Read Online State of Nature: Book Three of The Park Service Trilogy by Ryan Winfield - Free Book Online Page B

since everyone would have gone back to work after my speech. But the problem is, I only have a general idea where BethAnn lives from having seen Red sneak out his window and head to her block of buildings in the middle of the night. Turns out, we don’t need to know much more than that, though, because as we approach a row of apartments, I can hear weeping coming from an open window.
    “BethAnn,” I call up.
    When she doesn’t respond, Jimmy whistles. The sobbing ceases and a pale face appears in the window.
    “What do you want?” she calls down.
    “Let us up. I need to talk with you.”
    “You can talk with me from there,” she says.
    I look around, but there doesn’t seem to be anyone about.
    “Fine,” I half whisper, half shout. “I have a message from Red. He said to tell you that he’s thinking about you, and that he misses you, and that everything will work out just fine.”
    “What’s that mean?” she asks.
    “What’s what mean?”
    “That everything will work out?”
    “I don’t know. That’s just what he said. So don’t cry.”
    She leans out the window a little farther and looks around. Then she looks back down at me with a question on her face.
    “How come you can talk to him?”
    “What do you mean?” I ask.
    “If he’s contagious like you say, why can you talk to him?”
    It’s a good question, and I should have considered it before coming to find her. Maybe this was a mistake. I stumble to find an answer, but Jimmy jumps in and saves me.
    “He wrote the message and Aubrey read it,” he says, which is brilliant because it’s kind of the truth.
    “Is that it?” she asks.
    “What do you mean is that it?”
    “Is that all he wrote?”
    “He said he was sorry.”
    “Well,” she says, “you told me. Now go away.”
    Then she pulls the window closed. We turn to walk away, but we don’t get far when I hear the window slide open again.
    She calls after us, “Will you give him a message for me?” When I turn and nod yes, she says, “Tell him that I love him. Just tell him that for me, will you?”
    Before I can promise her that I will, she pulls the window closed again and disappears into the shadows of the room.
    “That could have gone better,” Jimmy says.
    “Tell me about it. And it didn’t kill much time either.”
    “How much longer till midnight?”
    “Too long,” I say. “But, hey, I know what might help pass the time. How about a trip to the beach?”
    “The beach?” he asks. “Here? Underground?”
    “Come on, I’ll show you.”
    We take the lift up to the recreation tunnels and walk the corridor to the locker room door. Inside, we grab clean shorts from the rack and change into them, leaving our zipsuits and our belongings in lockers. I’m disappointed to see that the sign on the beach access door reads: LIFEGUARD NOT ON DUTY
    I was hoping Bill would be here so I could show him how much taller and heavier I am. I think he’d be surprised.
    But at least Jimmy is surprised, because when we step through the door, his jaw drops and he stands transfixed by the scene in front of him. It’s as if the cavern has disappeared and been replaced by blue skies and sandy beaches. The gulls call, the waves tumble up the sand, the perfect clouds float in their windless skies, and although the illusion is not as convincing as it was to me before, it’s still a remarkable likeness.
    “I dunno whether to trust my eyes,” Jimmy says.
    “Why not?”
    “Because it looks like a beach, but it ain’t.”
    “How do you know it isn’t?”
    “Well, the air smells funny for starters. And those gulls in the sky is flappin’ but they ain’t goin’ nowhere. And there ain’t no shells or no rocks in the sand. It’s too perfect. Look at those clouds. They seem to be at the same height, but they’s goin’ in different directions. That jus’ ain’t possible. Plus, you can look right at the sun there without your eyes burnin’ up.”
    “Well, we can at least enjoy the