ash
February 13th, 2013, 10:33 PM
Hey guys, just wanted to drop the first chapter of my book here for some critiquing. Be tough. I know you will. I hope you enjoy and thanks for checking it out.
Chapter 1
“Do you think you’re going mad?”
The questions broke Dent's gaze on the campfire. His eyes burned and he tried to blink away the pain, his right hand was stiff and smudged with what appeared to be soot. In his left he held a picture, which he released into the fire without even giving a second look. He rubbed his dirty hand on his pants, then held his palms out, allowing the fire to lap at them until his fingers regained their feeling.
Night had settled in and brought with it a bitter wind that complimented the six inches of snow left by a storm earlier that afternoon. The glow of the fire lit the forest around him giving his shadow a place to play.
“I doubt that’s the case”, Dent protested as he wrung his hands together, “course, considering who I’m talkin’ to, I’m certainly not far from it”.
“Can you imagine what it would look like if someone found you here talking to me?”
Dent produced a tobacco bag from his military coat tattered from years in the wilderness, and fed the bag's contents into a rolling paper.
“If’n it were a carin’ fella, he’d put me outta my misery I suppose. But I doubt this part of the world has seen a carin’ man in a long time.”
“None so much as yourself, anyway.”
The paper and tobacco rolled easily in his fingers, fluid and without thought.
“I’m not sure who you remember, but a carin’ man wasn’t it.”
“I know you would have stayed if you could have, if that’s what you were referring to.”
He grimaced, part from the assumption and part from the heat, as he leaned toward the fire to light his cigarette. The flames exposed his weariness. His face looked sculpted from paper mache, and his eyes, sunken and pale, fought through his squint. His beard scruff added years and his smoking and drinking didn’t help. Already in his upper fifties, Dent was a rarity. A couple of decades past the life expectancy of the times, he felt every minute of it.
“Are you trying to ignore the comment?”
His words mixed with smoke as it fell from his mouth, “You wouldn’t let me if I wanted to.”
He adjusted where he sat, but the chill on the back of his legs wasn’t going away. Between his thighs rested a bottle half filled with brown liquor.
“And you think that will keep you warm?”
Thinking for a moment, he pulled the bottle free from it's place and took a large swig. “That oughta,” He mumbled, tucking the spirits away.
He took a drag from his cigarette and could feel the disappointment aimed at him through the silence.
“And I suppose you think the smokin’ is bad for me too?”
“Well, there are more efficient and less painful ways to kill yourself.”
Dent reached for the side of his leg and ran his hand across his Colt Single Action Army. He unsnapped the leather strap on the holster and his thumb found the curve of the hammer. Gripping the handle tight he slid the gun free. He took a moment to admire such a pristine piece of military hardware.
His Grandfather, Thomas Alexander Sr., carried it all the way through World War I, in the trenches of the Western Front. He used to say, “This gun’s sent more Germans home than a Meissen dinner bell”. Of course he also used to swear the gun still smelled of the dead in the trenches. The older he got, the less people listened to him and the more he started talking to himself. That’s how Dent remembered him, and now an older man himself, he related.
Just before Thomas Sr. died, he passed the gun on to Thomas Jr., who stored it away in the attic for years. It wasn’t until his father lost his job and the family fell on hard times that Dent saw that gun again. He watched his dad spend weeks trying to sell it to feed the family, and it may have been the economy or the smell of the dead, but no one ever bought the damned thing. It eventually defaulted to Dent after his father used it to put a bullet through his own head. It was a family heirloom unlike any other. Death followed it and Dent made sure the tradition continued.
“I’ve lived this long,” he said as he slid the gun back into the holster. “I see no sense ruining a good streak.”
“Well, if anyone is going to get you, it will be you.”
Dent snatched up his booze, “I’ll drink to that.”
“Of course you would.”
The alcohol coated his insides, stinging on the way down. It felt warm, but it wasn’t a real warmth. Confusion set in, along with anger. Dent had forgotten his purpose.
“The bag.”
The suggestion startled him, but sure enough at his feet sat a duffel bag.
