Ashes of Another Life Read online

  “I see.” Ms. Martinez lowered her voice, as if she didn’t really want to ask the next question. “And then what happens?”

  “They push me and pull me, a sea of burned bodies coming at me from all sides, forcing me toward the open door of the burning house. When I first started having the nightmare, I would wake up before we reached it.”

  “And now?”

  “Lately, I get hurled past the threshold of the house before I wake up. Thrown into the fire while the rest of them shamble through the door to join me. For a minute, I can feel the pain. So much pain.”

  “Poor girl,” the woman whispered, and then straightened her posture, eyes suddenly alert as if she hadn’t meant to say it aloud. “I thought for sure the medicine they prescribed would help to ease your trauma…”

  “I don’t take it.”

  Ms. Martinez cocked her head and scrunched her dark, thin eyebrows. “Oh, sweetie, why? The medicine can soothe your anxiety and make it easier to talk about things, to work through these issues…”

  “I—” Tara Jane paused for a moment, considering the best way to explain her position to a Gentile. Even the word “Gentile” proved how different her mind worked than the average American and how alienated she’d been her whole life. Someone recently explained to Tara Jane that the word itself was rarely—if ever—used in conversation anymore. And yet, it was a regular part of her vocabulary growing up.

  “I don’t feel comfortable taking pills.”

  When the counselor’s only response was a blank stare, she continued. “Father hated pills. He often preached against them. I remember when his second wife, Betty, visited a doctor and got a prescription for anti-depressants. Father was angry when he found out, but he didn’t punish Betty. He said God would do the punishing for him. Six months later, Betty got ovarian cancer and couldn’t bear his children anymore. God frowns on those who turn to medicine over prayer; it signifies a weak constitution. Those are Father’s words, not mine, but part of me still believes it.”

  “Oh, sweetie. That was just a coincidence.”

  “Then there was the incident with mother. Father did punish her when he found out she’d been taking pills to keep from having babies.” Tara Jane felt her cheeks flush with blood. “I’d never seen Father so angry. Mother had defied one of the most important rules set down by the prophet. He punished her, and after that, she didn’t take the pills anymore. She got pregnant twice more and died during childbirth the second time. Father said it was God’s revenge for her disobedient nature.”

  “Do you think it was?”

  She shrugged. “I don’t think God would take my mother as a punishment, no. It just doesn’t seem right. But medicine… it scares me to take it, all the same.”

  “I understand. And I think we’ve made progress today, just talking. You’re really opening up, and I appreciate it, but Tara Jane, I have to admit: The nightmares, the loss of appetite, the feeling of being watched. These are all symptoms of PTSD that can be treated.” She stood and began to walk around her desk, signifying the end of their meeting. “Will you do me a favor? Will you think about it, really consider trying the meds, and then come and see me first thing tomorrow?”

  Tara Jane nodded. She pushed out of the chair and steadied herself against the desk, feeling a bit woozy for a moment. She really did need to eat something if the simple act of standing was becoming a chore.

  She sighed. She passed an open window, and suddenly her breath hitched in her throat. She caught a glimpse of something, off in the distance. There one second, gone the next, on the edge of the parking lot. Her spine stiffened, familiar bumps on her skin.

  She blinked hard, but nothing was there. Only parked cars, an empty sports field with green grass swaying, and the lingering sensation that something out there had its eyes fixed on her.

  Chapter Three

  The ringing of Casey Wendell’s phone took her by surprise. Her ash-blond hair, hanging in a stylish bob halfway down her neck, swung to the side as she jolted upright, plucked from deep thought. A collage of paperwork stirred, corners flapping. The pen she’d been chewing on clattered to the desk, a pink lipstick stain ringing its gnawed plastic end.

