“Not again,” Tommy Boy whimpered.
I nearly whimpered, too. This location had attracted me during my first visit, and I’d been more than eager to enter the cave’s interior, but now it terrified me. The atmosphere rated right up there with misty graveyards and haunted mansions as an ideal setting for mischief, and I had no inkling of what steps to take next. After such a delicious taste of freedom since coming to Carmel Valley, this renewed sense of helplessness rubbed me raw. Using Veronica’s vernacular, it sucked.
Jake cursed the shadowy darkness inside the cave. Tommy Boy’s small lantern did little more than illuminate the tomb-like quality of the area directly in front of us.
“Let’s leave ‘em,” Tommy Boy said, his voice echoing back like a cold draft. “With us guarding the way out of here, they can’t get away.”
“I’ll stay,” I said quickly.
Jake shrugged. At this point, he didn’t seem to care what I did. I was grateful that with the faint light cast by the lantern there was little chance he’d recognize that I wasn’t Veronica. Tommy Boy treated me to a blank stare, reminding me of monkeys at the zoo with their empty eyes, resigned to their fate.
“Tie them back up,” Jake ordered.
“We left the ropes behind,” I said.
“Fuck.”
“We could use our shoe laces,” Tommy Boy said.
Jake looked at Tommy Boy for several seconds before shaking his head. “Forget it. They’re not going anywhere.”
Then, side-by-side, our captors walked out of the cave and disappeared through an opening in the surrounding bushes and trees, which might as well have been a moat, given our change of getting through it alive.
“Okay, Veronica,” I said. “We can’t walk way out of here with Jake and Tommy Boy armed and blocking the trail, so what’s the plan?”
“Plan?”
Unable to make out my sister’s face in the semi-darkness, I couldn’t tell if she was serious or just pulling my leg. “You’re the one who forced me into an identity switch, like some Parent Trap scheme. Call me crazy, but I thought you might have a plan.”
She didn’t reply.
“You do, don’t you?”
“You mean like pulling out a gun and shooting our way out?”
“Yes, damn it!” What was the matter with her? It wasn’t like Veronica to be so passive.
“What do you suggest?” she asked, her tone snarky.
“Me?” I hissed. “You’re the strong one. I’m just—”
“You’re just what, Sis? We’re identical in more ways than you think. What I can do, you can do, maybe even better. It’s hard to step forward if you don’t believe in yourself.”
“You missed your calling, Veronica. You should be peddling advice instead of drugs.”
Silence.
“I’m sorry,” I said, though I wasn’t.
“Feeling better?” she asked.
“We exchanged clothes, not personalities,” I snapped, deciding to keep talking to hide my fear.
“You could have fooled me,” she said. “You’ve become bitchy enough to pass for me, though I’d like to believe I’m not such a coward.”
“Ouch.”
“Listen, Marjorie, back at camp you said you could take care of yourself. I suggest you stop whining like a Tommy Boy clone and prove it.”
No answers. No road maps. No directions. What now?
“Anyway,” Veronica said. “You’re the one wearing the ruby slippers.”
“Boots.”
“Minor difference.”
“So, I’m supposed to just whack them together three times and make a wish?”
“Unless you happen to have some pepper spray or a loaded Taser in this fanny pack of yours,” she said, indicating the belted pouch now strapped around her waist.
My heart jumped as if trapped inside an inflatable bouncer. I wanted to punch something—someone. We had to stop bickering and come up with a plan.
“Let’s get this straight, Marjorie. You had a chance to get away and didn’t take it. That took courage, but I could use a little help here.”
“Mommy will help us,” Joshua said.
I sensed Veronica’s surprise, which matched mine. Joshua’s words had come out so naturally, as if he’d been speaking all along and we just hadn’t been listening.
“Look at the hands,” he said.
“I can’t see them in the dark,” I said.
Veronica unzipped the pouch and pulled out the smudge stick and matches Ben had given me the day he’d introduced me to the Medicine Wheel. “How about these?”
“Smudge sticks don’t burn, they smolder,” I said. “And matches don’t stay lit.”
“Smudging is supposed to get rid of negative energies, right?” Veronica asked.
“Yeah, and penetrate the barrier that separates us from the Spiritual realm. Why?”
She lit the stick and waved it in the air until it started to smolder, then handed it to me. “Go for it.”
