In Autumn's Wake

by Maguire, Megan

  I complain about the cold. The snow is no longer beautiful, light, and soothing. It no longer falls in soft flakes, melting on women’s noses. It’s old. The snow is dead. It’s grey and black, heavy and dense. A burden. Unable to lift and swirl like it did when it was young.

  I ask her if she ever watched me before the night we met. If she knew I did jobs for Ed, and that I’ve killed a handful of men. I ask if she lured Trevor to the bar, hoping I’d kill him, knowing he was a bastard who’d tick me off, knowing my temper flares when I’m around men like that, knowing because she had watched me.

  She quietly answers no to all my questions, which is very un-Autumn like.

  She respects my mood, wanting to help. She knows I need an ear and not a mouth, so she keeps two open and one shut.

  I tell her I’m not trying to hurt her or accuse her. I’m only searching for answers.

  I fire off questions, asking what district she worked in when she was a cop, who her chief was, and if he’s as corrupt as Ed. I tell her it’s okay now to talk. She should answer. I need her to speak.

  “I was in Rick’s district. He’s a friend of my dad’s. They’re both smothering me, but Rick’s mostly a good guy, trying to take Ed down.” She removes her sequin glove and drops it on the floor, saying it was too confining.

  She glances over her shoulder, and I tell her to stop looking at the body. I have nothing but remorse for what happened. I shouldn’t have pulled my knife. I’d take it all back if I could. I should’ve remembered the horror on Jake’s face when he realized he took a man’s life. He felt remorse instantly. I wouldn’t have pulled it if I’d thought of him.

  “I’m going to end up in prison.”

  “No.” She stares ahead. Her voice is small. She begins the same conversation I had with Jake on the way to dump the body in the river, the similarities unnerving.

  “This is over after tonight,” she says.

  “Is this over after tonight?” Jake said.

  “Nick won’t have you arrested.”

  “Are we going to prison?”

  “I’ll protect you, Dylan.”

  “Will anyone protect us, Dylan? Can anyone help?”

  “No one knows what happened.”

  “What happened? What have we done?”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “I’m sorry, Dylan. Don’t tell Mom and Dad. Please!”

  “Stop it!” I pound the steering wheel and pull over to the side of the street. “Get out of my head!” I hop out and kick the door shut, moving to the tail end of the car. My hands cover my face, stifling my tears.

  Her door swings open, and she hurries to my side. She caresses my forearm before sending me a foot back with a tight embrace.

  “I can’t take this anymore. They won’t leave me alone. No matter what I do, they’re always inside my head.” I try to break away, but she won’t let go. “I want him back. I want Jake back!”

  She holds me tighter. “What can I do?”

  I clutch my hair and look up at the black sky. “I want that night back,” I say in a lower voice. “Please, give me one more chance.”

  She says she’d give it to me if she could.

  “Nothing stops the pain.” I breathe so hard my lungs hurt. “I have to tell someone what happened. I have to get it out. Listen to me, Autumn. Listen. I need to talk about Jake.”

  24

  Jake

  “What have we done?” Jake’s wobbly voice fills my truck, his hands locked behind his head, body swinging forward and back.

  “Just sit tight.” I try my best to comfort him. “I’ve gotta call Sean. I didn’t have a chance to tell him everything.”

  “I’m sorry, Dylan. Don’t tell Mom and Dad. Please!”

  “Jesus, Jake. What the hell were you doing at that party?” I take out my phone and tap Sean’s number. “Come on, pick up, Sean.”

  “Hey,” he answers.

  I sit up straight, my hand tight around the wheel. “I nearly got killed. That guy had a gun pointed at my head.”

  “I know. I had to deal with the other guy. They were brutal. Thank God there weren’t more of them.”

  “Can you get rid of that body on your own?”

  “Yeah. I’ll put it in the water by the grain elevators. Why is this all fucked up?”

  I slap the steering wheel. “Because we went out back to take a piss. What were we thinking? They must’ve been on to us. They waited until we were alone. You should’ve stayed next to me instead of taking off to the other side of the yard. I felt ambushed.”

