“But his body,” I said. “It was buried in the woods. If it was an overdose…”
“Think about it, Mickey.”
I tried, but it wasn’t coming to me.
“The NFL draft was coming up,” Ema said. “Randy was already secretly fighting a positive steroid test. If this came out, if they found out Buck had overdosed because of Randy…”
I shook my head. My eyes went wide. “Parents would never do that.”
“You don’t get it.”
“What?”
“Of course they would. Buck’s mother said it clear as day. Buck was dead. There was nothing they could do for him. They had another son. He’d lose everything. He’d probably go to jail on drug charges and maybe even for manslaughter. She and I sat at her kitchen table, Mickey. She looked me in the eye and said, ‘We lost one son, but we didn’t have to lose two. What good would it do to destroy Randy’s life too?’”
I couldn’t believe it, but it all made a strange, horrible kind of sense. “So they buried Buck’s body,” I said. “They made up that story about him going to live with his mother. Who’d check a remote island? And even if they did, she could just say, what, Buck was at work or traveling.”
Ema nodded. “They hadn’t really thought it all out, but eventually she would move overseas. She’d tell people that she and Buck were living in Europe.”
“My God. That’s awful.”
“And yet it would work. Who’d question it? In a horrible way, it’s logical and even loving. They couldn’t save the one child-”
“So they tried to save the other,” I said, finishing the thought.
I thought about what Uncle Myron had said, about the mistakes that cost my father his life, about the ghosts that haunt him even now. “Still,” I said. “How do you live with that?”
“I’m not sure that she could.”
“So you think, what, you were, like, her confession.”
“I think she just needed to confide in someone. She knew I cared about him. She thought that maybe I even loved him. So she told me the truth and swore me to secrecy.”
We stood there, feeling the full weight of the moment.
“But now Buck’s body has been found,” I said.
“Yes.”
“Hours after you learned the truth and promised not to tell.”
“Yes.”
“That’s some coincidence,” I said.
“No coincidence. You see, that’s what Buck’s mom didn’t count on.”
“What?”
“She loved both her sons,” Ema said. “But I loved only one.”
The room grew very still.
“You called the police?” I asked.
“No. I stopped at the library after I left you. I sent an anonymous e-mail to them. I told them where Buck’s body was. I told them how he died. I told them the truth. With the clues I gave them, they’ll put it all together.”
We stood there. Upstairs I heard voices. Myron had come into the house after all. He was talking to Ema’s mom. They were right above us. And they were a million miles away. Everyone else was a million miles away. Right now, in this basement, there was only Ema and I and maybe the ghost of a teenage boy who was no longer buried alone in the woods.
CHAPTER 48
By noon, the media was all over the story.
Buck’s family was arrested. None were charged with murder. I don’t know what the charge is for hiding your own son’s body to protect your other son from prosecution. Whatever that was, that’s what the parents were both charged with. A search of the house found steroids and other banned substances in Randy’s room. I don’t know what charges were filed against him, but it sounded like a lot of them.
I only knew that it was over for me. Except, of course, it wasn’t.
Not even close.
• • •
A week later, Uncle Myron and I went to Buck’s funeral.
When we got back to the house, we sat in the kitchen.
We didn’t say a word for a very long time. We just sat in our dark suits and stared into space. Buck was dead. I couldn’t believe it. The finality of it was something I still couldn’t comprehend.
“So young,” Uncle Myron said with a shake of his head. “I know you’ve heard this before, Mickey, but you always have to be careful. Life can be so fragile.”
We sat in silence again. I loosened my tie. Time passed. I can’t say how much.
“I know it seems irrelevant now,” Myron said. “But do you know what you’re going to do about Troy and the basketball team?”
I nodded. “No choice really.”
He just waited.
“I’m going to tell Coach Grady the truth.”
“The truth will get you thrown off the team,” Myron said.
“Too bad,” I said.
“It’s not the end of the world.”
In light of what we had just seen, I knew that was true. But it still hurt.
“There will be next season,” Myron said.
I couldn’t imagine it right now, but maybe he was right. Or we could move. Mom might be better again. But I couldn’t let Troy get away with it. Every basket we’d make would feel tainted. There would be no joy. That was the problem with doing the wrong thing for whatever reasons.
It never feels right.
Uncle Myron opened the fridge and sighed.
“What?”
“We’re out of Yoo-hoo.”
Myron drank this chocolate soda called Yoo-hoo nonstop. “There’s more in the basement,” I said. “You want me to get it?”
“No, I’ll do it.”
He started down the stairs. I was alone. I walked over to the sink. The room was silent. Silent, I thought, as a tomb.
Maybe that was it.
I started thinking now about silence. More specifically, I started to think how silent this kitchen was at this very moment. I looked over at our refrigerator. I started thinking about how Bat Lady’s refrigerator was so noisy. I leaned closer toward the sink. Through the pipes, I could hear Myron whistling some old song. So maybe that was it.
Or maybe it was when Myron whistled that song.
Or maybe it was when I realized that I could hear him faintly through the pipes.
Or maybe it was because I realized how quiet our refrigerator was and if it’d been noisy-if it’d been like Bat Lady’s-I’d never hear that faint noise.
Especially if I was old. Especially if I played music a lot.
I felt a cold pinprick at the base on my neck.
Bat Lady had turned off the music too. That was what she said. She turned off the music so she could hear the doorbell when the repairman came. Her kitchen had been silent for the first time in years.
Silent. Like this one.
No refrigerator noise. No music.
And that was when she heard the faint sound of my father’s voice.
Like I was hearing the faint sound of Myron’s.
The cold pinprick grew and spread.
“Oh my God,” I said to myself. Then in a panic, I started shouting, “Myron! Myron!”
At the sound of my voice, he ran up the stairs as fast as he could. “What’s wrong? Are you okay?”
“Do you have an axe?”
“A what?”
“An axe? An axe!”
“In the garage. Why?”
“Get in the car.”
“Where are we going?”
“Just… just get in the car.”
CHAPTER 49
It was still daylight when we got to Bat Lady’s house.
I was out of the car before Myron pulled to a complete stop. I had the axe in my hand. I ran through the crime-scene tape. The tape made sense now. The police hadn’t put it up.
Luther had.
He wanted to keep people away.
That was why he set the house on fire too. He wasn’t trying to kill Bat Lady or me.
He wanted us gone.
“Mickey? Where are you going?”
Someone had locked the garage door. I took the axe, aimed at the knob, and smashed it open. I found the trapdoor and threw it back.
“Mickey?” Myron said again.