by David Bell
“Jason?” Regan said.
“What?”
“You say that about Logan, about trying to change his course. But you don’t know if that . . . It probably wouldn’t have . . . Look, just be careful. And don’t spend too much time away from home. That girl’s going to come back, or Hayden is, and they’re both going to need you there. That’s where you should be focusing your attention. Okay?”
“Okay. I just hope it’s not too late. For them or for me.”
* * *
The Pratt family lived on Washington Street. To get there from downtown, one literally crossed a set of railroad tracks and headed south. When Jason was a kid, the families there worked in factories—Henry Ball Bearings and Mission Electronics. As the years passed and the factories closed, they began taking jobs in places like Wal-Mart or McDonald’s, if they found employment at all. The houses on Washington Street were boxy and small. They sat close together on playing-card-sized plots of land, and even late in what had been a rainy spring, the lawns were patchy and brown.
Jason pulled up in front of the Pratts’ house, the address he found in the phone book. It looked no better or worse than the houses on either side of it, and as Jason approached the front porch, he saw that the railing was in need of a paint job as well. He stopped before he mounted the steps. There was one car in the driveway, a dented minivan parked above a large piece of cardboard, which was absorbing as much dripping oil as it could. He wondered if Hayden had been there recently, even though the listing in the phone book was for a Ruth Pratt, who Jason was pretty sure was Jesse Dean’s mother. Would Jesse Dean have brought someone to the house if his mother still lived there? Would he hide or hold Hayden there if he had to? Could he do the same with Sierra if she fell into his hands?
Jason started up the steps, but before he reached the porch, the front door opened with a creaking of springs. A woman about his age stepped out, shielding her eyes against the sun. She was obviously not Jesse Dean’s mother, and Jason looked her over, trying to determine if he knew her from growing up in Ednaville.
“Another cop?” she said.
Jason stopped halfway up the steps. “Excuse me?” Then the words registered in his head. “No, I’m not. Have they been here today?”
“Just a little bit ago. I figured you were a detective here for some follow-up.”
The woman was thin and wore sweatpants and a tank top. Her hair was piled in loose curls on top of her head, and her feet were bare.
“I’m looking for Jesse Dean.”
The woman snorted, like she’d just heard a slightly funny joke. “Do you think if Jesse Dean were here, I’d have to answer the cops’ questions? He’s not here. Who are you?”
“I knew him in high school.”
“You and everyone else in this town.”
“So he’s not around?” Jason asked.
“No, he’s not around. He doesn’t live here anymore. Not really, anyway, even though I guess it’s his house technically. I pay the bills.”
“Are you Jesse Dean’s sister?” Jason asked.
She snorted again. “Nice try. I’m his wife. I’m Mrs. Jesse Dean Pratt. Aren’t I lucky? My name’s Mandy Pratt. His mom gave us the house when she died, but Jesse Dean only lives here when he feels like it, which isn’t very often. And you are?”
“My name is Jason Danvers. I live here in Ednaville, and I went to high school with Jesse Dean, although he was a couple of years older than me.”
“He failed a couple of grades. I think he was the world’s oldest tenth grader at one time.”
The sun had risen higher, and Jason felt its warmth against the side of his face and neck as it climbed above the trees. Mandy shifted her weight. She placed one bare foot on top of the other and yet managed to remain still, holding her balance that way without wavering.
“The police probably asked you about my sister, Hayden, or maybe even my niece, Sierra.”
Recognition spread across Mandy’s face. She lifted her chin. “Ah, so that’s why you’re here. You’re looking for your sister too.”
“I’m sorry to bother you,” Jason said. “But it’s very important.”
“Isn’t everything important to somebody?”
“Have you seen my sister? Hayden? She was friends with Jesse Dean in high school, and someone, a mutual friend, saw them together at Center Park last night. By any chance did he mention her to you?”
Mandy’s lips pressed together. “Do you think Jesse Dean tells me about his women?”
“It’s not like that,” Jason said. He thought of Rose, and her claim that Jesse Dean was “her man.” He decided not to mention her. “Hayden dated one of Jesse Dean’s friends in high school. She married him eventually. Derrick Borders? Do you know him?”
“Ugh,” Mandy said. “I’ve met him a time or two. Not impressed.”
“So you don’t know anything about Hayden? Or Sierra?”
Mandy looked down at Jason. “I’ll tell you what I told the police. I hadn’t heard from Jesse Dean for maybe six months. Not unusual for him or for me. We’re not always together. About a week ago he called and said he was going to be back in town. He does this from time to time. I know what it means. He wants to stay here, and he wants me to stay out of his hair.”
“Does he make you leave?”
“Sometimes.”
“Did he this time?”
“No. He showed up. We spent some time together as husbands and wives often do, and then he was gone. I haven’t seen him since.”
Jason felt deflated. He wasn’t sure what he expected to find out at Jesse Dean’s house. As he stood there on the steps, he felt the fruitlessness of the whole endeavor fall down upon him. What did he think he could discover that the police couldn’t?
