Fallout (Joshua Stokes Mysteries Book 2) (21 page)

After about thirty minutes or so of looking over the files, Joshua became tangle-eyed. The words began to blur and run together. So immersed had he become in the files that nothing else had gained his attention. He was surprised to hear Emma and John Metcalf still talking. Undoubtedly, John had decided that he would rather chat with Emma than drive to his parent’s house in Lucedale.

Joshua wanted a cigarette, but did not want to interfere with the young folk’s conversation. He picked up his cigarettes, poured himself a glass of whiskey and carried them onto the front porch to light up.

It had gotten dark by then. His front porch lacked light from the kitchen that the back porch had. He did not want to turn on the front room light nor the porch light, so he fumbled around in the dark a minute before he found the rocker he usually sat in while out there. Once he sat down and kicked back with his feet propped on the railing, he saw a flicker of light in the night skies just before he lit a smoke.

It was extremely quiet on the front porch. All he could hear was night critters and the distant rumble of thunder. After a long inhale and slow exhale, he puffed a couple of smoke rings and tried to watch them float away… he swallowed half the whiskey, its warmth filled him with peace and tranquility as he listened.

A gust of wind blew swiftly but for only a moment. The wonderful smell of misty rain filled the air and he heard the sound of tender leaves fall and land softly on the tin roof overhead. Then all became quiet again. After a few minutes, the quietness within him took a brutal toll, it raged as strong as the whiskey that filled his aching soul. The darkness, like a sword, was long, cold, and sharp as he sat there on his front porch, blowing smoke rings into the dark. Thunder rumbled in the distance, a hard rain began to fall. He heard the sound of a whippoorwill as it ended its last lonesome call. The rain on the tin roof lulled and he began to doze, until the sharp clap, clap of thunder shook the very foundation of his soul. He sat upright with start, just in time to see a pine tree split from bottom to top as lightning shot into the sky to meet a downward electrical charge of equal strength and velocity. The light from their joining lit up the entire front yard.

The warrior he had seen on several occasions, sat astride his painted pony at the base of the divided pine. The two halves flowed outward from behind him, giving the impression that the horse and rider had sprouted giant wings.

The warrior’s eyes burned into his, but Joshua did not look away. Instead, he stared deeper, letting himself become one with the warrior. For a brief second he felt the rain on his back, the electricity of the storm raised the hair on his neck and arms and the intense sadness the warrior felt was his own. Suddenly another stroke of lightning struck, knocking him back into his chair. He smelled burnt sulfur, hair, and pinesap. An intense burn seared his shoulder; Joshua flinched and shifted his arm. The burning pain felt similar to being shot; the way the bullet feels as it tears through the flesh.

He picked his shirt up off his shoulder with his other hand until the sizzle cooled somewhat. Afterward, he fumbled for and found his cigarettes. He lit one and inhaled sharply, trying to dull the pain. When the next stoke of lightning came, he did not see the warrior, just the shattered tree.

“What the hell just happened?” he mumbled aloud and gazed out into the yard.

As the rain stopped and the heat from the burning tree mixed with the cooling vapor of the storm, a mist formed and covered the entire area. Soon, a thick smoke-filled fog settled around him. Joshua stood with the intention of going inside.

The last time such a fog had formed, he’d had a visit from an otherworldly phantom and he was not sure he was ready for that, at least not right then. Suddenly, the tender beginning of the ‘Time in a Bottle’ song filled the space around him. It was a moment before he realized that it was coming from inside the cabin. He figured that Emma must have turned on the radio in the kitchen.

Joshua opened the screen door and stepped inside. As he walked toward the table, he began to feel weak. He sat down with a thud and reached for the bottle of whiskey. He managed to pour himself a shot of whiskey and swallow it. He hoped it would help him feel better. He heard the back screen door slap against wood, Emma’s sharp intake of breath before she called out for John Metcalf to hurry inside.

Joshua tried to turn toward her, but before he could, nausea hit him hard and his head began to spin; suddenly but slowly, darkness surrounded him…

The sound of blood rushing through his ears, similar to the sound of water rushing over a cliff, greeted Joshua as he struggled to wake. The wa-wa of opposing levels of fluid filling his eardrums echoed through his conscious. He tried to raise his head but he couldn’t; he drifted back into la-la land. All of a sudden, he was dreaming. He knew he had to be. He was walking down a sidewalk holding hands with his mother. A man that was not his father, walked along with them. The man appeared to be in his mid-twenties. He had dark curly hair and dark eyes. He was tall, thin and wore wire-rimmed glasses.

