The Deep, Deep Snow

by Brian Freeman

  She answered immediately when I knocked. Her face showed surprise that it was me on the steps. “Shel.”

  “Hey, Breezy.”

  “Everything okay? You don’t usually stop in here.”

  “I was passing by and saw the light. I thought I’d say hi. I don’t want to get in your way if you’re busy.”

  “No, it’s fine, come in. The only thing you’re interrupting is laundry.”

  She waved me inside. Pop music played on a cheap old boom box. The interior of the mobile home was compact and cluttered. I saw dishes stacked in the kitchenette sink and clean clothes folded in piles on the dinette table and reclining chair. She cleared a spot for me to sit down in the built-in booth. I spotted a couple of old photographs hung on the wall over the sink, including one of the Striker girls after our volleyball victory. We had our arms wrapped around each other’s shoulders. We looked very young.

  “I’ve got a couple beers in the fridge. You want one?”

  “No thanks, but you go ahead.”

  “I can afford beer, Shel. Really.”

  “Well, okay. Sure. Why not?”

  Breezy grabbed two cans of Miller Lite from her small refrigerator. She popped both cans and put one in front of me. Then she grabbed a folding chair and sat down, propping her bare feet on the table and leaning back until the chair balanced against the door of the stove. Everything inside the trailer was a tight squeeze.

  She wore shorts and a pink spaghetti-strap top. A toe ring with fake jewels shined on her left foot, and a tattoo snaked up her ankle. She wore her hair long and straight the way she always had, but she’d stopped using highlights a while back and let it stay her natural brown. It was loose around her shoulders. Her pockmarked face was winter-pale. She took a swig of beer and then grabbed a remote control and turned down the volume on the boom box so that the music was soft in the background.

  We drank together for a few minutes, and Breezy did most of the talking. The air in the trailer was warm, and so was the beer. I hummed along in my head to the song that was playing, “Iris,” which had always been one of my favorites. When a T-shirt slipped off Breezy’s pile of clean clothes, I folded it and put it back.

  “Anything going on with you, Shel?” she asked after a while, because I hadn’t said more than two words while we were sitting there.

  “I’m just tired.”

  “Well, you must have had a hell of a day. This whole thing with Jeremiah is something else, huh? After all this time?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Do you know anything more yet?”

  “No, it’s too early to tell.”

  Breezy looked at me the way a friend does who’s known you for a lot of years. “You sure nothing else is wrong? You don’t look so good.”

  I shrugged. “Anna.”

  “Ah.”

  “She was over at Will Gruder’s place. We had another argument. Whatever I do, I seem to make things worse between us.”

  “That’s not you, Shel. It’s her. You can’t fix what that girl’s been through. Believe me, it’s easy to get screwed up even when you’ve got two parents. I can’t imagine losing your mom as a kid. But hell, why am I telling you that? You never even knew who your mom was. Or your real dad, for that matter.”

  “Yeah.”

  “I don’t suppose you ever get over that.”

  “No. You don’t. That’s why I know what she’s going through, feeling angry, feeling abandoned. I thought maybe it would give us some common ground, but it hasn’t worked out that way. We were so close when she was a girl, but not now. I can’t reach her.”

  “Well, kids are tough nuts to crack.”

  “I know.”

  “You’re the best thing in her world. Don’t give up. She’ll come around.”

  “I wonder.” My eyes drifted to the volleyball team photograph over her shoulder. I was ready to change the subject. “So I saw Violet today. She was up at the resort with Ellen Sloan.”

  “Yeah, I saw the media parade. I figured she was in town.”

  “She acted like we hardly knew each other. She kept calling me ‘Deputy.’”

  “Still the same stuck-up Queen Vi.”

  “That’s her.”

  Breezy winked. “You know, I can tell you a juicy story if you want. If you can take off your cop’s hat for a minute.”

  “What is it?”

  “Vi and I did coke together once in high school.”

