The Reservoir (3 page)

“Daniel…” Holly murmured softly.  “What is it?  Tell us what’s wrong.”

“Nothing’s wrong,” Zack said in frustration.

“Zack!  Let him talk!” Holly insisted. 

“Let it go,” Zack said softly.  “Please.”

“But something
is
wrong,” Daniel said in a low voice.  “
I’m
wrong.  It’s happened, Zack.  It’s happened.  I’m …
crazy
!  Just like the rest of ‘em.”

***

The remainder of the ride to the cabin took place in absolute silence.  If they were going to discuss Daniel’s fears, Zack had said it would happen back at the cabin, and not in a moving vehicle.  Holly suspected he wanted to be close to his friend, should something bad go down.

Holly knew that like her, her friends were worried sick about Daniel.  What did he mean he was ‘crazy, just like the rest of ‘em’?  Just like who? 

He wasn’t crazy.  Silly, carefree, mischievous maybe, but crazy?  Where’d he ever get an idea like that?  Crazy?  Hardly. 

Back at the cabin, the group trouped inside, depositing the groceries on the kitchen counter.  Wordlessly, they put away the perishables and then, one by one, moved into the living area and took a seat. 

Daniel dropped into the recliner.  He tipped his head back and raked his hands along either side of his head.  When he glanced up, his friends were watching him, their eyes fixed on his troubled, uncharacteristically pale face.    

“Stop looking at me like that,” he groaned.

“Like what, Danny Boy?” Niqui said softly.

“Like I’m crazy!”

“The only one here who thinks you’re crazy is you!” Zack quipped, and then stood up and began pacing.  “Okay, Dan, fill ‘em in.”

He gave his best friend a hesitant glance, and Zack nodded in return.  Daniel took his cue and began talking.  “I was … um, standing at the end of the dock.  I ... was going to cannonball in.  You know, drench you girls.”

“Yeah, surprise, surprise,” Kendall intoned.

“Go on,” Niqui urged.

“Anyway, I was waiting for you guys so I could launch, when…”

“What?” Holly prompted softly.

“I saw something.”

“What?”  Niqui asked.

Daniel rose from the chair and began pacing, opposite in direction to his best friend.  He didn’t speak for a solid minute, until Zack grabbed him by the shoulders and propelled him back into the tattered recliner. 

“Talk!” he commanded, and then uttered, “and so you know, there’s a logical explanation for what you saw.  And not … the explanation you’ve come up with.”

“I’m crazy,” Daniel said in a resigned, defeated voice.

“You … are … not!” Zack bellowed.

“Okay, okay,” Holly said, “Daniel, tell us what you saw.  Let us help you.”

He gave her a searching gaze, but finally spoke.  “Okay, I saw a girl.  She was underwater, looking up at me.  She um, had a funny, greenish complexion…”

The declaration was met by silence.  Finally, Holly sighed.  “No, Daniel, you
thought
you saw a girl,” she said in a reassuring tone.  “And yesterday, when I was boating with my family, and fell off the towable into 200-feet of water, I thought I saw an alligator gar coming for me.”

It was Zack who spoke first in response to Holly’s statement.  “What are you talking about?” he said, his voice incredulous.

“Well, the other day, I saw a show on TV about alligator gars.  Heck, from what I understand from the show, they aren’t even mean fish—they’re not even in this lake—but I thought I saw one.  And in my mind, it was coming right at me.”

Daniel gave her a hesitant glance, and she raised her right hand.  “Daniel,” she said evenly, “this reservoir is big, deep, and if you really think about it, kinda scary.  There are trees, hills, and God knows what else under all that water.  It can make an imagination run wild.  You saw a girl, well, I’d rather see a girl than an alligator gar coming my way—even if they are wrongly tagged as vicious killing machines.”

Kendall burst out laughing.  “Well, I didn’t see anyone or anything in the water, except rocks, stumps, fish, and me!  And I’m going back out there in a few to swim if we don’t get in that boat.”

“Kendall!” Niqui cried, “where’s your sensitivity?”  When Kendall didn’t respond, she turned to Daniel.  “Hey, brother from another mother, wanna hear what I saw in the inky depths of that water?”  She flashed a quick grin.  “Actually, the water isn’t inky.  It’s green, but I read that term in a book.  Inky,” she laughed, “has a mysterious ring to it.  Anyway…”

“What?” Daniel asked, bracing for her answer.

