by Robin Cain
Sadie knew Frank would be wondering, so she decided to send him a quick e-mail. He’d likely read that before picking up any voice messages. She flipped open her laptop and typed a quick message.
Sadie tried calling Tyler one more time but this time a woman answered the phone after only a couple of rings.
“Oh, I must have misdialed. I’m trying to reach Tyler.”
“He’s not here.”
“Then this is the right number? Who am I speaking to, please?
“This is Sam.”
“Oh, hi Sam.” Unsure if the information would be welcome, she offered it anyway, “This is Sadie.”
“When are you going to leave him alone? Haven’t you caused enough damage?”
Sam’s sudden aggression caught Sadie unprepared. “Sam, I-I’m sorry. I’m just trying to find him. I need to talk to him. Is he really not there?”
“No, he’s not. Do you think I’m lying to you?”
“I just want to make sure he’s okay. I’m not trying to get in the way. I’m just worried about him. Did you know he’s drinking again?”
“Well, way to keep right up with current events. Yes, I know he’s drinking, but he hasn’t been here for a couple days. I don’t know where he is and he was pretty wasted the last time I talked to him.”
The sound of those words terrified Sadie. “When did you talk to him last?”
“The other night and he was a mess. He’s got a real problem, you know.”
“Why do you have his phone?” Sadie remembered Tyler always carried his phone.
“He left it here plugged in on his counter; it was ringing, and I thought it might be him.”
“You’re at his house?”
“Yes, but I’m leaving. I just stopped by to leave him something.”
“Sam, I know this isn’t any of my business,” she said. Deciding there was no time to waste, she added, “Are you pregnant?”
“Hey, guess what? It is absolutely none of your business.”
“Sam, I need to know. Please. I think that’s part of why Tyler has disappeared.”
“Gee, you think?” Sam’s sarcasm was getting uglier by the second. “Well, it doesn’t matter anymore.”
“Sam, can I come see you? I’m right down the street. I want to help you find Tyler.”
“For your information, I’m officially done looking for him. He’s obviously very lost and, from what I’ve seen, he doesn’t want to be found. As far as I’m concerned, you’re the cause of everything and I don’t want to waste my time with you. Just do us all a favor and stay gone, would you?” Without another word, Sam hung up.
Stunned and saddened, yet convinced she could help Tyler if only she could find him, Sadie knew getting Sam to help was her only hope.
“Charles?” she called out to the caretaker, only to find him standing right in the hallway. “Oh, sorry. Didn’t know you were right there. I’m going out for a bit. Lock up when you leave, okay? I’ll see you Monday.”
“Everything alright?”
“Oh, everything’s fine. I’ll see you in the morning.” She hastily grabbed her set of keys and ran out of the house, leaving Charles standing there. Realizing this was none of his business, he put away the broom and got his things together to head home.
Hoping to catch Sam before she left, Sadie thought it faster to just leave her car in the driveway and run down the street to Tyler’s house. She needed to expend some of her frustration anyway. She arrived a few minutes later and knocked on the door. There was no answer. She tried peeking in the front windows but curtains blocked her view. She went around back to look into those windows and found the same thing. There was no sign of anyone home. Sam must have left. Not ready to give up, Sadie was deliberating breaking a window when she suddenly remembered there was another way. Tyler had given her a copy of his key and she’d never been able to part with it—thank God. She located the never-before-used key on her key ring, turned it in the lock and slowly opened the door.
Sadie felt like a spy, but she was certain she would find something in the house—some clue as to where Tyler might be. She was determined not to give up. He wouldn’t appreciate or understand the intrusion at this juncture in their lives, but she didn’t care. It was her responsibility to be certain he was alright.
She stepped inside and gently closed the door behind her, having not really given thought to her plan. Tyler would have normally still been at work this late in the day, but Sam said he had been gone for days. Not taking his cell phone, not telling his girlfriend where he was, his having started drinking—none of it sounded like Tyler was okay.
