Inside Voices Read online

  Drawn to where the child had played, Penny stood beside the carcass. She laid her palms against the warm skin while the opaque steam swirled in eddies around her head. The heady fish aroma permeated the heavy air and clung to her, making her feel heavy and slow. Breathing through her mouth didn’t help.

  She turned and surveyed the many people standing, walking, talking, the younger folk running and screaming around her. The sounds became muffled, as if far away. Penny peeked back to the carcass from beneath her eyelashes, splashes of red appeared everywhere. Streaked handprints, dripping crimson. A coppery tang snuck through the whale odor and caught in her throat, immobilizing her.

  Her vision tunneled and memories spilled forth of another time, another place where sounds of death and chaos and the coppery tang of blood filled her head. She stumbled backwards away from the whale, tripping over two kids running behind her, their faces painted crimson. Their mouths opened in laughter, but Penny only perceived screams.

  “Penny!” called Rita.

  Penny held her palms up to her face, blood dripping from her fingers. Her gaze shifted downward, her breathing shallow and her heartbeat thrumming in her ears as she caught sights of the streaks of red on her white jacket. Something inside her had broken long ago, and the edges were still raw and quivering.

  A sob tore free, and her chest hurt as her broken pieces fragmented yet again.

  “Noooooo,” wept Penny. Not this again.

  Strong arms embraced her.

  “Come on, Penny, I gotcha. Let’s get out of here,” said Rita.

  Penny, I’m here. Penny, focus on me, sissy. Stay with me, called Lucy’s faint voice.

  Penny’s legs gave out, and she slid down the length of the person holding her, her knees hitting the cold, wet ground.

  Divine Confession

  “Penny, honey, can you hear me?”

  Penny’s surroundings slowly came into focus. She was back in her house, laid out on the couch. A dull pain pulsed at her temples, and her thoughts were sluggish. Overall, though, a state of calmness blanketed her. Medication coursed through her veins. Blue lay atop her legs. She absently stroked his head while he licked her hand.

  “Mom,” she croaked. Clearing her throat, she tried again. “Lucy…”

  I’m here, Penny, her sister said faintly. And there she was, peering over the back of the couch. Their connection was odd, distorted. What medication had she been given?

  “I’m right here, sweetheart. How are you feeling?” said her mother as she knelt next to her.

  “Tired. Slow.”

  “Do you remember what happened?” Eelyn brushed Penny’s forehead.

  “I would rather not,” said Penny, concerned over her foolish reaction to the whale. She inhaled deeply, catching the scent of cinnamon and vanilla in the air.

  Army and Rita appeared within Penny’s vision. She imagined the look on Rita’s face was pity, whether it was or not.

  “Penny, don’t be sorry, sweetheart.” Her mother continued to stroke her hair.

  Try as she might, Penny couldn’t hold back the solitary tear that escaped.

  “We were all worried about you…” her mother broke off, her hand rubbing Penny’s shoulder. Penny met her mother’s eyes that were filled with worry and grief. Neither escaped unscathed from the day that caused Penny’s anxiety.

  “I’m sorry,” Penny began.

  “Oh, sweetheart, don’t be sorry. It’s not your fault. I should have thought about it more before I asked you to come down.” Her mother sighed.

  Army cleared his throat. “It may not be my place, but I don’t think either of you are at fault for anything that happened earlier.”

  When the silence stretched out longer than manageable, she replied, “It was the screaming, I think.”

  Army and Rita glanced at each other before returning their attention to Penny.

  “The kids were running around, laughing and screaming in the blood. All that blood.” Penny stopped to take a shaky breath. “Then I just heard screaming. And the red handprints were everywhere. It was just like that day, mother. I couldn’t stop thinking about it. I’m so sorry. I wasn’t able to stop it.” She fought back a sob.

  Not a day passed when Penny didn’t think about that day. It was always in the back of her mind along with the guilt and sorrow and shame.

  “You don’t have anything to be sorry over,” Army spoke up. “We all have demons. Some more than others.”

