by Sarah Hogle
I raise my eyebrows.
“Meanwhile, here are these other ancient beings who just want privacy, and they’ve outsmarted us,” he goes on. “A giant middle finger to the assholes who’ve ruined their habitats.” He frowns, coming to a standstill. “I’m sorry for saying assholes.”
I shake my head, suppressing a laugh. “It’s fine.”
“I don’t like to swear in front of ladies.”
“It’s fine. I swear all the time. Anyway, you were saying . . . ?”
“I got carried away. I won’t curse again.” I throw him a dour look and he continues: “Okay, so these people who hunt for Nessie, who have their own TV shows dedicated to getting video evidence of the supernatural, it’s all a money grab. They desperately want to find them, for money and clout, but if they find Sasquatch, if they find Nessie, that means the end of those creatures’ way of life. They’d never have peace again. If they’re legitimate, scientists would get tons of funding to do a real search, forcing them out of hiding. It’s not in their best interest to be found—which means the hunters don’t care about these creatures, really. It makes me happy to think they’re out there existing, that they’ll never be found by those they don’t want finding them.”
“You don’t want to find them?”
“I do want proof,” he admits, “especially of the Loch Ness Monster. That’s my favorite myth; there’s a ton of evidence to back up its existence, and not just the existence of one, but probably more. Maybe even more than a handful. But, I only want proof because I really need to know these myths most of the world doesn’t believe in have gotten away with it. That they’ve pulled off the greatest trick ever, living so stealthily that they’ve become legends and to believe otherwise nowadays makes everyone skeptical. I want to believe there are still wonders out there left unspoiled.” His face hardens. “But I wouldn’t interfere. I wouldn’t so much as take a picture of a Loch Ness Monster. I’d never violate its right to privacy.”
“You wouldn’t tell anyone?”
“I wouldn’t tell a soul. Not a single soul, not for a billion dollars.” He glances at me, expression unsure. “You want to laugh.”
He is wholly misinterpreting my smile. I have never adored a speech more than I adore Wesley’s talking ardently about mythical creatures with longing in his gaze. I have never had reason to hope the Loch Ness Monster exists, and now I’m 100 percent invested. I need Nessie to be real, for Wesley.
“Not at all,” I assure him. “I believe in things, too. Like, all the UFOs that have been spotted? I think we probably have aliens walking around on Earth.” I shrug.
His eyes light up. “Right? It makes sense! I think extraterrestrials are here, too. Maybe hiding in plain sight, looking the same as we do, or possibly shielded from the visible spectrum by advanced technology. Or, the government has them in captivity but they’re not telling us because it’ll expose the inhumane experiments they’re performing on them.” He slows down. “Look.”
It’s the entrance to a caved-in mine. The mine’s drawn on the map, too, right next to the first X. It’s barbed-wired, boarded up with a rotted beware sign. I wouldn’t have noticed it, obscured by a mass of thorny vines.
I whistle. “Nice catch.”
We drop our bags and stretch our limbs, my muscles sore already. After I strike gold and become a billionaire, my first purchase is going to be a track extending all the way out here, with one of those San Francisco trolleys to go with it.
“So. Aliens. Area Fifty-One,” I mention as we forage with our noses to the ground. I’m pleased I can contribute more to the alien conversation, wanting to keep the topic alive when it brings out such a marvelously, talkatively zealous side of Wesley. It’s clear he’s given myths and conspiracies a lot of thought.
One side of Wesley’s mouth hooks back in a grin. He reaches toward me, hand grazing my chest as he touches the pendant on my necklace. It lasts only a second, then he lets go, gaze averted to the ground. As soon as I can breathe again (it takes several seconds), I touch the pendant myself and it hits me.
The engraved 51.
On this jewelry that I thought was Violet’s, since I found it under Violet’s bed, which was actually . . .
“This is yours!” I cry.
Wesley bites his lip to keep back another grin, but it escapes. “Yes.”
I gape at him openmouthed. “Why didn’t you say anything? I thought it belonged to Aunt Violet.”
“I know.”
