“Mmmmm,” he muttered, flipping on the camera switches.
“What are you thinking?” I asked. He had something going on in that head of his.
“I’d say the same thing you are,” he said and stopped. “Hold on.”
He licked his thumb and then smudged it along my cheek, wiping off the iodine.
“Which is what?”
“Something’s not right. But we’ll figure it out. You ready?”
“Ready for what?”
“Ready for anything. Come on, we can’t lose them,” he broke into a trot heading to the barn where Sarah and Maximus just disappeared into. I did my best to keep pace.
As we entered the darkness of the barn, my eyes had a hell of a time adjusting to the light. I walked blindly for a few moments, feeling for Dex, when I heard a Spanish-accented snarl.
“You too?” Miguel’s voice came from the shadows.
We stopped. Miguel came out from a tack room, wiping his hands on a dirty cloth.
“Sarah and–” Dex started.
“They went to see Shan,” Miguel interrupted, pointing out the other end of the barn where the hall opened into a tunnel of light. “I don’t know why. He’s sick.”
He nearly spat out that last word, like it was our fault.
“He’s sick?” Dex repeated.
“His chest hurts. Nothing bad but he’s in bed.”
“Thanks,” Dex said and began for the end of the barn.
“I think it’s stupid. Leave the man alone,” Miguel said. I gave him a small smile as I passed him. His dark eyes were glaring at me with all their might as per usual, but I felt an aura of fear radiating off of him. Maybe it was my imagination. It was obviously having its way with me today.
I couldn’t dwell on it. I limped after Dex, our footsteps echoing down the cloudy hall until we entered the sunlight again and made our way for Shan and Miguel’s house, just behind a line of junipers.
It was a simple, small bungalow made with faded grey wood. Maximus was standing alone outside the front door. It was closed.
“Thanks for waiting,” Dex said sarcastically. “Where’s Sarah?”
Maximus ignored him with a twitch of his head and pointed at the door. “She went in there. Miguel said Shan was feeling ill and she freaked right out.”
“Chest pains?” I asked.
“I reckon so. Hope it’s not a heart attack. I don’t know how well equipped the hospital is here.”
“Yeah,” I said absently. That off-feeling was nagging at me again. I wondered if Maximus sensed it too.
“You can’t go in there with her?” I asked him.
He shook his head and stepped away from the door. He came over to us in a hush, putting one big arm over each of our shoulders, and led us away from the house.
“Are any of you getting a bad feeling about this?” he whispered, head between us.
Dex and I agreed. I hadn’t been in a huddle since my childhood softball games.
“I don’t know what though,” I added.
“Yeah, me neither,” Maximus sighed and straightened up.
The sound of the door opening caused us all to turn around. If Sarah could have seen us we’d have probably looked a might suspicious in our little head to head. But she couldn’t.
She closed the door firmly behind her and said, “Hello?”
“We’re here,” Dex answered, walking over to her. “Is Shan OK? Miguel told us what happened.”
She poked her cane out in front of her, almost nailing Dex in the knee, and walked toward the trees. “He’s fine, just has a sore chest,” she said dismissively.
“Sore chest?” I repeated.
She stopped but didn’t turn around. “Yes. A sore chest. Are you deaf? He probably pulled something. He does most of the work around here, don’t let Miguel or Bird tell you otherwise.”
Maximus walked over to her and put his hand on her shoulder. “Want some help getting through the trees?”
She brushed off his hand. “Do I look like an invalid to you, white boy?”
I almost laughed at his taken aback expression. He ran his hand through his red hair and gave us a shrug. She began to walk again, quicker, as if to prove she wasn’t an invalid. Not that we doubted that anyway.
I limped after her, the boys following.
“But if he’s a medicine man, can’t he heal himself?” I asked innocently.
Sarah laughed. “You really know nothing about the Navajo, do you? A healer cannot heal himself. He must find another medicine man to do that.”
She sounded quite grave but her tone became more flippant when she added, “Anyway, it’s nothing that some Aspirin won’t fix. Maybe tomorrow you can have a talk with him about this medicine man stuff. I’m sure he would love to enlighten you all.”
We followed her to the house in silence but came to a halt outside the door. After she went inside, I turned to the guys and told them I was starving.
And I did not want to eat lunch in the house. I wanted to get out of there for a bit.
Maximus nodded and headed up the stairs. “I’ll just tell them we are getting lunch in town before they start making us stuff.”
I looked at Dex.
“Need anything from inside. Books, perhaps?”
He shook his head No and walked over to the Jeep. “There’s a few books in here I got from the library while you were out on your little, uh, hike. I think we’re going to want to read them. As soon as possible.”
We ended up driving a little ways out of town, to one of the gas stations on the outskirts that doubled as a greasy spoon diner.
We piled into a small booth, Maximus squished up against me, and quickly ordered our food from the indifferent waitress before getting down to business. She didn’t even bat an eye at my bandaged hands.
After she brought us our much-needed meals, Dex had the books out and pushed one of them towards us.
“I think this is what we are dealing with here,” he said, eyeing the book. He glanced at me quickly and then looked away, giving the impression that though he was serious, he was still a bit apprehensive of what I might think.
I looked at the title. “Navajo myths and folklore?”
“All myths come from somewhere,” Dex said.
I flipped open the book to the index. “Any particular chapter?”
Maximus laid his well-groomed fingertip beneath Chapter Two: Skinwalkers and poked it hard for emphasis.