Burn Our Bodies Down

by Rory Power

  “And where’s that?” Connors says it idly, like maybe we’re just talking.

  “Calhoun,” I say. “Southeast of here.”

  Connors nods. “I know it. I’ve been a couple times.”

  A lie. Nobody goes to Calhoun.

  “You’re new to town, then?” he continues, like he’s the head of Phalene’s tourism board.

  I try to keep my face relaxed. He can’t see that I’m nervous. He’ll think it’s guilt.

  I saw someone out there. I went in. That’s all. It’s obviously not all to them, though. The fire, and a body they’ve never seen. A girl with my face. They think I did it. Or we did.

  But she can’t be a stranger in this town. There’s no way. She has to belong to Gram, to Fairhaven. I just don’t understand how, yet.

  “Sorry,” I say. “I just . . . Who do you think she is? You must have seen her before, or—”

  Anderson frowns, holds up his hand to forestall me. “We’re the ones asking the questions right now, not you. And I’m asking you when you got here.”

  There’s no way I can convince him I had nothing to do with the fire. Not until I’ve answered every question, proved I have nothing to hide.

  “This morning,” I say. “I told you that before.”

  “What time?”

  I glance between the two officers, catch Connors watching me with a wariness. Like I’m the ghost of the girl who died out there in that fire. Maybe I am.

  “I . . .” I don’t know. But I can’t say that, can I? And I don’t know when the fire started, and I don’t who that girl is, or how she got out there, and there are too many traps I could be walking into. I take a deep breath. I can try to answer this. At least we’re talking about the slice I understand, so small in the face of everything I don’t. “Midmorning, I guess. Maybe eleven?”

  “And you were alone?”

  Not technically. Mom taught me that even the smallest thing can be called a lie. “I got a ride in from—”

  “Yes or no will do,” Anderson interrupts.

  “Then yes. I arrived alone.”

  “Anybody see you?”

  I look out the conference room window to where Eli’s sitting at Anderson’s desk, Tess behind him, kneeling on a rolling chair and pushing herself down the aisle. They don’t care at all. This is nothing to them, no matter what Tess told me out there about being on my side.

  “They did,” I say, nodding toward the window. “They were in the square when I got here.”

  Anderson scoffs. “It’s not a good sign when you’re calling on Theresa Miller for an alibi.”

  “I wouldn’t know,” I snap. I can hold on and hold on, but when the rope breaks, it goes all at once. “Why don’t you just ask me what you’re really asking?”

  “And what’s that?”

  “Whether I set that fire. Hell, whether I killed that girl.” I settle back, cross my arms. “By the time I got to the fire, it had already started, and by the time I got out into it, she was dead. Whoever she is and whatever happened, it has nothing to do with me.”

  Anderson’s palm hits the table with a crack, and I jump. “Don’t bullshit me.”

  I grit my teeth, meet Anderson’s gaze steadily. If this is Nielsen business, then it’s mine, not his. He can pry all he likes, but I’m not letting him in. Not before I’ve had a chance to find the family I’m after.

  Connors pinches the bridge of his nose. “Jesus,” he says. “The apple doesn’t fall far, does it?”

  I don’t know what he means, but I smile anyway, and I say, “No, it really doesn’t.”

  Anderson gets up, his body blocking the light, blocking the window, and I reel back, before a voice comes from the lobby, muffled but still sharp enough to cut through the air between us.

  “Excuse me,” I hear. “Where?”

  I watch as the two officers make the same face—disgust, exhaustion and something else I don’t recognize. Something that comes with knowing a person.

  “Speak of the devil,” Connors says under his breath.

  “Damn it.” Anderson steps away from the table and scrubs one hand over his buzz cut. “I didn’t want her yet.”

  I twist around in my chair. Through the conference room window I can see Tess and Eli jump to their feet as a woman comes bursting through. She’s tall, as tall as Mom, dressed in pale blue jeans and a flowered button-down with the sleeves rolled up. Silver hair, long and swinging, and skin striped with wrinkles, with sunburn and tan.

  “Theresa,” I think she says, and Tess nods back, pointing to the conference room, otherwise lost for words, which doesn’t seem like a thing that happens very often.

