Wisdom Spring (5 page)

She was looking at me.

“What?” I asked. “You don’t want to change your hair color?”

She gave that little smile. “I’ve changed the color of my hair more often than you’ve brushed your teeth. No, it’s not that. I was just trying to figure out … Why are you doing this? You’ve had every reason in the world to jettison me and move on. You don’t know me. You don’t know if I’m a total loon, or worse, a con artist. And if I am telling the truth, you now have a bulls-eye on your back. So why are you helping me?”

As I was trying to come up with an answer, I spotted a decent-looking Marriott from the highway and took an exit that said Deming—I guess we were in New Mexico—and pulled into the parking lot, parking a fair distance from the front door. I turned off the engine and sat. After a minute, I responded.

“My life ended with Karen’s death. I assume you don’t have any children.” She shook her head. “There is no way to explain the deep grief you feel when you lose a child. ‘Shattered’ is the only word that comes to mind, and that doesn’t even come close. I have a gun in my trunk. I had visions of pulling off the highway someplace out here, in an area like this—Texas, New Mexico, or Arizona—of walking into the desert, and ending it. Let the buzzards and desert animals take care of my body. The problem is, there is still a tiny particle of me that wants to stay alive. And I have no idea why. When my money runs out, what am going to do? I can’t go back to my old life, my old career. I never liked it to begin with. I don’t see myself taking a job washing dishes in some small-town diner for the rest of my life, eventually being known as the crazy old guy with the mysterious past. I was hoping my brother could help set me straight when I get up there, but that’s expecting a lot. No, until I met you, I was just running out the string, delaying the inevitable.”

I paused, then continued, knowing that I had made my decision. “As whacked out as your story is, it gives me some sort of purpose. If you’re telling the truth, and God knows, I think you just might be, is it possible that I might be able to redeem myself in some way for Karen’s death? All I can say is your ‘Voice’ steered you in the right direction when it picked me. I have absolutely nothing left to lose. I’m probably the safest person you could be with.”

She leaned over and gave me a kiss on the cheek. “Thank you.”

“Okay, here’s how we should do this. I’m afraid you’re going to have to share a room with me. I think you should stay as far off the grid as possible. I don’t know what kind of crazy monitoring equipment they have nowadays, but they could be keeping an eye on hotels. If a guy is traveling alone for days, then he suddenly requests two rooms, or a room for two, it might flag something in their supercomputer. So I’ll get a room for one and bring in all the luggage. Then we can go get some dinner. That sound good?”

“I’m still not capable of making decisions, so I’ll trust your judgment. I never would have thought about them checking hotel anomalies like that, so I’m comfortable leaving it up to you. In the movies if they are trying to stay anonymous, they pay cash at hotels. Should you do that?”

“That’s not as easy as it once was. I will pay cash, but I’ll still have to leave my credit card for the deposit. As long as they don’t know who I am, I think I’m okay.”

I checked in while Jess waited in the car. As they gave me my key card, I heard the name Hillstrom and walked over to the bar, where Brian Williams was on a big screen TV reporting the national news. Staring at me was a 60-inch version of Jess. Luckily, it wasn’t a great picture of her—probably her driver’s license photo—and she looked like about a million other women. I just caught enough of the report to know that the prime suspect was one Jessica Norton. So far they seemed to be concentrating their search in the general DC area, but I knew that would expand nationwide soon. Maybe it already had.

“Seems like all the good-looking chicks turn out to be murderers,” said the bartender. He was looking at me, and I realized there was no one else in the bar.

“Makes you not want to date anymore,” I replied.

“You said it. Can I get you anything?”

“No thanks. I was just checking out the bar. I’ll probably stop in later. I gotta go bring in my bags.”

“Okay, see you later.”

I felt like running to the car, but I restrained myself. When I got there, I said to Jess, “Change of plans. We’re doing takeout. And you’re going to come in through the side entrance.”

“Something’s happened.”

“Yeah, your picture is front and center on the evening news.”

“Oh shit.”

