Ashlyn's Radio (27 page)

“Yeah?”

“The train, the conductor … I really had no idea how hard it must have been for you over these years to resist his pull. But I do now. I’m sorry for ever thinking you were weak, even for a moment.”

Rachel’s head whipped around. “What do you mean
you know
? What did you do, Ashlyn Caverhill?”

“The conductor came today, Rach.”

“Today?” Rachel’s eyebrows drew together. “But I don’t understand … how?”

“You know I had that migraine, right?”

 Rachel nodded.

“Well, when I was walking home from school — it was maybe 10:30 or so — the sky got all black. I mean, black as night, and the wind started whipping.”

“Omigod! We noticed that at school. We were in class, but you could see out the windows that it was like dusk out there. Someone asked if it was a solar eclipse, but I figured we were in for one hell of a hailstorm. Then it suddenly cleared again, and everyone forgot it.”

“It was the conductor’s doing,” Ashlyn said. “I’m sure it was his evil that darkened the sky and allowed him to come.”

“You’re kidding? In broad daylight? That’s
never
happened before. Well, as far as I know,” she qualified. “So then what?”

Ashlyn pressed her palms together, not surprised to find they were sweating again. “He … he started working on me. You know, about how everyone would be better off without me. My mother, my grandmother…. And he said how I’m the one who caused my father to do what he did.”

“Oh, Ashlyn, that’s not true!”

“But it felt true when he was saying it,” she said. “It felt as obvious as anything. And that voice!”

Rachel’s face looked drained of all blood, which made that horrible bruise show up even more lividly. “Did he offer you a ticket?”

“Yes. And … oh, Rach, I almost took it. Before I even knew what I was doing, I was reaching for it….”

“But you didn’t take it.” Rachel’s eyes welled. “You’re so much stronger than me, Ash. You didn’t have friends there to pull you back, but you still resisted.”

“No, you’re wrong! I did have a friend there. My father.” Ashlyn’s throat was thick with tears, and she barely got the last words out.

“Patrick Murphy?” Rachel’s eyes saucered. “Your father’s … shade … spoke to you?”

“Yeah. So you see, I’m no stronger than you are. I just had someone looking out for me.”

This time, it was Rachel who put her arms around Ashlyn. “Oh, Ash, I’m so glad. It would so suck if you’d gotten on that train. You know I’d have had to get on, too, if you did.”

Ashlyn pulled back, appalled. “Don’t say that! That wouldn’t have made me feel one bit better.”

“I know. But what else could I do?”

Ashlyn sighed. “I guess we’re just going to have to look out for each other, okay?”

“Okay. And Caden too.”

“And Caden too,” she agreed.

They sat in silence for a while. Finally Rachel asked, “Have you told Maudette any of this yet?”

“Good God, no! She’d have me enrolled in some boarding school on the other side of the country if she had any idea.”

Another pause. Rachel scuffed her foot on the small rug beside the bed, absently brushing the nap in the opposite direction as Ashlyn herself sometimes did.

“You know,” she said, “apart from the fact that I would just hate it and Caden would be crushed, that’s not such a bad idea.”

Ashlyn blinked. “You want me to go?”

“Hell no! Didn’t I just say I’d hate it?” Rachel blew out an exasperated breath. “But Ash, he came for you during the day. He came when you were alone. Which tells me he wants you on that train bad.”

“I sorta picked up on that.”

“Omigod!”

Another skipped heartbeat. “What?”

“He’s afraid of you!”

“Um … no. He definitely isn’t.”

Rachel took Ashlyn’s hand. “Oh, but I think he is. He must be if he’s this desperate to get you on the train. Now we just have to figure out why. What’s so special about you, Ashlyn Caverhill?"

Ashlyn snorted. “You tell me when you’ve got it figured out, okay? Because—” She paled. “Oh, crap.”

“What? Is Maudette back?” Rachel dashed to the window to scan for Maudette’s SUV.

“The radio.” Her voice felt like a whisper, but Rachel obviously had no trouble hearing it. She strode back to the bed.

