You Were Never Here

by Kathleen Peacock

  I pass Sam in the downstairs hall on my way to the kitchen. “Is it my father?” I spoke to my dad a few days ago, an uncomfortable call that kept cutting in and out because he was on his way to a writers’ retreat upstate before flying out to California for meetings.

  Sam shrugs. “It’s some girl.”

  Lacey. My heart skips and then races. She must have gotten the number from Dad or found it online.

  Part of me wants to run for the phone; another part of me wants to head back upstairs and pretend I’m not home. It’s tempting to believe Lacey has had enough time to think and calm down—maybe even enough time to be sorry—but there’s this tiny voice in my head that says things can’t possibly be that easy.

  I force myself to walk into the kitchen. Taking a deep breath, I wipe my palms on my jeans and then lift the receiver. “Hello?”

  “Way to keep a girl waiting.”

  It’s not Lacey; the call isn’t even really for me. Relief and disappointment wash over me. I’m not sure which is stronger, so I try to tell myself that I don’t really feel anything.

  “Hang on, Skylar. I’ll get Aidan.”

  “Wait! I’m calling for you. Sorry. I didn’t know your cell number. I wanted to know if you felt like going to a movie? Tonight? With Joey, Chase, and me? I have the night off from work.” Before I can ask, she adds, “Aidan can’t come. He has an essay due for English Lit Rewind.”

  I hesitate. The idea of getting out of the house for a few hours is appealing, but I have a feeling that the more time I spend with Skylar, the more I’ll have to remind myself that friends aren’t something I want—or need—in my life.

  “Please? I know you don’t like horror movies, but this one is supposed to be really, really good. Like, seriously great. And it’s only five bucks to get in ’cause it’s cheap night. I’ll pay. I’m paying for Joey anyway.”

  There’s something sad and hopeful in her voice. That puppy-dog factor that makes me feel like I’ll be kicking her, somehow, if I say no. “You don’t have to pay for me.”

  “You’re coming?” She lets out an actual squeal. “Chase and I will be there in twenty minutes. Joey’s going to meet us downtown.”

  Any chance to change my mind is cut off with the click of the receiver.

  “That was amazing!” Joey lets out a wallop for emphasis as the four of us spill into the alley between the theater and a bridal shop. “AFUCKINGMAZING.” He throws his half-empty popcorn bag into the air.

  It may be the first time I’ve actually seen him smile.

  “Hey!” objects Skylar as we’re peppered by kernels.

  “Sorry, Sky.” He tugs her close, gently spins her around, and then carefully finger-combs the debris from her hair.

  Chase glances at me and rolls his eyes.

  I try to smile, but it feels tight around the edges. I tell myself that I am not missing out, that I am fine with the way things are, but there’s this tiny weight in the center of my chest as Joey frees the last bit of popcorn from Skylar’s hair. His fingertips skate along her temple, like touching her is the most natural thing in the world.

  I imagine what it would be like to touch someone—and be touched—without having to worry about what you’ll see inside their head. No matter how many times I have the thought, it almost always makes something inside my chest feel tight.

  Skylar turns toward me as Joey steps away. “Hey—are you okay?”

  “Yeah. Of course.” Without consciously thinking about it, I had raised a hand to my own temple. “Headache,” I lie. “It’ll go away in a minute.”

  The guys pull ahead of us.

  “I’m sorry about the movie,” she says. “I thought it would be better. Too many gags and jump scares and not enough depth.”

  “How would you change it?” I ask. It’s a question my father asks me every time I bail on a TV show or complain about a book.

  She bites her lip as she considers the question.

  Chase waits for us at the mouth of the alley. “You guys look serious.”

  “We’re trying to figure out how to fix the movie,” says Skylar, rocking up on her toes a little bit with each step.

  “What?” Joey stops in the middle of the sidewalk and turns. His glasses slide down to the tip of his nose; he pushes them up, absently. “You can’t fix something that’s perfect.”

  Chase snorts. “You think every low-budget, supposedly found-footage movie is perfect.”

  “I’ve never said that.”

