The Stranger (13 page)

“What did he look like?” said the grumpy voice. “Race? Age?”

The nurse said nothing for a moment. Then she said, “I’m not sure. Ask the patient.”

She’s sure, thought Nicoletta. She knows what she saw. She saw a monster. But she can’t say that. The words won’t come out of her mouth.

Security never came in to ask Nicoletta anything. An aide, not the nurse, arrived later to finish charting Nicoletta’s vital signs. Nicoletta said nothing about an intruder. The aide said nothing.

She thought of Jethro’s journey home. How would he get there?

How could she ever refer to that cave as home?

Home.
She knew now that a house was only a house; the building on Fairest Lane was a place to buy and sell, to decorate, and to leave. But a home is a place in which to be cherished. A home is love and parents, shelter and protection, laughter and chores, shared meals and jokes.

Home.

He had none.

And how with that curse upon him, could she bring him home? Find safety for him? Find release?

Her parents and Jamie burst into the room, loaded down with Nicoletta’s schoolbooks and homework, a potted flower, a silly T-shirt from the hospital gift shop, and a balloon bouquet. The balloons rushed to the ceiling, dotting it purple and silver and scarlet and gold.

She wondered if Jethro had even seen a balloon bouquet. Or ever would.

“I’m so glad to see you!” cried Nicoletta. “Oh, Mommy! Daddy! Jamie!”

“You’re even glad to see me?” said Jamie. “You
are
sick!”

“Darling,” said her mother, hugging. “You look like you’ve had a good long nap. Feeling better?”

“Lots.”

“You come home tomorrow,” said her father. He looked worn and worried. He touched her cheek, as if to reassure himself that this was Nicoletta, his baby girl, his darling daughter.

“Tomorrow? I just got here.” She thought of a father, years and years go, who left a son inside the earth and never looked back.

“Isn’t it wonderful?” agreed her father. “Then just another day of rest at home and you’re on crutches and back in school. Orthopedic decisions are very different from when I broke a leg. When I broke my leg skiing, back in the dark ages, why, I was in the hospital for ten days.”

They talked about the dark ages: her parents’ childhoods, in which there had been no fast food, no video games, no answering machines, and no instant replays.

Nicoletta thought of Jethro, for whom all ages were dark.

I know what I could do, she thought. I could do what Jethro did for his father.
I could offer myself to the spirits of the cave.
I could exchange myself for him.

How romantic that would be!

Greatness of heart would be required. She would step down and he would step up. She would take the dark and he could have the light.

Jethro would have his fair share of laughter and love; he would smile in the sun, with no fear of turning to horror and stone. He would have his chances, at last, for life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. The dark ages would end for him.

And she, Nicoletta … she … would inherit the dark ages.

Dark.
Forever and ever, world without end.

Dark and all that
dark
meant. Unknown. Unseen. Things that crawled and bit and flew and slithered. Things that crept up legs and settled in hair. Things that screamed and moaned and wept in the entrapment of their souls.

Could she really do that? Was she, Nicoletta, strong enough to accept darkness and terror, fear and slime—
forever?

But it would not be forever, of course. He would come back for her. He would—

He would not.

He would not even remember. He would abandon her. Everybody would abandon her.

She thought of the Madrigals. How quickly they had abandoned her for Anne-Louise. She thought of Ms. Quincy, who had praised her voice for so long, only to abandon her the instant she heard a better one. It would all be like that, she thought. My entire life. Except my life would not have a span. It would not end. There would be no way out. It would be eternal.

Oh, Jethro! Jethro!

I don’t want you caught in your dark ages. I want you here on earth with me.

“Sweetie, don’t cry,” said her mother. “It isn’t that bad of a break. All will be well. I promise.”

She rested on her mother’s promise.

She thought of Jethro going back, and down, and in. To become part of the walls and the fall and the blackness, to live among the spirits he would not describe because they were too awful for her to hear about.

“Don’t cry,” said her mother, rocking. “All will be well.”

“A
SNOW PICNIC?” REPEATED
Nicoletta.

“Yes!” said Anne-Louise. “It was my idea. And you’ll be our mascot!”

Your mascot? thought Nicoletta. I get it. You’re the soprano, Anne-Louise. I’m the puppy. The rag doll. The mascot. Drop dead, Anne-Louise, just drop dead.

Christo said, “I’m driving!”

