A whoosh of air and now Betsie is standing—mostly on my crotch—and I feel a light hand on my shoulder. The Uber driver is doing his awkward best to let me know we have arrived. I nod and ease my legs out, snap my walking stick open. Betsie jumps out behind me.

  We are on the back side of the massive Griffith Park, surrounded, I know, by trees of all shapes and sizes. As I plant my walking stick steadily on the ground and take firm hold of Betsie’s leash, I do my best to get my bearings. I had asked him, in my handwritten note, to be dropped off at the closest entry point to the Old Zoo. According to Rachel, the Old Zoo was about a half mile from the new…and up a trail.

  The wind is scented with freshly mowed grass and sweet evergreen needles and something that might very well be trash. I love when my sense of smell is firing on all cylinders, or through both barrels. I take everything I can get. Every bit of stimulus I can. There are days when I can’t smell at all. I don’t like those days. Give me something, anything.

  And I’ve been given a lot recently, haven’t I?

  I had. More than I could have ever hoped or expected or asked.

  But I had asked. I had prayed. With a little girl.

  It’s 12:33 a.m. No time for a blind, deaf, mute to be wandering in Griffith Park alone, especially after having recently read a trilogy of zombie books, set in this very park. Now, with zombies on the brain, I wave off the driver’s concerned grip on my elbow and nod and give him the thumbs-up. Finally, he releases his tenuous hold on me and, a few minutes later, I suspect he drives off, although with those electrical cars, one never knows. Maybe he’s still here, watching me.

  Either way, I tug on the harness and head forward, sweeping the land with the walking stick, and soon find myself heading up an asphalt road.

  Chapter Fifty-one

  When my walking stick hits grass, I decide it’s time.

  I steady myself and begin the steps necessary to slip into the Winter Wind. It doesn’t happen immediately or easily. But I do relax enough to get a second or two of staticy, bluish snapshots of my surrounding area.

  And from what I can see, I am alone, and pretty damn close to where I wanted to be dropped off. I am about five hundred feet along a side road that leads from the parking lot.

  According to Rachel, who had researched the Old Zoo for me, it is a popular hiking destination for park goers, who explore the abandoned cages, stairways, and walkways.

  Getting to the zoo requires a short hike, probably one that is easy and fun for the sighted. Me, not so much.

  I pause and take one more mental snapshot of the surrounding area—a snapshot infused with blues and green and wavy, staticy energy, then I suck in some air, grip Betsie’s harness, and step onto the grass…and up toward the Old Zoo.

  Chapter Fifty-two

  According to Rachel, there are a number of old roads and trails that lead to the Old Zoo, which is buried off the main roads into the park, nestled far enough away to not be an eyesore, and just far enough away to be a fun day hike.

  Or a not-so-fun night hike.

  I feel Betsie jerking and pausing a little more than usual. She would never pull me…and she would certainly never run. My guess: she is seeing squirrels and other critters.

  A dog and squirrels, it’s a beautiful thing.

  Ten minutes later, I pause, focus my thoughts, and slip into the Winter Wind. Within seconds, the blue-green landscape comes into startling sharp focus.

  I’m getting better at this.

  Most important, I see the glowing, winding trail that, I hope, will take me up to the old L.A. Zoo.

  With the details of the landscape imprinted on my memory, I set off for the winding trail.

  ***

  The grass gives way to a dirt path, which I follow up.

  Whenever my walking stick hits something—a rock, tree root, or bush where there shouldn’t be one—I pause and reassess and sometimes even slip back into the Winter Wind to get a better feel for where I am.

  Of course, with the Winter Wind, I get more than just a feel—I get an honest-to-God snapshot. A dream come true.

  Higher I go, moving quickly now, swiping the walking stick like a metronome, back and forth, back and forth. Twice, a tree branch nicks my face. Hard to protect your face and feel your way with a walking stick and hold tight to your guide dog all at the same time.

  I need one more arm.

  Instead, I keep my face ducked down, and soon take the brunt of a few more branches along the top of my skull, but no serious damage. Gone are the days where I worry about poking an eye out.

  Later, I hit something solid. Not a rock, not a tree root. I hit it again, and feel the hollow vibration ring up through my stick and along my hands. A trash can, if I had to guess. Set to one side of the trail.

  I move on, in darkness…but not quite blind.

  Not anymore.

  ***

  I stumble over a small rocky protrusion and use my walking stick to right myself.

  I’ve been cocky, careless. Moving faster than I should have. The trail up to this point had been relatively smooth and clear of hiccups. The rock was a hiccup. Not quite big enough to register on my sweeping walking stick, but protruding just enough to catch the toe of my running shoe.

  I pause and steady myself. I’m not helping anyone with a twisted ankle or a broken leg. Betsie is good, but not so good that she can warn me of small, rocky protrusions.

  I set off again, and slow my pace.

  ***

  I pause to catch my breath.

  Losing one’s breath with a tracheal tube is hell. I think of it as akin to breathing through one nostril…and one nostril only. But I have long since learned to relax and breathe steadily and calmly.

