Tuesday, August 9, 2011, 1:00 a.m. Chatsworth Reservoir
Brittle grass crunches beneath our feet as George and I walk southward across the reservoir. Our passage dislodges spindly California sage needles. Crickets chirrup and an owl hoots, but the coyote chorus is silent. Fifty feet in front of us, the prairie grass ripples westward from passing animals. Pointy German Shepherd ears bob above the brush.
Motioning to George, we follow the dog pack as they race toward the darkened outline of Peppergate Ranch at the northwest end of the reservoir. Bringing up the rear is a shuffling Great Dane who groans with every step. A pfft sound erupts from his ass to crop dust us. In front of the Dane is a little Yorkie with her topknot secured by a pink bow. Above her, two Golden Retrievers hover, their legs pumping as they keep a protective pace with their tiny ward. We pass dogs of various shapes and sizes, living and dead, to catch up to the German Shepherds running side-by-side. They're in position behind Julano, floating six inches above the dried grassland.
The back of my neck's tingling. "Duke! Duchess!"
Duke ignores me, but Duchess gives me a quick side eye.
George grabs my arm and I skid to a stop. "Have you lost your damn mind? We should be at the Garcia Ranch, not running around the reservoir chasing dogs."
I shake him off. "You were too young to remember Duke and Duchess. They've been dead for ten years. Why show up now?" I sprint after the pack.
With a groan, George follows. We track the pack for fifteen minutes as they close the distance to Lizard Hill. Julano skids to a stop and the pack splits to form a semi-circle around the base of the hill. Atop the grassy hilltop, Peppergate Ranch is dark and silent.
The heavy clouds part. Moonlight reflects from the windows and onto a grey blob inside the fence. George retrieves our night vision goggles and I see Amber's fluffy yellow dog. He throws back his head and howls.
Julano raises his snout to howl, and the pack erupts in a mournful wailing.
As I remove the binoculars, a woman's voice shushes the dogs. "Keep it down or you'll wake Rose and Christopher."
George nudges me. "It's Amber and her mother, Aislinn."
The fence rattles as they climb and drop to the reservoir side. Amber's dog throws himself at the fence to scale it, but falls short and collapses. He lets out a whine that stops Amber. Speaking softly, she turns back to the fence to comfort him.
Her mother ignores the dog and breaks into a run. Halfway down the hill, her foot catches in a gopher hole. With a yelp, she tumbles to the ground.
George stashes our binoculars in the backpack as we climb to help her. I move to Aislinn's right and George to her left. We lift her to a standing position. Amber carefully side steps down the hill.
Aislinn shakes us off and tries to walk, but collapses. I catch her before she rolls down the hill. As I pull her to stand, her eyes meet mine. She blinks back tears. "I need my son."
"Lady, that thing you saw in the reservoir isn't human."
She shoves my chest and stumbles backward into George. "I'm no lady. What the hell are you two doing out here in the middle of the night?"
George grasps Aislinn's shoulders to keep her from falling. "We could ask the same of you and Amber."
Turning to Amber, I find her rigid and staring at the mysterious hill in the center of the reservoir.
I reach into George's backpack to grab my night-vision binoculars and train them towards the vast grasslands. A sudden burst of blinding light causes me to drop them. Pain shoots through my eyeballs and into the back of my head. "What the everlasting fuck!"
As I wait for my eyesight to return, Amber's voice reaches my ears. "Flames just shot out from the portal."
The white haze covering my field of vision gradually recedes. Prairie grass rustles with the movement of the dog pack as they race into the darkness of the reservoir. No sign of fire. "What portal?"
Amber's at her mother's side and helping her walk down the hill. They are thin, pale copies of one another. She speaks in a whisper. "To the land of the dead."
Fuck me. She must know Fernando's a ghost. "What did he say to you? My relative?"
Aislinn snorts. "Cut the crap. Your ancestor lured my daughter! She's lucky to have made it out alive."
I nod to George and we join Amber and her mother. George takes a position to Amber's left and I to Aislinn's right. I hold up my hands in mock surrender. "Truce, okay? Yes, he's our ancestor, Fernando Salvia. But I don't know why he's back. We're trying to find him."
Our movement past waist-high buckwheat unleashes the savory scent of summer. Aislinn sighs and brushes back strands of long red hair to glare at me. "Bullshit. Get the fuck out of here."