“Thanks,” he said with a grunt, leaning forward. Tucked deep in the bag he found a picture of a young girl, eight years old, green eyes, a button nose and few missing teeth showing through a large grin. Also from the bag he produced an aged teddy bear.
“How’s Ivy?” he asked, though he knew the answer.
“You can talk to her, you know?”
He looked the bear over, rubbed some dirt from it’s face and flicked his finger over where an eye used to be, before tossing it back down next to the duffel bag.
“No, not right now.”
He studied the picture as he had done thousands of times before. It was his favorite. His daughter, whose smile beamed adoration, sat on a rusted swing completely unaware of the world and what it had become. The sun behind her glared in the photo, lighting her imperfect face and blurring it all the same. She was genuinely happy, but it was her innocence that made him jealous. Carefree meant pain free. He released the picture into the fire.
“She keeps asking why her daddy won’t speak with her. It’s been a few weeks since you have.”
Dent picked up a stick and poked at the photo, burying it deeper into the fire. “She’d be what, sixteen by now? Think she’d still call me daddy?”
“Yes.”
Indecisiveness cut into his chuckle, he swirled the stick around in the fire stirring up sparks into the air.
“Think she’d remember what I done?” Dent asked.
“Did you really do it?”
He shook his head. “You can’t answer a question with another question.”
“Fair enough, but until you figure out the answer to my question, I can’t really give you an honest answer. Besides, you can’t really trust what I say after all, or maybe you can. Do you think you’re going mad?”
Dent smiled as he laid back on the ground trying to find the stars through the smoke, the snow and the trees.
“What do you think?”
“Well, you are talking to your dead wife. So, probably.”
With that, he gave up searching, pulled his collar up over his ears and drifted off to sleep.
Snow melted and dripped from the trees into small pools on the forest floor. The fire from the night before was nothing more than a hand full of embers smoldering in a puddle of black mud. The mix of smoke and fog began to give way to rays of sunlight. The woods were alive with animals running back and forth, some stopped to cock their heads at Dent as he lay motionless on the ground.
The Sun had been up an hour before he bothered opening his eyes despite the soggy ground beneath him. He sat up and rubbed his temples. The excruciating headache refused to subside and the bottle of liquor that turned on him over night was the only solution. It still had a few gulps in it but he finished it in one before he tossed it off into the woods. With eyes closed tight, he held his breath for as long as he could before releasing.
The wind picked up, and with no fire to keep him warm, or dry him off, Dent started to shiver. He bundled up the thin mattress on the ground and wrapped it with a rope, then tied it to his bag. A quick scan of the area satisfied him that nothing was being left behind, so he stood and hoisted the bag onto his shoulders. Out of the corner of his eye he noticed a lump, matted and soaked by the muddied campfire. He nudged it over with his foot. The teddy bear that never made it into the fire starred up at him with one eye, helpless.
“Bad night?” Dent asked as he scooped up the mess of a bear. He looked it over for a moment, “Me too,” then he tucked it between the mattress and the rope.
After spending most of the day trekking through the woods he reached a clearing, the Sun began to disappear behind the trees on the other side. A large pond sat as a reservoir in the center of the field, the water, no doubt chilled from snow melted in the afternoon sun, made his dry mouth hurt at the sight of it. His stomach growled another reminder that he had yet to eat, but it mattered little now that he was home.
His cabin, built by an old carpenter’s hand, sat back in the opposite tree line. It was nearly impossible to spot by anyone who hadn’t built it with that idea in mind; Dent himself sometimes missed it by twenty or so yards to the right and left. Not today though, and the pond would have to wait as well, the promise of honey wine and salted meats that awaited him inside was his top priority.
He stepped onto the porch, exhausted, nearly starved and hung-over, which put him in no mood for what awaited him. A paper wrapped package bound with twine and covered in writing leaned against the base of his door.
He pulled his gun and thumbed back the hammer as he spun and scanned through the trees toward the open field. He squinted as he looked for movement, listening closely for any sounds around him. He knelt down and picked up the package as his eyes darted from tree to tree. With his foot, he nudged the door open and slipped inside before dropping a large piece of lumber across the door.