Jason reached into his pocket and brought out a business card. He leaned forward and handed it to Mandy. “My cell phone number is on there. If Jesse Dean comes back, or if you hear anything from him, can you let me know? Or just tell him to call. I think he’ll remember me.”
“He remembers everybody. That’s one thing Jesse Dean does well.” Mandy studied the business card, flicking her thumb against the edge. “You work at America’s Best? What do you do there?”
“I work in their marketing and advertising department.”
“Fancy. I’m not from Ednaville, but it seems like everybody and their brother works for America’s Best.”
“It’s a company town. Or it used to be.”
“Yeah. Nobody’s hiring now.” Mandy slipped the card into her sweatpants pocket, and she studied Jason, her face inquisitive. “You say you knew Jesse Dean in high school?”
“Yes.”
“What do you remember about him?” she asked.
Jason wasn’t sure what to say. He tried to fix his mind on a single memory but couldn’t. He just remembered that Jesse Dean was “trouble,” as his mom would say. That he had a police record and other kids lived in a combination of fear and awe of him.
“I didn’t know him well. We weren’t friends.”
“One thing,” Mandy said. “Come on. Give me one memory of Jesse Dean.”
“I have to go.”
“Humor me,” she said. “Look at this yard, at this street. I’m here all day watching The View and Dr. Phil.”
“You have kids?” Jason asked.
She shook her head. “I can’t. Jesse Dean has one that he claims, and probably more.” She shrugged, trying to look casual and failing. “And I lost my job. Anyway, tell me one crystal clear memory of Jesse Dean.”
Jason leaned back against the railing. He looked out over the sameness of the houses, the declining fortunes of the neighborhood that had produced Jesse Dean. Jason pictured Jesse Dean on the periphery of high school life, always smirking, always cool. Always somehow far away and yet still close enough to brush against the teen
agers Jason knew. One night came back to Jason, one night that encapsulated his feelings about Jesse Dean’s predatory viciousness—
“We were at a party once,” Jason said. “It must have been junior year of high school. I was with my friends, and there were a lot of kids hanging out. It was one of those parties where the parents went out of town, and basically the whole school got invited. Like something from a movie, you know?”
Mandy nodded. “I remember those days.”
“Jesse Dean made an appearance. It was always a big deal when he showed up at some party. It was like a celebrity was there, you know?”
“Please.”
“No, really. Everyone knew him. Everybody was afraid of him, but they also wanted him to say hi to them or acknowledge that they existed somehow. Anyway, I don’t know how it started.”
“A fight?”
“Not even that really. Later on, people speculated that this kid had bumped into Jesse Dean when they were both at the beer keg. Maybe he spilled something on Jesse’s clothes. I don’t know. I’m not even sure if the kid knew what he did. He was a senior, a guy named Brad Barnes. He had just poured a beer for himself and went back to the party, minding his own business. But Jesse Dean walked over to Brad and tapped him on the shoulder. When Brad turned around, Jesse Dean said something. Then he punched the kid twice. Once in the stomach and once in the face. Hard punches. Brutal. The kid went down on the floor, and everyone was just standing around and looking. Watching.”
Jason looked over at Mandy. She wasn’t smiling, and without any inflection in her voice, she said, “That’s my man.”
“I watched the whole thing happen,” Jason said. “It scared the shit out of me. Not because of the violence, although that freaked me out. It was the humiliation of it all. It was like Jesse Dean wanted everyone to see what he could do. He wanted to send a message to every kid in that room.”
“And the message was?” Mandy asked.
“Don’t mess with me. Don’t you dare ever cross me.”
Mandy looked serious. “Do you understand what I’m trying to tell you here?”
“I think so. You’re telling me to stay out of Jesse Dean’s way.”
“That’s right,” she said. “Do you work with anyone like that in the advertising department at America’s Best?”
“No,” he said.
She nodded as if confirming an important point. She seemed to be genuinely concerned for Jason. “He’s bad news, friend,” she said. “He doesn’t care about anybody or anything. Keep that in mind when you poke around and ask questions about him.”
Chapter Fifteen
Thirty minutes later, Jason saw Sierra outside a downtown store. She wore a red sweatshirt as she walked among the thin morning crowd, her hair pulled back in a long ponytail. Jason’s hands shook as he guided the car closer to the curb. He hit the brakes when a pedestrian crossed ahead of him, the man shooting Jason a dirty look, and then he accelerated again, approaching Sierra. He rolled the passenger window down and slowed.
“Sierra?”
She kept walking. He honked the horn. Once and then again, longer and louder.
“Sierra?”
She stopped and turned. He saw her face.
It wasn’t her.
“I’m sorry,” Jason said. “I thought . . .”
The girl’s lip curled, and she twirled away, her long hair flying. A couple of people looked at Jason as they watched the scene play out. If he wasn’t careful, he was going to be the one getting arrested.
* * *
Nora called a few minutes later, and Jason answered with too much hope in his voice. She shut it down right away.
“No news here,” she said. “What about you?”
