"Your friend Peter," she said. "Did he die of AIDS?"
"Actually, you don't die of AIDS," Max said. "AIDS destroys your immune system and it's some other illness that kills you— something your body would have been able to deal with otherwise." He gave her a sad smile. "But no. Ironically, I was the one who tested positive for HIV. Peter had leukemia. It had been in remission for a couple of years but just before we went to the desert it came back and we had to go through it all again: the chemo treatments and the sleepless nights, the stomach cramps and awful rashes. I was sure that he'd pulled through once more, but then he died a week after we returned."
Max ran his finger along the sloped back of a statue of a horned owl whose human features seemed to echo Max's own, "I think Peter had a premonition that he was going to die, and that was why he was so insistent we visit the desert one more time. He had a spiritual awakening there after one of his bouts with the disease and afterwards, he always considered the desert as the homeground for everything he held most dear." Max smiled, remembering. "We met because of these statues. He would have moved there, except for his job. Instead, I moved here."
Sophie got a strange feeling as Max spoke of Peter's love for the desert.
"Remember we talked about dreams at the opening?" she said.
Max nodded. "Serial dreams— what a lovely conceit."
"What I was telling you wasn't something I made up. And ever since that night I've been dreaming of a desert— a desert filled up with these." Sophie included all of the statuary with a vague wave of her hand. "Except in my desert they aren't statues; they're real."
"Real."
"I know it sounds completely bizarre, but it's true. My dreams are true. I mean, they're not so much dreams as me visiting some other place."
Max gave her an odd look. "Whenever someone talked about what an imagination I must have to do such work, Peter would always insist that it was all based on reality— it was just a reality that most people couldn't see into."
"And are they?"
"I..." Max looked away from her to the statues. He lay his hand on the back of the owl-man again, fingers rediscovering the contours they had pulled from the clay. "I should show you Peter's office," he said when he finally looked up.
He led her up to the second floor which was laid out in a more traditional style, a hallway with doors leading off from it, two on one side, three on the other. Max opened the door at the head of the stairs and ushered her in ahead of him.
"I haven't been able to deal with any of this yet," he said. "What to keep... what not..."
A large desk stood by the window, covered with books, papers and a small computer, but Sophie didn't notice any of that at first. Her attention was caught and trapped by the rooms' other furnishings: the framed photographs of the desert and leather-skinned drums that hung on the walls; a cabinet holding kachina figures, a medicine flute, rattles, fetishes and other artifacts; the array of Max's sculptures that peered at her from every corner of the room. She turned slowly on the spot, taking it all in, until her gaze settled on the familiar face of one of the sculptures.
"Coyote," she said softly.
Max spoke up from the doorway. "Careful. You know what they say about him."
Sophie shook her head.
"Don't attract his attention."
"Why?" Sophie asked, turning to look at Max. "Is he malevolent? Or dangerous?"
"By, all accounts, no. He just doesn't think things through before he takes action. But while he usually emerges intact from his misadventures, his companions aren't always quite so lucky. Spending time with Coyote is like opening your life to disorder."
Sophie smiled. "That sounds like Coyote, all right."
Her gaze went back to the cabinet and the medicine flute that lay on its second shelf between two kachinas. One was the Storyteller, her comical features the color of red clay; the other was Kokopelli. The medicine flute itself was similar to the one that Geordie had traded away, only much more beautifully crafted. But then everything in this room had a resonance of communion with more than the naked eye could see— a sense of the sacred.
"Did Peter play the flute?" she asked.
"The one in the cabinet?"
"Mmm."
"Only in the desert. It has next to no volume, but a haunting tone."
Sophie nodded. "I know."
"He'd play that flute and his drums and rattles. He'd go to sweats and drumming nights when we were down there. I used to tease him about trying to be an Indian, but he said that the Red Road was open to anyone who walked it with respect."
"The Red Road?"
"Native spiritual beliefs. I went with him sometimes, but I never really felt comfortable." He touched the nearest statue, an intricate depiction of a prickly pear spirit. "I love the desert, too, but I've never been much of a joiner."
"Did that disappoint Peter?"
Max shook his head. "Peter was one of the most open-minded, easygoing individuals you, could ever have met. He always accepted people for what they were."
"Sounds like Jilly. No wonder they got along."
"You mean because of the painting?"
Sophie nodded.
"Peter never met her. I bought it for him at one of her shows. He fell in love with it on the spot— much as I did with the painting you gave me today." An awkward smile touched his lips. "I had more money in those days."
"Please don't feel guilty about it," Sophie told him, "or you'll spoil the pleasure of my giving it to you."
"I'll try."
"So did Peter have desert dreams?" Sophie asked. "Like mine?"
"He never told me that he had serial dreams, but he did dream of the desert. What are yours like?"
"This could take a while."
"I've got the time."
So while Max sat in the chair at Peter's desk, Sophie walked about the room and told him, not only about the desert dream and Coyote, but about Mabon and Jeck and the whole strange life she had when she stepped into her dreams.
"There's something odd about Coyote referring to Nokomis," Max said when she was done.
"Why's that."
"Well, everything else in your desert relates to the South-west except for her. Nokomis and Grandmother Toad— those are terms that relate to our part of the world. They come from the lexicon of our own local tribes like the Kickaha."
"So what are you saying?"
Max shrugged, "Maybe Coyote was the woman who sent you looking for him in the first place."
"But why would he do that?"
"Who knows why Coyote does anything? Maybe he just took a liking to you and decided to meet you in a round-about way."
"So was he Kokopelli as well?" Sophie asked. "Because it's the flute-playing that got me there in the first place."
"I don't know."
But Sophie thought perhaps she did. She stood before the cabinet that held Peter's medicine flute. It was too much of a coincidence— Max's sculptures, Peter's interest in the desert. The feeling came to her that somehow she'd gotten caught up in unfinished business between the two, neither quite willing to let the other go, so they were haunting each other.
She turned to look at Max, but decided she needed one more night in her desert dream before she was ready to bring up that particular theory with him.
"It feels good being able to talk about this with someone," she said instead. "The only other person I've ever told it to is Jilly and frankly, she and Coyote are almost cut from the same cloth. The only difference is that Jilly's not quite as outrageous as he is, and she's not always talking about sex. Everything Coyote wants to talk about eventually relates to sex."
"And have you slept with him?"
Sophie smiled. "I guess there's a bit of Coyote in you, too."
"I think there's a bit of him in every one of us."
"Probably. But to answer your question: No, I haven't. I'll admit I've come close— he can be awfully persuasive— but I have the feeling that if I slept with him, I'd be in more trouble than I already am. I'd be trapped in those dreams forever and can't see that being worth one night's pleasure."