The lingering aroma of Tyler’s musky cologne welcomed her in, wrapping its arms around her like an old friend. Piles of unopened mail sat on a table by the door, alongside a handful of change and an empty pack of Juicy Fruit gum. A pair of his muddied, worn-out work boots rested next to the old bench he sat on each day before and after a long day’s work. She let her hand linger on his things as she tried to commit these small pieces of him to her memory. God, how she missed him.
She walked into the kitchen. There were dirty dishes stacked up in the sink and evidence of some morning’s breakfast routine in plain sight on the counter. His flavored coffee creamer, absentmindedly left on the counter, sat spoiled and stinking. On the floor, a clothes-basket of unfolded whites waited to be put away. Sloping mountains of paperwork, organized in a fashion she recalled only made sense to Tyler, covered the kitchen table. His infamous “filing system.”
Sadie located a stack of work orders in one of the piles and began to flip through them. Scanning the dates listed, she found a couple work sites for which Tyler had noted hours worked just the week before. If someone was at one of the jobsites, maybe they would know where Tyler was. She stuffed them into her pocket. It was at least a place to start.
Sadie wandered through the room, continuing to look for signs of something—something left behind, something missing—something to maybe give a clue as to where he had gone. Walking into Tyler’s bedroom, she came across his unmade bed. The mismatched sheets strewn about by restless sleep habits reminded her of her own. She picked up his discarded but well-loved, lumpy pillow from the floor, pressed it to her face and inhaled deeply, hoping to satisfy her aching desire with the smell of him. Closing her eyes, she remembered the sight of his face pressed into that pillow, deeply asleep and snoring louder than she had ever imagined was humanly possible—bottomless hiccupping breaths, struggling upward from some mysterious void, followed by slow, thunderous, seemingly-endless exhales. She had no idea how anyone slept with him.
She gently placed the pillow back on his bed and glanced around the room. How long had his clothes, discarded and heaped in a pile by the shower, been there? The mess, like his bathroom counter strewn with men’s toiletries, gave no indication a woman lived with him. Just as a small sense of satisfaction filled her, she saw the purple envelope taped to the mirror.
Stepping closer, Sadie saw Tyler’s name handwritten across the front of it. She carefully pulled it off the mirror, turned it over a few times and held it up to the light. Closed but not sealed, it taunted her reluctance to look inside.
Ah, what the hell. I’m already trespassing.
She lifted the flap and pulled out the folded piece of paper.
T
I know you’re very angry with me, but this is as much your fault as it is mine. We both know that words won’t help anything now, but I want you to know I’m sorry about the hurt we’ve shared. I never intended for this to turn so ugly.
I’m not ready to be a mother and I know you had no plans to be a father. Hell of a joke God played, no? My plan is the only solution. Please know this isn’t just about you and your problems—though they certainly didn’t help.
I hope that you find your happiness one day. Loving you out loud has been both the greatest joy and the greatest sadness of my life. I hope there will come a day when you can forgive me for not having had the courage to take the
other road.
Please know that I honestly do love you—and I will miss your joy. Every day.
-S
Sadie felt the bile rise in her throat as a profound sadness settled into her heart. The thought of Tyler’s hurt, along with her own, was nearly too much to bear.
She quickly stuffed the letter back inside the envelope and, clutching it tightly against her chest, she realized she had to find him now, before it was too late.
Not bothering to lock the front door behind her, Sadie flew back down the street in a dead run, fearing she had very little time. She reached her driveway minutes later, out of breath and perspiring. Climbing into the rental car, she threw the envelope on the dashboard and dug inside her pocket for the papers she had stuffed there earlier. The work orders she’d taken from Tyler’s place referred to a house she recognized as not far away. She would head in that direction.
Preoccupied as she was when she started the rental car and sped off, Sadie didn’t notice the car parked alongside the street or that it had promptly pulled away from the curb to follow her.
