Tribe (Tribe 1) (6 page)

T
he week dragged by
, but finally Saturday came, and I was finally free. I had my own car! Yes!

Mom picked up the Prius on Wednesday, and I got her old Jetta as soon as I was off restriction, on Saturday. It was a diesel converted to run on old vegetable oil. Dad and River had learned how to do it from the internet. It had two gas tanks, one for diesel and one for the filtered veggie oil. I had to start and run it on the diesel until the engine was warm, then flip a switch installed on the dash to make it run on the veggie oil. The exhaust smelled like French fries, because Dad collected big drums of used oil from the local fast food restaurants, and filtered it with a contraption he made in the garage.

I was officially the Queen of the Hippies, according to my friends. “Laugh all you want,” I told them, “but I’ll be laughing all the way to the bank, because I won’t have to pay for any gas!” In reality, I’d probably have to do a little extra work around the house in exchange for Dad picking up the oil and filtering it for me, and I would have to pay for a little bit of diesel gas which was needed to get the engine warmed up, but telling them that would take away from all my gloating.

I wanted to take Meadow out for a spin, but when I called she said she was getting ready to go on a date. All my friends were busy, so I had to settle for River. He was thrilled to go, because he had a few months before he could even take Driver’s Ed classes, and Meadow rarely took him anywhere.

I’d been borrowing my parents’ cars since I’d gotten my license, but nothing compares to the feeling of driving
your own
car on a spring day with the windows rolled down. I was in heaven.

For River it was the next best thing to having his own car. I drove carefully down the winding road until we got to the county highway, where I could open it up and go fifty-five. River hung his head out the window like a dog and yelled “whooooo-hooooo”!

The little nerd-ball really needed to get out more.

The phone rang and I pulled it out of my purse and answered it without taking my eyes off the road. “Hello?”

“Ember? It’s Alex.”

I nearly drove off the road. River groaned and pulled his head back inside, clutching at the console and the passenger door as the car veered. I dropped the phone to put both hands on the wheel, and regained control. Pulling over to the side of the road, I stopped the car and picked the phone up off the floor of the car.

“Ember? Are you there? Are you okay?” Alex sounded worried.

“I’m fine, I should have known better than to pull out my phone when I’m driving.”
And can’t check caller ID first,
I finished in my head. “We’re pulled over now.”

“Sorry about that. Listen…we need to talk.”

If I’d been driving at that moment, we would have just crashed into a telephone pole.

“Why?! Um…I mean, what did you want to talk about?” I tried to keep my emotions level, but River was on to me. Plus, I’m sure he could hear every word Alex said, no matter how tightly I pressed the phone to my ear. I thumbed the phone volume down with the rocker button.

“I think you know what.”

River’s jaw dropped, and I was beginning to panic.

“Uh…no…I don’t.” I wasn’t a very convincing liar. My parents tried to stay out of our business most of the time, so I didn’t have a lot of practice at it. “Listen, River and I were just on our way somewhere. This isn’t a very good time—”

“Ember.” He sighed. His voice sounded much stronger than it had the week before. “You need to come see me, right now. If you don’t, I’m driving out to your house and camping on your front steps.”

“That’s a little creepy, don’t you think?” I tried to feign mild irritation, figuring that’s what an innocent person would be feeling. “You don’t even know where I live.”

“I looked you up on the telephone listings website, remember? Address, too.”

Damn!
Why didn’t Dad pay a little extra each month to the phone company to keep our telephone number private? It’s not the 1970s any more—didn’t he know some kind of stalker weirdo could decide to track us down? Sometimes his frugality could be very inconvenient.

I couldn’t think of what to say. River was waving signals at me that I didn’t understand, though I was sure they had something to do with me ditching the conversation with Alex.

“Maybe I should just talk with your parents instead…” Alex hinted.

“No!” I snapped, then continued in a friendlier tone. “No, no reason to bother them. I’m not sure what I can help you with, but if you want to talk, I’ll come right over.” I wrote down his address and said I’d be there in a half hour.

I hung up, then stared at the phone, dumbfounded.

“What are you going to do?” River’s anxiety radiated like a campfire. He looked around, as if there was some way for him to disentangle himself from the situation I’d gotten him into. I thought he might bolt from the car.

“Calm down, you’re freaking me out and I’m trying to think.” I stared harder at the phone. I
had
to go meet him. I couldn’t risk Alex showing up at the house. But I didn’t know what he was going to say, and I didn’t think having River along was the best idea.
Maybe I should drop River off.
We weren’t that far from home.
No, Mom will sense immediately that something is up.
He was a worse liar than I was, and he wasn’t much better at trying to stifle his emotions. He’d have to come along, though I was risking him spilling the beans to Mom and Dad later.

