Girl With a Past (10 page)

Aunt Carol had never given up her hippie
ways. Instead she had built a career on designing bohemian chic
clothing and home accessories. She had changed out of her bloodied
clothes into a rose velvet vest over a full paisley skirt, a silk
shirt and ankle boots, with her signature scarf tied around her
black hair. Indian style.

“We’ll bring you a sandwich,” offered
Carol.

“Fine.” Steven wasn’t feeling hungry even
though he’d been about to eat lunch when his father called and told
him to leave immediately to pick up Al on the edge of campus.

Oh man, did that scene blow. He couldn’t
close his eyes without seeing blood erupt from the side of his
sister’s head. She was running towards him, totally freaked even
before the shots, on a mission. If only he had some idea of what
she was on to. For sure, it had something to do with Mom.

14

Big Sur, July 1968

Familiar voices brought me back from
dreaming of Big Sur. I wanted to tell them I was okay, but even the
thought of trying to speak made my head hurt unbearably. Slipping
back into the world of dreams, even a nightmare, was easier.

The heat of the glaring sun intensified
against the granite and dirt, where I was sheltered from the ocean
breeze by the cliff and the rocky over hang. My heart pounded
nearly out of my chest when I awoke to find my legs draped over the
side of the ledge, my ears filled with the sound of the waves
crashing below. I scrambled to my knees, fought hyperventilating.
“Breathe in through your nose, out through your mouth.” I mentally
chanted until I stopped freaking out.

I licked lips gritty with dust, wiped sweat
from my brow, rolled my sleeves down over arms that were already
stinging with sunburn. If only I’d asked Jeff for some of the water
he carried in his backpack. Thinking of Jeff, usually my best
friend, I cursed him for leading me down what he called a shortcut
from the easier trail climb. With great care, I braved turning my
head to look up the mountain face. I had no idea how to climb up
from where I was. Faint, familiar voices from the beach below
reminded me that I had no choice.

I grabbed a handful of a manzanita bush,
pulled myself to my feet, and stretched for an outcrop within my
reach. Hot granite stung my palm digging into tender skin. I pulled
myself up the face with constant reminders not to look down.

An eternity later, I crawled onto the
shoulder of the road and wondered what to do next. My limbs shook
as violently as my heart throbbed. I clambered to my feet and
stumbled along the dry, dusty edge keeping as much distance between
the cliff and myself as the hot asphalt allowed.

A multi-colored VW bus wandered around a
bend in the road. I waved both arms in broad X’s and the vehicle,
covered in hand painted peace signs, pulled next to me on the
roadside.

“Can you take me to the ranger station?” I
asked.

When the two bearded young men stared at me
without responding, I added, “Well, at least to the nearest
phone?”

“Sure.” The bearded one in the passenger
seat grinned. He opened the sliding door to the rear compartment; a
cloud of marijuana wafted out the opening and engulfed me as I
climbed in. I perched on the edge of a homemade wood framed
bed.

“I think Nepenthe’s got the closest phone,”
I gasped. The smoke didn’t help me to catch my breath or clear my
head.

The two guys sat motionless, the driver
checking me out in the rearview mirror, the passenger turned to
face me.

“Look, there’s been an accident. Someone, a
girl, fell down the cliff, landed on the rocks below,” I
wheezed.

The beards nodded, but didn’t move.
“Shi-i-it.” The passenger muttered.

“I . . . we need to get help.” When that
failed to elicit any movement, I slammed my fist into the back of
the driver’s seat. “Turn this fucking thing around!” I pointed to
the road behind us, “Help is that way! The closest phone is at that
restaurant you passed, back there. It’s a couple, maybe three
miles.”

The driver slowly rotated the steering wheel
to the left, and pulled into the lane just as a sports car whipped
around the corner, smoothly corrected course to miss the lumbering
van. A pang of regret, if only I’d been pickier about what vehicle
I’d flagged down.

We chugged along, jolted from gear to gear,
never exceeding fifteen miles an hour.

“We kinda need to hurry,” I suggested, but
nothing changed. I sighed, resigning myself to the long minutes it
took to reach the restaurant parking lot. The bus rolled onto the
decomposed granite. I jumped out the side door and ran up the
timbered path beneath shading oaks.