  That’s when the woman turns. Looks at me through the window and smiles, smiles, smiles so wide it lifts me off my feet.

  I know you, I think. And you know me.

  When she comes in the door, she smells like smoke, and there’s dirt tracking behind her, clumped on her boots, staining the hem of her jeans. I can’t take my eyes off her, can’t help the slight reach of my hand as she steps into the conference room.

  “Gentlemen,” she says. The voice from the phone. It’s her. “Just what the hell are you doing with my granddaughter?”

  Seeing the body out on the highway was one thing. My face, still and empty and gone. Seeing my grandmother is another.

  We look alike. Exactly alike. It shouldn’t be a surprise—Mom and I match each other just the same way—but after this morning, it is. To see life there, to see her muscles shift under her skin. Nielsen women, just like the clerk at the pharmacy said. You look just like them. He’s right. I do. This is how everybody knows what I am.

  “Gram,” I say, barely more than a whisper. Her eyes flick to mine, with just a hint of the smile she gave me through the window.

  It’s not enough. I don’t know what could be—a hug? A sigh of relief? Tears? I don’t get any of those. But there’s a certainty in her I’ve never seen in Mom. She’ll handle this. I don’t know her, but I trust that much.

  Across the table, the officers are side by side, Connors pale and strained while Anderson puffs up with indignation.

  “You can’t just barge in here, Vera,” he says, his fingers hooked in his belt loops, elbows sticking out.

  “And you can’t just keep my granddaughter for no reason,” she replies easily, looking away from me at last. I hope she never calls me anything but that. Her granddaughter. Hers. “She’s a minor without an adult. You’re lucky I got here before either of you took this too far.”

  “This is serious,” Anderson says. “There’s another fire on your land—”

  “Yes, thank you,” Gram says. “Of that I’m aware.”

  “And we’ve got two girls nobody can account for.”

  “I only see one,” Gram says. “And I can account for her just fine.”

  I start to smile before I remember where we are. Why I’m meeting her like this.

  “That’s because the other’s dead,” Anderson says. “She’s one of yours. No getting around that. You really think we wouldn’t recognize her?”

  I watch her for it, for a sign that he got it right. That the girl in the field belongs to her. It’s the simplest way to explain this—me with Mom, and my sister with Gram. There’s nothing, though. No guilt she has to bury, no surprise she has to cover. She just frowns and says, “It’s a shame someone died, certainly. But I don’t see why she has to be mine.”

  “We found her on your land, Vera. You been keeping her to yourself?”

  It’s bait, but Gram doesn’t take it. “You hear all sorts of stories about young girls these days,” she says smoothly. “Drifters. Runaways.”

  Anderson scoffs, and for once, I agree with him. She has to be lying. There’s no way that girl came from anywhere but her house, on her land. “You’d know a thing or two about runaways, wouldn’t you?” he says. “About all of this. Good thing I’ve got all my dad’s old case notes in storage.”

  He has to mean Mom, Mom and the first fi
re. Anderson’s dad must have worked that case, and now here we are again. Everything fits together—Anderson is right about that. I just wish I could see the picture it’s supposed to form.

  “You’re more than welcome to get involved with all that again,” Gram says. “But it did your father very little good, as I’m sure it’ll do you.”

  “Really?” Anderson says. “That’s the angle you’d like to take?”

  “I don’t have an angle,” Gram says, as though she’s disappointed in him for even suggesting it. “I wish I could help you, but if you’re going to insist on speaking to me this way, I really don’t see how that’s possible.”

  It brings me up short, how flat she sounds. How utterly untouched. I wish I could be like that. I wish I could take what I’ve seen, take my questions and lock them all away. But Gram has to know what’s going on. Sure, she’s lying to the police, but she’ll tell me the truth when we’re alone. Right?

  “Look, there doesn’t have to be any fuss,” Connors says, making a half-hearted attempt at warmth. It seems a bit late for that. “If one of you would just tell us what happened, we could close this all up. But your granddaughter doesn’t seem to want to help us.”

