Pasquinelli/Rise 465
CHAPTER 2: RACINE CAVITT

Jon woke up the next morning early enough to get breakfast from Mrs. Jouler - continental today - and it was only the two of them to dine. It was a bit awkward at first because both of them remained silent, and with no television or cable, there were very little to distract either of them.

“Have a good sleep, dear?”

“Oh yes, thank you. I was pretty tired last night.”

“That’s good.” Jon reasoned she was probably commenting on the good night sleep, not at his exhaustion.

“So...” began Jon. He was trying to determine how to word his next question without sounding rude. “What occupies your time during the days, Mrs. Jouler?”

“Gardening, mostly. Tending to the house,” Mrs. Jouler replied in a laundry-list fashion. “That takes up most of my time, and of course cooking.”

Jon swallowed the bit of Danish he had been chewing and nodded silently. He looked at one of the windows in the breakfast nook and dazed down the sloping lawns and neatly tended gardens into the deep greens and browns of the forest just beyond.

Jon even asked about the weather in an attempt to continue breaking the ice. “Cold.” was all Mrs. Jouler had to say on the subject when it came up.

The sky was gray and cloudy, casting a misty haze that went deep into the forest.

After a very brief eating period, Jon glanced into the formal dining room, and saw a long rectangular table under an iron chandelier from the fifteen-foot ceiling. It was black and had curly flowered patterns coiled around false candles that remained “lit.” It reminded Jon of his grandparent’s house.

The enormous floor-to-ceiling mullioned windows on the front of the house looked out over Arcata, and the misty skies and foggy morning made a clear impression to Jon that this was indeed a coastal town. Jon was also of the opinion that towns always looked their best at sunrise and sunset. Not that Jon ever got up early enough to actually see the sunrise (unless he was training for a track meet that day, and the cityscape was certainly not the first thing on his mind at six or seven in the morning).

Stuffed with pastries and toast, Jon trundled up the stairs, and back to his bedroom door. It was then that he noticed his full name written on a sign on the door. He rushed down the opposite hallway to the women’s dorms. He saw three names: Adriana Montoya, Racine Cavitt, and Doreen James. Jon sounded out each name to himself, and got to the second name, “Racine. Ray-seen.” That was the Ray-Ray girl Mrs. Jouler was talking about that Jon had run into briefly last night. He was just about to knock on the door, but decided against it. He figured if he’d been out late, he wouldn’t want someone knocking on his door at eight o’clock in the morning.

As noiselessly as he could, Jon returned to his own room where several multi-sized boxes were scattered about the floor...and the desk....and some on top of the bureau. He sat down on his unmade bed and took a look around the room.

“Gotta do it sometime,” he said.

Forty-five minutes and a backache later, everything had been put away in its new home. He surveyed the small room once again and thought that the garage sale fairy had paid him a visit. There were mismatched knickknacks everywhere, pictures and awards waiting to be hung on the walls...the only things that seemed to fit neatly where they should go were his clothes, which he had very few of to begin with. He surmised that it might be a good idea if he brought some of his stuff back home with him when he left for Thanksgiving break.

By now the sunlight was pouring into Jon’s room from the now open window. The misty fog was burning off quickly, and far off Jon could hear birds chirping softly in the trees. That was one thing Jon certainly noticed as another huge difference between Arcata and Los Angeles - there was virtually no city noise at all. Even though he lived on a dead-end street back home, Jon could still hear cars driving by, or a helicopter sputtering overhead, or kids in the street. Needless to say it was always something. But there in Arcata was simply silence. A few times when Jon was very quiet and very still he thought he could actually hear time passing. But he shook his head, as that was a rather silly thought. For a time, Jon considered bringing a small TV with him to the Manor, but ultimately decided against it, not knowing how much time his homework and reports would allot him for recreational activities such as that.

He also wanted to into the forest - something he’d been looking forward to all year - but he also had to buy his textbooks for the coming semester. Jon showered, then threw on some clothes and grabbed his keys.

“Be sure to bring a sweatshirt, dear, it’s cool out there,” Mrs. Jouler called from the dining room.

“Thanks,” said Jon, leaving without a sweatshirt.

