The Sound of Many Waters (24 page)

The ailing radio garbled out
Tuesday’s Gone
by Lynyrd Skynyrd, and then the DJ announced that he had breaking news. Zane’s body tensed, but it was only a weather update. “Time to batten down the hatches, folks,” said the DJ. “Hurricane Juan is now a
nasty
category three storm. He’s expected to make landfall within the next 48 hours, somewhere near Saint Augustine. Its projected path will bring it right across the interior of the state. Mandatory evacuations for low-lying areas are to be announced soon.”

“That’ll bring it right through here,” said Destiny.

“What will you do?”

She grinned. “Hurricane party, of course.”

The road took them through Micanopy, a quaint centenarian of a town preserved in the formaldehyde shade of droo
p
ing oaks, then along the shore of a spring-fed lake, and eve
n
tually past an open wetland signposted as
Payne’s Prairie
. By nightfall they were zooming down a gravel road through a corridor of forest.
Gainesville-10 miles,
read a road sign peppered with buckshot.

“I want you to know,” said Zane, “I appreciate what you’re doing.”

She looked at him and laughed. “Sorry. For a second I forgot you were in drag.”

Zane had, too. He ripped off the wig, wiped off the make-up, and rummaged through a pile of clothes on the back seat to find a plain black t-shirt and some khaki shorts which—although tighter and shorter than he would have preferred—did not seem
too
girly. After he dressed, he pulled his last stack of doubloons out of the duffel bag, took one coin off the top for himself, and put the rest inside Destiny’s glove box. “You won’t have to dance a
n
ymore,” he said.

She looked at him sideways. “Who says I don’t want to?”

“I saw you crying on stage.”

“Oh, that? No, I just get overwhelmed with my thoughts sometimes. Right before I went on, I’d been thinking about the fact that every person I know, eventually, is gonna croak. You. Me. Everyone. It makes me want to go around campus screaming at people,
you’re all gonna die!
”

Zane laughed. “Probably not the best idea.”

“I just wish people would make the most of their time in this world, you know? Too many of us just kind of…exist.”

White smoke came pouring out of the car hood and Destiny pulled over. “Just a sec,” she said, and she popped the hood, grabbed a jug of water from the backseat, and dashed to the front of the car. “Radiator leak,” she said, and soon they were rattling down the road again. Judging by her nonchalance, refilling the radiator was part of her normal routine. They continued on for another few miles in silence, and then Destiny blurted a question that seemed to have been brewing within her for some time.

“So how’d you get mixed up in all this?”

“Wrong place, wrong time, I guess,” he said.

She looked at him for a moment, and then smiled. “Everything will work out like it’s supposed to.”

Was he putting her in danger by getting help from her? Was he being selfish? He wasn’t worried about Destiny being charged if the cops caught them. After all, he could deny that she had any knowledge of his alleged crimes. He was more afraid of her ending up like Mama Ethel and the IRS agent. Miguel wasn’t just some average criminal—he actually seemed to enjoy killing. Thankfully, though, Miguel had no way of knowing their whereabouts. It was not like the man had some supernatural gift or something.

Smoke poured out again. “That’s not good,” said Destiny. She pulled the car over, shut it off and looked at Zane. “We’re out of water. I didn’t think I’d be driving so much today.”

With his window down and the engine off, Zane could hear the night sounds of the surrounding forest. Crickets. Tree frogs. Buzzing things. “What do we do?” he asked.

“Someone’ll eventually come down the road. When they do, I’ll flag them down and ask for some water, and you can hide in the woods until they leave.”

Without opening her door, Destiny lifted herself through the open window. “Come on,” she said. Zane stepped out and found her lying on the roof, gazing at the stars, just like Lucia had always done. She pointed up with excitement. “Look, a satellite!”

Zane climbed up and lay next to her, the metal roof cool against his back. He followed her finger to a point of light, no larger than a star, sliding across the firmament. “They’re probably spying on us,” he said.

She flashed her breasts. “Spy this!” They both laughed. For the next twenty minutes, they lay there and stared at the cosmos, called to silence by its terror and glory.

“Did you know,” said Destiny, her soft voice breaking the stillness like a scream, “that if every star in the Milky Way was a grain of salt, packed together they could fill an Oly
m
pic-sized swimming pool? There’s a hundred billion stars just in our galaxy alone, and more than a
hundred
billion
galaxies
in the universe. Makes you feel small, doesn’t it?”

“How do you know all this stuff?”

“I like to learn. I have this nagging curiosity about the world and how it all works. What do you like to do?”

Zane thought for a moment. “I like to fish.”

She smiled, and then took his hand in hers. “The Big Bang is even crazier. Did you know that fourteen billion years ago—give or take a few hundred million—everything started from one teeny-tiny singularity?” She held up her fingers as if pinching an ant. “Something so small, and then—
pow!—
it exploded into something so vast, and it’s still expanding! But the thing with the Big Bang—for it to have even happened—it means there had to have been something that caused it, right? Som
e
thing beyond time and space and everything we know as real
i
ty.”

“And what do you think that is?”

“I don’t know. Maybe one day we get to find out. I hope so. All I do know is that the smartest physicists in the world say there should just be nothing. But there’s
something
. Something beautiful, and we’re all so lucky to be part of it.”

“No offense, but how can you do the job you do if you believe that?”

“Easy. When I’m up there, I just remind myself that none of it is real, in the sense of it being part of some ultimate truth. I’m just up there shaking my atoms, which happen to be aligned in a shape that men like, but in reality I’m just a vast empty space held together by bits of energy.” She smiled. “Plus, the money’s good.”

Zane raised himself on his elbows and looked down at her. “Did you know,” he said in the same tone she had used for her scientific diatribes, “that your eyes look amazing right now?”