Rachel said, “I packed the sandwiches.”

Cathy said, “But I made them, so don’t be afraid of food poisoning, Nickie.”

Nicoletta had to laugh. She got her crutches. Christo’s van was not large enough for so many Madrigals, but if they really squished and squashed, they could fit in a very uncomfortable but delightful way. The three leftovers followed in a leftover car. Nicoletta felt sorry for them, trailing behind.

Her white packed leg with its scrawls of Madrigal names stuck out in front of her, between the two bucket seats.

Christo said, “We’re going to that meadow you showed me, Nick. I thought I might climb the cliff.”

Anne-Louise gave a little shriek of fright. “Christo! You might fall!”

Christo smiled arrogantly. Falling happened to other climbers. Not to Christo.

“It’ll be icy,” warned Anne-Louise. She patted Christo’s knee excitedly.

Nicoletta definitely knew who had a crush on whom. Well, it was useful in a way. Christo would be deflected. It would free Nicoletta up for Jethro.

“Okay, Nickie,” said Rachel. “The time has come. What is this crazy story Christo keeps telling us about rock people?” The packed singers burst into laughter and the whole van shook.

Christo just grinned. “You’ll stop laughing when I catch it,” he said.

“Actually,” Anne-Louise said, turning to speak clearly, and be sure everybody knew that she knew first, “Christo brought his gun. He’s not going to climb. He’s going to hunt.”

“I’m against hunting,” said Rachel.

“I usually am, too,” said Cathy, “but this is a rock he’s after. The worst that can happen, I figure, is there’ll be two rocks after he shoots at it.”

Nicoletta’s brain felt as solid as the cast on her leg. She had plaster in her skull. What was happening? The cave and Jethro were becoming public territory. There were no taboos, there was no fear, there was no stopping them now. Even Cathy was laughing about hunting. It occurred to Nicoletta that she could not pretend Jethro was against hunting.

In fact, he and his companions in the cave were the most vicious hunters of all. For they hunted the hunters.

“I want a souvenir,” said Anne-Louise, in a little girl singsong voice.

Nicoletta hated her. She hated the flirting, the silliness, the fakery. She hated every single thing about Anne-Louise. Drop dead, she thought. Out loud she said, “It won’t be any fun picnicking there, Christo. Let’s go to the state park or the town lake.”

“Forget it,” said Cathy. “He’s told us and told us about this place, how romantic and weird it is, what strange things we’ll see. We’re on. This is it, Nickie.”

They turned into the lane that said
DEAD END.

They drove past the few houses and the high, winter-tired hedges.

They drove right up the dirt road and came to stop where the ruts were too deep for a suburban van. “How will we ever get through all this snow?” cried Anne-Louise, pretending fear. “How will we ever find our way in those woods?”

“Not to worry,” said Christo, comforting her. He was completely sucked in by her acting.

Nobody except Nicoletta seemed bothered by Anne-Louise. The altos, tenors, and basses piled out, the leftover car with its leftover people caught up, the boys hoisted the coolers and then they were faced with the problem of Nicoletta’s cast and crutches.

“See?” said Nicoletta. “I really think the town lake would be a good idea. That way you can prop me up on a bench right near where we park, and we’ll still have a good view, and yet we—“

“Nickie,” said Rachel, “hush. The boys are going to carry you. This is the most romantic moment of your life, so enjoy it.”

Christo and Jeff made a carrying seat of their linked arms and David helped her sit. With David holding her cast at the ankle as if she were a ladder he was lugging, Christo and Jeff carried her.

They went past the boulder.

Straight as folded paper, the path led them through the snow-crusted meadow. Weeds from last summer poked out of last week’s snow, brown and dried and somehow evil. The weeds tilted, watching the trespassers.

The two lakes were free of ice. They lay waiting. Tiny waves lapped the two shores like hungry tongues.

“Ooooh, it’s so pretty!” squealed Anne-Louise.

The sound of their crunching feet was like an army. Jethro was surely hidden safely away; he would have heard them coming.

I couldn’t stop them! Nicoletta thought at Jethro. It isn’t my fault! I wouldn’t have come, but I have to keep an eye on them.

The air was silent and the cave was invisible. They stopped walking. Only Anne-Louise found the place pretty. Rachel swallowed and wet her lips. “The water looks dangerous,” she whispered. “It looks—as if it wants one of us.”