He was trundling down the stairs when he thought of Racine Cavitt again. Taking a backwards detour, he went back upstairs to room number two. But unfortunately, it was all for naught. The room was empty and her door was slightly ajar. Jon’s bedroom was a world of cleanliness compared to Racine’s - books, magazines, photo albums, makeup, and clothes were everywhere. It was a shame too, because she had a corner room -- it had windows on two sides and was slightly bigger than the other singles. He vaguely wondered how long he’d need to wait for her at the front door to let her in again, but figured the likelihood of it happening again was slim to nil.

But Jon had things to do today. First things came first. Classes would be starting in a few weeks and he didn’t have any of his books to begin with. That would be the first order of the day. Remembering what happened to Ray, Jon patted his pocket -- the house keys were there. He knew he probably should have done that before almost leaving a minute before, but he chocked it up to not being used to his new routine yet. He looked out the windows in the back of the house one final time before leaving. He promised himself he’d make it there before sundown.

The tall, thin windows in the front door were ablaze with bright white light, contrasting the dark wooden doors and floor. Jon threw the doors open and bright, diffused sunlight hit his face and cool damp air filled his lungs.

Still in the driveway was his beat up old Thunderbird, and still no sign of any other student’s car. There was an old white Cadillac that Jon figured must be Mrs. Jouler’s, and a new black convertible Mercedes parked in between Oak Tree Manor and the adjacent property that must belong to the neighbors. Jon was about to pull open his car door when he froze in place. There was that silence again -- no cars, no people, no city noise....

“This seems like it’s going to be a quiet day,” he said to his car door handle.

At Humboldt State University, (which turned out to be hardly a five-minute drive -- the walk from the parking lot to the bookstore took longer than the drive there), the campus mirrored life at Oak Tree Manor. The campus was practically deserted, and it took Jon a good half hour to actually replace the bookstore, mainly because he’d never been to the college before, and the only map of campus he had was in one of the fall semester schedule of classes he had used to register. After making the wrong turn up a hill, then having to walk down it again, Jon finally just waited to see where everyone else was going. Sure enough, not two minutes went by that there was a person walking somewhere -- a student, or a very young teacher, by the look of it. Jon stayed put while the man walked away. Then another student - a girl this time - also strode by headed in the same direction. And not only that, but a group of two students seemed to come from the opposite way holding...yes, identical white plastic bags full of books. Jon followed the steady stream of book-buyers.

Once he finally got inside the bookstore, it was wonder to him how he’d missed it for the past half hour -- there were dozens of students packed in going through the shelves, perusing H.S.U. paraphernalia, and there must have been at least fifty people waiting in a line that zigzagged all over the store.

“I can’t believe how expensive these are!” said a girl holding canvas boards.

“Just be happy you’re not in any bio sciences,” said her friend, holding a massive textbook. “This one book is a hundred and fifty dollars.”

“It’s a scam.”

“They should start a club like, ’Students For Better Priced Textbooks”

“Or how about, S.A.H.P.T. ‘Sapped’: Students Against High Priced Textbooks.”

“Nice.”

The impression was daunting -- throngs of students looking quite annoyed and hurried all trying to get the same thing done, and not looking terribly thrilled about it.

Just after Jon collected his textbooks and was standing in line with his arms full of books did he hear that very distinct voice again. “You so just walked into me. Excuse you.”

Racine Cavitt (or at least the back of her) was exiting the bookstore. Jon craned as best he could, but could only see long black hair falling onto a designer hoodie. She had no trouble walking with two bags of books, talking on her cell phone while walking in big chunky heels. She was easily Jon’s height in the heels and her walk was graceful, but direct and with purpose.

After shelling out over three hundred dollars in textbooks and completing a rather tiring walk back up to the parking lot, Jon was on his way back to Oak Tree Manor. The entire process took less than ninety minutes -- much faster than Jon had thought. On the way back to Oak Tree, Jon took a detour through McDonald’s to grab something to eat -- he didn’t want to have to come down that hill again.

By the time he was back in his room with his books in a single, precariously balanced stack on his desk, it was just past one o’clock in the afternoon. Jon smiled. Now he really had free time until the semester started in a few weeks. He also knew what he wanted to do.

