Messages in the Grass
"We leave messages for each other in the grass… you can't see them unless you know what to look for…"
Past and future collide as Flame and the others work to organise a meeting between Souls and humans. It is
an opportunity for peace, but also an opportunity for disaster?
Revealed
***
"Are you going to tell him?" Dorsey asked.
"Are you?" I replied. We drove the lead car, and the boys were following in the other.
"Maybe he already knows," she said, "do we wait til he brings it up?"
"It's not like he has any relatives left," she added. I felt a little guilty about being uncharitably pleased about this.
"We have to tell him," I said, shaking my head.
The road ate away at the distance separating us with a kind of endless inevitability that held both fascination and dread. I thought back to the day when all had been revealed…
***
"It is so good to be home!" Henry said striding through the long grass, kicking up grass pollens and moths in little bursts of fireworks as he passed. Happily I breathed in the sweet warm scent of the grasslands, the darker damper fug of the forest at its edges. Summer camp was only an hour's walk away now, and it felt like we had been away forever. Henry had taken the lead early, him and Dorsey talking gleefully about the friends and family they had missed. Alex and I walked hand in hand a little behind. He watched me enjoying the valley, his strong, quiet face hinting at a smile without quite getting there. We started up a ridge bordered by a copse of trees, and the wind fled through the leafy branches as we stalked up the slope. Margie's camp had been a wonderful respite after the shooting, but nothing eased the soul like the familiar undulations of this place.
We crested the hill, and summer camp became visible in the valley below. If you knew where to look, that is. It was split into smaller camps that sheltered under groups of trees and shrubs, and from a distance, appeared like any other piece of forest and grassland.
Henry began to run, whooping, and Dorsey danced after him.
"Wait," Alex said, hand on my arm. I looked back at him askance, my feet aching to keep going down that one last slope.
"I wanted to talk to you before, well, before everyone else is around," he said. His face was strangely closed. Tensed.
"What is it?" I asked, puzzled, and a little concerned.
"There's something I just can't stop wandering about," he said, frowning, "When you were… in my head, I saw an image of Bhaskar… floating in a pool." I nodded, tears in my eyes before I could stop them.
"It's the last time I ever saw him." I said softly. The ache of his loss would always be there, but having Alex beside me made me stronger somehow.
Alex was quiet for a while.
"He had… white feet."
"Uh, yeah, I suppose he did."
"But he was wearing red shoes that day."
"Yes. White socks, I suppose."
"He didn't wear socks when he was swimming. He hated wearing socks when it was hot."
I frowned. It was stinking hot that day.
"What are you saying?"
"I don't know. Probably nothing. Forget about it." We stood in the gently swaying grasses and watched people appear like magic from the trees and swarm around Henry and Dorsey. Alex squeezed my hand and we descended.
***
We arrived at the summer camp to find everyone celebrating. Henry and Dorsey were swamped with people, and as Alex and I approached, the mob encircled us too. Everyone was teeming around, wanting to see us, talk to us, touch us, make sure we were really back.
Edith, less curled up from her bad joints but looking a little older, glowed with happiness to see us again; her family restored. By her side, George quietly shone too. And of course, I felt the all too familiar ache that was the space where Bhaskar was not.
Initial excitement over, we made our way over to Edith and George's camp to unpack.
"Hey, look, Dorsey's new boyfriend!" young David said, pulling a piece of paper out of Dorsey's disemboweled pack.
"Aw, isn't he handsome!"
"Not with those eyes he's not," Jake growled. I looked up to see everyone crowding around to see Dorsey's sketch of Falling Smoke. I smiled and got back to unpacking.
"Oh that's Falling Smoke, the doctor that saved Flame," Dorsey said easily, "He looked kind of familiar somehow…" The voices drained away and there was silence. I looked up, puzzled. Everyone was staring at the sketch.
"What, do you recognize him?" Dorsey asked, with a sudden tenseness in her voice.
"You don't?" George said tersely. Dorsey craned to her neck to get a better look.
"His name is not Falling Smoke," said Edie slowly and clearly, "It's Falling Snow."
I looked at Dorsey in shock.
Falling Snow?
Falling Snow?
That was impossible.
I found myself walking backwards, turned, and walked swiftly away.
"No, Alex, how about you leave this one to me," I heard Dorsey say softly.
***
"You alright?" Dorsey asked, catching up with me as I flowed through the long grass, trailing my heads through the spiky seed heads.
"He's supposed to be dead," I said, almost managing to keep the shake from my voice. Images conjured from Edith and George's stories flashed through my mind, but now in place of a generic young man, there was Falling Smoke with Burning Lights, sitting together, smiling… Except, of course, that it wasn't Falling Smoke.
"Well, he's not. It would kind of explain a lot, you know, the way you guys are so close-"
"I didn't know who he was! I didn't recognize him-"
"No but he recognized you," Dorsey said, grabbing my hand and making me stop, "He's been in love with you since he first laid eyes on you."
"Dorsey, stop," I said. The breeze had picked up, agitating the grasses and leaves in an echo of my inner disarray.
"But-,"
"Please just stop," I said. I closed my eyes. I had to think. Falling Smoke. I had thought I knew him. But if he recognized me, if he had Falling Snow's memories… he had never said... the thoughts ran round and around chasing each other in my head dizzyingly.
"I don't understand Dorsey," I said. "How can he be Falling Snow? Falling Snow is dead." I was shivering as if a ghost had walked through me.
"Well, I guess, he was shot," Dorsey reasoned, "but I guess the Souls healed him. For Falling Smoke."
"Does he know about Falling Snow?" I wondered.
"He should have his memories, shouldn't he?"
"I don't know," I whispered.
"I guess we don't really know what he thinks til we talk to him."
I groaned at the thought.
"You don't seem... particularly pleased about this," Dorsey noted.
"No," I said, "I'm not."
"Oh good," Dorsey said with quiet relief. I looked at her, confused.
"Well… you know… he's supposed to have been worth dying for…"
"Dorsey!" I said, exasperated, "You are talking about Falling Snow! I never even knew him."
"Alright, Ok, I know," she said, "I can't help but wondering, this whole Soul thing isn't exactly cut and dried."
"Alex will be pleased," she added. I looked at her, frustrated.
"Why on earth would Alex be pleased?"
"Well, you did just kind of walk off without a word… I'll bet he's wandering right about now whether you're about to bolt off and join your soulmate…"
I made a disgusted noise.
"Well, you might want to go and put his mind at ease then," Dorsey hinted. I sighed. Dorsey always seemed to know the right thing to do.
"You're right," I said.
"He's just over there," she muttered, pointing with her eyes. I smiled in thanks and walked over to him. He did look worried, hands in his pockets, stooped, mouth tense. Silly man.
"Hey," I said, smiling, put my hands in his. "Sorry for running off on you."
"Understandable," he said, but the worried look was still there.
"Got a bit of a shock," I said. He nodded, watching me.
"You seem... happier now," he said uncertainly.
"Dorsey said you needed cheering up," I said, "she reckons you'd think I'd suddenly turn into Burning Lights and chase after the good doctor. You wouldn't think that would you?"
A small smile slowly lit his face.
"No, because that would be silly, wouldn't it?' he said gently.
"Exactly," I said. "Burning Lights likes Falling Snow. But she's dead and he's gone. And Hungry Flame likes Alex Flynt."
His smile widened.
"I think the word you're looking for there is 'love'," he said. The forest birds rang out an alarm call in the wind while we stood in companionable silence. Alex pulled on my hands and we walked back to camp.
And I wondered what on earth I was going to say to Falling Smoke next time I saw him.