  “No? Do you even remember your list of suggestions for the first, inaugural Montgomery Falls Horror Fest?”

  “Inaugural means first, idiot.”

  Chase glances at Skylar for confirmation. She nods, and his gaze turns beseechingly to me. “Sorry,” I say, shrugging. “Inaugural does, indeed, mean first.”

  Joey laughs, and the sound seems to trip and stumble. His laugh is as awkward as the rest of him. Even Skylar seems to cringe a little.

  “When is the horror festival?” I ask.

  “Last week in August,” says Chase.

  “I still say we should have timed it for Halloween.” Joey shakes his head. “Imagine watching Halloween on Halloween.”

  “Right,” says Skylar, “because sitting in the middle of the town square in October for five hours wouldn’t be cold at all.”

  Joey drapes an arm over her shoulder and tries to raise his eyebrows in a way that I can only guess is meant to be flirtatious. “You don’t think I could keep you warm?”

  Skylar blushes.

  Glancing up at the darkening sky, he says, “I have to get home. My old man’s been giving me grief about taking the car out. He thinks the cops are going to pull me over for the taillights, and he doesn’t want to get stuck with the ticket.” He glances at Chase. “You and your cousin can still take a look at it tomorrow, right?”

  Chase nods. “Yeah. Just bring it by around noon.”

  Skylar pouts, but she doesn’t try to convince Joey to stay; she just gives him a kiss and sends him on his way, slapping his butt as he turns. She watches until he rounds the corner, then spins back to Chase and me. “Where to now?”

  No one has any ideas—Skylar and Chase because they’ve already been everywhere about a million times and me because I haven’t been anywhere—so we end up going to McDonald’s, where Chase tries to set a new record for number of hamburgers consumed by a single varsity athlete in sixty minutes. Skylar buys me a Happy Meal, claiming I need sustenance and a toy. “Since Joey bailed, you’re my date,” she says.

  I try to give her the toy—a blue plastic bear from some kids’ movie that matches the pink one she got with her own meal—later, as we stand to leave. She hesitates, but her eyes light up. “Really?”

  I shrug. “Sure.”

  She beams and takes the toy from my tray. “Don’t tell anyone, but I really love this movie,” she confides. “I’ve seen it four times.”

  None of us really feel like going home yet, so we end up wandering and finally reach the old train bridge.

  Years ago, trains passed through Montgomery Falls every day. They stopped after the last mill closed. The tracks are still here, though, slicing the town in half, and the bridge is still standing. It spans the whole river—almost a mile—its iron beams slowly turning to rust.

  I guess pulling up the tracks and tearing down the bridge would be like admitting all those jobs and all that money are never coming back.

  I glance up at the bridge. Even though it’s no longer in use, light bulbs hang down from the overhead crossbeams at semiregular intervals. “Didn’t you say Riley saw a light up there before he disappeared?” I ask Chase, momentarily forgetting the things Aidan told me about Riley and Skylar and that maybe I shouldn’t mention him around her.

  “So?”

  “So, if the bridge is lighted anyway . . .”

  “Huh. I never thought of that.” Chase frowns and then brightens. “The ghost light would be moving. It would stand out. And it’s probably blue.”
r />   “Why blue?”

  “Blue is more ghostly. Ghostlier.”

  “You think the ghost is worried about its street cred?”

  Chase laughs. Unlike Joey’s laughter, there’s nothing awkward about the sound. It’s easy and good-natured. He pulls his ball cap out of his back pocket and slips it onto my head, not noticing how I tense up. “Why are you so interested in the light? Scared you’ll see something if we go up there?”

  “No.”

  “Good.” He grins and starts up the slope to the tracks.

  Skylar and I follow.

  “Ghostly glows aside, why bother lighting the bridge if there aren’t any trains?” The incline is steeper than it looks, and my voice comes out a little on the breathless side. “I don’t remember there being lights the last time I was here.”

  “The lights haven’t been up that long,” explains Skylar. “People thought they would be pretty.”

  “And they thought they’d be a good idea after Riley crashed his dad’s boat into the bridge,” says Chase as he reaches the top.

