Talisman (37 page)

I noticed the leather seat was glistening with droplets of water. 
Why is the seat wet?
  I hunched down to slide into the car, but paused when I heard a faint noise.

“Did y’
all hear that?” I asked them.  They both shook their heads.

Weird
, I thought as I proceeded to lean inside.

My eyes
shot open and I defensively hurled myself back towards the ground.  Wriggling around in the floorboard was another
humongous rattlesnake!
  I let out a loud gasp as soon as my butt landed in the snow.

“What’s
wrong?
” Ty yelled as he noticed me pointing towards the car. His eyes almost exploded as he watched the monstrous reptile emerge from the Camaro and slither onto the ground.

Mike
was the next one to officially “freak”.  “Son-of-a-Bitch!” he screamed.  “Where in the Hell did
THAT
come from?”

The serpent was heading straight for me.  I started pushing myself back, plowing my arms and rear through the snow as fast as I could.  My body was trembling from the icy snow stabbing my skin, but mostly from the terrifying creature that had i
ts sights set on me.

Ty attempted to lunge at the snake.  It paused only to tease him with a superficial, yet intimidating strike.  That bought me a few seconds to get to my feet.  The scaly ra
ttler swiftly turned back to its intended victim —
me
.  I kept my eyes focused on the vile creature as it began to close in on me.  I could tell I was running out of room as I headed backward, towards the high retaining wall that hugged the school’s hillside.  There was no way to climb it.  I was trapped.  I listened intently to the rhythm of the snake’s rattler echoing in my ears.  Mike and Ty were yelling at each other.  They seemed to be searching for something to kill it with — though I rather doubted if either of them had any daggone garden tools in the trunk of their cars.

I sc
rambled to strategize an escape, but unfortunately, there wasn’t one.  The serpent started to recoil and took an attack stance.  Too bad there wasn’t a little old blind lady around to save me this time.  My ankle twisted around in my shoes as I postured myself for an expected assault.  I looked down at my stiletto heels and realized one of the ribbon straps had come untied.  Quickly, I yanked off the loose shoe and prepared to swing it with all of my strength.

I kept trying to convince myself,
This thing’s no different than any other critter you’ve snatched before.
  Ty was running towards me to make one last attempt at grabbing the creature.  Viciously, the rattlesnake thrust itself at me.  I whirled my arm around to counter its attack and instinctively closed my eyes as my head turned to dodge its sharp fangs.  Not a second later, my eyes flew open, and I became inescapably transfixed on my hand.  The heel of my beautiful stiletto had struck my attacker, piercing the rattlesnake’s head right between its eyes, and it was now staked to the stone wall.  Its scaly body twitched erratically as all signs of life drained from its muscles.  I took a couple of deep breaths and slowly released my hand from the shoe.

Ty rushed to my side. 
“Shi, are you
okay?
” Ty panted as he stared at the scaly corpse that now donned my high-heel through the center of its ghastly head.  He swiftly gave my listless frame much-needed tight squeeze.

The gesture was comforting.  Hell,
I needed to feel
something
.  The shock of what had just happened, as well as the accuracy my aim, was downright mindboggling!

The snake ap
peared from behind a “red” door… Just like the vision I had eariler
, I thought quietly as Ty held me in his arms.

Mike hurried over.  “What in the H
ell was that?!?”

“Apparently a snake —
Dumb ass
,” Ty growled.  “What I want to know is what in the Hell
‘IT’
was doing in
YOUR
car?”

Mike started flailing his arms and cussing.  “Those sons’ of b
itches from Princeton…I bet
they
came down here and did it!  I wouldn’t put it past them!  They were really pissed about the game…Not to mention the ass kickin’ Marcus and I gave a couple of their players.  I’d bet anything they were behind this shit!”

I stood there
quietly as Mike continued to curse and rant his suspicions.

“You’re keep
ing some pretty strange company,” Ty whispered.  “This is
twice
today, isn’t it?”

My eyes never
left the snake.  “How did you know?” I asked surprised, only tilting my head in his direction.

“I stopped by Bea’s
house on the way back from Pineville.  Mr. Mayfield told me about the snake.  He had it packed up in a box to take home with him.  I asked Bea what happened. 
What a coincidence
. 
Two
rattlesnakes, roughly the same freakish size, attacking the
same
person
— on the
SAME
DAY?
”

Telepathy wasn’t needed here.
I picked up on Ty’s disbelief just by the tone in his voice.

“
Yeah
…Imagine that,” I replied laxly.

Ty’s suspicions mounted.  “You don’t seem too shaken for someone who almost had their neck ripped
into by
another
twelve-foot rattler?”

“Shock
? 
I guess?
”  I tried to play it off, but that wasn’t going to work — not with Ty.  Clearly, we were both on the same page.  We both knew the snake was
not
intended for Mike Riverside.

Ty pried the snake from the rock wall and pulled my
stiletto heel from its head.  He quickly tossed the gruesome reptile on the ground.  The scaly corpse sank into a fluffy patch of snow.

“The only thing
shocking
…was your
aim
.”  Ty rinsed the remnants of bloody snake brains off my shoe with some snow and wiped the tapering, blade-like heel clean using one of the legs from his pants.  He gently guided my foot into my shoe and fastened the two ribbons around my ankle.

A subtle smile emerged as I thought,
I would feel just like Cinderella…if it weren’t for the fact that she didn’t have a daggone serpent flying out of her pumpkin coach…

“Wait here. 
I’m going to check inside the car before you go,” Ty insisted as he rose from the ground.  “Give me your keys,” he demanded to Mike.