  It was her desk phone, not her cell, so it would be business-related. She took a moment to adjust herself, straightening her jacket as if the caller could see her. She lifted the receiver. “Casey Wendell speaking.” She eyed the open file in front of her. She’d been mulling over the Sweet Springs reports and lost track of time again. She frowned, picked up a photo and let it flutter back down.

  “Ms. Wendell. This is Vanessa Martinez,” said the caller.

  A long silence. Where did she know that name? The coffee machine in the break room was on the fritz again, and with no caffeine to sort out the millions of thoughts in her head, her brain had gone into auto-pilot mode.

  “I’ve been working with Tara Jane Brewer.”

  Recognition dawned on her. Martinez was a budding therapist who visited schools and counseled teens whose needs went beyond “troubled youth.” The courts had placed the latest Sweet Springs escapee in her care, in addition to appointing a psychiatrist, whose name also slipped Casey’s mind at the moment. She really needed some coffee.

  From an open file on the desk, the young girl’s pensive eyes stared up at her. She had already been thinking about Tara Jane when the phone rang. “Ms. Martinez. It’s good to hear from you.” She was suddenly tense, nerves set on edge. “What’s up? Is everything okay?”

  “The girl is fine. I didn’t mean to alarm you. I’m just wondering if there’s been any news from her… well, her community.” She sugar-coated the truth for propriety’s sake, but Casey sensed the reluctance in her voice, her tongue tripping over that last word.

  “Ah, yes. The dastardly cult.” She heard Martinez gasp, ever so slightly, then chuckle under her breath. Casey wasn’t one for political correctness when she sensed she could get by without it. “They’re pushing for full custody, and most likely, they’ll get it. It will take a while, but it’s possible she’ll have to go back. She has extended family there, and they want her to come home.” A couple seconds ticked by, then she added, “They always do.”

  Tension oozed from the phone. The counselor’s voice sounded choked, nearly exasperated. “But how? How can our justice system allow her to return to such an awful place?”

  Casey thought about it. She understood what Martinez meant by “awful,” but it was a matter of subjectivity in the end. There were citizens of Sweet Springs whose family roots dated back to the very first town meeting, and they would argue that our society is “awful” and has become morally corrupt, not theirs, not their quiet little slice of heaven. But absolute power corrupts absolutely. And that’s what was happening in Sweet Springs.

  “They’re her family,” Casey explained, trying not to let her own irritation with the situation show. “If the court is going to remove Tara Jane from their custody, they need evidence of abuse.”

  “Evidence?”

  “Evidence. Testimony.” Casey sucked in a sharp breath, let it go. “I’ve been dealing with this for years. My advice? She’s got to open up and tell her story. The ugly parts. It’s the only thing that can save her. Can she do it? Is she ready to talk?”

  Another long pause, then Ms. Martinez’s voice came over the line sounding soft and defeated. “She was making progress… becoming more comfortable around those she’s been taught are “outsiders.” Absentmindedly, the woman sighed into the receiver. “But lately she’s withdrawing into herself. She’s not taking her medication, and without it, I fear regression… or worse.”

  “Have you talked with the foster parents? Do they understand the importance of encouraging her prescriptions?”

  Martinez sighed again. “I plan to stop by and talk with them tonight.”

  “Good idea.”

  “Tell me. Have there been others like Tara Jane? Who have escaped Sweet Springs?”

  “A few,” Casey said.
<
br />   Martinez let out a heavy breath.

  If she’s not careful, she’s going to pass out from all this sighing.

  “I’m afraid to ask,” the woman said in her faint Latino accent. “These others… Were they sent home?”

  Now it was Casey’s turn to sigh. Hell, maybe it was contagious. “The ones who were not willing to come clean about the abuse, who wouldn’t testify against their abusers, yes, they’re back in Sweet Springs.”

  For a moment, there was only the sound of breathing and light static on the line, and then the counselor said, “I’ll do everything I can to help.”

  “It’s been a pleasure, Ms. Martinez. Please, keep me posted.”

  “I will, and thank you for your time.”