“I thought it was for her—for her fifty-first anniversary or something!” I sputter.
“I figured. Violet bought that for me as a present. It was an X-Files key chain; we used to watch that show together.”
“And here I’ve been wearing it! Well, don’t I feel stupid.” I immediately reach for the back of my neck, fumbling with the clasp, but his hand shoots out, fingers closing over mine.
“No, keep it,” he tells me earnestly. “Please.”
I grumble, embarrassed. It’s good I can look away, busying myself studying the ground for any markers, any disturbances that might hint at treasure in the vicinity.
“I like that you wear it,” he tells me in a tone so soft and genuine that my chest cavity feels hollowed out. “For months, I wasn’t able to find it. Then one day, there’s that missing piece of my key chain around your neck.”
“Wesley.”
He stops. I raise my arm to a tree with a trunk curving into the shape of an S, the side facing us scratched with a large X at eye level.
Wesley stares. “Well, that was a lot easier than I thought it’d be.”
“No kidding. An actual X?” I glance from the tree to the map and back again. “They guessed the location with perfect accuracy.”
He unzips the outer pocket of his bag and withdraws a tool that resembles an oversized box cutter. Then he presses a button and waves it over the grass at the base of the tree. “What’s that?” I ask.
“Handheld metal detector.”
“Ooooohh, aren’t we a Boy Scout.” I’m teasing, but he nods in the affirmative.
“Eagle Scout.” He scans my face, adding wryly, “I was super popular in high school, as you can imagine.”
To look at him, you’d think he would have been super popular. A hot jock type. But Wesley Koehler isn’t anything at all that he seems.
Every new detail about him makes me want to know more. “Did you grow up near here?”
A small light on the metal detector flashes green as it beeps. He switches it out for a shovel, then juts a thumb. West, according to my compass. “In Stevenson, where my family still lives. You won’t have heard of it, it’s a very rural town.”
I’m amazed that he knows which direction is west without looking up. “I bet you were big into FFA in high school.” He definitely seems like the Future Farmers of America type.
“I got detention for being late to English all the time because I was taking care of other students’ plants in our ag class’s garden.”
“Giving those kids A’s they didn’t deserve, I bet.”
“Worth it. None of them knew anything about tomatoes.”
The tip of his shovel clinks against something underground. We lock eyes. “Aye, here be ye gold, matey,” I say, dead serious.
Wesley snort-laughs. We kneel, dusting dirt away, and wrench a dinged-up cookie tin out of the ground. Royal Dansk Danish butter cookies.
“Not quite a treasure chest, is it?” I observe doubtfully, the bars of gold in my mind shrinking down. Maybe it’ll be gold coins instead.
“Hey, I like cookies. I’ll take it.”
“Mmm, decades-old cookies.” I try to prize the lid off but it’s rusted shut. I hand the tin to Wesley, who pops its lid off in one easy motion. I’ll be honest, it makes me a little bitter.
“Well, it’s not cookies.”
It isn’t gold, either.
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I lift an art deco diamond ring from its bed—a faded washcloth—and twist it to catch the light. Wesley selects another piece of jewelry, an engagement ring with a large emerald flanked by two diamonds on a gold band. The third item in the tin is a diamond bracelet.
“Holy cow!” I exclaim. “I bet these are worth a crap-ton of money.” I pick up a small white card that has one line on it in gold typeface: We’ll always have Paris. “Interesting.”
Wesley eyes the card from opposite me, reaching for it. “May I?”
I hand over the card, trading him for the emerald ring. The metal is cold as I slide it over my finger, mentally pressing play on the scenario of standing on the Pont des Arts in Paris while a man on bended knee proposes to me with such a ring. Below us, the Seine glitters.
“This is extraordinary,” I murmur, trying on the bracelet. “We have to check the others. What if there’s treasure in one of the other spots, too?”
Wesley nods. “We should definitely check them all.”
