Heart Murmurs (13 page)

****

Beth stands at my window, the yellow, post-storm light casting an eerie glow against her profile. I look around my room, memorizing it. The unspoken fear I may never see it again darting in and out of my conscious mind.

“Tell me about your life… you know, your
original
life — if you don't mind?”

Beth absently strokes her belly, where I notice a small swell poking out beneath her white t-shirt.
How did I miss that before?

“You mean my life with my family? With Louisa?”

I smile and nod.

“It may not be what you expect. We were nomads, always moving. Louisa called us the ‘wandering family'. Father was eccentric.” She laughs. “So was Louisa. She couldn't fit in. She ran and climbed like a boy. And had ambition and wits, which at that time — were not desirable in a lady. No wonder she never married.”

She looks wistful, staring across the fields behind my house. “I never wanted to be famous. I only wanted to be home. And when they discovered
I
was to be the Conductor — everyone was shocked, and sad. No one more so than I. Father thought it would be Louisa, naturally. We faked my death.”

“I know Little Women was based on you — all of Louisa's sisters. And I've read your death almost destroyed her.”

“Well, it was my absence which almost destroyed her. So that I could fulfill my obligation as a Conductor. She worried about me, wrote to me every day till she passed.”

“Louisa was a Literati?”

“No. Louisa was a courier. She lived a normal life span. Conductors and the Literati live on… till they pass on the responsibility to an heir. An heir with the correct D.N.A. and traits. Conductors may suggest an heir, but the Literati must approve the choice.”

Beth's eyes look sad. “Father tried to pass the line to Louisa, and they refused him. They said she was too arrogant and proud. All of the Literati are authors. The gene must be paired with that particular talent. Most Conductors write, as well.”

“How do you know which authors are Literati?”

“Most are protected, remaining anonymous so that they may continue the quest. In some of their first editions, one might find a large, calligraphy L. I spent years trolling through old bookstores on every continent, searching.”

My mind clicks in recollection at the names on the shelves in Beth's guestroom. Poe, Dickens, Shakespeare. And more modern writers: King, Picoult, Freeman, Coriell, Atwell.

“That's why you collect first editions?”

I picture Beth's library, filled to the ceiling with dusty, leather-bound books.

“So you and Louisa communicate? Via that old stump?”

Beth laughs again; her delicate hands covering her mouth, but her eyes turn deadly serious. “Yes, that's exactly how we did it as children. We played post office. The court, the Conductors and Literati, are able to manipulate the tunnels with their imagination. But Conductors are limited. So, I created it — when I couldn't face one more day without her.”

“Limited, how?”

Beth considers, sitting quietly. “When I walk the tunnels, parts of my imagination appear, as if my thoughts bleed out, into the cavern. It takes tremendous effort to create anything. It took me weeks to make the stump appear. But them… it's like a direct line to their imagination. They think, it becomes. Altering time and space.”

I shiver. That kind of power could easily corrupt its owner.

Beth's lower lip trembles.

“What's wrong?'

“That is why we're being punished. For using the tunnels for personal gain. And for Lou convincing me to bring Morgan here.” Her hand compulsively rubs her belly. She squeezes her eyes and lips together.

“Beth…
I'm not sorry.
I'm so glad you saved Morgan. And I'm… glad to be alive. I owe Louisa my life. If she hadn't convinced you to bring Madelon… I'd been on the donor list for awhile, and I
was going,
Beth. Her heart, it saved me. But I don't understand something…”

“Yes, love?”

“I must be a courier, like Morgan said — because I see the tunnels. And because I almost died. If I were anything else — I would've lived on — been impervious to death?”

Beth's eyebrow rises. “Have you ever completed a book, Mia? Not started and stopped—completed?”

A hot rush flushes my cheeks. “Only short stories. Not until after the surgery. I had four novels started… but only finished one recently.”

Beth nods. “Ah… then that explains it. I was aging till I typed ‘The End'. Then all this began. The gene must not trigger until then. A full book completed.”

Beth watches my face. She wipes her eyes on the back of her hand and sniffs, but smiles through the tears. “You're right. Lou was right. Sometimes it
is
okay to break the rules — for the right reasons — regardless of the consequences. Lou was good at that.”

“At what?”

“Breaking rules. I was a timid mouse.”

“Me, too. But I don't feel mousy anymore.”

Beth's eyes swept over me. “You even look different, Mia.” She sighs. “I should go. Morgan and Edward are making the preparations.” She looks around my room doubtfully. “Will you be okay here by yourself? When will your parents be home?”

“Late. I'll be fine.”

She gives me a quick hug and pads across the room. I lie back down, waiting till I hear the front door click shut.

Intuition tickles my skin. A little urge prods me.

I walk across the room and lock the door.

My body is so tired, but my brain won't let me rest. We're off to see the Literati tomorrow. My mind hums through countless unanswered questions.

Will Claire and my parents even notice I've gone, if the tunnels can time-shift?

If they do…
will they ever let me near Beth and Morgan again?

The Literati…
men and women who live on…
how long? Is it possible to remain uncorrupted by such power? To only use it unselfishly?