He grabbed his phone and a compass (he didn’t know how much good a compass would do him, but it was probably a smart thing to do. At least, that’s what he told himself) and set off up the lawns to the end of the property. One thing caught Jon’s eye just a few yards before the forest began: there was a low stone brick wall that encircled the back of the property -- but the part that caught his eye was a gap in the wall. Indeed, there was a space in the wall about two feet long. Jon’s first thought was that perhaps the wall had broken or collapsed in that spot some years ago, but the closer he got to it, the more he doubted that theory. The stones that ran up and down the sides of the gap were perfectly vertical, and did not look cracked or broken at all. That break in the wall was meant to be there.

As he approached the tree line, Jon looked back over the gap in the wall and also noticed that if a straight line was drawn from the gap in the wall to the manor, it bisected the house almost perfectly. But he didn’t want to be distracted anymore. He’d also never seen the back of the manor before, and aside from an odd-looking curved room on the second floor, it looked rather like the back of any manor Jon would have imagined it should resemble.

Upon entering the forest, the scent of pine greeted him like an old friend, and the temperature dropped several degrees as the sun came down through the canopy only in small shafts. Aside from a few chirping birds, only the crunch-crunch of pine needles sounded in the dim.

Minutes ticked by as Jon wound his way around through the trees, not paying attention to time or direction. The floor sloped gently up, so Jon figured this would be a good marker for replaceing his way back. Throughout his entire walk through the forest, Jon was only unnerved once the entire time. He’d stopped in a random spot just to get his bearings, and take in his surroundings and appreciate the utter silence. But there was more than just silence. As he stood there, Jon felt like he could hear something -- a low hum. At first Jon thought it was his hearing, so he stuck his fingers in his ears and wiggled them furiously. But once he did that, the hum steadily came back. Jon thought he should probably go back to a place that wasn’t so eerily calm, when a wind whipped the trees, and a great sound permeated the silence, and Jon could have sworn that he heard someone whisper his name.

Jon looked around -- through the trees, under the brush, even high up through the branches. There was absolutely no one else there.

He took a step forward and nearly yelled out loud. There sat a barn owl, maybe twenty feet from the ground, staring right at Jon -- yellow eyes glinting reflected sunlight back at him. Jon took a deep breath and continued walking, trying to not pay much attention to the owl, but the owl seemed to be paying him attention. Its gaze was fixed on him, and the closer Jon got to the owl, it actually seemed to be more intrigued by him if that were possible. The owl lowered its head, moved side-to-side on the branch it was perched on, and even flapped its wings twice at him.

“What are you doing here?” Jon said under his breath, his heart rate finally slowing down.

The owl blinked. Jon raised an eyebrow. Then he took a step forward. Just one step. The owl did nothing save for continuing to look directly at Jon in that curious manner. It seemed as if the owl found Jon just as curious as Jon did the owl.

“Don’t you have anything better to do?” Jon asked. For some reason, asking it another question seemed like appropriate thing to do. Without giving an answer (Jon hardly expected it would), it fluttered down to the ground not fifteen feet from where Jon stood. It continued to stare at him, even though the human towered over it.

“Guess not.”

The rogue owl was not exactly in Jon’s way (it had landed where Jon had just come from) so he headed back the way he came, and after passing a few trees rather hurriedly, Jon couldn’t make out the owl anymore, but somehow knew it was still there, looking after him. After checking his watch (three thirty in the afternoon) -- he should be getting back. It wouldn’t get dark for another several hours, but seeing as this was his first time in a wild forest with very little sense of direction backing him up with no landmarks to speak of except the house itself, which didn’t really count as it was the destination, going back home might be the better idea at the moment. He could always return another time. He did, after all, have another month to go of doing whatever he pleased. Plus he wasn’t quite looking forward to running into any more wayward fowls.

But as it turned out, his fears were unwarranted. There were no more run-ins with strange birds, and in a matter of a few minutes, Jon intuited his way back to Oak Tree without any issues. It was late afternoon and the sun was still high in the sky. But it was also dinnertime, and Jon didn’t want to miss another home-cooked meal. He wasn’t entirely sure how good Mrs. Jouler’s cooking was, but he was sure to replace out sooner or later.

After a shower, he sat down with Mrs. Jouler in the dining room (she insisted dinner be served there) and she made and served a casserole full of all sorts of vegetables and cheeses. But as the two of them were sitting down to eat, Jon couldn’t help but feel disappointed. There was a noted absence of Racine Cavitt at the table. Could she be avoiding him? Or was he reading too much into it, and maybe she was just doing her own thing?

