I wanted to be mad at him because he intentionally kept things from me, but then he looked so helpless and pained. I knew I was going to have to put my feelings of doubt on the back burner and be there for him and make sure he was okay. Especially since I did drag him into the whole mess, or so I thought I did.
I ran my hand over his hair, which was one large, tangled, matted mess, and he let out a deep breath as if he knew I was going to be by his side. His skin felt hot, and sweat beaded down the side of his face. I suddenly felt terrible for even thinking he was faking his state to avoid the subject of our conversation.
A thought of my proximity to Mr. Pullman popped into my brain again. “Your dad used to own the house my mom and I live in, right?”
“Who told you that?” he asked, tapping his fingers on the steering wheel.
“My mom.”
He bobbed his head. “Okay, yeah, sure.”
“When was the last time someone rented the house? Was it empty when…?”
“They found that boy, yes.”
“What was your dad’s name?” I asked.
Mr. Pullman raised an eyebrow. “My dad?”
“Yeah.”
“What’s with all these questions? This boy got you brainwashed or something?”
“What? No.” I hadn’t the slightest idea what Mr. Pullman was talking about. “Just making conversation. Curious about some things with the house.”
“All right, there, Gabby. You better rest. You look pretty beat up yourself.”
I wanted to ask more questions, but it was as if his words made my body realize what it had been through. My limbs felt like noodles, and my eyelids began to droop.
Chapter Seventeen
Poor shocks woke me up. I lifted off the seat as we went over a speed bump. I was pretty sure I was out only for a couple of minutes, but it seemed like forever. Mr. Pullman pulled up in front of the ER entrance and put the truck in park. “Get out on my side of the truck. I might need some help with your friend.”
I nodded, and with much effort, Mr. Pullman rocked himself from side to side and extricated himself from the vehicle. Shimmying out, I followed him around the truck, where he opened the passenger side door, and Rusck almost fell right to the ground. Mr. Pullman caught him in time, and I ran over. The two of us pulled Rusck to his feet. His eyes fluttered open as we threw his arms around our necks.
“Gab,” Rusck whispered.
“We’re at the hospital.”
Rusck nodded and didn’t say anything else. Once in the ER, Rusck was quickly swept away, and I got shooed to the side to wait. I wanted to sit and go over everything, but I couldn’t fight my fatigue. Once again, sleep took over, and after a while, someone gently shook my shoulder to wake me up.
“Huh, what?”
“What’s your name, honey?” a nurse with an oversized grin asked me. She sat in the chair next to me with a clipboard in her hands and her legs crossed at the ankle.
“My name, what?”
“I’m going to help you start your paperwork, okay? Just a bit of basic information so we can have a look at you.”
“Me? Why? What’s wrong?”
“You’ll be fine. Probably just some stitches and possibly some fluids.”
“What?” I asked. It took a bit for me to catch on. I sat up straight, looking around. “Oh,” I said, suddenly remembering I was in the ER. “How’s Rusck?”
“The young man you came in with?”
“Yes, is he okay?”
“He should be fine.”
“Can I see him?”
“No, not yet, and we have to get you looked at first. Now, what’s your name?” the nurse asked again.
After another slightly confused second, the nurse dragged my name out of me and some other pertinent information so I could be properly admitted to the hospital. It turned out I did need stitches, eight at the top of my neck. I didn’t even realize I was bleeding, and they also stuck me with an IV because they said I was dehydrated. As I was getting all rehydrated, my nurse, who was named Nurse Ellen, came in and told me as soon as my mother showed up, I could go home.
“Can we take out the IV?” I asked, lifting my arm.
“In a little bit. First, there’s an officer right outside who would like to ask you some questions.”
“What?” I said, leaning up on the elbow of my free arm. “I didn’t do anything,” I said, trying to think if I actually did or not. I’d been so good for months. At least I thought I had been.
“No, honey, we know you didn’t, but any time a gunshot wound is involved, we have to call the police.”
“Because of Rusck. Is he really okay?”