“It’s playing? You can hear it now?”

“Yes.”

“You’re not really going out to the kennel, are you?”

“No.” Ashlyn was already on her feet, heading for the door.

Rachel caught her at the top of the stairs. “Ash, promise me you’ll tell me whatever the radio says. Everything. No matter what. Okay?”

Ashlyn hesitated. She needed to get down to that radio pronto, so she could catch the lyrics. But she couldn’t just promise to tell Rachel everything. Could she?

Rachel’s voice hardened. “It’s talking about me, Ash. I deserve to know what it’s saying,” she said. “Besides, there can’t be any secrets between us. I’ve told you mine.”

“Rachel….”

“Dammit, Ashlyn, I’m keeping
your
secrets, aren’t I? I’m not running to Maudette to tell her you almost boarded that train, or that the conductor came for you in the middle of the day. I’m
trusting
you to handle that situation. You have to do the same for me. That’s what friends do.”

Crap! She had to go and play the mutual trust card.

“Okay, okay, you win! I’ll tell you everything. But we have to
hurry
!”

She needn’t have urged haste. Rachel beat her to the basement by a good margin.

W
HEN THEY REACHED THE
bottom of the stairs, Ashlyn reached up and pulled the chain on the room’s single bare light bulb. The harsh light cast the usual sharp, swinging shadows for a moment until the light stilled, and Ashlyn felt Rachel studying her closely. Breathing shallowly, she forced her feet to carry her to stand in front of the radio, not even trying to hide the fear from her friend. Why bother? She couldn’t even pretend composure with that damned song playing on and on.

The dial was glowing, at least to Ashlyn’s eyes. Some horrible compulsion made her reach out and touch the radio’s gleaming, unblemished surface. She didn’t know what she expected to feel — pure evil or something. Instead, what she felt through her fingertips was the vibration of each boom of the music. In her fingers, in the hollow cavities of her body, in her bones, she felt every beat of the familiar tune behind those cursed lyrics.

“You promised to tell me
everything
, Ash,” Rachel said.

Ashlyn didn’t hear the words over the radio so much as read Rachel’s lips and the anxious look in her eyes. Ashlyn nodded. Then she turned back to the radio, and gave it her full attention. Not that she could do otherwise; the radio demanded it.

The tune it played was the same as before — the bastardized version
of Coming ’Round the Mountain.
But the lyrics had changed yet again from the last time she’d been down here. Yet they matched the bits and pieces she’d caught in the yard the morning the police had brought her home.

There’ll be another time, when she comes.

When she comes!

There’ll be another time when she comes.

When she comes!

Oh, there’ll be another time.

There’ll be another time.

There’ll be another time.

When she comes.

Well, the train ain’t gonna break, till she comes.

Till she comes!

That train ain’t gonna break, till she comes.

Till she comes!

Till it meets the end of the line,

There’ll always be another time,

She just has to get on board, when it comes

Ashlyn backed away on trembling legs.

“Ash?” Rachel trailed her.

She sat down heavily on the second step from the bottom of the stairs. Rachel stood there, waiting expectantly.

Ashlyn, had to tell her. She’d promised.

And as the radio started over on the song, Ashlyn sang along. Word for word, she repeated it, her eyes never leaving Rachel’s as the chorus unfolded.

Rachel’s battered face grew paler with every line repeated.

“He … he wants me,” she said, in a trembling voice. “The conductor wants me. He’s not going to quit, Ash. He won’t break … he won’t rest until he has me.”

Ashlyn couldn’t summon reassuring words quickly enough. There were few to give. Instead she said, “We’ll … we’ll get you out of Prescott Junction. You can go. You can just—”

“I can just
what
? There’s nowhere to run. Not for a girl like me. Nowhere to go. Maybe this … maybe this is to be my fate. I’ve fought it for so long. Maybe I’m not supposed to fight the pull anymore.” Rachel’s words were calm, but in sharp contrast, her fingers clawed at her skirt, digging into the fabric, digging into her thighs. Hurting herself again. Trying to draw her blood.

