The doorbell rings for the first time in what seems like forever. Camel Miranda scoops up Mark in his saggy pee diaper and hurries downstairs. Santa might be there with toys for Helena and Mark. Or a beautiful princess. Or Effie, whose mean father can’t keep her away from Helena forever.
She plops Mark down on his squishy diaper and unlocks the inside door. Instead of something good on the other side of the screen, it’s Effie’s frowning dad all by himself. He’s wearing his police uniform and gun, which means he’s probably come to arrest Camel Miranda for a salt and batter.
Camel Miranda grabs the door handle to keep him out. In case he decides to break in, she makes a tripping hazard by sliding Mark over in front of the door with her hoof.
“Good evening, Helena. Can you please tell your parents I’m here,” Effie’s dad says.
Camel Miranda shakes her head. Never ever.
Effie’s dad looks a bit mad, but he doesn’t draw his gun. “We both miss Effie a lot,” he crouches down to say. “Maybe we could write her a letter together. She’d like that.”
Camel Miranda nudges Mark a bit too hard, making him try to crawl away even though he’s needed as a shield. “Camels can’t write,” she says, holding up a hoof.
Helena smells her mom’s flu before the feet thump, thump, thump down the stairs. A sob lodges in Helena’s throat like a big bite of peanut butter sandwich she forgot to chew before swallowing. Mark cries even though he doesn’t have any good reason.
“Harvey,” Helena’s mom says in her scratchy voice, “where the heck is my brain today? I forgot you were booked to come finish the interviews.” She picks up Mark, holding him face out so he won’t catch her sick. Helena scoots around behind her mother. If Effie’s dad tries to arrest her, she’ll kick him hard in the nut sack.
“This a bad time,” Effie’s dad says.
“It’s not ideal,” Helena’s mom says with a laugh that sounds barfy. “Ben still can’t stop hurling.” Her nose is red and crusty when she turns to look at Helena. “Honey, do you think you can answer a few questions for Mr. Sam about the night of the school play?”
Camel Miranda doesn’t need time to think. She screams “elp” at the top of her lungs and runs away so fast not even a policeman’s bullet can catch her.
«29»
Willard barely registers the shame of wetting his pants. The black bear that’s sniffing around the cabin claws at the small pane of glass set at shoulder height in the wall. The thin glass cracks and the bear reaches in to swipe with a paw that Willard smacks with the cast iron fry pan. The bear withdraws, but only for a moment. From his grandfather’s teaching, Willard knows the pulsing noise the animal makes means it’s geared up for a kill.
Willard screams at Terrance to heat the sharp tip of the poker in the fire. When the boy doesn’t obey, Willard throws the fry pan in his direction, missing by a couple of inches. Keeping an eye on the door in fear that the bear will try to breach it next, Willard rushes across the room to heat the poker himself. He returns to the window, then jabs with all of his strength. The bear’s vocalization turns into a moan of fear that fades as the heavy animal runs away.
Willard sets down the poker, breathing hard against the pain in his chest. If his grandfather was here, Willard would earn a beating for drawing the bear to the cabin with his laziness. He should have buried and burned their garbage at the back of the property. Instead, since his return, Willard has let garbage pile up on the porch.
Terrance deserves punishment more, though. He’s too lazy to help with chores and always sniveling in a corner. He steals food whenever Willard’s back is turned, not caring that the nearest grocery store is a three hour round trip. He’s ungrateful, too. On the second day at the cabin, Willard broke his grandfather’s rule and gave Terrance the old toy train. Instead of playing, the boy refuses to even pick the thing up.
“This is your fault,” Willard says. “If that bear dares to come back, you’ll be its dinner.”
Willard feels trapped in the cabin that seems small and dark after staying in motel rooms with heat and electric lights. Now that he’s used to them, he wants television sets and grocery stores that he can shop at on a whim. He wants enough people around to scare off the wildlife.
Years before his grandfather used his savings to buy a rental house in Willard’s name. The house is a two-day drive away. Tomorrow Willard will dig up the paperwork. He’ll give notice to the renters telling them to move out. And Terrance had better smarten up. Otherwise, when Willard moves down south, he’ll leave the boy behind to keep their grandfather company in the shed. That will serve the lazy little bugger right.