  Help? That’s not what any of this has felt like. But I don’t have to worry. Gram isn’t fooled.

  “What you need,” she says, “is a scapegoat, and you will be finding one elsewhere.”

  A swell in my chest, bright and sweet. Someone’s finally fighting for me. Someone’s taking the weight from my shoulders and bearing it themselves. Is this how it’s supposed to be?

  “There’s no need for a scapegoat,” Anderson says, heated. “Your name is written all over it. What are you hiding, Vera? What were you doing this time?”

  I look at Gram, wait for an answer. Anderson’s asking her the questions I want to.

  “Honestly, Thomas, this is all a bit much, don’t you think?” Gram says, and his face goes bright red. She smiles at me. “Margot is visiting me for the summer, and she just arrived. That’s all.”

  For now, anyway. At least until it’s just us.

  “So she spent her first day at the scene of a crime?” Anderson says. “Some summer visit.”

  “What crime do you mean, exactly?” Gram raises her eyebrows, and doesn’t wait before continuing. “My farm caught fire, and unless you would like to call that arson—”

  “We might.”

  “Then go ahead. Charge Margot. Charge my granddaughter for setting fire to her grandmother’s land.”

  “She’s not who we’re after here,” Anderson says, glowering.

  “I’m glad to hear it,” Gram says lightly. “Well then. That’s that settled. And as for this other girl, it’s a tragedy, surely, but that is, in fact, the only thing you can say with any certainty.”

  It’s impressive. How polite she sounds, how little ground she gives. If I hadn’t seen my own face on that body, I wouldn’t hesitate to believe her.

  “We can say something else, too. She’s a Nielsen, through and through.” Anderson lifts his chin, and for a second he and Gram just look at each other. “Maybe we don’t have enough yet. But we will soon.”

  It’s a threat. But Gram doesn’t seem to care. “Looking forward to it,” she says with a cheery smile, before holding out her hand to me. “Come on, Margot.”

  “You can’t just take her,” Anderson says. “She’s got no ID. You have no proof of guardianship. Until we contact her family—”

  “You said it yourself. She’s a Nielsen. I’m her family.”

  It’s the best thing I’ve ever heard, and it burns up my questions, pulls me out of my chair, draws me to her side. I would go anywhere for that. Do anything.

  She looks down at me then, reaches out and sweeps my hair back from my temple, showing the gray streak there. She smiles faintly. “Just like,” she says.

  Like her? Like Mom? Like the girl in the fire?

  It should matter more to me, I think. It should scare me. That if anybody knows anything, it’s her. But nothing’s going to keep me away.

  “Margot’s coming home with me,” Gram says to the officers, her hand still brushing my temple.

  Anderson and Connors let me leave. I don’t think there’s anything else to do in the face of a force like Gram.

  Tess and Eli are still waiting in the bullpen. Eli’s just behind Tess, and he’s watching me with a sort of bland curiosity. Tess, on the other hand, looks absolutely delighted. I remember how she sounded, talking about Phalene, talking about how boring it was. Some entertainment at last. It makes me a little ill.

  Gram stops in front of them, barely acknowledging Eli before focusing on Tess. “I would say it’s nice to see you, Theresa, but it decidedly isn’t under these circumstances.”

  Tess shrugs, playing it easy, but I can tell she’s on edge under Gram’s scrutiny. “Hopefully you’ll see me in better ones soon.”

  “Oh dear,” Gram says mildly. “That sounds ominous. Let’s go, Margot. Some alacrity, please.”

  For a moment I try to imagine Mom saying the same thing, and I nearly laugh. We might look the same, but if Mom got anything else from Gram, I can’t see it yet.

  “I guess I have to go,” I say to Tess. “But—”

  She waves me away. “You’ll see me. We’re neighbors now.”

  “Yes,” Gram says as she leads me away. “And aren’t we lucky?”

  Gram doesn’t speak again until we’re out of the station, me rushing after her through the parking lot toward a weathered pickup truck. I chance a look behind me to see Officer Anderson lingering in the doorway, watching us.

