by Natalie Lund
“Excuse me,” she muttered, though no one was paying attention to her now.
In the bathroom, Callie planted her elbows on the tiles and splashed water on her face. She looked at her reflection, at the droplets funneling down her nose and the tip of her chin. The skin under her eyes was purple, like someone’s ink fingerprints on her face. Then the door opened behind her and Leslie appeared, her cheeks flushed.
“We want to order pizzas. People are hungry and some have to leave soon.”
“Okay. Go ahead.”
“What do you want to order?” Leslie asked.
“Whatever.”
“It’s your birthday. You should decide.”
“I don’t care. I’m not even hungry. Pepperoni’s good. Cheese is good.”
“You show up an hour late. You lie about your mother. You say you’re not hungry. Are you going to leave early too? Maybe flake red pepper into our eyeballs on your way out?”
Callie sighed and steadied her voice. “I’m sorry I was late and that I lied. I really am. But something crazy is happening.”
“I don’t care. You haven’t even said thanks.”
Callie’s fingers tightened around the ridge of the basin, like they were cramping. Was that what this was about?
“Honestly, I haven’t said thanks because I’m not thankful. I didn’t ask for this party. I didn’t want to do anything. And I only go to church group because my dad makes me.” She thought of Brenna, of how her simple I know had been enough. “I mean, let’s be honest. This is more for you than it is for me. You want to be the girl everyone is indebted to. Who’s going to bring you soup when you’re sick? Leslie. Who will do your laundry when your family is falling apart? Leslie. Who’s never going to let you forget it? Leslie.”
“What’s wrong with you?” Leslie hissed, tears in her eyes.
“Oh, I don’t know. It’s my last birthday with my mother.” Callie leaned over the sink again, aware she wasn’t going to have her mother as an excuse much longer, aware that there’d be an after—no matter how empty she made her life now. She let the water run scalding, let it burn so much that then it stopped burning. When she looked up again, Leslie was gone.
Leslie and her mother’s chairs were empty when Callie emerged from the bathroom. Her father’s fingers were steepled in front of him.
I’m sorry, she mouthed. He shook his head and pointed at Leslie’s seat. Callie pulled out her phone and texted: I’m sorry I said all that. You’ve been nothing but there for me.
Leslie did not reply.
MOST OF US DIDN’T
Most of us didn’t understand at the time why we repeatedly saw Frederic burying blood-splotched sheets and Eleanor’s nightclothes beneath the Crimson King maple in front of the inn. Now we know Eleanor needed something to bury, something to point to. There, a miscarried child, right where the roots arch above the soil.
Frederic bought a spaniel puppy for his daughter because she had no siblings to play with. The puppy was clumsy, tripping on its bunny-like ears and new long legs. Its fur was curly around its face and along its tummy. Some of us came over to tumble into the grass with it, to feel its hot tongue on our cheeks. And we loved Celeste, too, for her bright cheeriness like fizzy water. She was wide-boned, limbs nicked and bruised from playing hard. She’d flush from her neck to her strawberry-blond hair.
When we used the bathroom, we’d glimpse Eleanor eating rolls of antacids like they were Life Savers. Her already frizzy hair stood out straight from her head, and there were patches of it missing, like she’d been tugging at it. The inn closed around that time so Eleanor could rest. Our parents gossiped about it endlessly, using the words depressed and barren, and we pictured tracts of winter cornfields, a stubble of cracked stalks.
Celeste, who is one of us too, didn’t remember the antacids or the sheets beneath the trees. Only freedom. Only playing with her whole heart. Now, like us, there is so much more she understands.
The day the spaniel dug at the roots of the maple, Celeste was washing up for lunch and had left the puppy in our care. Even though we didn’t yet know why, those of us who were Celeste’s playmates knew that the mound was sacred. We called at the puppy to stop, but it kicked dirt between its hind legs with mad excitement. Eleanor appeared in the kitchen window, pale-faced and wild, and we scattered. From the park, we watched her stumble to the garage and emerge with the same shovel Frederic had used to bury the linens. She dragged it behind her like a red wagon, leaving a wake in the grass.
