It is hard for me to accept the moment. I look at this woman, and she has changed, but not as much as I have. Her unkempt long hair may be a little grayer. She wears her glasses instead of leaving them dangling from a chain. But she is, otherwise, frighteningly unaltered. I have an out-of-body experience. I seem to float outside myself. I see the tightness of my jaw. The deep lines of my face. Gone are the easy smile of my youth and the wide-eyed innocence I can’t even remember having. It is almost as though I can see right through myself, as though I wear the years like camouflage, hiding so much that I might as well not even exist. Maybe I wish I didn’t. Wish I never had.
Yet here I am. Right back to the beginning, in a way. That’s when I realize that time definitely stood still, just not for her. Or for anyone else. Just me. I have been trapped in this endless circle for so long, numb to the pain of biting my own tail.
“Was he evil?”
The question slips out before I know that I am going to ask it. Her head tilts, just slightly. I wait, needing the answer now that the question has been asked. When she speaks, her tone has changed. There is a quiver at the end of her words. For the first time I think that maybe she does remember. “I’m sorry,” she says. “I don’t know what you’re . . .”
In that moment, my resolve cracks. Although I need to know, it just doesn’t matter now. The wheel is rolling. The answer is imminent. There’s no getting out of the way. I’m just afraid, but I am done being a coward. I take a step back, looking over my shoulder at the doorway.
“I’m Liam . . . Brennan. You came to my house . . . when I was thirteen. You couldn’t have done anything,” I say, my voice cracking. I can’t make eye contact. “There’s nothing you could have done.”
“I remember you,” she says, barely above a breath.
I back away. She follows.
“Wait.”
But I can’t. I won’t. I’m out of the office and through the lobby. I push open the outer door. When I see the Mazda, the weakness that brought me here dries up to nothing. I am a husk. A shell. I have one purpose now. One path. And I just need to take it.
“Liam,” she calls out behind me. “Liam Brennan. I remember. Something happened back then, didn’t it? I tried. I did. I went to the police when I heard. I told them about that day. I told them that they needed to do something. But . . . Liam!”
I get into the rental car. The engine ignites, wanting to move. She stands across the hood from me. I see her mouth moving, expressing her regret, and all I feel is guilt for coming to this place. For seeing her again and allowing myself to believe that anything could have been different than it was.
6
Clouds darken the afternoon as I turn into the apartment complex. I stop on this side of the chain blocking the access road. When I get out of the car, I decide to leave the keys inside. Then I remove the chain, leaving it on the dirt across the entrance. A cold, wet breeze blows out of the east, slipping under my shirt. My teeth chatter, maybe from the chill. Maybe not. I pull out the phone and dial Bob’s cell number. He answers and the sound of his voice nearly breaks my heart.
“Patsy?”
“No, it’s Liam.”
“Liam?” He pauses, as if trying to understand why I would call from Drew’s wife’s phone. “Oh, man, what is going on? Everyone’s freaking out here. They’re saying that you . . . you have something to do with Lauren Branch’s disappearance.”
“She’s fine,” I say.
“How do you know?”
“I just do, Bob.”
There’s a silence before he continues, his voice guarded.
“Thank God. Was that . . . her? In your car?”
“Yes.”
“Oh, jeez. Where are you? Are you looking for your brother?”
“No,” I say. “I need your help. But you have to promise me you won’t tell anyone about what I am going to ask you to do.”
Bob does not speak at once. Instead, I just hear his breathing.
“This is about you and Drew, isn’t it?”
“Please, can you trust me this once?”
“Son,” he says softly, “I would trust you more than once.”
For some reason, his words make me cry. I try to hide it, but I know he hears it in my voice. There’s nothing I can do about that now.
“I need you to wait exactly half an hour and then call the police. Tell them that you got a call from me and that I told you I had Lauren at the old swim club behind the Arundel Apartments.”
“That’s it, huh?” he asks.
“That’s it.”
“Hmmm.” He pauses again. “Just promise me you’ll be careful. Don’t let him hurt you.”
“Him?”
“Your brother, Liam. I’m old but I’m not blind. Promise me you won’t do anything stupid.”
I think about everything I have done so far, taking Lauren to the swim park, ditching her car in the middle of traffic, driving through our childhood neighborhood, my truck at Marci’s office. He’ll know them all by now, all of the steps I’ve taken. And I’m counting on that.
“I won’t do anything stupid,” I tell Bob. I just hope my brother does. In fact, everything counts on that happening.
7
The first raindrops of a coming storm send tiny clouds of dust up in the air. The droplets dampen my hair, run down my face and my arms. I look up at the sky, opening my mouth. The water tastes so pure, so fresh, that I am left wanting more. As if I have never caught a raindrop on my tongue before.
I don’t have much time. He’ll be here soon. So I keep walking, moving deeper into the darker shadows under the high oaks and maples and beeches. The smells bring me back, damp leaves and musty soil, pine sap and rotting wood. I walk with my eyes closed, my hands open palms out. I let the air surround me, enter me. It feels so new, so different, so alive. I let it carry me. I let it bring me back to that night one last time.
