The Gatekeeper's Challenge (6 page)

“Some people take longer than others to feel ready,” Therese had said.

That had been three months ago, and today Therese didn’t feel any more ready to learn to drive.

Vicki lived on the northern outskirts of Durango in a second story apartment with scenic mountain views. Therese had only visited two other times, both since Mrs. Stern’s death, and both times the place had been in disarray. Today was no different. As soon as they entered the apartment and stepped into the living room, Therese recognized the pile of clean laundry that seemed always to occupy the dining room table, and closet doors to the washer and dryer stood open with more laundry, presumably dirty, spilling out from on top of the machines and onto the floor. Therese thought the location of the laundry closet was a major flaw in the design of the apartment, because the position from the dining room table was the only one, except for the balcony, offering the spectacular views that made these apartments worth living in. Their exterior was not quite shabby, but certainly left something to be desired with its dull dirty white siding and lack of nearby garden. The views of the mountains
made
the apartments, but unfortunately, the views in the Stern apartment were thwarted by the inefficient laundry system overtaking the best square footage. Therese wondered if things had been different when Mrs. Stern was still living here.

On the other side of the laundry heap, Mr. Stern stood stirring something on the stove.

“Hey, Dad,” Vicki called as they crossed into the small galley kitchen. “I hope it’s okay if Therese stays for lunch. Whatcha cooking?”

“Oh, hi Therese.”
Mr. Stern was tall and thin, and the thin white muscle shirt showed just how gaunt with the ruffle of ribs pressing through the material. His plaid shorts hung loose and reached down to his knobby knees and bony legs, which seemed less hairy to Therese than her own had been before she had started shaving. Despite the lack of hair on his legs, the mousy brown hair on his head was long and stringy and looked in need of washing. “We’re always glad for the company. I’m just making some chicken noodle soup. It’s from a box. Hope that’s okay with you girls.”

“Smells good,” Therese said.

Mr. Stern had retired from the Air Force the year the Sterns moved to Durango. He had taken a part-time job at Fort Lewis College teaching computer science and was off for the summer. Therese suspected money was tight in the Stern household. The worn-out furniture and near bare pantry were only a couple of things giving her that impression.

They took their bowls out to the balcony where there was no table, but where there were three Adirondack chairs. Therese wondered if she were sitting in Mrs. Stern’s chair as she and Mr. Stern sat on either side of Vicki.

Vicki and Therese told Mr. Stern all about the meet and the earthquake. He said he hadn’t felt anything, but he was always interested in earthquakes, so as soon as they finished their soup, he went to the living room and turned on the television to the local news hoping to hear more about the disturbance. He also went to the computer on the small desk near the television and searched the web for news. Therese thanked him for the soup and then followed Vicki to her room.

The girls sat on either side of Vicki’s bed—there was no other seating in the room, and only one other piece of furniture: an old, dusty dresser with a mirror hanging over it. Vicki’s clothes were scattered on the floor. Therese wondered how she could have enough clothes to
overtake the dining room, laundry closet, and the floor of her bedroom. At least the bed was made, which Therese found rather strange. Why make the bed if the rest of the room was so messy?

Therese had just begun to suspect she had been tricked into coming for a visit when Vicki asked, “Have you ever heard of NDE drugs?”

Therese shook her head, disappointed that Vicki was going in a drug direction. Therese had warned Vicki to stay away from the “Demon Druggies” at school, but she had noticed Vicki sometimes talked to them in a friendly way. She dreaded what Vicki might say next.

“Near death experience.
The scientific name is ketamine.”

Therese’s heart rate picked up. “What do you mean ‘near death’?”

“Something happens when you take the drug that causes you to die for a few minutes. Then the drug wears off and you come back to life.”

“You
die
for a few minutes? Isn’t that risky?”

“Therese, I’ve been to the other side. I saw my mom.”

“You’re joking.”

“I’ve never been more serious in my life. Do you want to hear about it or not?”

Therese shifted on the bed. “I’m listening.”

“Okay, so last night after my dad went to bed, I injected myself with the ketamine, okay? About five or ten minutes later, I had this awesome feeling of peace. I haven’t felt that way since before my mother died. It was so weird, actually, to feel that good, that content. That feeling alone makes me want to do it again.”

Therese was growing impatient. “So what happened?”

“Okay, so I’m lying right here on my bed, just like this.” Vicki moved over and lay on her pillow on her back. “Then I swear I had this
feeling like I was leaving my body. I flew right up there,” she pointed to the ceiling in the corner of the room, “and I hovered there for a while—I’m not sure how long. I could literally see myself down here lying on the bed.”

“And?”

“Okay, so I’m floating outside of my body, and then it’s like the lights go out. I’m somewhere dark, like in a tunnel, and I can see this light at the end. As I go through the tunnel, there’s all this fog all around me, and when I get to the end, I see this enormous body of water, like a lake or a river or something.”

Therese felt a shudder move down her back. “And then?”

Vicki sat back up. “So then I see this thing like a raft, and on board is this old man. He looks at me all surprised, like he’s not expecting me. He doesn’t say anything to me. He just stares at me, like he’s checking me out. I’m afraid to speak, so I just stand there staring back at him. After a while, I look back behind me, and I can no longer see my room or my body lying on the bed. So I turn back to the old man and say, ‘Can you take me across?’

“He doesn’t answer, so I wait. Then I just decide to step aboard. The raft man starts pulling us across with this long pole, and I’m so happy and peaceful because I feel sure I’m going to see my mom. It’s so strange how I wasn’t frightened at all.”

Therese’s heart was racing. “Then what happened?”

