Tantric Coconuts (6 page)

“I know this might sound strange, but hear me out. How many days of vacation do you have left?”

“Two weeks, give or take.”

“Perfect. Not a lot of time, but it should be enough to complete a crash course. You’re a quick study. Ted, I’ve decided to accept you as my student.”

“What are you talking about?”

Angel had hoped this would be obvious, but she went ahead and connected the dots for him. “It’s perfect, Ted. I can be your own personal spiritual consultant. You can help my aunt Lilly with this murder thing and we’ll call it an even swap.” When Ted did not respond, she continued, “By the way, Ted, I want you to know that as a Native American, I am not offended by the name of your RV. Still, I think Bertha will serve us better for our work. She’s practically a school on wheels.”

Ted still said nothing, so she nodded and continued. “A true win-win-win for all of us, isn’t it? You need a consultant, Aunt Lilly needs a more resourceful lawyer, and I need a client.” She finally looked him straight in the eye and tried her best to convince him of the genius of her idea. “I can introduce you to some of the most fascinating people you’ll ever have a chance to meet. It will be the pilgrimage of a lifetime. You’ll be telling all of your rich friends about me and your perfect vacation.” She grew even more excited. As is so often
the case, the pitch did more to convince the salesman than it did the customer. “What do you think? I’ll make it worth your while.”

The skin surrounding his eyes wrinkled upwards. “Not a bit of this makes sense to me.” The idea of climbing into Bertha with Angel and her wolf dog pushed Ted far outside of his comfort zone.

Angel was a little surprised that the customer did not appreciate the value of her wares, but she tried to remain patient; after all, her father had been similarly perplexed. “It’s simple, Ted. Can’t you see that what you need is a pilgrimage, a journey to find your true religious roots, with me as your spiritual guide? That’s what you want, right? That’s why you were reading that book. That’s why you’re on vacation—to find out what’s missing from your life and to honor your grandfather’s last request. I can help you do that. It wasn’t an accident that we”—Angel hesitated for the right words—“ran into each other. And if you could help my aunt Lilly out, you wouldn’t even have to pay me. It would be a bargain for all of us. Maybe you could pay for some gas and food. I am a little short on cash at the moment. You could do that, right?”

“Angel, I don’t think you understand what lawyers do. Your aunt Lilly is in South Dakota facing a murder charge. I’m a Kansas lawyer. I’ve never tried a homicide case. My specialty is more research and brief writing, divorces, little criminal matters. I couldn’t represent her. I’m just looking for a simple vacation, not to go on some spiritual quest. It’s kind of you to offer, but this is not what Argo and I had planned.”

Angel felt as if someone had thrown cold water on her psyche. She realized she had done it again: great ideas, poor execution. She looked down. “I see.”

Ted stammered, “Angel, I just think that you’ve misunderstood. Argo and I want to take a hike or two. Do some fishing. My ambitions are more limited than yours. I just go to my law office during the week. On the weekends maybe I watch a little football, basketball in the winter, and when the opportunity presents itself, I go on a date with a girl from town. I appreciate the holy trinity. That’s it. I don’t want anything more. I’m sorry, but I don’t understand why everyone thinks that something is missing from my life.”

Angel hadn’t anticipated resistance from someone who needed her help. She tried to reassure him. “You needn’t worry or be afraid about anything. I’m not going to ask you to wear a funny robe, chant, or burn incense. I’ll help you in a way that makes sense for you. That’s my job. I’m a spiritual consultant, remember?”

As the shock of her proposal for him to take a spirituality course—what he might call “Spirit Tech”—wore off, his skepticism returned. It occurred to him that maybe she had found out about his inheritance and this was an elaborate scheme to get his money. Maybe she was right. It was no
accident
. “Sorry, Angel.”

“Would you like to try just a few days and see how it goes?”

Angel was a mixture of beauty and beast—she both frightened and excited Ted. “Not really. Pilgrimage-as-vacation doesn’t interest me. I wouldn’t even know where to start with your aunt Lilly. I think we would both be better off if we just
got the Chieftain repaired and went our separate ways, before some other disaster hits me.” Ted could see the disappointment on Angel’s face, so he turned to avoid her gaze. “I’ll make some calls and see who can help us out with the RV.”

Pretty quickly, Ted’s day got worse.