“You want me to smudge the cave?”
“Unless you’ve got a better plan?”
She called this a plan?
For lack of anything better to do besides worry myself sick, I started to walk the perimeter of the cave—one timid step after another—waving the smudge stick up and down, left and right. My boot kicked something solid. It propelled forward with a metallic clang.
“What was that?” I croaked.
Joshua dropped to his knees and skittered after the sound.
I nearly passed out with relief when he flicked on a flashlight and pointed it at the pattern of hands.
“Pete must have left it behind during our visit,” I said.
In the eerie luminescence of the light’s beam, I saw enough of the child’s face to witness the wonder that had replaced the fear in his eyes. “You okay?” I asked.
He nodded, his gaze fixed on the wall of hands. The tension appeared to drain from his body, only to be replaced by a faint smile. He closed his eyes and started to breathe at an increased rate.”
“What’s he doing?” Veronica asked.
“Some kind of breathing exercise Dr. Mendez taught him as part of his therapy. It helps him relax and loosens his psychological defenses, which supposedly leads to the emergence of the unconscious and mystical connections to other people.”
“Sounds more like he’s hyperventilating to me,” Veronica said.
“Yeah, it’s kind of scary, but Dr. Mendez seems to know what he’s doing.”
Almost as if instructed to do so, Joshua said, “Sunwalker.”
I stubbed the smudge stick on the cave floor to extinguish it and then crawled to Joshua’s side and pulled him close. “My precious.”
We cuddled in our earthen tomb to wait, and while we waited, I realized that following day would be Easter Sunday. How appropriate. Buried in a cave on Black Saturday, the day the soul of Jesus descended into the underworld of departed souls.
“Mommy!” Joshua said, which jerked my attention back to the pictograph with its long flame-like fingers.
A pale outfall of light radiated from the wall as if its rocky surface were lit from within. The word Mother formed in my mind as well. How strange. I sensed only one presence, yet Joshua and I were both calling it Mother. Had my sister sensed it, too?
“Tell me I’m not crazy,” Veronica whispered from directly behind me.
“Our mother’s spirit is here,” I said. “I know it.”
“Okay, so let’s say I’ve been hearing her, too,” Veronica said, settling next to Joshua and me. “What’s her purpose? Why should we care? And what are we supposed to do about it?”
“I’ve been asking myself the same questions and haven’t been able to come up with any satisfying explanations. Just knowing I’m not alone and that you and Joshua are hearing something, too, gives me the strength to keep asking questions and listening for the answers.”
“Glad to help out,” Veronica said, her tone implying otherwise. “So, who else do you think we’re hearing?”
Here was my chance to put into words what I’d only been journaling about until now; to put forward the questions journalists ask, attempt to answer, and, more often than not, get wrong. “Spirits . . . their thoughts.”
Veronica pulled in a slow, controlled breath and released it in a way that would have made a yogi proud. “You’re making me nervous.”
“Bear with me now,” I said, mimicking Heather as she’d try to explain the unexplainable not all that long ago. “Because this is going to sound kind of weird. I think . . . Actually, I know . . . that our mother has been talking to me since I visited The Lone Cypress on Ash Wednesday.”
I glanced at Joshua. He continued to stare at the wall with the alertness of someone consumed by whatever had originally attracted his attention. His intense breathing also continued, and I tried not to let it worry me. I should’ve listened more carefully when Dr. Mendez had discussed the therapy work he was doing with the child, but it was too late now. At least Joshua wasn’t twitching and trembling or passing out.
“Listen, Veronica. Joshua’s hearing his mother, too. What are the chances that all three of us are going crazy? And you can’t blame a faulty gene because Joshua’s not related to us. My guess is that we’re tapping into some kind of collective unconsciousness. Heck, maybe we’re tapping into ourselves. How long have you been hearing voices?”
“Since coming to Carmel Valley two years ago and finding the mouse totem.” Veronica’s voice relayed strain almost beyond endurance, and I marveled that she hadn’t sought professional help.
“You’ve got to understand with your heart, not your head,” I said, quoting Dr. Mendez, though with less confidence and not nearly as soothing a voice. “Otherwise none of this will ever make sense. Joshua hasn’t been able to speak the truth, and we haven’t been able to hear it.”
