The-Hummingbird-s-Cage(77)

Another invitation. I focused on the glass gripped in my lap. “I couldn’t stay at the house tonight.”

“Talk to me, Joanna. That’s why you’re here, isn’t it?”

I drained the glass and handed it to him. “Can I have another?”

He smiled. “Irish courage, eh?”

“I’ll take any kind I can get.”

The refill he returned with wasn’t as small as before. I had to down half of it before I was ready to begin. Even then it wasn’t soon, and in little more than a whisper.

“That dog back in Laurel’s bed right now?” I said. “It didn’t just run away—that’s only what I told her. That dog is . . . Jim killed it with a shovel. Made me bury it in the yard. I can’t . . . I can’t even bear to look at it. It’s ghoulish.”

I paused and glanced at him, but he said nothing.

“There’s so much I don’t understand,” I continued slowly. “Olin has told me a few things. The rest he said I need to figure out for myself. But I don’t know the rules.” My voice began to rise. “I don’t know what’s real or not. Who’s real or—”

Simon raised his hand, cutting me off. “Do you feel safe here?”

The question caught me off guard. “What?”

“Do you feel like you belong?”

I shook my head at him, still confused.

“Belonging can mean a lot of things,” he continued. “As for me, I was born not far from here, on a little ranch my father built. This is where I grew up, so I know this country. This is where I fit. Where I want to be. This is new terrain for you, and I don’t just mean the landscape. You’re bound to have questions.”

“New terrain . . .” I repeated. “Yes.”

“You don’t know how you ended up here, beyond me finding you wandering around lost, holding on to Laurel for dear life. You see things you can’t explain. You sense things, but don’t know how.”

“Not everything,” I said. “Laurel used to tell me she could hear the dog barking on the Mountain. Even when I couldn’t.”

“The dog,” he said. “What else?”

He was coaxing me, guiding me. And at once in my mind’s eye I could see the Mountain—the way it loomed over me that first day at the breakfast table, and every day since, urging me to come . . .

“That was no mistake,” said Simon, and I knew he was seeing the Mountain with me, feeling its gravitation. “You were heading for it when I found you. Do you remember?”

I shook my head.

“It’s got a will of its own, hasn’t it?” he asked. “More intense at first. I’ve seen people traveling through and they’re single-minded. They want to hike right to the top, and no mistake.”

“Simon, I don’t want to hike to the top.”

He smiled. “You’ve got a will of your own, too.”

“Free will . . .” I murmured. “Really? Even here?”

“Even here. Nobody brings anything here they didn’t already have. The good, the not so good. The idea, as far as I can tell, is to keep trying.”

“Trying what?”

“Not exactly clear on that one myself,” he said with a small chuckle. “Maybe to follow our better natures till we get it right. Or maybe it’s different for each of us. But the thing to bear in mind when Morro confuses or frightens you is that it’s a community like any other. And the people here, they’re just people. And you . . . you’ve got time to figure things out.”

“How much time?”

He hesitated. “As long as you need to make a choice.”

“You know about that, too.”

“Yes.”

“Olin told me—‘Stay and get strong,’ he said. ‘Then decide.’ Simon, did you have a choice? When you first came?”

His expression shifted. There was a fixedness to it—the mask was back.

“No, Joanna,” he said finally. “Few people do.”

“This is a good place,” I said. “I feel like it fits me, too. Olin seems to think I should go back. And face my husband.”

“Did he say that?”

“Yes. Well, no—not exactly. He said I should consider this like a Place of Truth for me. To think of the things I’d done. Or failed to. And what I’d do with a second chance.”