Towering (27 page)

I felt a slight movement and saw the flash of a light. A flashlight. On the keychain. I pressed it again, and a tiny light shone. The floors, the walls, all made of gray concrete. The room was empty, the size of a closet. I walked to the door and spent several minutes trying first one key, then the next, in the old lock. I took the flashlight off the keychain, then tried to slide the big car key into the space between the door and the wall, to jimmy the lock. But since I couldn’t simultaneously see the lock and use both hands to try and open it, it was hard. I stuffed the keys back into my pocket.

In the pitch-dark room, I could hear the waterfall, people moving around. Who were they? Henry and Carl’s employees? They seemed more like captives, prisoners. Should I try to get their attention? Would they help? Or would they turn on me?

I didn’t know. I decided to think about it. I had time.

Then, in the darkness, I heard the sweetest voice, the only voice I wanted to hear.

“Wyatt!”

“Rachel!” Was she here? I wanted but didn’t want her to be. What if she was hurt, in danger?

“Where are you?” I asked.

And, somehow, I knew she’d left her tower to come to me. In fact, I sensed her in the freezing cold, walking through the snow to find me. She was walking toward a road, a road where these guys might be looking for her.

“Rachel.” I whispered it. “Be careful. God, be careful.”

“Wyatt?”

“Call Mama.” Could she hear me? I couldn’t tell. “Rachel, call Mama.”

I sensed her shivering. Then, I heard her voice. “She is coming. But where are you?”

Could she really hear me? “The Red Fox Inn. In Gatskill.” I began to shiver myself. It was like I was with her, inside her. “But Rachel, be careful. Don’t go with anyone but Mama.”

I hoped she heard me.

Walking had, indeed, been keeping me warm. Now, in the still dusk, I was cold, colder than I have ever been. My hair had grown still longer, and I gathered it around me, realizing as I did that it would impede me, make it impossible for me to run from anyone who wished me ill. I brought the scissors with me when I left, in case of trouble. I could cut it. Yet, I suspected it had grown for a reason, as it had grown before to enable me to escape. I remembered, also, the biblical story of Samson, whose strength had come from his long hair. Could it be that my hair would empower me? That it grew when I needed it?

I heard a sound, a car flying past. Was it Mama? Or someone else, looking for me? No, it was gone; it was nothing. But the car had created a wind, which bit into my arms, my shoulders. I gathered my hair around me. I hoped Mama would come soon!

I remembered something else. When my hair first began to grow, that was when I first began to dream about Wyatt, had first sensed he was coming. That was why I had made the rope, to allow myself to escape. That was also when he had, he said, begun to hear me singing.

Did my hair do that?

Only one way to find out.

I looked around, to make certain no one was there, that no one was coming, looking for me.

Then, I opened my mouth and yelled with all my voice.

“Wyatt!”

“Rachel!” His voice. It was coming to me on the wind.

“Wyatt?” Still, I could not believe it was him.

“Call Mama,” his voice said.

I answered him. “She is coming. But where are you?”

“The Red Fox Inn. In Gatskill.”

The Red Fox Inn! I remembered him mentioning that. I was shivering so hard, but through my chattering teeth, I heard him say, “Rachel.”

It was so soft I could barely hear it. But I whispered back, “Yes, love?”

“You have to get the key.”

The key? Had he said the key? What key? “I don’t understand.”

But suddenly, the wind was frantic, furious, blowing snow up around me, whipping it into my face. And then, another car, a red one, big. What I thought might be called a truck. Yes, truck. It was huge, and it was slowing, stopping near me. Oh, no. Was it someone, someone come to take me? I tried to crouch as low as I could, hide behind the snow-banked bushes, but I knew that if someone were looking for me, he would find me.

The key! I remembered, now, the key in the hairbrush. Danielle had shown me. Or was it a dream? Still it might be important.

“Rachel,” I said, “you have to get the key.”

A pause. “I don’t understand.”

“The key. The key! It’s in my car, outside the Red Fox. It’s inside the hairbrush on the front seat. I think it opens the door or something here. You have to get it. Or, better yet, go to the police with it.” Because, even as I said it, I knew I didn’t want her coming here. If they’d locked me up, what would they do to her?

“Rachel?”

No answer. But even though I was inside, trapped, I heard a whistle of wind in trees. Nothing else.

“Rachel?”

I wondered if the brothers were outside, if they could hear me. But if they could, they would probably think I was some idiot, babbling to myself. Still, I lowered my voice.

“Rachel?”

No answer. And then, I sensed that the reason she wasn’t answering was because her attention had turned to something else.

The truck came closer. It was huge, and it was terrifying. I knew it would swoop down upon me, like a falcon or owl, and carry me away. I huddled under my hair, digging deeper, deeper into the snowbank.

“Rachel!”

“Mama!”

She ran toward me, slipping on the snow, arms outstretched. I rose to meet her. When she came closer, she gasped, stopped. Staring at me.

“That coat! It’s . . .”

“Danielle’s—my mother’s. I know. I’m sorry! Wyatt gave it to me. I shouldn’t have snuck out with him, but I didn’t know, didn’t know it would cause so much trouble!”

And part of me was sorry, but part was not because it had to happen. It had to. Everything couldn’t just stay the same.