“We floated past these three big black dogs—I think there were three, the fog was so thick I could barely see two feet in front of me. And then there was this huge black
iron gate that creaked as it opened. On the other side there was this cavern and inside were three strange-looking people kind of floating just above the surface of the water. They wore long white robes, unlike the filthy red one of my raft man, and they looked clean, but kind of strange, and they pointed the raft man to take me down one of three paths. I could see the light getting brighter and brighter from a river of fire as we wound round the water in through the foggy cavern.

“The raft fell down some rapids, but I wasn’t scared—it was fun, actually—and then we went deeper and deeper away from the bright light into darkness. Someone was holding a lantern at the bottom. There were people lying comfortably in a shallow pool of water, like they were sunbathing in the darkness. I saw my mom sp
rawled out with her eyes closed, and she was still wearing the dress we buried her in. She was beside this really enormously fat dude, but she didn’t seem to notice or care about him. Before I could cry out her name, before she could open her eyes to see me, the raft started moving backward. The old raft man looked at me with a threatening glare, like he had known all along I wasn’t supposed to be there and his suspicions were now somehow confirmed. There was yelling coming from above. I thought I heard someone yell, ‘Grab her!’ but then I had left the raft and was flying away from the river back through a dark tunnel. Then I was at my ceiling looking down at my body. All at once I opened my eyes and I was here, again, in my own body, right here on my bed.”

Therese stared at her, speechless.

“So what do you think? You believe me, don’t you?”

The details of Vicki’s tour through the first part of the Underworld were too like what she herself had seen. Therese gave a nod. “I think so. That’s so, so weird.”

“Yes, it was. Next time I won’t wait so long to get on the raft. I think that’s why I ran out of time.”

“Next time?
You mean, you’re going to do it again?”

“Of course.
Why wouldn’t I?”

“Where did you get the drug?”

Vicki’s eyes beamed. “Okay, you have to promise not to tell a soul, do you hear me? Not a soul!”

“I promise.”

“I swear, if you tell anyone, I’ll be so hurt, Therese. It’ll be like my mom dying all over again. I won’t be able to take it.”

“I get it. I promise not to tell.”

“Okay, so you know Raleigh Jones?”

“The senior at our school?”

“Yeah. He waits tables at the Ranch House Restaurant down the road from here. My dad and I, we rarely go out to eat, but it would have been my mom’s birthday, and we needed a pick-me-up, you know? So a week ago we went, and Raleigh was our waiter, and it turns out it was his birthday, too. Anyway, he was giving away gifts, mostly to the other waiters and waitresses and the bartenders, but he recognized me, and so he brought me one, too, this silly little frog.” She held up a frog stuffed animal. “He said it was from the Dollar Store—that all his gifts were—but that’s how he celebrated his birthday every year. He bought a bunch of funny stuff from the Dollar Store and handed it out to his friends.”

“That’s nice.”

“That’s what I said. I told him he was supposed to receive gifts, not give them away, on his birthday. My dad told him about it being my mom’s birthday, and of course he knew what happened—everyone knows—and so that’s when he invited me to come to his house later for a party.

“I guess my dad was just glad a boy was showing interest, so he didn’t seem bothered by the fact that the party wouldn’t start until almost midnight, because that’s how long it would take Raleigh to close down his station at the restaurant. Raleigh asked if I wanted to wait at the bar till he got off. I could drink free sodas…”

“Sodas?”

“I mean pop. You all call them pop, I forgot. Anyway, and then he’d take me to the party. He said he’d have me home by two o’clock, if that was alright.”

“My aunt says sodas, too. So, you’re dad let you stay out till two in the morning?”

“My dad was never a stickler with rules. I’ve never really had a curfew, though up till then, I’d never gone out late. Besides you, well, I haven’t made many friends here yet, and after what Mom did, well, I think people are afraid of me or something.”

“It just takes time.”

“I know. Anyway, so I had a blast at his party. People were smoking pot and taking other stuff, too, but I just drank soda, I mean pop. Then a couple of people came running in from his bedroom—it’s just his granny living with him and she’s practically deaf. His mom died three years ago and his dad split when he was born. Anyway, this couple runs in, they’re seniors, too, one’s a football player, I think, and they say they’ve just come back from the dead. So they tell their story. They’ve seen their loved ones and stuff. A few days later, I call Raleigh and ask how I can have a near death experience, too. So he gets me the ketamine. And now you know the whole story.”

Therese filled with inexplicable excitement. “Do you think he could get me some, too?”

Vicki smiled. “I thought you might be interested. I thought maybe next time I try it, we could do it together, you know?”

Therese nodded. “Yes. Let’s do. But isn’t it risky? I mean, has anyone actually stayed dead?”

“I did a whole bunch of research before I did it, Therese. Out of the thousands of cases, a few have gone wrong, but the researchers attribute it to something avoidable—like the subject took too much of the drug, or inhaled a powder form rather than injected a liquid, or did
consecutive doses, and stuff like that. I think as long as you do the right dose, inject it in liquid form, and wait at least a week in between episodes, it’s really safe.”

Therese would do her own research, but in the meantime, she’d go ahead and plan this thing with Vicki. Maybe there was a way she could actually see her parents. Certainly she would see
Than, wouldn’t she? She could plead with him to come back for her, or to at least let her know how much longer he thought it would be before they could be together again. “So next weekend, will you be ready?”

“I’ll have to get more from Raleigh. It costs money, though.”

“How much?”

“Fifty bucks a pop. Raleigh gave me the first dose for free, but he says he’ll have to charge me next time.
It’s expensive stuff and hard to get. And right now lots of people are into it.”

“I can pay for both of ours. I have a lot of money saved up. I’ll give you the money tonight at the festival.”

“Oh, the festival! That’s right! We need to get you home so you can rest. It’s almost three.” Vicki jumped up and Therese followed her out of the room.