Veronica chuckled but not in a positive way. “So, because we weren’t listening, these so-called spirits decided to smack us over the head?”
“Something like that,” I said.
“So, what’s our mother trying to tell us?” she whispered.
“I don’t know but hope to find out one way or another.”
“When we get out of this mess, I’ll help you do just that,” Veronica said.
“Okay,” I said, grateful that she’d said when rather than if.
Joshua whispered something under his breath, which drew our attention. We waited, but nothing else happened.
“Is your mama here?” I asked.
“Yes,” he said, so clearly and sweetly that it brought tears to my eyes. I prayed that he’d live to chatter like other children his age.
To keep my fear at bay, and to keep from falling apart in front of Joshua, I resumed quizzing my sister. “What do you think Jake and Tommy Boy are up to?”
“They’re probably at a stalemate,” Veronica said. “They don’t dare leave you and Joshua behind. You know too much. But they don’t want to come right out and kill you either.”
I shivered. “They probably hope someone else will do the job for them.”
“Or something else, like the fire did with Theresa and Paul. A perfect solution for two low-level criminals.”
“This might be a good time for you to tell me what’s going on.”
“God, Sis. I couldn’t do anything for Joshua’s parents. They were drugged and unconscious when I ran across them on one of my mind-clearing hikes. I wasn’t strong enough to carry or drag them to safety. Besides, I didn’t have time. A fire had started nearby. I tried calling 911 but couldn’t get reception. Thank God, I managed to untie Joshua. But he didn’t want to leave his parents. So, I bribed him with my mouse totem.”
“You were going to tell me about that.”
“As I said, I found it on a hike soon after my arrival in Carmel Valley. When I gave it to Joshua, I told him it would bring him good luck. I left him as close as I dared to the monastery at Tassajara and told him to go for help. Then I went back for Paul and Theresa. But the fire blocked me. No one could have saved them. Not at that point, anyway.”
“What else?”
“All I know is that Joshua and his parents came across Jake and Tommy’s camp unexpectedly. Probably on a hike or a picnic. They found the shack and, unfortunately, the marijuana. I figure Jake and Tommy panicked and fled, because they left Theresa and Paul behind, drugged and at the mercy of the fire. They also left Joshua to die, not knowing I had freed him.”
“So why didn’t you turn them in?” I asked incredulously.
“I wasn’t aware of any of this back then. Only that I’d saved a child and not his parents. I was pretty shaken up, wondering if I could’ve done anything differently.”
“But you’re still hanging out with those losers, calling them friends.”
Veronica continued as if she hadn’t heard me. “So, you can imagine my reaction when I discovered Jake was going to be one of the guides on your tour. Ben wasn’t too happy when I invited myself along. Actually, he was pissed. Then he insisted on joining the party, too. To protect you from me. Can you believe it? With Jake being the dangerous one. Sure, Ben knew you didn’t like the man, but he had no idea . . . Anyway, when I told Morgan about Joshua and his parents, we put our heads together and figured out that his sister, Teri, and Theresa Alameda were one and the same. I give Morgan credit. He moved quickly after that. He managed to show up on the trip and convince Dr. Mendez to stay in case you or Joshua needed him. At first, Jake thought he was safe. Joshua showed no signs of regaining his speech and didn’t seem to be aware of Jake’s presence. But then . . . well, you know the rest. When Pete was injured in the lightning storm, Jake got the diversion he needed to kidnap Joshua and split. As soon as I noticed Jake was gone, I followed him, curious as to what he was up to. I didn’t know he had taken Joshua, though I should have. What was he thinking? How could he believe he’d get away with this?”
“So, Joshua knew you all along,” I said, “which explains why he took such interest in me at Dr. Mendez’s office. He thought I was you and that the mouse totem was mine.”
“Actually, there’s more to it than that,” Veronica said. “He wasn’t surprised when he saw me again, as if he already knew there were two of us. There’s something else going on between the two of you, but what that something is, I can’t begin to imagine.”
For a while, we sat in silence, but before I could give in to despair, Joshua said, “Let’s pray.”
The three of us scooted forward, and when we reached the wall, we bowed our heads and joined hands.
I led us in a prayer of faith, thanksgiving, and acceptance, concluding with, “Not our will but your will.”
To which Veronica responded, “Amen.”