As he turned to walk away, Ted stumbled over Argo’s leash, which had tangled itself around the base of a concrete grill, and fell straight to the ground in one grand, thunderous capitulation to his vacation demons. The ground was hard and dry and, for the first time in his life, Ted had the wind knocked out of him. The sudden lack of oxygen caused him to panic and he gasped for air.

As he struggled for breath, Angel moved quickly to his side and held his hand. Argo was licking his face. The wolf dog was poking her nose into his ribs. Angel’s voice was soothing but sounded like a far-off echo. “Just relax for a second, Ted, and let me help you.”

When enough oxygen had returned to his lungs, Ted sat up and felt his head. There was no blood. “I think I’ll be okay. I must have tripped.”

“Just the same, come inside out of the sun and rest for a few minutes before you start walking around.” Ted allowed Angel to support him as they went inside the strange-looking vehicle she referred to as Bertha. The inside was not organized at all, just as Ted had imagined. Angel cleared a spot beside her sleeping bag. “Rest here for a minute.”

Once Ted was prone, Angel placed a pillow under his head. “Do you feel better?”

Enjoying the attention, Ted let out a little pitiful groan
and said, “I think I’ll be fine. You’re right. I just need to rest a minute.”

Angel gently massaged the fingers of Ted’s right hand. He felt rather dreamy, so he was not sure how much time elapsed before he next heard her voice. “I want you to concentrate on one thing and one thing only.” Starting at the root of his fingernail and working down to the knuckles and into the palm, she gently massaged his ring finger. “I want you to think about nothing but the sensation that arises when my fingers touch yours. Is the sensation soft or firm? Does it tickle or scratch? Is my touch cold and dry or warm and clammy? Imagine that your entire essence, everything that is Ted Day, is encapsulated and concentrated into this one space where our hands are coming into contact. There is a lot going on in this tubular corridor; try to imagine it: blood, muscle, bone, nerves, and skin. Billions of cells are interacting; try to focus all of your awareness on this seemingly small aspect of yourself. Try, if you can, to visualize and sense all of your life’s energy focused in this one stamp-size speck in your infinite field of awareness. Think about nothing else, Ted, but your finger and how it feels.”

As she spoke to him, in what Ted could only describe as a vaguely hypnotic tone, she continued to rub his right ring finger.

Ted had never been invited to pay such close attention to a single aspect of his physical being, and the effect was immediate—as if he had been released from a terrific burden, like a heavy backpack slipping off after a long day’s hike. His
leg twitched involuntarily, and Angel knew that he was almost asleep.

Once he was fully asleep, Angel tried to tidy Bertha. She then dug into her tool closet, pulled out her portable field welder, and went outside.

When Ted woke from his little midmorning nap, he felt simultaneously comfortable and somewhat shocked to be resting inside Angel’s strange vehicle. He looked around, confused, and it took him a few seconds to put it all back together.

He had not only fallen asleep but also experienced a vivid, almost Technicolor dream. The voices had been crisp and clear—but now the dream was gone. Argo was resting quietly beside him as if nothing had happened, but something clearly had happened. And while it had obviously been a dream, it had had a very different feel to it. Before they slipped away, Ted put words to the images.

Ted was young and sitting on his grandfather’s lap while the old man read to him from
The Lion, the Witch and Wardrobe
. In the dream, young Teddy became agitated and pleaded, “Stop, Grandpa. Stop reading.”

“What’s wrong?” Grandpa Raines asked.

“Don’t let Lucy go through that door at the back of the wardrobe! She doesn’t know what’s on the other side.”

Grandpa Raines, fully alive and in good humor, laughed, “Lucy wants to go through the door.”

The images were so real that Ted wondered if instead of a dream it had actually been some ancient memory from
his childhood that had broken loose from its moorings and floated to the surface of his consciousness.

Ted sat up and looked around for Angel. Not seeing her, he stretched and got up. “Come on Argo, let’s go find Angel. I have no idea why I’m taking a nap in the middle of the morning.”

Once outside, Ted looked around the campsite. When he didn’t see Angel, he walked toward the Chieftain. When he got closer, he saw No Barks sitting at the rear of the vehicle next to a gray box that looked like a piece of well-worn carry-on luggage. Extending from beneath the RV was a pair of long brown legs capped with black combat boots. Ted heard a crackling noise that carried on for few moments and then stopped. He peered under the RV and asked, “What are you doing?”

