Chapter 8 #2
“It was fun!” Jennifer sang as she glanced back at the tree.
“It felt like that tree was me,” she confided to the group.
“Can’t tell you how many times I’ve been knocked down by all the crazy curveballs in my life.
But…” she said with a mischievous grin. “I decided a long time ago that every knockdown is an opportunity to rebuild. With each left hook life threw at me, I countered with a hug for myself, and I came out stronger, wiser and better lookin’ than ever thanks to Botox, a good plastic surgeon, and a healthy bank account!
So, that’s what I did for the tree. I gave it a magical hug. ”
“Slap my butt and call me a biscuit!” Gram said, in awe of Jennifer. “Those right there are some words to live by… dead or alive!”
“I’ll bite, Biscuit,” Shitty Ritchie said, slapping Gram on the bum.
“Oh, hell no,” Alana Catherine said, picking Shitty Ritchie by the waistband of his pants and turning him around to face her. “You do not slap anyone on the butt without permission. Ever. Especially not my great-grandmother. You got it?”
“Ever?” Shitty Ritchie questioned.
“Ever,” she ground out. “You’re going to learn some lessons on manners and how to be socially acceptable.
And if you don’t, I’ll put your rude little ass in timeout.
You’ll be standing in the corner with your nose touching the wall for decades unless you start displaying some polite behavior. You feel me?”
I grinned. My daughter was a chip off the old block.
Shitty Ritchie, of course, was baffled. “Literally or figuratively?”
“What?” Alana Catherine snapped.
“Did you just ask me to feel you up?” he inquired warily. “Because I would be delighted to.”
My daughter didn’t know whether to laugh or scream. So, she tossed the idiot in the air and drop-kicked him. Jennifer caught him just before he hit the ground.
“Dude,” Jennifer said, laughing. “Gonna have to teach you about slang and colloquialism. This here boy is too literal.”
“Crap,” Alana Catherine said as she walked over to Jennifer. “You’re correct. I’m sorry, Shitty Ritchie. From now on, I’ll be more careful when I speak.”
Shitty Ritchie had absolutely no clue what the hell was happening, but just went with it.
“Y’all should hug it out,” Gram suggested.
And they did—Shitty Ritchie, Jennifer and Alana Catherine. Gram floated over them and patted their heads lovingly. Her hand didn’t go through them. At all. Alana Catherine reached up and took Gram’s hand in hers. Jennifer and Shitty Ritchie joined the hand-clasp embrace. Gram was in seventh heaven.
I gasped.
“One questioned answered,” I said aloud. “The Trinity can touch the dead. They don’t go through them. I’d guess that all three are Death Counselors.”
Alana Catherine looked at me strangely. “Should I test the theory?”
It was my turn to look at her strangely. “Want to be more specific?”
“Sure,” she said, reaching for Gram. “Come to me, Gram. Hug me. Let’s visit for real.”
“No,” I yelled at the same time Gideon did. There were a million ways it could go totally wrong. She could be out for days, or weeks, or months… or worse.
Both our daughter and Gram ignored us.
“Trust me. I’ll be back in five minutes,” she promised.
As the two most important women in my life embraced, Alana Catherine’s knees gave out, and she crumpled to the grass.
Before she could hit, her five-person Demon protection crew caught her and gently laid her on the ground.
My heart was beating so loud, I was sure it could be heard in the next state over.
“Shit, shit, shit,” I ground out, circling the women.
I was trying not to lose it and not doing a very good job.
When a Death Counselor did a mind dive, their bodies stayed on the Earthly plane.
When I did a mind dive, what felt like only an hour in the Darkness ended up being a few days on Earth.
Time ran differently on the different planes.
My daughter had never done a mind dive. There was no way she would just be gone for five minutes. It wasn’t possible.
I was beginning to doubt our motto. It was becoming clear that not everything was possible no matter how hard one believed.
“Relax your crack,” Candy advised. “Ain’t a dang thing you can do about it now.”
What I wanted to do was scream. What I did was count the minutes. Literally. Out loud. It was the longest five minutes of my life.