“Yes. After you talk to the officers, you can go visit him, if you’d like,” Nurse Ellen said, flashing her vibrant grin again.
I nodded. “Okay.”
Later, my mom waited for me down in the lobby as I went to visit Rusck. I tapped on the doorframe to his room. The door was slightly ajar, and I heard his mom say, “Yes, come in.”
“Hi, Mrs. Almeida,” I said softly, walking into the room.
“Hello, Gabby,” she said, standing and giving the sleeping Rusck a kiss on the forehead.
“Is he gonna be all right?” I asked, even though I was already assured by Nurse Ellen that he was.
“Yes. He’ll have to stay here a few days, though. He was shot twice.”
I nodded even though I already kind of knew.
“Somebody shot my boy. Why?”
“I honestly don’t know,” I said, feeling a little guilty about not telling her the truth. I was tempted, but I didn’t know if Rusck would want me to. And with the sad look on Mrs. Almeida’s face, I was sure the truth would crush her. “The police said it was probably just a mistake.”
She nodded.
“But even though he got shot, he’ll be okay?”
“On his arm, most of them entered just under the skin and went right out. The doctor said there was a lot of tissue damage, but nothing that’ll kill him. He was also shot in the side, but I guess the shells break up or something, so there were a few spots where the pieces—I think they might be called pellets—penetrated, but he was lucky. They bounced off a couple of his ribs, fracturing them, but no serious damage.”
“Wow. What about his head?”
“He’s concussed, but he also has an infection, and the weird thing is it’s not caused by the injuries from today.”
“It’s not?”
“No, he has this large wound on his chest that got infected. We’re lucky we caught it. If not…” She paused, sucking on her bottom lip, her eyes becoming watery. “Do you know anything about that?”
“Uh,” I said, looking over at Rusck sleeping in his hospital bed with a cannula under his nose and an IV hanging out of his arm. I was at a loss; did I tell her the truth? But that would lead to more questions, so to be on the safe side, I answered, “No, I don’t know.”
“Okay.” She took a deep breath and looked down at her hands which she wrung together. “Only a couple minutes. It’ll be best to come back tomorrow.”
“Okay, I’ll be quick.”
Mrs. Almeida gave me a gentle hug and went to wait in the hall. I walked over to Rusck and grabbed his hand. “Hey, when you wake up, you have some explaining to do,” I whispered, just in case his mom was listening. I gazed at his sleeping face. He looked so peaceful and hopefully safe from whoever was hunting us down. I brushed my fingertips over his cheek. He had stitches from the middle of his left cheek over to his ear. Over the bridge of his nose was also a small line of stitches. “I talked to the police. I didn’t really say anything.”
I didn’t know what to say to the cop who came and talked to me. He just asked a few questions about what happened, and I told him Rusck and I were out taking a walk when someone started shooting at us, and that was about it. He asked me what the perpetrator looked like, and I gave him the description of the raincoat, but since I couldn’t see the face, it wasn’t much help. The cop
told me it was probably some dumb kid out hunting rabbits. I just nodded and went with the cop’s theory.
“Get better, okay?” I said, giving Rusck a kiss on the cheek.
***
The ride home was a quiet one. My mom was pissed that she had to leave work to come get me and sign off on my paperwork and stuff. She didn’t seem to care that somebody hunted down my friend and me in the forest, or that I had to get stitches, but that was my mother, a regular old bucket of sunshine.
“All right, I’ve got to get back to work,” she said, taking a swig from the gallon of milk in the fridge.
“No! You can’t leave me.”
“What is your problem, besides the usual?” She wiped her mouth with the back of her hand and put the milk back in the fridge.
“Were you not listening when I recapped my evening?”
“Yes, and you’ll be fine.” She dismissed me with a wave of her hand.
“No, please,” I said.
“It’s early in the afternoon. You’ll be fine. Call a friend tonight if you get scared.”
“Mom.”