“Have a good day at all?” said Mrs. Jouler.

“Sure, was…nice,” Jon said. “And yours?”

“Lovely, lovely… My favorite time of year.”

Jon went up to the tower with all the computers after wolfing down his dinner and found his location on a mapping website, and traced his trek roughly along the path he thought he had taken. By that time, and after emailing Daniel about his first day, the sun had set, and again there was no sign of Racine Cavitt, and he had run out of things to do. He’d also realized how tired he was, as if the setting sun had turned off his energy switch for the day, so he lay on his bed, his body physically drained. He kept thinking about owls swooping by his window as he nodded off.

The next day, Monday, dawned bright and cloudless. There was a steady breeze blowing through the trees, and while the weather mirrored the day before, Jon felt a difference in the air he couldn’t quite pinpoint. He briefly contemplated busying himself in the forest again, but thought better of it -- it was such a nice day that he wanted to spend some of it in the sun. For the past several weeks, he’d gotten very little sunshine after graduation with no track meets.

After breakfast, he picked a Mark Twain book, Roughing It, from the Manor’s library. Jon took it to the low stonewall at the edge of the property. Jon didn’t read a whole lot, but Mark Twain’s style made him laugh when he read it, and a long read in the sunlight sounded pleasurable. But several hours and several chapters into the story, the warm sun had lulled Jon into a daze with his eyelids sagging and his head drooping. The breeze through the trees was creating a hypnotic white noise, so Jon eventually gave in and laid on his back with the uneven stones of the narrow wall that provided little comfort. But at that point it was irrelevant; Jon was drowsy regardless, and he wasn’t about to go back up to his room. He just hoped his back wouldn’t kill him the next day as he drifted off.

A pain abruptly awaked Jon all over his front side -- he had rolled over off the wall and landed flat on his face into the ground from his wall spot. The same dry, permeating laugh he heard the other night reached his ears again -- this time, it was much closer.

“That was hilarious,” came the raspy voice.

Jon groaned and rolled over. Racine Cavitt was towering over him, a wide smile planted firmly on her face. She was very pretty with almond shaped eyes and dark long hair. He got to his feet, annoyed that she found this all so funny.

“I came outside and saw you there. I was going to ask what book you were reading, but saw you asleep as I got closer. Then you rolled over out of sight. Ha!” She started laughing again at the thought of it.

“Glad you thought my pain was so funny,” Jon said, still half asleep and hurting.

“Well whatever if you’re going to be like that about it.” She turned and left Jon there, with bits of grass all over himself, and with his face still very much hurting.

Eventually Jon got himself up, and was facing the forest. Perhaps it was a trick of the light, or maybe just because it was near sunset, but Jon saw that the space between the trees seemed unnaturally dark. Then, as if the forest was listening to Jon’s thoughts, a strong wind whipped out through the forest and blew at Jon, sending needles flying everywhere. Jon narrowed his eyes and held his gaze for a moment -- the forest seemed to lighten to its normal color. After shaking his head and picking up the Twain novel, Jon retreated back to the house. He wasn’t sure if all this fresh air was driving him nutty or not.

The rest of the evening remained quiet. Jon read in his room until it was time for dinner, which he attended, thoroughly convinced it would just be only Mrs. Jouler and he. Plus he was also depressed that he’d finally made contact with Racine Cavitt only to end up insulting her. As he stepped heavily down the staircase to the dining room, he realized the only prospect for companionship at the manor had most likely just slipped through his fingers.

Stepping through the dining room doorway, Jon nearly gasped. Already seated were Mrs. Jouler, and Racine Cavitt. Jon’s heart did a leap.

“Oh Jona-Jon, nice to have you here,” said Mrs. Jouler a little too jovially. “Please, please, have a seat.”

“Thanks,” said Jon uncertainly, and he took a seat across from Racine.

“Jon, this is...um,”

“Ray,” said Ray.

“Isn’t your name -- ?” began Mrs. Jouler through almost clenched teeth.

“Racine, yeah. But that’s not what I go by. It’s Ray,” she said snidely to Jon, who suppressed a laugh.

“When I was a young lady, I simply would have died if people knew me by ‘Ellie’ or some other foul hybrid of a name,” said Mrs. Jouler in an attempted offhand tone that was far more disparaging than blatant sarcasm.