Part III
twenty-three
MOVED HUNDREDS of feet from where it had been dumped, the body was carried to its final resting place by the current from the storm the night before. Its fight for buoyancy now over, the body slowly settled to the bottom of the lake. Cradled loosely in a hammock of brown muck and tendril of weeds that gathered in the depths, it was now a curiosity only to the creatures that resided there. The bravest of the hungry fish began to nibble on its toes.
Out scuba diving with her husband, Tom, in Lake Sullivan early Sunday morning, Laura Caston swam over to the old boat sunken decades ago in Johnson Harbor, curious to see what treasures it had to offer. Not the best location for diving, Lake Sullivan didn’t compare to the southern, warmer bodies of water Laura preferred. But she had never been in a fresh water lake—except for her original certification dive that hadn’t allowed time for exploration detours—and she was hopeful it would proffer some pleasant surprises.
Laura glided through the shadowy water, stopping every now and then to pick up debris she found lying on the bottom of the lake. A paradise for boaters, Lake Sullivan was inundated with traffic in the summer months, and Laura now retrieved the byproducts tossed overboard by those inconsiderate souls. As she stuffed another discarded rusty beer can into her bag, she saw movement at the very edge of her visibility. Squinting to focus, she saw what she thought might be a gathering of fish. They appeared to be all feeding on something. She slowly made her way over and watched as the multitude of startled fish scattered in all directions. She stopped and waited a moment for the murky water to clear.
The swollen gray corpse introduced itself to Laura feet first. Its inflated appendages waved along with the current like a psychotic’s version of a Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade float. The mottled corpse’s colorless bulging eyes spoke to Laura of horrors she couldn’t even begin to comprehend.
Laura screamed.
When her regulator fell out of her mouth and water began to flood into her throat, she instinctively went into survival mode. Relying on her training, she blindly grabbed for the inflation valve on her vest and allowed its rush of air to quickly propel her to the surface.
With her head now above water, she violently gagged and coughed up all the water she had swallowed on the way. It crossed her mind how lucky it was she not been in deeper water; this rapid ascent would have otherwise likely killed her.
Panic grabbed hold of her and she frantically struggled to keep her head above the choppy water. She tried to relax and regain her composure, but her fear was getting the best of her. She would likely drown if she didn’t get it under control. Her heart raced as she struggled to breathe normally. She wanted desperately to get out of the water and away from the decaying body she had seen below. She sensed its dead arms still reaching out for her, begging her for help.
Only about three hundred feet from shore, Laura wasn’t far from their boat, but she knew Tom was still somewhere below her, in what she guessed was about forty feet. Certainly, he would notice her absence soon and come looking for her. Her heart raced with anxiety.
She tried to focus on the distant shore to calm her fears, knowing she had to stay put so authorities could locate the body later. She treaded water and waited, scared and alone, unsure how much longer she could remain in this same spot without losing her mind.
What felt to Laura like hours later, Tom eventually surfaced. He popped up some twenty feet away from her in the chilly November morning air, pulled off his mask, wiped the water from his face and tried to get his bearings.
“Tom! There’s a body down there!”
“What?” He’d only heard part of what she’d said. He held his mask in one hand and swam toward her. “What are you talking about?” he asked, when he finally reached her side.
Frustrated with his lack of urgency, Laura nearly screamed her response. “There is a dead body down there! I found it down by the sunken boat.”
It took a moment for her words to register. “Are you kidding me? Where?”
“Down there! It’s right by the sunken boat!”
Tom cleared his mask and inserted his regulator before he quickly dove beneath Laura to investigate. Laura stayed put. Enough was enough. She couldn’t look at the body one more time.
A few minutes later, Tom popped back up to the surface. “We’ve got to call the police,” he said. “Stay here. I’ll swim over and get the boat.”
Staying there wasn’t her choice but she knew there was no other. “Please hurry.” All this time in the air and cold water had begun to make her shiver. She began slow breathing exercises she’d learned in yoga while she concentrated on Tom swimming over to the boat. His felt like a snail’s pace.