«30»
Gabriel is alone outside. Willard has stayed inside, too afraid of the bear to hang his own wet pants over the porch railing. Willard wants the cabin door to stay shut against the bear, so Gabriel is free to walk to the end of the porch. With only a sliver of moon to shine on the snow, the yard is so dark Gabriel can barely see the angel and animal statues. The forest is silent. The bear must be gone.
Despite the freezing cold, and Willard’s instructions to be quick, Gabriel stays outside. He’s sick of being afraid, and bored with watching Willard roll the toy train back-and-forth while he makes “choo-choo” sounds under his breath.
Willard isn’t a real adult. He’s a kid like Mitch from Gabriel’s class, one who’s bigger than the other kids, but nowhere near as smart. Willard’s dangerous, though. He’s the kind of mean person who doesn’t know how to stop before it’s too late.
Gabriel hops down two steps. His red runners don’t have much grip so he skates out onto the slippery yard, coming to a stop by bumping into a cement dragon. A thought comes to Gabriel; If he runs away right now, Willard won’t have the guts to chase him.
Gabriel no longer hopes for rescue. Celine and Elvis aren’t ever coming and no one else is either. Gabriel’s legs tremble and his heart pounds in his ears as he takes a few more slippery steps towards freedom. If he runs away, the bear might kill him or he might freeze to death, but then Gabriel will go to heaven, which is better than the cabin.
Gabriel makes himself stop walking. He doesn’t want to die. He loves school and drawing pictures. One day, if he lives, he’ll get his own dog, maybe a Yorkshire terrier or a French bulldog. And he doesn’t want Miss Granger to worry about him forever.
“Terrance,” Willard shouts, a warning that Gabriel has spent too much time outside. When bullies used to hurt Gabriel in the playground, he was nice back until they stopped. To keep Willard from killing him, Gabriel has to make friends with the kidnapper. To do that he can’t be himself, he has to be Terrance. But Gabriel will only be Willard’s little brother until a real chance comes. Then he will escape.
«31»
It’s late as Harvey trolls the back roads on the outskirts of Fenny. The Gabriel Wheeler case has exceeded the hours allocated for the initial intensive response. As of tomorrow, Harvey’s exhausted patrol officers will return to their regular schedule of shifts. A sustained investigation will continue, although at a slower pace. Harvey is tortured by a feeling that he’s missed seeing a crucial connection. He doesn’t want to sleep until he figures out what.
He’s in a dream-like state, following his subconscious down dead ends. Suddenly he’s steering to the right, off the road and hurtling down a rutted driveway, before his conscious mind has a chance to clue in. The Chisholm family had abandoned both their property and the mobile home on it soon after some private family tragedy. Eighteen years had passed without a sign of either a property sale or the family’s return. Yet the snow was rutted, a fact that screamed out for Harvey’s attention.
He parks the car before the bend that would reveal his presence to an onlooker. The Tahoe’s door plows aside knee-high snow as Harvey shoves it open. His are the only human prints, although deer tracks abound. A flashlight played along a section of rut merely tells him whomever drove onto the property did so prior to the latest dump of snow.
The Chi
sholm’s trailer is a black hole against the night sky. Harvey draws his gun, and moves toward a vehicle-shaped section of driveway where the snow hadn’t reached. The aluminum door is open, its screen in tatters. Harvey stands to one side, shifts the door in with a foot. Snow dumps from the easement onto the ground behind him. He freezes, listening intently until he’s certain his are the only lungs huffing in the cold air.
Harvey exchanges his gun for a flashlight. It’s obvious partying teens were here, not a kidnapper and his victim. Harvey’s light plays over the evidence: a tower of beer cans; cigarette butts ground into the shag carpet; familiar graffiti in the bedroom where it looks like sex was had, if the blanket and condom left behind are any indication.