“Fortunately the Great Depression ended a long time ago,” Ray said without missing a beat.

This time Jon really couldn’t hold his laugh in. Mrs. Jouler tightened her jaw and flushed. She said no more on the subject of nicknames. From then on there was certain camaraderie between Jon and Ray. A couple of times, their eyes locked and Jon smiled. Ray would go back to eating and didn’t seem to make a friendly gesture, but at least began conversation with him, or rather, joined with him in a roundabout way.

“Weather’s nice,” Jon offered.

“Quite,” said Mrs. Jouler tersely.

“Yeah, great for gardening,” said Ray with a not-so-delicate emphasis on the word.

It apparently went over Mrs. Jouler’s head because she visibly brightened at that.

“Oh very much so. Not too warm, not too cold, and some nice clear sunshine. My roses may begin doing well.”

“Roses, right,” said Ray flatly. She looked at Jon and smirked. Again, Mrs. Jouler didn’t notice.

“Should be lovely in a few weeks before fall really starts to kick in....”

And Mrs. Jouler proceeded, for the next twenty minutes, to bore both Jon and Ray with tales of how her garden had won numerous times for Best Showcase Garden of Arcata, and how difficult it was before Ken Love died several years back and he’d won the Best Garden award intermittently for several years, and how Mrs. Jouler always suspected him of cheating by using a professional landscape artist.

Jon politely feigned interest, whereas Ray yawned obviously two or three times.

Finally Jon was finished eating, so he cleared his things and excused himself from the table before going up to his room. He was there only a few minutes when he heard a loud knock at his door.

“Yeah?”

Ray was on the other side, looking smart in a green blouse and clunky heels (she’d changed since dinner). She walked right in and extended her hand to him. “I’m Ray. That wasn’t a really good introduction down there, or outside earlier. And you’re Jonathan?”

“Well yeah. But it’s Jon. Call me Jon,” he shook her hand, which was quite soft with French-tipped nails. “I opened the front door for you the other night.”

“Oh yeah,” said Ray with a big smile. “Now I remember. Hey, thanks for that,” she added.

“No problem.”

“Yeah, I might have been out there all night if you didn’t happen to be there.” After a second’s thought, she said, “Well, no... I might have broken through a window or something.”

Her attire might have indicated otherwise, but from what Jon witnessed of her before, he didn’t doubt it. Ray sat herself on Jon’s desk chair. Her long black hair fell in layers on her face, then down to her shoulders and back. It looked like she had an expensively tended head of hair. Jon wished he’d thought to get a hair cut before moving up to Arcata.

“So why did you come outside earlier today?” said Jon, trying to keep the conversation going.

“What? I’m supposed to stay inside all day and night?”

“No, I just --”

“I’m kidding. Like earlier when I said that you falling off the wall was hilarious. Well...it was actually, but still. It’s bad karma to be happy at someone’s pain.”

“Oh,” said Jon, now even more confused trying to figure out if she really did think his falling over was funny or if she felt bad.

“You need to loosen up,” she said, now smiling at him. “Besides, I kinda like the outdoors. Shut up,” she added after Jon widened his eyes perceptibly. “And it’s my birthday today. I didn’t exactly want to stay inside celebrating with her,” she said, tossing her head in the direction of the door.

“Happy birthday,” said Jon in earnest. Remembering the bit of astrology he knew, Jon said, “August 19th...you’re a Leo, aren’t you?”

“Yeah but I don’t really believe in that kind of stuff.”

“But you believe in karma?”

“Is that a problem?”

“Just don’t spray me with holy water.”

There was a brief pause, and then Ray laughed. It was a laugh that easily filled the entire room. “No promises.”

“So what are you in for? I mean, why are you here so early before the semester starts?” Jon asked, changing the subject.

“My parents arranged it this way. They’re off on their fifth honeymoon in Aruba or somewhere, and they figured it’d be less hassle to slough me off here before they left than have to come home early and ruin their alone time to get me moved out here.”

“Oh,” said Jon, suddenly feeling sorry for Ray. He knew exactly what it was like to have problems with parents at home. But his parent wanted him to stay rather than leave like Ray’s.

“How about you?”

“Well, I thought it’d be a nice opportunity to come up early and get to know the town and school before I started classes.” But it was clear that his rehearsed answer to her question was not going to be good enough, because Ray raised an eyebrow and folded her arms at him.”

