Castles (3 page)

I don't know exactly what possessed me at that point, but I smacked Cade across the face as hard as I could. He fell to the side, his cheeks brushing a barrel cactus on the way down. If people in the trailer park didn't hear my pleas for him to stop, Cade's cries were certainly heard.

I watched Cade's body quiver as he cried and waited until there was little more than a soft whimper. Michael and Justin—who later would tell me I was out of line—stood still and watched with me.

Cade finally pushed himself off the ground and looked up at me. A few scratches ran across his now bright red cheek.

"We say nothing, Cade," I finally said.

Cade nodded slowly and stood up. He was going to keep his promise.

I remember my dreams more often than most people, I think. They are vivid reminders of some past life dropped into surreal settings—school days sitting behind a desk on a beach of purple clay or playing with the neighbor kids on the back of a rhinoceros. I learned early on—probably when I was seven or eight—to wake up and consciously remember every detail I could.

"Write it down," Grandma would say. "You can sell it later."

I tried that for a few years, but after Mama read my journal to one of her boyfriends, I stopped cold. No one else needed to understand what went on inside my head when I slept, just as they didn't need to know what I felt about them.

I started writing again when I was twelve.

The dream I had the night we stumbled across the body in the Bus was surreal, of course, but it was also memorable in other ways. I met people I don't think I'd ever seen before, walking around the Bus in circles, holding hands and singing songs I didn't know. They would stop on occasion, look at me and laugh, then continue on in their little carousel.

One of the faces in the crowd looked at me longer than any of the others. There was something recognizable about the man—maybe in the way he walked or what he wore or how his eyes would speak volumes to me each time he rounded the corner of the Bus and caught my gaze. I don't know for sure if he was the body in the Bus, but my thoughts have always gone that way.

The next evening, a storm smacked into our trailer park. I'd found the cupboard to be too small to hide in, so I'd started to crawl under the table. Mama would always look at me whenever she was home and just shake her head. I could imagine the anger in her eyes, but I feared nature more than her wrath. Didn’t matter: she wasn't home that night.

I sat under the table with my knees pulled to my chest. I think this was the first time I really wondered what I was doing. Here I was, a mature nine year old who'd just been witness to a dead body. What did nature have against me that I feared it so much?

Nervously, I crawled out from under the table. Mama wasn't home to witness the birth of her daughter from the cocoon of fear I'd been so wrapped up in, but I knew Grandma would probably tell her. I thought for a moment of going to the window and watching the dust pound the side of the trailer, but I never made it that far. All I could do was stand against the side of a wall in the kitchen and wait.

At least I wasn't under the table.

When the winds finally died down, I took a few cautious steps toward the front door. Grandma was outside in her chair, rocking back and forth. As she rocked, I heard her hum softly.

"Grandma?" My voice stopped both her hum and her rocking.

"Come here, Maggie." She turned back and looked at me through the screen door. "The storm is over."

I stepped onto the porch and sat down next to her. There was still a pretty strong breeze and the smell of rain and dust was in the air. The sky had turned a reddish brown.

"Did you hear the wind talk, Maggie?"

"No, Grandma. I didn't listen."

"Well, well. You really should." She looked down at me and brushed her hand through my hair. "You didn't hide under the table this time."

"No I didn't."

Grandma was proud of me. She didn't have to say it for me to know. Inside, I felt more comfort emanating from her than I think I'd ever felt from anyone else.

"What did the wind say, Grandma?"

"Oh . . ." She took her hand back and pulled the afghan around her a little tighter. "Something about a secret you're keeping."

I didn't know at the time, but Grandma had always known where I was and what I was doing. She told me a few months later that she'd woken up from her nap and sat outside on the patio, watching the boys and me run from the Bus. I don't know if she saw me hit Cade.

"The wind knows a lot of things, Maggie. You can't keep it all to yourself."

I swallowed and looked out past the fence. The sun had set, but in the red glow of the dust tainted sky I could see the outline of the Bus.