Tom reached their boat, climbed up and hurriedly stripped off his gear. Leaving it in a heap where it fell, he went to start the engine. Without a thought to proper boating procedure, he flattened out the throttle and raced back to where he had left Laura treading water. He threw the engine into reverse and managed to come to a dead stop within inches of where Laura was treading water. She normally would have reprimanded him for his carelessness, but now wasn’t the time. Tom helped her into the boat and helped strip off her gear. There were goose bumps covering her flesh.
“Where’s your cell phone? Give it to me,” he told her.
Laura pointed to her bag lying on one of the seats without saying a word. Tom hastily dug through it until he’d located the phone, pushed the numbers he needed and waited. His words rushed out of him before the dispatcher could even finish saying “911. What is your emergency?”
“We found a body in Lake Sullivan. In Johnson Harbor. Outside Big Bear Park, off the road that leads to the campgrounds. A woman—she’s dead.”
“Sir, did you say you found a body?” the 911 dispatcher said, speaking in an unnaturally calm manner.
“Yes. Yes. Me and my wife. I’m calling from our cell phone on my boat. Please, please send someone right away.”
“Sir, what is your name?” the dispatcher asked, still unruffled. “Are you or your wife in need of any medical assistance?”
“No, we’re fine,” Tom said, glancing over at Laura to see if she had stopped crying. “My name is Tom Caston.”
“Mr. Caston, don’t go any closer to the body. Go to the shore and remain there, but don’t touch anything. Give me your exact location, please. I’m dispatching a unit right now. And sir, I’m showing a private number. Give me your cell number so we can contact you.”
“Tell the police they have to follow the south trail, past the last pier, about a half a mile down. We’ll stay here and wait,” he told her. “We came by boat, so we’ll be at the shore.” He recited his number twice, getting it wrong the first time.
Tom hung up. Laura had wrapped herself in the towel. Unable to come to grips with what she had discovered, she was still softly sobbing.
“The police are on their way. E
verything is going to be okay.”
“My God, this is awful. What do you think happened to her?”
“I don’t know, but there is nothing we can do. We need to head to shore and wait for the police.” Tom started the boat’s engine and followed a straight path to shore so the body could later be relocated. When he got the boat into shallow enough water, Laura hopped out of the boat. She fumbled awkwardly to get a hold of the tie line, finding it difficult to concentrate on what needed to be done.
“One of us is going to have to get to the road to meet the police and guide them down here,” Tom told her, jumping out of the boat and grabbing the line from her. He began to wade through the cold water and pull the boat to shore.
“You stay. I’ll go,” Laura suggested.
“Okay, I’ll make sure the boat is out of the way. Are you sure you’re okay to go?”
“Y-yes. I’m okay,” she answered, not convinced she meant it. She grabbed her shoes off the boat seat and plowed through the water to the shoreline. The discovery of this body had shaken her to her core. With its arms splayed out in the frigid water undulating with the current, the body looked like it was struggling to swim for shore. The memory made her shudder. As she began to head up the trail, she heard the sound of sirens in the distance.
Officer Tim Johns had gotten the 901Henry code over his radio while on another call investigating a complaint of a barking dog. It wasn’t every day the code for a dead body was called out and his heart was pumping.
“10-4. Lincoln 324 responding. 10-26, three minutes.”
“10-4 Lincoln 324. 10-19 caller at scene.” The dry voice of Dispatch came back, acknowledging that Johns was en route and advising him to contact the caller at the scene.
Johns jumped into his car, tossed his notebook on the seat and threw the patrol car in reverse. He hit the toggle switch for the siren. A dead body meant lots of “lookers,” so he had to get there quickly before the media got wind of the situation and flooded the scene with cameras and questions. He prayed that whoever had found the body hadn’t disturbed any evidence. At this point he didn’t know if it was a suicide or murder, but neither would surprise him. He’d seen it all in his ten years with the department—more than he cared to remember. The city had grown rapidly in the last few years and its crime rate had unfortunately kept pace.