Chapter Thirty-Three - Cody
I got most of the funeral arrangements done by the time evening came, and then went home tired and wet to take a hot shower and eat supper with Mama. It was just the two of us, for once; Brandon was spending the night with one of his friends. It was a lot quieter with him and Marcus both gone, but that was all right. She fixed spaghetti and garlic bread, one of my favorites, and the quiet was soothing after such a rough day.
“I talked to Lisa today. I think maybe we might work things out, after all,” I mentioned between bites of food, knowing she’d be pleased at that news.
“I’m glad,” she nodded.
“Hmm. . . would’ve thought you’d been more excited,” I said jokingly.
“Did she get a chance to tell you?” she asked.
“Tell me what?” I asked.
“Obviously she didn’t,” she said.
“I guess not. So what’s the big secret?” I asked.
“I’m not sure if I should be the one to tell you or not,” she fretted.
“Well, since you already mentioned it, you might as well tell me. If you don’t then I’ll have to worry about it all night long till I see Lisa again. Come on, Mama; I promise I won’t be mad at her for not telling me. I know she was in pretty bad shape this afternoon,” I said.
“All right, then. But don’t judge, till you hear the whole story,” she warned.
“Do I ever?” I asked, frowning.
So she proceeded to tell me the whole story about New Mexico and Miss Latimer and the fake breakup, and I couldn’t decide whether to be shocked or sad or numb. I’d finally struggled my way through all that garbage till I reached some kind of understanding and acceptance of reality, to forgiveness and peace, and the revelation that things had never been quite what they seemed to be knocked me flat in the dirt all over again.
I really hate to be manipulated, and the idea that everybody I loved and trusted was secretly maneuvering behind my back was a hard pill to swallow. It stung almost as much as that whole incredible story about Lisa and Marcus hooking up at a party. In hindsight, I couldn’t believe I’d ever swallowed such a whopper as that in the first place. She must have been really desperate, to come up with something that stupid. I ought to have known better. I ought to have demanded more answers when she tried to feed me that line of bull. If I had, then things might have turned out different.
My face flushed red when I thought about what a fool I’d been.
“Why didn’t you tell me all this sooner, if you knew?” I asked, accusingly.
“Because I knew y’all would work things out sooner or later, if I stayed out of the way. It wasn’t my place to meddle in the meantime,” she told me, and I grudgingly decided maybe she had a point.
I was still struggling to adjust myself to the idea that Lisa had been lying to me this whole time. I couldn’t decide whether to be furious or whether to feel sorry for her, let alone Marcus. Knowing they did it for my own sake and no other reason made it easier to forgive, I guess, but that didn’t mean I was okay with it, either. As soon as things settled down a little, we all three needed to sit down and have a serious talk about what it means to trust somebody.
“Here. This is the stuff that’s supposed to break the curse. Lisa dropped it off awhile back, and told me to have you drink it,” Mama said, holding up a tube of green liquid. I stared at it, and then reached out to take it into my own hand.
I looked at the vial, watching it glitter in the soft light, and my heart softened. I could only imagine how much it had cost Lisa to get that little tube, all the fear and humiliation she must have suffered. All for me, and not even any thanks. That was greatness of heart if anything ever was.
I think I’ve said before how irresistible that trait has always been in my eyes; that reflection of the Light that illuminates the world and makes everything beautiful that it touches. I think I would have fallen in love with Lisa all over again, just from hearing that she’d done such a thing for a complete stranger. It was the deed itself which was beautiful, not the fact that she did it for me.
But it had been for me, and there was no way I could thank her, nor ever repay the gift she’d given me, except to love her forever with my whole heart. And that I had every intention of doing.
But there was still the issue of what to do about Layla, because there wasn’t a shred of doubt in my mind that she was the same person as this so-called Miss Latimer. According to the dreams, we were both still in danger of death if I understood things right. Layla had practically said as much, if and when she found out Lisa and I were back together again. Therefore I didn’t drink the liquid right away, and handed it back to Mama.
“What’s wrong?” she asked.
“I think I’ll let you hold on to that little gem for a while before I use it,” I said, my mind already working far ahead.
