Twisted Heart

  ‘OK, I hear you. I’m not saying it wasn’t real – the fires, the poor kid who died on Black Rock.’

  ‘Oliver,’ I reminded him.

  ‘But you, Tania – you have to be aware.’

  That my psychic energy made me borderline crazy? Is that what we were back to? The idea that super-sensitive me could so easily slip from reality into nightmare visions of dark angels out for revenge.

  Out of the window I saw Dad throwing down grain for Zenaida and somehow the sight of it kept me grounded. I felt this was a time to back down from argument, to let it go. ‘I know. I hear you.’

  ‘Good. So no volunteering?’ Orlando was strident, demanding in a way I didn’t recognize or like.

  ‘No,’ I agreed reluctantly. ‘In any case, how can I?’

  The puzzled frown came back, the uncertainty behind his beautiful grey eyes.

  ‘What do you mean – how can you?’

  It wasn’t exactly the way I’d planned the break the news – not after our difference of opinion over New Dawn, but it came out anyway. ‘How can I volunteer when I’m not going to be here?’

  ‘Why, where will you be?’ His eyes widened, he had a moment, a flash of hope that I would be in Dallas with him.

  ‘Paris,’ I murmured. And God, forgive me, I saw the hope die. ‘As soon as Mom is well enough, I fly back.’

  I lay for a long time without sleeping, remembering how Orlando had walked away. He’d left the room without switching off the camera, without saying anything.

  ‘You OK?’ Dad had asked when he came in from feeding the dove. ‘You and Orlando, you had fight?’

  ‘Kind of. I told him I was going back to Paris. He walked out on me.’

  ‘He wants you in Dallas?’

  I’d nodded, bit my lip to stop it trembling.

  ‘He loves you,’ Dad had pointed out. He’d said this to comfort me but it only brought on the tears. ‘Big passion, you’re his first girl. I remember this.’

  And now I couldn’t get to sleep for running over the options – Paris and my career, or Dallas and the guy I loved. And was it possible to have both? Was it greedy to want both?

  I turned over to my right side, stretched out the cramp in my legs, turned over on to my left. A breeze disturbed the dreamcatcher hanging over my bed.

  And the wolf man leaps in through the window, teeth bared. Bearded and with amber eyes, he creeps out of the forest, out of the thorns and thickets where he has his lair. He leaps and tears me apart.

  I sat up in bed, in the dark, trying not to cry out, remembering all the times I dreamed of fire, smoke and the child in the burning house who called for her mother. And how Mom was always there to comfort me.

  Where is Maia, my gentle good angel, to protect me from danger? I don’t know my enemy. I don’t know him yet but he is in the room, he has me between his jaws. One more bound takes us out into the night, across the water to the island in the middle of Turner Lake. ‘Help!’ I cry, knowing that no one hears.

  I didn’t sleep and my head felt dull and empty when I got up the next morning, I wasn’t so much tired as confused and not wanting to talk to anyone as I left the house to drive into Denver.

  Luckily Dad had already set out to check out a new construction job, locally in Paloma Springs, but unluckily Holly caught me in the driveway.

  ‘Hey, Tania, you want to drive down to New Dawn with me?’ she called over the fence.

  I waved my car keys and shook my head. ‘Sorry, I’m visiting the hospital.’

  ‘Not now. Maybe later this afternoon. Richard wants to show me some video footage.’

  ‘What video?’ I noticed she was already on first-name terms with the fascinating Mr Ziegler.

  ‘A documentary shot by the Explorers last week – Conner and Jarrold went up to Carlsbad, above the snowline. The video shows the type of survival skills I’ll need when I accompany the next group. They call them bands, named after natural objects. Mountain Lion, Falling Leaf – that kind of thing.’

  ‘So you’re definitely still planning on volunteering?’

  ‘Why wouldn’t I be?’ Holly paused to consider the implied challenge behind my question then understood. ‘You talked to Aaron?’

  ‘No, to Orlando.’

  ‘And he’d already talked to Aaron. Those guys trade gossip faster than we do! What did Orlando say?’

  I shrugged, got in my car while we were talking. ‘He said, don’t do it.’ I closed the door. ‘We don’t know enough about New Dawn: he doesn’t like the sound of Antony Amos, yabber-yabber.’

  ‘Just like Aaron, blah-blah.’

