“Will you look at that,” Dad had said.
Whispering, as if worried she might break the spell, Mom said, “Beth’s got the magic touch.”
I felt a glow inside. Sam gurgled and held my hand till his eyes got heavy and his little head drifted back to Mom’s shoulder. For the first time, I loved him.
But sitting here now in the car, holding Sam’s hand, the tightness still in my chest, I feel something hovering about the air, something—I don’t know? Something not quite right. Something that tempers the elation and happiness and the ecstatic shock we’re all feeling. I think of those questions again, those questions that can’t be ignored: Where has Sam been? What has happened to him? Three years. Three years of what?
The police car turns down a street and Earl follows, and I see that we’re headed to Pine Forest Elementary. Where Sam went to school before all this happened. The parking lot is full of cars and news vans. It’s crazy, but it dawns on me: Sam’s reappearance is a huge story. Not just for my family, but also for everyone else.
I feel Sam’s fingers tighten on mine, and I sense him turning to look at me. But I stare straight ahead. I can’t look into his eyes. Those eyes that hold the secrets of where he’s been for over three years. Of what he might have gone through. I just try to breathe. Because if I take slow breaths then I can probably keep the tight ache in my chest from erupting.
CHAPTER 2
The White Truck
Josh
Nick and I are practicing crosscourt forehands. Back and forth, back and forth, a nice rhythm. Everyone else on the team has left for the day, but we’re still going at it.
“You two are workhorses,” Coach Runyon said once, and by his tone and the big smile on his face I could tell that he appreciated our hard work. That day, I told Nick that we had to keep it up and push ourselves harder than the others. Nick and I, we’re just freshmen, but there’s a good chance we’ll play varsity tennis this coming spring. We’re pretty good. Not just for our age, but for any age. Our team lost a lot of seniors, and to be honest the older guys on the team aren’t as solid. We really have a shot at this.
I’m supposed to go to a student council meeting at four. I’m vice president of my class. Homecoming’s next week, and we have to decide on our parade float design, the nominations for homecoming court, stuff like that. After that, I’ll go home and do my homework. I’m making all As so far, just like I did all through middle school. Everyone said high school was so tough, so different, but so far it’s been a piece of cake.
Dad thinks I’m taking on too much. He teases me, says that it’s okay if I relax now and then, but what can I say? I like to stay busy.
I guess I take after Mom in that way. She works long hours at a big firm in town—well, big for Tuscaloosa—doing bankruptcy law. She’s never home early. She has to prove herself by putting in a lot of time. Just like Nick and I are doing on the court. Dad’s a geology professor at the university, so his hours are more flexible. He’s usually the one who makes dinner nowadays, and who picks me up in the afternoons.
So I’m surprised to see Mom’s car drive up and pull into a parking spot alongside the courts. At first I think maybe it’s someone else’s car that just looks like hers. But then Mom gets out. I smack a forehand into the net. I drop my racket head and look over again. She waves. She’s wearing shades, even though it’s an overcast day.
“Hold on,” I shout to Nick, who’s staring over at her, too, maybe annoyed she messed up our rally. I cross two empty courts to get to the tall chain-link fence that separates the courts from the lot, and when I do, before I can even say hi and ask what she’s doing here, she says, “You need to come with me.”
“What is it?” I ask. It’s not like Mom to just show up like this, and the sunglasses are hiding her expression, so my heart starts going a million miles a minute. “Where’s Dad?” I say.
“Dad’s fine. Just grab your stuff and come to the car. I’ll tell you then. Everything’s okay.”
“Okay,” I say, feeling a little reassured, but still a little weirded out. I cross the courts again and grab my stuff. “I have to go,” I yell at Nick, who’s still standing on the baseline fingering his racket strings.
“What’s up?” he asks. He starts walking over. Nick is my best friend. He’s the reason I started playing tennis, to be honest.
“I don’t know. My mom’s being strange.”
