I bent one of the blinds back with my finger. Just beyond the back yard fence, lights were coming on at the neighbors. The sun was up enough to cast glares on the windows. It had to be about seven or so.
I wanted to call Kevin. I wanted to visit Pete McPherson, first, though. That is where my answer would be. I don’t know how I knew that, I just knew. Whatever Pete said would determine what I was going to do. I swung my feet off the bed, and reached down into the suitcase. My fingers hit paper before cloth, though. Instead of a shirt, I pulled out my plane ticket. I knew what it said, but I read it again. The return flight was in ten hours. I could exchange it, if need be.
‘You won’t have to,’ I thought. After all, this was all too weird. The ‘little town with a dark secret’ was the standard staple of television movies, not real life. ‘It might be the drugs,’ I thought. If so, then I would visit Pete, and then go try to convince Kevin to get into a program somewhere. Maybe he would move to be closer to me. Maybe I could leave Susan, and be strong enough to stay with him while he cleaned up. Lots of maybes; not enough becauses.
Who had my mother been talking to? I wondered if maybe I just hadn’t been awake enough, yet. Part of my mind grasped that idea anxiously. ‘A dream’, it said, and I felt better. Maybe it was just a dream, and I hadn’t heard anything at all. I would know once I talked to Pete McPherson, found out what he’d been told.
I’d let this whole situation get about as strange as I intended to let it without doing some fact finding, first.
THIRTY-ONE
The hot water streamed over me. My shoulders felt bunched underneath my bones. I turned my back to the spray, and leaned against the shelf my father had installed for my mother’s things. I put my forehead against it, looking down at my toes. They looked strange. I wondered how long it had been since the last time I’d really looked at them. I stood up, and backed into the spray again, letting my head fall backward. I closed my eyes and leaned back until the water smacked against my forehead, flowing over my skull.
Kevin. I wanted to see Kevin. I wanted to go see him, and then leave this town. Did I want him to come with me? That was the question. What was I going to do about Susan? It had all seemed much clearer yesterday.
I shut off the water and reached for a towel. I remembered being so young that I was too short to reach the towel rack from the tub. I would climb out of the tub and grab the towel and then climb back in as fast as I could. While I was drying, my mind would always wander to the footprints I would leave on the tile. “Why is there water on the floor?” my mother would ask. I would shrug, and she would sigh.
I looked for those prints. I looked for those tiny feet. There was no trace. I could almost see them, though.
Downstairs, the television was on. The paper rustled as I came down the stairs. “Nearly eleven,” my father commented, without looking away from the headlines.
I didn’t say anything. My mother was at the counter, reading over a cookbook. A measuring cup and two eggs sat next to the book. “Whatcha’ makin’?” I asked.
She looked up, and her face split. Her lips and eyebrows were drawn into a smile, but her eyes were dull and lifeless. “What, dear?” she asked.
“What are you making?” I asked, again. I opened the refrigerator and took out the milk. I sat the jug on the counter, and opened the top. She watched me without moving anything but her eyes.
“I know, cup.”
Her smile twitched wider for a second, then re-settled. “I’m making some poundcake.”
“Oh?” I asked, “for who?” I got a cup and brought it back to the counter.
“I thought I might take it over to Mrs. McPherson at the hospital.”
I stopped twisting the cap, and didn’t move. “Oh?”
“Yes. It seems that she’s been very upset the last few days,” my mother said, reabsorbed in the cookbook.
“How—umm—how do you—uh—know?” I asked.
“About Gwenneth? Oh, I don’t know. Rumors floating around. I overheard someone talking about it,” she said, but her voice never changed it’s flat tone. “she was our neighbors, you know,” she said.
“What?” I asked. I still hadn’t moved, or even breathed.
“You don’t remember? It must’ve been—oh, I’d say a year or so before you started school.”
“Here? The McPherson’s lived here?”
“Oh, no, dear. She wasn’t Gwen McPherson, then. She was still Gwenneth Ladd. She hadn’t met Peter yet. She did that year, though. I introduced them.”
“She lived alone?” I asked.
“The milk, dear,” she said, looking at it with a flick of her eyes, then back to the book.
I twisted the cap closed once more. “Mrs. McPherson—umm—Gwen lived alone?”
“Of course, dear. You don’t think a young couple like that would have waited so long to have their first child, do you?” she asked. She had cracked the eggs, and was adding sugar.
“I don’t know. I didn’t—umm—I didn’t know.”
“You knew little Randolph, didn’t you?” she asked. Her hands only paused for a second, then she went back to mixing.
“I—yeah, I did,” I said.
“Tragedy,” she said and crossed herself.
“Have—did anyone say why they think that she’s been upset?” I asked.
My mother clicked her tongue, and shook her head a bit, “Well, it seems that people have gotten it into their heads that those little boys remains they’ve found, the ones from the ditch?” I nodded, though she wasn’t looking, “it seems that people are thinking that set of remains might be little Randolph.” I waited. She continued mixing. “People have been trying to talk to her. Reporters and the like.”
I nodded, again. “Ah,” was all I said.
“Imagine—” she shook her her head “—they have no shame. She’s resting, poor girl.”
“I—umm—I thought that I would maybe go see Pete today,” I said.
“That would be wonderful, Michael. My son, the good boy. I always told Doctor Gantner that you were my good child. The only one. The only one,” she repeated, and chills ran over me. She walked to me, wiping her hand on her apron. She put it on my forehead. “I don’t want to worry you, dear, but I think maybe you’re getting sick. You haven’t been yourself. Are you getting enough rest?”
I could see in her eyes that she was asking questions she was supposed to ask, but that her mind was far away. They were dull, and glazed over. I wanted to ask her about this morning, about the sheriff, about what Kevin had said. For that split second, with her hand on my forehead, I felt like I needed to confess to her. I closed my eyes, and her hand was the only thing in the world holding me up.
Then her hand went away. I opened my eyes. The room was cold, even with the oven. I looked away. I heard the squeal of the oven door as she put the cake in. I turned and walked away.
“Mikey,” my father said as I walked past. He said it low, so I knew automatically that whatever he was about to say I was not supposed to repeat to my mother. I stopped. He lowered a corner of the paper. “Your mother and I were wondering when you plan on leaving,” he said. I couldn’t stop my face from reacting. “We enjoy having you here, mind, but—well, we know you have things you have to do. I’m sure your girlfriend, Shannon, right?”
“Susan,” I said.
“Susan, right—I’m sure Susan must be missing you, by now,” he said. I didn’t say anything. He looked at me for a moment longer, and nodded to himself. The corner of the paper came back up. To this day, I still don’t know why, but I knew it’d be the last time we spoke.