Tunnel vision and base senses overwhelmed him as he secured his small cabin. He checked the only other room where he slept to make sure no one was waiting for him to drop his guard. Then the back door. It was still locked. By now it was too dark outside for the constant window checking to be effective. The panic and the paranoid thoughts wrestled for his attention, beating around in his skull. Had they come for him? How could anyone find him here? Who would know where to look? He’d been here nearly eight years without so much as seeing another human being. This was by design. He had no intentions of anyone finding him.
Hours passed. The light under the door suggested the Sun was coming up. Dent sat in his chair fighting the urge to sleep, constantly having to retrain his gun on the front door. Eating or drinking were luxuries left in the past; his head pounded with every heart beat. There wasn’t a muscle in his body that didn’t ache, or a limb that didn’t tremble. He gripped his gun so tight, his forearm felt like it was on fire. He couldn’t let his guard down. It’s just what they would want, he thought.
He glanced at the package laying on the floor. Was this even real? Maybe he had gone mad. He thought about the night before with his wife. Talking to her like she was still alive. Ridiculous. It wasn’t the first time either, and most definitely not the last. And it was the same with his Daughter. The stress, the guilt of their deaths, paranoia, the solitude and alcohol, all working together to drive him over the edge. The silence was deafening. He could feel the blood coursing through his body, his eyes burned and he began to lose focus. His eye lids drooped and the last time he let them close, he wouldn’t open them again for two days.
A heave brought him to. Then another. He was so dehydrated and without food that nothing came up. His lips were cracked and caked with blood. He heaved again. The light from outside was blinding and felt as if it was cutting through his skull. He trembled to stand then staggered into the kitchen area.
The water and meat he found brought back some of his strength. He began to work the stiffness out of his body and gradually the pain faded to make room for the memory of the other night. The package. It was nowhere in sight. Groaning, he knelt down and laid his head on the floor for a different angle. Across the room, underneath the chair, next to his revolver, the package sat. At that distance he could still make out the writing; A name he hadn't seen in a long while.
To: Denton Alexander.
He shut his eyes and smacked his head against the floor, hoping it would shake lose whatever connection inside made this a reality.
“Is something wrong?”
Dent rolled onto his back, “What do you want from me?”
“You know,you're much nicer to me when you're drunk. Quite the opposite of most people.”
His wife knelt next to him, the sunlight behind her cast a glow around her tracing the white dress, flowing in a breeze that didn't exist. Dent couldn't see her face from the Sun.
“Having trouble remembering what I look like?”
Dent pealed himself from the floor and made his way to the chair, sending dust into the air after collapsing into it's welcoming cushions. He reclined with his eyes shut, hoping the sunlight, and his wife, would disappear.
“That really hurts,” she said, holding back no sarcasm.
“Would you please just leave?”
“Not until you open in.”
Dent swept his hand under the chair, feeling for the package. “Then you'll leave?”
“Well, yes, after you read it.”
He was so worried about who dropped the package off, that he neglected to think about it's contents, passing over it's distinct shape and size as a book.
“It's a book. You know that,” she mentioned, swaying out of the sunlight to give him a brief glimpse of her face, then falling back into it's luminescence.
Sure enough within the wrapping was a journal, and a note with it that read:
It is with much luck and prayer that this find Denton Alexander, my father.
“Ivy?” he asked, expecting his wife to still be in the room, though she was not. He hesitantly flipped the cover back and read.
April 6, 2007
I decided to date this entry in the year 2007 because Sister Constance told me that’s the closest year anyone can figure it really is. Something about people losing track of time after some big war from before I was even born. She said they figure it’s close to April and I like the number 6 so I picked it. I been at the church for awhile now and still haven’t made no friends. Probably because I don’t like talkin to no one. Sister Constance says I should write about things that happen to me and maybe I’ll find my voice. I don’t know what she means, but there ain’t nothing else to do. I don’t know what to write about so I’ll just start from when I came here. Sister Constance said some man found me curled up in a barn and brought me here. She says I looked half dead with no meat on my bones. I don’t really remember much. She said the Sun got to my brain. I don’t know, I still remember some stuff before I got here. Sister Constance said it’ll come back over time. I’ll write more later.
