Glimpses: The Best Short Stories of Rick Hautala (47 page)

Biting her lower lip and making a funny sound in the back of her throat, Sally nodded. She reached up and grabbed his hand. Her grip was cold in his, so he gently rubbed her hand to warm it.

“Their hair and clothes look all silvery and misty,” Sally said. She was silent for a moment as she craned her head forward, studying the elusive figures. “But you’re right. They’re not ghosts, and they’re not scary.”

“No, they’re not,” Alan said breathlessly as a strong sense of relief washed over him. “And they wouldn’t let you see them if they weren’t willing to help.”

Alan’s knees popped as he stood up and started walking again toward the forest with Sally close beside him.

“They have different names,” he said, “depending on which country—which
human
country they’re in. The English have my favorite name for them. They call them ‘the Fair Folk.’”

“Do you mean fairies?” Sally said.

“Yes. Fairies. That’s another name for them—fairies and elves, and some people call the land they live in the ‘Land of Faery.’ There are so many names for them, and they live in so many places, but most cultures agree that where they live is a place called ‘Under the Hill.’ That’s where they took me to be healed. Under the Hill.”

“So you didn’t really
die
die,” Sally said. “You were just … hurt real bad.” Sally looked at Alan with a mixture of confusion and fear and … was that hope he saw in her eyes?

He certainly hoped so.

“They were checking all of the men who had been wounded and killed that day, going from person to person, but I was the only one they picked up and carried off with them.” His voice caught, and the memory filled him with deep melancholy. “They took me Under the Hill where they healed me.”

“And you—?” Sally started to say, but they were close to the forest now. When they were less than ten feet away, Alan and Sally drew to a halt. He cast a quick glance over his shoulder, expecting to see the guide rushing down the hill to escort them to the exit, but the man was nowhere to be seen. Alan was sure the fair folk were using their power of ‘glamour’ to hide him and Sally from the guard.

“If that’s true,” Sally said, “if this all happened a hundred years ago, that means you must be—”

“I was born in 1886, in
St. Louis, Missouri,” Alan said, “so that makes me one hundred and nineteen years old.”

“Are you kidding, Grampy?” Sally gave him a sly, skeptical look. “No one lives
that
long.”

“Well, you see … when I left them, when I came out from Under the Hill after they healed me, I realized I had been there for many, many years.”

“Why did they save you and not any of those other men who were hurt so bad?” Sally’s face was as pale as paper in the gathering gloom. Her eyes shone like two sparkling stars.

“I don’t know,” Alan said. “I asked them about it many times, but I never got a straight answer. They don’t really explain themselves much. It had something to do with what they called my ‘birthright,’ but no one ever explained that to me. As far as I could tell, I had been there only one night … maybe a day and a night … so you can imagine my surprise when I got out and discovered that forty years had gone by in the real world. The incredible thing was, I hadn’t aged more than a day.”

“Like Rip van Winkle,” Sally said, “’cept he was asleep for only twenty years. And he got all old and stuff.”

“That’s right. Like Rip van Winkle. I don’t really know how else to explain it. I guess we just have to accept that it’s … magic.”

Alan and Sally were silent as they stared at the figures in the woods. They had stopped moving but, even so, Alan found it difficult if not impossible to look directly at any one of them for long. In the blink of an eye, a figure would fade out of sight and then reappear someplace else. Their eyes flashed and glowed in the deepening gloom. Their hair, like fine-spun silver threads, wafted like gossamer on an unfelt breeze. After a long silence, one of the figures raised a hand as if in greeting and beckoned Alan and Sally to come forward.

Sally held back, her hand squeezing her Grampy’s hand tightly.

“Is that why you’ve come back here?” she asked, her voice laced with fear. “Is it time for you to die, and you’re going to go with them?”

Alan looked at her, emotions catching in his throat, making it impossible to speak.

“I don’t want you to die, Grampy. I love you,” she said.

Tears spilled down her cheeks, glistening like quicksilver in the darkness as she clung to him. Her pale face, floating in the deepening darkness like a tiny moon, was as translucent and insubstantial as the faces in the woods.

“No, Sweetie. I’m not going to die.” Alan gently touched her cheek with his fingertips and felt the coolness of her skin. “Not for a very long time, anyway, but I wanted you to—”

His heart was breaking as he considered what he was about to tell her, but he had no choice. Pulling her close to him, he was terribly conscious of her frail, trembling body.

“You know the … the blood disease you have …” he said, choking on nearly every word.

“Uh-huh,” Sally said with a sharp nod. In an instant, her eyes clouded up, and her expression froze.

“And you know what the doctors have done … or tried to do.”

The tears in his eyes made everything appear dim and hazy. Even the tiniest hint of light from the night sky shattered into a dazzling rainbow of brilliant colors. The forest was absolutely silent with not even a hint of breeze or bird song.

“They’re all trying to make me get better,” Sally said, but even as she said it, Alan could hear the note of resignation in her voice. She knew—even if not consciously—that there was no hope left.

“The doctors have done everything they can, Sweetie,” Alan said. “And now I want to see if these … if my friends can help you.”

Sally looked at him with a startled expression.

“You mean you want
me
to go with
them
?”

Alan nodded slowly, and as he did so, he took her hand as if to guide her forward into the woods. A soft, murmuring noise that sounded vaguely like voices came from the darkness.

“How … how long will I have to be gone?” Sally asked, her eyes widening with fear and confusion.

“It will only be for one night,” Alan said.

“But I don’t want to leave you, Grampy.” She was crying now, her body trembling. “What if it’s like when you went under the hill? What if I’m away for forty years?”