At five minutes on the dot, Alana Catherine woke up with Gram. They were laughing and still talking a mile a minute. The conversation was so all over the place I couldn’t make heads or tails of it.
“Alana Catherine,” Gideon’s voice boomed and echoed through the field.
The Grim Reaper was about to lose it. Everyone got quiet.
Fast. “You almost gave me a heart attack.” He threw up his arms. “Which is impossible. However, in the five minutes you were gone, I died approximately ten thousand deaths. I’d hazard a guess that your mother died at least twenty thousand. What do you have to say for yourself?”
Alana Catherine stood up and walked over to her dad, who was wound up tight.
She hugged him, and his body instantly relaxed.
She turned to me. “I’m sorry I scared you both.
That wasn’t my intention. I wanted some real face-to-face time with Gram.
I should have explained more to you before I did it. ”
“How?” I asked, still in shock. “How were you only gone five minutes? Time runs differently on the different planes? I don’t understand.”
My daughter took my hands in hers and smiled. “Correct. Time doesn’t run concurrently on the different planes. What was five minutes for you was about three hours for Gram and me.”
I shook my head in bewilderment. “How?”
“I chose it. I spoke the words aloud—the parameters,” she explained. “From the plane you leave, you can set how long you’ll be gone. It’s finite. The time in the Darkness is not. You can hang out for days, but on the Earthly plane, I would only have missed five minutes.”
I was still digesting this news. “Help me understand how you knew this, please.” I’d been the Death Counselor and the Angel of Mercy for almost a year, and I’d had no idea it was possible just to decide how long I’d be stuck in a mind dive.
That would have come in a real handy more than a few times.
Alana Catherine shook her head. “That I can’t help you with because I don’t know how I know… I just know that I do know.”
“Awesome,” I said a little sharper than I’d wanted to sound.
My gut instinct was to keep picking it apart, but my brain was aware that it was futile.
Magic wasn’t logical or linear. Trying to make sense of the mystical would take millions of years, and there would still be no answer. So, I went with it.
“Are you implying that the next time I mind dive, I can determine how long I’m out?” I pressed.
She grinned and winked. Again, I was reminded how much she looked like Gideon. “Yes.”
“Got it,” I said. My heart still raced in my chest. “How about this? Next time you do something that might send me over the edge, you explain it a little better before you dive in, so to speak.”
“Can do. Will do,” she promised.
“I have a thought,” Gideon said, recuperating quicker than me. “I’d like to do a couple of experiments,” he went on. “Shitty Ritchie, do you see that boulder to the left of the tree?”
“Shitty Ritchie has excellent eyesight along with a healthy sexual appetite,” he announced. “Of course, I can see the boulder.”
I wasn’t sure what sexual appetite had to do with an enormous boulder, but I wasn’t about to ask.
Gideon ignored the icky part as well and kept talking. “What would you like to do to the boulder?”
We all collectively held our breath and prayed that it wasn’t something super gross.
“Shitty Ritchie would love to blow the boulder to bits. Once it’s been reduced to rubble, I would make tiny army forts, then blow them up as well.
Once the pebbles have been reduced to dust, I would bathe in it to get ready to pursue many busty women, paying close attention to coating my dong.
Eau du Rock is a very manly scent. It would attract many ladies. ”
“What the actual fuck?” Candy Vargo mumbled.
“What did I tell you earlier?” Heather commented. “Ignore him.”
“That was more than expected,” Gideon said with a wince. “Jennifer, don’t think too hard, just answer the question. What would you like to do to the boulder?”
“Would this be before or after Shitty Ritchie reduced it to rubble and dusted his wank with it?” she inquired in all seriousness.
Gideon glanced up at the cloudless sky for a long beat. “Before. Long before.”
“Awesome,” Jennifer said. “I’d grab a nice bottle of Chablis, go to the right side of the boulder where it’s sunniest, and toast the beauty of nature. I’d also name the rock so it doesn’t feel left out. That there boulder looks like a Jerry to me.”
“Agreed!” Shitty Ritchie chimed in.
“I see,” Gideon said with a slightly perplexed nod.
It was unclear what he hoped the experiment would result in, but it didn’t seem to be going all that well.
“Alana Catherine,” Gideon said. “What would you do with the boulder?”