-Ivy
If the date is close to accurate, that’s four years after she died, Dent thought, but it couldn’t be.
April 34, 2007
I don’t even know if that number is right. It’s been a few weeks since I wrote my first entry so it sounds right. The things Sister Constance said about no one keeping track of the days got me interested, so I been countin. Today I was thinking about my mom. I miss her.
-Ivy
May 2007
Sister Constance said I did my days wrong, so now I’m only writing the month and the year. The other stuff is too confusing. I had a bad dream about my mom and dad last night. We was running through a field full of flowers, but the flowers kept growing taller and taller until I couldn’t see my folks no more. I cried but no one ever came for me. I couldn’t sleep after that. I’ll try to write again tomorrow.
-Ivy
The further on he read, the more legitimate the journal seemed. Ivy wrote about things too consistent with their lives to be coincidence. This had to be from his daughter, though he didn't want to accept it, it was nearly impossible to dispute.
Around mid-2008 the journal entries started to became jumbled. Some made no sense at all. Words were interlaced with symbols and a seemingly made up language. Other entries trailed off or were interrupted by random things remembered.
June 2008
Today in class we learned about Saint Joan of Arc. She really interested me. Who can imagine a girl so young being so strong? a far, to the space. wrong. afectionnn, [email protected]&aaagm63yy°N 9not a thing0.ha2°W after my mom was murdered, the men who found me said my daddy did it but I never believed them they fixed me up made me feel better gave me a place to live they kept asking me questions about him a lot of questions they kept telling me what a bad man he was i know he wouldnotever hurt me or my momshe trained up a military and led armies and crowned a king.
So many of her entries seemed more like scribbles. Some were as normal as can be, often giving a glimpse into the life of a girl growing up on her own, yet some seemed to be written by another person all together. Like twins separated at a young age, one moving on to a normal life and one living a life undesired by any rational human being. A hand full of pages around 2009 had been torn from the book.
Later entries were more difficult to read. Filled with emotions and pain so detailed and vivid, Dent could almost feel it himself. Ivy spoke of her mother less as the years went by, and even less about him. The jumbled mess also seemed to stop, allowing for clear entries that disturbed Dent none the less.
By the final entries dated 2011, Ivy grew into a very different person than the girl writing back in 2007. She traveled from town to town, stealing to survive, even selling herself if she was extremely desperate. It was hard for Dent to read any of the details, especially of when selling herself took a turn for the worse. She became bitter and scared. The final entry was marked:
2011
At this point I have very little to live for. I’ve fallen into business with some people that are not likely to let me leave unless I’m dead. New Saints wasn’t what I was promised and I’m in over my head. I care as little for myself as the men who use me. I talked to my mom the other night. She said it was OK to let go, that she was waiting for me. She said that desperation will eventually give way to acceptance. I miss her. I miss my daddy too. I wish they were here to take me away from this.
Who would send this and why? Dent thought. Before he even set the book down, his gun was slipped into the holster. He grabbed his bag, still strapped to his sleeping mat and the old bear, and stuffed in the last bit of salted meat, followed by a blanket, his only other shirt and pair of pants and then the book. He pulled on his jacket and took a lantern from the wall. He found a box of matches in the table in kitchen. He also made sure to take the last two bottles of liquor before he left. Everything else in the cabin would stay.
Outside, Dent lit the lantern and held it up, illuminating the treeline in front of him. It was still too dark to see anyone, but he still couldn’t shake the feeling that he was not alone. He smashed the lantern on the porch. The dry cabin was engulfed in flames in seconds and the woods were as bright as day. He drew his gun and took cover behind a nearby tree, checking for movement.
The heat was intense and he had to move whether he was alone or not. But he waited. He needed the cover of smoke. Once it was thick enough, he sprang up and ran at a pace that was impressive for his age.
Keeping an Eastern orientation as best as he could, Dent made it to a part of the woods that the light from the fire couldn’t reach. The smoke was a different issue. He coughed hard into the fold of his arm. It felt like there was glass in his lungs, but at least there was little chance he could be followed.
