Blackwater (6 page)

I passed the Batman’s house. The drapes were closed. Hannah’s bicycle lay by the door.

A woman stood on the little beach, looking out at the river. I knew who she was right away. Otis’ mother.

I took a step backward, but she heard and turned. Maybe she thought every sound around her was Otis, too. I saw her white face, eyes staring and red-rimmed. Her dark fuzzy hair stuck out, stiff as a cactus.

“Brodie Lynch, isn’t it?”

I nodded. She had a flashlight in her hand, one of those big commercial ones. Behind her the river roared and rushed, letting little white spits of foam jump up, swallowing them again. The Toadstool lay quiet and empty.

“Are you all right?” she asked.

“Yes.”

She took a step toward me. “Thank you for trying to save my son.” She must have had makeup on, maybe hours ago, and it was smeared all over her face. She was about my height. “I’ve been searching for him all night.” She held up the flashlight. “The batteries gave out.”

I could hardly breathe. If only I’d been able to
slip away before she saw me.

“I’ll find him,” she said. “I will.”

I poked my head forward like some old turtle. “I thought I’d search today too,” I said. “My cousin Alex and I could….” I made an arc with the stick to show her how Alex and I would look everywhere.

“They’re saying Otis made that girl fall.” It was hard to hear her over the thunder of the river, and I wanted to look away but I couldn’t. “They say he was trying to make out with her.”

Make out? She meant he was coming on to her.

Now she was talking again.

“It’s not true. They’d met out on that rock before, and other places too. That girl liked my boy. She called him, plenty of times.”

Stupid, stupid, to feel this ache of jealousy because Pauline Genero had called Otis, had met him, had liked him. She was dead. They were both dead. My dad says we are all made in the likeness of God, but I’m pretty sure I’m not.

Mrs. McCandless was nodding, agreeing with herself. “She liked him.”

I took another step back.

“Well …” she said. “I guess I better go home. My daughter’s here. She said she’d look today and I could stay at the house. One of us has to be there for Otis, when he comes back.”

She was scaring me to death. I was scared that she was right, and Otis would come home, and I was scared that he wouldn’t.

She turned for one last look at the river and then shuffled past me. One of her tennis shoes had a little gold-colored charm hanging from the lace. A soccer ball. Otis played soccer. It made me want to cry.

I touched her arm. “I hope he comes home,” I said, and I meant it. Right then, I really meant it.

W
hen Mrs. McCandless had gone, I stood, trembling. “I didn’t mean to do it,” I whispered to myself, jamming my elbows into my sides to hold my bones together. I was staring blankly at the hole where Alex and I had hidden the towels, and I suddenly knew where the missing flip-flop was. It probably fell out inside there.

I peered over my shoulder. Nobody there. Nobody watching. But there had been yesterday. I got down on my hands and knees and poked my stick into the opening. It hit something, pushed it further back. The flip-flop came out on the third try, and I hunched there, holding it.

On the other side of the river, Gloria Webster was jogging along the path. I recognized her red
hair and the yellow nylon shorts she wears when she trains for the Gainsville marathon. Was it Gloria who’d seen us yesterday?

I stood up. Now that I had the flip-flop, what could I do with it? I should give it to Raoul. I could say I’d found it. But would he believe me? Or would it be something else to point a finger at me? I could put it back in the hole. Or throw it, and let the Blackwater take it the way it had taken Pauline. That would be safest. The rubber sole had little dents made by Pauline’s toes. I remembered her dangling feet, and I was shaking again. I stuffed the flip-flop deep in my jacket pocket and curled my hand around it.
Don’t think about it. Don’t think about who wore it and what happened here.

Now I couldn’t get home fast enough, tripping over myself as I half walked, half ran along the path.

The Batman was standing in his open doorway, wearing striped pajamas, drinking from a bright blue mug. “Hi, young man,” he said. “How are you feeling this morning? How’s the head?”

I slowed reluctantly. “OK.”

Hannah came out, already dressed in cut-off
jeans and a hooded sweatshirt with the hood pushed back. She was eating something from a bowl. “Hi,” she said. “Like some cereal?”

“No,” I said. “Thanks.”

“The cops were here last night, asking questions.” She wiped a trickle of milk off her chin.

“Oh?” My fingers tightened around the flip-flop.

