Tonya shivered, laid out on leaves edged with frost. Her head spun when she tried to raise it, and she felt sick to her stomach. It was difficult to order the thoughts ricocheting inside her tender skull. What time was it? How long had she lain unconscious?
Her ears were ringing, distorting sounds of police shouting and dogs barking. Through the trees an officer wielded a powerful flashlight. Every few paces his big German Sheppard sniffed at the fallen leaves, then led his master in a circle, looking for a bomb that wasn't there.
Last night in a panic, making a bomb threat to evacuate the woods had seemed like genius. She hadn't anticipated endangering the lives of these officers, who might be breathing infected air as they searched under every leaf. Unless she confessed, they would keep looking.
Admitting she made a false bomb threat would get her charged, but it couldn't be helped. That is, unless she could think of a good excuse for her actions? Tonya shook her head at her own folly, making herself dizzier. There was only one way out of this mess. She had to invent a rational, believable explanation for 'crying bomb,' one that didn't involve magical fires or mysterious eating epidemics. Just the thought of her predicament made her head throb double time.
She touched her forehead and found a teacup-sized bump. That's it! When the police come for me, I'm faking amnesia.
The sky disappeared, blocked out by a monstrous head. Black eyes stared into hers, and growling sent her neck hairs standing. Time to flee, but light glinting on its enormous teeth convinced her not to move. The beast was so close she inhaled its rotten breath.
"I found somebody!" an officer yelled. He recalled his dog, but not before it dribbled slobber onto her face. Tonya groaned. She hated dog slobber.
"Are you okay?" A second officer stepped up to look at her.
She nodded, then winced at the pain it sent through her head.
As the first officer rejoined the search with his dog, Tonya wasn't sure what to do. Should she protect this cop or elude him, in case Donna's family had infiltrated the police as well as the hospital?
"What happened?" he asked.
"I hit my head on a tree." She cupped the goose egg on her forehead.
"You were riding your bike, off the path, in the dark?" He stood with his hands on his hips.
"I was being chased by angry students."
He quirked his head and raised an eyebrow.
"They were upset because I called about a bomb, and they had to leave."
He stroked his chin and got down on his haunches. He pointed a flashlight into her face. "What bomb?"
"I saw suspicious wires high up in the trees and I thought, terrorists for sure right?" Better sound as ditzy as possible, if she were going to sell this tale. "But everybody got mad and came after me."
"We haven't found any bomb."
"Thank goodness! That's why I'm still alive. When I was riding like crazy to get away, I was sure everything was about to blow."
"Where did you see these wires?"
"It was dark." She looked around, pretending to look for landmarks. "I don't know, but somewhere on the path."
He took her hand and they stood up in unison. Tonya groaned. Her leg muscles were in agony from running and pedalling, and they were stiff from laying on the frosty ground. She took a step but her leg refused to stretch properly and she stumbled.
"Easy there, lean on me." The police constable took her right arm and pulled it around his big shoulder, at the same time wrapping his other arm around her waist. "Do you think you can walk? My car's back at the road."
"I'll be okay," She wobbled as the world spun and leaned into him more than she intended. Beside her, he felt warm and solid. At another time this might have been a dream, a uniformed hero, rescuing her and giving her a hug at the same time; but right now, going with the cute constable could put her into enemy hands.
They walked until she could see the trees thinning and a car passing on the road beyond the woods. She wriggled away from him. "I'm okay now," she lied, "just stiff from falling asleep on the ground. If you don't mind, I'd like to go back and get my bike."
"Let me give you a ride. You're covered in scratches and that bump on your head needs treatment."
"But my bike..."
"I'm sorry, but you have to come with me." He steered her through the trees, toward the roadside. "The bike is a write-off."
"Oh well," said Tonya. "I don't love cycling." It was the first true thing she'd said to the constable, and she was glad he wasn't looking at her face, in case he could tell. Under interrogation, she feared she would crack and confess everything. The truth would earn her psychiatric attention.
They arrived at his car. In a moment, he would lock her in the back, behind a heavy grill. It might as well be a jail cell. She had to get away.
As if he could sense her agitation he said: "You can sit in the front." He took her hand and helped her in like a gentleman. Was that to put her off guard? The minute she was seated and it was too late to fight, her eyes closed...
Tonya tilted the seat bolt upright and forced her eyelids open. It seemed right to trust this handsome, uniformed man. So tempting to let him look after her. She felt her mind drift away from fears of enemy families, and magic, and deadly disease. It would be so sweet just to relax. As the car pulled out, she was hardly conscious of it moving, until the constable said:
"So, describe this equipment again?"
He spoke as though she were a suspect. With effort, she ordered her thoughts. "Up in the trees. There were wires and boxes and blinking red lights."
"Uh huh. And why were you in the forest, riding your bike?"
"It was Halloween. I'm too old for trick-or-treating."
"That explains the yellow suit. Well, partially anyway." He shot her a crooked smile then turned back to look at the road. "I'm going to take you in and get your formal statement, but not until a doctor declares you fit. You really cracked your head."
"The bike took some of it. No doctor necessary."
He smiled. "Right, but I'm still taking you to the hospital to get checked for concussion, and then to the detachment." His tone made clear that this was not just a request.
