Solitary: A Novel (29 page)

I listen to random songs on my iPod. I love that out of 20,000 songs there can be one chosen for any particular moment. The reality is that usually the random songs are the ones that have the most meaning.

Even when things are random, they can still be profound.

The trees alongside of me stand like soldiers at arms. The road is visible for only a few feet in front of me, the sun somewhere rising but still unseen. I feel a mist covering my face as I pedal my bike.

I know where I'm going even if I can't see that far in front of me.

I like this feeling. If I can't see that far ahead of me, nobody else can see me either.

Well, maybe someone can see me now. But if He's really there He's been ignoring me for long enough, so a little longer isn't going to really matter.

When I reach the road turning to Jocelyn's, I decide to get off my bike and walk it the rest of the way.

I'm not going to go up to the door this time.

This time I'm simply going to be the lurker, checking to see who's at her house and hoping that I might get a chance to see her.

Maybe she'll be taking an early morning stroll looking for berries and will suddenly see me.

Right.

I walk down the driveway in the gloom and damp forest and see the house in a distance. I pull my bike up into the trees and then rest it against one, finding a place where I can hide out and spy.

Maybe this is what someone is doing to me. Who knows.

The sun settles in above me, above the dewy trees and fog-swept limbs. It seems like I wait for an hour or more, but I finally see what I'm hoping to see.

Not Jocelyn, but her wonderful step-uncle.

Wade Sims steps out of the door looking groggy and half dead. He walks to the small white car parked behind the Jeep. He starts it up and turns around, heading down the driveway and toward the road that probably leads him to work.

I know this is my chance.

Maybe Jocelyn's aunt is there-who knows. But I have to get to Jocelyn and tell her what happened yesterday.

She's the only one who might know.

Maybe she'll be able to explain who did this.

I sneak through the woods on the outskirts of the cleared area around her house. I exit along the side where only one window sits. I wish I knew which room belonged to Jocelyn. Then I'd do the good of pebble-against-the-window trick. I wouldn't even have to climb a tree to get to her.

I'm almost to her house when I hear the screeching of the front door. This sends me diving to the ground like some marine storming a beach. I land pitifully in plain view of the door, not close enough to the side of the house for it to shield me.

The figure on the top of the steps hovers as I bury my face into the long grass. As if that's going to help.

"Chris?"

I stare up and see a face looking both confused and amused.

"What are you doing?"

I'm sprawled out on her lawn early in the morning.

"Hi," I say.

"You're lucky, you know?"

"Why?"

"He just left," she says.

"I know. I'm dumb, but I'm not that dumb."

"Come on in. How'd you get here?"

"Bike."

"You're up early this morning."

"There's a good reason."

"Really?"

"Yeah." I reach the steps below her. "Well, maybe not good, but reason enough for me to come see you.,,

"Everything okay?"

"No."

"Come on in. My aunt's still asleep. Long night last night."

"You too, huh?"

Jocelyn rolls her eyes and keeps the door open for me.

As we enter the small house with the kitchen there to the right as you come in, I notice that Jocelyn is wearing her pajamas. They're plaid pants that match the blue and pink top.

Just seeing her like this ... it makes me stop.

She's adorable. She's like a Christmas present I've always wanted to find in the morning sitting under the tree.

Don't you dare say that to her, Chris.

"Can I get you anything?" she asks in a way that sounds like she's used to people showing up on her lawn first thing in the morning.

"No."

"You sure? You look kinda sweaty."

"Well-yeah, anything is fine."

"Helen usually makes coffee, and sometimes I have a little of it to wake up. I'm not much of a morning person."

"You look like one to me."

Her hair is wild, but only makes her look more attractive. She pours me a glass of orange juice and asks if that's okay. I take a sip and still feel nervous, wondering if we're being watched or overheard.

"What's going on?"

"Something happened last night. To my mom."

I tell Jocelyn what happened, explaining it in a voice slightly above a whisper.

"Who do you think did it?" she asks me.

"I was-I thought that maybe you might know."

"What? Why?"

"Because of last night. I got an email from someone telling me to stay away from you. That what happened to my mom was just a warning."

Jocelyn's expression changes. It almost like she's seeing someone die right in front of her.

"Do you think-maybe your step-uncle could be involved?"

"Wade?" Jocelyn shakes her head. "No. He's stupid and violent, but no-it wasn't him."

"Then who-why, Jocelyn?"

"You shouldn't have come over."

"I wanted to tell you. I needed to tell somebody."

"You didn't tell your mom?"

"No."

"Good."

"What's this about?"

Jocelyn stands up and moves to a window, looking outside. Then she holds up a finger to me, walks into the family room, and is gone for a while.

When she comes back, she's changed into some jeans and a sweatshirt.

"Come on," she says.

"Where are we going?"

"Outside."

"Out to where?"

"Just follow me," she says.

I follow her to the back of her lot and through the woods. The sun is warming things up a little, but it's still shadowy in the forest. After walking a few minutes up a small hill, I can see that we're following a trail. It soon turns into another, larger trail-almost like an old road that's been abandoned and forgotten about. It's level and heads through the woods.

We walk for a long time. Jocelyn is hauling, moving several feet ahead of me and not in the mood to talk. Every time I even try, she just tells me to be patient, to wait, to keep going.

I don't even know how long we walk. Maybe an hour, maybe more.

The road slowly but surely edges upward. We finally reach a place where the woods and the road open at the top of a clear mountain. She stops and holds an arm in front of my chest, stopping me from going any further.

