Time has erased most of the anger, and all the other reasons I left in the first place, though I know those reasons are still likely there. But I want to go home.
So I’m asking you to think about coming with me. I’ll understand if you say no, though quite honestly, other than Crow, I don’t know what would tether you here.
I do know that I want you to come with me. Think about it, Adele.
Will.
• • •
I set down the pad. “He wrote this? He doesn’t know half these words. Who did he pay?”
“Snake,” Crow whispered. “Addy could not turn that down. Not innocent Addy. The thing’s poetic.”
And accurate. Mr. Loumans had the same effect on me. He reminded me of what I’d lost, planted in me the desire to find the one man I could never leave, though he may have left me.
Cameron Raine. What would I ask him if I saw him again? Would he recognize my face? Well, Crow’s face.
“It’s a good letter,” I whispered.
“See how he set it all up?” Crow began to rock. “The poor, abused reverend’s son, forced out of his hometown and lost in the big city. Suddenly stricken by conscience and going back to make things right. That’s not good, that’s genius.”
I waited a few seconds. “Suppose there’s always a chance the kid’s all right, and the letter’s true.”
Crow looked over sharply. “If it is true, I will die.”
Later, I thought over her statement, so forcefully predicted. As I rewound the tape of all her words, turns out this was her only prophecy.
Scary.
The train rumbled into Morneau, and Crow peeked out of the car.
“They’re getting off. He has her now. Will knows this place. He probably called his old friends. We’re Addy’s only hope.” Crow slapped my shoulder. “They’ve left the depot.”
She grabbed her bag, I held the notebook tight, and we jumped onto the platform. Crow yanked me inside the vacant depot. In the distance, two figures tramped away from us onto a snow-packed road.
“Keep an eye on them.” She grabbed her smartphone from her coat pocket. “Morneau. Population two thousand. They’re heading away from town.”
“Any churches that way?” I asked.
Crow dropped her arms. “Let the letter go. It’s lies. I need you to follow them.” She flattened down her black leather. “We’re in Hicksville. I’m too visible here. You have your phone, right?”
I patted my flannel and rubbed the pocket. Lying was easier if I didn’t actually speak.
“I’m going into town to find out what I can about Will. I’ll need more than bathroom stories to convince Addy’s she’s in danger.”
I frowned, and so did Crow. “You wanted to be useful, so here’s your chance. Don’t let Will touch her, and if he does—”
“What?” I asked. “What do you want me to do?”
I pushed out the door and hauled myself onto the snow-packed road, stopped, and called back. “I’ve never been wrong yet, and I believe every word of that letter.”
Crow whipped around and stormed off toward the grain elevator and the water tower and what looked to be downtown Morneau.
• • •
The end of my junior year, on what had become the only trendy day to go to school, the administration packed up every student, all two thousand of us, and shipped us off to Valleyfair Amusement Park, the closest thing Minnesota has to Six Flags.
Did I tell you that Adele adored me? Idolized me? It’s true, but on days like this, I’m not the one she wanted to hang with. She had other friends—Jacque Basset and Lori Hammond, to be exact—friends who would drop their lives for her. If you knew Addy, you knew why. Adele was not only beautiful and smart and witty, she was quick with a laugh and long to listen. I realize perfect is an overused adjective, but every so often, you meet a perfect person. Normally, they nauseate. But Adele was so perfect you couldn’t even hate her. She treated you better than herself.
That’s sick.
Back to Valleyfair.
It possessed typical amusement-park fare: killer rides, greasy food, an impressive water park . . . and hounds. Hounds ran in packs of threes or fours. They entered through the turnstiles and quickly ditched their shirts in order to place their few chest hairs on display. Actually, only two of them posed. The others were skinny and knew it.
Here, my stint in Shane provided insight. The leader, normally the loud, chiseled one, jostled with the number two in command. The others tagged along with tongues wagging, satisfied to be in the presence of such beefy hounds. These others mutts laughed and joked as if they belonged, but inside they felt like crap.
Unsupervised hook-up venues like Valleyfair drew hounds like vomit, and I took it on myself to watch Adele from a distance. With crowds thick, it was a chore to keep a visual, but over the years, I’d honed my Adele-o-meter. At first, a few of my disciples accompanied me, eager to convince me they gave a rip, but soon they drifted, leaving me alone to keep up the vigil.
Many mangy packs approached Adele on my junior-year trip, but the last group, the group of three? They were different.
Shirtless and his two followers mastered the art of sniffing and hunting. I placed myself behind the concession booth not ten feet from Adele and marveled. This lead hound was good.
He first addressed Jacque and Lori, and set them to giggling.
“Smart hound,” I whispered. All hounds needed to get by the friends. They formed the moat around the castle. Too bad that in Adele’s case, the moat was pretty shallow. Shirtless quickly turned his attention to the prize. He got Addy talking, not a good thing, and then cast his line.
“We’re heading over to the water park. Why don’t you come?”
Adele had been to the water park. The hound could see that, no doubt enjoying the sight of her wet. And this is where I wished Addy’d spent a little more time with Nietzsche, for how true it is that “the man of knowledge must be able not only to love his enemies but also to hate his friends.”