I reached the rustic patio overlooking the
ocean and grabbed the arm of the nearest waiter, “Help me please. A
girl fell on the cliff over there,” I waved down to the beach south
of the patio. “I need a ranger.”

Blue green eyes beneath sun-bleached blonde
hair studied my face for the seconds it took to absorb my meaning.
Then he turned and strode through glass doors to the interior of
the restaurant. I hurried behind him.

He leaned across the rough wood counter,
pulled a black phone toward us, and dialed a single digit. “Mare,
give me the ranger station.” He handed the receiver to me.

I listened to the ring and looked down at my
body, at the dust and blood on my legs beneath once white shorts,
smears on my tennis shoes, and felt the sweat and dirt on my face,
I noticed curious patrons looking me over.

I didn’t fit in the hipster chic, glass and
redwood structure that hung on the cliffside overlooking the ocean.
We seldom ventured inside this establishment. Lemonade on the patio
was the best I could usually afford. The one time Jamie had treated
the whole bunch of us to dinner here, we’d spent the afternoon
showering in a cold waterfall and getting ready for a big night
out.

I told the rangers what I knew. “Yes, there
are three VW bugs parked on the other side of the road, I’m not
sure of the distance, maybe a hundred feet from the top of the
trail.”

In the process of telling them, I realized I
didn’t actually know much. Who had fallen? Was it my friend Carol?
Or one of the dates with Jamie or Ron or Tom?

“She fell . . . hurt . . . rocks,” I
remembered hearing above the sound of waves breaking.

Blonde-with-amazing-blue-green-eyes unwound
his white apron; “I’ll drive you back to the spot so you can show
the rangers.” He handed me a paper cup filled with lemonade.

It was the most delicious liquid to ever hit
a dry mouth.

He took my arm, guided me down the steps and
into a topless jeep. As he backed out of the staff parking, he
turned to offer me his hand. “I’m Ted.” His blue green eyes held
mine for a few seconds.

“Lexi.” I wiped my hand on my filthy shorts
and reached the tips of his fingers, expecting sparks to fly. A
previously unexperienced flow of desire traveled down my arm
through my body to below my tummy and made me look away in
embarrassment.

“Tell me when we get there,” Ted said.

Even his voice elicited a sensual
response.

I pulled back long strands of hair that blew
across my face, and concentrated on the side of the road, uncertain
that I could locate the right spot. “There!” I shouted over the
sound of the jeep and the wind. I saw the cars on the left side of
the road and figured this had to be the point that jutted out above
the beach.

Ted pulled over to the shoulder; I slid off
the seat and down to the gravel. Then I peeked over the edge while
Ted turned the vehicle around and parked on the opposite side of
the road.

He joined me in pacing the top of the cliff.
“What happened?” he asked.

“I’m not sure. My friend and I were halfway
down the trail––” I saw him look me up and down, most likely noting
the evidence that I had been off the trail. “Well, actually, Jeff
and I took a shortcut, and we heard shouting from the beach that
someone was hurt, from falling down the face, I think.”

“Who’s Jeff? Your boyfriend?”

“No, a friend. A friend I grew up with.”

“Are you staying down there?”

“Some of our friends are. We just came for
the day. Uh, the evening.” I thought about the way I had pictured
the evening going. We’d sit around the driftwood campfire, drinking
beer, smoking a joint or two, and speculate about the secrets of
the universe while toasting marshmallows for s’mores. The sky
brilliant with stars, the moon reflecting on the ocean, the heavens
perhaps revealing knowledge we hadn’t learned in our university
classes. Well, not gonna happen that night.

“Where did you come from?”

“We left Berkeley this morning. Jeff and I
both have to work tomorrow night, the rest planned to spend the
weekend.” I heard sirens on the road north of us, then the slapping
of helicopter blades overhead.

A yellow fire truck followed by a smaller
yellow vehicle forced us to move out of the way. The first fireman,
clad head to toe in yellow, greeted Ted as he jumped from the side
of the truck. “Hey, Ted, what’s happening?”

“Down this trail.” Ted pointed to the start
of the path down. “Someone’s hurt.”

