Whispers in the Dark (10 page)

I nodded and pulled out of the parking lot after Jerry’s truck. I would be stuck in the car with Danesh for the whole drive, and I didn’t know if I had that much conversation.

“How far is it?” I asked.

“Forty-five minutes, maybe.”

“It’s so funny. I mean, New England is tiny. You can drive across three or four states in a few hours. But you don’t have to drive across state lines just to get dinner.”

“Here, you could stand in four states at once, if you’re in the right spot. They have it marked so the tourists can do that.”

I’d heard of the Four Corners Monument, which marked where Arizona, Colorado, New Mexico, and Utah met. I didn’t want to admit that I’d thought I might like to play tourist and visit. But I wondered if I could use his mention of tourists to introduce a topic that interested me more.

I hesitated, remembering how he had shut down when I tried to tease him about the New Age crowd thinking he was a shaman, but I wanted to understand. “You get a lot of people like that girl who was just in?”

He grunted.

“I’m not surprised people assume you’re Native American.” I tried to think how to word my question so as not to offend. “Does that affect how people treat you in this job?”

“Sometimes.” He sighed and turned toward the side window, but a few seconds later he looked back with the half smile in place. “It’s very trendy in some areas to be Native American. At least to people who aren’t.”

“But you don’t take advantage of it.”

“It’s cheating and it’s... shallow, I guess. For all the progress we’ve made with civil rights, people still have a lot of stereotypes. With Native Americans, some of the stereotypes could be considered positive. They’re seen as heroic, with some sort of mystical power. But in reality too many of them struggle just to get by. Anyway, I don’t like to get attention for the way I look.”

I could imagine women flocking to him, especially when he smiled. Most men would love the attention, but something in Danesh’s voice told me he was telling the truth.

We drove in silence for several minutes, and then Danesh began to talk. “My first college girlfriend—her name was Jennifer. I was so flattered when she came after me. And she did pursue me, one hundred percent. She was beautiful, smart, fun, with this long red hair and long filmy skirts. It took me a while to realize she thought I was Native American, and she liked that.”

He sighed. “For a while… I didn’t even tell her the truth. When I did, she was disappointed. She was into dream catchers and vision quests, stuff like that. She didn’t want to hear about my Filipino grandmother, let alone the Danish side. I was supposed to resent whites for betraying my people. I played along for awhile, but finally I got sick of being pushed to be someone I’m not.”

“Wow,” I said and thought what an inadequate response that was. No wonder Danesh resented people assuming he was Native American. “But you must realize that working at a site like Lost Valley is just going to make things worse. People come here with Native Americans on their minds. They might not make the same assumptions in a big cosmopolitan city, like San Francisco or New York.”

Danesh gave a shudder of disgust. “It’s not worth it. College in Boulder was enough city for me. I’ll put up with a lot for this.” He gestured at the landscape, which still seemed barren and brown to me. The rock formations were fascinating, but cool and impersonal, not welcoming.

“I was star watching once, alone up on a mesa,” Danesh said. “During the Leonid meteor shower. It was mid-November—dark and cold, but perfectly clear. Amazing. I saw shooting stars by the dozens. Then it started to get foggy, so I headed back about three in the morning, through these patches of swirling mist. I came out of one of them, and standing on the path in front of me was a wolf. A gray wolf—huge! You have no idea how big they are until you see one up close. We just stared at each other for a long time. I think he was as startled as I was.”

He was silent for a moment. “Finally I realized I could be in danger. The wolf seemed to be waiting for me to make the first move, so I shook my backpack and it rattled, the pot and fork and tin can from my dinner, human sounds. The wolf turned around and walked away.”

He grinned at me. “I can’t tell you how nervous I was the rest of the way back to my car! Afraid that it might appear again… but hoping it would, too. It was the most incredible experience of my life.”

“It sounds amazing.” I had to force my eyes away from his smile and back on the road so we wouldn’t crash. “I’m jealous.”

