Bones and Drones

by K A Goodsell

  It felt like an iceberg lifted off of my shoulders. “I’m not going to give you any leads on Daniel Lockwood. Not yet. We’re not there yet.”

  He nodded. “Safe call. It’s mutual.”

  If the drive-in was open year-round, I’d be the weirdo sitting in a beach chair with a coat, hat, and a pile of blankets. But with my distaste for summer, I never managed to go. I used to come when I was younger because my parents would make Nat and me. We would pile the back of my father’s truck with blankets and pillows, prepared for us all to fall asleep. I loved sitting back there, all of us small, munching on candy and popcorn, watching movies all night. It was one of my favorite things to do as a kid.

  But then I grew up, and I never went. It wasn’t because I didn’t have time, because I did.

  The guests pulled their cars onto the grass in front of us. I noticed that I knew almost everyone here. Was it even possible that someone here tonight was the person who killed Teddy?

  The killer was still on the loose. Were others in danger? Was I in danger? Suddenly, I didn’t feel good about my choice to come here where there was nowhere to hide. I worried for my parents, who were somewhere in this crowd, for the kids playing, for Gage and myself. Half the people here probably didn’t even know there had been a murder yet. There wasn’t even a lot of buzz going on about it at the moment. That would change come tomorrow.

  Gage looked out toward the crowd alongside me as we approached the concession booth.

  “Can I have a Dr. Pepper, please?”

  “How about a Dr. Pepper float?”

  I pursed my lips together, ready to come back with a statement about the hospitality industry and making sure the customer is satisfied, but instead said, “Sure.” I reached into my front pocket and pulled out a $5 bill.

  He filled a cup at the fountain and scooped in the vanilla ice cream.

  “Three dollars.”

  “What’s with the straw?”

  We both watched as the orange straw turned to red as it got colder.

  “It’s magic,” Gage answered waving his arms over it, adding a little jazz hand.

  “No,” I shook my head. “I mean why the fancy straw?”

  “That’s the way we give out milkshakes here.”

  “But this is a Dr. Pepper float. I don’t know if I’d classify it as a milkshake, per se.” I reach forward with my cash and Gage ignores my hand pulls a ten out of his own pocket. “I’ll keep the change as a tip.”

  Huh. “I want to pay for it on my own.”

  “Don’t worry. No strings attached. I know you’re with O’Moore.” He took a swig from a cup he already had behind the counter.

  “Excuse me,” I huffed, sitting back on my stool, but then I stood again. “That’s none of your business. Also, please take my money.”

  “No.” He put the cup down and wiped his hands on the tan apron tied around his waist. “You’re welcome.”

  I stood there with the money, looking around to see if there was a tip jar or anywhere that I could leave it where it wouldn’t blow away with the light wind gusts. Finally, I caved and put the money back into my pocket, sighing. “I don’t understand, but thank you.”

  “There it is,” Gage smiles. “No problem, Grimes.”

  I wasn’t sure if this was the end of the conversation, so I sat back down on the stool. “We weren’t dating, by the way.”

  “Who?” Gage asks.

  “Elgort and I,” I clarify. “We’re just friends.”

  “That was emotional back at the house,” he said, stuffing a few pieces of popcorn from a red Solo cup into his mouth. “I mean, that was like Korean drama stuff there.”

  “We’re friends,” I said again, and my voice rose for a brief second. I looked around to see if anyone had heard. “We had a moment the other night, before everything happened, and that’s why it’s a bit heated.”

  “Moment? Come on, give me something to ooh about before the movie.”

  “We were at the dock the night before they found the body.”

  He put the popcorn down. “Shit, so you may have been there while it happened?”

  I shrugged, trying to play it cool, but I was sure he saw in my face the slight panic. “We have no idea. I left before Elgort, so he was at the dock after me. That’s why we aren’t allowed to talk or be alone together now. The station is investigating.”

  “That has to be uncomfortable at home.”

