Forty-Four Box Set, Books 1-10 (44) (25 page)

“Yeah, back in Montana on the Gallatin a few years ago. It wasn’t pretty, but nobody got seriously hurt. I had three people fall out and had to get them all back in. They were bruised and scared, but nothing else.”

“Scary,” I said.

“Just like we said in training, it happens sometimes. It’s what you do when they are in the river that counts. It’s all part of the adventure. Even here, on this little run we do all day. It’s not a complete Disneyland ride. There are risks.”

I nodded. I suddenly felt a little cold. It wasn’t that I didn’t know what Ty was saying, it was just that I didn’t think about it most days.

“It’s always good to be reminded though,” he said. “And to never get too comfortable on the river. It’s one of the most powerful forces of nature. Anything can happen out there.”

Our food came. We started eating and I felt a little better.

“You really like what you do,” I said. “River guide and ski instructor?”

“What can I say? It’s a charmed life. I want to do this for as long as possible. So what are your plans for the fall?”

It was strange, but for the first time ever, I didn’t tense up with that question. It felt like Ty was a good friend and it was normal for him to ask. Or maybe it was the casual way he had said it.

“I’m not really sure,” I said.

I told him about all the things I didn’t want to do. We both agreed that offices and suits shouldn’t be in our futures.

We finished eating.

“Dinner was epic,” Ty said.

“I knew you would like it,” I said, settling back into the booth.

I wanted to talk to him, but couldn’t think of a way to begin. I wasn’t sure if he knew about my accident, and if not I decided that I didn’t want him hearing it from someone else. I wanted to be the one to tell him.

But I was getting stuck on the words.

“Abby, what is it?”

He must have noticed my expression.

I inhaled. I hated talking about it.

“Did you know I was in an accident a few years ago?”

He was quiet for a minute, but his face did the talking.

“Yeah. They told us right after they decided to hire you. Something about you being in a car crash coming back from the mountain and it took you a long time to recover. I have to say though, I never would have known. I mean, you seem normal to me.” He paused a moment. “Sorry. That was stupid. What I meant was, the way they told us, I thought it was really serious. I was expecting you to have lots of scars, you know?”

“Yeah, that makes sense,” I said. “And they didn’t tell you anything else?”

“They also told us about your friend. The guy who died in the accident. I’m wondering if that’s the guy you were talking about. You know, when I first asked you out to dinner.”

My heart took off as I tried desperately to hold back the tears. I looked at Ty and nodded.

“Yeah,” I said. “Jesse. We’d been best friends since fourth grade.”

We sat quiet for a moment, both sinking in my deep pool of sadness. I stared out the window watching people walk by, trying to pull myself together.

“I’m so sorry, Abby,” he said. “You can always talk about him to me. I’m your friend.”

I nodded, but kept my eyes outside. I didn’t want to talk to Ty about Jesse, but I was glad that he offered and that he knew who Jesse was now. And how much I missed him.

“Okay,” I said. “I’ll be right back. I promise I won’t leave.”

I stood up and tried to smile. When I turned the corner I ran to the bathroom, washed my face, and tried to calm down. In a few minutes, I was okay and walked back out. Ty was waiting up at the front and had already paid the bill.

“Hey, I thought I was taking
you
out to dinner, remember?”

“No way,” he said. “This is my treat.”

“Thanks,” I said. “How about that hike?”

“Oh, yeah, I’d love to if you still want to go.”

“Let’s go.”

I wasn’t done talking. I decided to tell him everything else. That’s what good friends did. They told each other their stories.

CHAPTER 23

“You want to walk up the trail or take the road?” I asked, handing him a water bottle from the back seat.

I always kept a large supply of them for soccer. I took one too and we started walking toward the trail signs.

“Not the road,” Ty said. “Unless there’s some sort of advantage.”

“Only in winter when there aren’t any cars. Let’s go up the trail then.”

We started climbing.

“I still can’t believe you haven’t been to the top of Pilot Butte yet. You never even drove up?”