  When I am ready, I move on again.

  ***

  Another snapshot.

  A hill before me, choked with trees. Small, super-bright spots dart in the undergrowth. Sometimes they jump. Rats, I think. Or mice. Off to my right is a bigger bright spot. Something is lumbering with its tail raised. A skunk.

  The trail leads into the thick copse of trees, and I head forward again, breaking my connection to the Winter Wind, and sweeping my walking stick before me.

  ***

  My next snapshot.

  Before me, the path opens up into a clearing, with a grassy field on one side and the stacked, rocky formations of a long-neglected zoo exhibit on the other. The ruins look a lot like something you might see buried deep in the Honduran forest. Indeed, I could have been an explorer in a South American jungle, stumbling upon a lost Mayan city for the first time, a city that hasn’t quite been overgrown, a city that, apparently, was built with cages and pits and enclosures.

  Or a mostly blind man stumbling through the Griffith Park on a wild goose chase.

  The image of the manmade stone grottoes wavers as I lose my focus. I don’t want to lose my focus. Not now. I take a deep breath and re-focus, and sink deeper into my meditation.

  There are many walkways, paths, stairs, and graffiti is everywhere. Most interesting are the abandoned cages, which line the many corridors. And broken bottles everywhere. I imagine the abandoned zoo is a favorite for teenagers looking to get high and drunk. And a favorite for the homeless, too. A beacon for derelicts and the wayward. Next to me is a small shack that I can only imagine has housed its share of the homeless.

  So much decay. Yet, so much beauty, too. I see where nature is reclaiming some of the corridors and cages and abandoned buildings. In fifty years, the whole damn place will be forgotten.

  And it’s all open. All abandoned. Anyone could be here. Anyone.

  Even a blind man looking for the impossible.

  I enter the Old Zoo.

  Chapter Fifty-three

  I pause often, taking more Winter Wind snapshots, picking my way along corridors and between cages, not sure what I am looking for, and not even sure I’ll know it when I see it, either.

  While I scan, I remind myself that nothing is so lost that it can’t be found, my brother included—and all of the missing for that matter. I put myself in what I call a receiving mode—a mode that is open to any possibility, no matter how unlikely. Such a mode had helped me connect the dots on some of my toughest cases.

  I continue scanning the abandoned zoo. I only need one shred of evidence that something is going on here. One tiny shred and nothing more.

  And so I search….

  ***

  As the minutes pile up, and as the cool wind turns cooler, I am beginning to think that coming out here is a very bad idea. I am thinking of turning around, of trekking back through the woods, until I remember how far I have come tonight, the hassle I went through just to get here, to be here now.

  Stay positive. Stay in that receiving mode. Just a little longer.

  Throughout this whole inner dialogue, I never slip out of the Winter Wind, which impresses me. Except the more I am impressed, the more it wavers and flickers.

  Focus.

  I stand there, motionless, in the night, in the misty coolness, and watch the light show in my mind. The energy show, perhaps. I watch it roll in through my thoughts in waves. Sometimes it scatters, like frightened fish. Sometimes it collects its globs, forming shapes that seem vaguely human, and then those scatter, too. Mostly, the ripples of energy move over physical objects, giving them shape, giving them life, bringing them into stark contrast. At least for me.

  From where the energy originates, I don’t know. Where it goes, I don’t know that either. But here it is, flowing over the land and through my thoughts, touching on everything, alighting everything, giving it substance and depth, even for the blind. Even for those without eyes to see.

  I do not know what I am looking for, or even if anything is here worth seeing—

  (No, I think. It’s all worth seeing. All of it, every last broken shard of glass and trailing curlicue of graffiti.)

  —but I tell myself, over and over again, and with more and more certainty, that if there is something here to be seen, I would find it. Here. Now.

  Somehow, some way.

  What I think I’m looking for is an entrance below ground, an entrance to a subterranean chamber. That feels right to me. The Old Zoo was built on a forested hill, with many levels, and many rooms built into the hill itself, like bunkers. These were basements to maintenance buildings, administrative buildings and perhaps even veterinary facilities.

  Or, maybe, research facilities.

  The rooms would have been cooler, especially when there wasn’t air conditioning a hundred years ago. I suspected those rooms were here, too, locked up and sealed away…empty rooms, abandoned rooms.

  Forgotten rooms.

  I focus my attention on the steps leading down into the lower levels.

  There are a number of stairways in the Old Zoo. Many are narrow and covered in enough graffiti to make you almost appreciate the art form. And I appreciated it now. I appreciated the crap out of it. I wish I could see the scrawls clearly enough to read. For now, I see only hints and outlines and shapes. One such shape, and it appears to be a predominant one, is the penis. And there are lots of them, of all shapes and sizes.

  My perspective is from above. How that works, I don’t know, but I seem to be viewing the park about three or four feet above my physical body. The view spreads out many dozens of feet in every direction, seemingly at once, penetrating the dark shadows and, apparently, even passing through walls, as I can see into hallways, grottoes, and even nearby maintenance buildings.

  This gives me an idea.

