“Can’t I just go back to the jeep?”
“Then gimme that crow bar if your not gonna help.”
“This shit wasn’t in the job description.”
“You said you wanted to help.”
“Yeah, but this?”
“I thought you needed money, Harlan?”
“Okay, Ray. Open it up.”
Known to most folks in Ketchikan as a humble street custodian with an affinity for road kill, Ray Meza took a huge breath. Head bowed, he waited in silence until Harlan, a seasonal vagrant he’d met at church a few hours after he’d seen the murder in a dream, started humming Amazing Grace. Though he had a pretty good idea what was to come, he needed to be prepared. They were all different. It didn’t matter who they were or what life they’d led. Some folks needed a little guidance.
Ray took another breath and began to feel himself slipping. His body relaxed, heart rate slowed, breathing nearly stopped. When his mind started searching for an opening, he knew it would happen soon. The moon reminded him of the day he met Black Eagle. It was raining as usual. Riding a scraggly old mare into the campground outside the cannery, the old trapper looked dead. He took one look at Ray and smiled. He raised an opened hand and passed the “gift” to a curious Tongass Tlingit boy the world couldn’t have cared less about.
But realizing that there were things he just couldn’t change, the man superstitious Tlingit’s called Crows’ Brother drove the rusted crow bar underneath the lid. A cracking noise ignited his blossoming vision. They were out there. They snuck through portals like the one opening above him. Fiends. Scavengers.
After another thrust, the wooden lid split. Rank death raced up his nose down the back of his throat and splash landed in his gut. Harlan’s song wavered, but the protection it provided was still there. Those misty colors typical for a November night in the Tongass wilderness faded to that thick silver hue that made the living look dead. Ray jerked the bar up. The nails pulled out of the old crate.
Once the lid had been worked free, he covered his nose and mouth and kicked it off. Harlan stumbled back and moaned like a seasick moose. The beam from his flashlight careened into the sky. The protection vanished, while Harlan whined on his knees.
“Lord have mercy. Lord have mercy . . . ”
All Ray could say was, “Wow.” But what he felt resonating from the makeshift coffin and somewhere in the nearby forest was a disconnected fear that slowly sank deep inside him. It began to swirl and swirl until everything he’d eaten came charging out. The violation before him was amazingly horrific, but the victim’s wayward soul that trembled in the nearby forest reached out to him. His fear finally touched Ray in that place he’d learned to keep hidden from the living.
With duty foremost in his mind, Ray turned toward the thick forest where he saw them swarming again. They sailed over a line of ancient pines in a frenzied cluster that looked like a gaggle of wacky bats. Then they were gone.
“Bla-hooo!”
Harlan heaved tacos and French fries then cried out for his savior. Ray hustled over and took his hand.
“Go back to the jeep, man.”
“Why?”
“So I can do what I gotta do.”
“That poor—
“He’ll be fine. Now if they get here before I’m done, you let me do the talking.”
Harlan surrendered the flashlight and headed to the jeep. Ray went back and knelt down beside the victim. The crate the body occupied was no bigger than a wheelbarrow. His torso and head floated in the center of the blood pool like crushed ice in rank water. Ray placed his hand on top of the head. When he shut his eyes, it started right away.
Now he was in the crate. Those latent senses opened wide and slowly freed him to walk among the dead. Frozen by the exodus of his own soul, Ray’s dormant body held silent vigil over the dead man’s remains. He had to move quickly. The victim was terrified not because he had become a lost spirit or that he knew he was dead. The killers of his body had gone, but the hunters of his soul were swarming. His name was Angel, a local logger and not much of person. He done things he was ashamed of. Finally, he’d paid dearly for them.
But Ray entered the forest and took his hand anyway. He led Angel’s soul away from his butchered remains. In the forest, Angel could find the crows. They would take him to the other side. When Angel grew strong enough to release Ray’s hand, hoards of them appeared in the sky. They soared on steady currents and cackled like lunatics. But when they saw Crows’ Brother standing beside their prey, sonic shrieks filled the night sky. They changed direction and zigzagged out of sight.
“Time to go.” Ray whispered. Then the huge moon faded into a brilliant blazing sphere. Three crows soared out of the sphere. Their presence scattered Angel’s soul into zillions of particles and drew his energy into the sphere. It was over.
When Ray woke up, three Sheriff’s deputies were pointing rifles at his head hoping he would flinch. He could hear Harlan shouting at them. Everything else seemed like a dream. The sky above him was peaceful, quiet. The big moon painted the forest with the clearest silver light he’d ever seen.
When a gunshot from a frightened deputy’s rifle echoed throughout the forest and Harlan started screaming, Ray’s work was done. As he made his way toward the sphere, he looked back over his shoulder at Harlan, raised an opened hand and passed the “gift.”
The End