For the next few nights, I dreamt of the Bus and the carousel of singing men. The one who looked at me for longer than anyone else had moved from the line and stood to the side. Always he looked at me, and although I wished he'd speak, he never said a word. He smiled, though, and I appreciated that.

I still wondered if he was the man I'd seen in the Bus. I'd wake up from each dream, write down what I saw and always question the possibility. I don't consider myself an obsessive person, but for days after, the body in the Bus was at the forefront of my thoughts.

I guess I needed to know.

I didn't dare ask anyone to go with me. Between the three boys, there may have been enough courage to walk to the Bus, but not enough to go inside. I didn't even want to bring up the subject to Cade; he may have been manipulated to keep his mouth shut once, but I didn't think he'd do it again. Michael and Justin were just not man enough. They barely peeked in through the window when I told them what I saw.

What was my curiosity? To know for sure if what I'd seen was a dead body or to satisfy the dream images? Maybe I could get them to stop or at least transform them into something more pleasant.

I waited until Grandma was at the store and Mama was asleep on the couch. I knew the routine well enough to know when I could test the waters of supposed freedom. Grandma would take about an hour, and even if Mama woke up, she wouldn't question where I was. I guess she thought I was old enough to go to the neighbor's trailer and hang out, be back for dinner and all that.

I really don't think she cared what I did.

I crossed the desert at a slight trot, weaving between the bushes and cactus carefully. As the Bus loomed closer, I could sense anticipation swell inside me. My heart beat faster, the palms of my hands seemed tacky, sweat beaded on my forehead. I was scared, as well. Scared of finding a rotted body, of discovering something maybe a nine-year-old shouldn't see. And how was I to be sure the body in the Bus was or wasn't the man from my dreams? Did I have it in me to turn him over? Was his face even there?

I stopped before reaching the Bus. The fear had eclipsed the anticipation and forced my body into inaction. It was something I hadn't expected. It was supposed to be simple—run to the Bus, satisfy my curiosity and get back before dinner.

I know now the reason I finally stepped through the door of the Bus was something akin to what makes a person look for the dead body in a crash, keep their eyes open when they stumble across a beheading on the Internet or watch in stunned silence as massive destruction is spread across the news. In all of us, there is a morbid interest to see what death looks like, as if knowing will ease our internal fear of it somewhat. It's that need to temper our fear of the unknown that welcomes the open casket at a funeral. We hope to see serenity in death, a smile on the face of a loved one as they begin the process of decay.

I am no different.

When I stepped into the Bus the second time that summer, I was greeted not with a dank smell or that odd humid heat. I was not shown anything new in front; the dice were still there, the dust undisturbed except where I'd placed my hand days ago.

From the back of the Bus, something stirred. It sounded like a small animal, but the more I listened, the less confident I was I could identify it. Surely a snake wouldn't make so much noise. A small mouse might, but it sounded louder. A coyote was too big. With those animals discounted, I was pretty much out of zoological knowledge.

I peeked around the passenger seat, hoping the noise came from an animal I could easily outrun.

The body was gone. In its place, writhing on the ground in what looked like pain was what I could only describe as a blackened leather tongue. It shifted back and forth on the floor of the Bus, a sick sucking sound coming from what looked like its mouth. In the brief moment my body couldn't move, I swear to this day the thing looked up at me and cried.

I ran home, oblivious to the desert around me. I narrowly passed cactus, hopped over bushes, kicked rocks aside as I prayed the thing in the Bus wasn't behind me. There were people screaming inside my head, voices I recognized who berated me for going back. I heard them ask me what I hoped to learn, what I wanted to see. They chided me, as if a grand lesson in life had just been administered and I was incapable of understanding the implications.

I reached the fence in time to see Grandma step into the trailer with a few bags of groceries. My heart was beating too fast and my lungs burned with the fires of the hot desert air. I prayed she didn't see where I'd come from, but in a sense, I was pining to tell her. Grandma would understand. Grandma would say everything was going to be all right. I just couldn't see the big picture right now.

