolt upright and glare at him. Then I look down at my arm. My eyes bug out as I take in the edges of ragged flesh and the blood seeping out onto the jacket underneath my arm. “What did you just do?!”
“I told you not to go to sleep. Stay awake until we get to the hospital or I’m going to poke your cut again.”
“Poke my …? Are you serious?!” I want to wrap my arm up in towels and hold it against me where he can’t reach it, but those towels in the back seat look like they’ve already been used for a lot of gross stuff and I don’t want to ruin my shirt. It’s an ugly sweatshirt, granted, but it is from my college days. I have a lot of memories wearing this thing. It’s bad enough it has a rip in it now.
“Did you hit your head?” he asks.
He reaches over like he’s going to touch my scalp so I lean away. “No touching!”
“Does it hurt?” He glances at me before going back to staring out the windshield. He’s leaning really far forward. The snow is making it very hard to see anything, even with the wipers going really fast.
“Like a bitch,” I say, leaning the side of my head against the seat-back. I’m staring at Ian’s profile. “You are seriously good-looking, you know that?”