“How come?” she asked.
“Well, it seems to me Layla can’t curse me twice, and I think it’s about time I paid her a visit. I might need that cure more when I get back,” I said.
“Back from where?” she asked.
“I think it’s about time I went out there to New Mexico and busted some heads,” I said. Yeah, I know, it sounded like pure bravado. But I was dead serious, too. If anybody thought they could get away with hurting my family and the people I loved, then they’d find out otherwise real quick. That was a lesson already burned deep into my soul by a hundred generations of history.
My family is from Cumberland, you see, right on the border between England and Scotland. That was always a land of conflict and strife, of raids between the two kingdoms and governments who did nothing to protect their people. For thousands of years it was like that, ever since the Picts and Romans fought over the same ground; maybe even earlier. People had no one to depend on but family, and that was a bond you never, ever forsook. So maybe somewhere back in the misty depths of time there’s still a Borderland warrior who looks out of my Texan eyes and sees a world very different, yes, but in some ways no different at all. I like to think so.
For all I know, one of them might even have been a knight in shining armor back in the old, old days, a man of honor who not only knew how to fight but also how to care for the sick and the hurting, how to build things of beauty and to humble himself before God. I’d like to believe that, too. True, I have my own battles to fight and my own courage to find, but it surely does help to remember those things.
Mama didn’t say anything right away, but she looked unhappy.
“Before you do anything like that, I guess there’s something else I need to tell you,” she finally said.
“Well, this sure is turning out to be a night for secrets, isn’t it?” I said dryly.
“It’s just some things your father told me when you were a baby, that’s all. I don’t know how much of it is true, or even if any of it is,” she said.
“Mother, just tell me, for pity’s sake!” I said, exasperated.
“Well, for one thing he told me that story Marcus heard, about the curse and where it came from. I never realized other people in town knew anything about it. He also told me those bright blue eyes of yours are the mark of a curse-breaker, but I guess I’m getting ahead of myself a little bit. Do you know that crystal up there on your Grandpa Reuben’s tombstone?” she asked.
“Yeah, what about it?” I asked.
“Your daddy always told me that crystal is tied to you. As long as it’s up there on the mountain, in that very spot, then it’ll guide and protect you no matter what. It’ll give you true dreams to show you which way God would have you to go, and no kind of magic can touch you. Not even the curse. He said your Grandma Hannah dedicated it to you when she first put it there. But you still have a hard choice to make,” she said.
“What kind of a choice?” I asked.
“Well, you can decide to live out your own life just like a normal person if you want to. The crystal will p
rotect you from the curse for as long as you live. You’d be skipped over, you might say, but in that case the curse would pick back up again with any kids you might have,” she said.
“And what’s my other choice?” I asked.
“Well, he also said you could choose to take that crystal loose and use it to make an end of the curse forever. He never said how, but he did say it’d be dangerous and you might even die. He personally never doubted which choice you’d end up making, though, and that’s why he told me not to say anything about it till you turned twenty-five, so you’d have time to come to your full strength before you put yourself in danger. That’s why I never told you anything,” she said.
I sat there with my mouth open, reeling from yet another shattering of everything I ever thought was true. Mama knew about the Curse? I was immune to magic? That was incredible. My mind jumped instantly to that night Layla tried to kiss me, and the fear in her eyes. Suddenly finding out she couldn’t hurt me might have been why she turned tail and ran off like a scalded dog. Not knowing why her magic didn’t work would have been scary, I guess.
There was something else that bothered me about the whole thing, though.
“But how can any of that be true? I wasn’t even born yet when Grandma Hannah put that crystal up there. How could it have anything to do with me one way or the other?” I objected.
“Maybe she had a dream about you,” Mama said.
There was always that possibility, of course. Hannah had owned that crystal for a long time before she ever put it up there on the tombstone, so if it could really give visions of the future then it was entirely possible she might have had a few. I certainly couldn’t think of any other way for her to know all those things.
“But why me, though?” I asked, and Mama shook her head.
“That I don’t know, son. I’m sure there’s a good reason, but sometimes we have to be content not to know what it is,” she said.