“It’s not a great picture, so you’re probably pretty safe for the moment. Hopefully no one at that truck stop, the Burger King, or your evangelist family, will put two and two together. But I’m going to run into a drugstore and pick up some hair color. Dark brown? Do you wear contacts?” She shook her head. “Okay, I’ll pick up some reading glasses that you can wear if you’re out in public. I’ll get the lowest magnification so you won’t trip over things. And some sunglasses. Every little change helps, I suppose. Of course, what do I know? It’s not like I’ve ever done this before. Chinese okay with you?”

She nodded her head dumbly.

It was weird. Jess’s life was on the line, and by association, so was mine, and yet, I was excited. I don’t know why, but I felt motivated about things again. I was actually getting into this!

Chapter 5

We were sitting in the room an hour later, an array of Chinese food cartons spread out in front of us. I was hungry, but I noticed Jess just picking at her food. I suppose having the whole country on the lookout for you could affect your appetite.

“Maybe I’ve watched too many movies,” I said between bites. “But it occurred to me that just about everything in this country is built around technology, so the safest thing we can do is avoid it as much as possible. Stay away from toll roads—toll booths have cameras—take the smaller roads. If we can get to Alaska without incident, my brother and I can keep you smuggled there until … well, until something.”

“What do we do when we hit the Canadian border?” Jess asked.

“Hadn’t thought of that. We’ll come up with something, I guess.” I changed subjects. “Any peep out of The Voice?”

“Nothing,” she answered. “It’s not like it carries on conversations with me, but I’ve kind of gotten used to hearing it.”

“So tell me more how it works. I know it told you to run. You said you think the parking sign was another message. How can you be sure? Does it ever talk in complete sentences? Is it male or female?”

“Definitely male. The messages come in lots of different forms, which is why it’s so hard to explain. As I said, in the beginning it was more like intuition. It progressed into my dreams at night. I’d wake up knowing that somebody had just told me something. After a minute I’d usually remember it. Sometimes I’ll be in a public place and I’ll hear someone give me an instruction. I’ll quickly look around and realize that no one near me had said it. Sometimes it’s a little more emphatic, like it was in Washington, and sometimes I’ll just be reading a book or a magazine, or even a menu, and a sentence will pop out at me with some sort of instruction. When I look back down at the page, that sentence isn’t there anymore. How did I know about the parking sign, or using the restroom at the Burger King? I can’t really tell you. I think I’m just getting used to the communication in all its forms.”

“Was the ‘run’ message typical of the kind you get?” I cut in.

“No. As I said, that was much stronger. In fact, it was almost pleading, now that I reflect back. But usually it’s simple messages like, ‘Cross the street here’ or ‘Take the Metro right now.’ Usually not words, just images. Sometimes even an image with a word. Some—especially over the last week or so—have kept me hidden or even saved my life, but most of the messages over the last year have been pretty benign. I’m not even sure why many of them came. I mean, I know where to cross a street.”

“Could it be that The Voice has been training you to listen to it?” I asked. “Maybe it knew that you had to get used to its presence before it could make any life-changing suggestions. It had to become part of you.”

“Funny you say that, because at times The Voice brings me a lot of comfort, like it’s a part of me. Maybe you’re right and it has been training me.”

It was getting late and I suggested we get some sleep. They had given me a king-sized bed and I didn’t want to raise any flags with the front desk by asking for two queens. But I figured we were adults and could survive being in the same bed. The truth was, I had become quite attracted to Jess, but this wasn’t the time or place to act on it. She had other things to occupy her mind at the moment.

She had run out of her apartment quickly, without packing anything, so I knew tomorrow I would be in the women’s section of some department store stocking up on clothes and other items for her. In the meantime, I let her wear one of my shirts to sleep in.

I took a shower first, so as to give Jess all the time she needed when she took hers. I had gotten into the habit over the last couple of weeks of sleeping in my underwear, but for this occasion I dug into my suitcase for my pajamas and put them on in the foggy bathroom.

Jess’s shower seemed to go on forever. It must have felt especially good to her. Calming as much as cleansing. I couldn’t imagine having to leave home the way she did, without time to think, without time to prepare. But she was doing pretty well, considering. While I, too, had to leave my home under stressful circumstances, it was completely different. Like Jess, I was totally lost, but unlike her, I had had time to prepare—too much time maybe. Anyway, while I was heartbroken, she was scared. Terrified, really.