“Okay fine,” Jon confessed. “My dad owns a shop at home and would rather have me waste the rest of my life working here to pick up the business than do something I really wanted to. So, I couldn’t take it anymore and asked Mrs. Jouler if I could come over early, and she said yes.”

“Wow, okay. Almost sorry I asked. What does your mom say?”

Jon opened his mouth to respond, but nothing came out; he just shook his head a few times silently.

“Oh my god, I’m sorry, I should have kept my mouth shut. I didn’t know she had passed away.”

“No, no,” said Jon quickly. “She’s alive, she’s just...incapacitated.”

“Right, okay. That’s good. Sort of.”

Jon smiled at her. “Maybe you should quit while you’ve only got one foot in your mouth.”

“If only I was that flexible.”

“So what made you choose Oak Tree?” said Jon, nervous to hear how much further she might take the flexible comment.

“I didn’t. My parents did. Actually, my parents chose the school and everything. They wanted me someplace far enough away so that I couldn’t cause them trouble, but close enough so I could be checked up on.”

“That sucks.”

“Not really; they want me to major in business, but as soon as I transfer to NYU, I’ll be majoring in dance. They won’t know that till graduation.”

“That’s...cool. And sneaky,” said Jon, trying to cover all his bases.

“Naw, I just don’t like being told what to do. What’s your major?”

“Probably forestry, maybe minor in botany.”

“Wow, okay. So you want to be a tree hugger.”

“Something like that, yeah.”

“Found anything fun to do around here?” said Ray.

“Not really, no. There’s a whole lot of weird people here.”

Ray laughed again. “You’re funny. I like that.”

Jon’s heart skipped a beat. In high school, he hadn’t really garnered attention from any of his female classmates, and as it seemed now, he may have one with her full attention on him now, and possibly for the remainder of the interim.

“God, your room is so clean.”

Jon looked around. To him this was normal -- he had a few clothes on the floor, books strewn about in uneven piles, and his bed was only partially made.

“My room’s a mess. Like always.”

Jon decided it would probably be a bad idea to confirm her statement with his experience of glancing into her room briefly the day before. Ray looked wildly around Jon’s room. “Where’s your TV?”

“Didn’t bring it. Where’s yours?”

“When I came, I didn’t think I’d be going back in time to the turn of the twentieth century. I thought there might at least be a TV somewhere here. Somewhere.” Ray looked around longingly as if one might fly in through the window.

“Or we could replace something else to do. I do have a car, and classes don’t start for another couple of weeks. There’s gotta be something around here to do.”

“Yours is the Thunderbird, right? Let’s take my car,” Ray suggested. “Think it’ll be more fun.”

“Your -- car --?” Jon spluttered.

“Yeah, my -- car.”

Jon thought he’d looked thoroughly on Turning Leaf Court, but perhaps he’d overlooked a small vehicle parked in a nondescript place.

“Tomorrow?” Ray said.

“After the whole lot of nothing I’ve got planned, yeah, tomorrow is doable I think.”

“Good!” said Ray, and with that, she left Jon’s room, and by the sound of it, went up to the tower to go online. Jon wasn’t quite sure he’d actually made a friend, but all signs pointed to yes.

The next day, Monday, dawned dark, gray, and drizzling. Jon groaned when he looked out his window. Strictly speaking, he hated rain, but knew it was good for the plants, even if it was bad for daily outings.

But by the time he and Ray had breakfast (eggs this time), got ready to go, and were actually out the door, the sun broke free of the clouds and began shining. But Jon frowned when they went outside. He only saw his car in front of the manor. Had she just been teasing him? But Ray was determinedly walking past Jon’s car. He didn’t understand until Ray pulled out a key ring, pressed a button, and the back lights of the Mercedes he had seen the other day flashed twice. It was her car. He looked at the license plate, and felt rather silly -- he should have known it was her car by the personalized declaration ‘FABULUS’.

“I should have known,” said Jon as Ray was brushing miscellaneous items off the passenger’s side seat. Apparently she kept her car as neat as her bedroom. “Nice plates.”

“Nothing but. I gotta represent.”

Jon sat down in the plush black leather seat after Ray was done shoving her junk on the floor in the backseat. “Awesome,” he said, looking around buckling the seatbelt.