“Come on, Adele.” Jacque whined like a child. As if she believed, even for a second, that this invitation had anything to do with her. I saw Adele wavering. Time to spring.
“Hey, Adele!” I quickly approached.
She turned and gave me a big hug. “Hey, Crow. Are you alone? Because we were thinking of heading to the water park. Want to come?”
I don’t know who looked more disappointed, Shirtless or Addy’s friends. I looked down at my black on black outfit. “I didn’t dress for it, but yeah, it’s nice of you to invite me.”
“Like you ever dress for it!” Adele smiled. “Guys, this is my sister, Crow. Crow, I forgot their names.”
I stepped toward them and whispered, “Shirtless dog.” I backhanded the leader’s chest. “And these are your two puppies. Cute little family you have here.”
“You freak.” Shirtless frowned and backhanded the shocked dog standing beside him. “Let’s go.”
“Freak? You’re calling my sister a freak? Yeah, just keep on walking. I’m sorry, Crow, you don’t deserve that. Hang with us the rest of today.” She hugged my arm.
• • •
I thought of Shirtless as I marched, lost and alone, a solitary figure surrounded by pine trees green and white. I should have let Addy go to the water park. The hound might have been a pretty decent guy.
CHAPTER 22
THE THOUGHTS OF C. RAINE
Every mile is two in winter.
George Herbert
THE WIND PICKED UP. All warmth from my boxcar dream had faded, and my tennis shoes provided precious little by way of frost protection. I’d gone on long winter walks before, mainly two-hour hikes between the Shack and Mom’s house, and mainly with Basil. But that route had rest stops along the way, namely Perkins and Duke’s All-Night Coffee.
There was no
Perkins on this road.
Just miles of farmland, stretching out as far as I could see. Spaces widened the farther I wandered from Morneau, and fewer trees lined the road, unfortunate as the occasional shelterbelt provided a brief break from the wind. I tugged the flannel around me, peeked at the sky, and stopped.
Never one to pay too much attention to the weather, I, when Crow, always stared down as I loped. It was easier to keep track of my steps. This was not so with Shane, which is why I actually saw it happen; I witnessed a clear blue sky turn cloudy.
Not a big deal, you might think. You’ve seen clouds roll in, too, but I wager you haven’t seen a line of thick gray rise on the horizon and advance toward you—with speed. A perfect line, like a gray sheet pulled over a bed of blue. The front seam of that sheet reached a point directly overhead, and I stared up at a sky exactly one half blue and one half gray. Have you ever seen that?
Didn’t think so.
Neither Will nor Adele showed any concern, at least from the rear and from a distance. No staring, no finger-pointing, no screams, “It’s the end of the world!”
“Where you going, Shane?”
I slowly lowered my gaze and turned. “Hi, Sadie.”
My syrupy visitor walked on by, knitting the whole way, something akin to driving and texting, albeit on a smaller scale. “Oh, honey. You’re at it again. I warned you about shaping others’ futures. The first time around, Will and Addy didn’t come out here until just before Mayday, and here we are at Christmas.”
“Wait!” I jogged up to her. “I’ve really cut down. I’ve held my tongue. There’s so much more I could have said.”
“I know, child. That’s not why I’m here.” She handed me a sweater. “Try this. Should just about fit.” I whipped off my flannel and squeezed into the warmest sweater I’d felt. I wriggled back into my coat.
“Thank you. I was dying out here.”
“An interesting turn of phrase coming from you, but point taken.” She grinned quickly, her face returning to solemn. “You ain’t had much time to look at that locket.”
“Was I supposed to?” I dug in my jeans. Again, the locket felt heavy in my hand and I flipped it open.
Dark red. Drippy red.
My heartbeat quickened. “What’s happening?”
“Coraline, I mean Lifeless, is fixing to wake. I don’t know the moments you have left here, but it’s about to fade to black. She’s clinging precarious to shallow sleep.”
I knew all about shallow sleep, and my shoulders weakened. “My time’s going to run out before Mayday, isn’t it?”
Sadie paused in her knitting.
We wandered in silence. I do not remember how long.
“I failed again,” I whispered. “Two chances and every advantage, and I failed again.” I gritted my teeth and stopped, stared up at the two-tone sky. “You may as well take me now.”
From the corner of my eye, I saw Sadie reach out her hand. I closed my eyes and stretched trembling fingers out toward her.
Sadie slapped a pair of wool socks into my palm. “So impulsive.”
I frowned, balanced against a fence post, and slipped off frozen shoes.
“Be careful now, that be electric fencing. Shane’s tough, but that’d push it.”
I straightened and finished the job. “I won’t be around to help Addy. What’s left for me here?”
“Your first good question.” Sadie drew a deep breath. “I think even you’d admit you done a fair piece of work. You aren’t the same you I spoke to at the beginning of your walkabout. You’re gentler.”
“Being a wuss does little good.”
“And you believe some different things about people. About Thomas and Will and Basil. You see things clearer.”
“But if I can’t make Crow see it—”
“And maybe most of all there’s an itching inside, something that, if I were to leave you here until Lifeless wakes, you might be able to attend to. If you get a move on.”