He took one of the bottles of liquor from his bag. It was going to be a long walk to New Saints and he didn’t want to make it alone.
###
Chapter 1
“Do you think you’re going mad?”
The questions broke Dent's gaze on the campfire. His eyes burned and he tried to blink away the pain, his right hand was stiff and smudged with what appeared to be soot. In his left he held a picture, which he released into the fire without even giving a second look. He rubbed his dirty hand on his pants, then held his palms out, allowing the fire to lap at them until his fingers regained their feeling.
Night had settled in and brought with it a bitter wind that complimented the six inches of snow left by a storm earlier that afternoon. The glow of the fire lit the forest around him giving his shadow a place to play.
“I doubt that’s the case”, Dent protested as he wrung his hands together, “course, considering who I’m talkin’ to, I’m certainly not far from it”.
“Can you imagine what it would look like if someone found you here talking to me?”
Dent produced a tobacco bag from his military coat tattered from years in the wilderness, and fed the bag's contents into a rolling paper.
“If’n it were a carin’ fella, he’d put me outta my misery I suppose. But I doubt this part of the world has seen a carin’ man in a long time.”
“None so much as yourself, anyway.”
The paper and tobacco rolled easily in his fingers, fluid and without thought.
“I’m not sure who you remember, but a carin’ man wasn’t it.”
“I know you would have stayed if you could have, if that’s what you were referring to.”
He grimaced, part from the assumption and part from the heat, as he leaned toward the fire to light his cigarette. The flames exposed his weariness. His face looked sculpted from paper mache, and his eyes, sunken and pale, fought through his squint. His beard scruff added years and his smoking and drinking didn’t help. Already in his upper fifties, Dent was a rarity. A couple of decades past the life expectancy of the times, he felt every minute of it.
“Are you trying to ignore the comment?”
His words mixed with smoke as it fell from his mouth, “You wouldn’t let me if I wanted to.”
He adjusted where he sat, but the chill on the back of his legs wasn’t going away. Between his thighs rested a bottle half filled with brown liquor.
“And you think that will keep you warm?”
Thinking for a moment, he pulled the bottle free from it's place and took a large swig. “That oughta,” He mumbled, tucking the spirits away.
He took a drag from his cigarette and could feel the disappointment aimed at him through the silence.
“And I suppose you think the smokin’ is bad for me too?”
“Well, there are more efficient and less painful ways to kill yourself.”
Dent reached for the side of his leg and ran his hand across his Colt Single Action Army. He unsnapped the leather strap on the holster and his thumb found the curve of the hammer. Gripping the handle tight he slid the gun free. He took a moment to admire such a pristine piece of military hardware.
His Grandfather, Thomas Alexander Sr., carried it all the way through World War I, in the trenches of the Western Front. He used to say, “This gun’s sent more Germans home than a Meissen dinner bell”. Of course he also used to swear the gun still smelled of the dead in the trenches. The older he got, the less people listened to him and the more he started talking to himself. That’s how Dent remembered him, and now an older man himself, he related.
Just before Thomas Sr. died, he passed the gun on to Thomas Jr., who stored it away in the attic for years. It wasn’t until his father lost his job and the family fell on hard times that Dent saw that gun again. He watched his dad spend weeks trying to sell it to feed the family, and it may have been the economy or the smell of the dead, but no one ever bought the damned thing. It eventually defaulted to Dent after his father used it to put a bullet through his own head. It was a family heirloom unlike any other. Death followed it and Dent made sure the tradition continued.
“I’ve lived this long,” he said as he slid the gun back into the holster. “I see no sense ruining a good streak.”
“Well, if anyone is going to get you, it will be you.”
Dent snatched up his booze, “I’ll drink to that.”
“Of course you would.”
The alcohol coated his insides, stinging on the way down. It felt warm, but it wasn’t a real warmth. Confusion set in, along with anger. Dent had forgotten his purpose.
“The bag.”
The suggestion startled him, but sure enough at his feet sat a duffel bag.
“Thanks,” he said with a grunt, leaning forward. Tucked deep in the bag he found a picture of a young girl, eight years old, green eyes, a button nose and few missing teeth showing through a large grin. Also from the bag he produced an aged teddy bear.
