Beyond the Grave

by Judy Clemens

  Tara waited to make sure Casey got into the system. “There you go. If you have any questions, give me a holler. I’ll be right over there doing librarian stuff.” She gave Casey a quick smile and left her alone.

  Tara was right. The system really was easy. A lot simpler—and less dusty—than the ancient microfiche machines Casey used in the past. She decided to go right for the target and clicked on the Armstrong Arrow which would have come out the Sunday immediately following Halloween forty-five years ago. She didn’t think there would be anything about Marianne leaving town—because who reported on that sort of thing?—but maybe there would be photos from the town’s Halloween costume contest, or trick-or-treating, or even a social pages article detailing the party with all of the women.

  “So, are we finding anything yet?” Death hovered over the chair at the next computer. From what Casey could see—and hear, from the accent—Death was attempting to be Giles, the librarian and Watcher from Buffy the Vampire Slayer. But then again, it could have been any tall British guy in a suit.

  “Just starting,” Casey mumbled, not wanting the very nice and normal librarian to think she was talking to herself. She brought up the front page of the paper, and the first thing she saw was a headline about the fatal Halloween party. As Casey predicted, the article didn’t mention Marianne’s disappearance, and covered only the facts of the get-together, the masked intruders, and the death of the woman, Amelia Barrios. She scrolled down to the obituary photo, which took up several inches.

  Casey choked.

  Death shot closer to the screen. “Could it be?”

  “It has to,” Casey whispered.

  Even with the black-and-white image, there was no hiding it—the young, dead woman’s hair was as white as newly driven snow.

  Chapter Twenty-seven

  “You okay?” Tara stood up behind the counter.

  “Do you know anything about this?”

  Tara came to peer over Casey’s shoulder. “Oh, sure. That Halloween party is the big town mystery.”

  “But this woman, Amelia Barrios. Does she have relatives around?”

  “Of course. Everybody here—well, except for me and Dottie, and now you—has relatives in town.”

  “And who are they? Her relatives?”

  “Well, her husband lives down the street. Bill Barrios.”

  Casey glanced at Death. Nell’s grandma hadn’t simply died. She’d been murdered.

  Tara was still talking. “Her daughter Gracie lives out of town a bit. What’s her last name? Another Basque one. Achabal, that’s it.”

  “And Nell?” Casey wanted the confirmation, even though she knew the answer.

  “She’s Amelia’s granddaughter.”

  It made sense now. Nell said her grandmother died a long time ago. But did the girl know how she died? And why? Her grandmother’s death was like one of those horror novels she liked to read. Or the movies she watched when she could choose.

  “Is this all true? Everything they say in the article?”

  Tara took the seat at the next computer, which unfortunately already had Death sitting in it.

  Death shot out of the chair to hover on Casey’s other side.

  Tara shivered and rubbed her arms. “Who knows what’s true and what isn’t, after all this time? But I would tend to believe that, rather than what people say now. It’s like that telephone game. The more people tell the story, the more it changes.”

  “Tell me what you’ve heard.”

  “Okay, but remember I’ve been told lots of stories, and they sometimes contradict themselves. Also, keep in mind I came here ten years ago. I wasn’t around when it happened. I mean, as a kid or anything.”

  “Just tell me the basics.”

  “Okay, well, there was a Halloween party. Obviously. One of the women had it at her house, Wilma was her name, but it was co-hosted by her best friend. Ethel Merman, I call her, because she wears lots of dark lipstick and over-the-top clothes. I mean, I like a little bit of color, but she goes crazy.”

  Death chuckled. “I do believe she means old Flower Pants.”

  “Her real name is Ethel Bernard. Anyway, Wilma and Ethel had this party, and from what the cops found out, some of the people showed up wearing costumes that covered their faces, so no one could give an exact list of who actually was there. I guess they were going to have a costume contest later on, and they were waiting until then to reveal who they all were.”

  Casey considered the photo she had stuck in her jeans and pictured the clown, Richard Nixon, and the devil. She knew there was something creepy about those costumes, but knowing they were truly unknown was even worse. Could they have been the intruders who tied up the women? Or were they simply party-goers who hadn’t given their identities to the police? Or had the costumes been taken off by that time and discarded, thought to be unimportant?

  “So, anyway, these people, who they thought were their friends in disguise, said they’d come up with a fun game for the party, kind of a magic trick, and did the other women want to see it? The women at the party had already been knocking some back and were halfway to sloshed, so they thought it sounded fun. These women, the disguised ones, gathered up the folding chairs Ethel had gotten from the Methodist church, and lined them up in Ethel’s living room. They had the women sit and used ropes to tie them all up. Like I said, the women were kind of drunk, so they let them do it. Once they were all tied up, the disguised ones told them they had to get themselves untied—”

  “—while they burned the house down.”

  “Right. So the people in the disguises, whoever they were, took off. The women at the party thought they were about to die and tried to get untied, but they couldn’t. So Joyce Staples, this woman dressed as Wonder Woman completely flipped out, screaming and going crazy, so everybody was paying attention to her. Nobody realized Amelia Barrios—dressed as Lucy, of all people, you know, the crabby girl from Peanuts?—was having a heart attack. By the time they noticed, they couldn’t help her. The Bride of Frankenstein, I think, was the first to get free, and she called the ambulance, but it was too late. By that time everybody forgot the house was supposed to be burning.”

