Mayday (3 page)

THE THOUGHTS OF C. RAINE

Death, where is thy sting?

The Apostle Paul

I SAW
THE MATRIX.
Remember the traitor scene when Morpheus gets captured? That black cat walked by Neo, twitched back, and then walked by again. Same cat. A glitch in the program. A blip in the Matrix. In the next scene, people started hitting the floor.

An unpredictable woman in Lifeless's predictable dream provided me with many very good reasons to stay out of the ambulance. The intruder was a glitch in the program. A blip in Lifeless's matrix. Nonetheless, I obeyed her, climbed in, and shut the door behind me.

Addy, here I address only you. Do you remember Grandpa's smell? That combination of old person and Old Spice? It surrounded him, filled his house, and sent a message: relax, you're with me. That scent filled this cab. It felt like home.

I rubbed my thighs hard. Yeah, out of habit, but more for the feel of denim, which satisfied more deeply than ten minutes of popping bubble wrap. My hands didn't stop there, but slid down onto cool leather, where famished nerves ate up the feel of the smooth seat. As I said before, sensation was light and air.

The lady didn't speak or glance my way. I did both, and salivated. She looked exactly like the woman who formed the Mrs. Butterworth syrup bottle. She was brown and content and ready to spill goodness all over your plate. That grandpa smell vanished, and the scent of pancakes swelled. Go figure.

A question wormed inside my head.

“I'm dead. Lifeless is dead. This is the end. Right?”

Her lips tightened, and she set her hands in her lap. “S'pose that doctor of yours is tellin' your mom it may be up to interpretation.” She turned her head and focused on my hands, rubbing as they were. “Truth is, no. You've never been more alive.”

“I'm in a dream.”

“True, but dreams is just life underestimated.” She nodded. “You did enter this dream the usual. The bigger question is how'd you like to leave it.”

I said nothing, and she broke into a wide smile. “My name's Sadie, honey. I want to help.”

This yanked out a chuckle from way down deep. The scoff rubbed shoulders with a laugh and drifted out, filled with more sarcasm than I thought possible to own. I turned away, nodded out the window. “Based on the motionless girl, it's a little late for that.”

In front of us, reporters scurried back and forth, dragging their cameramen like heavily laden asses, trying to get the best shot of the reporters' smiling faces and my bleeding one. The police shoved them aside, and went back to work with their yellow tape.

“She ends up a stupid vegetable, which, after you set up some serious life support, is not a very high-maintenance condition. Believe me. You can't help.” I exhaled hard. “I do appreciate it, though. So now do I get to know how you snuck into—”

“Lady! Inside the vehicle. Open up.” A policeman rapped on Sadie's door, and I jumped.

Officer Dewey?

Sadie winked at me and slowly lowered the window.

• • •

Basil Dewey, simultaneously my best friend and worst enemy, my most and my least, told precious few that his dad was a cop. “He works for the city of Minneapolis. Like a garbage man.” That's what he'd say when pressed, but I knew the truth from the beginning.

“It would ruin my reputation.” Basil swung his legs from the catwalk beneath the Mississippi River Bridge. Suspended one hundred feet up and with cars whizzing over our heads, it was an awesome fifth-grade hangout. He stretched forward and dropped a stone. Far below, it clanked off a barge deck. “It's kind of true. I mean, Dad does deal with everyone else's trash, you know? Besides, if your dad's a policeman, it's like being a preacher's kid.”

“Is that bad?” I tossed a stone toward the boat. Miss.

“I don't know, what do you think?”

I drew my legs up close. “I think you have a great mom and a cool dad, and who cares what they do.”

Here he paused, leaned over, and we bumped shoulders. “You know, if we were married, they could be your parents, too.”

Yes, he said that.

“You're an idiot.” But those were just words. Already at ten, I couldn't imagine life where he wasn't.

As years went by, Basil's dad also kept his cophood hidden, relishing in his secret identity each time he broke up one of our parties. “Do your parents know where you are?” he'd ask Basil.

“No sir,” Basil would reply. “And I'd appreciate your not telling them.”

Dewey's eyes twinkled, and then hardened. “I'll need to take you in, son.” Basil always left our gatherings in cuffs. Dewey marched him to his squad and threw him in back. Unaware that Basil's police escort ended at his own front door, our classmates ascribed to Basil hero status.

The playful interchanges forever earned Officer Dewey my respect, a fact unchanged when Basil told me he'd later been tazed three times for consumption in the comfort of his own home.

How I would have liked to see that. . . .

• • •

“
I have no need of this ambulance,” Officer Dewey huffed. “Move 'er out.”

“In time,” Sadie reached out and cradled the man's cheek in her hand. Dewey pressed his head against it and closed his eyes. When next they opened, Dewey tipped his hat and marched away.

“What did you do to him?” I quickly covered my cheeks, peeked at Sadie, and then dropped both my gaze and my hands. “He didn't see me.” I had wanted him to so bad, even if it would have meant a good tazing. “I'm still nothing. It's not real. I feel me, but I can't feel any of this.” I reached toward her wool mittens. . . .

Rough and scratchy to the touch. So were Sadie's fingers. I stared at the woman with wide eyes.

“Life feels good, don't it?”

“What do you know about my life?” I drew back my hand, held it up in front of her face. “Don't answer. It doesn't matter. Any minute this dream will end, and I'll wake up beside Lifeless and—”

“Shoot girl, you there right now.” Sadie pointed toward the ambulance's dashboard, grabbed her needles, and started a slow knit.

I leaned forward, squinted at the mounted display; the hospital room came into focus on the screen. The cheating scrub placed my mirror back in the bedside drawer, twisted off her wedding ring, and strutted out of the room. No question about who planned to pick her up.