Danesh sighed. “Jennifer insisted that it was my spirit guide. Said I should have asked it questions instead of scaring it away. But it wasn’t anything mystical. It was a real, wild, powerful animal, and to me that was better. Anyway, I decided then that I wanted a job that kept me outside, not sitting at a desk all day long. So maybe the wolf was a guide, in a way.”

“I like that thought.”

We rode in silence for while, and then Danesh started talking about some of the other area attractions—Monument Valley, Mesa Verde, the Canyonlands. He made me want to visit every one of them, and I wondered how long I could extend this trip. I had already started looking into jobs in the region, even before I knew how I felt about it. Now I was starting to believe I could be happy living here. I might not have embraced the landscape the way he did yet, but I was starting to see how it could get under your skin.

Danesh gestured toward the road ahead. “Almost there.”

A glance at the clock confirmed that we had indeed been driving for over half an hour—and it had been easy to keep the conversation flowing. I squinted at the faint bumps on the horizon. The billboards were visible first, then neon signs, and before long we passed fast food joints and motels. Jerry turned once, then again, and I lost sight of his truck, but Danesh directed me, and within five minutes of entering town we reached the ball field.

The field was a hard-packed tan diamond surrounded by a hard-packed tan landscape. It looked like someone just put up a fence and some bleachers in the desert and painted lines on the ground. At least finding a parking space wasn’t hard; cars sat at random angles behind the bleachers.

We got out to join Jerry as a tall, thin woman hurried toward him. She reached him first and gave him a quick hug and kiss. Then she turned to Danesh.

“Danny, honey!” She pecked his cheek lightly. “And who’s your friend?” The way she said it suggested we were dating.

“Kylie, our visiting archaeologist,” Danesh said. “This is Maureen.”

I’d been wrong about makeup here. Not that Maureen was gaudy, but she was definitely wearing eye shadow, mascara, and lipstick, and I’d bet on foundation and blush, too. Her hair, brown with frosted blond highlights, was permed and spritzed into a fluffy helmet of curls. Except for the shorts and T-shirt, she looked ready for a sorority party, not a ballgame.

“Pleased to meet you.” Maureen held out her hand, and I gaped at the long, hot-pink nails with little rainbows and butterflies on them. Maureen chuckled. “Oh, don’t worry, they’re fake. I’ll probably lose one or two during the game, but I can fix them in no time.” She leaned forward conspiratorially. “I do them myself.”

I nodded and shook hands. I wondered if the whole team was like this. For a big city girl, I felt decidedly outshone. Maureen seemed an odd match for shy, stuttering Jerry, but as she chattered while we walked toward the field, I decided maybe they were perfect for each other. Jerry was a good listener, and Maureen obviously liked to talk.

“It’ll be fun to have another girl around,” Maureen said. “Danny hasn’t had a girlfriend in just ages. I try to set him up, but he’s so picky.”

Danesh gave an awkward laugh. Before either of us could speak, Maureen went on. “You’ll have to come to church on Sunday. We’re having a ladies’ luncheon afterward, just the girls, you know. You’ll get to meet everyone.”

“Um, maybe….” Not.

Maureen didn’t seem to notice any lack of enthusiasm. “We play softball Wednesday evening and bridge on Thursday. On Fridays and Saturdays we usually go dancing or to one of the bars, and Sunday there’s church and usually a picnic or something in the afternoon.”

“I’ll have to see….” I said.

Danesh winked at me. “She’s here to work, not get caught up in the whirlwind of local social life.”

“Well, I know that,” Maureen said. “I’m just trying to make her feel welcome.”

I had to smile at such warmth, though I suspected Maureen’s friendship could get overwhelming.

We joined a group of people, both men and women, mostly in their twenties and thirties but some older. Some of the women wore makeup like Maureen, but not all. Everyone greeted me warmly, and I promptly forgot all their names.

When they heard I was working at Lost Valley, talk turned to the excitement of the night before. “I heard that horrible man was released already,” a woman said.