  “Seriously?” I remember the week his father had bought that boat. A “pleasure craft”—that’s what he called it. Big enough to carry twelve, with a little cabin underneath the deck.

  Riley took a bunch of people out on the boat after the Riverview Lions won a game back in November. Amber. The guys from the team. A few people from school. They were having a great time until Riley hit the bridge. The cops arrested Riley for—” He turns back to Skylar. “What was it, Sky?”

  “Property damage—though they weren’t exactly thrilled about all the drinking on the boat.

  “He was drunk?” No matter how much Riley might have changed over the past few years, I can’t imagine him being stupid enough to drink and get behind the wheel of anything.

  “Nah,” says Chase. “Everyone else was, but Riley practically never drank.”

  “You weren’t there? Aren’t you on the team, too?”

  Skylar pokes him as she reaches his side. “Chase was in the supply closet with an adoring Lions fan.”

  “It wasn’t a supply closet. Don’t make it sound so cheap.”

  As I reach the top, I lose my balance. Chase grabs my arm to steady me. Thankfully, I had pulled on a long-sleeved shirt before heading out. “Pretty sure Aidan will kick my ass if I let you tumble to your death.” He plucks his hat from my head. “And this one is my favorite. I don’t want to lose it.”

  I swallow. The drop isn’t that bad, but the idea that Aidan might be upset if I fell makes my heart speed up just a little, and as I follow Chase and Skylar to the wooden barrier that stretches across the mouth of the bridge, I can’t help but think of that night on the porch and the way Aidan had leaned down toward me.

  I tell myself that Chase is exaggerating, that Aidan wouldn’t really care. I remind myself that nothing could happen even if he did. Still, there’s a part of me that holds on to Chase’s words, wrapping them up and tucking them away to examine later.

  Even though it’s dark, the moon and the glow from the streetlights on the avenue below are enough to illuminate big black letters that spell out NO TRESPASSING and DANGER. There’s a gap underneath the words where someone has kicked in the bottom two boards of the makeshift wall.

  With his long legs and muscular arms, Chase just clambers over the barricade, but Skylar and I have to wriggle underneath.

  Even though the bridge is lighted, the bulbs are so few and far between that there are thick pools of shadows separating each small circle of light. Chase starts across, fearless, but I stay in place, staring down at the gaps between rail ties while I try to run a mental structural analysis on a bridge that’s been neglected for decades.

  If it was built to handle freight trains, surely it can hold three teenagers—even if one of them is on the chubby side.

  “Don’t worry,” says Skylar, picking up on my hesitation. She digs in her oversized purse and then hands me a large wrench, a ring holding about fifty keys, and a pack of wax crayons. “Hold these,” she commands, then shoves her hand deep into the bag. She comes up with her phone and turns on the flashlight function.

  “Do I even want to know what else you have in there?” I ask, gingerly slipping the wrench, keys, and crayons back into her bag.

  “I used to be a Girl Scout. I excelled at the whole always-being-prepared thing. Got a merit badge and everything.” She shines the beam from her phone over the spaces not covered by the small pools of light that dot the bridge. “Come on, Dorothy,” she says, catching the bottom hem of my shirt and giving it one quick tug. “Step onto the Yellow Brick Road.”

  What the hell, I think. What’s the worst that can happen?

  It’s cooler up here. The wind skims the water and then swoops up to wrap itself around us as we make our way across the bridge. Once we’ve covered almost two-thirds of the distance, I turn and glance back. Reduced to pinpricks of light, Montgomery Falls looks even smaller than it does during the day.

  If Riley told someone he saw the ghost light, does that mean he was up here the night before he disappeared, or would he have just seen it from below?

  Not that I actually believe in the ghost light.

  Chase walks to the edge of the bridge, to a gap between two support beams. At first, I think he just wants a better view of the water, but then he crouches down like he’s going to try to hang off the side.

  “What are you doing?”

  Skylar is looking in the other direction. At the sharp note in my voice, she turns and then curses.