  I released the handbrake and noticed Holly keep pace with me on her side of the fence. We reached the end of our driveways at the same time and she leaned in through my open window. ‘You know what this is?’

  ‘A conspiracy?’ I said, making it light. Two guys talking behind our backs, trying to control their girlfriends’ actions.

  ‘They’re jealous!’ Holly declared. ‘They’ve seen the muscles on those mean and moody juvies, and they don’t want us to go within half a mile.’

  Holly makes me laugh, the way she’s so dramatic, so black and white. I don’t always agree with her, but the things she says leave a mark.

  Jealous or not? I thought of Orlando as I drove down to Denver, and I tried to reverse the situation – would I feel OK about him volunteering in a situation where there were gangs of good-looking, needy girls? If I’m honest, probably not. I’m the girlfriend who stresses about those waif-models and wacky designers on his college course, remember.

  So I tried to be open-minded, to tell myself that Orlando’s jealousy was kind of flattering, that it was something I could handle and I decided I would be adult enough to run Holly’s latest theory by him the next time we spoke. If we spoke! I had a sudden picture of Orlando’s back turned as he absorbed my Paris news then strode out of the room full of boxes. I saw the door swinging shut.

  Sure, we’ll speak, I told myself, driving into town past the high chain-link fence of the Three Peaks Correctional Facility and the roadside notice that read ‘Do not pick up hitch-hikers along this section of highway’, as if some dumb-ass driver would be stupid enough to do it.

  I drove on, stopped in Cherry Creek to buy more flowers for my mom – bright-orange gerberas this time, no pastel shades for my mom – and went into the hospital to see her.

  ‘They say I lost my sense of taste and smell,’ Mom told me. ‘That’s careless of me, huh?’

  I sat on the edge of her bed, holding her hand.

  ‘It’s because some part of my sensory cortex is bruised, but they tell me I’ll slowly get it back.’

  ‘That’s good, Mom.’ Trying not to stare at the curved scar across her scalp and the row of neat sutures, I smiled.

  ‘Lucky for me the bleeding occurred where it did,’ she went on. ‘Any closer to the vagus nerve and it would have been a different story.’

  ‘You don’t have to talk,’ I assured her. She seemed so tired, so pale. ‘Just listen. You’ll never guess what happened with Holly last Saturday. You know she entered the triathlon at New Dawn? Well, a kid from the community gets into trouble during the swim stage. And who’s there, right on the spot to try and rescue him? Holly, naturally. Only she can’t get to him and the poor guy drowns. Yesterday we went to a memorial service. It sounds tragic but actually it was awesome.’

  Mom listened and gave tiny nods, as if moving her head was painful.

  ‘The doctors did find another small problem,’ she told me when I paused for breath. ‘There’s a disconnect between my brain and my left hand. I tell it to move and it refuses to cooperate.’

  I gasped and looked at the hand lying free of the sheets, resting palm down on the bed.

  ‘Watch,’ she told me. She stared at the hand and willed herself to raise it from the bed. All she got was a faint tremor of her fingertips. ‘Dyspraxia,’ she explained. ‘Don’t worry. They’ll put me on a rehab program and before you know
it I’ll be good as new.’

  ‘So I’ll stay longer,’ I told Dad on the phone. I’d called him in Paloma Springs to update him on Mom’s latest news.

  ‘How long?’

  ‘A week, maybe two. Until I’m sure she’s going to be OK.’

  Dad didn’t argue with my decision. And he didn’t say he was glad, but I knew he was. ‘What food tonight?’ he asked. ‘Take-out pizza or fried chicken?’

  ‘Pizza.’

  ‘OK. Don’t tell your mom.’

  ‘I won’t. See you later.’

  We finished speaking and I walked out into the garden. For the first time this fall I felt a wind cold enough to bring snow down from the mountains, though the sky was still blue and the sun dazzling through the branches of the aspens. I walked through the trees, kicking up russet red leaves, hearing above my head the call of our resident dove.

  ‘Sorry, no food,’ I told her. ‘Maybe later.’

  She sat on a branch, staring down at me, head to one side.

  ‘I know, I’m mean. But it’s for the good of your waistline. And I’m sorry you lost your mate. What happened to him?’

  The noise came from deep in her throat, her pink chest was puffed up.