The puppy bowed, its paws stretched toward her, its rear and wagging tail in the air, like they were about to play. Eleanor lifted the shovel, her arms visibly shaking, and swung. The flat side of the shovel connected with the dog’s jaw. It yelped, high-pitched and almost human, before staggering sideways and collapsing. Eleanor dropped the shovel and cupped her cheeks, covering her eyes with her fingertips.
Just then, Celeste appeared on the doorstep, and our hearts went out to her, our happy friend.
“Is lunch ready?” Celeste called. She didn’t know what had happened.
Eleanor uncovered her eyes. The dog was on its feet again with its head tilted at an angle that seemed off, uncomfortable. It licked her calf and slunk toward Celeste. From that day on, the spaniel walked with its head cocked, as though wondering what it had done wrong.
Those of us who saw kept the secret until we no longer had secrets to keep.
On the walk home from the museum, Joshua bubbled with nervous energy. He wanted to investigate now so he could disprove the legends, but he was terrified, too. What if they were true? In some movies, ghosts were dangerous—deadly, even. Or worse, his biggest fear: that he’d finally found a gay man in this shit town, someone to look up to and learn from, and he was dead.
Joshua’s mother emerged from the house as he was checking the mailbox to see if his latest comics had arrived. Her red hair was down, but kinked where it had been wound up in a bun. Cake a little dirt under her fingernails, add some calluses to her hands, and she’d look just like she had on his grandparents’ farm. The thought flooded him with warmth.
“How’s the project?” she asked. He straightened up, recognizing her fake casualness. This was the talk he’d managed to delay the day before.
“It went good,” he said.
“Brenna seems”—his mother squinted, as though searching for a word in the distance—“interesting.”
“She’s nice,” he said defensively.
His mother put up her hands and lowered them, like she was closing a briefcase. “All I meant is, she’s very different from you.”
Joshua kicked a crab apple. It skittered across the lawn and stopped at the edge of the driveway. “Not that different.”
“Okay. I look forward to getting to know her better then.” Her voice was gentle, probably the same voice she used with the kids amid abuse cases and custody battles. “Listen, we need to talk. Lawrence told me about yesterday.”
It was sunny, but the storm a few days before had chilled the air.
Joshua narrowed his eyes. “What exactly did he say?”
“He’s worried about you. I know you don’t have the highest opinion of him, but he does care about you.”
“I’m sure,” Joshua said.
“Don’t be surly. Let’s sit.”
He looked at the grass suspiciously.
“It’s not that damp. Come on.”
They sat side by side on the curb.
“So why did you skip your morning class yesterday?”
Joshua glanced across the street. He didn’t need this right now. He needed to talk to Luke to find out who he was. He couldn’t let Brenna and Callie down. “I didn’t want to ride the bus,” he said. “So I rode my bike.”
“Why?”
Joshua pointed at his bruise. “Things like this happen.” It was a half-truth.
&nb
sp; Tears welled in his mother’s eyes. She dabbed at them with her denim sleeve.
“Oh, Mom, don’t cry. Stop. I’m fine.”
She shook her head. “I didn’t listen to you about school. I’ve been so busy.”
Joshua felt his own tears, hot and sudden. It was Tyler. It was his mother. It was Callie’s grief. It was the yearbook, the police report, and the name patch battling with the worldview he’d finally settled on, that he’d grown to trust, because Mercer’s had let him down. He wanted to crawl into his mother’s lap. Like when his grandfather died and they’d moved into that apartment that always smelled of laundry detergent and rumbled with the dryers below. Their mother would sit on the bare floor, pull him and his sister onto each knee, and play feel-good cartoons on her laptop. It had been the three of them against the world that year, and he craved it now, how knit he’d felt to them.
