Chapter 6: night sky; familiar somehow; a killer

Please note: In the Works Cited portion of Chapter 1 there are suggested music pieces to accompany this and other Chapters to enhance your experience of reading. I hope you enjoy them...

Upstate New York, late December, 2016

Fire danced in the fireplace, its light welcome in the darkness of the room. Its heat wrapped him with its warm embrace. Reese felt empty now – silent and empty inside – just the sound of fire snapping in the fireplace and air rushing over burning wood, its soft roar heading up the chimney stack. He pictured the smoke rising up above the roof to clear air; and sky above them, bright with stars blinking in the night.

Night sky. Like so many nights when he was young.

Colorado, July, 1990

Cool breeze on his skin made him shiver, and finally he woke. For a long time now, the breeze had teased him in his sleep, sliding over his skin, coaxing him from his dream. The sun was down low already, and in this spot under the canopy of trees, darkness had slipped in while he was sleeping. The rock below him was still warm from the afternoon sun, but the breeze was cool, almost cold now, and goosebumps lifted on his skin. Time to head home.

The only way off his rock in the middle of the stream was to drop back down in the water and swim to the other side. He slid forward to the edge and dipped his legs in. Cold. It was cold on his skin – clear mountain stream coursing down from the rocky ledge up above. He pushed himself forward off the rock and down into flowing water, head bobbing on the surface, neck-deep in the pool. He could imagine the gray-green minnows below, scattering as he disturbed the rhythm of the stream. In a minute they'd forget all about it and return to the rock, facing upstream, their gray-green bodies waving in the gentle current.

Reese wished that he could stay. He would lay on his rock all night staring up at the stars in the patch of sky above the stream. And night sounds would rise all around him, tiny scurries on the ground and bird calls in the trees, water splashing and gurgling in the rocks above the pool.

He'd reached the far side of it now, swimming to the shallows near the bank. He grabbed a handful of grass to pull him up, and felt cold air on his wet skin. At twelve, he was slim and tall for his age. Not an ounce of fat on his frame. Nothing to keep the cold at bay. Instantly, he was shivering.

Arm over arm, he grabbed for grasses on the bank, lifting himself until his feet were firmly on the path. Now every inch of wet skin was exposed, and he shivered uncontrollably. He'd walked in today in hot sunshine, sweating from the hike. No shirt, just the shorts he was wearing, and sneakers.

He leaned down to straighten his sneakers on the path, then he rubbed the bottom of his feet on the moss and slid each foot into one. He knelt down to tie the laces quickly, so he could be on his way. His teeth chattered and he wrapped his arms close around his body as he walked. The wet shorts clung to the skin of his thighs, wicking any body heat away, and Reese tucked his arms even closer to his body. He slid his hands up and down his arms, warming himself as best he could.

This was the path that woodland deer used to reach the water. His steps walked the same path that they walked, day after day, night after night, to drink from the pool. At the top of the path was the edge of the woods, deep forest stretching far off to the road. He shivered again just thinking of it.

The air in the forest would feel colder still. He remembered nights when there was a mist hanging in the woods, air that smelled of leaves and rich deep earth. A refuge in the heat some summer nights. He would breathe deeply then, inhaling the cool sweet air in his favorite woods near his favorite pool in his favorite place on earth.

Tonight, though, all he wanted was to be at home, in front of a roaring fire, eating hot soup. At the top of the path he stopped, looking into the woods. He was shaking with cold now, and he couldn't bring himself to enter. His legs were shaking so hard that he let himself drop to the ground at the edge of the trees.

Reese felt the earth beneath him. It was warm, warm against his skin. He laid down on his side, scrunched in a ball on the warm earth. Nothing in his recent memory had felt this good. He warmed himself there, first on one side, then turning to warm the other, the soil wiping the water from his wet skin. As long as he stayed down on the earth, he felt warm and safe from the cold. He rested there, drying himself, slowly re-warming his body. He smelled the earth beneath him and trees behind him in the woods – pine, fir, and quaking aspen – and grasses on the bank leading down to the pool.

He shivered again. Every once in a while the forest behind him breathed a shallow breath down the hill – over the top of him. Reese closed his eyes. If he could just wait here a little longer, warm himself in the little heat left here from the day, then he could make it back. Back to his home, where he could warm himself by the fire. Another breath from the forest chilled him again. The cold mountain air was winning.

In a little while, there were soft footsteps on the earth, echoing quietly under the trees. She stepped softly, ears swiveling to listen for danger, and nose twitching toward an unfamiliar smell. She lifted her head to peer ahead, but saw nothing in the woods to alarm her. It was harder to run now, her belly swollen with twins. In just days, she would birth them, when the moon was full and high overhead. But tonight, she was headed to the pool where she would drink.

Just ahead, the trees ended and a narrow bit of land led down to the water's edge. She would have to take care on the soft slope, where the soil and the little stones rolled away beneath her. She was not so nimble now to leap from the path to firmer ground.

There was that strange smell again. She stopped and looked around her in every direction, ears twitching, her tail swiveling, white fur flashing underneath. The white-tailed doe stepped forward softly. Her footsteps made hardly a sound in the deep loam under the trees.

Her eyes searched ahead. The treeline ended just a few steps away. She liked to stand there at the edge of the trees looking out from above – before she started down the bank to the water's edge. She felt something different here tonight. It made her edgy and cautious. But the smell of the stream up ahead pulled her. She needed to drink; and she pressed ahead.