  Penny covered her face with a pillow. “There are too many…nightmares…memories,” she said, her voice muffled. “This was a nightmare, the same nightmare,” her voice all but disappeared with the final word.

  A stronger person could handle this, she thought.

  You are not weak, came her sister’s sharp retort.

  “Penny, you are one of the strongest people I know. You are talented, smart, hard-working. And you are fortunate to be surrounded by so many people who care about you,” said Rita. “Army wouldn’t have picked someone who couldn’t handle the job.”

  “Thanks, Rita,” came Penny’s muffled response as she teetered on the pit of grief.

  Army placed a cup of tea next to Penny. The mint aroma reminded her of her father. She tilted into the pit. It would be so easy to fall into the overwhelming sadness. Her father’s birthday was two days ago. Or at least would have been. Penny failed to notice how her mother was coping.

  Penny exhaled and let the tears fall.

  “I miss him so much, mother. I wish I’d been able to stop it. Done something to prevent it. I was there, but I couldn’t do anything to stop it.” She couldn’t stop the words from flowing.

  But you did prevent the one with Noah and the bear, her sister reminded her faintly.

  Unsure what to think about that, Penny let the comment slide.

  “It’s not your fault. I don’t blame you. No one does. You need to stop blaming yourself. You did not pull the trigger. There was nothing to be done.” Eelyn sighed and pulled Penny close. “What you saw the night before…what would you have done? Told someone? No one would have believed you. You didn’t understand it. Hell, even afterwards I didn’t understand it, sweetheart.”

  Penny had shared her recollection of the vision, albeit in a brief, censored version, the morning before the incident. As much as she blamed herself, Penny hoped her mother did not hold any resentment towards her. Penny was only 99% certain her mother didn’t but the “why” of her visions ate at Penny constantly. What good were the visions when she didn’t have the ability to stop or change them?

  “You are so lucky to have such support, Penny. Family is so very important,” said Army.

  Penny recalled meeting Army that first year in college. She had written a research proposal for the use of a modified biochip to track marine mammals, and it had caught his attention. The chips, fitted with GPS and biotechnology, would not only track tagged animals via satellite, like the standard collars, but also would provide details about health and body functions as well as alert the scientists to any deaths. Marine carcasses tended to be lost to the sea and so determining causes of death proved challenging. Perhaps the chips weren’t as cool as the solar-powered video collars in use, but they could provide useful information without much interference with the animals. The chips could be used on any age and sex and would add to the research obtained with the collars. The collars would continue to be used unless they malfunctioned or were no longer needed.

  Over the next couple of years, the professor stayed in contact. Once he secured funding, he requested Penny work with his research team on the project over the next two years. The opportunity piqued Penny’s interest in focusing her future career on the marine bears, and she gladly agreed. Completion of the two-year project would secure her standing in the graduate program.

  When Army learned that Penny’s mother was a veterinarian, he mentioned the need for one, as his usual vet in Utqiaġvik was close to retirement and a bad hip prevented him from much field work. Eelyn agreed a
nd was hired on part-time at the veterinary clinic to help out ol’ Doc.

  Not to be left behind, Lucy also agreed to move to the small community of Utqiaġvik but not to work with the arctic research team. Lucy preferred writing and staying indoors, ever the recluse. The debilitating illness that Lucy suffered through resulted in restrictions with her physical activities, but she stayed mentally fit and more than comfortable to settle into the role of a writer, insisting that she lived vivaciously enough through Penny’s eyes.

  They knew eventually they would live apart, a point their mother had made more than once. They wouldn’t be able to rely on each other forever. But throwing into the equation that their mother, too, had made both moves with them placed a significant flaw in her case. Their prognosis of staying together was excellent.

  “Me, too,” Penny responded. She sat up, pulled herself together. Life was easier wearing a smile. Obviously hers was forced, but her friends and family accepted her effort.

  When Noah returned the following week, the spring whaling festival had come and gone. The panic attack Penny suffered the few days prior prevented her from attending, and she stayed busy with work instead.

