Spirit Tree (Part 1)

Hey my friend, can you believe it's September? Yeah, me either. But summer was good--I got a painted bedroom for my birthday--and in escapism's honor (you can never start too soon) I have a story to give you about a girl, and a guy, and what happens when your favorite climbing tree turns out to be holding your mama's soul hostage, may she rest in peace. --Elm

I waited by the door, wishing for even a hint of breeze as I gripped the ring on the chain around my neck. The ring was a gift from my mama, and I needed the comfort as I watched for the cloud of dust that meant Zachary was at the gate. The dirt road curved like a snake around the Spirit Tree and led through the pastures to the eventual gate and road. This evening, the Tree, bejeweled in its great variety of colorful bottles, whipped like it was possessed. A breeze might have given me an explanation.

I wished I could ignore the Tree, and I wished even more that Mama were here. But the advice she'd spoken had to be enough. "Mind the Spirit Tree."

As the sun touched the horizon, the telltale puff appeared, and I walked out to the figure emerging from the coughing truck. Dressed in his fencing uniform, Zachary looked like an albino alien. I don't know why fencing fashions are what they are, but I resisted teasing him—the Tree was just too loud.

That, and my resident misery about his current girlfriend. But he’d come.

"I just finished class. What's going on, Rae?" he asked.

I waved a hand toward the problem.

Zachary hadn't always known about the tree, but he saw it go out of control when my mom died. Our family--I keep thinking of it as "our" but with my sister somewhere on the East Coast it's pretty much just me--has a history of strange deaths. Funerals don't happen because there isn't a body left to bury. Aunty found my uncle's slacks pierced on a pitchfork in the middle of the crow field eight years ago but she never even freaked out. Mama and I found Aunty's silver barrettes beside the hotel riverbank a few years later, while we were on vacation of all things. But she'd warned Mama to take them home and dispose of them properly the night before, so Mama didn't take it to the police. That's when my sister left. Zachary hung out and played a lot of cards.

And then there was my mom, but I could only think of her as alive. A left-behind ring doesn't mean anything.

Zachary transferred his sweet look of concern to the tree and whistled low. "What does it mean?"

"I don't know, but I wondered if you wanted to come find out with me. What if I bruised my shin or something?" I laughed, wanting him to know I hadn't just called him all the way out here on a fluke, but not wanting to give word to my fears.

He puckered his lips. "You think a bruised shin is all you would get?"

"Maybe?" I loved it when he understood.

"You mind if I change out of these clothes, first? The Tree always does me in. I had to use bleach and Oxyclean and Tide in order to get the last stains out." He jogged back to his truck, took another stare at the psychotic tree, then grabbed his pack.

I'd seen the tree do this twice. The first time, Mama had tucked me in bed and said to stay put, but I didn't. I pressed my face to the window and watched as she shimmied right down beneath the waving branches clutching Aunty's barrettes. I waited all night for her to emerge, but I must have fallen asleep because in the morning, she was back and dozing on my rocker, her fingers black except for the white stripe where her ring was missing. I scoured the Tree for metal glints and secret passages and found nothing. The second time, when the ring took her place on the pillow, I refused to bury it no matter how the Tree waved. It was mine, not the Tree’s.

The one thing Mama hadn't left me was an explanation of why the Spirit Tree had to be minded. Deep down, I kinda figured it was time to find out.

I clenched the chain as I listened to Zachary’s thumps in the bedroom. He came out pulling his sneakers onto his feet, one at a time, then he straightened and stared at me. He raised an eyebrow in invitation and I ran over to him and buried my face in his t-shirt. Everything fell away and the entire universe felt right, just for a moment.

He pulled away, and I sighed.

"Everything's going to be okay, Raygun." He smiled his lopsided smile and I nodded. "Let's go check out that tree?"

I grabbed the pillowcase I'd packed of good ol’ iodized kitchen salt, all the remaining peppermint sprigs Mama had dried on a fishing wire across the kitchen, and my knife. Last second, I grabbed the old umbrella by the door, then marched outside into the jangle of bottles. Not a breeze to cool my sweating knuckles.

Striking distance from the tree, I tugged Zachary back a step and pried at the top of the salt cylinder. I let the salt fall from the spout as I walked a circle around the Tree, like Mama had done that night so long ago.

It felt right, like so many other things that felt wrong.

Zachary kept pace with me. "Am I supposed to be inside the circle, or outside it?” he yelled over the clatter.

"Depends," I called back. "The salt contains the spirits. What I don't know is whether they’re inside the tree or if it’s warning us against something.” I tossed him my cell phone since his didn’t have reception. He caught it with his swordsman skills, keeping a wary eye on branches that swished too close. “I have to go under there,” I pointed at the roots.

"What’s under there?” he asked.

"I don’t know.”

"Great.” He stepped inside as I finished the ring. "We'll go together, then."

I shook my head. “I need you to call for tree-removal services if I don’t come out.”

He didn't laugh. "I mean it. I’m not letting you go by yourself.”

While the statement warmed me, it was one of those things that felt wrong. “I think it’s a family thing," I said.

I ducked to my knees and eyed the branches to find the next available opening. I wondered what they’d find if they really pulled the tree up by the roots, but I doubted they could reach the trunk through this. Zachary grabbed at my shirt and pulled me around.

“Rae. If there’s anyone that’s family around here, it’s me. The tree has to let me come, too.”

He was family? I stared at him, not sure if I wanted to laugh or to cry. How many times had I wished he were my brother when I was little? And how many times had I wished since then for a different kind of relationship? I glanced back into the crashing chaos and shrugged. “You’ll have to vouch for yourself.”

He nodded and grabbed my hand. I swallowed as he squeezed my palm, and he grinned. “We can do this.”

Helmets might have been smarter, but I didn't have the guts to come back twice even with Zachary. I opened the umbrella, leaving the handle short, and shoved it over both our heads. I spit dirt as I army-crawled beside him, way too aware of him, toward the black hole at the base of the tree.

Remembering Zachary’s impression on my palm, I let go the umbrella and crawled headfirst into the dark.