* * *
• • • • • • •
IT ISN’T LONG BEFORE I’m regretting that bottle of water I chugged right before we left. I order him to stay put on the bank of a stream while I find somewhere to relieve myself. Paranoid he’ll see me from across a football field’s worth of distance, I get hopelessly lost in the weeds and don’t stumble my way back for thirty-six minutes. Wesley rises from his designated rock on the riverbank when I emerge, face white with panic. His hair is a mess, like he’s been running his fingers through it nonstop. I notice he has rerolled his sleeping bag to compress every molecule of air from it and tucked it into the top of his pack along with the many bells and whistles he’s also reorganized during my absence. “I was about to go looking for you! I was prepared to get slapped for it, too, depending on what you were doing when I found you, but there are bears around here. Don’t wander so far.”
I wield my trusty can of bear mace that I pray I won’t have to use, smiling. It hurts. My left cheek said hello to a briar a little too closely and got clawed. “I’m all good!”
“Here, you should put on more bug spray. It’s been a few hours.” Wesley starts fussing with Off! Deep Woods and a creamy green ointment that smells powerfully of mint. I wrinkle my nose as I slather it on, but it’s not good enough for Wesley and he makes me slather it on even thicker until I’m head-to-toe green goop. I’ve never felt so unattractive in my life. Wesley stands back, appraising me with satisfaction. “It’ll keep the ticks off you,” he says, painting himself into Shrek.
“I smell foul.”
“Better than getting Lyme disease.” He tosses me a canteen of water. Wesley puts conscious effort into avoiding single-use plastics and wouldn’t be caught dead with Aquafina. “Drink all of this, so that you don’t get dehydrated. We’ve got a long hike ahead.”
“Thank you, Eagle Scout.” I pat his shoulder in a friendly way. His shirt is damp with sweat. “You too, mister. Have a canteen.”
“I drank two of them while you were gone. Do you want to sit for a while? Take a break?”
“I’m ready to keep going if you are.” There’s no stopping me now. I’ve got gold fever. “Gimme that map.”
He gives me the map and a granola bar. “To keep your blood sugar stable until we stop for lunch.” He tries to be discreet about watching me eat it to make sure I finish the whole thing, but his long legs propel him at a brisker clip and being ahead of me, he has to keep twisting to see what I’m doing.
I can’t even pretend to be annoyed—it’s just so nice that someone cares. I peel the granola bar open, savoring it in tiny bites.
It takes close to two hours to reach the second X on the map, leading us to a long-abandoned rail yard. The metal detector is useless here, with scrap metal all over the place making it scream its head off. We toe aside unattached rails, pick up spikes and drop them into the weeds. Axles. Piston rods. A crushed lump of metal I’m calling a whistle, even if it isn’t. We complain about mosquitoes and how it shouldn’t be this warm so early in May until we’re sick of each other and ourselves. Then, marvel of marvels, I find our hard-won loot inside an old switch lantern with its blue lens busted out. Probably from all the rocks we’ve kicked.
“This can’t be it,” I say, holding up the treasure. It’s a cassette tape.
“Has to be. There’s nothing else here.”
Also, the only marking on the tape’s label is the letter X, in blue pen.
“Maybe it’s a decoy,” I reply slowly. “Maybe somebody got to this treasure before we did and replaced it with a cassette tape.” I can hear my incredulity. “For some reason.”
“Maybe it’s unreleased Beatles recordings,” he replies mysteriously.
I brighten, giving his forearm a series of rapid pats. “Hey! What if it isn’t music: what if it’s a secret murder confession?” I rack my brains, trying to remember where the Zodiac Killer lived. “Are there any famous unsolved murders around here?”
“Let’s keep going,” he suggests, plucking the tape from my fingers. “Maybe we’ll find something better at the next spot.”
We break for lunch on a soft hilltop, the heat of the day swelling to a crescendo. Our peanut butter and jelly sandwiches are warm and mushy, but I’ve worked up such an appetite that I inhale mine in three seconds flat. I didn’t pack enough water, so to ration it out Wesley offers to split a canteen. Every time it’s my turn to take a swig, I get the world’s most pathetic thrill out of knowing our mouths have both touched the same spot.
Getting up after my legs have had a chance to rest is torture. “Aghhhh,” I groan.