When they reached the sidewalk of a two-storied house, that he recognized as the home he shared with his parents, his mother stopped and told him to run along inside and start on his homework. Joshua started toward the house but when he reached the porch, he stopped and turned toward them.

He heard his mother say, “Thank you, for walking us home Mr. Dixon, but you did not have to do this. Joshua and I would have been fine.” The young man appeared nervous - Joshua could tell the man had a crush on his mother. He saw the man glance around and up and down the street.

With a thick, southern accent, he said “Please Miss Annaleigh, call me J. B. I wanted to walk with y’all because it is not safe; believe me when I tell you this. Always,
always
be watchful and don’t trust people, especially men you don’t know.” the young man lowered his voice and said, “I know you know my father, but do not trust him either.” Joshua saw a look of surprise come over his mother’s face at the man’s words.

“I will probably be leaving as soon as I save enough money,” the young man said. “I cannot stay here with
these
people. My family is damned, Miss Annaleigh, damned I tell you. They are damned and going to hell, every one of them!” he exclaimed loudly, and then lowered his voice again. “I don’t have any other choice but to run away. I just wanted to let you know that I won’t be coming back to church before I leave.”

“Isn’t there another way?” Joshua’s mother asked. “You are doing so well” she said, “You almost prayed through last Sunday. Next time, you may receive the Holy Ghost-”

“I sorry ma’am, there is no other way; I have to go now. If I stay here, I will be damned too. Whatever you do, do not let my father inside your home. He is a
very
dangerous man, Miss Annaleigh!” Before his mother could speak again, the man turned and ran back toward the main street. Joshua watched him turn the corner and then looked toward his mother; she too was watching him go. When she turned to come up the sidewalk, Joshua could tell that what the man said bothered her.

“Hurry inside, son,” she told him. Once they were inside, she locked the front door and pulled the blinds.

“What’s wrong, Mama,” he asked. After she went to the kitchen and locked the backdoor, his mother looked toward him and smiled as if nothing at all was wrong.

“Nothing’s wrong, honey, I am just being cautious, that’s all,” she said as she walked back to the front room and placed her purse on a small table by the door.

“Now, you need to start on your homework while I start dinner. You can do it at the kitchen table; that way, if you need help I will be right there.” She smiled and walked back into the kitchen.

“Sheriff Stokes, can you hear me?” Joshua heard the voice; it brought him out of his dream. He did not want to wake, at least not yet. He wanted to finish his dream or memory. Whatever it was, it was more than he had remembered thus far. However, whoever was shaking his shoulder and calling his name refused to let him slip back into dreamland. He wanted to yell at them, but could not find his voice. The harder he struggled to speak, the more pain he felt in his throat.

“He’s coming to,” he heard a male voice say, “Nurse, you can remove the oxygen mask.” the man then said, “Joshua Stokes, nod if you can hear me.”

Joshua tried and thought he nodded. His mouth and throat were so dry that his tongue was stuck to the roof of his mouth. He felt someone remove something from his face and ears. He struggled to open his eyes. When he finally managed to open them, everything was blurry.

“Sheriff Stokes, this is Doctor Lightcap. If you can you hear me, blink your eyes.” Joshua blinked twice. “Okay, now that I know you understand what I am saying, I can give you something to drink if you’d like. Are you thirsty?” Joshua blinked twice again. He had never been as thirsty in his life as he was right then. He felt a hand slip behind his head and raise it, and then he felt a cup at his mouth.

“Just a sip to start with,” the doctor said softly. “You’ve been out for nearly thirty hours. We can’t have you strangling to death on water,” the doctor said gruffly.

The first sip of water was hard to get down and it hurt going down, but the second sip was easier. The third, he held in his mouth and swished it around to wet his entire mouth.

When he could speak, the first thing Joshua said was that he wanted a cigarette. When the doctor informed him that he could not have one, he said, I’ll be damned if I can’t. If I can get up from here, I will. He then proceeded to try to get out of the hospital bed. No one offered to assist him, which suited him fine, he did not want any help. He finally managed to sit up on the side of the bed. That was when he realized that he wore only a hospital gown.