There lay Lifeless, her monitor beep steady, the all-done tone of a microwave. Adele stood reading aloud.

“If you need volume, hit that bottom—”

“I know where she is in the book,” I said. “I've read Plato's
Republic
before. Adele does a good job. I mean, philosophy isn't her thing— What is that?”

Faint, like a whisper, a shadow slumped against the wall. Gnarled and disfigured, its eyes were closed, and I turned away.

“Hard takin' that first look, isn't it, dear?”

I shook my head. That thing was in my corner.

“So, yes, Coraline, that be what you look like, your soul anyway.”

I had no words. As mentioned, I'd spent plenty of time reading about souls, whether they exist, why they exist. I had never until that moment given thought to their appearance. Weeks before the crash, I came to the conclusion that the soul is the truest part of you. Knowing that was my working definition, you'll understand the magnitude of her statement.

I'd always been beautiful. But a beautiful shell with a hideous-looking soul? My hands shook because it fit. It was possible that the truest part of me was hideous. Sadie was messing with core definitions.

Don't screw with my core definitions.

“No, that can't be my soul. I'm right here.”

“Yes, child, you are. But there's much more to you than soul. This would be the part to understand: right here, right now, you are a soul-mind. Your body has a mind with choices, wishes, and dreams. Your soul does, too. But your soul-mind don't come to be aware until your body's mind falls asleep.” She shook her head at the gruesome thing on the screen. “Which you done. It usually takes another to show you the shape of your true self. That be one of the reasons I'm here. That poor thing is what you look like, all right. Quite a sight.

“Anger sure can twist a soul.”

I peeked in the rearview and stroked my face, the pretty one. “But I look like I used to, before.”

“Yes'm. We do return folks to their physical form inside the vehicle.” She touched her own face and adjusted a slouching bonnet. “Aids the conversation.”

“This is absolutely crazy.” I lifted the door handle, and paused.

Dream's end. I can't watch.

The final moments of the dream proceed as follows: Mom arrives on the scene and rushes toward Adele. There's hugging and weeping, at least from sis. Mom's face is stoic. Like she saw this every day. Like trains clip my car and knock life from my body on a regular basis.

Like she expects this, wants this.

There in the ambulance, filled with unexpected fury, I could not keep silent.

“It's me!” I lowered the window and stuck my head outside. “That thing is me! Cry, Mom, dammit!”

Sadie's hand landed soft and weighty on my shoulder. “You come to your crossroads, Coraline.” She set her knitting down on the seat and glanced at my mom. “There's no figuring out some people. No makin' sense of that mom of yours. But honey, best a person can ever do is understand themselves.” She checked her watch. “I need to make my rounds, so it's come time to give you your choices.”

“Choices,” I repeated, wiping my eyes with the palm of my hand.

“Ever wondered why that first ambulance is foggy? You'll find out someday. That be where your soul will end up. For good or ill. It'll take you on to your future.” Sadie tapped her fingers on the dash. “I wish they'd tell me what was in there, but I don't know. I do not know. Maybe someday.” She stared in silence, and then cleared her throat and pointed straight ahead. “You know where the second leads. Right back to the hospital room. Back to now.”

“I get it. Future, present.” I shifted in my seat. “And you're the Ghost of Christmas Past.”

Sadie didn't laugh. “You
can
relive your life. You have a second chance. It's called your walkabout. It's one of the benefits of being stuck in the middle, your body's mind asleep and your soul's mind wide awake. As long as your body dreams, you're free to move in time, whenever you'd like. Her voice slowed. “But when Lifeless's dream ends, your walkabout is over.”

“Dreams last only a few minutes, right?” I stared at Adele. “What difference could I make in a few minutes?”

“One minute can change the world.” Sadie peeked at her watch. “You know that.”

Outside, rain fell. A straight-down rain without wind. It should've stopped. That clearing sky was normally the last glimpse I had before waking. This time, the heavens did not break. The downpour grew so intense, I could no longer see the scene through the windshield in front of me.

I patted Sadie's shoulder. “This has been a nice diversion. It's been weeks since my last conversation. But I have a packed ambulance to catch.” I exhaled hard. “I'm sure you'll be here next time around.”

Sadie grabbed my arm. “You leave, and your roads be chosen for you. You want a say? This is your last chance.”

Odds are, there was nothing true to this dream. Sadie didn't exist. Lifeless's subconscious had simply stretched a bit further than normal and used its few remaining vegetated cells to think this up. But that obsessive knitter pressed the one button I had left.

Choice. Any choice.

I couldn't risk leaving one behind, even one in a dream. I couldn't risk more hellish boredom.

Safe.

Eternal.

Lifeless.

Lightning crackled, and the silhouette of Adele slowly walked away with Mom's arm around her shoulder. Adele. One hellish minute had changed her world. She believed in me, counted on me, and I had failed her, let a monster lay hands on her. I could make Addy's life right.

I could stop both Maydays from happening.

“Take me back,” I whispered. “Real back. Real everyone-can-see-me back.” I glanced over my body. “Take me back to April. When I was thirteen. Just before Mayday.”

Sadie raised her eyebrows. “You want to be thirteen? That would place you in middle school? What was so important?”

“You gave me a choice. I chose. Can you do this or not?”

“Spunk you never lacked.” Sadie thought a moment. “April of your thirteenth year? So be it. You'll be needin' these.” She handed me newly knitted mittens. “Minnesota can still be cold in spring. Now go on. Best hop in back and get changed.”

“My clothes seem to fit fine.”

Sadie ignored me and picked up a spool of yarn. “What shall I make next?”