“Nothing.”
“Anything from Jesse Dean’s house?”
“I met his wife. She hasn’t seen him.”
Jason flashed back to that high school party, the swiftness of Jesse Dean’s justice. Had Hayden or Sierra run into something like that?
“Are you coming home now?” Nora asked.
“Soon. I’m going to check one other place first.”
“Had the police been to Jesse Dean’s house?” Nora asked.
“Yes, they had. Just before me. That’s good news, isn’t it?”
Nora sighed. “Maybe. But if you didn’t learn anything there, that means the police probably didn’t either.”
* * *
Thompson Bluff sat three miles north of town. More than a century earlier, one of Ednaville’s leading citizens, a man by the name of Charles Thompson, donated over one hundred acres of land to the county to be used as a nature preserve and park for its citizens. Over the years, picnic areas were added, as well as trails and a Frisbee golf course. When Jason was a child, nearly every church in town held their annual picnic at Thompson Bluff, and several times a year his science teachers dragged an entire class of children through the park’s many winding trails, pointing out plants and birds and snakes to a group of kids who were only too happy to not be sitting in a classroom for a few hours. The park closed at eleven o’clock, but that didn’t stop high school kids from going there after hours. There were plenty of places to pull a car over for a window-steaming make-out and groping session, and the picnic shelters and trails made convenient hideaways for drinking and smoking. The police mostly left the kids alone. An unspoken agreement seemed to exist among law enforcement in Ednaville: As long as no one acted too crazy, the police left everyone alone.
Jason and Nora had driven past the park many times. It was nearly impossible to avoid for anyone driving north out of Ednaville. The entrance to the park sat off Highway 27, the main road that led to and from Ednaville. Nora had mentioned on more than one occasion that they should go there and hike or picnic, and Jason always tried to put her off.
“It’s not as nice as it once was,” he told her.
And he was right. State funding for maintenance of the park had been steadily cut. As unemployment rose statewide, more people found themselves with little to do during the day but drink and get high, and like the teenagers of the past, they found a welcoming place for it. Jason didn’t get the impression the park had become dangerous, just unpleasant, full of a different class of person than him.Colton was right when he said that more and more people called it “Heroin Hill,” a reference to the drug and other activities both real and suspected that took place. The police saw that as a reason to look for Hayden there, so Jason decided to look there as well.
Jason hadn’t been inside the park since their return from New York. To be more accurate, he hadn’t been inside the park since the night of his high school graduation, the night Logan walked away. If asked, he couldn’t have said why he’d never gone back, but as he drove down the highway and the entrance to the park came into view, he understood that going there alone, even approaching the park alone, would be a very different experience from going there with Nora. Before he even slowed the car and turned in at the gate, he felt a stab of nostalgia in the center of his chest, the twinge that reminded him of how much the place mattered, how large a role it had played in his past.
He followed the winding park road slowly. Listening. Absorbing. In so many ways, it looked exactly the same. Every curve in the road seemed familiar, and he guided the car effortlessly, as if a map had been imprinted in his brain and would never fade. But the closer he looked, the more he saw the cracks. Garbage overflowed and spilled on the ground. Picnic shelters were decorated with graffiti. Broken bottles and crushed cans littered the walking paths and trails. And he saw the people. Men sat in the shelters wearing dirty T-shirts and grimy jeans. The laces of their shoes or boots were undone and they smoked, one hand cupped in the other, looking at the ground where their ashes fell as if searching for answers. The women he saw smoked as well, their pale skin spilling out of ill-fitting clothes. He spotted a lot of tattoos, a lot o
f overweight and underweight people. The cars were dented and rusted, the tires mismatched, the taillights trailing wires. Jason went around again, making sure he hadn’t missed anything, but he knew that Sierra, and even Hayden in her cleaned-up condition, would stand out in that environment. But as he made the second loop, the light filtering through the trees and dappling the road, he suspected there was nothing to be found on Heroin Hill. Nothing that related to Sierra or Hayden anyway.
He made a detour during the second loop. Instead of continuing all the way around, he turned on the far side of the park and took a side road that led down to the start of the Frisbee golf course. A smaller picnic shelter stood there, one where the disc golfers met before starting their rounds. When Jason pulled in, the lot was empty, the shelter no less degraded than the others. He remained in the car, taking in the surroundings. The trees were still filling out with leaves. The grass was the bright green of spring. In another week, seniors would be graduating from the local high schools. Would any of them come up there to celebrate? Was it even possible to believe that it had been twenty-seven years since his own graduation, since the night he last set foot in the park?
Jason leaned back in his seat. He rolled the windows down and let the breeze come into the car. Even with the changes, it was peaceful at the Bluff. He stared at the trees and let himself believe nothing had changed—not the park, not his life, not his sister’s life. He wanted to think he could get out of the car and walk into the woods and follow the path he took that night with Regan, and somehow he would end up at that moment in time again, the moment when the two of them came so close to acting on the flirtation that consumed the second half of their senior year.
* * *