“How’s Ivy?” he asked, though he knew the answer.
“You can talk to her, you know?”
He looked the bear over, rubbed some dirt from it’s face and flicked his finger over where an eye used to be, before tossing it back down next to the duffel bag.
“No, not right now.”
He studied the picture as he had done thousands of times before. It was his favorite. His daughter, whose smile beamed adoration, sat on a rusted swing completely unaware of the world and what it had become. The sun behind her glared in the photo, lighting her imperfect face and blurring it all the same. She was genuinely happy, but it was her innocence that made him jealous. Carefree meant pain free. He released the picture into the fire.
“She keeps asking why her daddy won’t speak with her. It’s been a few weeks since you have.”
Dent picked up a stick and poked at the photo, burying it deeper into the fire. “She’d be what, sixteen by now? Think she’d still call me daddy?”
“Yes.”
Indecisiveness cut into his chuckle, he swirled the stick around in the fire stirring up sparks into the air.
“Think she’d remember what I done?” Dent asked.
“Did you really do it?”
He shook his head. “You can’t answer a question with another question.”
“Fair enough, but until you figure out the answer to my question, I can’t really give you an honest answer. Besides, you can’t really trust what I say after all, or maybe you can. Do you think you’re going mad?”
Dent smiled as he laid back on the ground trying to find the stars through the smoke, the snow and the trees.
“What do you think?”
“Well, you are talking to your dead wife. So, probably.”
With that, he gave up searching, pulled his collar up over his ears and drifted off to sleep.
Snow melted and dripped from the trees into small pools on the forest floor. The fire from the night before was nothing more than a hand full of embers smoldering in a puddle of black mud. The mix of smoke and fog began to give way to rays of sunlight. The woods were alive with animals running back and forth, some stopped to cock their heads at Dent as he lay motionless on the ground.
The Sun had been up an hour before he bothered opening his eyes despite the soggy ground beneath him. He sat up and rubbed his temples. The excruciating headache refused to subside and the bottle of liquor that turned on him over night was the only solution. It still had a few gulps in it but he finished it in one before he tossed it off into the woods. With eyes closed tight, he held his breath for as long as he could before releasing.
The wind picked up, and with no fire to keep him warm, or dry him off, Dent started to shiver. He bundled up the thin mattress on the ground and wrapped it with a rope, then tied it to his bag. A quick scan of the area satisfied him that nothing was being left behind, so he stood and hoisted the bag onto his shoulders. Out of the corner of his eye he noticed a lump, matted and soaked by the muddied campfire. He nudged it over with his foot. The teddy bear that never made it into the fire starred up at him with one eye, helpless.
“Bad night?” Dent asked as he scooped up the mess of a bear. He looked it over for a moment, “Me too,” then he tucked it between the mattress and the rope.
After spending most of the day trekking through the woods he reached a clearing, the Sun began to disappear behind the trees on the other side. A large pond sat as a reservoir in the center of the field, the water, no doubt chilled from snow melted in the afternoon sun, made his dry mouth hurt at the sight of it. His stomach growled another reminder that he had yet to eat, but it mattered little now that he was home.
His cabin, built by an old carpenter’s hand, sat back in the opposite tree line. It was nearly impossible to spot by anyone who hadn’t built it with that idea in mind; Dent himself sometimes missed it by twenty or so yards to the right and left. Not today though, and the pond would have to wait as well, the promise of honey wine and salted meats that awaited him inside was his top priority.
He stepped onto the porch, exhausted, nearly starved and hung-over, which put him in no mood for what awaited him. A paper wrapped package bound with twine and covered in writing leaned against the base of his door.
He pulled his gun and thumbed back the hammer as he spun and scanned through the trees toward the open field. He squinted as he looked for movement, listening closely for any sounds around him. He knelt down and picked up the package as his eyes darted from tree to tree. With his foot, he nudged the door open and slipped inside before dropping a large piece of lumber across the door.