  Suddenly the blue sky is filled with a hundred mourning doves. Their grey wings speckled with black whistle as they land in the trees. The sun shines. My bird gazes down through golden leaves. A predator approaches through the long grass – fox or coyote. Wolf, even. Bearded jaws, amber eyes. Who are you? The dove takes off with a whistle and a whir of wings. She soars into the sky and away.

  For a moment I thought I smelled burning wood and I raised my hand to shield my eyes from the sun. I checked out the forested slopes of Black Mountain, afraid to spot the tell-tale spiral of smoke rising – the start of another burnout. But no, there was nothing. I looked at my watch and made a sudden decision, found my keys and set off down the hill.

  Holly’s car was already parked in the lot at the entrance to the New Dawn Community. It was two thirty and the cold wind was still blowing down from Carlsbad. Clouds were gathering over the lake, I noticed. The first snow of the winter – it’ll be here before nightfall, I predicted.

  Leaving my car, I set off up the trail in the opposite direction to Amos’s luxury pad, towards the row of cabins on the hill, not exactly sure who I was looking for or the real reason I was here.

  I was still curious to find out more about the New Dawn kids – I admit that, and I was tempted to take a look at the documentary video footage of their wilderness walks. Plus, the fight with Orlando had brought out my not-so-inner rebel. I was convinced he was wrong about wilderness-walking Amos’s parallels with Zoran Brancusi, even though Holly might be right about the jealousy thing.

  My feet crunched on the dirt track as I came to the first cabin in the row – a small log building hidden amongst the aspens. It had the formulaic porch with a log pile, a porch swing and a row of coat hooks by the door, which stood propped open by an iron boot jack. As I drew level, one of the girls I’d noticed before – the skinny, nervy one – ran out on to the porch, followed by the girl with the face jewellery. She was yelling and the first girl cowered against the log pile.

  ‘Hey!’ I called and began to walk towards them. It didn’t make any difference – the second girl carried on yelling.

  ‘I know you took them! Who else goes into my room? That’s where I left them – on my bed!’

  The first girl looked terrified. She shielded her face with her arm.

  ‘Quit yelling. What are you fighting over?’ I demanded as I reached the porch.

  Close up, I saw the skinny girl was no match for her attacker. She was shorter and lighter, and looked like she needed to eat better. Her small face, dominated by huge dark eyes, was shadowed: her wrists so thin they looked like they would snap.

  The tall girl swung round towards me, ready to hit out. I thought she was going to leap down the step and swing a punch but something stopped her. Instead, she pushed her hands into her jeans pockets, scowled and walked past me down on to the trail. The girl by the log pile slowly lowered her arm.

  ‘I’m Tania,’ I told her, letting her draw breath.

  ‘Ava.’

  ‘You OK?’

  She nodded.

  ‘You sure?’

  Pulling herself upright, Ava, flicked her long hair behind her shoulders and made a weak attempt to push aside what I’d just seen. ‘Why shouldn’t I be? Kaylee‘s cool – she doesn’t scare me.’

  ‘Really? She scares the hell out of me!’ Over my shoulder I saw face-piercing girl disappear down the trail towards the creek where I’d last seen Jarrold. ‘You two share a cabin?’

  Ava nodded.

  ‘So what did she lose?’

  ‘Her socks.’

  ‘All that yelling over socks?’

  Another nod and Ava’s long lashes flickered down over her glistening eyes.

  She sniffed back the tears. ‘I have to go,’ she told me, but she didn’t move.

  ‘Was that really it?’ I couldn’t believe a girl could get so angry over a pair of socks.

  And suddenly the floodgates opened. ‘Kaylee caught me talking with Jarrold,’ Ava sobbed. ‘Yesterday, in the social area. We were only talking – end of story.’

  ‘Oh!’ I paused to let this settle. ‘I heard Jarrold is on a no-talk regime.’

  ‘He is. We broke a guiding principle.’

  ‘So I won’t tell anyone,’ I promised. ‘Kaylee and Jarrold – they’re an item?’

  ‘She thinks they are,’ Ava said in a rush of bitterness as she pushed past me and ran down the track. ‘But it’s all in her head. Jarrold isn’t really into Kaylee. He’s only into himself!’