“I told you. 
I’m
taking Shi home, Ty.  You’re not
driving her in my car!”

Ty gave Mike a firm shove. 
“I’m going to check it for any other ‘
surprises’
…or do
YOU
want to?”

A look of fright surfaced on Mike’s face as Ty snatched the keys from his hand.  Mike didn’t put up any more of a fuss, not
after the thought of more of those things hidden in his car had crossed his mind.

“
YOU
DO THAT,
” Mike barked.  “Check it over good — and in all the compartments inside, too!”  Mike jerked into shiver as he backed away from his car.

Ty opened the trunk and searched it thoroughly.  He leaned inside
the car and checked in every nook and cranny of its interior. 
Nothing
.  Then he popped the hood for a quick once-over, and just to be on the safe-side, he even looked under the car.  Once Ty had given us the “all clear” sign, Mike ran over to him and snatched back his keys.  He stood by the passenger-side door and glared at Ty.

“Come on
, Shi.  Let’s go,” Mike insisted.

“Go ahead and get i
n, Mike.  I need a second,” I told him as I approached the car.

Mike shrugged his shoulders and walked
around to the driver-side door.  I looked up at Ty.  His cheeks were rosy from the whip of the cold air and his dreamy blue eyes were glistening.  He shifted around nervously in the snow for a moment, like he wanted to say or
do
something.

“
Oh
, before I forget,” Ty began as he pointed to his tuxedo jacket I was still wearing, “Your purse is inside my coat.  You ran off without it.”

Sure enough, I
felt around in one of its inside pockets and there was the beaded-black clutch, safely tucked away.  I pulled it out and smiled.

“Thanks, Ty,” I said softly.

“Well, I didn’t want you to think that you’d lost it,” he replied.

“
Oh
…I’m not thanking you for
that
.”

“For
what
then?” Ty asked as he edged closer.

“For trying to sa
ve me.  You distracted it.  I saw you trying to stop it…So,
thank you
.”

Ty smiled and gave my hand a tight, lingering squeeze.  “I’ll be waiting for your call.”

His touch felt electrifying.  I stood there wishing we were both back on the dance floor.  It would’ve been my very
first
kiss, though I still didn’t quite know
whom
I would’ve been kissing.  I could feel myself starting to blush, but hopefully the cold air on my own cheeks camouflaged any visible traces of emotion.  Feeling Mike’s heated and awkward stare on us, I smiled and climbed inside the car.  I gazed back at Ty in the side-mirror as we cautiously crept out of the parking lot.  He had walked back over to the snake and picked it up to examine it closer.  Not a few seconds later, Ty shook his head and casually pitched it off to the side.  Unfortunately for Kara Leighton, who’d just walked up beside him, it landed on her, draped perfectly around her neck.  Ty looked mortified.  I cringed and turned my head.  We could hear every single one of her high-pitched screams as we drove off.

The drive could ha
ve been a little quieter, in my opinion.  Mike kept asking me — “If I liked the song that was playing?” — “Was I hungry?” — and my favorite was — “Do you want to go somewhere to
talk?
”  I didn’t know what his deal was this evening, but I’d had enough.  At that moment, the only question I would have answered, “Yes” to was,
Do you want me to shut the Hell up?

We still had several miles to go before we
would reach the mine.  Mike was adamant about stopping at the Kwik-Serve for something.  Finally, got a hint of peace and quiet while I waited in the car.

Ton
ight was my first school dance, my first almost-kiss (I think),
and
my first-step toward a one-way ticket to the nut-house.  I was beginning to rule out schizophrenia, because some of the visions had actually come true.  As I watched the snow dance in the night sky, I knew one thing that didn’t sound crazy — both of those rattlesnakes were no coincidence and somehow
Mr. Estell
was responsible.  I was going to have to investigate that theory more extensively.  Considering the series of events fate had thrown in my path, I only had one real concern at the moment. 
What
was going to happen next…
and when?

I noticed the snow seemed to be dwindling
when Mike jumped back in the car.  He had been in there awhile, but he didn’t return with anything in his hands.

“I
thought you said you had to ‘get something’?” I questioned.  It really didn’t make sense.  He was so insistent about stopping.

“Yeah,” Mike muttered, appearing
cagey as he started up the car.  Mike revved his engine and peeled out of the slick parking lot, slipping and sliding in the snow.  I shook my head at the reckless, juvenile maneuver.  For a moment I thought he was trying to distract me from any more questions.

I sure hope that dumb ass didn’t waste his money on condoms
, I thought to myself.
  I need “peace”, not “a piece”!

Our side of Highway 52 was completely covered with snow.  The only tracks
that had been forged were in the oncoming lane, traveling from the direction of the mine.  Though the pristine snow-covered lane was nice to look at, it would’ve been a lot easier to follow behind a plowed line of someone else’s tires.  Mike even had enough sense to proceed with caution.  He slowed down to about 5 mph.  My “peace and quiet” would take a little longer than what I’d anticipated.  We were about two miles from the mine when Mike finally broke the awkward silence booming inside the car.

“It’s going to feel pretty strange, what with my family not owning the
mine anymore,” Mike remarked.

“Well, I guess you’ll just be known as ‘some rich guy’s son’, rather than ‘some rich guy’s son whose father is their dad’s boss’,” I quipped.  “Don’t worry, Mike.  I’m sure your popularity among Welch’s female population will remain intact.”