“Wait up,” Nick calls as he gathers his things, but I head toward the gate without him. I see Mom watching me. She has her hands in her coat pockets, like she’s cold. When I finally get to the car, I ask, “What is it?”
Mom takes her hands out of her pockets and removes her sunglasses. Her eyes are red. “I have some . . . good news,” she says, but in a way that makes it seem like she has bad news.
Nick jogs up right behind me.
“Nick, you may as well know, too,” she says. “Word’s starting to spread.”
“About what?” I ask.
She clears her throat, looks right at me. “They found Sam Walsh. He’s home—he’s alive.”
For a second there’s just the noise of cars whizzing by on Fifteenth Street. Just the sound of my own breathing.
“Whoa,” Nick says, breaking the silence.
I just stare at her. At first it doesn’t make sense. Sam? Who is Sam?
But I know.
“The police found him, in Anniston.”
“Anniston?” Do I even know where that is? “He’s alive?” I ask, but really I’m just repeating the words to make them real to myself. When I thought about Sam, he wasn’t someone who was alive. But he wasn’t someone who was dead, either. He was just gone. And, to be honest, I tried not to think about him at all.
“There’s going to be a news conference at Pine Forest Elementary. Sam’s going to be there, with his family. I want—I think we need to be there.”
“Whoa,” Nick says again.
“Nick, you should call your mother,” Mom says.
He nods and starts digging in his bag for his cell. Nick was friends with Sam, too. In fact, he and Sam were best friends back in elementary school. It was only after Sam went away that Nick and I became close.
I look at Mom and she smiles at me, but it’s a weird smile, like she’s faking it to cover for some other feeling. I feel my heart start to beat faster and faster, how it does before a big match. Sam’s back. Sam’s alive. It’s unbelievable.
I need to focus. Like when I’m losing a match and have to tell myself to just take it point by point, to not panic. “Should I change?” I ask Mom. I’m in my tennis clothes.
“Yes, okay,” Mom says, nodding distractedly. “But hurry.”
I jog through the side door of the gymnasium and into the empty locker room and start to change back into my regular clothes. If I keep my mind busy—if I focus on tying my shoes and buttoning my shirt—then I can trap out other things. Nick barges in.
“Dude, this is insane,” he says. “I mean, I thought Sam was, like, dead. He’s been missing for what—?”
“Three years,” I say. Three years, three months. How many days?
“Holy shit. I mean, what happened to him?”
“How should I know?” I say. I stop tying my shoes and look up at him. “How should I know?”
“Hey, chill.” He sits on a bench across from me, leans forward. “You okay?”
I nod again. I continue tying my shoe. “I’m fine,” I say, speaking to the floor.
===
It was July. July 12. Mom was still in law school then, taking a course so she could finish that fall. She was always studying. Dad was teaching summer school, so he was on campus a lot.
Sam lived across the street with his mom, stepdad, and his sister. I guess Sam and I were what you would call friends. I don’t think he really liked me much, honestly. But we were the same age. I
’d known him since I was in first grade, and we were neighbors. During the summer, we’d ride our bikes around Pine Forest, or into the woods that butted up against our backyard, which had these well-worn trails and small mounds of dirt we could jump, though I never had the nerve to do anything too tricky, like shake my wheels about while flying through the air, which Sam did all the time.
“Pussy,” Sam would always say when I refused to do any tricks. Then he would laugh, so I couldn’t tell if he was being serious or if he was joking.
When it got really hot, Sam and I would stay inside and play video games or watch movies—usually at my house. I think he liked my house better because he fought with his sister a lot, and with his stepdad, who he called Earl but who I called Mr. Manderson. And his mom was tired and grumpy most of the time.
Mom and Dad liked Sam. He always put on his best face with them. Mom called him a charmer. But to me he was unpredictable. Nice one minute, mean the next.