“They wanted to know if we’d seen anything.” The Batman pulled hard on one ear. His ears were long and droopy. I looked at them, trying not to hear what he was saying. Maybe he pulled at his ears a lot.

“I told them we can’t see the pond from the house,” he said. “The bend’s right there. We can’t see past it.” He pointed with the blue mug and I looked where he was looking. The bend was there all right.

I shifted uncomfortably. “Well, I’d better get home.” Then I remembered. “Thanks for bringing over the book,” I told Hannah.

“Sure.”

I began edging away.

“Wait up,” she said. “I’ll walk with you.” She set the empty dish and spoon on the porch next
to her bicycle. The backpack had been thrown there, too.

I didn’t want her to walk with me. I didn’t want to talk to her or anyone.

“It was Raoul who came last night,” she said, hurrying along the path beside me. “He’s a nice guy. Real friendly. He had a policewoman with him. She’s new, I think. I didn’t know her.”

My throat was dry and my mouth too. It had probably been Samellen Ferguson. “Did they ask anything else?”

“Naw. But …” She nodded across the river. “Raoul said somebody over there, walking or something, saw the whole thing. Whoever it was put in a call to 911. But it was too late, of course. The police talked to her.”

My heart thumped like a drum in my chest. Maybe I was having a heart attack, too.

“Raoul wanted to find somebody else to back up whatever information they got. He’s asking around.”

“Did Raoul tell you what the person said?” Hannah picked up an empty Fritos bag, crumpled it and put it in her pocket.

“No way. Raoul’s nice, but he’s still a cop. I
guess he can’t go blabbing about stuff like that. I think he only told as much as he did to open us up, you know. But like Dad said, we can’t see past that bend. It’s probably just that the person saw them fall. What else could it be?” She glanced at me sideways and I thought, Is she suspicious? Does she know something? Or was I just getting super paranoid?

“It couldn’t be anything else,” I said.

We had reached the end of the path and we stopped, both of us staring silently at the Blackwater. Early mist hung on it, pale as smoke. I could smell the wet, coppery, river smell.

“Otis is still missing,” Hannah said. “My dad called this morning already. There’s no way he could be alive now.”

I shook my head. Alex thought he was still alive. But Alex had to be wrong.

The sun was coming up and the sky was streaked with pink. A helicopter putt-putted over the town.

“Pauline was so pretty,” Hannah said. “It’s creepy to think how one minute you can be alive and then something happens and you’re dead. Forever.”

My fingers found the rubber flower on the flip-flop, counted off the petals. I had to get away, think. What had that person told Raoul? What?

Hannah shivered. “I go to boarding school in Connecticut,” she said. “Did you know that?”

I shook my head.

“My dad’s away so much, traveling, giving talks, boarding school just works out better. The river’s always seemed like freedom, you know?” She paused. “I don’t like it anymore, though. It’s cruel. I can’t stand cruelty.” She shoved her hands deep in the pockets of her sweatshirt. The Fritos bag rustled. “One time, I was only nine, Dad and I were living in Florida. That was before I started boarding. He was doing his study on Gray bats. There was a cave there where the bats roosted. Only some of the locals knew about it and they kept it quiet. They’d go in the cave at night, when the bats were out hunting, and they’d gather guano.” She stooped to pick up a round river pebble, dropped it again. “Guano’s bat poop, and it’s good fertilizer. They’d sell it.” She pushed back her hair, then plunged her hands into her pockets again. “My mom died the year before.”

I wondered if I should say something about how awful that must have been, but she was talking again in a strange, flat kind of voice.

“Dad was always busy. I think he was trying to forget. I was a stranger in that little Florida town. I didn’t know anybody. I hadn’t a single friend. They all thought I was weird. The Batgirl, they called me.”

I turned my head away from her.

“There was a gang of older kids,” she said. “A gang is awfully tempting when you have nobody.”

I remembered Alex saying something like that and I nodded. I guess Alex had nobody either. Only the Vultures.

“I ended up telling those guys where the bats roosted. I showed them the cave. They went there in the daytime when the bats were sleeping. They had explosives, like big firecrackers, that they’d made themselves, and they lit them and tossed them into the cave. I screamed at them not to. To stop …” She shuddered and began grinding the toe of her shoe into the soft dirt of the path. “The bats screamed like babies. They were all killed, blown to bits. Dad and the other mammalogists he was working with came
and gathered up the pieces. That’s all that was left, blood, bones, bits of fur. My dad cried.”