  Casey met Death’s eyes, stunned. Officer Whistler hadn’t had this amount of detail. “That’s horrible.”

  “Yeah, it really is,” Tara said.

  Casey thought about the photo. Had anyone in the public seen it before? It wasn’t in the newspaper. But would film have been developed that quickly back in the seventies? She hesitated, then pulled out the envelope.

  Tara gave a little laugh. “What’s that?”

  “Have you ever seen this?” Casey slid the photo onto the table.

  Tara looked at the picture for a few seconds before her eyes widened. “Oh, my gosh. Is that—that’s the women from the party! Where did you get this?”

  So the photo was new to her. Where had it come from?

  “Do you know who these people are?”

  Tara’s eyes roamed over it. “Most of them.”

  “Is one of them Dottie?”

  “Oh, no. She didn’t go. She was home with Vern, handing out candy, so she didn’t experience any of it.” She squirmed. “Some people say it was Dottie and Marianne in the costumes, but it doesn’t seem possible since Dottie was home with Vern, and we all know now that Marianne had taken off with some guy.”

  “Which Marianne’s family blames Dottie for.”

  “Isn’t that crazy? I don’t see how that’s supposed to be Dottie’s fault.”

  “They needed someone to blame, I guess.”

  “Stupid.”

  The door opened and a couple of older women came in. Neither one was Flower Pants or her friend, but Casey still took a good look. Were they in the Halloween picture?

  “I’ve got to help these ladies,” Tara said. “They come in every day to Skype w
ith their grandkids. It’s sweet, I guess, but since the grandkids are too young to actually talk, it seems kind of pointless.”

  Casey laughed. “They probably just like seeing them. Do you need me to move?”

  “Nope. They can use the other two computers.”

  Tara went to get the women set up. Casey scanned the next few issues, but was able to find only a few more articles in the Idaho Press-Tribune before the stories faded away. Not once did the group photo show up, nor did the cops put forth a solid lead on the intruders. The rumors about the divorcing couple, the woman having the affair, and the greedy landowner, were simply that. Speculation that ruined lives.

  There were no articles that mentioned Marianne or her flight from her family, but Casey wasn’t surprised. What Marianne had done wasn’t criminal. It was too bad the town and all of its judgmental citizens didn’t realize the same thing would apply to Dottie.

  Tara got the other women situated and came back to Casey. She plunked down some old books and Casey recognized the format. Yearbooks.

  “Thought you might find these interesting.” Tara sat in the same seat as before and opened the top one. “You’ll recognize some faces. It’s the class of 1963 you’ll be most familiar with. This is their senior year.”

  “Who should I be looking for?”

  The phone rang at the desk. “I’ll be right back. Take a look while I’m gone.”

  Casey slid over the open book and turned to the pages filled with senior portraits. The first one to catch her eye was Ethel Bernard. Good old Flower Pants. Her expression was surprising. Softer. Happier. Without the pinched, angry countenance, she was actually pretty. The quote underneath her photo proclaimed, “Most beautiful girl in town.”

  Huh. Not something Casey would ever have suspected.

  Casey didn’t recognize anyone else on that page. She turned to the next and was confronted with a younger version of Vern. As with Flower Pants, his photo spoke of an easier time. His eyes sparkled, and he looked rather handsome in his suit coat and tie. His quote said simply, “Most likely to succeed.”

  Did running a convenience store for an unappreciative, unfriendly town count as succeeding? Casey didn’t think so.

  Casey paged through, recognizing Flower Pants’ friend Wilma and finding other familiar people, such Nell’s grandpa Bill Barrios and her late grandmother Amelia, and Stuart Rush, who, because of his last name, must have been Marianne’s husband.

  Casey went hot and cold, realizing she hadn’t seen Marianne. What had her last name been before she got married? What did she look like? Casey didn’t know.

  She got through all the pages of seniors, then went back to the beginning. She scanned the first names until she found Marianne close to Flower Pants, where Casey had missed her the first time around. Marianne Cenarrusa. “Most likely to be mayor by the time she’s twenty.”

  Interesting.

  But not as interesting as her picture.

  Marianne’s photo was different from the other girls’. Sure, she wore a formal dress, and her hair was set in a flip of the times, but it was the look in her eyes that set her apart. Confident. Intelligent. Not going to take crap from anybody.

  Casey could respect that.

  But she couldn’t respect abandoning her friends and family without a word.

  “How’s it going?” Tara was back.

  “Just found Marianne.”

  “It’s sad, isn’t it? To think how she let everybody down.” Tara held out her hand. “You haven’t found it yet, have you? I can tell.”

  “Found what?”

  She waggled her fingers and Casey gave her the book. Tara paged through. “I used to study these when I first arrived. All the years up to the day I got here. That’s what comes from being a librarian. I want to know all about everybody.” She grinned at Casey before going back to the book. She went quickly through the sections of sports and choir and clubs and scholar awards, stopping often to point out a picture of Vern, who was involved in every sport and served as class president, until she arrived at the one she’d been looking for. She turned the book toward Casey.