“No,” he said. “I’ve been meaning to, but I just haven’t had the chance.”

“It’s a little steep at the beginning, but it’ll get better in a few minutes,” I said.

Ty smiled. He didn’t seem to be struggling at all.

It was only about a mile to the top. We kept climbing and rounding the butte and in about 20 minutes we were standing at the observation platform. Three cars were parked and a few people were taking pictures. We read all the signs identifying the landmarks in the distance.

It was a perfect evening. The sky was still light and there were no clouds.

“Wow, you can see the entire Cascade Range from here,” Ty said.

“Yeah. It’s a great view.”

I pointed out some other things.

“This is amazing.”

As we headed back down, I started telling him more about the accident. The lake I had drowned in. The fact that I had been clinically dead for more than 40 minutes. How it had taken a long time to come back, both physically and mentally. And that I still couldn’t see colors.

Ty listened and didn’t say much of anything while I talked. We had made it almost all the way down by the time I finished.

“So you had one of those near death experiences?”

I checked on his energy waves. They were the same, white and shooting off around him. He wasn’t upset or bothered about any of it. He wasn’t making any judgments. I was relieved.

“Yeah,” I said. “Kate was at the hospital, sitting with my body and waiting for the morgue guy to come and get me when I woke up.”

“Oh, my God, that’s some serious stuff right there.”

I unlocked his door and walked around and got inside. As I started the car, Ty reached over and put his hand on mine.

“Thanks for telling me,” he said. “I mean it. That is something crazy you went through. Honestly, I had no idea. I’m really, really sorry about throwing you in the water. Now it’s making more sense. I feel like an idiot. I had no idea. They just said you were in a car accident.”

“No worries,” I said.

We drove back over to the rafting company, listening to the radio and not saying too much. When I pulled in next to his car and parked, he leaned over and gave me a hug.

“Thanks, Abby.”

“Hey, I’m the one who needs to thank you for dinner.”

“No, I mean thank you for telling me what happened,” he said. “It means a lot that you shared all that with me.”

I was glad that he knew now. It was a hard thing to talk about, especially with people I didn’t know so well. But Ty was different. It felt like he was a real friend and that I could trust him. Completely.

CHAPTER 24

Kate was leaving for Portland early Monday morning and Dr. Mortimer was going to be dropping off his stuff sometime during the day. She had already given him a key and the alarm code and stocked the refrigerator with some sort of green juice he liked to drink before work.

“Bye, Abby,” Kate whispered, sticking her head through my bedroom door.

It was still dark outside.

“Wait,” I said.

I got up and walked over to my desk and handed her a sketch of the woman I had drawn the night before. It wasn’t great, but at least it would give her an idea about what she looked like in a general sort of way.

“This will help. Remember, I’ll be sending over the pictures tonight, so look at them when you can and let me know. Also, if I were you, I wouldn’t… well, how should I put this?”

“I know, got it,” I said. “Don’t talk about any of this ghost business with Dr. Mortimer.”

“Yeah, it’s probably for the best. At least for now, if you know what I mean. Otherwise, he’ll ship you back to Dr. Krowe while I’m gone.”

I smiled.

“And remember that I’m staying with Erin. You have her phone number, right?”

“Yeah, I have everything. Say hi for me.”

“Okay.
Ciao
for now. I’ll be back tomorrow night. Hopefully we’ll learn some new things about your ghost.”

I was too wired to get back to sleep, so I poured a cup of coffee and sat in the living room watching the morning light fill up the room. It was exciting to think that we might actually make some progress and find out about the ghost.  

I thought about Ty as I got ready for work. He had texted me a couple times over the weekend just to say hi and tell me what he was doing. I had liked going out with him. It had been a good dinner and hike and I found myself thinking about him often. He really was a nice guy and I hoped that we could be friends. I hoped that it would be enough.

I got to work and saw him hanging out by the van.

“Hey, Abby,” he said, smiling.