“I’m leaving, Gabby. Here, order some food or something.” My mom reached into her purse that sat on the counter and pulled out her wallet. She plucked out a twenty and threw it down.
“Fine,” I said, snagging up the twenty before she changed her mind. It was rare that she gave me money, so I knew she must’ve felt at least a little guilty about going back to work.
“Ah, one more thing,” she said, going into the front room. I followed her, and she picked up an orange messenger bag. “Is this your friend’s?”
“Yeah, it is.”
“Well, the dumb nut left it just lying out on the front porch. I swung by the house before I went to the hospital, and there it was.”
“Okay, I’ll take it to him tomorrow,” I said, recalling him pulling it off before we went back into the woods and placing it down in front of the garage.
After my mom left, I popped a few meds for my head because it pounded like someone banged on a drum in there, and contemplated showering because I was sure I was a mess but opted to go plop down in bed instead—bringing Rusck’s bag with me. I sat on the edge of my bed, tossing his bag on the floor, but as soon as it landed, I picked it back up, placing it in my lap. For some reason, I knew I needed to look inside.
I flipped back the front flap and checked out the main compartment. There were a couple of textbooks, a folder, a bunch of loose papers, just school stuff, pretty much. Then I peeped in the other pockets on the inside. Some gum, a rubber band, pens, a handful of peppermint candies—those round ones you usually found in a dish on the counter at the doctor’s office—but once again, nothing much. Flipping the flap back over, I noticed on the front of the bag, concealed under a strip of fabric, was a zipper. I unzipped it and dug around inside, and much to my surprise, I found my phone. “What the…?” I said out loud to myself. I thought I lost it in the woods, but obviously, I didn’t, because there it was. Why in the hell was it in his bag?
Chapter Eighteen
I needed to think, so I went to hop in the shower, but first, I covered up my stitches with a waterproof bandage Nurse Ellen gave me in the ER. My stitches were not supposed to get wet for the first couple of days. I climbed in and let the water run over me, trying to gather my thoughts.
Rusck had my phone in his bag. Did he find it and pick it up before we even went into the woods? Did he purposely hide it, and if so, did he know somebody was going to meet us in the forest?
The other thing that truly bothered me was that Rusck left his bag near the garage. My mom said she found it on the front porch. Did the shooter find it and put there? That was the only explanation, really. And did the person who was shooting at us put my phone in Rusck’s bag? Maybe I left my phone behind, and they found it.
The other thing that concerned me was that Rusck chose not to tell me quite a few things. Why didn’t he want me to know certain information? Was he involved with some sort of cover-up of the murdered children? Because I felt certain that somebody—the person shooting at us—did not want us digging up the remains. Also, was the person with the shovel who threw the rock at Rusck the same person as the shooter? I had too many questions and not enough answers.
I slipped on some clean clothes and picked up my dirty ones, with something pinging to the ground as I picked up my jeans. I bent over to grab the little earring I found in the forest. I’d totally forgotten about it. Back in my room, I tossed my clothes in the corner—my form of a hamper—and put the earring on the set of drawers, sitting for a while on my bed doing nothing but staring at my phone. What did it all mean? In search of possible answers, I grabbed my laptop from the floor and powered it on. All I knew about what happened to Rusck’s brother was what he had told me, so I decided to research it further.
At first, it seemed to be pretty much all what he had told me already, with some photos of Creed looking happy. But as I read further into some of the articles, I kept coming across a line that went something like Creed Almeida’s brother, who was the last to see him before his disappearance, is the main suspect in the case so far. He was taken in for questioning but was later released. Wow, talk about skipping out on some details. Last to see him alive and a suspect, both of which Rusck failed to mention. Did Rusck not tell me, perhaps, because he felt ashamed, or was it for a totally different reason? Was he somehow actually involved? Did he know who was behind the murders and what was going on? I’d have to make sure I headed back to the hospital later. But wooziness took over, and I lay back on my bed, waking up wrapped in my comforter hours later.