She stared at it for a hot sec then nodded. “I’d use it to build something—something beautiful. Something that would last and make a difference to someone, or a bunch of someones.”
Charlie patted Gideon on the back. “Congrats, old man. I see what you did there.”
Heather and Tim nodded in agreement. The Demons all nodded. Gram and Mr. Jackson seemed like they were in on it, too. Hell, even June seemed clued in.
Only Candy Vargo and I were left out.
“I hate to be late to the party, but I don’t get it,” I said.
“Thank Jesus Heesus Christ that I’m not the only fuckin’ one,” Candy yelled. “I’m still stuck on the part about the little fucker washing his pecker with dust. That’s one nasty-ass visual.”
“Thank you!” Shitty Ritchie said.
“Wasn’t a compliment, jackass,” she shot back.
“Whoops! My bad,” he replied with a giggle.
“Moving on,” I said. I was done discussing Shitty Ritchie’s dusty privates. “Explain, please.”
Gideon let his gaze run over the Trinity before it landed on me. “I don’t believe that training Jennifer to fight is going to be necessary. The present Higher Power is a single being and has to possess all the qualities that make It the supreme leader.”
“I’d hardly call that fucker a supreme leader,” Candy grunted.
“I concur,” Gideon said. “However, at one point and for a very long time, the Higher Power did possess all the makings and gifts of the supreme being.”
I was starting to get it. “Keep going,” I urged.
“The Trinity Higher Power has divided and conquered the qualities necessary. Shitty Ritchie is the force. Jennifer is the healer of mankind. Alana Catherine is the visionary of the future.”
Candy Vargo squinted at him. “You figured all that shit out from a question about a rock?”
“I did. You want to challenge it?” Gideon inquired with a raised brow.
“Nope,” she replied with a grin. “What I wanna do is get rid of the fucker in charge now, so we can finally live in some fuckin’ peace for a while. I’m gettin’ tired of all the bullshit. You feel me?”
“I’d be honored,” Shitty Ritchie told her.
She drop-kicked the minuscule idiot all the way out to the boulder.
“I say we call it a day,” Heather said, looking up at the darkening sky. “We could have a movie night and order in some pizza.”
“Sounds like a plan,” June agreed. “I’ll make some cookies!”
Now, that sounded like an excellent plan to me.
As we made our way back to the house, Gideon’s phone buzzed loudly. It was the Demons on the perimeter. My mouth went dry. He took the call, listened to what they had to say, then visibly relaxed. “Let him through.”
“Who?” I asked.
“Dip Doody. He’s here to see Jennifer,” he replied.
“Oh my goodness!” Jennifer squealed. “I miss that man.”
I glanced around wildly at all the people. “How the heck are we going to explain the rather large group of people here?”
“Jennifer could say she joined a cult,” Candy Vargo suggested.
“Umm, no,” I snapped. “Guys and gals move it. Most of you can watch TV in the master suite upstairs. A few of us can hang with Jennifer and Dip. Am I clear?”
“You are,” Charlie said. “And I agree. Let’s go people. Now!”
We ran like the wind and made it back to the house in plenty of time to make a plan.
Gideon, Tim, June, Charlie and I would greet Dip along with Jennifer.
Shitty Ritchie practically threw a fit over being excluded.
However, explaining an eight-inch-high dude with razor-sharp teeth and a penchant for mentioning his pecker in public wasn’t happening.
He only calmed down after Alana Catherine threatened a year-long timeout if he didn’t march his butt upstairs. She was serious. Shockingly, he obeyed.
“We ready?” Jennifer asked, checking herself in the foyer mirror and putting on a little lipstick.
“We are,” I replied.
I just hoped the zombies didn’t make an appearance.
It was risky letting Dip Doody anywhere near our general vicinity, but it would cause more problems if we didn’t.
The man was the sheriff. Jennifer was his girlfriend, and I didn’t doubt for a second that he wouldn’t call in the troops if he suspected any foul play where she was concerned.
“Good luck, fuckers,” Candy called out from the top of the stairs. “You’re gonna need it!”
I hoped she was wrong. I’d had enough crazy for one day.