The Lost Causes of Bleak Creek

by Rhett McLaughlin

  Leif stepped back and straightened his clip-on tie, hoping that listening to Rex talk about Alicia wouldn’t cause him to explode into a full waterworks display before he was able to say anything.

  “I’m Rex, and this is my best friend, Leif, and we’re best friends with Alicia.” Rex was suddenly struck by the feeling that he couldn’t trust anyone in the pews. They all looked perfectly normal and perfectly sad, but so did Wayne Whitewood. “Uh, were”—he corrected himself—“We were best friends with Alicia.” Rex looked to Leif, inviting him to speak. Apparently this would be somewhat of a tag-team speech.

  Leif took a deep breath and forced himself to begin. “I know,” he said, “that some of you think Alicia was ‘troubled’ or ‘a bad influence’ or, you know, something like that, but I never saw it that way. Alicia is one of the most amazing people I’ve ever known.”

  “I agree,” Rex said, even as he felt a paranoia gripping his chest more tightly by the second. “Alicia was the greatest. So smart and funny. And weird! But not bad weird, like ‘doing magic tricks in your room by yourself’ weird, but good weird, like ‘doing a magic trick that’s not even a magic trick because that’s the joke’ kinda weird.” He scanned the audience, simultaneously questioning why he’d decided to use magic as a gauge for weirdness and thinking he’d somehow know the faces of Alicia’s murderers—assuming members of Whitewood’s cult were out there—when he saw them.

  Meanwhile, Leif was interpreting everything Rex was saying as an attempt to one-up him, to try to out-honor Alicia. He knew this wasn’t a competition, and sure, they both missed her, but what he had felt for her was more profound than Rex’s admiration of her lips. “Even more than all that,” Leif said decisively, “Alicia had a huge heart. You could see that with every person she met.”

  “That’s for sure,” Rex said. “She could make anyone—” His eyes landed on Mary Hattaway, the secretary over at Second Baptist Church, sitting there in the fourth-row aisle seat. More specifically, his eyes landed on her hand.

  Her carefully bandaged hand.

  He looked at her face, where her cold eyes burned into his, even as she made it seem like she was genuinely mourning Alicia. He quickly looked away. “Sorry,” he said into the mic, clearing his throat. “Sorry.”

  Leif glanced at Rex, who seemed to have gotten so choked up about Alicia that he’d needed to stop talking. He related, but why did Rex get to be the one to have the public emotional breakdown about her? If that was going to happen to anyone, it should be him!

  “You know,” Leif said, before he’d even made the decision to do so, “I’ve never told anyone this, but I…I really…Since this past summer, I’ve had…feelings for Alicia. Like, more-than-friend feelings.” Leif heard his mom gasp as he took in the expressions of everyone else in the audience: some surprised, some sweetly moved. He couldn’t believe he’d just said that.

  “What?” Rex asked, off-mic.

  “I never got a chance to tell her how I feel,” Leif continued, ignoring Rex, “but I wish I had. You can’t waste a moment, you know? Because, if you do, the person you care about might, you know…they might be gone.”

  The crowd was silent, as if absorbing the profundity of what Leif had just said.

  “Whoaaa,” Mark Hornhat said from the back of the room.

  Rex was absorbing Leif’s words too. He’d recalled their conversation about Alicia back on the rocks. Why hadn’t Leif said anything then? Their friendship had always been built on honesty. That’s what made it work. He was stunned. He couldn’t really dwell on that at the moment, though, because seeing the Boykinses’ devastated faces reminded him there was something more important to address.

  “He’s right,” Rex said into the mic. “We can’t waste a moment. Which is why we need to tell you what actually happened to Alicia.”

  “What?” Leif said off-mic, now his turn to be surprised.

  “Everybody praises Mr. Whitewood and his school for saving the town or whatever, but I don’t see what’s so praiseworthy about murdering kids.”

  Leif’s mom gasped again, as did Rex’s and the majority of the other people sitting in the pews.

  “I mean, how many ‘freak accidents’ can one school have?” Rex continued. “Four dead kids in, like, a decade? Doesn’t that strike you as at least slightly disturbing? Right, Leif?”