  Outwardly Penny hoped people saw a happy, recovered Penny. Behind the mask, her dark thoughts tormented her. She refused additional medication, as it interfered with hearing her sister. Medicated, she displayed the abnormal happiness, knowing it was false but not caring. It bothered her. Medication free, her true feelings, the good and the bad, rang loudly in her ears. She pursued a lifestyle of fitness, preferring running and martial arts to blow off steam and help focus her mind. No one offered martial arts in Utqiaġvik, so she ran through her perfected patterns and techniques alone to maintain her skill.

  Alone one morning, Penny donned a pair of sweatpants and a tank top and began running through every taekwondo belt pattern she knew starting at white and ending with black. The small home was a simple, open floor plan. She had only to move the kitchen table and chairs off to the side next to Edgar’s perch, and the kitchen floor opened before her.

  She repeated each pattern three times before advancing to the next colored belt. Music helped her concentrate, and she wore ear-engulfing headphones to pull her into her zone. They canceled out all sound, and she soon became lost in the motions, ignoring the puppy until he lost interest and disappeared. She finished the last move of the first-degree black belt pattern and held it, her back to the front door. A song ended followed by a brief period of silence in which Blue barked. Penny glanced around, looking for the dog, when a figure loomed from behind her.

  Startled, she jumped away and landed in a defensive stance, ready to fight off the intruder. The intruder, however, held his hands aloft with a sheepish grin beneath a thick, black beard.

  Self-conscious she cursed and stood, removing her earphones.

  “Have you been standing there long? Don’t you knock?” she asked.

  He glanced down with the sense to look apologetic. Perhaps his cheeks were ruddy, but with the beard it was hard to tell. “I did knock, but Blue was the only one to come to the door. I thought I would let him out for you since I riled him up. Sorry, I…” he trailed off and scratched the back of his head. As he did, his black, long-sleeved crewneck pulled up revealing the large hunting knife he wore on his belt and less than an inch of smooth, white skin. “So, you know, ah, taekwondo?”

  Penny tucked a loose strand of hair behind her ear and then crossed her arms, tucking her fists behind her upper arms. “Yeah, a bit.”

  He leaned sideways against the kitchen counter and folded his arms in front of him. One of Lucy’s notebooks, the one with ink doodles of a flying horse with lightning trailing his aerial hoofbeats across the sky, rested nearby and caught his wandering gaze. He reached for it and studied the drawing.

  “This is cool. You do this?”

  Stepping forward, Penny took the notebook from Noah. “It’s my sister’s. One of her writing notebooks. She filled a ton of these.”

  “Any good stories in this one in particular?”

  “There’s one about humans colonizing an alien planet.” Penny pointed to the sketch in the center of the notebook. “This illustration here was her inspiration for a race of creatures that lived there.”

  “Nice artwork. Not your typical Pegasus with rainbow hair,” he said in a tentative tone, as if not wanting to reveal a manly specimen such as he knew the proper term for a flying horse.

  “They had horns, so not a Pegasus. She called them A’Sarien.” She tucked the notebook under her armpit for safe keeping and glanced away.

  “Is the story any good?” he asked.

  Penny shrugged. “What she told me about it, or at least what I needled out of her, sounded amazing. But maybe I’m a bit biased, right?” When he smiled, his eyes crinkled at the corners. She tried not to lose her wits when their eyes met. “Anyway, it isn’t finished.”

  She flashed a quick smile before looking away. Perhaps if she had the ability to disappear, it would have been an opportune moment. The notebook crinkled, and the metal spiral binding pinched the sensitive skin in her armpit as she twisted her arms in front of her, weaving her fingers together.

  “My sister painted those,” Noah said as he nodded to the underwater scenes painted on the wall behind Edgar.

  Since moving in, Penny wondered who the artist was behind the diving seals and breaching whales, but she never remembered to ask once outside the house. Edgar appeared so out of place perched in front of the murals, a black splotch in a sea of blues and greens. He seemed to stand up straighter with the thought. She tried to convey that he was in the perfect place, and she was happy where he was. His feathers ruffled, and he settled lower on the perch.