“Let’s go.” I stuck the phone in my purse and we drove to the address in Spokane Valley that Alex had given me.

* * *

Alex was standing out in front of his house when we arrived, wearing the same hoodie and baseball hat, with a black t-shirt and jeans. His skin was no longer as pale, and he looked like he’d gained a good ten pounds in the last week. I lowered the passenger window, but he opened the rear passenger-side door and got in.

“Let’s go,” he slammed the car door, “before my mom finds out I’m gone.”

“Why?” Reluctantly, I pulled away from the curb.

“Because she’s gotten really over-protective the last few months. She won’t let me go anywhere. I told her all week I felt great, but I’m lucky if she lets me out on the back deck.” He glanced back as if to make sure no one had come running out the front door. “She was out back, pulling the patio furniture out of the shed like I asked her to, so I could sit outside now that it’s nicer weather. I left her a note.”

River was sitting half-turned in his seat, watching Alex.

“Hi, I’m Alex.”

“Uh…I know.”

“And you are…?”

“That’s River. My brother.” I angled my rear view mirror just a bit so I could see Alex. “Where are we going?”

“Anywhere. Someplace we can talk. Alone. No offense, River.”

“No problem.” But River was disappointed. He wanted a front-row seat to the impending implosion of my life.

“There’s a park nearby,” Alex suggested. “I guess we could go there.”

As we drove, I tried to rein in my anxiety. I could feel River getting antsy in the seat beside me. I stole glances at Alex in the rearview mirror. He looked good. Too good. And though it took me a full two minutes to realize it, the stench of the chemo was almost entirely absent. I had to pay attention in order to detect the faintest whiff of it.

Alex directed me to a park about a mile from his house. We left River in the car to listen to the radio while we walked over to a picnic table under a shelter in an isolated area of the park. I sat down, and he paced in front of the table.

I tried to talk about the weather, putting off the inevitable, but Alex wasn’t having that.

“What did you do?” His expression was stern.

“What?” My voice was small and quiet, like a child who’d been caught with her hand in the cookie jar.

“You know what I’m talking about. I’ve been trying to figure it out for a few days now. But there’s only one answer. It was you.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” I forced my face into a mask of innocence.

“The doctors did new scans on Wednesday—”

Oh crap.
I started to panic.

“—and you know what they found?” He stopped pacing, his gaze riveted on me.

“Uh…no.” I glanced over toward the car, where River had perked up in his seat, watching us. He sensed something was amiss.

“Nothing!”

“N-nothing?” I stammered.

“Or almost nothing. The cancer was almost completely gone!”

That’s impossible. It’s far too soon.
I didn’t know how to respond, and my breath came fast and shallow. “That’s…great. I’m so happy for you.” But my congratulations sounded weak, even to me.

“Ember.” He leaned forward, placing both hands on the table. “On Saturday I was dying. While we were talking I had terrible spasms of pain. Then you put your hands on me, and five minutes later I felt better than I had in months.”

I gulped, then pasted what I hoped was a seductive smile on my face. “Well, I’m flattered. Any time I can help, just ask.” I winked at him.

Something flickered in his eyes, then it was gone. Angry, he pushed away from the table and resumed his pacing, his voice strident. “It wasn’t just that day. I’ve felt better and better every day since then. I haven’t felt this good in a
year
. I have some color back, I’ve gained fifteen pounds, and my hair is growing back.” He whipped his olive baseball cap off and bent forward, scrubbing his hand over the dark brown fuzz that covered his head. “Half an inch long in a week! How is that possible?”

“I…” my brain wasn’t cooperating, and my well of witty comebacks had run dry. His healing shouldn’t have worked so quickly. It didn’t make sense, and now all my parents’ dire predictions were coming true.

I hate it when that happens.

I gazed down at the cracked wood of the tabletop, hoping for inspiration to hit.

Alex sat down across from me at the picnic table, leaning forward. “Look at me Ember. Look into my eyes.”

I looked up, and his eyes were no longer dark and agony-filled as they had been before. The pain was gone, and their color was more like a warm, chocolate brown.

“Tell me,” he continued, “that you have no idea what I’m talking about. Tell me to my face that you had nothing to do with it. Because I don’t think you can.” He waited a moment, and after being met with my silence, he tore his gaze away, surveying the park and all its frolicking inhabitants who were out to enjoy the warm spring day. “I’ve been racking my brain, trying to figure out what happened. My parents think it’s a miracle. And maybe it is.” He looked back at me. “But not in the way they think…is it?”