  “Ignore him,” Gram says, and I jump at the sound of her voice. Almost like Mom’s. Almost familiar, but not quite. “They’re all the same. If they see a chance to knock me down, they’ll do it however they can. It’s been like that for years.”

  I wish it were as simple as that. A grudge held and unearned. It’s not, though. That girl was real, and she must have come from Gram. There’s no other explanation.

  I get into the truck. I can feel every inch of my skin, every press of the seat belt. It hurts. All of it hurts. The blisters from the fire, the stares of the police officers. And Gram, meeting me finally and being nothing like what I thought I wanted, simple and sweet and easy.

  “Your mother’s not with you?” Gram says brusquely as she throws the truck in reverse and rolls the windows down. Like I really am just visiting for the summer. I don’t know how she can pretend everything’s normal.

  “No,” I say. I don’t want to talk about Mom right now. “She didn’t want me coming here in the first place.”

  We peel out of the lot so fast I careen into the door, let out a hiss as some of my burn blisters pop. She turns onto the road bordering the town square, and I glimpse a few of Tess’s friends from this morning, back at the fountain, stretched out to tan. But then Gram’s leaning on the gas and we’re out of Phalene proper almost before I can blink. Like everything at the station never happened.

  “Why not?” Gram asks.

  I can barely hear her over the wind coming in through the open windows, and it takes me a minute to remember what she’s talking about. Do I want to be honest and tell her how far Mom went to keep her—her and that girl in the field—a secret? I doubt it’ll be a surprise. Not with what I’ve seen today.

  I decide on something neutral. A shrug, and I say, “Just how she is.”

  Gram laughs, a cracking, unruly sound. “That’s an understatement, Mini.”

  “Mini?” My first thought is that she’s insulting me somehow, in a way she knows I won’t understand. But that’s not fair. She’s done nothing yet to tell me that’s who she is.

  The fields stream by as we head in the direction of the fire. My mouth goes dry, my head swimming. Gram doesn’t seem upset that her land’s gone up. Why doesn’t she care?

  She glances over at me, one hand on the wheel, the other dangling out the window. “Sorry,” she says. “I used to call your mot
her that.”

  So, not an insult. But it sits uncomfortably in my chest anyway. I don’t want to be like Mom to her. I want to be myself. Her granddaughter.

  “She never told me,” I say.

  “Of course she didn’t.” Gram sounds bitter, and I know the feeling. “She doesn’t know you’re here, does she?”

  I look at Gram, searching. For disappointment. Disapproval. For the thing that’s gonna send me back to Calhoun. But she’s just asking, her expression open and curious.

  “No,” I say firmly. “I didn’t tell her. I just left.”

  “Well, we’ll give her a call when we get home.”

  Home. It’s enough to keep the rest of what she said from hitting me, but when it does I lurch across the console, leaning toward Gram, my palms itching to grab her arm.

  “Please, let’s not,” I say. I hate how anxious I sound. “She’ll figure it out on her own. And in the meantime, what she doesn’t know won’t hurt her.”

  Gram shakes her head, her eyes still on the road. “There is a time and a place for that line of thinking, Mini, but I don’t think we’re there.”

  The time and place were at the police station. She had no trouble keeping things from them. But I guess I should be happy, should take this as a sign that once we get to Fairhaven, she’ll tell me everything.

  And all of this—it should make me more uncomfortable. Even without the fire and the body, Gram should feel like a stranger. But she isn’t, really, is she? She’s Mom, and she’s me, and she’s family, and it wasn’t that she never wanted me. It was that Mom never wanted her. There was only ever Mom between us, and now that’s gone.

  The fire’s coming up on our right. This is the same path I took with Tess and Eli, twenty minutes on the bike turned into five in the truck. Out across the tops of what corn has survived I can see a fire engine parked on an access road, fighting the blaze back toward where it came from.

  But I’m looking up ahead, to where two cruisers are parked across one lane of the highway. When we left the scene for the station, there was only one, and only one officer keeping watch. It felt like half a dream. Like it couldn’t be real.

  It’s different now. Neon crime scene tape, and a stretcher waiting for the body. I can see two figures there, on the shoulder of the road, the body between them covered with a white sheet.