What should she do? Tonya didn't want to make a false statement, and she was afraid to face Donna at the hospital. Once she found out how much Tonya knew, Donna might order her a lobotomy!
"I hate hospitals. Besides, I feel fine." She moved her head around in a circle, pretending it didn't make her woozy.
"Your head must hurt."
"A little." She put her hand up to touch the bump on her forehead. "See, it only hurts when I touch it," she lied.
"Sorry Little Lady." He pulled alongside an ambulance by the roadside and rolled down his window to talk to the driver.
"This girl hit a tree on her bike. Real feisty. Says her head doesn't hurt but..." He shrugged and got out of the car to talk to the driver.
Tonya tried to exit, but he engaged the power locks. She was trapped. Even if she could leave the car, how could she lose a police car and an ambulance on foot? Just moving her head fast made her stomach heave.
When he had finished talking, the cop returned, offering her a hand out of the car. "They're just going to make sure you're okay."
"And if I don't want to go?"
"Don't make me arrest you." His smile was tight.
To prove she was okay, she insisted on getting up into the back of the ambulance without help and sat, pretending she wasn't desperate to lie down on the gurney.
"I have to strap you in," said the attendant.
That sounded too tempting. "I'm not sick,"
"Sorry, but you have to lie down. The less your head moves the better." The ambulance still wasn't moving. "Now."
"Please? I hate being strapped down and I hate hospitals. Can't you drop me at the medical centre on campus?"
"Sorry. The police need proof you are fit for questioning, and I need you strapped in. You look kind of green."
Tonya didn't see a way to refuse that wouldn't put this nice young ambulance attendant into 'save the uncooperative victim' mode. She was familiar with it from lifeguarding, and feared what a professional would do to ensure compliance.
"All right, but don't strap me in tight. It makes me claustrophobic." That part, at least, was true.
The minute she lay down, Tonya's eyes closed. She was on the verge of passing out. As the ambulance pulled onto the road, her head was turning slowly, but sped up when the vehicle did a U-turn. She allowed herself sixty seconds with her eyes closed, but no more. Forcing them open, she craned her neck to look the attendant in the eye.
"So, do you live around here?" she asked. The attendant was young and healthy-looking, but not nearly as handsome as the police constable.
"I'm from North of Loon Lake. It's not in a town. Do you know Rural Route..."
She pretended to listen as he described the tiny intersection closest to his father's farm, but she was more worried about the dwindling distance between the ambulance and the hospital. Strapped to a gurney and moving fast, there was no way to escape. Without appearing to move, she loosened the straps, all the while encouraging the attendant to tell her about the horse he was going to buy someday.
"What are you going to call him?"
"I don't want a foal. He'll come with a name."
The questions were a ploy to prove she wasn't concussed, despite the ringing in her ears, and the way the world swooped in a circle whenever the ambulance hit a bump. So far they didn't know her name, and she had to keep it that way. The farms petered out, replaced by small businesses and houses. Town was close now.
The attendant seemed nice, and she really did hope he would get his horse one day, but when the ambulance slowed for a red light, she slipped off the far side of the gurney, and threw it at him.
She leaped out of the ambulance and ran. Although she had thrown it as hard as she could, Tonya was sure he was uninjured. She, on the other hand, was so concussed she could hardly see where she was running. The horizon kept circling around as her head spun. In her effort to put distance between herself and the ambulance, she tripped over her feet. Slow down. If she fell again she would probably pass out. Her only hope was to duck into a backyard before the driver got turned around.
It was a good thing she waited until they were in town. A mile further out the houses were still acres apart. Here, they were grouped along a handful of loosely interwoven streets. She sprinted across a wide lawn and found a chain link fence. Stuffing her toes in the holes, she climbed over easily. Dashing across the lawn, she emerged between two houses and crossed a small street. She crossed another set of lawns and another street before she saw a shed where she could hide and catch her breath.
It was dark inside and smelled of mould. The arterial 'stab, stab, stab,' of pain in her temples dulled to a steady throb as she caught her breath. The shed was safe but also a dead end. This was the residential side of the lake, nowhere near campus, or friends who might give her a lift. The ambulance would spot her the minute she went near the highway, or tried to walk home.
Home. That's where she should go!
These winding streets were only a fifteen minute walk from her old house. Even though her parents had sold it, and the locks were changed, Tonya could still get in through the kitchen window. There might be new owners to catch her, but it was early morning. They could still be asleep. It didn't matter. Tonya had to know why her parents had sold up and left without a word of warning or a forwarding address. They must have left under duress to leave her boxes on the lawn and go without saying goodbye. It made her wonder if they had fallen victim to Loon Lake's secret conflicts, and whether they needed her help. Maybe the house held some clue as to where they disappeared to.
As the Sun rose on November 1rst, Tonya began walking 'home' in the half light. She had made it through Halloween, but it was unclear whether she or her friends were all infected with the eating disease. The only thing she knew for sure, was that organized forces were behind it. But why? Why kill people with a supernatural disease? If the goal was death, there were easier ways. They could poison the water. They could use guns or bombs. Why this disease, and who were the real targets?
********
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