  My mouth fell open. “Are you kidding? Violet?”

  “Yeah. In the locker room.”

  “That’s hard to believe. She’s such a straight arrow.”

  “Not always. It wasn’t even my idea. It was her stash, not mine.”

  “And you never told me?”

  “We kept you out of it because of your Dad. Nobody else knew. We didn’t want to get kicked off the team.”

  “Where did she get it?”

  “I don’t know. If you wanted anything back then, it wasn’t hard to find. Some things never change. Actually, you want to know the real dirt?”

  “What?”

  “I hear Ellen had a pretty serious drug problem, too. Pills.”

  “Who told you that?”

  “Dennis.”

  “You still see him?”

  “Oh, I throw him some pity sex now and then. He’s not a bad guy. Nothing’s really been the same in his world. Losing Jeremiah. Losing Ellen. Leaving his job. I feel sorry for him. Anyway, he swears Ellen was a pill-popper for years. Who knows, maybe she still is.”

  “Or it could be a man talking crap about his ex.”

  “Yeah, well, it’s hard to say. Vi and Ellen are both pretty tight-assed. I suppose they’ve got to unwind somehow.” Breezy tilted the can to her lips again and then wiped her mouth. “I miss this, you know. You and me dishing.”

  “Me too.”

  “We should do it more.”

  “Yes, we should.”

  Breezy slapped her chair down on the floor. “Hey, can I tell you something funny? Since we’re sharing dirty secrets. I’m not exactly proud of it.”

  “What?”

  “I hooked up with a guy at the Witch’s Brew last week. Out-of-towner. He came over here, and we did it, and he snuck out in the middle of the night. Guy left fifty bucks on the table. Can you believe that? He thought I was a hooker.”

  “Oh, crap.”

  “Yeah, at first I felt like a slut, but then it made me laugh. It’s not like I didn’t keep the cash, too. I’ll tell you what, it made me think. People always say you should find a way to get paid for doing what you love.”

  “Breezy. No.”

  She laughed at me. “Kidding. I’m kidding. I love shocking you, Shel.”

  I laughed, too. It felt good to laugh. I hadn’t done enough of that lately.

  We spent the next half hour making jokes the way we had back in high school. I didn’t think about Anna or Dad for a while, which was a relief. I only had the one drink, but I was relaxed enough to feel a little bit drunk. We were both grinning like teenagers when we saw headlights spray across the front window of the trailer. I heard the growl of a car engine and tires pushing through the slush outside. Breezy got up and peered through the blinds.

  “Well, look at me, all popular tonight.”

  “Who is it?”

  “Adam.” She swung open the door, letting in frozen air that brought goosebumps to my skin. She put up her hands in surrender. “Is this a raid, Sheriff? Two cops showing up at my door in one night?”

  Adam climbed the steps, making the trailer shake. He had his hat off, and his face was red with cold. He slid off his brown leather gloves and shoved them in his pocket. “I saw Shelby’s cruiser. I figured I’d better see what the two of you were up to.”

  “Girl time,” I explained.

&nb
sp; “I’m out of beer,” Breezy told Adam, “but I’ve some got whiskey in a cabinet if you want some.”

  “No. Thanks.”

  The strain of the day showed in Adam’s tired eyes. He rubbed his hands through his messy brown curls. His boots tracked melting snow on the floor. I squeezed over in the built-in booth to give him room to sit down, but he stood awkwardly where he was.

  “Do you need anyone up at the resort tonight?” I asked.

  “No, I’ve got it covered.”

  “Did you say anything to the press?”

  “Yeah, Ellen and I made a statement. She said the usual things, hoping this is the break we’ve waited for, praying for answers, you know the drill.”

  “Sorry about the FBI.”

  “I saw it coming.”

  Breezy put up her feet again and rocked back and forth. “So Jeremiah was over at the Mittel Pines Resort after he disappeared. Wow. You know that means whoever took him had to drive right by my trailer. That’s creepy. If I’d looked out the window, I would have seen him go by.”

