C.E. Murphy - Coyote Dreams

My attention came back up to Barbara, who stood by the stove looking very human and confused, so much so that my heart went out to her. I knew that look. I felt like I’d spent an awful lot of time with it on my face. I was actually putting my hand out to her, like I might offer some kind of comfort, when whatever uncertainty had surfaced was swallowed whole again, and Barb sprang across Morrison’s body at me, her hands clawed.

That was more what I expected from a chick. I braced myself, but not enough, and her weight drove me over backward into Morrison’s kitchen table. I heard wood splinter and the smooth surface lurched downward beneath us while Barbara skimmed her lips against her teeth and hissed from the back of her throat. I grabbed her wrists and rolled, crashing off the table into the chairs. More wood splintered, and I wondered how I was going to explain the remains of the kitchen when Morrison woke up.

If Morrison woke up.

For a few seconds I couldn’t see anything except red, and I wasn’t sure if that was the Sight or just my normal vision full of fury. Barb got a hand loose and jabbed her fingers into my eyes. I screamed, as much with anger as pain, and grabbed her wrist again to bite into the webbing between her thumb and forefinger. She shrieked and jerked away, sending us off the chairs and onto the floor, the light dimming. I spat out a mouthful of coppery blood, gagging on the flavor. My vision cleared again, tears streaming, and I snatched her hand out of the air as she drove it toward my eyes again. Her wrists were tiny, and once I had both of them I knotted the fingers of one hand around them, imprisoning her and leaving me with a hand to punch her with.

Triumphant, I reared back on my heels to get my weight behind a hit, and clobbered my head on the table. Stars sparkled in my line of sight and I realized a little too late the reason the lights had dimmed was we’d rolled under the table. Barb pulled her legs up and kicked me in the stomach with both feet, sending me back far enough to smack my head on the table again. I did my best mindless beast roar and flung myself on her, no longer trying to get a hit in. I would just smother her with my superior body weight. And whack her in the eye a few times with my elbow, if I could. For a few seconds we were biting and rolling and scratching and screeching, the indignity of fighting like girls ridiculously clear in my mind. I couldn’t remember getting in such a noisy fight before.

The table crashed over sideways as we rolled into its legs with enough force to knock it down. The smash made us both freeze for an instant, as if we expected a parent to come storming downstairs to find out what was going on.

I recovered first, probably because I had no siblings to wrestle with, and therefore less expectation of getting in trouble for wrecking the house. The table no longer hindering me, I grabbed a fistful of Barb’s shirt and hauled her to her feet so I could hit her. This time I let go when the punch landed and she staggered back into the window.

Which shattered, and she went head over heels through it with a shriek.

I stood there a couple seconds, completely unprepared for that. My first thought, I admit, was, hah! but it was followed by the somewhat more alarming, Christ, she could be dead . Glass was still shimmering and trembling as I took the couple steps to the window and put my hands on the sill gingerly, looking out.

Barb popped to her feet and hit me in the face with a pair of plastic-wrapped pruning shears.

It had been a while since being hit on the head had knocked me into the realm of Other. Overall, I liked it better when I was sliding in and out of psychic realms on my own cognizance, though I had to say there was something for waking up in my garden without my head hurting. It was a big fat psychological fib, because I knew perfectly well that out there in the real world I was going to need a nose job. Fortunately, my self-perception didn’t include a mashed-in face, and in my garden, imagination trumped reality.

“Joanne.” The thin, weary voice seemed to come from all around me and nowhere at the same time. It made my heart lurch, one part panic at my garden being invaded and two parts hope: I knew that voice. “Jo,” it repeated, and I whispered, “Coyote?”

I could almost sense him. His presence was more a wish than a fact, as if he’d been mixed up with oxygen and smeared liberally through the atmosphere: I couldn’t see it, but I knew it was there. My heart pounded so hard it made my stomach hurt, and for some reason there was a film over my eyes, blurring my vision. “Coyote?” My hands had gotten all cold and shaky and my cheeks burned hot, until I felt like I might fall apart from conflicting temperatures in such a small space. “Coyote, are you okay? Where are you?”

A breath of a chuckle came through the air, but that was all. No more words, nothing reassuring, no explanation as to how I might go about stopping Barb from sucking my friends’ life forces. “Coyote, I need you.” I sounded young and so tremulous I’d moved beyond pathetic into outright fear.

He didn’t say anything else. The garden seemed to shift and sigh, like it was waiting for something, and I put my face in my hands with a hoarse laugh. “Imagination trumps reality. Please, oh, God, please help me get this right.”

I reached for my power, still whispering pleas into my fingers. It spilled upward, delicate as a filigree net, pouring through me until I could see my garden the way the younger me had, some fifteen years ago. Life infused it, though not as thoroughly as it had then. Here, it simmered below the surface, instead of bursting free and full of laughter. My waterfall, always off to my right, was as I remembered it, sheeting down a wall of granite, rather than thundering so hard and fast it made mist, but at least it held the promise of more. Everything felt that way, as if it waited to come to a boil again. I was absurdly grateful it thought it still could.

I dropped my hands from my face and reached out, casting my net of power as if I would be able to draw Coyote in. It shimmered blue, ocean-colored, and rode the air like feathers on the water. I had no car analogy to suit this, but nets had worked for me in the past, and the one I wove now was so fine it might catch raindrops and cradle them between its threads. I clung to the idea of my spirit guide, trying to gather him in so he could become cohesive and whole again, instead of just a voice in the ether.

A pulse ran through the net, silver power that rippled and overwhelmed the blue that was predominant. It caught me in the belly and pulled me forward with unexpected strength. Panic seized me and I resisted, for which trouble I earned a snort I knew all too well, and a distinct sensation of dismissal.

I couldn’t tell if it was surprise or dismay that caught me out, but it didn’t matter. I faltered for just an instant, a hiccup of concentration lost. Silver swept my net, wrapped around me, and hauled me through space and time like so much flotsam.

Joanne was tall at—more than thirteen, now. I’d had one disastrous flirtation with perms as a teenager, the summer after my freshman year. The ends of her short hair were still curled, so she’d been fifteen for a few months, and if I remembered my own haircuts correctly, that meant in another six or eight weeks she’d be pregnant. My stomach cramped up and I knotted my hands into fists, staring down at the younger me. I was less than two inches taller than she was, and by the end of her sophomore year she’d be able to look me in the eye. Right now, height was the only thing I had on her at all.

I could see the cohesion of her power, riding under her skin and sparking through her aura. The net I’d woven was gone, replaced by a silver cord that thrummed back and forth between us, twisting and writhing in the air like it had life of its own. I wanted to bat at it and make it lie down. Joanne ignored it, looking over me like I made a bad taste in her mouth.