  Chase just laughs. “Don’t think I can hang off the edge?”

  And here I thought Joey was the asshole of the group.

  Skylar passes me her phone, slapping it into my hand so hard that my palm stings. As she does—

  My back collides with a wall, hard enough to bruise. Hands slip under my skirt as I tug at someone’s shirt. A mouth against mine that tastes like beer and caramel. Someone I want. Someone I need. The body pulls back and I see a familiar face. Riley. And in the background, laughter and cruel words like the ones on the poster. They rise up like a tidal wave . . .

  The bridge comes rushing back. Somehow, I manage to keep my balance. Somehow, I manage not to drop the phone between the ties as Skylar grabs Chase’s arm and pulls him away from the edge.

  She hits his shoulder with her tiny fists. “You. Are. Not. Funny.”

  I think Chase grins. I think he says something, but I turn away too quickly to catch it. A wave of heat rushes across my face. Things inside tighten at the remembered sensation of a body against mine. It feels wrong. Not just because I saw something that should be private, but because of the taunts that followed. Because I didn’t just see Skylar’s desire: I saw her fear.

  I clench my left hand.

  I hate this.

  Keeping my back to Skylar and Chase, I stare out over the water, waiting for the stolen heat inside of me to fade. No wonder Lacey hates me, I think. No wonder Riley was scared of me.

  “Cat?” Skylar steps up next to me. “Chase was just being an asshole. He’s sorry. We’re sorry.”

  A faint headache blossoms at my temples. I know I should tell her that’s not it, that they didn’t do anything, but it’s easier to let her think that I’m mad at them than it is to try to explain what’s wrong. It’s safer.

  “It’s okay,” I say, taking the coward’s path as I run a hand over my face. I start to turn to Skylar, but the moon slips out from behind the clouds, and something at the edge of the water catches my eye. I try to shine the light from the phone toward it, but we’re too far from shore. The beam travels out over the water for a few feet and then scatters into the darkness.

  The phone beeps: a warning that the battery is low.

  “Skylar . . .” I bite my lip and then point to the northern bank. “Is that someone in the water?”

  Chase steps up beside us and squints into the dark. “Probably just driftwood.”

  But he doesn’t sound sure. Without dis
cussing it, we all start walking toward the north end of the bridge. We’re still several yards away when the glow from the moon shines enough light on the riverbank to see that the dark shape at the water’s edge definitely isn’t driftwood.

  I don’t know which of us starts running first.

  With his long legs, Chase beats us to the north barricade. This time, there isn’t any hole for Skylar and I to slip through. He laces his fingers, forming a step with his hands. He boosts us up, first Skylar, then me. My knee collides painfully with the top boards as I go over, and I almost fall as I come down on the other side.

  Chase hits the ground a few seconds after me. He pulls out his own phone and shines it toward the water. The riverbank on this side is muddy and choked with crabgrass and the roots of dead trees. Chase passes the light over the water’s edge, and I see it: a dark shape only half on shore.

  “It’s just garbage,” he says. He lets out a relieved laugh that cracks a little in the middle.

  I wait for the tightness inside my chest to unclench. It doesn’t. In my hand, Skylar’s phone beeps again. I start down the muddy slope, struggling to keep my balance. The beam of light flickers and then goes out as the phone dies.

  “Cat?” Skylar calls my name from the top of the bank. “It’s nothing, just leave it.”

  But the closer I get, the less like nothing it seems, until I’m close enough that even without the light from the phone, I can pick out a red shirt and a pair of high-tops.

  Eleven

  I STUMBLE THE REST OF THE WAY DOWN THE BANK ONLY TO lose my balance at the bottom and hit the ground hard. Chase is right behind me. In the glow from his phone, I catch a glimpse of a pale face and dark hair. A girl.

  It’s not Riley. Relief floods me as I push myself unsteadily to my feet.

  Skylar starts crying. Huge, panicked sounds.

  “Holy shit.” The beam from Chase’s phone shakes almost as badly as his voice. “Holyshitholyshitholyshit. It’s Rachel. Rachel Larsen.”