I decided she was probably right about that. Sometimes you simply have to accept reality for what it is and let that be the end of the matter, no matter how unsatisfying that may be. As the saying goes, it is what it is. That might sound like the kind of frivolous and flippant thing only a high school kid would ever say, but it actually contains a grain of very good sense when you think about it for a while.
Well, all right, then. I could accept the fact that I might never know why God chose me instead of somebody else, but I couldn’t help wondering how Hannah must have felt about that. She and Reuben only ever had one child, my Grandpa Martin, and I suppose she would’ve liked to use the crystal to protect him, if she had her own way. From her point of view, it must have seemed that God was asking her to condemn her own son to an early death to save me instead, her grandson’s great-grandson, and it must have seemed utterly irrational since the crystal could have been passed down to me eventually anyway. That’s what I would have been thinking, at least. She must have wondered why God would ever ask her to do such a thing, and for her to actually go through with it must have taken a kind of faith I could barely imagine.
I guess it’s possible that that in itself was part of the reason why He asked, of course. Greatness of heart in one person is an inspiration to all others who see it, and the ripples may wash ashore in far times and places and in ways the original doer of the deed knows nothing about. But then again, there might also have been some very practical reason why He asked; that crystal might have saved me from death a dozen times already, for all I knew, in some odd way that never could have happened otherwise. Nobody ever knows what might have happened.
Or maybe it was both.
I loved her a little bit then, this old woman I never knew who sacrificed so much for me, and for a fleeting moment I wished I could have met Hannah Trewick McGrath, if only just once, to thank her for having the courage to believe. As it was, I could only bless her silently, and pray that her dreams gave her comfort, and promise her that I’d never let her sacrifice be in vain.
I guess Daddy was right about what choice I’d make, after all.
But my head hurt from trying to digest too much new information, and I was so confused about everything by then that I didn’t know what to think anymore.
“But what am I supposed to do?” I finally asked.
“I’ve told you all I know, Cody. If you don’t know what to do then maybe it’s not the right time to do anything yet. Wait for a dream. You might have to be patient,” she said.
“I’ve got to think about all this for a while,” I finally said, shaking my head.
“Yes, you do. Whatever you’re supposed to do, I can’t help but think it’s something more than just busting some heads, as you put it,” she said.
“So what changed your mind? Why are you telling me all this now, all of a sudden?” I asked.
“Because I don’t want you to do anything foolish, that’s why. You can’t make wise decisions if you don’t know everything, and if things like this are happening then I think it’s time I told you,” she said.
“Well. . . thanks,” I said.
“You’re welcome. Just think about what you need to do, and I’ll support you whatever you decide. But don’t do anything hasty, all right?” she asked.
“I won’t,” I said automatically.
That night, I dreamed again.
At first it seemed ordinary and even dull, because it started out in a place that I knew quite well; the cemetery at Nebo. The only odd thing was that it seemed to be almost empty of tombstones. The only one in sight was my Grandpa Reuben’s, and the dirt seemed fresh on that grave. I wondered if I was seeing something from long ago instead of the future, and if so I wondered why.
In front of the grave was a lady in a black dress, praying, and somehow I knew it was Hannah. Then I saw her lift up her hands to Heaven, and she spoke my name, and I glimpsed a shining crystal in her hands. She said some words from Scripture that I vaguely remembered hearing before, kissed the jewel, and then attached it firmly to the top of her husband’s tomb.
Then she turned around, and I could have sworn she looked right at me. I don’t know if it’s possible to communicate across time that way, but I know for just a second we locked eyes, and she smiled. But only for a second, because then the whole scene vanished and I found myself reeling into utter insanity again.
I was in the midst of a howling storm on a mountaintop at night, with lightning bolts striking the boulders all around me and splintering the stone. I wanted to cower down under the rocks to keep from getting burnt to cinders, but my other self in the dream did no such thing. He climbed on top of a boulder, then reached out and grabbed one of the bolts in his bare hand. Then he threw it back at the clouds, for all the world like Thor in a cheap Viking movie. Then the storm hushed, and there was rain.
Only rain, quiet and still.