“I’m…I’m sorry,” I stammered.

“It was just so cruel. How could anybody be so cruel?” She shook her head. “And of course they lied when they were confronted. I hate liars. Don’t you?” Her gaze was so honest and so searching, I had to look away. She’d hate me if she knew. “Anyway. Why don’t you come out with me sometime to see the bats of Rivertown?”

“The bats?”

“Yeah. I watch them. Take notes. It helps my dad.”

“I don’t know,” I said.

“Well, think about it. I’m going home now.” She turned back along the path. “See you later.”

“See you,” I echoed.

I stood, taking deep river breaths. A log came crashing down the Blackwater, thumped against the bank, rolled off again. John and I had dragged one like that out last summer, and we’d tried to chip it hollow and make a canoe, but it was way too narrow and not deep enough. This one would be no good either.

I walked up the hill. Maybe I could run away.
I’d get in Bobby Steig’s Camaro and drive. I knew how to drive. I’d lift the cat off first. But Bobby kept his car locked. There’d be no keys and I didn’t know how to do that thing with the crossed wires. I could take Mom and Dad’s car. But they really need theirs. Maybe I could hitch a ride.

I slid in behind Bobby’s locked Camaro and peered around it. His cat leaped down and walked away with its tail up. Our house lay quiet in the morning sun. It didn’t look as if anybody was awake. No cop car there yet. No Raoul.

I tiptoed to the front door, got the key from behind the potted azalea and let myself in.

There was a white envelope on the floor. It looked as if it had been pushed under the door. I picked it up. Maybe it was another card telling me how great I’d been and what a tragedy it was that I hadn’t managed to save even one of them, either Pauline or Otis. I’d had four cards like that already, mostly from people in Dad’s church. Mom had propped them on the mantel. If only she knew.

I wasn’t even thinking police, or anything dangerous, because this envelope didn’t have a
dangerous look to it.
Brodie
was printed on the front. I pulled out the piece of lined paper inside and unfolded it. Printed on it in big block letters was one word.

TELL.

T
he inside of the house lay quiet in the gloom of drapes still closed. The red light on the answering machine by the phone winked urgently, on and off, on and off. Dad had probably put it on before they went to bed. I stared at it numbly.

My hand that held the piece of paper shook.

TELL.

The paper had been ripped from a ring binder and was ragged and torn at the edge, the holes torn away. Who had written it? In the silence I heard the thudding of my heart.

I folded the paper small and put it in my pocket with Pauline’s flip-flop, then ran up the stairs.

Alex was still asleep, quietly now, his face
to the wall. I hissed his name, but he didn’t move.

“Alex!” When I grabbed his shoulder, he mumbled, “What? What? Leave me alone.”

I shook his shoulder. “Hey.” He blinked and rubbed his eyes. “Where were you?”

“I went to the river.”

“What for? Why didn’t you wake me up?”

“Look!” I held the page in front of his face. “This was pushed under the door.”

He sat up, took the note, looked at it for a long time.

“Well?” I asked. There was panic in my voice and I heard it.

“You’re not going to, are you?” Alex asked at last.

“Not going to what?”

“Tell.”

I snatched the page from his hand and folded it back in my pocket. “I don’t know. Maybe it would be better. Somebody on the other side of the river saw us. She’s gone to the cops.”

“Who is this somebody?”

I shook my head.

“Don’t go off half cocked,” Alex said. He
caught hold of my wrist. “Look. I was with you. I’ll back you up. We’ll deny whatever. You wouldn’t believe what a good liar I am.”

I would, but I was too frazzled to say. Hannah hated liars. I hated them myself.

Alex scratched his head. “One time Jimmy McFarren…he’s in our gang…well, anyway, he took a watch off a drunk who had passed out at the bus stop. I was with him. Somebody saw and the cops came and I—”

“Shut up. Just shut up,” I whispered. “I don’t care about Jimmy whoever. Shut up about him.”

Alex shrugged. “OK, OK. I just want you to know I’ll never let you down. It’s like we’re brothers. I know we’re not. We’re only cousins, but maybe, you know, if I stay …”