“Oh, shut up.”

“Seriously. It’s like they’re glowing in the moonlight.”

Concern filled her face. “The moon shouldn’t be up yet.” She looked down the road. “Headlights!”

They both scrambled off the car and Zane ran into the woods. He hid behind a tree and watched Destiny wave her hand as the headlights approached.

Please don’t be a cop car, Zane thought. But as the vehicle approached, he relaxed—the headlights were high off the road and the engine had the deep hum of a diesel. The vehicle stopped beside Destiny. Moths and eddies of dust swirled about the beams.

“Hi!” yelled Destiny as she walked to the driver’s side of the truck. “You got any water?”

Zane’s eyes adjusted enough to see
U-Haul
written on the side. There’s no way, he thought. But when he saw the broken rear-view mirror, he knew. He bolted out of the woods. “Destiny! Get away from him!”

She turned and smiled at Zane, holding up a jug. “Relax, he’s got wa—”

The truck’s door swung open and knocked Destiny to the ground. The jug of water fell out of her hand and emptied into the road. Miguel jumped out of the truck and aimed a pistol at her. “Please don’t,” she said.

Miguel smirked. “Sorry, señorita.”

Zane barreled out of the darkness and lunged at Miguel, slamming him against the truck. The pistol flew out of Miguel’s hand and landed in the road. Zane reared back to punch him, but Miguel grabbed Zane’s arm and twisted it back. Zane whimpered.

“Where are the coins?” said Miguel.

“I told you. I hid them. Kill me and you’ll never find them.”

Miguel grabbed Zane in a chokehold. “I won’t kill you yet—but you’ll wish I had.”

A shot rang out. Miguel collapsed backward against the truck and slid down the fender and hit the gravel. Blood streamed from a hole in his side. Destiny stood there holding the pistol. A whisper of smoke emanated from its barrel. “Take it,” she said. And then, in a horrified scream, “
Take it!
”

Zane grabbed the gun and put his other arm around Destiny’s back. She cried and quivered. “It’s okay,” he said. “It’s all okay now. Just atoms, remember?”

He helped her to the car. When he turned around, Miguel was gone. Only a puddle of blood remained. “Where’d he—”

“Zane!” screamed Destiny.

Miguel wrapped his arm around Zane’s neck, compressing it like a snake, and ripped the gun out of Zane’s hand.

“Run,” wheezed Zane, and Destiny bolted toward the woods.

Miguel fired three wild shots into the darkness. “I’ll find you!” he shouted, and then he forced Zane toward the truck. “Get in,” he said, and Zane did.

Miguel struggled to climb in and keep the pistol aimed in Zane’s direction at the same time. Miguel’s shirt, sopping with blood, clung to his body like a wetsuit. He leaned against the passenger door and aimed the gun at Zane. With his other hand, he dug around in the glove box and pulled out a plastic bottle.  He unscrewed the cap and held the opening over his mouth, but nothing came out.

“Damn it,” he growled, and he threw the bottle down. He plucked a greasy rag from the dashboard. When he put the rag on his wound, it instantly turned red.

“Drive,” said Miguel.

Zane put the truck in gear. “Where?”

“You’re going to help me retrieve what is mine.” Miguel winced. “But first I need to get fixed up. That bitch who shot me—what was her name?”

Zane did not reply. Miguel jabbed him with the pistol. “Her name.”

“I don’t know.”

“Doesn’t matter. I’ll find her, same way I found you.”

Zane followed Miguel’s glance to a GPS unit sitting on the middle console of the truck. It looked identical to the one Miguel had used to track the IRS boat. Two green dots on the screen moved away from each other.

“How’d you get a transponder in her car?” Zane asked.

“I didn’t,” said Miguel. “You did, when you put my duffel bag in it. How do you think I found you under the bridge?”

Zane sighed. Why had he not even checked the bag?

Miguel grinned, his teeth red. “Maybe you’re not so smart after all.”

Chapter Twenty Five

The skull atop the wooden post at the trailhead rattled in the breeze. Dominic stopped. The two cavities that once held someone’s eyeballs stared back at him, and the lower jawbone dangled open like it had a secret to tell.

Who were you? Dominic wondered.

I am you
, said the skull.

Dominic took a breath and continued on. In the early morning darkness, the overgrown trail closed in around him. A thin mist blanketed the ground and obscured his feet. Other skulls and bones hung off tree limbs. Some looked human but most had belonged to deer, bears and creatures altogether alien to him.

He came to a bend in the trail where the branch of an old oak stretched over. He ducked under it. When he emerged on the other side, his face filled with fear. All around him, hundreds of small, human-shaped effigies woven from palm thatch swung from branches. Each one had a sun-bleached bird skull for a head. Their slanted eye sockets and sharp beaks gazed down at him with ire.

What is this God-forsaken place? he wondered.

Where you belong
, said the things.

The previous night, as part of their secret plan, Francisco had instructed Dominic to take the left trail—the forbidden path, he had called it—before first light and follow it to the end. “Do not be afraid,” Francisco had said, but the old man did not warn him about the macabre things he would encounter along the way.

He continued past the dangling figurines. Around the next corner he came to a rotted pine stump atop which a Spanish
conquistadore
helmet sat impaled with a sword. An armor breastplate leaned against the stump. The helmet looked similar to the one he once wore, except for a few markings on the side which included an etching of
Nuestra Señora del Pilar
. Dominic ran his fingers over the Virgin. When he was a boy, his father had taken him to the shrine of Our Lady of the Pillar in Zaragoza, along the river Ebro, where the
Madre de Dios
supposedly appeared. They went as pilgrims for her feast day. After saying their prayers and attending Mass in the basilica, he and his father gorged on
paella
and danced with strangers in the streets until dawn.