  “What does?” I took a sip of the Dr. Pepper float. “Oh, you mean between Elgort and his dad?”

  “His dad must sweat bullets that his son, the quarterback and the pretty boy of Pine Grove, is involved in a murder.”

  “He’s not involved,” I correct him quickly.

  “Well, technically so are you now.”

  He wasn’t wrong. I was involved in a murder case, and I hoped to solve it with the help of Pine Grove’s deceased. But maybe also with Gage.

  I looked back at the movie screen, listening to the echo of the sound system, and then turned back toward Gage. “I don’t hate you, by the way. I’m just not necessarily excited about your existence.”

  “I didn’t think you hated me, but good to know. That’s okay, though; I understand the hostility that you must feel right now with having an opponent in a competition you thought was made for one only.”

  I flash a fake smile at him. “I’m not worried. I just think we should keep this fair.”

  Gage stood to load dishes into the washer. “Keep your morals away from me. Also, you haven’t said anything about my Dr. Pepper float yet. They are magical. Rated ten out of ten on Yelp.”

  “You know…” I put my cup down on the counter. I hadn’t even taken a large sip of it yet, and already I was frustrated with it. “Yes, I agree with you actually about your comment from earlier. It is filling me with an anger that you’re in this competition with me. You don’t know anything about these cemeteries. I basically live them. It’s hard, too, because for once in my life, I was actually happy. But then life had to get up in my face and go, ‘LOL, one sec,’ then mess everything up.”

  “You know, you’re cute when you get frustrated.”

  “Well, get ready, because I’m about to be gorgeous.”

  “You want a cookie?”

  I stopped mid point as I raised my hand towards Gage as if I was going to say something incredible, the best of the best comebacks, something that not even the movies could top. But I had nothing. I was flushed; I was upset, and for what? Nothing.

  Plus, was he really offering me a cookie, or was he just being a jerk?

  “Excuse me?”

  “I have rum raisin or chocolate.” He picked up a Tupperware container and put it on top of the counter, pushing it toward me. “I think the rum raisin will go well with your Dr. Pepper float. But that’s just me.”

  Stunned, I looked at him and then at the box. “I don’t understand you, you know that?”

  “What I understand is that you’re frustrated, and I’m frustrated about this deal we’re stuck in. The mayor told me that if I don’t work with you on this, he wouldn’t sign off on my internship with your father’s team. So I’m stuck just as much as you are. Have a damn cookie.”

  “I guess you already knew the dark side had cookies, huh?” I looked between him and the box again. “Raisin cookies that look like chocolate chip cookies are the main reason I have trust issues.”

  Gage leaned over and picked out a cookie for me. “Chocolate chip. I swear, and if it’s not, you may punch me.”

  “Wow.” I took the cookie from his hand and a napkin from the corner of the counter. “What an offer.”

  “Expires in two minutes, so make your decision efficiently,” he said and winked.

  I took a bite of the cookie. It was chocolate, and holy hell was it good. Gooey, yet crunchy, and it almost tasted like there was milk and dark chocolate. I pulled the cookie away from my mouth and looked to see what is inside.

  “If you’re thinking double the chocola
te, that is correct.”

  “But…” I said with my mouth full. “Two kinds?’

  He nodded. “My mom’s recipe.”

  “How come you’re not selling these?” I asked before taking another bite. I grabbed my Dr. Pepper float off the counter and took a sip. Not rum raising like he suggested, but pretty good together.

  “Dark and milk. Some of them even have some white chocolate. I had some left over. I only make them like once a month and give them out to kids usually or people who are having a bad day, such as yourself.”

  I wasn’t having a bad day. It was just a bump knowing he was the person on the other side of the boat. But it was a boat that could be flipped, and I would be the only one left standing at the end. He just didn’t know it yet.

  “Talk to me about something other than this competitive bickering. Do you really like classic movies? Maybe other Hepburn movies?”

  “Anything black-and-white,” I tell him again. “I also like classic horror.”