“Hey.”

I helped him load up some gear as the other guides arrived. We got into the van and drove up to the river.

In my first group, a friendly family from Kansas with four little kids and a grandma were in my boat. I had a little trouble with the second group. Two teenagers were loud and obnoxious, but Ty helped me out with them, pulling them aside when we were scouting. I could hear him whispering that he would leave them there if they didn’t shape up. The boys stared at the river while he talked. I could tell they really wanted to go down the rapids and promised to behave.

I was a little tired as we pushed off for the final run. There were three couples from different states in the raft. They were all pretty quiet and reserved, but I didn’t mind. I could save my wildlife speech for the groups in the morning.

I noticed instantly that the water felt rougher and stronger than it had all day. Wild. Faster. Unsettled.

A strong current pulled us down the first set of rapids and I saw a new whirlpool forming on the right as we flew by. My stomach tensed and my heart raced.

“Be careful out there,” Ty whispered after pulling off to scout Big Eddy. “It feels different. Try to follow where I go and remember what we talked about at dinner. Keep your eyes open and prepare for the unexpected.”

“Got it.”

I still felt confident. I would have to be careful, but I was determined to get through the rest of the run smoothly.

We got back into the rafts and Ty went first. I followed from a distance. As I back paddled, I saw something flash up ahead in the thin layer of mist right before the big drop.

It was her. Standing in the middle of the river, her eyes large and furious, staring at me.

“Oh, my God,” I whispered, trying to catch my breath.

And then trying to breathe. The current was sweeping us forward. We were headed right toward her. She just stood there, in the middle of the river, full of rage, with those eyes.

Those eyes.

I had to refocus and pay attention to getting in the right channel and shooting through Big Eddy. But I started thinking about our training and what they had told us about a raft from another company hitting a boulder at a bad angle in these rapids and flipping. One of the tourists had nearly drowned and a kid broke a leg.

But it was too late to turn back. I had to figure it out, had to go forward.

A huge wave suddenly pushed us to the left sharply, rocking us and banging the raft up against the big boulder before the first drop, close to where she was standing. I yelled at my group to paddle and steered us straight again.

“Harder,” I shouted over the deafening sound of the water.

We had passed through her, but then she was up ahead again, standing on a large rock, overlooking the last drop. I whispered to her, pretty sure nobody on the boat could hear.

“Leave me
alone
,” I said.

But she just glared.

Suddenly the raft tilted and then turned around. We were backwards on the river. I pushed the paddle down into the water, trying to get us straight. But it was too late. I had to stop trying, because if we went down sideways now, the current would flip us.

My heart pounded in my chest. There was no choice but to go downriver backwards and blind and hope for the best.

“Paddles out,” I yelled at the tourists.

I turned around in my seat, watching and paddling the best I could. Water crashed over the sides of the raft. I couldn’t see anything, just large white waves flying up all around us. Then we dropped, listing badly to the right as we went full speed into the next wave.

“Damn it!” I said.

I knew it was out of my hands. The fast water took us down and there was nothing more to do but hope that we didn’t land in the whirlpool or hit a large boulder.

But I wasn’t as scared anymore. My breath was even now, and my nerves under control.

“We’re not going into the water,” I said to myself in a low voice. “Not today.”

Another drop.

“Everyone lean to the left,” I shouted. “Quick!”

We all leaned just in time. The final wave took us and spit us out into the calm section of the river, still facing backward.

Everybody cheered, including me, as I turned us around.

Ty had been watching us. He must have known I was having some trouble.

“Good job,” he said.

I weakly returned his thumbs up. My mouth was bone dry and I sat there, unable to move for a minute. I thanked everyone for listening so well. I could tell they were happy to be done with the rapids. I couldn’t blame them. I felt the same way.

But fear surged through me as I thought about her. She had seemed so angry and had distracted me right before the biggest set of rapids.

Had she done that on purpose? Had she wanted me to flip the raft? Or worse?