“I’m not going to brush this off,” she said. “I promise you that I’m calling the school Monday morning, and I’m going to drive you there myself.”
“You don’t have to do that.” He wondered if Tyler’s parents would be called in for a meeting, if he’d have to unravel his lies and pick out the truths in front of everyone.
“Yes, I do,” she said. “It’s my job as your mom.”
It occurred to Joshua that it must have been so hard for his mother, too—to have been largely on her own with him and Ruthie.
“You’ve done good, Mom. This isn’t your fault.” He reached out for her hand, but once it was in his own, he felt awkward—self-conscious—and dropped it.
She wiped her eyes again and cleared her throat. “As part of doing better as your mother, I need to hold you responsible for your actions. You’re still grounded and have chores, but I’d like you to spend some time with Lawrence. Do you hear me?”
Joshua wanted to roll his eyes at this, to blurt out Lawrence’s attempted bribe or the fact that Lawrence didn’t want to spend time with him, but he just nodded.
She patted his knee, stood, and wiped damp blades of grass off her backside. “You can start by cleaning your room.” She leaned down and plucked a dead leaf that was stuck to her foot. “And raking.”
Joshua’s heart sank. There’d be no escaping to investigate Luke. Not under her watch. Dutifully, he followed his mother inside and opened the kitchen door that led to the garage. Lawrence was at his workbench, drilling holes in a piece of wood, gold flecks of pulp like pencil shavings coating his arms. Joshua bit off his fingernail and spit the sliver onto the mat. He and Lawrence had barely said a word to each other all day. People said tension was thick, but Joshua thought silence was too: sliceable.
“Hey, Larry.”
Lawrence started at Joshua’s voice, the drill whining as he lifted it.
Joshua put his hands up. “Don’t shoot.”
Flushed, Lawrence wiped his face and set the drill down. “What do you need, Josh?” he asked, sounding more tired than embarrassed by Joshua’s presence.
“Just the rake.” Joshua pointed at the wall where the rake hung. Something flitted across Lawrence’s face. Disappointment? Joshua certainly wasn’t going to apologize for storming out the other day, if that was what his stepdad was expecting. But maybe he could cross Spend time with Lawrence off the chore list, for his mother’s sake. “Do you need help or anything?”
Lawrence tilted his head, like he had to process the question from a different angle. “You want to help me?”
“Yeah. I don’t know. Just if you need it, I guess.”
“Have you used these tools before?” he asked, gesturing to his workbench.
Joshua’s instinct was to make Lawrence squirm: Gay men know how to handle tools, Larry. Or, alternatively, he could snap back: You’re so closed-minded that you can’t even conceive a gay kid might know what a hammer is. But he thought of his mother crying, of taking her hand and it not feeling right anymore—not like those moments she’d drawn him onto her lap when he was little and rested her chin on his shoulder. He could play nice. He could be bigger than this petty, gum-faced man.
“You could teach me,” Joshua said.
Lawrence dropped his eyes to the pulp on the table before him. He was probably trying to figure out a way to avoid spending time with Joshua, which was more than fine. He could still tell his mother he’d tried.
Lawrence coughed into his fist. “Well, I guess you could run to the hardware store with me in a few minutes. I’m making your mom a wine rack for our anniversary.”
Joshua tried to hide his surprise. Maybe his mother had talked to Lawrence, too, convinced him to spend more time in the same room with his stepson—no matter how uncomfortable it was.
“Okay,” Joshua said.
“Okay,” Lawrence repeated.
Joshua felt generous-hearted, forgiving, and a little bit hopeful. If he could face the Lawrences of the world, maybe he could face the Tylers, too, and all the others at school. Maybe he could be a hero yet.