* * *
—
I FIND MYSELF in my room again. Drew stands by my door. He is seventeen now. Not the man I am destined to face. He has the same line to his mouth, though. And the same way of looking through me. For days, I had expected retaliation. For what I’d done to Eric Clarkson’s BMW. I’d expected Drew to turn my father’s attention back on me. But it hasn’t happened. It never happened.
Instead, he stands there looking at me. The bruise that surrounds his eye has started to yellow. His mouth opens and the words slip into me like the tip of a needle.
“Do you know how Mom got the alcohol?”
I don’t say anything. He takes a step closer to me.
“He bought it all. He brought it home with him. He carried it up to her room. Did you know that?”
“Dad?” I whisper.
“Jesus, Liam, are you that stupid? Yes, Dad.”
I close my eyes, picturing the empties on the table beside her bed. I can feel her cold skin against my fingertips as if I relive that moment layered atop this one. Then an older memory returns. A neighbor offering help to my father. And him returning home with a paper bag, glass bottles clattering inside.
“He took me with him a couple of times. In the car, he kept telling me that if he didn’t do it, she would. She’d get herself killed driving drunk. He told me he was keeping her safe as he pulled bottle after bottle off the shelf.”
The corner of my brother’s mouth hovers as a deep pain throbs behind my forehead.
“You know when he brought me to the liquor store the last time?”
I close my eyes.
“After she came home from rehab. When she wasn’t drinking anymore. It was that day, Liam. After she brought home that kitten.”
“What kitten?” I ask stupidly.
Drew just rolls his eyes. “I skipped the last three periods that day. I got home just before Dad. He had dropped off Mom already. For that meeting. H
e had me go around the house and pick up all of the stuff she bought. I had to carry it out to the car. He grabbed the cat, though. Right by its neck. And he threw it into that cardboard carrying box.”
Finally, the smile slips from his face. He looks troubled, exactly as he would the night he tried to turn Patsy against Lauren.
“He told me to get into the car and he drove over to that apartment complex, the one at Arundel. That thing screeched the entire drive. He drove around back, near that trail that goes into the woods. The one that goes to that creepy pond. There was a dumpster back there. He parked next to it and told me to throw all that stuff in.”
My eyes open. I don’t want to hear this. I don’t want to listen to him.
“Then he threw the cat in, box and all. I couldn’t believe it, really. The funny thing is, Liam, he closed the lid of that dumpster so softly, like he couldn’t hurt a fucking fly. Isn’t that funny, bro?”
He actually laughs. But I hardly notice that. Instead, I see my father. What he did. But it’s not about the cat.
“When we got back into his car, he drove to the liquor store. He didn’t lecture me that day. Not at all. He never said a thing. Nope, he just bought a case of vodka. He had me carry it into the house. Up to her room. He wanted me to be a part of it, Liam. He wanted that. You know he did.”
I slam my fist into the wall. The sheetrock rends as my fifteen-year-old hand passes through it. White powder sprinkles the carpet and covers my knuckles as I pull my hand out of this new hole.
I hear my brother laugh. I look and see his smile. I boil from the inside out, like my skin might suddenly peel away. My shoulder strikes him, hard, as I pass. He staggers back into the wall, laughing outright now. And I race down the stairs.
I tear through the kitchen, past the laundry room and the family room. I throw the door open. And I see him at his workbench. He is tall, straight-backed. His graying hair is full and slicked back. His forearms are tan and wired with muscle as he works on another of his models. But when he turns to me, when he looks at me . . . I . . .
He has no face. It is blurred, like someone has hurriedly erased his features. But no, that’s not right. That’s not how I saw it then. It is how I remember it now. I press fingers into my eyes. I squeeze until it hurts, trying harder to pull up a memory of his face. Instead, he stares back at me through time, through an empty soulless void. I see him but I can’t see him. I need to see him.
8
My memories fail me. My childhood double binds my adult mind, turning every thought into an endless, convoluted knot. I was in the garage. I was in my bedroom. My brother was there. He’s gone. Both are true. Both are false.
I walk through the rain to the cabin at the end of the trail. Even in the growing gloom, the silver padlock sparkles like a beacon. It draws me to it, like I hear the song of the siren once again. I know where it leads. I know the doom. But I walk nonetheless.
As I stand before the door, I reach back and touch the grip of the pistol that rests against the small of my back. It is there still, as I knew it was. Nodding, I remove my key and unlock the door. The hinges creek as it swings open. A smell washes across my face. Not death, not really even decay. Instead, it is the aroma of nature’s relentless force, ever pressing to reclaim what was once hers. What will be again, regardless.
The inside of the cabin is dark. I pull out Patsy’s phone, switching on the flashlight. A harsh beam cuts into the corner, shining on the crumpled blue tarp. I move to it, kneeling down reverently. The light pans and I see the human skull still lies among the pile of blackened bones. The empty darkness of its eyes stares at me, pleading with me to let the past rest in peace, as I have for so many years. But that isn’t going to happen. I am ready to face it now. Nonetheless, I can barely breathe as I snap a photo and text it to my brother.