  “Uh,” Leif said into the mic, not quite understanding how even a soul-baring moment like the one he’d just had could be wrested away by Rex. “I agree that it seems a little fishy.”

  “It’s more than fishy!” Rex said. “This man is a killer!” He pointed at Whitewood, and the crowd again gasped. Rex hoped it was the sort of gasp you’d hear at the end of a murder mystery, but he had the feeling it was actually disgust at his insolence. He couldn’t stop, though. “And we’re just gonna let him play the organ at the funeral of the girl he killed? That’s not right! You’ll never believe what we saw at the spri—”

  “Now, now, that’s just about enough,” Wayne Whitewood said, standing up from the organ. He’d shouted the words, but he didn’t look angry. In fact, he seemed to be radiating warmth and kindness.

  “See?” Rex said into the mic, terrified but knowing he needed to press on. “He doesn’t want us telling you—”

  Whitewood stepped between Rex and Leif and covered the microphone. He lifted his hand, adjusting the mic to his level before putting an arm around each of the boys. Rex and Leif stayed completely still (or as still as they could while trembling), convinced they were about to be murdered in public.

  “I’m truly sorry to interrupt you fellas,” Whitewood said into the mic in a quiet, gentle voice, “but I don’t think your words are really appropriate for the occasion. Trust me, I get it. As most people here know, I understand grieving very well. I lost my wife and my daughter.” There were tears in Whitewood’s eyes. “And just like you, I wanted to blame someone. When grief takes ahold of you…well, it’s not pretty. But I promise you boys…it will get better. Time makes everything better.”

  “Bless you, Mr. Whitewood,” said a man from the crowd.

  Whitewood nodded and smiled. “Now, why don’t you fellas get back to your seats? You said some beautiful things about your friend, and I know her family appreciates it.”

  For lack of any other options, Leif and Rex stepped back from the podium and walked wordlessly to their seats, careful not to make eye contact with anyone, especially their parents. They stared forward as their sixth grade teacher, Mrs. Crawford, began to talk about what a joy Alicia had been to have in class.

  * * *

  —

  AS JANINE AND Donna walked side by side across the lobby of the Shackelford Funeral Home, weaving through clusters of people and looking for the teenage boys Janine had met that day in Li’l Dino’s—the ones who had just bravely called out Whitewood during their best friend’s funeral service—Janine couldn’t help but feel a tinge of satisfaction.

  The Gnome Girls were back.

  Well, not entirely—Donna still wasn’t saying a lot and seemed to sporadically regress back into the aloof version of herself at unpredictable moments—but it was certainly a start.

  With Donna by her side, Janine almost didn’t mind the stares and frowns that had been aimed in their direction all afternoon. Their attire certainly wasn’t helping. Since she, understandably, hadn’t packed anything funereal, Janine was wearing one of GamGam’s dresses, a matronly black number that was so baggy she’d had to pull it back in various places with safety pins. Donna didn’t have that excuse, but she’d opted to wear a puffy-shouldered black dress over a pair of torn blue jeans and black Chuck Taylors. They looked like Addams Family rejects.

  Janine hadn’t known if Donna would be game to come to Alicia’s funeral, thinking it might be traumatic for her, but Donna had insisted. As they had stood in the back during the incredibly sad service, Jan
ine had snuck glances at her cousin to make sure she was okay. Even though Donna had spent most of the time with that zombie look on her face—a protective instinct, Janine figured—a hint of determination flashed across her face when Rex began to rail against Wayne Whitewood. Janine’s resolve had strengthened too; she recognized allies when she saw them.

  Because Rex was right. There seemed to be something ominous under Wayne Whitewood’s smiling, organ-playing exterior.

  The interview Donna had done with Janine once they returned to GamGam’s after their dramatic highway encounter had only confirmed that fact.

  “They tried to drown me,” Donna had said, eyes aimed squarely at the floor, clearly not enjoying having a camera pointed at her but enduring it for the sake of the greater good.

  “Drown you?”

  “Well. First they cut me,” Donna said. She held out her right hand to the camera, where a faint scar could still be seen across her palm.