“You’ll get better,” Alan said, and even as he said it, he tried his best to believe he was telling her the truth. “You’ll be healthy again. No matter how long you’re with them, it’s better than … better than …”

He stopped himself, unable to finish the thought.

Sally looked from her Grampy to the motionless figures in the woods. The low sound of voices continued as one of the figures shifted forward and held out a frail, white hand to them … to
her
.

Sally looked at her Grampy, tears streaming down her face.

“But if I go … if I stay with them for forty years … you may not—you can’t live that long. You won’t be here when I come back!”

The desperate pleading in her voice pierced Alan’s heart. It tore him to shreds to think that he was looking at his precious great-great-granddaughter for the very last time.

“Why can’t you come with me, Grampy?” she wailed. “You said they’re your friends. You can come, too. We’ll both be gone together.”

“I’m sorry, Sweetie,” Alan said, shaking his head, “but it doesn’t work that way. I didn’t know until just now if they’d even take you with them, but I see now that they will, and it makes me happy.”

“What about Mommy and Daddy … and Charlie, my goldfish? What if they’re all dead, too, when I come back?”

“It can’t be helped,” Alan said. “Last week, the doctors told your folks and me that there was nothing more they could do. If you don’t go with them now, you won’t live more than six months.”

“But I’d rather live six months with you than forty years or the rest of my life without you, Grampy!
Please!
…
Please
don’t make me
go!
”

Even as she said this, the figure closest to them stepped out of the forest and reached out to take Sally’s hand. The instant their hands touched, she fell silent. The fear on her face melted away as she turned and looked at the figure.

Before leaving, the figure regarded Alan with a look of unfathomable sadness and compassion in his silvery eyes. Without thinking, Alan stood up straight, squared his shoulders, and stiffened his arm as he gave a snappy military salute. Like a soldier from one war recognizing a soldier from another, the figure clenched his right hand into a fist, raised it to his chest, and then solemnly bowed his head low.

“You’ll wait for me, won’t you, Grampy?” Sally called out as she stared moving off into the woods, still holding onto the hand of the mysterious pale figure.

“You know what I’ve always said, Sweetie. I’m going to live forever or die trying.”

“Please,” Sally called out. “Please wait for me, Grampy. I’ll come back.”

With every word, her voice grew fainter and fainter until it was lost beneath the low sighing of the wind in the leaves. Numbed by sorrow, Alan stood where he was and sobbed as he stared off into the woods.

But as sad as he was, Alan was also filled with a fresh sense of hope as he watched the pale shadows blend into the darkness that now embraced the Belleau Woods.

He had to believe that the fair folk who had tended him so carefully that day on the battlefield in 1918 would save his great-great-granddaughter’s life now.

And he hoped that, when she emerged from Under the Hill, no matter if it was days or months or even forty years from now, this world would be a better place. In spite of whatever wars, seen and unseen, were being fought, it would have to be a better world simply because she would be in it.

"Her throat was serpent, but the words she spake Came, as though bubbling honey, for love's sake...."

—Keats:
Lamia
, 64-65.

Love can change us all, it's true.

You must know that old joke about how a woman will try and try to change the man she married, and then complain twenty years later that he's not the man he used to be. An old joke, but true. Love
does
change us all. We all find that out sooner or later. Unfortunately for Dennis Levesque, he found it out a little too late.

It was springtime in
Hilton, Maine, a small mill town nestled in the mountains of the Western part of the state. Some folks would say that you can't use those two words "springtime" and "Maine" in the same sentence without fear of contradicting yourself, and most years, that's true. No matter what the weatherman on TV says, there's as good a chance of a blizzard in April as there is in November. Sure, the plow ridges may be gone, the Red Sox may be swinging their bats in Fenway Park, and the dirt roads may turn from ice-glazed skids to mud-slick washboards, but only the swelling buds on the trees and the song of the peepers down in the marsh can convince you that winter might truly be over.

It was a Friday evening, late in April, and a cold wind was blowing down off nearby Watcher's Mountain. In spite of the cold, Dennis Levesque was sitting outside on his porch. He had his feet propped up on the rickety railing and was drinking a beer as he leaned back in one of the faded lawn chairs. He had left this particular chair out on the porch all winter. The pale straps were frayed and sagging; they looked like they might not make it through the coming summer, but Dennis was determined to see how long they'd last. He’d paid five bucks for this chair, and he wanted to get his money’s worth. The plastic container that held the three remaining cans of beer lay on the splintered porch floor, within easy reach. Two empties were crumpled up beside it.

"Returnable cans be damned! Who needs the fucking nickel?" Dennis whispered as he tilted his head back and guzzled from the can he was holding.

When he patted his shirt pocket, feeling for his cigarette pack, his hand froze in mid-motion. Letting out a sigh that hung like a frosted mist in the night air, his fingers clamped around the small piece of paper and pulled it free. In the dim light from the kitchen window, the piece of paper looked sickly gray; but earlier that day, when Bo Hoskins, his foreman at the mill, had handed it to him at the end of his shift, it had been a different color.

Pink.

Bright pink.

Pussy pink
, Dennis had thought at the time.

"NOTICE OF TERMINATION"

That was all it said at the top, both earlier today and now, as Dennis unfolded the paper and stared at it in the fading twilight. There were more words in the spaces below, but they all added up to the same damned thing.

He'd been
fired
... "down-sized," as Wilson had repeatedly said. “Shit-canned.”

"Bullshit...
bullshit
...
bull-titty-fucking-shit
," Dennis sputtered.