Silence ensued as he locked his gaze with mine. For the first time, my own anxiety faded enough for his emotions to intrude. He was confused and desperate for answers. I felt the joy of his improving health, but it was overshadowed by something, most likely the desire to know the truth, laced with a heavy dose of concern. I imagined that he was worried that his remission was only temporary. I also felt his determination. He was positive I knew what had happened, and his fierce determination to discover the truth would never waver. I could feel that.

I couldn’t understand why he was so sure I was involved. Most people weren’t supposed to know. They weren’t supposed to feel healed, because the process of full healing took time. That’s what I had always been told. When I healed Ellen, the lady with the heart failure, my parents told me the reason she noticed the difference right away is because her breathing improved so dramatically. That’s something that is easily noticed, when a person is used to fighting for every breath. But Alex? How would he notice anything? Other than a reduction in pain, what would he have noticed? And even if he felt more, what would make him connect that to
me?
I didn’t have the answers.

But his eyes pleaded with me for the truth. I didn’t know what to do. He wasn’t buying any of my lies. If I continued to plead ignorant, he could go to my parents. That wouldn’t help matters. What if he went to his doctors, or the media? They may not take him seriously at first, but when he had scans taken for years that show cancer progressively riddling his body, then another scan showing it gone overnight, they might pay attention, if for no other reason than it would make a great human-interest story.

I was screwed no matter what I did.

“
W
ell
?” Alex folded his arms, waiting. “I know it was you, Ember. I don’t know how you did it, and I don’t even know
how
I know it was you…but it was. I can feel it.”

That startled me. Normal people do have intuition and empathy, but in such minute amounts compared to Healers, that it was unusual to hear the average person claim to really
feel
something is true with any certainty. I’d heard people say it before, but often it was said euphemistically—and it was not something I wanted to hear in that context. I would much prefer it if Alex were as clueless as the average joe.

Maybe my healing has gotten a lot more powerful now that I’m older, and I zapped him with way too much energy.

Over my anxiety and Alex’s determination, I could feel River getting antsy in the car. He knew things weren’t going well, and as I looked over toward the car, I could tell he was contemplating getting out. He sat upright in his seat, his face almost pressed against the glass, pale beneath his light-brown mop of wavy hair. I could imagine his hand paused on the door handle, as he debated whether or not I’d be mad. There was uncertainty, worry, and fear all rolled into one. I tried to give a subtle, dismissive wave. That didn’t seem to relax him, so I forced my heart rate to slow, and that seemed to appease him a little. He sat back slowly, but continued to watch. I suspected the radio was no longer on.

Alex glanced back at the car, then at me. “What’s wrong?” He’d caught my little exchange with my brother.

“Nothing,” I sighed. This guy was a little too observant for my comfort. Maybe that was why he’d noticed the changes so quickly. I realized this situation wasn’t going away, no matter how much I wanted it to. If I told Alex the truth, I risked exposing my family. If I lied, Alex was sure to pursue the truth, and that risked exposing my family in a very public way.

Which would be infinitely worse.

“I just…I don’t know what you want me to say.”

“How about the truth?” He remained motionless, a statue.

I looked away, biting my lip.

“Fine. If you won’t give me answers, I’ll find someone who—” he turned to walk away.

“Wait!” I heaved a sigh. I didn’t really have a choice. “Sit down.”

He returned to the picnic table and sat across from me, hands steepled beneath his chin.

“I’ll tell you. But first, tell me what made you think I had anything to do with you getting better.”

“Well,” he gazed off into the distance, watching the children play on the playground. “I can’t say for sure. Just…when you touched me, I felt myself start to relax. And trust me, that never happens when I get bad pains like that. It lasts and lasts, and when they finally start to pass, I’m exhausted and weak. But the pain started fading shortly after you laid your hands on me. Then I felt warm all over, especially where you touched me. It felt like a wave of peace came over me, and I got sleepy. I don’t think I ever fell completely asleep, but it felt…I don’t know…like I was in a hazy daydream. It was nice.” He turned his face away, but I thought I saw a hint of a blush on his cheeks.

He cleared his throat and looked back at me. “For the rest of the day, I felt good. In fact, instead of feeling worn out at the end of the party, I was sorry to see it end. Even though I knew the fundraiser had been a bust, I didn’t care. I was still a little tired, but nothing compared to how it had been for the last couple of months. And it’s gotten better every day since.”