Tunnel vision and base senses overwhelmed him as he secured his small cabin. He checked the only other room where he slept to make sure no one was waiting for him to drop his guard. Then the back door. It was still locked. By now it was too dark outside for the constant window checking to be effective. The panic and the paranoid thoughts wrestled for his attention, beating around in his skull. Had they come for him? How could anyone find him here? Who would know where to look? He’d been here nearly eight years without so much as seeing another human being. This was by design. He had no intentions of anyone finding him.
Hours passed. The light under the door suggested the Sun was coming up. Dent sat in his chair fighting the urge to sleep, constantly having to retrain his gun on the front door. Eating or drinking were luxuries left in the past; his head pounded with every heart beat. There wasn’t a muscle in his body that didn’t ache, or a limb that didn’t tremble. He gripped his gun so tight, his forearm felt like it was on fire. He couldn’t let his guard down. It’s just what they would want, he thought.
He glanced at the package laying on the floor. Was this even real? Maybe he had gone mad. He thought about the night before with his wife. Talking to her like she was still alive. Ridiculous. It wasn’t the first time either, and most definitely not the last. And it was the same with his Daughter. The stress, the guilt of their deaths, paranoia, the solitude and alcohol, all working together to drive him over the edge. The silence was deafening. He could feel the blood coursing through his body, his eyes burned and he began to lose focus. His eye lids drooped and the last time he let them close, he wouldn’t open them again for two days.
A heave brought him to. Then another. He was so dehydrated and without food that nothing came up. His lips were cracked and caked with blood. He heaved again. The light from outside was blinding and felt as if it was cutting through his skull. He trembled to stand then staggered into the kitchen area.
The water and meat he found brought back some of his strength. He began to work the stiffness out of his body and gradually the pain faded to make room for the memory of the other night. The package. It was nowhere in sight. Groaning, he knelt down and laid his head on the floor for a different angle. Across the room, underneath the chair, next to his revolver, the package sat. At that distance he could still make out the writing; A name he hadn't seen in a long while.
To: Denton Alexander.
He shut his eyes and smacked his head against the floor, hoping it would shake lose whatever connection inside made this a reality.
“Is something wrong?”
Dent rolled onto his back, “What do you want from me?”
“You know,you're much nicer to me when you're drunk. Quite the opposite of most people.”
His wife knelt next to him, the sunlight behind her cast a glow around her tracing the white dress, flowing in a breeze that didn't exist. Dent couldn't see her face from the Sun.
“Having trouble remembering what I look like?”
Dent pealed himself from the floor and made his way to the chair, sending dust into the air after collapsing into it's welcoming cushions. He reclined with his eyes shut, hoping the sunlight, and his wife, would disappear.
“That really hurts,” she said, holding back no sarcasm.
“Would you please just leave?”
“Not until you open in.”
Dent swept his hand under the chair, feeling for the package. “Then you'll leave?”
“Well, yes, after you read it.”
He was so worried about who dropped the package off, that he neglected to think about it's contents, passing over it's distinct shape and size as a book.
“It's a book. You know that,” she mentioned, swaying out of the sunlight to give him a brief glimpse of her face, then falling back into it's luminescence.
Sure enough within the wrapping was a journal, and a note with it that read:
It is with much luck and prayer that this find Denton Alexander, my father.
“Ivy?” he asked, expecting his wife to still be in the room, though she was not. He hesitantly flipped the cover back and read.
April 6, 2007
I decided to date this entry in the year 2007 because Sister Constance told me that’s the closest year anyone can figure it really is. Something about people losing track of time after some big war from before I was even born. She said they figure it’s close to April and I like the number 6 so I picked it. I been at the church for awhile now and still haven’t made no friends. Probably because I don’t like talkin to no one. Sister Constance says I should write about things that happen to me and maybe I’ll find my voice. I don’t know what she means, but there ain’t nothing else to do. I don’t know what to write about so I’ll just start from when I came here. Sister Constance said some man found me curled up in a barn and brought me here. She says I looked half dead with no meat on my bones. I don’t really remember much. She said the Sun got to my brain. I don’t know, I still remember some stuff before I got here. Sister Constance said it’ll come back over time. I’ll write more later.