  “Did you see anyone?” I asked curiously.

  “Oh, no.”

  “No strange cars coming or going?”

  “I doubt I’d remember if I did, Shel. I was barely home for days after Jeremiah disappeared. I was putting in double shifts at the diner. Those first few nights, I didn’t get back here until midnight. Still, it’s weird that the kid was so close to me, and I never knew it. It makes me sad. Like I should have done something to save him.”

  “Do you remember anything else?”

  “Hey, come on, are you kidding? It was ten years ago.”

  “I know, but what about the Gruders? Do you remember anything about them? It’s an interesting coincidence that they live so close to the resort where Jeremiah was taken.”

  “Well, yeah, but snatching a kid wasn’t their thing. Look, Shel, I know you’re not happy about Will and Anna, but I can’t see those boys doing anything to Jeremiah. Adam, you talked to them, didn’t you? Did you see anything weird going on?”

  Adam shot me an impatient look. “Shelby and I both talked to them at the school that afternoon. They were playing basketball. I can’t see them kidnapping Jeremiah, taking him thirty miles to an abandoned resort near their house, and then coming all the way back to Everywhere to shoot some hoops. It doesn’t make sense.”

  He was right. It didn’t make sense. And maybe Breezy was right, too. I was just looking for a reason to pry Anna away from Will Gruder.

  I stood up from the booth. “Well, I better get home. Monica’s hanging out with Dad, and I need to rescue her. Thanks for the girl talk, Breezy.”

  “Any time.”

  “I should go, too,” Adam said. “Breezy, don’t beat yourself up about Jeremiah. There’s nothing you could have done.”

  “Yeah. Thanks.”

  We opened the trailer door. Old Man Winter waited for us like a ghost with frigid breath. I took one step down into the cold, but then I stopped and turned around as I thought of something else. I was reluctant to ask the question with Adam standing between us, because this was something better shared friend to friend. But I needed to find out anyway.

  “Hey, Breezy? Listen, I don’t mean to put you on the spot.”

  “What is it?”

  “Well, there were a lot of strangers in town those first few days after Jeremiah disappeared. Media people. Out-of-town cops. Volunteers. They were big tippers over at the diner.”

  “Yeah. So?”

  “So I was wondering if anyone came out to Witch Tree with you after your late shifts.”

  Breezy didn’t react well to what I was implying. She opened her mouth as if to fire something back at me, but then she stopped. Her face pinched into a strange, unhappy expression as she looked back and forth between us. I knew I’d crossed a line by not waiting to talk to her in private. It’s one thing to joke about easy sex, it’s another to have your friend ask you about it in front of a man. I saw Adam flinch, as if he’d wandered into the middle of a shooting match and figured he’d better duck.

  “Why do you care who came home with me? Jeremiah was already gone by then.”

  “I know, but if someone was out here with you, we should probably talk to them. Just in case they saw anything. Like you said, this is the only road out to the resort.”

  “Well, there are so many men, Shel,” Breezy said sourly. “What makes you think I’d even remember?”

  “I’m sorry. Look, I’m not judging you. I would never do that. This is just routine follow-up.”

  Adam played the good cop, which, of course, made me the bad cop. “We’re not trying to pry, but Shelby’s right. If you came back here with someone, you should really tell us who it was.”

  “Really, Adam? You think that’s what I should do?”

  “He could be a witness and not even know it.”

  Breezy shook her head. “Well, sorry, the answer is no. I was working late every night, I was tired. Nobody came out here with me. Got it? Now you can both go.”

  I wanted to say something else to make it right, but for now, there was nothing more to say. I’d made a mistake and offended a friend. Adam put a hand on Breezy’s shoulder and thanked her and murmured an apology. Then the two of us tramped down the trailer steps into the snow, and she slammed the door behind us. We stood by our cars as the freezing cold stung our faces.

  “That was awkward,” I said. “Sorry.”