There on the ground she saw something. Pale, small, and alive. She stopped in her tracks. For a moment she was going to turn and run. But then she didn't. It hadn't moved. She watched it for a moment. She could see it shivering. Like a lost fawn on the ground in the woods. Her nose twitched, and her ears flicked. She took a step closer, ready to run if anything threatened.

But, it didn't move. She could tell it was alive, and yet it didn't move. She could see it shiver again. Her soft dark eyes looked down at it, curled in a ball at her feet. She reached out and touched it gently with her nose, then lifted her head, ready to turn and run. It didn't move.

She felt her own life inside her, lively, tumbling and stretching, her sides bulging and wiggling with their motion inside her. Perhaps this little one on the ground had wandered away, not much bigger than a young fawn itself. The doe leaned down and nudged it with her nose. It felt cold.

She remembered a fawn born too late in the season, and the cold coming in too early that year. Her first time giving birth. She remembered the smell of its wet skin, how she tried to dry it, and the tiny newborn shivering in the cold air. Until it didn't move any more. She looked down at the small, wet ball at her feet, and leaned down, bending her legs to lower herself next to it, her warm fur covering its back.

In a little while his shivering stopped. Like a blanket had rolled out over him. Warm and safe from the cold. Large, exquisite eyes watching him. Nose softly twitching with his smell. Familiar somehow.

Upstate New York, late December, 2016

Reese felt the glow of the fire on his eyelids. And he could see the motion of someone between him and the fire. He opened his eyes. It was Jules, poking the fire, adding more wood. He nodded his head. Now he understood. Everything tumbled into his mind, and he could make sense of it now.

Jules turned her head, like he had said something out loud. But he hadn't. She scanned him, sitting there, and turned back to her fire. With the iron poker, she was lifting the logs she had added, now that they'd tumbled down from their weight on the burned ones below. She made a space for the air to go, to feed the fire. Flames shot up, and the new wood steamed and popped and sizzled.

When she was done, Jules put the iron poker on the stone seat – a little ways down from the fire. Then she turned around and went back to her player, changing the disc that had stopped inside. She had another one in mind now. For this time of night, with the fire roaring and the dark air high overhead.

She walked back to the L-shaped couch where Reese was sitting. Like she had done once before, she sat down close to him, crowding his personal space. His eyes were on her, and for a long moment she said nothing, tuning in. And then the music started. Music she had played for him once before; solo piano, with the sounds of water, and a paddle swishing, a canoe gliding and birds calling in the deep woods. It was the same music she'd played the night Reese learned of his brother, his twin brother.

Reese started to shiver. His eyes focused on the fire over her right shoulder. He couldn't seem to bring himself to speak. So she started. Softly:

"You were a long way from home."

He nodded.

"In the mountains," she said.

He nodded. Shivering again. Her eyes were reading him.

"Wet and cold – alone in the mountains – "

"She found me. The doe. I never knew, before tonight."

"She watches out for you, John," Jules said, in her softest voice. "For you – and Matt."

His eyes filled and threatened to spill over down his face. He was trembling. The sound of paddling in a mountain stream, water gurgling in the darkness, and birds calling – he could smell the pines, feel the cold air of the mountains on his skin. Music. Memory. Entwined in his mind. He remembered the doe, her twin fawns at the edge of the pool, and him on his rock, watching.

Jules waited. She could sense that he was finding his path. Her mantra appeared in her brain: the highest good for all concerned. She nodded to herself and closed her eyes, so she wasn't tempted to interfere. There was a fluttering in the air in front of her chest. Yes. He was struggling. It felt like bird wings flapping in a cage. Jules repeated her mantra and breathed a deep slow breath. She was right there if he needed her.

Reese jumped in his mind to another time. Back to Basic, with his drill-sergeant growling in his face, and him in the mud commando-crawling under barbed wire, with his rifle and his face above the slop. Night trainings. Day-long runs with packs on their backs. And clipping onto the wire, wind flapping his gear through the open side, stepping out to nothingness, air rushing past, until the tug, and the sound of the chute coming out, and then the jerk as his chute caught air.

He remembered these thoughts, and having them here once before, with Jules. The steady drumbeat of his early success, day after sweaty day, month after grueling month. He could see it in his eyes, and the way that he carried himself.

What did she like to call him? A warrior. She called him a warrior.

And maybe, for a little while, it was true. The good days, when the mission was clear, and the enemy, too. But something had changed.

His success had pushed him to work more and more where he knew less and less. He was becoming a deadly weapon wielded by any hand, pointed and fired at an enemy he didn't know, and often did not even see. They were no longer exclusively soldiers he killed. They were targets, chosen for him, purported to have lethal intent. They might be terrorists, but they might be scientists, hackers, engineers, politicians – those whose work could bring danger to our shores. His targets didn't know he was coming. He just appeared and killed them.

Jules could feel the fluttering, frantic now. She opened her eyes and Reese was trembling again, shaking his head, no.

"No?" she said out loud. His jaw clenched and his shoulders lifted high near his ears.

He had it. It was there in his mind, like poison. She could feel it.

"Say it," she said, softly then. He trembled, holding back.

"Say it." Tears filled his eyes and spilled over, lines jagged on his cheeks as he shook his head, no.

Slowly, in her softest voice:

"How can it be - any worse - than this?"

He leaned forward with his face in his hands, shoulders trembling. She reached over and wrapped her arm around him, waiting. His muscles clenched under her arm. Jules leaned down near his ear. In a whisper:

"Say it."

In his hoarse whisper-voice, "what if he knew? – what I am." She felt him clenched and trembling under her arm and she leaned her head down against him. Softly:

"And what is that?"

A long pause, and then this:

"A killer."