“Top down,” said Ray as the pushed a button and the roof retreated in between the space of the backseat and the trunk. “What if it rains?”

“It won’t,” said Ray.

Jon smiled to himself. He thought it rather presumptuous of Ray to think she could control the weather, but he sat back in his seat regardless.

“Relax. I checked the weather on my phone. No more rain.”

Jon shrugged. “Alright.”

When Ray began driving (huge designer sunglasses and all), Jon was surprised all the stuff in her car simply didn’t fly out. She took turns as if in a go-kart, and took off from stop signs and lights so fast her tires often squealed.

In next to no time, they were on the highway, speeding north. “Uh Ray?” said Jon loudly. The wind made it hard to hear one another at eighty miles per hour.

“Wha?” said Ray, dancing in her seat to the music she was playing -- a rock band Jon had never heard of but something his mother would have called “noise.”

“Where are we going anyway?”

“I think we’ll head up to Trinidad. Pretty there.”

Arcata was the furthest north Jon had ever been, so a day trip even further north seemed the appropriate thing to do at such a junction in his life. “Awesome.”

As Jon and Ray made their way further up the coast, Jon couldn’t help but ponder Ray’s situation. She seemed to have been sloughed off at Oak Tree Manor against her will, and she drove a brand new Mercedes-Benz. Ray must have seen him and put two and two together.

“My parents are both lawyers. Actually met in law school. Sickening, I know.”

“Not really. Kinda nice, actually.”

“Except I fight with them all the time. But I usually get what I want,” she said, smiling.

Jon didn’t press the matter any further.

As the minutes ticked by and Jon’s hair got more and more ruffled from the onslaught of high-speed air, there was one thing Ray was certainly correct about -- the nice weather was holding up, in fact, the skies were clearing up with each passing minute, until finally, when they began to slow down and merge to the off ramp, there were only a few puffy white clouds sidling their way across the brilliant blue sky.

They took an exit on Main Street, and as soon as they began driving west, it was clear that Trinidad was even smaller than Arcata. There were only about a dozen streets running through the whole town, and none of the businesses were any that Jon recognized, save for one Starbucks.

They reached the end of town within minutes, so Ray turned the car around and went back into town. The ocean looked magnificent from where they were a moment ago. Then Ray voiced a realistic question.

“Whose idea was it to come here again?”

“It was just a fluke,” said Jon cautiously.

Ray growled in exasperation.

“It’s not so bad. It is pretty like you said.”

“I just forgot the last time I came here as a kid; there’s not really all that much to do as an adult.

“Hungry?” Jon said, thoroughly feeling so.

“Yeah, let’s do it.”

After a few minutes of wandering, Ray pulled into the parking lot of a wood-slat standalone building called Seaside with a helm wheel sticking out of the cement.

“Hope you like seafood,” said Jon as they entered the restaurant that was adorned with nautical themed trinkets and colors.

“I’ll manage,” said Ray.

Jon was sure she would manage, but he wasn’t so sure about everyone else in the place. Ray came in looking dazzling with a tight skirt on, dangling earrings, and light makeup. She could have been a movie star the way the men in the room gaped after her. The establishment seemed full of locals -- some older men and women, several gruff-looking men Jon figured to be fishermen with rubber coveralls and deep tans. Time seemed to go by slowly as the cheery hostess seated Jon and Ray -- the fishermen all chewed very slowly and looked as if any fast movement might set them off.

Ray seemed nonplussed by the whole thing. “Diet Coke please,” she said without even opening the menu.

“Uh, regular Coke for me,” Jon said quietly.

Their hostess nodded and walked off.

Jon was too uncomfortable to make any lengthy conversation because it seemed like everyone there was quiet and listening. At the very least, the restaurant wasn’t very big, and Jon was certain their every word could be heard. Ray continued to be steadfastly not affected by it all.

“My bra is too damn tight,” she said while visibly trying to adjust it under her sweater. Jon put his face in his hands and turned all sorts of shades of red. “WHAT?” Ray said.

“Nothing,” Jon said, muffled through his hands.

While they were waiting for their order, Ray finally took a low tone and said to Jon, “That old lady to your left has been mad-dogging you ever since we got here.”

Jon wasn’t really surprised considering how ostentatious they looked compared to everyone else at the Seaside restaurant. He just shrugged at Ray as their food arrived.