Wesley gives me a once-over. “You want to sit for a while longer?”
“Nope.” I meet his concern with obstinacy. “Unless you’re getting tired.”
“Pshhhh.” He grins, and off we go. I have to grit my teeth for the first few minutes, before my muscles loosen up and cooperate again. My back isn’t as compromising.
I shift the weight of my pack for the tenth time in as many minutes. Wesley’s slightly ahead of me, so he shouldn’t have noticed, but he tugs it off my shoulders, slinging it over one arm to lump my burden with his. I try to protest, but he shakes his head.
There are biting winds in my hollow chest cavity now. Sharp, silvery arctic winds. A crush’s physical effects are just as intolerable as the emotional ones.
We find the third X at two thirty in the afternoon, in a wishing well. It isn’t a proper wishing well. It’s a decorative lawn ornament, with cute wooden shingles and a charming bucket you can pulley up and down. When we come upon it, the bucket’s at the bottom. We crank it up, set aside clear plastic operating as a protective cover, and lift out two plastic-wrapped photographs.
One of the photos is of Uncle Victor, before he got sick, standing in front of the mirror that’s built into the white wardrobe in the living room. His clothing and the salt-and-pepper hair tell me it was taken in the eighties. He’s squinting with a Polaroid camera held up to one eye, flash brightening as he presses down on the shutter release. His other hand is in front of him, pointing down at the floor. The other photograph is exactly the same, identical down to the ghostly lens flares, except Victor’s pointing upward.
I get full-body chills.
“This is weird. I think Victor knew a little more about this whole treasure legend than he was letting on.” I shake my head in disbelief.
Wesley’s not studying the photos. He’s watching me. When I look at him, he scrubs his hands over his face, messes up his hair, and groans into his steepled fingers, “I have a confession to make.”
Oh no. For a moment, the possibility that this is all made up, that Wesley put these treasures here, floats to the surface. But then he shows me the card from the first treasure: We’ll always have Paris. There’s print on the back, which I didn’t look at before.
hollywood ice, finest celeb
rity imitation jewelry. the casablanca collection.
My jaw goes slack. “So the jewelry is . . .” I can’t bear to finish the thought.
He bites his lip, rueful. “Fake. Yeah.”
“Casablanca . . . That movie’s in Victor’s VCR.”
“Violet watched it every year on her wedding anniversary. I knew as soon as I saw the card that this must have all been planned by Victor. I’m thinking he buried it a long time ago, to lay the groundwork for a buried treasure urban legend. Either that or he thought of all this while he was sick and got someone to help him. A gift for Violet, to find after he died.”
“Oh.” I am feeling extremely stupid for getting so excited over the jewelry. The rings and bracelet are pretty, but they’re costume jewelry. Probably worth about fifty or sixty bucks, if they’re from a legitimate collector’s edition. “I thought it was real treasure.”
“I should have told you. It’s just that you might have wanted to turn around and stop looking, if you knew this wasn’t real.”
And he wanted to keep going?
I want to ask why. I’m afraid he’ll give me an answer.
Wesley tips up my chin with a fingertip, willing me to meet his eyes. They’re flooded with guilt, and if I weren’t already kneeling on the ground, that touch would have tripped me. But then he second-guesses it, letting go. “I’m sorry.”
“No, it’s all right. It’s . . . sad that Violet never found this.” After her husband died, she started filling up the house with junk to replace him. I think it’s likely that she didn’t put up a Christmas tree or ornaments ever again, so Victor’s surprise went undiscovered. I am horribly disappointed on his behalf, and devastated on hers. If she had known he’d left her something like this, maybe it would have changed her grieving process. Maybe she wouldn’t have built the hoard monster that bricked up the door to Victor’s bedroom, keeping his secret dormant until after her own death.
I gather up the rings and bracelet, the cassette tape, the photographs. “They are real, though,” I tell him after a while. “They’re not diamonds, but to Violet, this would have been better than treasure. And this was one of her dying wishes.” I stand up, slipping each piece carefully back into my bag. “We might as well see it through.”