  “Yeah.”

  “I had to ask.”

  “I know. You were smart to check.”

  I didn’t say anything more. We both got into our cars. I waited while Adam started his engine and drove into the night. I looked at the trailer and thought about going back to the door to confront Breezy again, but all that would do was make things worse.

  Even so, I knew the truth. Girlfriends always do.

  Breezy was lying.

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  I found my father staring into the flames of a roaring fire when I got home. The fireplace took up most of the north wall of the great space in our house, and he’d built it himself brick by brick. There were no lights on in the room, just the fire’s orange glow. He sat in a Shaker chair, his back straight, his feet flat on the floor, his hands on his knees. I didn’t let him know I was there. I watched from the wide arched doorway and wondered where he was and what he was thinking about.

  Monica came up behind me. She was drying her hands on a kitchen towel. She took off her big glasses and wiped away water spots and then repositioned them carefully on her face. The glasses made her eyes look twice their size. She wore the yellow polka-dot apron that I’d given to my father when I was nine years old. It looked ridiculous on him, but on Monica it seemed to fit, even though it was so big that she looked like she was wearing a bed sheet.

  “We had spaghetti,” she squeaked. At almost sixty years old, she still looked and sounded the way she had my whole life. She was as sweet and perfectly preserved as strawberry jam.

  “Did Dad eat?”

  “Yes, he needed a little help with it. He wasn’t too happy about that.”

  “His pride hasn’t gone away, that’s for sure.”

  “I think I’d feel worse if it had. I did laundry, by the way. I figured you wouldn’t be up for it when you got home.”

  “I don’t know what I’d do without you, Monica.”

  “Oh, please. There’s nowhere I’d rather be.”

  “Is Anna back?”

  “No. I haven’t seen her.”

  I tried not to let my frustration show. I had no idea whether Anna would come home at all. She knew I needed her help, but that didn’t mean anything to the girl. I thought she might stay out just to spite me.

  “Are you hungry?” Monica asked. “There’s still some pasta.”

  “I can heat it up my
self. You should go home. You’ve got a long drive.”

  “Only if you’re sure you don’t need anything else.”

  “I’m sure.”

  Monica untangled herself from the extra-large apron and handed it to me along with the kitchen towel. She grabbed her winter coat from the hall closet, then retrieved her satchel purse and Moody’s flowered urn from the table near our front door. I waved at both of them, and Monica giggled and left. I felt bad that she still had to drive an hour to get home. With me and Dad depending on her, she didn’t have much of a life for herself.

  I went into the kitchen and heated up a small bowl of pasta and sauce in the microwave and ate it quickly at the table. Then I joined Dad in the great space that had once been the church sanctuary. Sometimes he played music in the evenings, and sometimes he preferred silence. This was a silent night. The crackle of burning wood was enough to occupy him. Even on a January evening under a high ceiling, the fire made the room so hot that I began to sweat. My father didn’t seem affected by it at all. His face had the same suntanned glow it always did.

  “Hi, Dad,” I said as I pulled over a chair and sat down next to him.

  “Hello, Shelby. How was your day?”

  “Oh, fine.” Then I stopped biting my tongue and decided to be honest with him. “Actually, no, that’s not true. It was a pretty tough day for all of us. Do you remember Jeremiah Sloan? The boy who disappeared?”

  “It was last summer, Shelby. I’m not likely to forget it.”

  In fact, it had been ten long years, not six months, but I was glad that Dad knew who Jeremiah was. His mind operated like a time machine with a bug in its programming. You couldn’t tell where it would carry him next. Whenever my father went traveling, he came out at a different moment of his life. Sometimes the moments were enveloped in fog, and sometimes they were crisp and clear. And you never knew how long any given moment would last.

  “Well, it looks like someone took Jeremiah to that old abandoned resort out near Witch Tree. Mittel Pines. We still don’t know what happened to him. The FBI is coming back into town to run the search.”