“Don’t worry. When it comes to welding, I’m an artist. Come look.”

Ted scooted under the chassis and nestled in beside Angel. Lying on his back, he looked around. The sagging back half of the water tank had been reattached to the frame with the skill of a plastic surgeon. It was a beautiful weld. There were also two brand-new bolts securing the busted metal strap that kept the water tank in place. Two rusted and sheered bolts rested on the ground nearby. Ted rapped the tank with his knuckles. It seemed secure. “I’m impressed.” He knew enough about welding to know that it was a lot harder than it looked. “I’m thinking you should add ‘field welder’ to your spiritual consultant sign.”

Angel’s neck was tired, so she inched over closer to Ted
and rested her head against him. She stared at the welds as if they were Rembrandts. “I do damn fine work, don’t I? My father lets me create art by welding old auto parts together. That’s how I got interested in welded sculpture.”

“You have lots of talents.”

“Most pay poorly or not at all.”

Angel scooted out from under the chassis and brushed the dust and small pieces of gravel from her shorts. When Ted also emerged, she gave him a casual hug and said, “You’re roadworthy. Good luck.”

Ted, very grateful to have met Angel and feeling a little guilty for thinking that she was trying to con him, smiled. “It was really nice crashing into you.”

“Come on, No Barks.” Without another word, Angel Two Sparrow walked away.

Ted wondered why there weren’t women like Angel in Crossing Trails. She was interesting. He sat down at the picnic table with Argo and waited until he heard Bertha’s engine start and the gravel crunch as Angel pulled out onto the highway and headed west. He imagined her driving with her drum music blaring. He had the urge to yell out and tell her to wait. Maybe he’d made a mistake. A pilgrimage wasn’t such a bad idea, but he also suspected that on some level it was an awful idea. Angel was just a pretty palm reader, a traveling tarot card reader. Not for him. He’d made the right decision. Stick to what was safe. However great Angel might be, she was on a very different path. Ted closed his eyes and suddenly recalled the second part of the strange dreaming episode.

The four of them—Angel, Ted, and the two dogs—were around a campfire in the woods, by a gurgling creek surrounded by mountains that were small by the standards of the Rockies. Still, the geological formations were primitive and beautiful—different from anything he had ever seen. Vivid red embers floated up into the sky like parachutes in reverse and dissipated into the black nothingness of the night. The moon was nearly full. They were dancing in the dark. Moon dancing.

Ted smiled to himself. Dogs don’t tango on their two hind legs, and neither did Ted Day. It was a crazy dream. What did it mean? Tangoing with Angel and their dogs under the full moon in a strange forest was definitely not a
normal
dream for Ted Day. He wanted only normal dreams. Ted resolved that this one meant nothing. That’s what it meant. Since when did dreams communicate to Ted or anyone else? Believing in dream communication was dangerous. It had landed Aunt Lilly in jail. He wondered if spiritual consultants knew anything about dreams.

Ted shook the dream off like water from a dog’s back. He pulled out his phone and checked for messages. There were none. He saw Angel’s text from the night before, and for some reason he found himself missing her. Willing to bet that Angel would know about dreams, and with every shred of self-confidence he could muster, he decided to call her, thank her again for welding his tank, and ask about the dream.

He waited for her to answer. On the third ring, she did.

“Hey?”

“Angel, Ted Day. I wanted to thank you again for welding the tank. You did a great job. Also, I wanted to say … I enjoyed our little time together.” Ted paused, wondering if he sounded professional, and then asked, “By the way, what do you know about dreams?”

“I’m a Lakota. Dreams are very important for us. I know a lot. Just ask me,” Angel responded, turning down her drum music.

“While I was on the floor of your bookmobile, I had two very strange dreams. They were dreams like I never had before.”

“This does not surprise me. Bertha is a dream catcher. Significant dreaming events occur under her roof. Also, powerful dreamers—like myself and Aunt Lilly—can further widen these dream spaces. Would you like to tell me about your dreams?”

Ted sighed and tried his best to describe the dreams. She interrupted for details as she saw fit, and when Ted was finished, she asked, “Before I say anything, Ted, it’s important that you tell me what you think these dreams were trying to tell you.”