Ashlyn grabbed her hands. “We don’t know that. We don’t—”

“You heard the radio!” Rachel shrieked, her calm control shattered. “They’ll be another time when she comes. That train ain’t gonna break.” Tears poured down her face and her shoulders sank. Ashlyn could feel the draining to defeat as she held her hands. And oh, God, that sensation scared her more than anything that had happened yet.

“There’ll always be another time.” Rachel said. She pulled her hands back, and Ashlyn let them go. “No matter what Dad says … no matter how many times he says he’s sorry, there’ll always be another time when he does these things to me. It’s always about betrayal. My whole life….” She touched her cheek, and then her chest as if Arch Riley had pounded her there too. “The … the radio knows it. Everyone knows it! There’s only one way out for me. Only one ticket.”

“No! You promised!” Ashlyn shouted at her. Not just to drown out the radio, but in her desperation to reach Rachel as her friend spiraled down into desolation and hopelessness.

And as if perfectly accepting now, and eerily in perfect sync with the song as it played all over again on the radio, Rachel sang the last verse. She only changed the pronoun, making it completely her own. “I just have to get on board when it comes,” she said helplessly. “I … I don’t think the choice is mine.”

Ashlyn tried to hold back the swelling panic. She’d kept her word and told Rachel every single thing she’d heard, but what if doing so was what pushed her over the edge? What if repeating the radio’s message finally propelled Rachel onto the train, like Maudette had pushed Polly all those decades ago when she’d told her the damnable fate the radio claimed for her? Ashlyn’s heart thumped hard in her chest, but it seemed to be pumping icy dread.

“The choice is always yours!” she protested. “The song … it doesn’t have to mean that at all! Rachel, you just don’t—”

Ashlyn’s words shocked to silence. The song had ended and the announcer was back, segueing into the Prescott Junction news.

The familiar dark voice was silky and smooth, and Ashlyn turned toward it.

“What is it?” Rachel asked.

“Another … another news broadcast.”

“Tell me,” Rachel commanded. “Tell me everything you hear. You have to, now more than ever!”

Ashlyn wet her lips. Dare she? Oh God, dare she not? If Rachel thought she was lying, or modifying what she heard, would that be the final betrayal in her life to send her to the train?

The announcer began. And swallowing past the hard lump in her throat, Ashlyn did too, her words following the original ones in staccato bursts.

In our social news tonight, Anthony Berg is no longer living with his family. After his involvement with the late Paulette Degagne came to light recently, his wife sent him packing. Apparently this wasn’t the first time that Berg had cheated on his wife, but Charlotte Berg (soon to be Charlotte Lee once again) says it will definitely be the last.

“It’s what the snake deserves,” Rachel mumbled, drying her eyes on her sleeve.

Ashlyn nodded. That one was okay. Well, not for Anthony Berg, but she didn’t feel sorry for him either. But that little bit of social gossip was fine to repeat to Rachel. She could only hope the other news items would be equally harmless.

“I’ll know if you’re lying,” Rachel said, as if reading her thoughts.

The announcer’s voice filled the room again, at least for Ashlyn. But this time as she listened, and this time as she spoke, the jolt of fear she felt surpassed the last one. Rachel grabbed her hands as Ashlyn repeated after the velvet voice, and the two girls clung tight.

The train’s been seen in town again, with that dark conductor. He waved his ticket in the air for his special passenger. And her father hollering as he does, and what with everything folks in Prescott Junction think about her, is it any wonder that she got on board the train?

“See?” Rachel whispered. “Didn’t I tell you….”

Ashlyn shook her head. “Wait … just wait,” she said. There’s more….”

And we have one final story tonight. This one about Ashlyn Caverhill. It seems the conductor isn’t the only one she’s defying these days. Her grandmother, Maudette came home and caught her in the basement listening to the radio, when she was supposed to be out in the kennel office. And Ashlyn wasn’t alone in that basement. Rachel Riley was down there with her, further angering Maudette. And disappointing the old woman — why it practically broke her heart.