After they’d finished eating and paid, Jon finally turned around to the spot where the staring older woman had supposedly been sitting. There was no one there.

“What should we go do now?” said Jon at a normal volume once they’d cleared the restaurant doors.

“I dunno. I doubt you’d wanna go shopping in town.”

“First of all, yes, you’re right. Secondly, I think this is in town.”

“YOU!” said a hysterical, quavering voice.

Jon and Ray spun around to see the hunched little old lady standing there, hardly five feet tall with her gray hair pulled back in a bun, finger pointed accusingly at Jon.

“Excuse me?” said Jon as politely as he could muster.

She hobbled closer to them. “It is you. You destroyed my family, burned our village, and assassinated our King and Queen!”

Jon couldn’t help it -- he’d let out a short chortle as he said, “I’m sorry, what? What did I do?”

The old lady got an insane gleam in her eye and said, “I will make you pay for what you’ve done.”

Jon looked at Ray who stood there with her arms folded and an eyebrow raised.

“Come on Ray, let’s just go,” Jon muttered in Ray’s ear.

“No. I want to stay and watch what she’s gonna do,” Ray said loud enough for the old lady to hear and not taking her eyes off the hunched figure.

“I think we should just -- ” but Jon never finished his sentence. He felt like he was falling through nothingness; he was dizzy and disoriented. When he opened his eyes he couldn’t move. His body was chained at his extremities, spread-eagled in complete darkness. Jon couldn’t even tell if his eyes were open at all except for the sensation of rapid blinking he was sure was real. But he soon found out that his eyes were indeed open because he saw a red and orange light ahead emerging from the black. It grew very rapidly until Jon saw that it was fire -- it cast a reddish light on him, and as he looked down, realized that he was naked and the chains holding him up were stretching him apart... but the fire was coming closer. He could feel the heat approaching him and the chains simultaneously ripping him apart. All he could do was yell out -- the flames were all he could see now; they rushed in and engulfed him, searing his skin, burning his eyes. He didn’t even know if he was yelling anymore -- the pain was so great and the fire was so loud he couldn’t tell up from down. His eyelids were burned off and for a moment, saw the orange light burning him, then blackness again.

Then instantly, everything was gone -- the chains, the flames, the pain; it all disappeared. Only darkness remained, and a voice.

“Son? Son?” Someone was shaking him.

Jon opened his eyes again and saw reality once more. The cloudy sky was above him along with a concerned man in a paramedic uniform.

“Jon? Is he okay?” Jon could hear a familiar, raspy voice saying.

“How many fingers, son?” The paramedic held up his hand.

“Four,” said Jon in a daze.

“Can you sit up?”

“Yeah.... yeah I’m fine.” Jon sat up; he did feel fine, though also felt like he just woke up. Ray was talking to another paramedic and looking worriedly at Jon.

“Do you want to be admitted to the hospital?”

“No, I’m okay, thanks.” Jon got up to his feet with the paramedic’s help, but when it was determined that he could stand and walk around on his own, they left him, and the ambulance with the three paramedics and one fire truck all left.

He and Ray finally were headed back home. They hadn’t said much to each other. Ray had only asked if Jon was okay. When he responded in the affirmative, they hadn’t exchanged anything further until Ray was pulling off the freeway into Arcata.

“What happened to me?” Jon said.

“I’m not sure. I think that crazy old woman slipped you something in your food. You kind of just stood there like in a trance for a few minutes. I called 911 when I couldn’t wake you up, then you collapsed right as the ambulance got here and started screaming like nothing I’ve ever heard before. I tried to tell them that she slipped you something, but they just led her away. Then you woke up like nothing happened. I wanted to go after her, but I was more worried about...”

“Yeah, I felt like I was … hallucinating, I guess.” It didn’t feel like a hallucination to Jon, but never having experienced such a thing, he wasn’t sure what it was supposed to feel like.

“I still say it was that old lady. I’m just glad you’re cool.”

“Yeah, I feel fine,” Jon said truthfully. But his mind was going a mile a minute. That episode he had had come on so suddenly and disappeared so suddenly it felt surreal. Even thinking back on it now Jon felt like it was just a vivid dream. What could have caused that?

“Just don’t do it again, okay?”

Jon nodded, staring off into space as they pulled up to Oak Tree Manor. Little did he know that promise would not be kept.