Voices rose in disagreement.

“The police are busy,” the woman said. “They just had a drug bust at the high school.” She leaned forward and said in a stage whisper. “And you would not believe some of the people involved!”

Talk turned toward that, but I wondered if the woman could possibly be right. Surely they wouldn’t let the man go without bail, which he could hardly afford. But maybe they didn’t take domestic violence so seriously out here. My stomach churned at the thought that he might be free already.

Finally the gossip died down. “Kylie is on my team,” Maureen said, slipping her arm through mine. “What position do you play?”

I’d been doing more pitching recently, but that was too public a role. “Um, shortstop is good, but if anyone else—”

“No problem! You’re our guest. And I play second so we’ll be right together.”

Nobody else seemed offended. I cast one helpless glance back as Maureen dragged me onto the field. Jerry was settling himself on the bleachers. Two little boys had cornered Danesh and were showing off a radio-controlled car. He grinned and waved at me. I resisted the temptation to stick out my tongue at him and resigned myself to an “interesting” experience.

Chapter 12

By the end of the first inning, I decided I was probably one of the best players—not that skill made much difference. Players made crude but good-natured jokes about the other team and sometimes their own teammates, cheered whenever anyone hit or caught the ball, and teased without cruelty when someone missed. I was glad I hadn’t mentioned pitching, because our pitcher was the best player. Grace looked about twelve, all long arms and legs and long brown hair, her serious concentration and sizzling fastball a contrast to the outfielders, two overweight guys guzzling beer and a little girl picking dandelions.

When my team was up at bat, I answered curious questions from half a dozen people, turned down a can of light beer and accepted one of cola, and hit a single before the next two batters struck out.

Three innings later, I had no idea what the score was or even if the same players were always playing on the same team. Sometimes people from the bleachers joined in when other players wanted a break; Danesh spent one inning in the outfield deep in conversation with his neighbor, and Jerry was coaxed to take the catcher’s mitt for a while.

Finally, in the middle of the fourth inning, shouts from the bleachers sent everyone rushing toward home plate. I stumbled after them, wondering what was wrong. Then I noticed the pizza delivery truck. People pulled money from their wallets and handed it to Maureen, who counted it all. “We each put in about five dollars,” she told me, “if you have it.”

I patted my pockets and remembered that my wallet was in the car.

“It’s on me.” Danesh winked at me and handed a ten to Maureen.

I grabbed a piece of supreme pizza and looked for a seat. Maureen sat on the bleachers next to Jerry, her arm draped over his shoulders, chatting to someone standing nearby. Danesh was talking to Grace, the pitcher, who ducked her head shyly so her hair half-covered her face, but then laughed at something he said.

Two men converged on me. “So how long are you here for?” one asked. His graying hair and the lines around his eyes suggested middle age, but the way his blue eyes glinted suggested a bachelor on the prowl.

I’d finished classes and only had to deal with my thesis, so my time was flexible, but I kept it vague. “It depends on my research. A few weeks.”

The other man said, “That’s all?” He was slightly plump, with thick black hair and tan skin, no more than twenty. I thought he had a Spanish name, but I couldn’t remember what.

I made a vague sound and took a bite of pizza, glancing around at the crowd. Here was another game. Everyone seemed to be flirting with someone, who half the time was flirting with someone else. Even the couples bantered with people other than their dates or spouses. A plump redhead leaned over and whispered something in Jerry’s ear, causing him to blush and Maureen to playfully shoo her away.

Forget ancient peoples. This was a strange and mysterious culture.

We played a few more innings, maybe six in total, but I wasn’t sure. Nor did I have any idea which team had won, though everyone seemed to be bragging and putting down the other team. Some people said goodbye and headed to their cars. I grabbed a change of clothes and a towel and followed Maureen to the women’s “locker room,” a box with cement floors, one shower with a trickle of cold water, and a large metal mirror. Five of us took our turns in the shower and then crowded around the mirror to brush hair and touch up makeup.