Amber glances at her mother. "Are you sure Auntie won't wake up?"
"Ambien is a miracle drug. She won't wake until morning."
The reservoir is strangely quiet as we walk toward the so-called portal. No cricket chorus, coyote yowls, or owls hooting.
Amber nods and walks with her head bowed and shoulders slumped, like she's being crushed by the weight of her family's brand of dysfunction.
These two are nothing alike. Drugging her nosy sister is genius, but my gut tells me to be wary of Aislinn. How did someone so devious have a naïve, awkward kid like Amber?
George breaks the silence by clearing his throat. "Maybe we have more in common than you think."
I shoot him the side eye, but he shakes his head and continues. "I'm not sure you'll believe me, but what the hell. As far back as anyone in my family knows, since even before the 1700s, we've only had boys. No girls. Maybe that's not so strange, but..." he pauses for dramatic effect, "everyone dies unexpectedly in what my grandfather called a calamity."
Amber turns toward George, her face ghostly grey in the moonlight. "What's a calamity?"
George meets her eyes, then looks away. "Something tragic and unforeseen, like our father. He was going through an intersection when a tractor-trailer blew the red light and plowed into him. He was dead before the car stopped moving."
Aislinn's frowning as she intertwines her fingers and twists them back and forth. "Your mother must've been devastated."
Her words summon the image of Mama in her wedding dress, lying broken at the bottom of the Twelve Apostles. To banish the ghastly memory, I force myself to focus on the faraway hill.
George clears his throat and sidesteps Aislinn's observation. "Let's see, there's also my great-uncle Shandor. He thought he'd beat the curse by holing up in a bunker in the hills. So get this! He gets bitten by a mosquito and dies of an infection."
The furrows across Aislinn's forehead deepen. "Maybe it's just a coincidence? Bad luck?"
A bitter laugh escapes from George's throat. "There've been so many relatives that've died of lightning strikes over the years. Then there was Walter. He was a fighter pilot, decorated Korean War hero, came back with a fist full of medals! He's vacationing in Hawaii and gets hit on the head by a coconut and dies instantly. And Carlos, he did two tours in Vietnam and got the Purple Heart! I guess he ate some bad chicken in Barstow and never made it back to Simi. That Impala was a friggin' mess from what my dad said, white interior covered in shit..."
Amber pulls her long hair back into a ponytail. "Wait a sec, if your relatives all die in weird ways, why did Ken pull that crazy Senior Stunt?" She eyes George. "Seth says you're planning something even wilder this year!"
George's mouth spreads into a wide smile. "I don't think the curse was very well-thought out. We figured out a way to cheat it. It's almost like a super-power. As long as we stare death down, we survive. Our motto is Keep the Reaper in front of you."
Aislinn sputters, "So if I put a gun to your head and pull the trigger, you won't die?"
I chuckle and nod. "We play Russian Roulette all the time. There's always a misfire or some other crazy shit. You get a couple of Salvias together and it's on! Knife throwing, grenade juggling, whatever you can think of, we've done it. You should see our family reunions."
The misshapen hill at the reservoir's center looms large as we make our way across the vast savannah.
Amber's eyes widen. "How'd you figure it out? I mean, how to beat the curse?"
George turns his face toward the teen. "Who knows? Probably during some war, our family's filled with decorated vets going back to the Civil War. They volunteered for the worst missions and never got killed, although I had a second cousin who fell off a bunk bed and broke his neck."
"Who cursed your family? Who'd be so mean?"
Aislinn's eyes flick to me and her lips spread into a wicked grin. "Indeed. What did your family do to inspire such hatred?"
I want to fire back with a sarcastic comment, but my skin erupts in painful tingling and ringing fills my ears. I look at the others as we stop walking. Their faces are screwed up in various expressions of discomfort. "You guys feel it too."
Nodding, Aislinn resumes the trek up the hill. We fall in alongside. My calf muscles strain against the steep ascent.
Growling sounds as we crest the top of the hill. Duke and Duchess stand sentinel in front of boulders arrayed in a perfect circle. Their lips curl upward to show sharp teeth.
AUTHOR NOTES:
Banner photo of Julano at the Grotto taken by the Author