Another yellow clothed man removed his
jacket and pulled a backpack from the smaller vehicle. He nodded at
Ted, and followed two firemen down the trail. A radio crackled,
answered by a ten-four. My heart leapt at the sight of the men who
remained behind, readying a body basket.

“Want to go down?” Ted nodded toward the
beach, held out a hand.

“As long as you don’t suggest a shortcut.” I
ignored his hand and headed down the trail, carefully placing one
foot in front of the other in the sandy dust.

We stuck to the trail and it would’ve been
easy, if slow going, had I not been freaked about what we would
find at the bottom. Halfway down, we moved aside to allow two of
the rescue team and the basket to pass us.

I climbed over rocks to the sand and caught
a glimpse of long black hair tucked into the basket. No one but my
best girlfriend Carol had hair as dark as shiny coal. I moved
closer. Her normally porcelain skin was statuary marble white, her
green eyes, closed. A clear mask sat over her mouth and nose and a
tube ran to a canister that sat on her chest.

I pushed through the onlookers. “Is she
going be alright?” I demanded of the rescuer.

He looked me in the eye, nodded and then
continued to lace up the basket in preparation for hauling her up
the cliff face.

I hurried to Jeff’s side. “Jeff, what’s the
matter with her?”

“She hit her head. And I think she may have
broken her arm and wrist trying to catch herself.”

“She’s unconscious?”

Jeff grimaced, nodded.

I climbed over a ribbon of rock, sloshed
through a tide pool, and stood next to Jamie. I punched his upper
arm. “How could you let this happen?”

“I had nothing to do with this. I was
unpacking gear, I didn’t even look until I heard her scream.” Jamie
moved to put his arm around my shoulders, but I ducked out of
reach.

I felt my eyes pop with anger. “You left her
up there?” I hissed.

“I came down with June. Carol and Dave
teamed up. They were a few minutes behind us and goin’ slow. June
and I both have some mountain climbing experience, so we offered to
carry the packs.” Jamie groaned, “I shoulda gone behind them. I
was, fuck, just impatient.”

I looked over at Dave. “What happened?”

Dave shrugged, shook his head. “I think she
tripped.” He looked at his feet and kicked a little sand. “I don’t
know,” he muttered.

Elliott spoke up, “She fell about ten, maybe
fifteen feet. She tried to break her fall with her arm, but she
landed on her head anyway.” Elliott frowned, hesitated. “She was
moaning earlier. Lexi, I think she’s going to be okay.”

Carol was loaded into the basket that had
been attached to pulleys at roadside. Firemen guided it up the face
of the cliff. My stomach jumped into my throat as the basket
dangled from the red ropes and twisted out of their grasp once.

I couldn’t watch.

If Carol had been conscious she would’ve
been screaming her head off. She hates heights and would never have
agreed to this outing if I hadn’t bullied, bribed and begged with
dogged persistence.

Had I killed her?

* * *

A radio on the hip of a fireman packing up
equipment crackled. He turned to Jeff, “Where do you want her
taken?”

“Closest hospital,” I blurted.

“Well, closest is Community, Eskaton in
Monterey is a few miles farther.”

“Community in Pebble Beach?” Jamie
asked.

“The closest hospital is what, is that
thirty, forty miles away. Are you kidding me?” I tried not to
scream.

“Yes miss, that’s the closest.” He turned to
Jamie, “You know Community?”

Jamie shrugged. “Only because of the fame of
the architect, and I’ve heard about the all private rooms
thing.”

“Then you know it’s kinda . . . well, it’s
not cheap.”

Jamie leaned close to the fireman, “I will
take full financial responsibility,” he murmured.

“You’ll have to come do the paperwork then,”
the fireman announced.

“Right.” Jamie dug car keys out of his
short’s pocket and tossed them to his date. “June, darling, will
you drive the girls home please?” He nodded at the other two girls,
dates of Elliott and Tom. “Jeff, you will bring Lexi with you guys
to the hospital?” He grabbed a sweatshirt from his mummy sleeping
bag, picked up a small pack of personal items, and followed the
fireman up the hill.

15

Pebble Beach, July 1968

After loading the cars, and making two stops
for directions, we finally found the damn hospital. It looked more
like a small Kennedy Center than a hospital.