I thought about The Voice. I’d always been a pretty common-sense kind of guy, and communication from the grave—or wherever it was coming from—didn’t fit into the realm of “normal” for me. But what were the odds of someone in her situation, being scared beyond rational thought, meeting up with someone who was no longer afraid of anything? And on the other side of that, her entering my life provided me with a purpose at the exact time I needed one. Okay, it was a little spooky.

Jess finally came out of the bathroom. She was wearing the shirt I had lent her, but all I could think of was what was under that shirt. Oh, it was going to be a tough sleeping night for me!

She crawled in next to me, again gave me a kiss on the cheek, and thanked me one more time for everything I had done for her. I looked at her again before we turned out the lights. The shower had been cleansing, but the stress in her face was still there. Add to that the sheer exhaustion she must’ve felt. If anyone needed a good night’s sleep, it was Jess.

*****

It turned out not to be a tough night for me after all. I must’ve fallen asleep the minute my head hit the pillow. I awoke to the smell of coffee. I looked over at Jess, sitting cross-legged on a chair by the window. She was staring into space. It was a dark day, with a light drizzle coming down. There were probably some hills in the distance, but the clouds obscured them. I looked at my watch. Eight-thirty. That was the latest I’d slept in years. Jess heard me moving and came out of her catatonic state.

“The coffee isn’t great, but it’s coffee,” she said, stretching.

“How did you sleep?”

“Like I was in a coma.” She paused. “The Voice came just as I was waking up. Kind of a half dream. It was an actual sentence—maybe because I wasn’t awake yet.”

I was alert now. “What did it … uh, he … say?”

“
‘It all starts in Homer.’
I have no idea what it means.”

I did. I felt a shiver travel down my spine. “It means that, for whatever reason, I’m not supposed to drop you off along the road. You’re definitely coming with me to Alaska.”

She cocked her head and looked at me.

“I never told you where in Alaska I was going,” I said. “My brother lives in Homer.”

“Whoa.”

“Yeah. I guess you’re meant to chill out for a while.”

“I’m not so sure.”

“What do you mean?”

“That Voice has been guiding me toward something. I don’t know what yet, but something. To just lead me someplace to hide out doesn’t feel right. Maybe there’s another reason I was supposed to meet you.”

“You mean you think Homer might be hiding a clue?”

“Honestly, I don’t know. But it seems to make sense. Also, it said ‘it all starts in Homer,’ not ‘hide in Homer.’ That sounds pretty significant.”

“You’re right, it does.”

I decided right then that I was either all in or all out, and I knew the answer to that. The Homer thing had rattled me. Not only had I not said a word to her about Homer, I had nothing on me or in my luggage about it. It wasn’t even in my brother’s information on my phone. Only his cell phone number, and that wasn’t a Homer exchange. There was absolutely no way she could have known. Add that to all the other little oddities and I had to believe it was happening. She really was hearing a voice.

“We have a couple of hours ‘til check-out,” I said, looking at my watch. “Will that give you enough time to color your hair?”

“Yeah,” she answered, looking at the bottle. “This is a pretty simple process.”

“Okay, then tell me what you need for clothes and whatever. I’ll go find a Wal-Mart—this is the southwest, there’s gotta be a Wal-Mart—and I’ll pick it up for you.”

“I feel really guilty. You’re buying everything for me and you don’t even know me. I can’t even contribute.”

“Jess, look, this is something I can do, and something I want to do. Don’t worry about it. So tell me what you need.”

We made a list. Jeans, blouses, underwear, hair brush, toiletries, sneakers, and much more. I didn’t know how I was going to possibly get it done in two hours, but Jess pointed out the Wal-Mart from her view at the window, so luckily I wouldn’t have to waste any time looking for it. Once we were done, Jess headed to the bathroom with the hair color and I grabbed a few hundred dollars—I felt more comfortable paying cash—and went out the door, not looking forward to my shopping spree.