Nobody argued.

Nobody said she was being silly.

Nobody tried to walk between the two lakes, either.

The boys set Nicoletta down. They set the big cooler down, too, and Nicoletta used it for a chair.

Ice had melted on the side of the cliff, and then frozen again. It hung in thin, vicious spikes from its crags and outcroppings. There was no color. The stone was dark and threatening. The day was grim and silent.

Christo’s voice came out slightly higher than it should have. “I’m walking between the two lakes,” he said, as if somebody had accused him of not doing it. “The cave is over there. When the thing came out and attacked Nicoletta, it came out of there.”

“Nothing attacked me,” said Nicoletta.

“It touched you,” said Christo.

“There was nothing here,” said Nicoletta.

“I believe you, Christo!” sang Anne-Louise. “I know there was something here. I’ll go with you, Christo!”

Anne-Louise and Christo walked carefully as if they were on a balance beam. The water reached up to catch their ankles. A moment passed before Rachel and Cathy and David and Jeff walked after them. Did they not see the cliff snarl? Did they not see the hunger of the cave, how it licked its lips with wanting them?

“There
is
a cave!” cried Rachel. “Oh, Christo, you were right! Oh my heavens! Look inside. It’s beautiful!”

No, thought Nicoletta. No, Rachel, it’s not beautiful. Don’t go in, don’t go in.

But now her tongue was also plaster and did not move, but filled her mouth and prevented her speech.

No one went in.

A cave gives pause. Even with walls shining like jewels, the dark depths are frightening and the unknown beyond the light should remain unknown.

The Madrigals posed at the entrance, as if waiting for their cue to sing, needing costumes, or a director to bring them in.

“Anne-Louise,” said a voice, “you go first.”

T
HE SCREAMS OF ANNE-LOUISE
were etched in the air, like diamond initials on glass. Indeed, glass seemed to separate the safe from the fallen.

The Madrigals were collected as if about to concertize. But it was horror that held them, not an audience. They, in fact, were the audience. They had aisle seats to the end of Anne-Louise.

Anne-Louise, whose voice was not so beautiful when screaming in terror, was on the far side of the glass.

The screams went on and on and then stopped. They stopped completely. The silence that followed was even more complete.

Nobody attempted to go in after her.

Nobody tried to rescue her.

Were they too afraid? Or too smart to risk the same ending?

Nicoletta had the excuse of an immovable leg, a helpless body. None of the others had an excuse.

But Nicoletta had known what would happen. None of the others could have known. And so Nicoletta Storms was the one with no excuse at all, no excuse ever.

Whose voice sent Anne-Louise tumbling forever into the dark?

Was it me? thought Nicoletta. Did I shout
Anne-Louise, you go first!
I who knew what would happen to the one who went first? Did I want revenge that much? How sick and twisted I am, to destroy a classmate over a singing group.

I’m sorry! thought Nicoletta. As if being sorry would change anything.

Time stopped.

The sun did not move in the sky and the teenagers did not move beneath it.

Sound ceased.

Nothing cried out within the cave and nobody spoke without.

The glass wall broke.

Anne-Louise, babbling and twitching, fingers curling and uncurling, eyes too wide to blink, staggered out of the cave.

Still nobody spoke. Still nobody moved.

They were like a group photograph of themselves. A still shot of Madrigals from another era.

“It’s in there,” whispered Anne-Louise. “You were right, Christo. It’s in there! It picked me up. It caught me.”

Anne-Louise addressed Christo but did not seem to see him. Instead she staggered away from the cliff, hands out as if holding a rope nobody else could see. On an invisible lifeline she hauled herself in Nicoletta’s direction. There was sand in her hair, as if she were a bride at some dreadful wedding. Her guests had not thrown confetti.

“It’s there?” breathed Christo. Excitement possessed him. “It really exists? You saw it? You touched it?”

“Don’t go in!” screamed Anne-Louise. Her voice was huge and roiling, nothing like a soprano’s. It was ugly and swollen. “Don’t go in!” she shouted. She did not let go of her lifeline, but kept hauling herself between the lakes, past Nicoletta. She fell to her knees, and Nicoletta saw that the kneecaps were torn and bruised from an earlier fall. Still Anne-Louise did not stop, but crawled, sobbing, trying to find the straight path and the way out.