That day in July, Sam was at my house and wanted to play this video game he’d heard about, but which I didn’t own. What was it called? Alien Invasion or something dumb like that. I never really liked video games; I only ever played when Sam came over. So he thought we should go buy it—we could put in together, with our allowances. That sounded fine to me. I didn’t really care.
The only problem was that Mom was studying and wouldn’t drive us, and Sam’s mom was at work.
I pressed Mom once more. “Please?”
“Honey, I have way too much to do. Besides, you don’t need another video game. Play with the ones you have.” Then she turned back to her big red legal books.
“We could bike to McFarland Mall,” Sam said when we were back outside.
McFarland was the second-rate mall that was two or three miles down a busy road, but they had a decent video game store there. “That’s too far.”
“Not on our bikes.”
“It’s too hot. Besides, I’m not allowed to anyway.”
“I’m not either. But so what? Do you always do what Mommy says?”
“Not always.”
“Yeah you do,” he said. “Goody Two-shoes.”
“I am not,” I said. I once stole a pack of Life Savers from a Publix. Sometimes I peed in the shower.
He smirked again, like he was going to challenge me. “Then let’s go,” he said. “Screw the rules.”
I sighed. “Well, if we go, I need to get my money.”
“Then get it. I’ll go get mine. Meet you back out here in five minutes.”
I went up to my room and grabbed my money from the small top drawer in my dresser, enjoying the coolness of the house. Part of me didn’t want to go back outside. I didn’t want to ride to the mall. It’s like I somehow knew it would be a disaster.
When I passed Mom on the way out, she was still totally wrapped up in her studying. I doubt she even heard me leave the house.
Back outside, I waited. There’s still time to back out, I thought. Just then Sam rushed out of his house, hopped on his bike, and rode over. “Let’s go.”
===
In the car on the way to this news conference, I can’t even remember the last time Mom and I talked about Sam. We’d moved away from Pine Forest a year after Sam went missing, and once we were gone it was like we forgot about anything that had happened there.
“Are they sure it’s Sam?” I ask, still thinking it’s all so unreal.
“What?” she says, like I’ve asked something dumb. “Of course they are.”
“Where was he?” I ask.
Mom hears me, but she doesn’t say anything for a few minutes. “He was in Anniston.”
“You said that. But why?” I wait for more, but she doesn’t offer anything. “Did he run away?” I know this isn’t true, even when I ask it.
“No,” she says. “He was living . . . he was with some man. We don’t know much more than that. But he’s okay.” I see her furrow her brow, like she has doubts.
I start to feel a little queasy.
“We don’t know what he’s gone through,” she says. “But none of that matters right now.” Mom has one hand on the steering wheel, but with her free hand she reaches over and grabs mine. I let her, but I don’t squeeze back. She stops at a red light.
Suddenly, I don’t want to go to this news conference. I don’t want to see Sam. I want to go back to when Nick and I were hitting tennis balls across the court, when the day and evening before me was plotted out, when there were no surprises. I turn and look at Mom. “I’m missing my student council meeting. Everyone will wonder where I’m at.”
“It’s okay. You can miss just this once.”
The light is still red. Any minute it will turn green, and it will be a straight shot to the elementary school. That school I always hated. I unlock the door and unbuckle my seat belt. I step out of the car. Just before I slam the door, I hear Mom say, “Josh!”
I don’t run. I just walk. I know this road. It’s close to our old neighborhood, so I head back away from there. I walk and walk and then I hear gravel crunching, the sound of someone running behind me. I look back and see Mom.
“Josh!” Mom catches up and gets in front of me and grabs me by the shoulders. “What are you doing?” She looks at me like she’s pissed, but I see her eyes soften with alarm. She touches my cheek and wipes something away. “Oh, Joshie.” I hate when she calls me that, and she knows it. But she pulls me tight against her, and my cheeks are wet against her shirt. I hadn’t realized that I’d started crying.
“It’s going to be okay,” Mom says.
I pull back. I sniffle and wipe my nose with my sleeve. She’s looking at me like I’m breaking her heart. Cars speed by and suddenly I’m embarrassed, exposed. “We’re going to be late,” I say.