It was nearly dark out. In the midst of still waking up, a cool breeze in my room raised the hair on the back of my neck. While pulling my comforter tighter around me, I got the distinct feeling that someone was in the room, and when I turned to look next to my bed, my heart temporarily stopped beating.
I wanted to scream at first, but I didn’t want to scare Kevin away, so I swallowed my pending scream in one large gulp. Seeing shadows, rabbit corpses possessed by spirits, hearing giggling in the night, those were one thing. But this was an actual, real, true, live spirit standing in my room, and even though I kind of knew him, it still scared the crap out of me. I opened my mouth but just choked on a lung full of air. Kevin looked at me with his head tipped and lips lightly pressed together. He looked like a hologram, almost, transparent with a bluish glow, but he still looked so real standing there like he was just some average fifteen-year-old who wandered into my room.
“Kevin,” I said out loud, sitting up in my bed. He nodded and gave me a forced smile. It wasn’t the brilliant smile from the photo in the paper. It was fake, like he was trying to conceal his sadness. Besides his sullen demeanor, he looked just like his picture, and he was wearing a pair of low-rise cargo shorts and a black band tee. I got over being scared because I soon became overwhelmed with sadness. The boy in my room, who looked so normal and cute, was dead. He was nothing but a collection of shimmering ions or molecules, energy, whatever it was called, caught between two worlds.
I sat on the edge of my bed, unsure what to do next. It was a situation I never ever dreamed I’d be in, so I just said his name again. In response, he looked down at the set of drawers next to my bed. He set his finger down near the earring I had found in the woods. He then reached up and touched his eyebrow.
“Wait a sec,” I said, standing. “Turn toward me.” Kevin did as I asked, and we were standing face-to-face, just inches apart. A chill ran through my body, and I let out a stuttered breath. I couldn’t believe I stood so close to him. Up close, his ghostliness didn’t seem as apparent, and it was like I stood in front of Kevin as if he was still alive. In essence, part of him was still alive, just not the part that stayed with the earth. It took me a second to recover my breath, and I said, “That’s yours, isn’t it?”
He looked down at me and nodded. As I looked into his eyes, he sucked on his bottom lip, glancing down. I reached up an
d placed my hand on his cheek, almost expecting my hand to pass on through, which it almost did, but there was a bit of resistance. Kevin looked back up and leaned his face into my hand.
“I’m going to help you as best I can,” I whispered like it was some sort of secret. He nodded slightly and reached out and touched my face. Another chill quickly passed through me, but then I was overcome with a feeling of warmth. We stood there for I didn’t know how long, our eyes searching, looking for some kind of understanding. It made me feel so much closer to him, as if I knew him before he passed. “There’s a vigil tonight,” I said after a while.
Kevin dropped his hand and scrunched up his nose.
“For you.”
He cocked his head to the side.
“A lot of people miss you. Maybe I could give the earring to someone? Or should I take it to the police? It might be evidence or something.”
He started vigorously shaking his head.
“No, to the police?”
He nodded.
“Should I give it to your mom?”
He nodded, and his face fell into a frown.
“Okay, it’ll be like a secret tip I give her. I can tell her to look in these woods too. Anything else you want me to tell her?”
Kevin bit his lip and raised an eyebrow.
“Well?” I asked.
He raised his right thumb to his lips, kissed it, and then waved it out and away from his mouth. I could feel my lip starting to quiver. It was so sad, knowing it was probably some secret little gesture between him and his mom. Maybe his way of letting her know he loved her. This time it was my turn to nod in response. I was afraid if I said anything, I’d start crying. With the gentlest of touches, Kevin pinched the tip of my nose. It was like when he touched my face, I felt it more on the inside. He smiled, an actual happy smile, and then disappeared.
I flopped back onto my bed to collect my thoughts. My head swirled. Kevin must’ve missed his family so much, and everybody missed him, wanted him to come back. The sad part was they all still had hope he was alive somewhere out there. I knew the truth. Did I tell it to his family, or let them still have hope?
The Answers Are In The Forest Page 11