  I break my connection to the Winter Wind and move closer to an abandoned maintenance building. I pause and slip and hold my walking stick with one hand, bow my head, and slip into the Winter Wind. I shift my focus into the building—through the flimsy sheet metal and find myself in what I can only imagine is a very dark space. Except, for me, it’s alive with light. Stagnant light, which moves in slow eddies, pooling within the room. Brighter lights huddle in the far corner, and a long, winding light slithers across the floor.

  Great…snakes.

  The room is littered with leaning beams of wood and broken machinery. Old pumps, I think. Hard to tell. There are no doors or stairs or anything that seems to indicate there might be a basement. I try something, almost as a lark, and project my focus beneath the building. I am surprised when a small crawlspace comes into focus. No, nothing beneath this building except the land itself.

  Feeling like I’m onto something, I scan the nearby cages and walkways and buildings. In particular, I look for hidden rooms behind doors or walls. Hidden staircases. Anything that looks like it might have been used recently, perhaps.

  But I find nothing of worth. Sure, there’s a walkway hidden from view behind a nearby building that seems to be popular with smokers and drinkers, but certainly not what I am looking for.

  I move off another direction, pause, slip into the Winter Wind, and scan the surrounding structures… and find nothing of worth, certainly nothing that would indicate anyone was using this park for anything other than what it was intended for: drinking and getting high, apparently.

  Finally, after many minutes of doing this, I pull back my awareness, lift my head, and break the connection to the world of blue-green vibration.

  The Old Zoo is large, but there isn’t an endless procession of abandoned buildings. I am certain I have searched all that I’ve come across. I am about to give up hope, about to look for the path out of the zoo, back through the park, and back to the parking lot where I can, hopefully, conjure up an Uber ride, when I recall the old shack on the way into the park.

  The only structure I had yet to scan.

  Feeling little hope, I strike off toward the shack…and toward the exit.

  Chapter Fifty-four

  I pause where I think the shack is.

  The night has grown colder, with a small wind seguing sometimes into a bigger wind. My sense of smell has abandoned me completely, but the air feels fresh, crisp, and far removed from the nearby big city. Big, big city.

  My brother feels both nearby and so far gone that I am at a loss. That this is the last building in the Old Zoo gives me little hope. Maybe I had missed one here or there. I could always come back in the light of day with Rachel. Maybe she would humor me.

  I pause and grip my walking stick, steady myself, and slip into the Winter Wind, perhaps faster than I’d ever done before. It is almost instant, and I am impressed, excited, and a little nervous, too.

  The surrounding vegetation comes quickly into view, sharper and clear. The trail is leading before me, down into the parking lot far below. A forest to my left, and the shack just to my right, almost within touching distance.

  I shift my focus to the shack. Shifting my focus is a new and interesting concept for me. Although I can see around me, 360 degrees, I can also focus my attention where I want. After all, I am not using eyes to see. I am using a sort of expanded awareness that I am only barely grasping.

  With this being the last building, I give it special care and attention. After all, what had I to lose?

  The outside is rectangular, dilapidated, although it rests on a cement foundation. Cement steps also lead up to a front entrance. It is similar to other storage buildings I have come across, although this one might be bigger, and it’s surrounded by a chain-link fence.

  Like something out of a video game, or a Hollywood movie special effect, I push through the corrugated metal siding and find myself inside the structure.

  The energy here is staticy, yes, but also a little more lively than the other buildings.

  Someone’s been in here, I think. Perhaps even recently.

  Then again, what did I know about energy?

  The room is bigger than I had expected, no doubt making either an excellent security office or administrative building, or a large storage room. Hard to know, as it’s been gutted, although many beams crisscross the room, lying on top of bigger slabs of metal sheets and wood panels.

  There is much graffiti in here, more so than the other buildings. Maybe because this is the first building in the park. I make out the words: “Don’t Trust the Man” and “Bow Down Before Me.” I see a pentagram or two, but mostly, it’s all just random inanity. Stick figures running up and down stairs. Gang tags. Words that start off looking legible, then trail off into incoherence. With nothing really to say, they tag for the sake of tagging, deface for the sake of defacing, rebel for the sake of rebelling. I say if you’re going to spend the money on the paint—and the time hiking up here—then have something proactive to say. Better yet, get a blog.

  I move my focus away from the graffiti and look down at the dusty, cement floor, mostly covered in wood and metal. Most of it seems to have come from the open ceiling above. All of it litters the floor and forms a haven for the many brightly lit rodents that I now see burrowed under the debris.

  I focus again on the floor, and in particular, the particularly big slab of wood that seems to be centered perfectly in the room. Too perfectly?

  I shift my focus again, this time to beneath the wood, and gasp.

  So loudly, that I am jerked out of the Winter Wind.

  And now I am moving.

  Chapter Fifty-five

  Had I not known that the building was empty of human life, I might have been nervous. Then again, what’s darkness to me? Of course, darkness is an emotional response…and knowing I was entering an abandoned building in the middle of the night, struck an emotional response, an old fear. An old fear I quickly squashed.