One Step Too Far (Frankie Elkin #2)(34)

“I saw him,” Scott babbles immediately. “I saw him.”

“Who?” Martin, striding forward.

“Tim. I swear it! At the edge of the woods. He was right there, wearing his green jacket. I could see him, clear as day.”

By the glow of the firelight, I watch Martin’s face shutter.

“You were mistaken,” he states curtly. “Tim’s dead.”

I haven’t heard him say the words before. I’m not completely sure what they cost him now. Martin’s not one to share his emotions. And yet, there’s something about the set of his jaw, the rigid line of his shoulders. In his world, I sense, that single statement is a horrific mark of delineation. Whatever good happened in his life came before. Now, there is only after.

None of us move.

“I saw him!” Scott insists.

“How?” Nemeth asks.

“Had to take a piss. Minute I crawled out from my tent, I spotted him, straight ahead. Watching us.”

“How did you see him?”

“What do you mean? He was standing there. Clear as day. I’m telling you.”

“In the beam of your flashlight?” Nemeth prods.

“I didn’t have . . . I don’t have . . .” Scott looks down, seems to realize for the first time he’s not holding any flashlight nor wearing a headlamp. In fact, he has no light source whatsoever.

Luciana dabs at his face with a wet bandana. His cheeks and forehead are a collection of scrapes and tears. About what you’d expect if someone went racing blind into night-blackened woods, careening off every tree branch along the way.

“Your shirt,” she murmurs.

Scott pulls it over his head, hissing sharply. Across his chest are two long, deep gouges. Luciana fingers the first one, feeling out the edges, and he winces.

Miggy glances away sharply. Feeling that horrified, I wonder, or that guilty?

“You were dreaming, buddy,” Neil murmurs softly. “You got up to take a leak and saw what you wanted to see. What we all want to see.”

Scott glances at his friend, losing some of his bluster. “But I swear . . .”

“You didn’t have a light. How could you have seen him standing all the way over there?” Neil points to the edges of camp, where night has turned the surrounding landscape into a wall of ink.

“It felt so real,” Scott says at last.

The water has started boiling in the cooking pot. Luciana gives it a second to cool, then dips in the bandana and resumes dabbing at his wounds. To give Scott credit, he doesn’t flinch as she starts flicking pieces of dirt and debris from the gouges on his chest.

I speak up. “Do you have a history of sleepwalking?”

He glances at me. “Sometimes.”

“Is it worse under stress? In unfamiliar places?”

“Yes.”

“Is that what happened five years ago?”

“Maybe. I’ve had episodes off and on since childhood. I wondered if that night . . . Was I really that drunk, or was I sleepwalking? Maybe that’s why I didn’t hear anyone call. But, lately . . . it’s gotten worse.”

“Post–Tim’s disappearance?”

Scott doesn’t look at me. “Post-marriage.”

“Guilt walking,” Neil coughs, an edge in voice.

Scott doesn’t answer. There is plenty of collective blame from that single camping trip, but looking at the friends now, it’s clear Scott carries an extra load. If he hadn’t disappeared, if Tim hadn’t gone for help . . .

If Scott hadn’t married his best friend’s former fiancée? His actions, then and now, have further isolated him. Miggy was right. They are not a band of brothers anymore. They are the walking wounded, inflicting further damage as they thrash around in their pain.

“Why were you screaming?” I ask.

“Screaming? I wasn’t screaming.”

“Maybe when you ripped open your chest,” Luciana comments soothingly. “That looks worthy of a yelp or two.”

“I don’t remember screaming,” Scott says uncertainly.

I have another question: “If you started out chasing . . . your vision . . . into the woods, how did you end up behind us on the other side of camp?”

“I have no idea. I saw Tim. I remember seeing Tim. Then . . . I’m not sure what happened next. Maybe it was just a nightmare.”

A fresh noise. We all spook, our nerves on edge. Nemeth immediately shoulders the rifle.

Bob lumbers into camp. He has boots on but unlaced and an open shirt revealing a torso covered with as much furry red hair as is on his face. There’s a streak of blood on his forehead, but it doesn’t seem to bother him as he snaps off his flashlight and asks, “What happened to our food?”



* * *



—

Luciana, Miggy, and Neil stay with Scott to finish tending his wounds. No need for stitches, Luciana offers up. But definitely the gashes need a thorough disinfecting before being glued shut.

I’ve stayed in communities where superglue is all anyone can afford for healthcare. I’m still not sure I want to watch someone have their chest closed up with a tube of adhesive.

So I follow Nemeth, Martin, and Bob away from the camp, to where Nemeth hung up our food and trash in scentproof garbage bags. Two of the three black bags are now nothing more than gutted pi?atas, their contents strewn all over the forest floor.