“Why did you go in for new scans? I thought the doctors had pretty much written you off.”

“They had. But I was feeling so good, and my mom was driving me crazy all week, trying to keep me in bed. I told her I thought I was in remission. She didn’t believe it, even though she wanted to. I felt so different, I knew something was happening to me. My dad was kind of mad and felt like I was holding on to false hope. Mom was worried I’d kill myself, trying to do stuff that I shouldn’t because I thought I was getting better. So when I begged them to run some tests, they eventually agreed, and after arguing with the doctors, they finally approved it.”

This boy wasn’t just observant…he was persistent as hell. Those tests couldn’t be cheap, but he finagled a way to get his parents and his doctors to do it, despite the risk of complaints from the insurance company, and all on his whim. I saw him in a new light. Despite the illness that ravaged his body (and still left his body weak, even in the wake of his healing) he had a fighting spirit like none I’d ever seen. And he’d managed to put me in a position where I was considering telling him my family secret. I was awed by it.

“So…” I realized I was staring at him, and looked away. “What did the doctors say?”

“What
could
they say? You know doctors. They think there’s a rational explanation for everything. First they said my scans must have gotten mixed up with someone else’s. Then they claimed it had to be the machine, that it must be on the blink. So they put me in a different machine, and got the same results. Then they tried another. Eventually they gave up trying to explain it, and mumbled something about needing to recalibrate the machines—all of them.”

I laughed. “Boy, I wish I’d been there for that.”

Alex watched me while I laughed, a small smile curving his lips. As my laughter died away, there was a moment of awkwardness, and in that silent moment, I felt it.

He was attracted to me.

Oh...wow.
I hadn’t expected that. Knowing how people felt about me—or at least having an inkling of it—created many awkward moments for me, though usually not in a positive way. I looked away and tucked a strand of hair behind my ear.

He cleared his throat. “Yeah, well I was there, and it
was
kind of fun, watching their jaws drop, babbling on with their incoherent explanations for the impossible.” He grinned, then it faded. “But you know it isn’t impossible…don’t you?”

It was my turn to clear my throat. “Ahhh. Well. It’s hard to explain.”

“Try me.”

I squirmed under his gaze. I could feel River going on alert again, and decided to put up a shield of protection, hoping it would block some of the emotions I was feeling. I closed my eyes briefly, imagining a sphere of white light surrounding me, keeping my emotions within my own aura, and holding the emotions of others at bay.

“Ember?”

“Yes?” My eyelids flew open.

“It looked like I lost you there for a moment.”

“Nope. Right here.” I smiled at him. How could I tell him? My parents would be furious. I knew I should beg off; let him talk to my parents if that’s what he wanted. I’d get even more lectures, but surely they’d come up with a plausible story to satisfy him.
Yes, that’s what I should do.

But even as I thought it, I knew I wouldn’t do it. Because I
wanted
to tell him. I trusted him, just as he trusted me that day. I felt connected to him somehow. Beyond that, I yearned to tell someone I could trust. Though it could bring crushing humiliation and possible danger if I revealed my secret, the need to share and be accepted for who I truly was burned within me.

“Well…it might sound crazy, but…” I took a deep breath, and exhaled. “I’m a Healer.”

“Yeah, you’re not exactly dropping a bombshell. I kind of figured that part out already. What I want to know is
how
.”

What? It was that easy?
I simply told him the truth, and he believed me. I had expected him to mock me, to ridicule me, to call me crazy and get as far away from me as fast as he could. But he simply sat there, his gaze even.

“Um…” I faltered, unsure of what to say next. “Well…I was born that way.”

“How does it work?”

“Pretty much like you felt it. I touch you, and I…I call it ‘opening the channels’. It’s hard to explain.” I searched my mind for an analogy. “Okay, this might sound a little gross, but…you know how you can consciously start and stop the flow of urine? It doesn’t take much effort, and often you don’t need to think consciously about it. It comes easy. You just start the flow of urine, and stop it when you want. Or let it go until you’re done. That’s kind of how it works. I open up the energy centers located in my body, and let the healing energy flow.”

“Okay. I get it. Though I could have done with a better analogy.”

“Hey, you asked.”

“I know.” He smiled. “So...you’re healing with your own energy?”

“No. It’s…basically, it comes from everything around us. It’s the universal life force energy that everything is made up of. I’m merely a channel, a conduit. Kind of like a funnel. I’m the tool used to funnel the energy into you, and once it gets to you, it clears blockages in your energy pathways, and allows your body to function properly, and heal itself.”

“That’s amazing. And it always heals this fast?”