  Prom king. Prom queen. The guy with the crown was none other than Vern, smiling, handsome, his arm around the queen.

  Flower Pants.

  Casey shook her head. “Really?”

  “Really.”

  “But were they…They got elected as king and queen, right? There was nothing else?”

  Tara took the book back and turned to the final pages, where people were chosen as Class Clowns, or Smartest, or Most Fashionable, as well as predictions for coming years. And there, under the banner of Class Couple, Most Likely to be Happily Married with Kids, was a photo of Vern. With Flower Pants.

  Casey’s breath left her in a rush. So Flower Pants’ flirting did make sense. There was a history there. Flower Pants absolutely did have a crush on Vern—now and back half a century.

  Tara leaned over to study the photo. “I know, right?”

  “So…” Casey took a moment to let it settle. “What happened?”

  Tara wrinkled her nose. “It’s kind of a soap opera. Vern and Ethel got engaged right out of high school. They were supposed to be married the next July. But then Vern went to Portland for a summer business course so he could help his dad with the store. A couple months later Dottie came to town looking for him. She was pregnant. They got married in October.”

  Wow.

  Casey pondered young Flower Pants and how she must have hated his new wife. Had those emotions ever faded, even a little? Or had that resentment held on full-force for fifty years?

  “Did you hear about his dad?”

  Casey looked up from the yearbook. “You mean how he died soon after the baby?”

  “Yeah. A lot of people blamed Dottie. They say his heart attack was because of her. It’s ridiculous, but what are you going to tell people who have believed something for so long?”

  A group of kids entered the library, and Tara looked up and smiled. “Time for my daily baby-sitting. I don’t mind, really. But it does require my attention.” She stood. “Feel free to look at these, but they do have to stay here. Reference books, you know.”

  Casey transferred the stack to the other side of the room and leafed through them. She found lots of photos of both Vern and Flower Pants, starting with their middle school years, but it wasn’t until their junior year they began showing up together. It was disconcerting. Vern looked…joyful. She’d never seen that on him in real life.

  But then, she’d only known him for three days, during this time when his wife was dying.

  Casey thanked Tara and left. She still had some time before Vern expected her back at the store, and she had lots of questions.

  More now than ever.

  Chapter Twenty-eight

  Casey was surprised by the number of people on the street, most of them young. She shouldn’t have been, seeing how Tara had just been inundated with the younger generation. School must have let out. She watched for Nell, but didn’t see her among the children on the sidewalks.

  A copper-skinned boy with dark hair ran past her laughing, with another boy racing after him, their backpacks banging against them, shoelaces untied, coats flapping from their hands, because of course they weren’t wearing them. Casey watched until they disappeared, a knot forming in her stomach. Omar would never run laughing down a sidewalk, never have school friends, never learn how to speak Spanish, or understand geometry, or write a persuasive essay. He would always be her baby, cooing and giggling and making the first sounds of toddler-hood. Until he wasn’t.

  Dottie hadn’t gotten to know her child for even a day. Had lost her before she’d taken her first breath. Now Dottie had been tethered to this town where she had neither friends nor family because her daughter was buried here, had lived in her mother’s womb here. Had died here. Was it worth it? The
years of disdain and suspicion and mistreatment? Was it all because she didn’t want to leave her daughter’s grave? This, in addition to her father-in-law’s controlling hold on the store. Casey couldn’t imagine the pain.

  No, that wasn’t true. Casey knew the pain. Nothing else could hurt so badly as to lose her baby. Her husband. But Casey couldn’t stay where she had loved them. Couldn’t live in that house, see the things they’d touched, the places they’d walked. She’d been running from those memories since the day they died, and couldn’t see herself ever stopping. At least, not as long as she had to bear those reminders every day.

  She stopped in the middle of the sidewalk. Was that the key to her discontent? Seeing those things? Being reminded of what she’d lost?

  But no. Even on the road, she remembered. Even here, hundreds of miles from home, it gnawed at her soul. Could she ever run far enough?

  A kid on a bike flew past and Casey began walking again.

  Dottie and Vern had chosen to stay in Armstrong. Chosen to deal with the bad treatment so they could stay close to their daughter and fulfill his father’s wishes. Had it really served them better than starting over somewhere new? It didn’t seem so to Casey. From what she’d seen, the Dailys’ lives were basically empty of everything that made life worth living. Wouldn’t they be better off if they’d moved on?

  Would she?

  The sound of a vehicle broke into her thoughts and Casey glanced at the street to see a truck cruising slowly beside her. The driver was Coop, Lance Victor’s stupid friend. One of the girls from Saturday night sat in the passenger seat. Her window lowered, and Casey prepared to run the other direction.

  “Hey,” the girl said.

  Casey stopped, and the truck did, too.

  Casey looked from one kid to the other. “What do you want?”

  Coop grinned. “Nothing. Except this.”

  The girl held up her phone. Casey looked at it, but it was only the back.