He checks the closets then steps away from the room, aiming his body toward his SUV. The blanket could lure him to sleep in the filthy, freezing trailer; he’s that bloody tired. Rash behavior, however, is not an option. On his deathbed, his father worked his way through every possible dangerous scenario a man might encounter or initiate. He forced Harvey to promise that he’d never do any of them. He can’t climb onto the roof when there’s frost, or leave rusty nails lying around the yard, or drive dangerously. Harvey had argued, “I’m a cop. Dangerous driving is part of the job description.”
“Look in the mirror,” his father replied. “You’re lots of things, but you’re no Bruce Willis.”
His father’s diagnosis of melanoma came a few weeks after they had buried Harvey’s mother. To spare his loved ones an added burden, the grieving widower hadn’t mentioned a thing until later days when the situation got too bad to hide.
You’re a good boy. Although Harvey’s father has been dead for years, it’s his voice he hears. On Harvey’s long list of missed people, his dad is at the top. He could’ve used the old man’s wisdom the past four days.
Gabriel Wheeler is the good boy, if everyone who knows him is correct. Except no one says is, they all say was. As if they’ve determined the child’s fate without the need for evidence or hope.
Harvey holds up two fingers almost touching them together as he gets in his vehicle. “I came this close to beating a woman, Dad. The missing boy’s mother.”
“No biggy. I wanted to wallop your mother plenty of times. The woman had a mouth on her like you wouldn’t believe.”
“Don’t lie to make me feel better. You were always gentle as a lamb.”
“Baaa,” his father bleats.
With his head resting against his arms, Harvey hugs the steering wheel. “You shouldn’t be dead.”
Harvey can almost feel the sinewy hand of his father on his head. “Sorry, son. Can’t be helped.”
“I lost Effie.”
“You’ll get her back. One day.”
“I can’t find the boy.”
“Not with that crap attitude, you can’t,” his father says.
“What have I missed?”
Harvey waits for more, for the piece of evidence that will make things clear—but his dad has said his piece and left.
Part Two
Spring Break
«32»
Although there are lots of pictures of kids on the Wal-Mart community bulletin wall, Gabriel Wheeler is the only person dressed as an angel. Helena thinks one girl with red hair looks a bit like Effie. Another has a mustache, which means he should be too old for things like kidnapping. One little boy looks like he knew one day he’d get snatched. He has the same sad eyes as a girl in grade seven who got pulled out of class by Principal Johnston during PE last year and came back a week later with such an embarrassed face the popular girls didn’t let her back into their group.
On the last day of school before spring break, Helena’s teacher gave her an assignment to write poems about anything except Gabriel Wheeler. The teacher thinks writing Gabriel poems is still one of Helena’s favorite things to do. It’s not, though, because he’s been missing four whole months. During recess before spring break, all the kids said they were bored of him. Some kids even believe he probably got lost in the snow and froze to death. None of the kids want to play Kidnapper-Kidnapper anymore.
Even though they’re kind of boring, the missing kids are still way more interesting than Helena’s grumpy parents so she reads more of the posters anyways. Lots of the children are missing, injured, or lost, which seems like an awful lot of bad things to be at once. One boy with a big birthmark on his face also has something called a port wine stain and she wonders if he was allowed to drink alcohol or if he snuck the bottle.
Helena inspects her dad when he laughs too loud. He stands at the high counter trying to talk an evil-looking woman with a ring through her lip into giving him his money back for a DVD player. The machine doesn’t work because as soon as they got it home Helena broke it by fiddling too hard with the buttons. He huffs as he writes something on a piece of paper, but Helena knows he won’t give up. They need all the money they can get their hands on if they’re going to be able to be able to afford their vacation.
“Helena,” her mother says, “bathroom?”
It’s a command, not a hint, so Helena heads toward the ladies’ room beside the customer service counter. Once inside she stops to look at herself in the mirror. She’s wearing the new Snow White costume her Auntie Cynthia bought her to replace the Camel Miranda costume that was getting too shabby. The gown’s top, which her auntie calls a bodice (the word makes her think of a body and ice), is blue with white piping. The puffed sleeves are red and the skirt is yellow tulle. Except for the freckles on her nose and a scar on her top lip she got the day the training wheels came off her bike, Helena looks almost exactly like Snow White.