In the safety of the trailer park and confined by the fences I should have never crossed, I slowed my pace and looked back.

The Bus stood like a memorial against the azure sky.

I never told Grandma what I saw in the Bus—neither the body nor the tongue thing—but I think she knew. I felt ashamed, like maybe I had stumbled on something I wasn't supposed to see. It was no longer just a matter of disobeying; I was given a glimpse of something so horrible at an age where I should have been protected from all things bad.

The dreams stopped abruptly the night I returned from the desert. The singing men and their carousel were no more. It wasn't until months later, shortly before I turned ten, that I dreamed of anything remotely related to what I'd seen. I started sitting outside with Grandma in the evening, and I asked her once—as innocently as I could—what one of my dreams meant.

"What did you see?" She rocked back in the chair and stared out at the horizon. The clouds had built early that day, and in my heart, I knew another storm was brewing.

"A tongue. Just a tongue on the floor the trailer." I didn't want to look up at her. I felt uncomfortable at best and probably a bit ashamed. What nine-year-old dreams of a tongue?

"What did the tongue do?"

"It cried and broke in two."

Grandma laughed and I felt all the tension in my body quickly slide away through my toes. I crossed my legs and smiled weakly. I felt silly.

"A tongue that cries, Maggie. My, what an imagination."

"Why would I dream of such a thing?"

Grandma didn't say anything for a moment, probably trying to come up with an answer. Finally, I heard her lean forward. I could sense the smile on her face fade slowly. When I looked up, I was right. "Do you have a boyfriend, Maggie?"

I blushed. There were many boys at school I liked, and a few of them lived in the trailer park with us. I never considered any of them
boyfriends
, however, just boys that looked and smelled nice. "No, Grandma. Boys don't like me."

"Oh, but I think they do." She put her hand on my head and passed her fingers through my hair. "Doesn't that Michael fellow always walk with you from the bus stop?"

"Yeah, but he's just a friend. He doesn’t like me."

Grandma smiled. What did I know? "Watch him a little closer, dear. You'll see."

I pulled my eyes away from Grandma and looked at the clouds in the distance. They seemed to churn like smoke from a fire, ready to do God's bidding and clean up another mess. I felt butterflies in my stomach dance, but I didn't know if it was related to the storm or to Grandma's words. Maybe it was a combination of the two. Maybe it had to do with Michael instead.

"Men are evil creatures, Maggie."

I looked back at Grandma as the butterflies exploded in spasms of painful agony.

"The tongue of a man is like a snake's," she said. "It splits in two. On the one hand, it can talk nicely to you and make you feel good, but turn it around and the tongue will curse at you, call you bad names and make you feel small. You watch out for the tongue of a man."

"Is that why I dreamed of a tongue?"

"You're feeling something for Michael. He tempts you and I can't blame you. The temptation of a man is impossible to fight off, and you have to be ready when the tongue strikes back."

To say I was confused at that point in my life was an understatement. It was Grandma, in fact, who once told me that love between a man and woman is the greatest thing in the world. It creates things, much like God creates the weather. Billions of drops of water, she said, come together and dance on the wind. They feed off each other and grow. Clouds are born of the love they share, and as that cloud grows, the landscape of the world is changed for good. That was her simple explanation of how babies were made.

Why was Grandma telling me now that men were evil? Why should I care?

"If the tongue of a boy is so bad, Grandma, why not cut it out?" Really. Why not get rid of it? It seemed like common sense to my nine-year-old mind.

"You got to be careful when you cut, Maggie," Grandma said. "There's always so much blood."

Grandma didn't say another word for a while. She pulled the afghan around her tightly and turned back to her observation of the weather. I tried to do the same, but the thoughts in my mind—of Michael and his tongue, of the body in the Bus and the thing I saw—jumbled together and prevented me from paying any more attention to what was on the horizon. I didn't know that was the last conversation I would ever have with Grandma.