  Casey hung up, eyes fixed on the photo. It was good to know someone else cared as much about Tara Jane as she did. This was a heavy load to bear alone.

  Her jaw tightened. She began to grind her teeth but stopped.

  I’m developing too many nervous habits.

  There are young lives at stake, and I’m expected to remain calm? Professional? Freedom of religion: the double-edged sword.

  She’d been to Sweet Springs only twice in her life. The first time, she was the passenger of a respected elder in the community, discussing the case of a young runaway found sleeping on the streets. She should have known the child was running from something, but it had humbled Casey to see the quaint homes and the well-tended gardens. Boys chopped wood and girls watered crops and plucked chickens. The women sewed dresses and baked bread. The people worked for everything they had. Nothing came easy, and everything was earned.

  In those early days of her career in social services, Casey Wendell assumed that’s what the young girl had been running from—an old-fashioned way of life, a physically demanding existence with Easy Street lying just beyond the gates. She knew, now, how wrong her assumption had been.

  On her second visit to Sweet Springs, she arrived in her own vehicle. She had noticed a pastry shop on her ride through town with the church elder and decided to sample some home-baked goods. The residents froze at first, watching with leery eyes as her car crept past the front gates. They began to retreat, shooing the children into their homes. They drew their curtains and peered out, suspicious of the unfamiliar vehicle and the outsider behind the wheel. It was then that Casey began to see how things really worked.

  The residents couldn’t imagine life outside their community. Sequestered in their tiny patch of isolated desert, everything beyond the red cliff borders seemed a galaxy away. Current news, politics, major world events—everything was filtered through the church, and if any information reached these people at all, it was always tied to scripture and prophecy. All they knew was hard work, faith, and family.

  There was no telling what they thought of Casey Wendell as they watched her roll down the street in her flashy yellow car, expecting to find the village bustling with life, but seeing only fearful eyes squinting at her through dark, shrouded windows. She frowned as she remembered the awkward car ride that day, how they’d responded to her like a herd of gazelles discovering a lion in their midst. They were terrified of sin, and outsiders were chock-full of it. On their rare excursions into town, people scoffed at their 1800s-style clothes and pointed at their over-sized families, laughing, and it only served to deepen the wedge between Sweet Springs and the rest of the world.

  She pictured Tara Jane’s face the first time they had met—dark hair plastered into a wave against her forehead, eyelids swollen from crying—and she wondered how people could hold their religious faith at a higher esteem than their own children. Maybe it all traced back to the Old Testament moment when God commanded Abraham to sacrifice his son. A can of worms had been opened during that suspenseful moment, which perhaps was impossible to close.

  Casey had never been particularly religious or Atheistic, choosing instead to ignore the issue altogether. It upset her, the things people were willing to do in the name of God.

  Scary shit.

  She used her rolling chair to push away from the desk and glide over to the filing cabinet. She opened the drawer in the middle and retrieved the nearly empty glass bottle she had stashed there yesterday. Its brown contents sloshed around inside, and she had to chuckle to herself. Some people hid pints of vodka around the office. She hid bottles of Starbucks.

  She unscrewed the lid, set it down and took a gulp.

  Mmmmm. Caffeine.

  She savored the rich roasted flavor with hints of vanilla. Her shoulders loosened a little, but the rest of her was still tense, muscles tight. The desk lamp shined on the metallic lid, reminding her of how her father’s police badge used to look when she was a child.

  She remembered pacing the hardwood floor of the foyer in her white ruffled nightgown, waiting for him, so excited to hear the sound of his keys jingling against the lock. He always gave a tired smile before turning to the coat rack, the lamps glinting off his badge as he removed his state-issue jacket. To her young eyes it seemed like the most priceless treasure in the world—that badge, the brass symbol of her father’s heroics.

  She frowned. Removing the Starbucks lid from her desk, she threw it in the trash and raised the day-old coffee to her lips.