  “They are very good,” she replied. “Is she into art or was this a hobby?”

  “She’s a lawyer in Juneau. This was a hobby…is a hobby still, I think.”

  “Um, do you have any other siblings?” She tried to recall if she ever heard. She was getting a bit chilled standing still having turned the heat down to practice.

  “Yeah. A younger brother, Harry. He started at the U in Anchorage last fall. He’s working at one of the canneries this summer.”

  That last statement elicited a hundred questions in Penny’s mind, but Noah suddenly looked like he had other things on his mind than discussing family. Besides, Lucy probably wouldn’t want him reading her stories.

  “I was wondering if you wanted to hit the beach on the bikes?” he asked. “I think I finally have the 250 running decent. You up for it? We could pick up a few rouge containers.”

  When she first discovered Noah owned motorcycles, she was ecstatic. The dry riverbeds and sand hills near the greater LA area provided ample room for her to ride motorcycle growing up. Penny had even considered buying her own bike, but the few for sale in Utqiaġvik were pricey. On top of that, Army insisted she not ride alone. Safety in numbers and all that meant even more with the possibility of a murderer in the area, two-legged or four. Noah often took out a bike on his own (but he was from this area) to retrieve dart casings. This would be the first time he asked her to join him.

  They followed a trail on the tundra to the beach several miles away. The wide tracks that replaced the bike’s tires provided traction on almost any terrain. They raced the wide stretches when side-by-side riding was possible. Penny whooped into the wind when she pulled ahead.

  The round rocks of the beach gave the modified bikes good traction. They passed an enormous piece of tundra that had eroded and broke from the mainland, forcing them to ride out into the water. The ocean splashed up against her jeans, but the bikes continued without so much as a splutter.

  As they approached a small strip of beach where a creek emptied into the ocean, Noah slowed, and Penny followed suit. They slowed to cross the eroded beach and then throttled it once again. Penny’s bike skidded slightly and as she corrected, she peered back and caught sight of a huge polar bear standing atop the bluff overhead. From the distan
ce and the angle, she didn’t see any black marks on his face and then wondered at the thought. No visions of a scarred bear bothered her that day.

  Ten minutes later, Noah slowed, coming to a stop on a wide swath of beach. Penny stopped and removed her helmet, happy for the breeze that cooled her scalp.

  “So, what did you think? The bike give you any trouble?”

  “No, it rode great! Did you see the bear?”

  He peered over his shoulder back down the beach.

  “On top of the bluff where we crossed the stream?” she continued.

  “No, I didn’t see one, but I didn’t look up either.”

  “I doubt it was my dream bear. The one that we tagged that day.” The day she knocked Noah over. The words had escaped her mouth before she thought them through.

  Noah got off his bike, rested it on the kickstand, and approached her. “What do you mean, your ‘dream bear?’”

  Penny leaned back, a nervous laugh escaping her. She waved a hand at him. “Oh. You know. Nightmares about being attacked by a polar bear. Paranoia at seeing a polar bear during the day. It’s just the job and the constant daylight wearing me down.”

  He crossed his arms, waiting. “You said ‘dream bear’ not ‘nightmare bear.’”

  “Please, don’t laugh.” She picked at a frayed string on her glove. “Okay, so I may have been having dreams about that same polar bear that I tackled you over.” Every day and night. There was something raw about sharing such a secret with a stranger. Not a stranger, but not familial either. “I mean, before I tackled you.”

  He shoved his hands into his jean pockets and stared out across the Beaufort Sea. After a few minutes of tense silence for Penny, he spoke.

  “So, the day you knocked me over, you dreamt about that?”

  Penny rubbed her furrowed forehead as if she could suppress the memories. “Well, not exactly. There was this indescribable sensation, right before I pulled you - pulled you down, sorry again. I got dizzy and saw a scene play out of a bear attacking you.”