  “Are you sure Whitewood was involved?”

  Donna had paused a long moment before nodding. “He was the one who cut me.”

  “Oh my god,” Janine had said. “I’m so sorry, Donna.” She’d been tempted to turn off the camera, to hug her cousin, but Donna said it was okay and seemed determined to keep going. “Can you…can you tell me about the drowning?”

  “They carried me into the spring and—”

  “Wait, what spring?”

  “Bleak Creek Spring. Next to the school.”

  “Oh. Right. From the resort days. Okay.”

  “They carried me in, and I was…”

  “You were what?”

  Donna shook her head back and forth at least a dozen times, and the distant look came back, and Janine had known that this time they were indeed done for the day.

  “There,” Donna said now, pointing past the line of people waiting to offer condolences to Alicia’s parents and sister, to where Rex was in an intense-seeming conversation with two adults who had to be his parents.

  “Perfect,” Janine said, but before she could take another step, a brittle hand landed on her arm.

  “Still here, huh?” It was that awful woman Mary Hattaway, in a dark version of the many-buttoned outfit she’d been wearing the first time Janine met her. She spoke brightly but wasn’t smiling.

  “Yup,” Janine said, looking Mary right in the eyes. “Still here.” She wasn’t sure if Mary herself had been the one to paint the profanity on GamGam’s Grand Marquis, but Janine was certain she’d been involved.

  “That little architecture movie sure is taking a long time. And, Donna,” Mary said, “what a nice surprise to see you out and about.”

  Donna grunted.

  “Still keeping the dishes clean at Li’l Dino’s?”

  “Go screw yourself,” Donna said under her breath, looking at the floor.

  “Well, bless your heart,” Mary said. Janine guessed that meant Mary had heard Donna loud and clear. Leaning in toward Janine and lowering her voice, Mary added, “I think it might be a good idea for you to leave town, sweetie. They have lots of interesting ‘structures’ in other places.”

  As Janine tried to think of a snarky response, she was distracted by Mary’s right hand, which she’d noticed was wrapped in a bandage, more or less in the same place where Donna’s scar was. “What happened to your hand?” she asked.

  Mary’s face turned a deep shade of red. “Oh…I, um…I broke a glass,” she seethed. “It’s fine.” Realizing she’d lost her composure, she pivoted sharply and marched off.

  Janine turned to Donna, who looked like she was receding into herself again. “I’m sorry, we don’t have to stay here. We can leave.”

  “No,” Donna said, as she nodded over Janine’s shoulder at Rex, who had broken off from his parents and was heading for the front door.

  “Rex,” Janine said more loudly than she’d intended.

  “Huh?” he asked, walking over to them, blinking as if she’d just woken him up.

  “It’s me, Janine. The filmmaker?”

  “Oh. Yeah. Hey.”

  “And this is my cousin Donna.”

  Donna gave a small nod while staring at her shoes.

  “I’m so sorry about Alicia,” Janine said. “You’re right, you know. What you said up there. About the school. You’re totally right.”

  “Oh,” Rex said, both relieved and validated. “Well. My parents don’t think so. But…”

  “Let’s go over here for a minute,” Janine said, leading them to a large fake potted plant they could comfortably speak behind without drawing too much attention. “I’ve read about the deaths at the school. So I know it doesn’t add up. In every single case, the body was too disfigured to have an open-casket funeral. Just like with Alicia.”

  “Yes! Right?” Rex sounded shocked, as if he couldn’t believe anyone would actually agree with him.

  “When Donna went there, they…Well, are you okay if I tell him?”

  Donna nodded.

  “They cut her hand and tried to drown her in the—”

  “Spring!” Rex said.

  “How do you know that?” Janine asked.

  “Oh, man, that’s…because that’s what almost happened to our friend Ben. He…Well…” Rex looked around to make sure no one was listening, and got distracted by the sight of Leif walking past them with his mom. “Hey!” he whispered.

  Leif’s head spun toward them, seeming for a moment as if he thought the plant itself was talking to him. When he saw that it was Rex, though, his expression hardened. “What do you want?” They were clearly in some kind of fight.