9
I stand at the edge of the water, staring out at its darkness. The rain disturbs the surface, making it jagged and harsh. I feel him out there. He is coming for me. I can see the arch of his shoulders so clearly. The bend of his knee. The strength of his back. I see his hand, large and dry. But his face is a void.
The emptiness enrages me, both now and then. The anger builds, merging the smells of the forest with those of my father’s workshop. Glue and oil. Acrylic paint and dampness. They swirl like a tornado around him, around us.
“You killed her!” I scream at him, and I hear the voice of a fifteen-year-old in my head.
Strangely, I can hear his voice. It is clear and loud in response. It roars from the emptiness that is his face, my father’s face.
“What did you say?”
“You killed her, you bastard!”
My father stares at me. Slowly, he rises off his stool. His steps are like torture. His hand, open, rears back. And he slaps me across the face with enough force for me to falter backwards, my ear ringing and my vision a flash of pure white light.
“Get out of my house,” he hisses.
I stagger back, tasting blood in my mouth. My head spins. My back touches the doorway to his workroom. I can barely see through tears that burn with my shame, which grows with each shuffling step I take away from him, out into the basement, toward the steps. Where could I go? How could I be free?
But I’m not alone. As my bare feet shuffle across the cold red concrete floor, my brother appears in front of me, a ghost out of the darkness. That smile is on his face, but I can’t notice that. All I can think is that he will see the burning red mark on my face. The thin trickle of blood at the corner of my mouth. And worse, my tears.
“You can’t let him get away with that, Liam,” my brother whispers.
I try to step around him but his hand against my shoulder is firm. His words in my ear are a bitter, unimaginable poison.
“Mom needs to rest in peace.”
10
Where am I? My eyes are open. I am looking up through a canopy of branches that sway and whip in the rising wind. Rain falls on my face, heavy now. I reach up and touch my skin. It is there. It isn’t empty, faded. It is the face of a man, not a fifteen-year-old boy. I take in the air. I know where I am. I am at the old swim park. I know what it means.
Drew has not responded to my texts. Maybe he hasn’t seen them. Maybe I wish it could be true. Even if he did, if he saw them and understood, he might not come alone. He could bring half of the state police force. He could arrest me, blame me for all of this. He could paint one of his stories: I am the jealous little brother trying to bring him down. Or worse, Patsy and I are having an affair, and Lauren found out. That’s his game. And he never loses.
But we aren’t playing his game. I’ve made sure of that. He’s spent hours being unsure. Where am I? Why would I leave her car like that? My truck at her office? How could I have Patsy’s phone? Where is she? Where is Lauren? How much could they know? The bones?
I have him off-balance. I feel it to my core. He’ll come, and he’ll come alone. He will race here to confront me. He will, once again, underestimate me. He needs to. He can’t admit that, for the first time, I have defied him. Patsy has defied him. And for all his power, he can’t be prepared for that.
* * *
—
TIME PASSES SLOWLY now. I stand on the bank of the pond. The wind causes a light current to lap up on the black sandy beach. I reach down and pick up a stone. As the rain falls in sheets across the surface, I throw the rock out into the center.
A flash of lightning illuminates the park for the quickest of instants. It is like time stops, like I stand in the middle of some fading picture watching the splash. I imagine the stone sinking into the depths. I picture it falling and falling until it comes to rest on the roof of a rusted-out Ford Explorer, one that remained in peace for far too long.
“Liam.”
His voice is flat and hard, just loud enough to be heard over the storm. I turn, my eyes still adjusting to the su
dden flash. At first, all I can see is a shadow. He towers between two of the cabins, his hands in the pockets of a long overcoat. I freeze for a second, because his face is so shrouded in darkness that I can’t see his features. I can’t see his eyes, his mouth. I need to see his face. To know it is real. To know all of this is real.
For an instant, I think to run away. Get out of there and never look back. For so long, I saw him as something above human. A god with the power to warp reality to his will. Since I saw him turn that power on Patsy, though, something changed inside of me. The years came crushing back. The torture. The fear. The disgust and guilt and pain. Everything that was broken inside me. I pictured it all being laid at the tiny feet of that unborn child, my brother’s future son. I saw the cycle so clearly in that moment. I saw my life repeating over and over and over again. No one could deserve that. I thought about everything I had done. And, for one shining moment, I found the strength to take a stand.
But his face. Trying to blink the rain away, to see him, I close my eyes. In that instant, instead of Drew, I see my father. He stands in his workshop, the light from that tiny lamp shining on his hard, sharp profile. Slowly turning toward me. But his face remains a void, a splash of nothing.
When my eyes shoot open, my brother is still wrapped in darkness. His face is still hidden. I need to turn away, to run away. Or the shadow will simply swallow me whole.
A jagged bolt of lightning crackles overhead. In the flash, I see. It is Drew’s face, his piercing eyes and flat mouth. He is real. He has always been real. He is not the emptiness. And he is no longer smiling.
“I know you brought her here,” Drew says. “You can’t stay away, can you?” He laughs. “Maybe I couldn’t, either, if I did what you did.”
The Perfect Plan Page 24