-Ivy
If the date is close to accurate, that’s four years after she died, Dent thought, but it couldn’t be.
April 34, 2007
I don’t even know if that number is right. It’s been a few weeks since I wrote my first entry so it sounds right. The things Sister Constance said about no one keeping track of the days got me interested, so I been countin. Today I was thinking about my mom. I miss her.
-Ivy
May 2007
Sister Constance said I did my days wrong, so now I’m only writing the month and the year. The other stuff is too confusing. I had a bad dream about my mom and dad last night. We was running through a field full of flowers, but the flowers kept growing taller and taller until I couldn’t see my folks no more. I cried but no one ever came for me. I couldn’t sleep after that. I’ll try to write again tomorrow.
-Ivy
The further on he read, the more legitimate the journal seemed. Ivy wrote about things too consistent with their lives to be coincidence. This had to be from his daughter, though he didn't want to accept it, it was nearly impossible to dispute.
Around mid-2008 the journal entries started to became jumbled. Some made no sense at all. Words were interlaced with symbols and a seemingly made up language. Other entries trailed off or were interrupted by random things remembered.
June 2008
Today in class we learned about Saint Joan of Arc. She really interested me. Who can imagine a girl so young being so strong? a far, to the space. wrong. afectionnn, [email protected]&aaagm63yy°N 9not a thing0.ha2°W after my mom was murdered, the men who found me said my daddy did it but I never believed them they fixed me up made me feel better gave me a place to live they kept asking me questions about him a lot of questions they kept telling me what a bad man he was i know he wouldnotever hurt me or my momshe trained up a military and led armies and crowned a king.
So many of her entries seemed more like scribbles. Some were as normal as can be, often giving a glimpse into the life of a girl growing up on her own, yet some seemed to be written by another person all together. Like twins separated at a young age, one moving on to a normal life and one living a life undesired by any rational human being. A hand full of pages around 2009 had been torn from the book.
Later entries were more difficult to read. Filled with emotions and pain so detailed and vivid, Dent could almost feel it himself. Ivy spoke of her mother less as the years went by, and even less about him. The jumbled mess also seemed to stop, allowing for clear entries that disturbed Dent none the less.
By the final entries dated 2011, Ivy grew into a very different person than the girl writing back in 2007. She traveled from town to town, stealing to survive, even selling herself if she was extremely desperate. It was hard for Dent to read any of the details, especially of when selling herself took a turn for the worse. She became bitter and scared. The final entry was marked:
2011
At this point I have very little to live for. I’ve fallen into business with some people that are not likely to let me leave unless I’m dead. New Saints wasn’t what I was promised and I’m in over my head. I care as little for myself as the men who use me. I talked to my mom the other night. She said it was OK to let go, that she was waiting for me. She said that desperation will eventually give way to acceptance. I miss her. I miss my daddy too. I wish they were here to take me away from this.
Who would send this and why? Dent thought. Before he even set the book down, his gun was slipped into the holster. He grabbed his bag, still strapped to his sleeping mat and the old bear, and stuffed in the last bit of salted meat, followed by a blanket, his only other shirt and pair of pants and then the book. He pulled on his jacket and took a lantern from the wall. He found a box of matches in the table in kitchen. He also made sure to take the last two bottles of liquor before he left. Everything else in the cabin would stay.
Outside, Dent lit the lantern and held it up, illuminating the treeline in front of him. It was still too dark to see anyone, but he still couldn’t shake the feeling that he was not alone. He smashed the lantern on the porch. The dry cabin was engulfed in flames in seconds and the woods were as bright as day. He drew his gun and took cover behind a nearby tree, checking for movement.
The heat was intense and he had to move whether he was alone or not. But he waited. He needed the cover of smoke. Once it was thick enough, he sprang up and ran at a pace that was impressive for his age.
Keeping an Eastern orientation as best as he could, Dent made it to a part of the woods that the light from the fire couldn’t reach. The smoke was a different issue. He coughed hard into the fold of his arm. It felt like there was glass in his lungs, but at least there was little chance he could be followed.
He took one of the bottles of liquor from his bag. It was going to be a long walk to New Saints and he didn’t want to make it alone.
###