  “Just…come here for a second. It’s the filmmaker lady. From Li’l Dino’s.”

  Leif seemed to have a private battle with himself before sighing, telling his mom he’d only be a minute, and joining them.

  “She thinks I’m right,” Rex said. “About the murders at Whitewood. I was just about to tell her and her cousin Donna what we saw at the spring.”

  “Okay,” Leif said, unimpressed.

  Rex shook his head in frustration, deciding to continue the story rather than letting Leif have a piece of his mind. That could wait. “So, we were at the spring the other night and we saw this…like, this ritual. Like, a cult ritual.”

  The word cult caught Janine off-guard, even after hearing Donna’s story. “Are you sure?”

  “Pretty sure,” Leif chimed in. “They were wearing light blue robes, and they—”

  “Don,” Janine interrupted. “Were they wearing robes when they…?”

  “No,” Donna said. “At least, I don’t think so.”

  “Okay.” Janine hoped these kids weren’t adding fantastical details just for the hell of it. “So what happened at this ritual?”

  “Whitewood cut some woman’s hand,” Leif said, getting more into it, “and then the water lit up this weird blue.”

  “I remember that,” Donna said.

  “The water…lit up?” Janine asked.

  Donna nodded.

  “Wow. All right.”

  “Yeah, and then Whitewood walked into the water,” Rex said, “and stayed under there for, like, a long time. Not even sure how he did it. Probably some kind of breathing tubes or something.”

  Janine’s skepticism was kicking into overdrive as the details grew more sensational, but watching Donna as she absorbed the boys’ story was enough to keep her disbelief suspended.

  “I’ve been thinking about what to do next,” Rex said. “We should probably tell Sheriff Lawson, right? Because this is huge. He’s the one over there talking to Alicia’s parents. We could pull him aside and—”

  “Can’t do that,” Janine said. “We need to be incredibly careful.” She saw the confusion on Rex’s and Leif’s faces, the inability to process the idea that being careful would mean not going
to the police, but she didn’t want to explain the entire situation with Donna’s father to them. Not here, anyway. “I think the best thing for us to—”

  “I think the best thing for y’all to do is to head on out,” a deep voice said. They turned to see Leggett Shackelford in his black suit and mammoth mustache framing the same unwavering smile as Mary Hattaway’s. “I’m sorry to interrupt your meeting, but this place is full of grieving folks, and I believe you’ve already made enough of a scene today,” the big man said, locking eyes with Rex before turning to Janine.

  “Hi, I’m Leggett Shackelford,” he said, extending a large paw for Janine to shake, “and this is my funeral home.” She tried not to noticeably freak out when she saw a raised scar along his palm.

  “So nice to meet you,” she said, with zero warmth in her voice as she shook his hand.

  “I’d love to say the same, but I’ve heard about the unfortunate movie you’re makin’. Big Gary told me he’s still missing three stones. Such a shame.” He spoke with an unnatural congeniality, that sappiness the people of Bleak Creek so often adopted when ripping you a new one. “And now, to show up at this young woman’s funeral, after all you’ve done to upset people here? Seems pretty impolite, if you ask me.”

  “Well, nobody’s asking you,” Janine said, unwilling to play his game of fake friendliness. “Though I could, if you’d be down to be interviewed for my documentary.”

  Leggett held his grin in silence, surprised that a young woman would talk to him that way.

  “Okay, ma’am, I think we’re done here,” he finally said. “Now, if y’all could make your way home I’d appreciate it.”

  “Gladly,” Janine said, giving a quick nod to Donna, Leif, and Rex before making a beeline for the exit, hoping they would follow.

  Once she was outside, she saw that Donna and Rex had followed, but Leif had reconnected with his mom. Rex’s parents were walking out the door, so she tried to speak fast.

  “You need to take us to that spring.”

  18

  AS REX AND Leif led Janine and Donna through the darkness—Janine with a camera bag slung over her shoulder and Donna holding a tripod duct-taped to a long aluminum pole—both boys were silent. This was partly because they were once again sneaking onto the Whitewood School property, but mostly because, other than a perfunctory phone call about logistics, they hadn’t spoken since the funeral.