What’s stupid beyond belief is that Helena and her cousin Claire, a lucky duck who’s at Disneyland for spring break, are supposed to be twins in their matching dresses. The cousins are the same age, but they don’t look even a teeny weenie bit alike. Claire’s all twisted up and strapped down to a wheelchair while Helena is a perfectly normal girl. Her cousin even has to wear a Snow White wig because her hair is nothing but Shreddies-colored tufts, not thick and black like Helena’s. Even with fake hair and a red satin ribbon, Claire could never be a princess. Helena thinks her aunt Cynthia should have bought Claire a dwarf costume instead.
When she comes out of the washroom, Helena makes the mistake of looking at her mother patting an empty place beside her on the bench. Mark is on their mom’s lap with his head thrown back and his mouth hanging open. Drool runs down his chin. There’s a wet spot right above the honey pot on his new Winnie the Pooh T-shirt, also a gift from their auntie. Helena’s glad there aren’t any kidnappers in the store to see how cute he is.
Her mother pats the seat a second time. Helena’s expected to stop fooling around, but she pretends she doesn’t understand her mother’s sign language.
Helena wonders if any of the missing kids’ parents warned them not to go places with strangers. She knows from overhearing her parents talking that Gabriel’s mother probably didn’t bother because she’s a Drug Addict and a Prostitute, which means Sexy Seller.
“Helena,” her mother says in a no-arguments tone. “Come. Sit.”
There’s no pretending she didn’t hear. Helena takes one last fleeting look at the Missing Person posters. She sings a warning written on one as she twirls across the room, making her yellow skirt flare out, “Caution is advised.”
¤
Helena’s dad got their DVD refund hours and hours ago and all they’ve done is drive her Uncle Jeff’s extra car through a bunch of boring towns. Her parents, who’ve been chatting, are quiet for the moment, so Helena leans forward to pat her mother’s back. The candy scent of Chanel No. 5 hovers around her shiny black hair.
Helena presses her lips against Romy’s pearl earring, a perfect and wonderful gift from Grandma Louise before she was dead that made Helena’s dad say, “Perfunderful!” —perfect plus wonderful—for the very first time. It is also the gift that made Helena’s mother say to her father, “Does this mean your mo
ther’s finally forgiven me for stealing away her baby boy?”
“Is that how you see me, Romy. As a babe?” Helena’s father asked. Then they did some yucky smooching even though her mom answered, “Of course.” Helena thinks their smooching was idiotic because when people call her a baby she gets completely irked and so should her dad.
Her mother turns her head. She smiles a big lipstick grin for Helena’s dad, which makes her look as beautiful as Snow White when she charms all the little birds and animals.
“I have to piddle,” Helena says, as much to distract them from getting all smoochy again as because it’s suddenly true. She yanks the skirt out from under her bum, just in case. She tucks as much of it as she can under her armpits, which is okay to do because she’s wearing blue tights and her underpants don’t show. She wonders what happens to kidnapped kids when they have to go. Do the kidnappers stop at a gas station restroom, or do the kids have to wet themselves?
“Dogs piddle,” her mother says. “People take a whiz.”
Helena’s dad sighs. “Tell me again why we have to keep our poor daughter topped up with so much water she audibly sloshes.” He nibbles the edge of his blond mustache, which Helena thinks can’t taste good, especially not if there’s old food caught in the prickly hairs.
From the tone of her voice, Helena knows the answer her mother gives is for her benefit, so she’ll remember exactly what the doctor said. “The extra pressure on her bladder helps her know when it’s full.”
“And that’s a positive thing, why?” Helena’s dad says. He winks even though he’s not being fair to her mom who doesn’t enjoy forcing water down Helena’s throat.
The car glides past an exit with a gas station symbol on the sign, but her mom doesn’t notice until it’s too late because she’s busy changing the CD. They’ve had the Jonas Brothers three times in a row and even Helena’s getting sick of “Time for Me to Fly.”
All That Remains (A Missing and Exploited Suspense Novel Book 1) Page 8