  He nodded, accepting my answer. “The fall festival is a few weeks away. I’ll be doing double features.”

  I looked at him, interested. “Oh, yeah?”

  “Yeah! You should totally come.”

  I nodded, telling him I’d think about it.

  We were silent for a bit, watching more people pile in as kids ran around. A group of teenagers was playing with a football in front of the screen, and I tried not to feel a pang of guilt about Teddy. Some people still didn’t know who had died.

  “So, what is it you do with forensics and drones?” I asked, trying to distract myself by bringing us back to the conversation we had started earlier. “Why would the mayor ask you for help?” I didn’t mean for it to sound like I was knocking what he did. It came out way harsher than I intended it to. But I was actually curious. I had heard of drones helping with important research in the history realm, but I’d never really heard of it helping with graves and finding buried people.

  “Well,” he said, looking at me, “I can use my drone to see underneath the soil for graves. Or heat. I can see heat, too. My goal is to go to college for engineering. I really want to create drones that will help with all sorts of cases, murders and otherwise. For example, with a drone, you could see where people are trapped if a huge earthquake hits a city, and there’s missing people. They would see where someone is from the heat sensor and be able to dig them out. Of course, this could also help with other things, too, but I think it would be so cool to create the perfect drone and help with that.” He rambled on, scooping another red cup full of popcorn. “There are already drones that do that, but I want to make the best, you know? I’m not entirely sure how I’m going to do it, but it’ll happen, eventually. I think that using them to figure out more about history is the coolest, though. Imagine finding a lost tomb, or even a small pyramid in Egypt, and being able to scan it with a drone, finding out what’s in there? I could sell them to the FBI and other law enforcement agencies. I think that would be so cool.” He was breathless with the excitement.

  “Why is it so important to you?”

  “I’m not sure, honestly,” Gage said. “I think I’ve always felt that it was more important to have technology be helpful than entertaining. To help people in need. It should be here for a reason and have a purpose to it. It shouldn’t just be. Like, going back to the pyramid thing, did you know that some can’t be opened because they’re so air-tight? There are some that literally haven’t been explored. They’re built so they couldn’t be robbed. The Egyptians were so smart like that. And some of them have only been explored minimally. Like a small section. That’s not good enough. I want to know what’s in all of them, how they were built, and how we can recreate them. What if the remains of a famous leader are in there, and we never knew? We could study so much from it, and that’s the coolest thing. If I can pull this off, I could literally help change world history. What we’re reading in our textbooks… it could be changed by what I find.”

  I nodded.

  “So, when you say that it would be able to scan tombs, that’s like, what we’re doing with our job now, right?” I asked.

  “Yes, but on a much smaller scale,” he replied. “We’re just looking at grave sites. What I would like to be able to do is scan something as big and dense as a pyramid. Those things are so huge and made of so much limestone that it’s nearly impossible to scan using technology we have at the moment. Not well, at least. You could probably get a general idea, but nothing important.”

  I nodded, still curious about it all. I loved history, but I mostly studied my town’s history and the history of the US, not world history. “How did they even make the pyramids, anyway?”

  “That’s the coolest part!” Gage was animated, and it was fun to see him so lively. He had always seemed like such a quiet guy. Despite being such good friends with his sister, I’d never really seen him like this. It was refreshing. He was human, and alive, and he had passions. It made him seem less like an ice cube. “They literally used the simplest tools to build these limestone blocks they carried on top of pyramids to place. It’s completely wild. What we use heavy machinery for now, they were using man power. To make the blocks, they would just use plumb bobs and square levels, chisels and hammers. The most basic of tools. But they wanted it to be perfect, since they were making them for kings and the richest of the rich. They were religious, so the blocks had to be perfect when they placed them. It’s all very scientific and so cool.” He stopped to think for a minute, veering to a slightly different direction. “When it comes to saving someone’s life, or bringing closure to family members trying to mourn the loss of someone, wouldn’t it be amazing to help? To bring someone peace? I think that’s one of the greatest gifts you could give someone.”