“An itching? I do think about Crow a lot, well, Crow and . . .”
Dad.
“Your father, Coraline. Your father be alive. He’s not far.” She pointed to my pocket. “There’s a reason I gave you the locket. The one from him. I told you not to worry about Adele. I told you not to spend this time trying to cheat death. This time was always for you, you and your dad. Haven’t you felt it, Coraline? Bits and pieces of what was, what could have been, what should have been between the two of you? And here you done gobbled up sacred time trying to save someone who needs no saving.”
I feel it.
“I tell you this now because I could not before. We supposed to leave you to your own discoveries, your own conclusions during your walkabout, but time is short. Hear this: Your father didn’t do right by you. He didn’t stay for you, fight for you. He lay on your shoulders more than they was meant to bear.” She peeked up, and lowered her voice. “But imperfect as the man is, he never stopped loving you.”
Sadie was gone. Where she stood lay another pair of mittens. “Thanks, Sadie.”
I picked them up, stuffed in my hands, and felt a crinkle. I pulled out a piece of paper and read the address.
“No way.”
I slipped the scrap into my back pocket and retrieved Dad’s locket once more. The red blazed under the brilliant sun. All its former colors—green, yellow, and red—I knew from Lifeless’s dream. I knew what they meant. Green was life; the family was happy, Dad was there. Yellow was a warning of Jude the Destroyer. Red was pain and the end of all things.
But that’s where the dream colors stopped . . .and my philosophy started.
I didn’t know what happened after the end.
I didn’t know black, the color I wore in life, the color that followed death.
I glanced up, and the clouds were gone.
Time. I need to get back. I need to get back with Crow. She needs to know.
I looked ahead and squinted.
Will and Adele were gone, too.
CHAPTER 23
THE THOUGHTS OF C. RAINE
Diogenes struck the father when the son swore.
Robert Burton, “Anatomy of Melancholy,”
Democritus to the Reader, 1621
I’D NEVER BEEN A TRACKER. Paw prints from tree to tree meant squirrel, but that was the extent of my ability. The hardpack left only an occasional tread imprint of Will’s dress shoe when it strayed and caught fresh powder at the road’s edge. But when I reached two distinct sets of tracks leading off into a field, it almost had to be them, and I set my face against the wind.
I followed them into the woods. There was only the crunch of the snow and the amplified sound of breath, and I felt small and inconsequential. But the spaces of winter left room for thoughts of Dad, and I wished I could recall taking even one walk together.
The trees thinned out, and I emerged onto a smaller road. There, the two tracks merged, and separated, one heading left and the other right.
“Great.”
I chose the smaller print and quickened my step, rounding a curve in time to see a church in the middle of nowhere, a tiny house at its side, and Adele slipping in between them.
Pulling my flannel up around my face, I jogged nearer, passed the house, and rounded the church, where I paused at the sign out front.
HILLTOP BAPTIST
PASTOR WILL KROFT SR.
ALL WELCOME!
“Huh. He did tell the truth,” I muttered. “That sneaky kid.”
I walked beyond the church’s glass door, circled the entire building, and approached the entrance to the house. I breathed deep and knocked.
There was a pause, and the door flew open. Adele rushed into my arms, pushed back out, and cocked her head. Her mouth opened to speak, then slowly shut.
“Yeah, it’s complicated.” I winced. “Crow’s i
n town, too. Can I come in?”
She glanced over her shoulder and didn’t answer.
She was alone.
Got it.
“It’s all right,” I said. “I don’t need to come in. I’ll wait outside for whoever gets here next and—”
“No, it’s okay,” Adele gestured me in, and I followed. She turned. “Do I get to go first?”
“Yeah.”
“Why are you and Crow following us?”
“Straight to it. Good approach.” I looked around the vacant house. “I’m going to tell you some things, and I’m hoping you don’t hate me or Crow. Actually, you can hate me, just not Crow; well, feel free to hate Crow, but get over it quick, because—”
“Shane!”
“Right. Crow thought you might be in trouble out here on your own.”
“But I’m not alone. I’m with Will.”
I gazed at the floor.
“Oh, Crow.” Adele exhaled hard. “All these years and she’s still protecting me. Wait, how did she know we’d come here?”
I winced and raised the notebook, handed it to her.
She leafed through it. “Now I am mad at her.”
I winced again. “I asked her to do it.”
“Now I’m mad at you.”
“You don’t work with Will. You don’t see the Jekyll and Hyde, how different he is when he’s not around you. I guess you can take that as a compliment.” I pointed at the notebook. “The Will I work with, that Crow sees, isn’t a Will you’d trust with anyone.”
Adele’s eyes flared. “That’s my decision to make!”
I backed toward the door. “I see that now. Addy, I’m leaving. I won’t bother you anymore. I never meant to smother you. Not when we were young, not now.”
She took a step back. “You sound like Shane, but you speak like my sister. How do you know about that? Did Crow tell you?”
I gazed at Addy and sighed. Sadie was right. Addy was fine. She made it. She didn’t need me to undo her life. She only needed me to let her live it. I opened the door and stepped out. “I’ll leave you be.”