Usually Brenna drove on the interstate to the Cities, but today she felt too nervous, like she needed the slowness of country roads, rows of corn and pig barns, to think. Brenna needed to find out why Dot was here, why she haunted Brenna—if haunted was even the word for it. According to the legends, the Winston twins smashed china because they were angry and wanted the injustice known. The Clarks pushed cars to safety because they didn’t want others to die how they had. And Mrs. Jenson’s story kept kids from playing in grain silos—lest they end up buried too. But what was Dot’s reason? And why did the voices tell Callie to Find them. Save them?
Brenna wanted to know the truth, but she also didn’t. She felt better around Dot—like she had something to learn from her, and why question that?
She rolled down the windows to light a cigarette. The speed limit dropped for the bridge, the cars bottlenecking, so she was forced to take in the slate-gray expanse of water, the tracks along the banks, the riverboat casinos like tiered wedding cakes.
She’d picked up the car from Manny, but had ignored four texts from her mother. There’d been dozens of messages and calls since her mom realized she’d left, but she’d ignored them all. Brenna wasn’t sure what she’d do after the show. Another night in a car—even if it was Golden Girl—made her nerves jangle. She’d been so tired and hungry all day.
Amy had loaned her a few dollars, and she had just enough time to swing by Raul’s, her favorite place in the Cities, for actual tacos—shaved pork nested in corn tortillas and topped with cilantro, onions, and lime.
After dinner, the navigation on her phone led her to a row of bars next to an old railroad bridge with rusted trusses.
In the parking lot, Brenna turned off Golden Girl and sat for a moment. Callie’s and Joshua’s numbers were in her phone now, and they’d each texted that their families had held them up from investigating. She wished they were with her now, or that they’d invite her to spend the night at their homes after the concert.
A few rows from Golden Girl there was a blue Jeep—just like Colin’s. She’d been so excited about the prospect of seeing Dot again that she hadn’t even considered she was on Colin’s turf now. It was a weekend; he’d be out like every other college kid in the Cities.
She watched the venue door, trying to see past the bouncer. Dot was inside. Answers were inside. And they weren’t just about Dot but about Brenna herself—why she mattered. There must be a reason, if a Storm Spirit had chosen her. Or was that a crazy thought? Besides, Jeeps were common; there was no reason to be nervous.
She marched up to the bouncer, accepted the black Xs on her hands, and went inside. Another band was finishing their set, and Brenna sat on a barstool near the back, surveying the crowd. Hipsters mostly: beards and tight pants and granny glasses. Definitely Colin’s crowd. Brenna tugged at the dress she’d borrowed from Amy. It was made of artificial black lace, some polyester blend: cheap and undoubtedly flamm
able. She’d practically ignite under the stage lights.
After the first band cleared the stage, the house lights went up and roadies began shuttling equipment to and from the stage. Brenna hopped off her stool to squeeze to the front, hoping to find Dot.
“Excuse me,” she muttered over and over again, elbowing her way toward the stage, swimming through the stench of booze, cigarettes, and sweat. A wave of menthol smokes and something woody hit her.
“Bren.”
She looked up into Colin’s face.
“Oh. Hey. I—” All the blood rushed to Brenna’s head and pounded in her ears. What words were supposed to go next?
Colin wore a stretched gray sweater, gray beanie, black jeans, and boots, like he’d stepped out of one of the black-and-white filters on her phone. His curls were wet with sweat and sticking to his cheeks and neck. She wanted to brush them away and lick the salt off her fingers. Same Life Stage Girl was nowhere in sight.
A group surged behind Brenna, propelling her into Colin. He was warm and his scent was dizzying. She heard him inhale too. What, she wondered, was her smell? The powder makeup dusted along the collar of Amy’s dress? Cilantro and onions?
The tide of people receded and Brenna was back on her heels, feeling suddenly cold, like she’d climbed out of a pool without a towel.
“Sorry,” she said, but she wasn’t. That old thing was between them, like a spiderweb—fragile, delicate, nearly invisible, but glimmering in just the right light.
“How’s it going?” Colin asked.