The night breeze coming through my window kisses my face, and I close my eyes, being still and grateful. When I thought I was dying, I had a sort of revelation I bet most people have as wrinkly octogenarians.

I've learned — no matter how bad things seem — there's always someone worse off. So it's safer —
healthier
— to think about what you
have
and
can
do.

I hear the wind whipping through the blanket of wildflowers outside. They stretch for two acres in every trumpet shape and glorious shade of whites, reds and purples. They've been there every fall for as long as I can remember.

I see a younger me running through them.

I feel sleep coming, and give myself over.

My dreams are so vivid now. Madelon's memories and mine combine into a weird, period stroll through our combined subconscious. My heart reacts, sputtering in my chest in reaction to her thoughts. Children riding horses. A boy with beautiful, bright blue eyes and a dirty face.

The scene shifts. I'm back on the battlefield.

Thump-thump-thump-thump-thump.

I hear snuffling. It's too close. The battlefield pig.

The terror builds, ripping out of my chest with a high-pitched keen and I sit up in bed. I'm lost in that world between sleep and wake. I shake my head furiously, trying to clear it.

I pinch myself.

“Ow!” I am awake.

The snuffling
is real.
It's echoing through the empty hall outside my room. I struggle to get my bearings, holding my head. My chest is heaving as I try to suck all the oxygen from the air at once.

I look around my room, trying to take comfort in my surroundings.

No go
. The snuffling is getting louder. Scratching against my door.

I bolt from bed, running over to stare at the door. I drop to the ground, peering through the crack underneath it.

Sharp, dirty, cloven hooves trip-trap on the polished hardwood floor. One kicks it—too purposefully. With absolute intention.

The hooves and legs bend, like the beast is stretching.

“Ah!” My hand flies to cover my mouth.

One pus-filled eyeball stares under the crack, locking eyes with me.

I scuttle backward, my stocking feet slipping on the floor.

“Mom, Dad,” I whisper. But then I remember — they're both on night shift.

I'm simultaneously relieved and terrified at being alone. Alone in the house with a monster.

My conscience whispers,
Pigs eat meat
.

My cell phone. It's downstairs in the kitchen, charging.

The scraping turns into bashing. My doorknob jiggles with every ‘fwumph'. The wood is going to buckle.

I run over to the window, wrenching it open. I stare down at the ground. If I leap, I'll break my leg or my neck. A tree is just out of reach.

A tell-tale crack rips through the air. The door splinters in a long, jagged line.

I fly back across the room and heave my shoulder into the armoire. The armoire moves, inch by inch, seemingly in slow motion. It's so heavy. It finally covers the front of the door, blocking the crack.

I have only minutes. I must get out.

The door vibrates again. The pig squeals, angry at the new resistance.

It sounds like a million layers of sound, tinny and piercing. It reminds me of the flowers.

The armoire rumbles. In place, it doesn't move.

I step backward. My eyes search uselessly. There's nowhere to go.

I'll have to fight.

I fly to my closet and wrench out an old softball bat.

It rumbles again. The door behind it explodes, shattering, and raining down splintered shards.

The armoire tips and I leap out of its way. The side of it grazes my heel as it crashes to the ground. I feel the hot ooze of blood seep down my ankle and jump backward, bat above my head—

The pig's nostrils flare as it crouches, hackles rising in a bristled mohawk. It bounds over the fallen armoire.

I'm stunned by its size. I don't move, as the world shrivels into just the image, flying through the air. My grim reaper, flying through the air.

The whispers
scream
at me. To
fight, fight, fight
.

My heart kicks my chest and I throw myself to the floor. Its cloven hoof brushes my hair as it sails over top of my head. The bat clatters to the floor and slides six feet away to roll under my bed.

The beast thuds down. My head turns in slow motion as time feels elongated. I hear the scream. It's mine.

“Mia!”

Morgan is standing in what's left of the doorframe, behind the fallen armoire. He throws a fireplace poker to me, which I catch and raise above my head.

The beast snarls, baring its tusks. A thick string of foam oozes out… falling surreally to the floor.

“Hit it, Mia!” Morgan's frantic voice speeds up time again.

It lunges, mouth open.

I swing. The poker connects with the side of its head in a wet ‘thwack.'

It collapses, shaking its head, its eye rolling in its socket like a black and white marble.

I'm dumbstruck again, frozen to the floor. The whispers are goading.

“Mia, for the love of all that's holy. Come to me, girl! Get away from it!”

Morgan jumps atop the armoire, and up over the pig. It's a massive fleshy mountain of heaving death.

He shakes me. “Mia!”

I nod, fighting out of the horror-trance. He grabs my foot, hoisting me up and over the pig, onto the armoire. He grimaces. And jumps. Not high enough. One of his boots doesn't make it, kicking the beast squarely in the ribs.

It screams, snapping its jaws towards his boot.

Morgan pulls it back, but its tusk lodges in his heel.

“I — Oh — I—”

I imagine the beast running him through with his tusk—and running through my heart along with it. I slash the poker down at the same moment he wrenches his leg out. Morgan lets the boot slip off. The beast's jaw pulls back, with his tusk firmly pierced through Morgan's boot.

We fly down the hall, down the stairs.

“We have to go tonight, love. They know we're coming.”