“I gave you a big dose. It sped up the process. But to be honest, even the dose I gave you doesn’t explain having results this stupendous. I’m at a loss to explain your speedy recovery.”

“So you do this all the time, then?” He sounded disappointed, and his feelings matched his tone.

“No, I don’t. There are…repercussions.”

“Like what?”

“Like ungrateful teenage boys tracking me down and threatening to expose me.” I raised my eyebrows and looked pointedly at him.

“Hey, I only said I’d talk to your parents. And from what you said, I doubt it would have been much of a surprise to them.”

“True. My mom knew what I’d done as soon as she saw me.” I watched an older couple walk past with a dog. When I looked back, I caught Alex watching me. I felt the embarrassment coming from him as he looked away.

He’s cute when he’s embarrassed
, I thought.
Wait…what? No, I cannot start crushing on a guy I healed. That is
not
going to happen.
But now that the thought had occurred to me, I couldn’t help but notice that he was kind of cute, now that his face was filling out and he had his color again. The hair he’d shown me looked a little funny—fuzzy and soft like baby hair—but I had a sneaking suspicion that Alex would normally be an attractive guy. When he wasn’t dying, that is.

The sound of the car door interrupted my thoughts.

“Hey, it’s getting hot in the car.” River called. He stood next to the car, and I could see even at a distance that he was sweating. Though it was a nice spring day, the Jetta was black, and River must have baking in car’s interior. “You know Mom doesn’t like us to idle the car to run the air conditioner.”

It was my car now, and I could do what I wanted to, but running the AC would just run down my fuel supply. “I’ll be right there,” I called, though I found myself reluctant to leave.

“I have so many more questions to ask you,” Alex said, his disappointment leaking through.

“I know, but I can’t let him fry in the car and…I don’t really want to discuss this in front of him.”

We both stood and started to walk back toward the car.

“Could we…? I know I’ve been pushy about all this. But I just had to know...”

“I don’t blame you. It’s been a big week for you.” I cast a sidelong glance at him as we walked.

“Anyway, I’d like to…I still would like to hear more…” he halted, hands thrust in his pocket, looking at the ground. “Do you think we could get together sometime, without River around? I mean,” he added quickly, “so you could…you know…tell me more?” He peeked out at me from under the rim of his ball cap.

Tell him no! Tell him no!
a voice inside me warned. This could only end in trouble for me. But my mouth had a mind of its own. “Sure.” I smiled.

“Is tonight too soon?” He was feeling anxious, probably worried he’d scare me off.

Jenna and I had plans to go to a movie to celebrate my attainment of vehicular freedom. “That would be fine.”
She won’t mind if I cancel.

We agreed that I would pick him up at seven, and we headed back to the car in silence. River eyed me with suspicion as we both settled into the car, and took off. We drove in silence, and I could feel Alex’s awkwardness and the probing sensation of River’s curiosity. I tried not to look at Alex in the rearview mirror—every time I did, I caught him watching me.

He didn’t even get halfway up his walkway before his mother ran out of the house, breathless and anxious. I could hear her chastising as she put an arm around him and dragged him into the house. She cast a disapproving look over her shoulder as they climbed the steps, and I felt Alex’s annoyance and embarrassment.

“I don’t think you’re her favorite person right now,” River said as we watched them go inside.

“Nope. She probably crapped her pants when she found his note. And she blames me for ‘kidnapping’ him.”

“She’s a worrier.”

“Yep.”

“He likes you.”

“Shut up.”

River gasped. “And you like him!”

“Shut up!” I could feel my cheeks flame, and I put the car into drive, staring straight ahead.

“Is that why you healed him?”

“No!”

“Em, this is not going to end well. You need to stop it, before it gets started.”

“Nothing is getting started.”

“I heard what he said, at the end…about seeing you tonight.”

“Mind your own business.”

“Hey, when your screw-ups mean more restrictions for me, it
is
my business.”

“Look,” I glanced over at him, “Mom and Dad are wrong about this healing stuff. I mean, I was wrong because of the way I went about it, sure, but if they weren’t so strict about not letting us heal people, I wouldn’t have had to do it that way. It’s not fair, and you know it, River. We aren’t kids anymore. I’m practically an adult, and a hundred years ago, boys your age were considered men—capable of holding down jobs, hunting for their tribe, marrying, you name it. We’re not little kids, but they don’t see that. We’ll always be their babies. Meanwhile, Mom gets to heal people on a regular basis. And Dad probably would too, if he wasn’t so overly worried. If they’d just give
us
the same support that they give each other, we could heal people, too.”