No True Legend

Chapter 3: Ghost of the Future (Tara)

I can't get my sketch to come out right.

I'm curled up in the atrium at the Inn, watching the hummingbirds flit through the flowers and skim over the pond. It's so beautiful.

Bonus: it's warm enough today to sit on the grass and bask in the sun with my sketchbook from Auntie Hay in my lap while Ms. Wilma reads on the bench under the shade of the gnarled oak tree.

Auntie Hay and Warren are at the doctor's to check on the baby, so I'm supposed to stay with Ms. Wilma until they come back.

I want to be mad. I'm totally old enough to stay home alone now.

But I do really like Ms. Wilma.

Uncle War's grandma is always nice to me, so I don't mind staying with her.

Today she gave me lemon cake with sugar icing, this yummy light cloud I just wanted to gobble up forever.

I'm still wiping crumbs off my mouth, trying to get my fingers un-sticky, as I try for the thousandth time to sketch what I think Nine must look like.

I kinda started off thinking of Beast again, but I ended up making him look more like a werewolf and really scary.

I'm still learning how to draw. Auntie Hay tells me I'm good, but I'm nowhere near as amazing as she is with her gallery paintings. She's having her stuff constantly shown off here in town, plus some bigger cities like Missoula.

I want to give my paper about Nine a fabulous cover and maybe turn it into a whole illustrated booklet.

But everything I try drawing comes out looking like something from a horror movie.

If I just put him in a hoodie to cover everything up since he's supposed to be all burned up, then he looks like he'd stab somebody in the woods in a slasher flick. I want to make him look...

I don't know.

Kind? Tragic? Even beautiful in his own way.

Mostly, I want to make him look like he's in love, but I don't know what he looks like to start with.

"What are you drawing, dearie?" Ms. Wilma leans on the arm of the bench and peers over at my latest sketch, which looks more like some weird, creepy alien mutant rather than a man. "That looks quite frightening."

"I'm trying to draw Nine," I say, looking up as her eyes do a slow blink. "I'm writing about him for my school project. Uncle War told me the legend, but Doc told me it's all wrong."

"Oh, that wild old yarn." She clucks her tongue. "That rascal. He made my life quite dull, you know."

"Dull? How's that?"

"Well, there's no competition anymore," she says. It almost seems funny to her, a small happy smile teasing at her lips. "The Paradise Hotel and my Charming Inn used to compete for customers in the good old days. With the hotel gone, I don't even have to work for it. I'd have to say I enjoyed the challenge, especially working against all the money they poured into that glitzy hotel."

I sit up straighter, clutching my sketchbook. "But what about Nine, Ms. Wilma? Is he really real? Did he...did he really burn the hotel down?"

"If you ask the locals, he did everything from burn the hotel down to cause a traffic jam in the middle of town. I've even heard some people say he went back in time and shot Lincoln. He's like Elvis."

I frown. "Who's Elvis?"

"Oh, my. How precious. You are young, aren't you?" She sighs. "He's a ghost everyone thinks they see. With Nine, it's something about when the nights start to get real hot and people get restless, sweating and tossing in their beds. They think they hear and see the strangest things when they can't sleep. Strange men skulking around. Monsters in the woods. Some of them even say he comes into town once a year to leave flowers for a special someone, but I've never seen it." She presses a hand to her chest. "And I know the only florist in town. So where's this Nine getting these flowers, hm?"