  The social area that Ava talked about was a big old ranch-style building surrounded by pinon pines and standing in a secluded inlet on the shore of the lake. There were rooms with pool tables and table tennis, a cinema room and a cafeteria, but the main room was a sitting area with a big open fire and half a dozen leather couches, where the walls were hung with moose, deer and elk antlers and the floor carpeted with a huge bear skin, head included. Those glass eyes stared at you every time you walked by.

  ‘Tania, welcome!’ It was Antony Amos himself who spoke as he spotted me in the doorway. He sat on one of the couches, surrounded by staff and kids, apparently in the middle of a meeting. This is where I finally found Holly after half an hour of searching.

  ‘Come in,’ Aurelie insisted, sending Kaylee to fetch me.

  I want to make it clear – I didn’t walk into this with my eyes closed. I was definitely on my guard, looking out for the whoosh of wings, the sudden dark angel swoop. And honestly, there were no wings or sharp black beak, no hairy jaws, amber eyes and snapping teeth – no enemy, nothing.

  ‘Follow me, please,’ Kaylee said, just like a waitress showing me to my table. She wore her black hair loose, still parted down the middle and kinked by her usual braids. I noticed a white-and-red beaded belt around her jeans.

  Jean-Luc was the one who stood up to offer me his seat, in between Jarrold and Channing, with his short, thick hair and basketball physique.

  ‘Hi, I’m Channing,’ he told me, as if it was information he’d rather have kept to himself. Since he’d spoken at the ceremony by the lake he’d definitely closed down the shutters and seemed more your stereotypical juvie – silent and sullen, with a huge chip on his shoulder.

  ‘I know. I’m Tania,’ I told him.

  ‘She’s here to volunteer!’ Holly announced brightly from a couch on the far side of the roaring log fire. She looked totally at home with the situation, kind of fired up and wanting to make a good impression. Richard Ziegler sat close by her with photographs and what looked like maps on the coffee table in front of them.

  ‘I’m not sure yet,’ I muttered. Like I said, I wasn’t certain what had brought me here. Maybe I was a moth drawn to a flame. Or else I was bidding for independence from Orlando, dead set on making my own decision a
nd following my star.

  Amos was seated away from the fire, his feet stretched out and almost touching the bear head. ‘Richard has spent some time explaining to Holly our philosophy here at New Dawn,’ he told me with a smile. ‘To sum it up, we could say it is walking in the wilderness to find the greatness of the Creator in each and everyone of us.’

  ‘Our wild walks allow us to move in harmony from broken heart to whole heart, from heart at war to heart at peace,’ Ziegler added with all the zeal of a convert, the firelight flickering across his handsome face.

  ‘There is greatness in us all,’ Amos repeated. ‘We learn from Mother Nature how to survive. She teaches us.’

  Ziegler chimed in with more beliefs while, sitting beside him and basking in his warmth, Holly lapped it up. ‘At the start of our journey we learn to drop the burdens of our previous lives and allow greatness to take their place. In the wilderness we eat what we find, we walk, we sleep. We give thanks to the Creator.’

  ‘So anyway, I’m sure Tania and Holly have heard enough philosophizing,’ Amos said at last. He broke the spell, stood and came over to me with a smile. ‘Call in at Trail’s End when you’re done here,’ he invited. ‘I have footage from last week’s wilderness walk that you might like to see.’

  Then he left the room, inviting Jean-Luc to take the seat that he’d vacated, and allowing the meeting to continue.

  ‘Holly, as a volunteer next week, we’d like you to join the Hawk Above Our Heads band,’ Ziegler told her. ‘Out in the wilderness, a band is like family. You make sure each member of your band stays safe. You trust each other completely.’

  ‘So who else is in my group – the Hawk Above Our Heads band?’ she asked eagerly.

  Ziegler leaned forward to consult a list on the table. ‘That will be Blake and Marta, plus Channing and one other.’ Then he glanced up towards a geeky-looking kid on the outside of the group, not sitting but standing in the shadows. ‘Regan, you’ll take Conner’s place in the Hawk Above Our Heads band. You’ll be Explorer number 4, out on Carlsbad. That makes Blake, Marta, Channing and Regan, plus Holly as Friend. The other group out there next week is the River Stone band, comprising Kaylee, Ava and Jarrold. You’ll be lakeside. You need to take this location into account when you make your preparations.’