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“It was the sound of your belt that did it,” I say on a hiccup. “Things like that send me to a dark place.” I sniff and turn my face so he can kiss the tears away on my other cheek. “How am I ever going to be what any of you need when I can’t even handle the sound of a man getting undressed?” Fresh tears flow, and Rev kisses those too. He catches them in his beard, with his hands. Gentle hands. Gentle touches from a man with crazy eyes.
He leans over me, and those eyes look deep into mine. Somehow, he holds my gaze while his goes distant.“Don’t you know, Cora, baby? You’re already what we need. You’re the heart of Eagle Peak. You’re healing us. Each one of us. And it’ll take each one of us to heal you.” Hespeaks the words distinctly, as if each one holds ten times its usual weight. As if he’s making a prediction. A prophecy.
“Did your Gift that show you that? How does it work?” I’m too curious to be embarrassed about my meltdown. I’m learning Rev doesn’t mind questions, not like Jud. He listens and patiently answers. Not to mention, his voice soothes me. I could listen to Rev talk all night.
“Mmm.”He hums thoughtfully. “My Gift. Well, now, that’s an interesting topic. You want the short answer or the long answer?”
I want to forget the darkness, and a long answer will help with that. Snuggling into his chest, I say, “Will you tell me a bedtime story…Daddy?”
Chapter 15
Rev
And just like that,Cora pierced my heart and injected herself inside. I will never be the same.
“Rest your eyes, darlin’. Daddy’ll tell you a story. Might be a little scary at times, but don’t worry. It has a happy ending.”
I lie on my back, and the too-thin bundle in my arms rests her head where she can hear my heartbeat. Maybe it’ll lull her to sleep. My little one has had a big day. She needs her rest. And her daddy to keep her safe and warm.
But story first.
I make sure she’s wrapped up cozy in her street clothes—never did get her into those pretty, pink PJs—and then I begin.
“To understand my Gift, you have to know what I used to be like. I was a bad man, sweet Cora. The kind of man your father would have called the police on if he saw me talkin’ to you. I done a lot of bad things in my life, and I enjoyed doin’ ’em. Would’ve done a lot more if I never got caught.”
Cora’s still as a deer in the crosshairs. She watches me like a child, mesmerized, a little afraid, but eager to hear more. I rub slow circles on her back as much to comfort myself as her.
“When the Virus hit Big Mac—that’s the state pen in Oklahoma, mind—I fell ill just like the rest. I was layin’ there in my sick, face on the floor, because the concrete was the only thing in my cell cooler than my fevered skin. I was dyin’. I knew it. Was okay with it. I wasn’t no good to nobody, and everyone around me was dyin’. I figured I’d be next.”
Cora lays her hand on my chest, next to her cheek. She pets me with tentative strokes. Giving me back some of the comfort I give her because she can’t help how sweet she is.
After clearing the emotion out of my throat, I go on. “Then it happened. Or I thought it did. Wasn’t sure what a criminal like me ought to expect from death, but I figured what waited for me in the afterlife wouldn’t be pleasant. I was right. The dyin’ process hurt. And it was terrifyin’.
“This black…gunk—” Just remembering makes my stomach jump like I’m being stabbed. “Started comin’ out of me. It came from every orifice. Mouth, nose, eyes. It blocked my hearing, and it dirtied my laundry. It was cold as ice, but it moved like lava with chunks in it. It was like having fresh mozzarella pulled from me. You can’t imagine the pain.”
“I know pain,” is Cora’s quiet reply. She’s made a fist in the cotton of my shirt, but she keeps up the stroking with her thumb. She has no idea how that soft touch strengthens me. It helps me move past the murderous rage that seizes me as three little words remind me what she’s been through.
“That’s right. You do know pain, don’t you, little one?”
She turns her face into my shirt, and I keep going.
“This gunk, it pooled on the floor. The small pools joined together and became a big pool, and the big pool, well, I knew I had to be dead, because no living person could ever see what I saw. That pool became a snake. A fat, huge thing, like a python but—I swear. To. God. That thing had a human face with red, slitted goat eyes.”
Every fine hair on my body stands on end at the memory. I stare at the dresser, where the kerosene lamp steadily consumes its fuel. A small, hot flame glows behind antique glass. I feel Cora peek up at me. I pet her head and soldier on.
“And that snake, it hissed at me. I think it was talking, but I couldn’t understand the words. I just knew it was seriously P.O.’d. Thought it would strike me with its fangs, but it didn’t. It slunk away, squeezin’ itself through the bars. I couldn’t see it once it slithered past my cell, but I could hear it scrapin’ its belly along the floor all the way down the block. And then, you know what happened next?”
I look at Cora then and find her eyes wide. “What?”
“I heard the security door at the end of the cellblock unlock and slide open, even though there were no guards left to operate it. And instead of more slithering, I heard footsteps.”
Her mouth makes a smallO.
“That black thing that was inside of me, it was able to unlock the door andwalkout of Big Mac.” I let that hang in the air.
“What was it?”
“Well, now, that’s the question, isn’t it?” I scratch my goatee. “That, little one, is the beginning of my Gift. See, I wasn’t dead, like I thought. But I wasn’t alive anymore, either, not as the man I was before. I was something new, just like all of us who survived the Virus.