“Are you sure you’re up for it?”
“Yes,” I say. I’d rather go home, or back to school. But a picture of Sam has been piecing together in my brain. Sam on that hot summer day, in his Superman T-shirt, cargo shorts, his brown hair wilted in the sun. And I know I have to see him to really believe he’s back. That he’s grown up, just like I have. That he’s okay.
===
That day, Sam and I biked up the slight hill on the shaded side of the street, the side by the woods. Once we reached the top, the woods ended, and we burst into the sun, which was high in the sky, beating down on us.
We took a left onto Skyland Boulevard, a busy thruway from the west side of town to the east, broken in the middle by a grassy median. We rode our bikes on the left side shoulder, facing the oncoming traffic, as we’d always been told to do. We biked past the Toyota dealership, the entrance to a neighborhood called Eastlake, and then past Buddy’s, a convenience store. Cars whizzed by. Sam sped ahead, and I shouted for him to wait up. I was getting tired already, and overheated. My shirt was sticking to my back. My forehead was dripping sweat. I had forgotten my hat. Up ahead, on the left, was the Department of Motor Vehicles, set well back from the road and fronted by a wide lawn. We still had a long way to go—more strip malls to pass, churches, even a cemetery. I knew all the landmarks well; we’d driven past them hundreds of times. But it all looked weird now, outside and up close. I kept pedaling, trying to catch up to Sam. Finally, I saw him slow down and circle back, probably annoyed at me for being a slowpoke.
Just then a bright red truck with a loud muffler sped toward us. I could see that there were a few guys wearing sunglasses and baseball caps sitting in the back of the truck. They drove by, and it was like time slowed, because I could see the two boys in the back—maybe college age, maybe older high school—sipping big plastic cups of soda. One flashed a grin and yelled “Faggot!” as they zoomed past. And then a cold explosion of liquid landed on my back. I was so surprised that I slammed on my brakes and then stuck my foot out to catch myself. But it wasn’t enough. I fell to my side, the bike crashing on top of me.
There I was, in the dirt and gravel on the side of the road, covered in something wet. I tried to stand, but I had a burning scrape on my elbow and my leg. I saw an empty Chick-fil-A cup that had rolled to the side of the road.
I finally stood up, my heart racing. Up the road I saw the truck getting smaller and smaller, and then it was gone. I tried to brush the dirt from my legs and arms, but some was mixed in with the blood from my scrapes. I peeled my shirt back, briefly, before it stuck back again. I was a mess. I fought the urge to cry. Sam pedaled up, laughing.
I don’t know why I expected sympathy.
“Wow, that was amazing!” he said. “They hit you like a bull’s-eye!”
“It’s not funny,” I said.
“Are you okay?” he said, but he was still smiling.
“No,” I said, hoping my voice didn’t crack.
He snickered. “That cup must have been totally full of Coke. It looked like you got hit by a diarrhea water balloon.”
I’d had enough of it. I hated him. I hated the world. I felt a kind of anger I’d never felt before.
“Fuck you,” I said, feeling a perverse thrill saying those words. I picked up my bike, hopped on it, headed back toward home. I was still in pain, but that almost didn’t matter anymore.
“Hey, where you going?” Sam called.
I didn’t respond. I kept pedaling.
“Come on, don’t go home! I’m sorry!”
I had my money in my pocket. He wouldn’t be able to buy the video game without me. A short distance later, I heard him shout, “Pussy!”
I turned around, quickly, and yelled “Fuck you!” again.
They were the last words I spoke to Sam. I don’t even know if he said anything back.
I kept pedaling as fast as I could. The trek was slightly uphill at that point. I started to feel sick. I had to stop and toss my bike down again. I bent over the side of the road and coughed and puked up a nasty puddle of clear liquid. My eyes were watery, and the sun continued to beat down on me.
We Now Return to Regular Life Page 3