“What the hell happened? How did I get here?”

“The best we can figure,” the doctor replied, “Is that you were struck by lightning.”

“Lightning?” he questioned.

“Lightning,” Doctor Lightcap repeated and as he said it, Joshua remembered sitting on his front porch watching the storm coming closer, the split down the middle pine tree, and the warrior on horseback and how for just a moment, he was the warrior. He felt the rain, the rise of the hair on his neck and arms, the intense sadness the warrior felt… then the clap, clap of the thunder and lightning. He remembered the burning, searing pain that ripped through his left shoulder. It had reminded him of a bullet tearing through his flesh.

“You have a pretty nasty burn on your left shoulder blade. The heat of the lightning cauterized the tear in the flesh. If I had to guess, I would think that it had to feel much the same as a bullet tearing through the flesh. I am surprised that you made it inside. If John Metcalf and Emma Carr had not found you, you could have died.”

“They were on the back porch talking. I had gone onto the front porch to keep from intruding on their conversation… I remember watching the storm, the lightning striking a pine tree, splitting it down the middle. I even remember walking inside to the kitchen table, and I think I remember hearing Emma come in, but that is all I remember.”

“John Metcalf said that your heart stopped. He thought at first that someone had shot you. He thought it was powder burns from a shotgun blast to your shoulder blade but with no blood, he quickly realized that you had been struck by lightning. He performed CPR on you while Miss Carr called an ambulance. Metcalf kept you alive until they got to you. You were in bad shape when you got here to the hospital, Son.”

Joshua found it hard to believe that he had been struck by lightning and that his heart had stopped, but there was no other explanation for what happened to him. The doctor had to be right. Maybe that was why he had had the dream or vision of his mother.

“It was touch and go for a bit, at least until we got you stabilized. Since then, you have been in a coma of sorts. Miss Carr and Metcalf have been here at the hospital the entire time. She saw you twitching and trying to talk in your sleep; that was when I decided to try and wake you.”

“Hmm, sounds pretty damn rough” Joshua mumbled.

“Yep, Son, it was… another thing, I had to ban your friend Hook from the hospital. He wanted to drag you out of that bed and wake you up before you was ready. He said something about a damn fishing trip!” the doctor exclaimed. “I thought that man had done lost his mind. I had some of your men; a Deputy Cook and Deputy Calvert stand guard at the entrance to the hospital in case he tried to slip back in here again.”

Joshua chuckled. “Leave it to Hook to stir up some trouble,” he mumbled. Just as he said it, James stuck his head in the door. “Speak of the devil.”

“Damnit, Hoss, you scared the shit outta me!” Hook exclaimed as he came toward the bed. He reached and grabbed Joshua’s hand, shook it, and gave him a shoulder hug.

“I’m too damn ornery to die,” Joshua mumbled. “Find my clothes for me, Hook.”

The doctor spit and sputtered saying that he was not ready to leave the hospital yet. Joshua informed him that he had been ready since he opened his eyes and that he was leaving and he did not care whether he had his approval or not.

James found his clothes and helped him put them on. Joshua noticed the burnt spot on the shoulder. When the doctor realized he was not going to be able to stop Joshua from leaving, he called for a wheelchair. Joshua objected to at first and tried to walk out of the room. His legs turned to jelly and he had to grab a hold of the bed for support.

“I can tell you right now, you won’t be able to walk that far on your own steam; at least not yet,” Hook said. When Joshua still made no move to get into the wheelchair James looked him in the eye and said, “If the doc wants you to ride out of here, you’re gonna ride. Now, get your ass in the damn chair or I will tote you out on my back. It really don’t matter to me whether you walk or I tote you, but I’d rather push you than tote you, Hoss. So get you ass in the chair!”

“You’re going to need fresh bandages,” the doctor yelled as they wheeled down the hallway toward the elevators.

“It’ll be taken care of, Doc, don’t worry,” Hook yelled over his shoulder, and then bent forward to whisper in Joshua’s ear. “They’ll play hell catching us once we make it to the elevator.” Hook chuckled and grinned. When the elevator door opened, he shoved Joshua into the elevator and then wheeled him around to face the opened doors.