  “We were ambushed.”

  “We shouldn’t have split up!”

  “Then why are we splitting up now? We can put the bodies in the same spot.”

  “I don’t know.” I shake my head. “I wasn’t thinking straight when we left. I just wanted to get everyone out of there before anyone else came outside.”

  “What now? Did you call Ed?”

  “You call and tell him about the coke in the house. I’ll take care of Jake and this other guy.”

  “Ed?” Jake pivots in his seat. “Eddie Dorazio?”

  “He’ll help,” I tell him.

  “He’ll arrest us, and I’ll end up in prison!”

  “Is Jake all right?” Sean asks.

  “Does he sound all right?” I gulp down the vile taste in my mouth. “He clubbed a guy with a crowbar to save my life. I was a second away from death.”

  “He said he was gonna kill you!” Jake shouts.

  I give his shoulder a comforting squeeze. “He has no idea what’s going on.”

  “Get him home,” Sean says.

  “Are you nuts? I’m not taking him home like this. He can stay at our place tonight.”

  Jake looks frantically around the truck. “Where’s my hockey stick? You see it, Dylan? It has my name on it. If the cops show up and find—”

  “I got it. It’s okay. I made sure we didn’t leave anything behind. I threw it in the truck bed.”

  Sean cuts back in. “We’re lucky we moved the bodies before that car turned down the alley.”

  “I know, right?”

  “Look, where ya gonna be?”

  “I’m pulling into the parking lot next to the river. The one at Fullerton Park.”

  “No,” Jake says. “I was here for a hockey game earlier.”

  “On the ice?” I ask, ending the call with Sean.

  “In the parking lot. We had a pick-up game going.”

  “Is that how you heard about this party? From the guys you were playing with?”

  He nods. “John’s older brother told us about it.”

  I rub my forehead, startled when I look at my fingertips and see blood. I rub again and look, smearing the stickiness between my thumb and forefinger. Could be from the guy Jake clubbed and not my own. I can’t remember anyone taking a whack at my head, but it’s throbbing like I’ve been hit.

  I wipe my fingers on my pants. “Jake, these aren’t the same kind of house parties I take you and Heather to.”

  “I wasn’t gonna be alone.” He turns to me, his skin pale, eyes red-rimmed and pained. “I was waiting for my friends to show.”

  “Doesn’t matter, don’t go to unfamiliar houses without me. I’ve told you that before. How do you know which ones are safe?”

  “It was safe. John’s brother said they had foosball tables and video games in the attic.”

  “Twig, no.” I close my eyes for a second, then look back at the street. “That’s a draw. They have drugs up there that they offer kids. It’s how they get you hooked and selling for them.”

  He shifts in the seat when I turn into the parking lot. “What if my friends come here tomorrow and find the body? We can’t do this, Dylan.”

  “No one’s gonna find him.” I pull alongside the outer edge of the field that leads to the iced river, killing the lights and the engine. “Take a deep breath for me.” I put my hand on his shoulder, no
ticing the tears on his cheeks. “Putting the body in the river will wash away any evidence.”

  “But—”

  “Twig, the current will take the body out to the lake. No one will find it until the ice melts.”

  He stares at his fleece gloves, examining them for blood. “I don’t wanna go to prison, Dylan.” He stuffs his hands under his legs when they start to shake.

  “It’s all right. I’ll take care of everything.” I put on my black knit cap and tug it down over my ears. “Come on. We can’t sit here for too long and think about it. We have to get the body out of the truck and haul ass outta here. Then we can talk.”

  “Who is that?” He glances back, eyes wide with fright. “Dylan, I saw headlights. Someone’s coming.”

  I look all around. The lot is dark. “No one’s down here this time of the night. Must be your imagination.”

  “No. I swear I saw a light over there.” He points. “At the second entrance.”

  “Jake, the lot’s empty. Trust me.” I rub my hands together and blow on them to keep warm. “You see and hear things when you’re under major stress. It’s not real, just paranoia.” I open my door. “Come around to my side and help me carry him to the river so we can get this over with.”