“I saw a water moccasin coming toward me.  It was big, fanged, and about to get me.  I almost screamed, until I realized one, the thing was a stick, and two, we don’t have water moccasins in Washington State.  Praise God,” she added wryly.

“Niqui, you are crazy,” Zack quipped, and then dashed toward her and tackled her.  The two fell to the floor, arms and legs flailing.

“You guys!” Holly admonished.  “Over here?  We have a friend in need…”

She sent a glance at Daniel.  Suddenly, he looked better.  His pale face had taken on a healthier, rosier hue. 

“Are you guys telling the truth?” he asked Niqui first, and then Holly.  “You really thought you saw those things?”

“Yep, among other things,” Holly replied.  “There’s something about having your body floating on hundreds of feet of manmade lake that congers up all sorts of fearsome things—makes the imagination run wild.  And the fact that operators at the dam can flip some sort of switch or such and make the water level either rise or lower is also kind of creepy.”

“But I wasn’t even in the water,” Daniel protested.

“It’s the shadows,” Holly declared.  “The shadows will fool you every time.”

“Everybody in?” Zack asked. 

The group of kids settled into the boat.  Holly took hold of the towable and carefully situated it on the seats in the front of the boat, and out of the way for the time being.  “Can you see all right?” she asked Zack.

Since he was so tall, he could easily see over the tube as long as he stood up.  He began carefully backing away from the dock.  Holly noted right away that he knew what he was doing, as he easily navigated away from the stump patch.

Once they’d cleared the shallows and entered deep water, she breathed a sigh of relief.  She noted Niqui was sprawled out on the back seat, closest to the outboard motor.  Kendall sat on the seat that backed up to Zack’s driver’s seat, while Daniel took the seat that backed to her passenger seat.  Zack kept the boat to a sedate pace, perhaps topping out at ten miles per hour. 

“Can’t you go any faster than this?” Kendall called out with frustration.  “My eighty-six-year-old great grandfather drives faster than you do.”

“Just trying to see what I’m up against,” he replied, glancing at Holly, who rose to stand and began pointing out landmarks.  She gave him the same spiel David had given her, warning him about the island, with its steep underwater inclines, and the stump patch coming up on their right.  She also warned the group as a whole to keep their eyes peeled for stray logs, since they were prevalent in the water—particularly after a rain storm.

“Why don’t we head over to the bridge—to the channel leading to the Siouxon?” she suggested.  She was curious to see how high the water was at this point during the day.  It was nearing six-thirty.  Had the water level been lowered?  Or had it gotten deeper, thanks to water being released into the reservoir from the dam above? 

Zack proved to be the epitome of caution and restraint, ignoring Kendall and Niqui’s cries for increased speed.  “Let me get the feel of the boat,” he called back.  “Every boat is different.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Kendall murmured.

Upon reaching the bridge, Holly noted the water was high and she didn’t want to chance going under it, lest the water rise and trap them.  There was no telling when they might get out if they did happen to get stuck, and it would be mortifying for the county law enforcement, who policed the lakes on boat and jet ski, to find them trapped. 

She knew she would never hear the end of it from her brother or stepfather, particularly since David was a deputy who worked Marine Patrol for the sheriff’s office in the adjoining county.  During the summer, he often patrolled Yale Lake, as well as Lake Merwin nearby. 

Holly directed Zack to a nearby cove.  He turned the boat around and they motored at a sedate pace to the cove which was just north of the bridge.  Zack set the boat to idle, shut it down, and then asked Daniel to help him drop anchor. 

“Anybody want to take a dip?” Holly asked.

“Keep your vests on,” Zack advised the group.

“No way,” Kendall said.

Zack sighed heavily.  “Humor me, Kendall.  Wear a vest.  Everybody.”

“Come on, Zack,” she groaned.  “We all know how to swim.”

“Wear the vest until you get accustomed to the area.  And whatever you do, don’t dive.  You could easily hit a rock or a tree.  And if that were to happen,” he said, raising a finger for emphasis, “the vest will keep your face out of the water, even if you can’t manage it under your own power.”

“You’re kidding, right?” she said.  “And since when did you go all Rescue Ranger on us?” 

“No, I’m not kidding,” he responded, in all seriousness.  “And so you know, boating is serious business.  People get killed on the water all the time.  Tearing around like idiots, some of them drinking—no, Kendall, I’m not kidding.  Wear the vest.”

