The Last Handful of Clover - Book 3: The Stone in the Stream

3.61 Homecoming

Richard felt a momentary panic at seeing the two mediums, knowing that they could see him while Carla could not. He actually felt like scurrying away, as if he really was that frightened cockroach, afraid of the light. But before he could dart past them, Pil and Howard entered the house, and he froze.

"Hello, Richard," Pil said, simply, his face unreadable. "I'm tempted to ask how you've been."

Howard smiled slightly, but it was a sad smile. And Carla did not look in the least surprised to find out that the house was not empty after all. It was as if they had all three expected him to be here, and would have been more surprised if the house truly had been empty.

"How are you here?" Richard stammered.

"Can we sit?" Pil asked, gesturing toward the living room. "It's been a long drive. And that car brings back bad memories."

Without replying, all three of them walked past Richard into the living room. Howard and Pil sat on the couch, and Carla took the overstuffed chair. They all walked past Richard's passageway without giving it a second glance.

The way out is only for me, Richard thought. Nobody can see them but the dead.

"I don't understand," Richard said, standing in front of the trio. "Why are you here?"

"Are you really that surprised to see us?" Pil asked. And when Richard didn't reply, he continued. "It took some convincing to get Carla to bring us back here. But now that the roads have reopened, and martial law has been lifted, we thought it was safe."

"Escort you back from where?" Richard asked.

"Boise," Howard said. "Idaho."

"What? Boise? How did you end up in Boise?"

"It's a long story, Richard," Pil began. "But first you need to know that Keith is alive."

His knees failed him, and Richard fell to the carpet in front of the two men. A feeling of both pain and joy swept through him, and he began to shake. "Keith? He's alive? How? I saw him shot!"

"He was shot, but it didn't kill him. It almost did, but he survived."

"How is that possible?" Richard stammered.

Howard took up the story. "Richard, when you disappeared, Carla and I got to Keith right away. We all thought he was dead. We thought he had to be."

"I did too," Pil said, his voice heavy with guilt. "I was sure we had watched him die. But I guess he had just lost consciousness."

"His heartbeat was weak, and he'd already lost a lot of blood," Carla said, through her wired jaw. She was trying to focus on where she thought Richard must be, and even though she couldn't hear anything Richard said, she knew it was her job to tell this part of the story. "Pil had collapsed, because he thought Keith was gone. He also had a bullet wound in the shoulder, and I think that was finally registering on him. But when Howard and I got to Keith, I found a pulse. Howard stayed with him. He took his shirt off and used it to hold back the bleeding, which was horrific. While he did that, I rushed to the squad car for the first aid kit. When I got back, Keith's pulse was barely detectable, but it was still there. And Howard had stopped the worst of the bleeding. I packed the wound with gauze, and together, Pil carried him out of there."

Richard was trembling and staring at Carla. Waves of emotion were cascading through him as he heard each detail. The vision of Keith being carried through the desert in Pil's arms like a baby—bandages on not only his burned arms, but his belly as well—was a picture he couldn't push from his mind.

"We got him in the squad car, and we rushed him into Dugway," Pil continued. "Because the guard post was destroyed, there was nobody there to stop us. It was only two miles to town, and we were there in something like four or five minutes."