  I pull out a bath towel that’s stashed behind the seat and wrap the guy’s head. It stops the blood from dripping all over our clothes and hides the battered skull from Jake.

  “Can I wait here?” he asks.

  “No way, I’m not leaving you up here by yourself. Not until I know you’re gonna be all right. Besides, I need help carrying him down the bank.”

  “Someone will see us.” His eyes dart toward the street.

  “My truck isn’t visible this far in. Like I said, take a breath. Okay?”

  I drag the guy out of the back, livid that Jake was at the party. I’d be dead if he weren’t, but still, he knows better than to be out this late without his friends, or me. Our parents would’ve picked him up once it got dark if they knew he was out in this area alone.

  “I hate touching him,” he says, holding the guy’s legs, losing his grip numerous times.

  “We’re almost there, man up.” I wince at my words. He’s eighteen, helping me dump a body, and I tell him to man up. I’m surprised he’s not cowering on the passenger-side floor of my truck, unable to speak or move. He doesn’t have to be brave.

  “This is fine.” I release the arms. “Careful where you step, the ice is thin in spots.”

  He knocks snow off his clunky wool-lined boots. “What happens next?”

  “I need to break the ice. Step off it and stay on the bank while I head back to the truck.”

  “No.” He grabs my coat sleeve, staring at the body. “Don’t leave me here with him.”

  I watch tears drip off his chin. My head hurts, and my heart’s split in two. I left Heather earlier in the same condition as Jake, heartbroken and alone. The thought of facing her tomorrow fills me with utter fear and shame.

  “Okay. You go. There’s a concrete block in my truck bed. It’s holding down the tarp you used to pick up the leaves at the Andersons’ last fall. Dig out the block from the snow and bring it down here. Hurry.”

  He races off, only two years younger than me, but just an innocent child compared to what Sean and I have seen.

  I hear the concrete block knock against my truck as he wedges it free from the ice. It’s stuck to the bed along with some dead leaves that fell out of the yard waste bags he hauled away for Lona. He worked past sunset for her, using up all the gas in my truck.

  He returns with the block and his hockey stick. The hockey stick, I’m assuming is for comfort.

  “You buy that expensive stick with the money you got from Lona?”

  “Yeah.” He holds it up. “Is this heavy enough to break the ice?” He raps the block with his stick.

  “I hope so. I should be able to lob it close to the body. The ice is smooth there. It’s harder to break through where it’s all jagged. Once the block weakens the ice, his weight should take care of the rest and send him through.”

  His lips part and I can see his breath. “How do you know all this?”

  “I don’t.”

  He clutches his stick close to his chest. “I’m gonna be sick, Dylan.”

  “We’re almost through this.” I pick up the block.

  “Maybe we should call the cops and tell them the truth.”

  “Jake, you don’t know everything that happened back there.”

  “But this doesn’t feel right.”

  “It shouldn’t.”

  Holding the block with two hands, I twist to the right and pitch it forward. It lands a foot from the body, cracking the ice in a web pattern. We wait. The block and the body stay on the ice.

  “Try again.” He steps out.

  “I’ll get it.” I tug him back.

  I keep an eye on the widening rift under my boots as I inch toward the body. The farther out I walk, the thinner the ice becomes. I lift the block and hear the sound of a crack that echoes across the frozen river, but turn and see that it’s Jake tapping the ice with his stick.

  “Stop that.”

  “What?”

  “You’re freaking me out. That sound is gonna give me a heart attack.” I slide my feet back to him.

  “Sorry.”

  I hurl the block again, and it goes straight through this time. Water streams out of the hole and a puddle forms around the body.

  “Push him closer so we can go,” Jake says.

  “I’m too heavy. If I don’t stay a couple of feet away when he sinks, I’ll go down with him.”

  Jake walks a few steps out, a few more, and I grab his shoulder. He reaches way out with his stick and nudges the guy’s legs, getting his lower half to slide closer to the hole. “Dylan, he’s not gonna fit in that tiny hole.”