She was staring at me as if I had grown a second head. “Your hair?”

“It just started growing.” I clutched it around me.

“Today?”

“No. I mean, not only. Weeks ago, when I asked you for the scissors. That was when Wyatt came. I made a rope for him to climb. And then, it stopped, but it started again today. I don’t know why. It’s like it grows when I need it. I wondered why I needed it today.”

On the road, another car roared by. Mama and I both started and crouched down. It passed. She grabbed my hand. “No time for this now. We must go—now, before anyone finds you!”

I tried to run, even walk, to her car, but my hair was caught on something. A branch. I yelped, and reached to untangle it. Mama helped me and then, her holding my hair, we walked to the car.

It was nearly dark, and a tight squeeze with all my hair. She reached over me to push a button which, I guessed, locked the door. I sat in silence as she locked her own, then fastened herself into the car. She looked back over her shoulder, then backed out onto the road.

“Best to put the hood over your head,” she whispered. “It will be dark soon, and they won’t know this car—it’s the neighbors’, but best to be safe.”

I obeyed. I felt safer—a bit—now that Mama was here. I could smell the scent of her house on the coat. Now, I knew it was her house. Yet, I knew that there was something I, and only I, would have to do to find Wyatt. I pulled my hair toward me. Perhaps I should braid it. Yes, I would do that. I began to sift through the hair, looking for the ends, so I could arrange it behind me.

I knew she wanted to ask me more questions, why I left, and how. There would be a time to answer those questions, or maybe there wouldn’t. But now, I didn’t want to talk about it.

I breathed in. “He said . . .” There was a car behind us, close behind, which seemed strange on such a deserted road. Its lights glowed bright in the mirror between our heads. I saw Mama’s hands on the steering wheel, gripping, her knuckles white, striped red. I sunk down in my seat, still arranging my hair.

The car roared around us at incredible speed. Soon, I could only see the red lights on the back of it as it disappeared into the night.

Mama laughed, a short bark. “Crazy driver.” Then, she turned to me. “I don’t even know where we’re going.”

“Maybe . . . the police?” I wasn’t sure whether this was the way to go, but in books, people called the police when there was trouble. Wyatt had mentioned that he should have called the police about his friend Tyler.

But Mama shook her head. “I’m afraid not. The police were . . . not helpful when Danielle disappeared.” She pursed her lips together. “They thought she had simply run away . . . or perhaps, that I killed her. And I can’t take you to my house. It’s no hiding place, and we can’t hide anymore anyway. No, we will have to settle this ourselves.”

I had feared, or maybe anticipated that. On both sides of the car was blackness, black trees, black rocks, black space. Mama was barely a shadow beside me. “I think he is at the Red Fox Inn, in Gatskill. I heard . . .” I stopped. It sounded crazy.

“What?”

“Sometimes, I can hear his voice in my head. And he can hear mine. I know he can. That is how he found me.”

Mama nodded. “I had suspected as much. That’s where I was going, in any case. The Red Fox Inn was where it all began.”

“Where what began?” I found the ends of my hair, and I arranged it, as best I could, into three sections. I began to braid it as close to my head as possible, though I knew it would grow.

There were no cars on the road now. It was so quiet, so dark.

“All of it,” Mama said. “I suppose it is time to tell you. Perhaps I should have told you long ago.”

The scary car was long past, but her knuckles were still white. I wanted to embrace her, but I feared it would distract her. “Tell me what, Mama?”

She sighed. “Once, when I was a much younger woman, I had a difficult life. I took care of my elderly parents, worked hard at a job, and didn’t have much hope in my life.”

“I’m sorry, Mama.”

“Then, one day, a smiling stranger came along and I believed myself in love. He offered me a magical leaf. He said that, if I ate it, I would be happier, more alive. I ate it, and so I was. I saw wonderful visions, even felt like I could fly, and when I ate that leaf, which was a drug called rhapsody, I felt like I had no problems, even when the stranger left. But then, there was no more rhapsody, either, and I was miserable. I tried other drugs, but they weren’t the same. I went through horrible withdrawal.”

She looked at me, then away, and I realized she was embarrassed. I decided to say nothing, so she could go on.

She did. “Just at that time, I met a wonderful man, your grandfather, and we fell in love. I told him about the rhapsody, and I found that, with his help, I was able to control my urges. We were married and were very happy. Soon, I was expecting a baby, which would be the culmination of my joy. My husband’s name was Daniel, so we planned to name the baby Daniel if it was a boy, Danielle if it was a girl.”

I nodded. She meant my mother, Danielle. I continued to work on my hair, though it was already nearly a foot from my head now.

“And then, my husband was killed in an accident. I was all alone, frightened, no family, no friends. I only wanted to return to the one friend that had kept me company before, rhapsody. I had heard on the street of a secret place to get the drug underneath the Red Fox Inn. I went there, and I stole it. I was, of course, caught, and the owner, a man named Carl, said that he would tell the authorities, who would take my baby from me. I cried and cried, my remorse was so deep. Finally, he agreed to let me go. But he looked at the baby, who had such startling blue eyes, almost the color of rhapsody flowers themselves, and he said, ‘I have one condition. When she is seventeen, she must come here to work for me.’