I look out and see a small grassy crest in a shape of a dome.

"What's this?"

"We can't go any farther. I don't want to be seen. But if we were to keep walking up that hill, you'd find a series of large boulders with lots of little flat stones scattered all around them.

I look out, seeing the bright sky in the shadows of the trees. There's nothing ominous about what I'm looking at, yet the way Jocelyn talks builds terror inside of me.

"In the center of the large rocks is a fire pit."

I'm tempted to crack a joke because all of this is too much for me. But I keep my mouth shut and listen.

"Those stones-I believe, no, I know that they're basically gravestones. It's a cemetery up here."

"Really?"

"Yeah. The stones have inscriptions. Stuff I can't read or make out. But they're all kinda the same. And the fire-it's been used before. It was used shortly before Stuart Algiers went missing."

I look at Jocelyn.

I swear, if it were anybody else-and I mean anybody-I would laugh in their face.

"What are you saying?"

"I'm saying that-this is all going to sound crazy, but whatever I'm telling you because I'm almost positive. I believe that Stuart Algiers was killed up here."

"Stuart-the one Poe was dating?"

"Yeah. Sometime around Christmas."

"How do you know?"

"Because of some of the things he told me. He didn't want anybody to know, especially Poe, but he told me. He told me about how the stone showed up in his bed one day and how the warnings continued and then he disappeared."

"What stone?" I ask.

"The stone that's out there. He showed it to me. I found it, Chris. I found that very stone. It's one that fits in your hand-a heavy, flat stone."

"And you think, what-someone left it for him as a warning?"

"I don't think it's a warning. I think it's like-a notice or something like that. A warning is to prevent something from happening. But there was never any intention of preventing what happened."

"How do you know he was killed?"

"He just disappeared. Just like that. And this town-this cursed, wretched little town-they didn't want anybody to know. I went to the police right afterward and told them everything. I told them stuff I haven't told anybody. I told them that Stuart was afraid because all these strange things were happening to him. They said it didn't make sense, and I know. But I told them to check this place out. They did and found nothing."

"But how do you know?"

"I spent one night digging, Chris. I found enough to know that there are bodies under there."

"Shut up."

"I'm serious."

"Then did you-you have to tell somebody."

"I did. I told the cops. Then suddenly everything changed. I was told to back off-guess in that case I was warned. And then sometime this summer, the same thing happened to me."

"What?"

"I went into my room and found one of those stones on my bed."

I stare at her and feel the air leaking out of me.

"And what's happened since?"

"What do you mean what's happened?" she says in an angry voice. "Nothing. Absolutely nothing. Except that a lot of people have started acting strange. As if they know. But of course I can't prove anything. I can't scream out about finding a rock in my bed, you know?"

"There's no way ... you really think that Stuart was killed?"

"I didn't find his body...." She stops and shivers and lets out a groan. "But I found part of a skeleton. And I know if someone came in and dug up all around this place, they'd find a lot more. I know that's where Stuart is."

"But why? What'd he do?"

"Nothing. Absolutely nothing."

"Then why?"

Jocelyn breathes in and looks at me. "What if it has nothing to do with Stuart except that he's a sacrifice?"

"A what?"

I'm not following this. My brain is on slow and is struggling to keep up.

"A sacrifice."

"Like for some cult or something like that?"

"Don't give me that look," Jocelyn says.

"What look?"

"A look that says I'm crazy."

"I didn't."

"You're giving it right now."

"This is just-all of this is crazy."

"Is it crazy that your mother was knocked out just to warn you?"

"Yeah, but-"

"But what? Somebody doesn't want you hanging out with me. Why would that be?"

I start putting the pieces together, but I don't like the picture that's forming.

"No."

"Chris-nobody knows about this. I didn't go back to the cops, because ever since I did, my life's been a living hell. I don't trust anybody. Aunt Helen-she's not involved in any of this, but I don't want her getting hurt. And you-I didn't want anybody else involved in this."

"Involved in what?"

"I don't know. That's the thing. I sound-I know I sound like a crazy person. I think half the time I am a crazy person."

"I just don't get-who-why?"

"Stuart Algiers told me that stuff in confidence, and he felt the same way. He saw things. He was experiencing stuff-"

"Like what?"

"Like-omens. Dark stuff."

"Have you?"

"Yeah."

I wait for her to tell me more.

"I just don't want you getting hurt," she says.

"Me? You don't want me getting hurt?"

"Or anybody else."

"What about you?"

"I don't know. I'm still trying to figure that out."

I grab her hand, then glance out at the grassy ridge beyond us. "This is crazy. Beyond crazy. Nothing's going to happen to you."

"Don't."

"Don't what?"

"I don't need you to be a hero."

I laugh. "A hero? You think that's what I'm trying to be?"

"Every guy has to save his woman. That's such a tired cliche."

"I'm not trying to be `every guy,' and I'm not trying to live up to some stupid cliche. I don't want anything to happen to you for selfish reasons. You got that?"

"You can't do anything about it."

"I know I can't help it, but I'm serious, Jocelyn, and I mean this with everything I have-I love you. I can't do anything about that, but that doesn't mean someone's going to take that away from me."

She looks up at me and smiles and exhales.

"Chris."

She wraps herself in my arms and holds me tight.

"Nobody's going to do anything to you. And I mean it. And if we have to run away or dig a hole and hide inside, I don't care. We'll figure something out."

"You're not a part of this."