  I don’t want to think about this.

  She took a gulp and finished the bottle, her trademark lipstick stains coloring the rim, and tossed it into the can.

  Her father had been her hero for as long as she could remember. As a child, Casey would beg her mother to let her stay up late so she could hug him goodnight when he got home. On Friday and Saturday nights, her mother would agree, and Casey would watch the big hands of the family room clock slowly tick, plotting the questions she would ask him, for even at a young age she understood that too many questions would irritate him after a long day on patrol.

  No matter how tired he was, though, he managed a smile when he saw her there, waiting for him, full of curiosity about his day. He would drop to his knees and welcome her into his arms before walking her down the hall, slowly enough to talk for a while, sending her to bed with a stern warning to, “Stop waiting up” for him, which always went unheeded and likewise unpunished.

  One night, Casey’s father didn’t come home. It was a school night, so Casey had been in bed for an hour when her mother rushed in, shook her awake, and told her to get dressed. They rushed to their big, old Ford without so much as another word and went speeding down the highway. Her eyes were filled with tears before her mother could explain. She knew. They both knew. It was bad. It had to be bad for mother to have such a look on her face—a mix between fury and surrender. Deep down, they’d always known something would happen to him, the very reason Casey begged to stay up each night.

  She could still picture the tubes poking in and out of her father like a circuit board, the blood blossoming like a rose in fast forward on the white gauze taped to his side. His bruised and swollen face only vaguely resembled her hero, but his big, blue eyes were open wide, which was better than she had feared. His once-handsome features were slack from pain medication, but he filled with joy at the sight of his family. Casey let go of a breath she might have been holding the entire car ride, and cried tears of joy and pain simultaneously.

  A vigilante had shot Casey’s father. They tried to make it sound like a failed burglary, but she picked up pieces of the truth from the adult conversations she overheard the following weeks. A crazed vigilante had thought the police department was a failure. He was tired of living in a crime-riddled part of town. He’d written numerous letters, letting the department know that God was watching, and if they would not do God’s work, he would. Neighbors and co-workers admitted hearing him aggressively spout scripture and talk about “cleaning the streets of sin.”

  While he was taking justice into his own hands one night, an encounter with law enforcement resulted in his death when he drew a gun, shooting an officer twice in the chest. Not just any officer—Casey’s father. Devoted husband and ten
-year veteran of the force, Henry Wendell.

  The memory of her father’s slow and painful recovery still troubled her over two decades later. It baffled Casey how her father forgave that man. When Casey expressed hostility towards the shooter, her father would say, “Let it go, Casey.” He never spoke ill of the man who nearly took his life. He would lean back, lace his hands over his chest and say, “Forgiveness is the least I can give in return for my life. I’m still here, Casey. Still here.” And he would smile, and she would smile back. But secretly she made a decision to never trust anyone who showed signs of mistaking hatefulness for religion.

  She leaned back in her desk chair now and laced her fingers across her chest, just like her father. But it didn’t calm her. What was going on in Sweet Springs was wrong, and it needed to stop. The women were subservient to the men, and the ones who resisted were either punished until their spirits were broken or married off at an early age to an old man with several wives already. The young boys didn’t have it much better. They were always at risk of being cast out of the community, penniless and alone, for the slightest misbehavior.

  As Casey’s father always said, “I do not hold the people accountable, but each individual person.” There were good people in Sweet Springs, trapped under the control of something they couldn’t fight. The church owned their property. The church provided their jobs. Hell, the church even had the power to break up their families and reassign them to new fathers and husbands. Living under that sort of control, one learned to stay quiet, to blend in and follow along. She couldn’t let her bitterness for blind faith let her lose sight of the real problem: there were children not far from here living in absolute fear.

  Her stomach growled. She checked her watch and realized it was time to grab some lunch. Her breakfast had been light. She needed nourishment laced with caffeine… and she needed it soon.