All but Daniel jumped into the water.  A series of piercing cries sliced the air, as the kids were shocked by the water temperature.  “It’s so cold!” Kendall cried.  “So much colder than back at the dock.”

The group congregated together, treading water, and trying to warm up their body temperatures.  Holly noted Daniel kept an eye trained on the waters around his friends.

Clearly, the kid was still spooked.

“Dang, it’s cold,” Niqui complained. 

“There’s a creek up this channel, on the other side of the bridge aways,” Holly told them.  “It’s called Siouxon Creek, and it’s really cool up there—ha, ha, no pun intended.”

“How’s it cool?” Niqui inquired.  “The creek I mean.  In ways other than water temperature?”

“Well, it gets really shallow along the channel to the creek.  If you’re careful, you can take your boat up and drop anchor, not far from the waterfall.  My brother loves it, because he’s a rock hound.  He’s found all kinds of rocks up there.  There are also hundreds of salamanders.  We went back there the other day and anchored the boat.  Harry and I swam back, toward the waterfall.  I happened to glance down, saw a huge trout, and all of a sudden, all these salamanders came swimming to the surface.  They crawled all over me, up on my shoulders and into my vest.  I guess I was their island of safety from the big fish.”

“Did you scream?” Niqui asked, making a horrified face at the prospect of slimy salamanders crawling all over her.

“Well, yeah, but I like salamanders,” she admitted.  “They’re actually really cute.  When I was a kid, I called them mud puppies.”

“Sweet memory,” Kendall said drolly.  “Maybe Daniel saw a salamander back at the dock.  Heck, maybe it was a
girl
salamander.” 

Each member of the group sent her a warning stare, to which she responded, “Let’s get in the boat.  I’m going to die from the cold.”

“Yeah, death is imminent,” Zack said drolly, as he reached for the ladder Daniel had already draped over the side.  He hoisted himself in first, and then helped the girls, as they awkwardly climbed the flimsy ladder.

Once they were all back in the boat, Daniel seemed relieved to have them there.

He eased back against his seat, and then reached for a can of soda from the cooler.  “Anyone else?” he asked.

Zack nodded and Daniel tossed him a can, which he promptly snapped open.  Zack took a deep swig of the soda, and then glanced around.  He nodded toward Mount St. Helens in the background.  “Pretty,” he observed.

“My understanding is, it used to be prettier,” Kendall said, and Holly laughed.

“You mean, before it blew its top?”

“Yeah, then,” she agreed.

“We weren’t even born then,” Niqui commented.

“I’ve seen pictures,” Kendall informed.

“It’s still really pretty,” Daniel said, and then sighed loudly.  “If she blew right now, would we die?”

“Depends on which way she blows, I guess,” Zack said. 

“If she blew our way…”

Zack shrugged.  “No way to live, worrying about what could be…”

Daniel acknowledged his words with a slight nod, reading the underlying message his best buddy was sending his way. 
Stop worrying
.

“So, Daniel,” Kendall said, “what did you mean earlier, when you told us you were crazy—like the rest of ‘em’?”

“Figures you’d bring that up,” Zack said with a weary sigh, shooting Kendall a look of daggers. 

Daniel glanced around, taking in the faces of his four best friends, one by one.  He’d never told them about his biggest fear.  Except for Zack, he’d never told them the truth about his father.

***

Daniel’s eyes were filled with indecision as he grappled with whether or not to tell his friends about his worst fears.  Once he said the words, he knew he could never take them back.  Sure, he understood on an intellectual level that mental illness was nobody’s fault—God knew, nobody sighed up for it.  But, still, would his friends look at him differently if they knew his secret?

“Okay, look,” he said with a sigh, deciding to just go ahead and take the plunge, “there’s something I’ve never told you girls.  Zack knows, because, well, sometimes I just need to talk about it.  But for the most part, it’s been a secret that I’ve kept since I was really little.” 

He had his friends’ attention now.  “Go on, Daniel,” Kendall urged softly.

“Okay, wow.”  He let out a tremulous breath.  “Okay, here goes.  My … dad … has mental illness.”  He glanced at Zack, who nodded, urging him on.  “He’s um, he’s a paranoid schizophrenic.  I also have two cousins who have one form of mental illness or another.  It’s, um, apparently hereditary.”