  “It’s a weak spot. It’ll open up.” My cell rings, sending him running back to the bank.

  “That scared the shit outta me,” he says.

  “It’s Sean. Hold on … Yeah, what’s up?”

  “Eddie’s not answering his cell.”

  “He’s supposed to be waiting for our call.”

  “I know. Are you done yet? I’m heading back your way.”

  “Almost.” I shudder at the sound of Jake striking the ice with his stick again. “Jake, stop it.”

  He eases up a little but doesn’t stop. It’s a habit. All the players on his team do it. The stick making contact with the ice hypnotizes them. I’ve watched the kids at his games, not even aware they’re doing it.

  “What should we do about Eddie?” Sean asks. “He’s supposed to be in the area with his crew.”

  “I can’t think about him right now. Let me finish here, and I’ll call you back. I gotta get this guy in so we can leave.” I put my cell in my pocket and take out a cigarette, needing a second to figure this out. I can probably drive the body forward with Jake’s stick, far enough onto the weak spot. Tap. It all depends on how slick it is out there. Tap. Tap. “Jake, I’m gonna send you and that stick into the river if you don’t stop tapping the ice!”

  “Sorry,” he says. “I messed up, Dylan. I messed everything up.”

  “No. Sean and I did.”

  “I killed him.”

  “It’s my fault, Jake. Not yours.”

  Wind barrels across the ice. I turn away and flick my lighter, shake it, and try again.

  Tap. Tap. Tap.

  Flick. Flick.

  “Dammit.” I rest my hands on my knees and hang my head low, waiting for the wind to stop. I’m fuming over Ed not being here and shaken by the two guys who jumped us. This night is a disaster.

  “I wanna leave.” Jake taps his stick, stepping out on the ice. “Just push the guy and get it over with.” He taps again, moving closer. “Do it, Dylan. I don’t wanna be here!” Tap. Tap.

  “Stop it!” My temper flares. I spin around, warning h
im with a shove. He lands on his knees and drops his stick. I turn away from him and flick my lighter, sucking in the short flares, dying to get it lit.

  “Dylan.” His voice quavers.

  The repetitive flicks fade as the north wind speaks. It blows against my back and down my neck, constricts my chest and crushes my ribs.

  “Dylan!”

  My pulse leaps as the temperature outside plummets, the chill in the air matching the feeling that goes up my spine. The river vibrates under my boots, climbing up my legs to tunnel inside the chambers of my heart.

  In an instant, the water is resurrected from a deep sleep to swallow Jake whole, announcing itself with a splash and a gasp.

  • • •

  “His stick was the only thing left when I turned around. It was that fast.” I bawl on Autumn’s shoulder. “I heard him scream under the ice, but I couldn’t see him.” Her fingers rake through my hair as we sit on the curb in the snow. “I told my parents he wanted to show me where he had played a pick-up game earlier with his friends.” I sit up and sniff, arms folded tight to my chest. “But when we got there, he saw a patch of black ice on the river and said he needed to slide on it. That’s what I told everyone, that Jake couldn’t stay away from the ice because he was a hockey player. I tried, but I couldn’t stop him.”

  “Shh,” she soothes. “It’s okay.”

  “I lied. I couldn’t mention the party or the guys we killed. I never even told Sean I shoved Jake and he slid out to the thin ice. I never told anyone it was my fault!”

  “Dylan, you—”

  “I killed Jake.”

  “You didn’t—”

  “He was gone in two seconds.” I wipe my nose in my coat sleeve. “Then Heather. She left me too.” Relief never comes. I weep like the searing wind, a forlorn howl.

  Those final moments will forever haunt me.

  25

  Time.

  It’s taken me a year to reveal how that night played out. A secret that never left my lips now resides with Autumn. Granted, Ed already told her, as if somehow he knew. He asked me why I snapped and killed Trevor, and if I had done the same to Jake. He told Autumn I might’ve killed my brother. He brought it up like he was at the river that night, and now I’m questioning the headlights Jake thought he saw.