  His answer surprised me, and I sat back, looking at him.

  His dark hair fell into his eyes, which seemed to stare into my soul.

  I realized I was blushing and looked down at my lap. “I agree with that,” I told him. “I actually mold clay on skulls to help bring closure to cold cases.” That was something I’d never really told people outside my family, since it was so different. Few people my age were likely to find it cool. I closed one eye, bracing for impact. I knew that he would find it super weird, like most people did when I joked about it. Even Raimy was a little weirded out by it, so we didn’t talk about it much.

  “Well, that’s really cool,” he says, seemingly genuinely interested.

  “Really?” I asked. “Most people are weirded out by it.”

  He nodded, and I grabbed my bag, pulling John Doe from it. I handed it to him, telling him the story behind it and how I wanted so badly to figure out that case. When he recovered from the shock of being handed a human skull, he complimented my talent and seemed impressed.

  For the first time that day, I felt happy. Someone gets me, it seems.

  “Tomorrow, eleven-thirty in the morning. Meet me at Center Cemetery. I want to see what you and your little robot can do.”

  “Are you asking me on a date? I accept.” He handed John Doe back to me and picked up an ice cream Sunday glass to wipe it dry. “You know, you aren’t going to win this competition.”

  I smirked at him and it felt like the perfect movie moment to turn away. “If I were concerned about that, I’d have brought that up when I first conversed with you. But I have a feeling you’re just using your drone to compensate.”

  As we were talking, the movie had started playing. We keep talking through it, lost in conversation. About an hour in, the hairs on the back of my neck stood on end, and I turned around.

  A man in his late forties stood at the counter, asking for popcorn. I recognized him from last night. He was the one getting into the white work truck.

  I froze, eyes wide, not knowing what to do. I couldn’t tell anyone who he was.

  “Hi.” He nodded at me, exchanging his cash with Gage for his snacks.

  “Hi,” I said back, trying to smile as perfectly as I could, e
ven though I wanted to turn away.

  “You okay?” Gage asked as the man stepped away with his popcorn. When he turned around, I noticed a rip in his feather-filled vest. A few pieces of goose down were hanging loose.

  “Do you know who that is?” I asked him.

  “Yeah, that’s Andre Fitzgerald. He’s a contractor,” Gage said. “You haven’t seen him around the Inn before? I know I’ve seen you at the front desk.”

  “I know I definitely have talked to him in passing before.” I watched as he walked back to his pickup truck, climbing into the bed and sitting down in a beach chair. There was a second one beside it.

  When the person next to him leaned over to take the popcorn, the light just barely caught a face. A woman. Who was he with?

  “Hold on,” I told Gage. The wet grass was slippery as I stepped out, and I had to be careful of my footing. I wanted to go up and see who the woman was. I looked around the concession stand for something to take over to him. “Did you give him the right amount of chance back?”

  Gage cringed. “Of course.”

  “Okay…” I looked around the booth until I spotted the napkins. Perfect. I grabbed a huge handful and walked toward the truck.

  “Hey!” Gage called out. “Where are you going?”

  I waved back at him to stop and continued walking. As I got closer, I studied the truck and its tires. They were huge, and inside the passenger seat was a pair of work boots resting on the floor mat.

  I ducked slightly and walked toward the back of the truck. “Excuse me,” I said, standing up straight as I neared the side where he could see me. “You forgot napkins, and I thought I’d bring them by—” I looked at the woman seated next to him. “Velma?”

  She quickly flattened out her blanket on her lap and put the popcorn bucket down on the truck bed. “Hi, Paislee.” She straightened her hair.

  “Hi,” I said again, trying to put the two of them together. “Sorry to interrupt.”

  “Not at all,” she said and reached for the napkins. “Thank you for these, I needed them. Andre always tends to forget tidiness.” She smacked him lightly with the napkins and sat back in her chair.