Chapter Eighteen – Faith

 

Water cascaded down over my body as I continued to rub my skin raw with body wash.

No matter how hard I tried to get clean, it just didn’t seem to work. I imagined I could feel the crow feathers all over me, still, like a lingering and unwanted touch.

That had been no normal dream, and I knew it. But who in their right mind was going to believe some crazy woman talking about how a crow had invaded her dreams? About how it had somehow stolen my mind’s eye and enforced its own vision on me?

For Christ’s sake, it had happened to me, and even I barely believed it! How was I supposed to be able to convince someone else that I was telling the truth, that my experience had been real and true?

I shampooed my hair, rinsed it, turned my face up to the shower head, and tried to let the water wash me clean. Maybe, somehow, the purifying water would penetrate deeper than just my skin and hair, and it would take away these memories. Wash away these thoughts inside my head, of ghosts and UFOs and government conspiracies. Of those people in the morgue who’d come for the body, or the way Dr. Lawrence had acted when I’d gone into his office the day before.

Because, no matter how hard I tried to ignore it, the memory was there. The memory of something else being in my dream with me. Because it wasn’t just the crow—the crow had just been some sort of…messenger. A spirit that had moved on behalf of someone else.

Don’t ask me how I knew. I just did. All this that was happening to me—it was real. It was as real and solid and truthful as the ground beneath my feet, or the sun hanging high in the fall sky.

A knock on the door shocked me out of my thoughts.

“Hey girl,” Veronica called from the hallway. “I’m going into work early. They still haven’t replaced Abby down at the bar, and they want me to pick up her afternoon shift. You gonna be okay?”

“Yeah,” I lied. “Of course. Why wouldn’t I be?”

“Okay,” she said, clearly meaning her words, and headed off down the hallway.

God, all I wanted was for someone to believe me, for me to somehow feel like I wasn’t going absolutely insane.

I knew, though, that the only way to make myself feel less crazy was to untangle this mystery in front of me, this strange twisting tale that had somehow dropped into my lap when Eb Shook had arrived with the remains of that poor pig.

And then there was Samuel Fitzgerald.

Somehow, I was tied to him. All of this, maybe, was tied to him. Probably not directly, but he knew more than he was putting on airs about. I saw it in his eyes as I’d told him about my dreams, saw the recognition hiding there. A recognition he was desperately trying to hide from me.

Was he a journalist, even? And, if he wasn’t, who was he really?

I finished rinsing off and leaned down, turning off the shower. I pulled back the shower curtain, grabbed my towel from the nearby rack, and began to dry off. I stepped out of the bathtub, the warm steam of the bathroom covering my skin in its warm embrace even as it fogged up the small vanity’s mirror.

Idly, I reached up, clearing the fog from the silver-backed glass’s face with a swirl of my hand.

For the first time, I saw a hint of fear reflected back in my eyes. A hint of worry at what the world might actually hold. The dream from last night, the crow at my window, had made this all too real. Made it more imminent than even the poor, stripped-down remains of Eb Shook’s swine as it lay dead on the metal examining table of the county morgue.

I needed to confront Sam. I needed to find out what he knew, see if he could help me feel sane again. I knew I couldn’t be too forceful or upfront about what I wanted. But, one way or another, I needed him to tell me the truth. It didn’t matter that I was attracted to him, or that I was beginning to love the sound of his voice and the way he walked. What mattered was that I just knew he had an idea of what was really going on.

Or, maybe, I didn’t need to say anything at all to him? Perhaps I didn’t need to force his hand. After all, if I’d been able to convince him to let me go along for the ride to Shook’s, maybe I could keep managing to do it? I could stay attached to his hip, and find out what was going on that way.

But, first, I needed to get ready. Because, no matter what he said, whether it was the truth or not, or if it even helped me get one step closer to finding out what was really going on, I was going out to Eb Shook’s farm with him. If nothing else, I owed it to myself to see this through all the way to the bitter end.

Because I knew, if I did tease out enough threads from this tangled mess of a situation, I’d get to whatever had been in my second dream.

I’d get to whatever was behind the crow.

And when I did, I’d make it know that it didn’t have any business in my dreams. Or anyone else’s.