This is Not a Love Letter

by Kim Purcell

  “He’s not in the river,” I say.

  He gives me a long, sad look, like maybe he feels sorry for me. “We’ll figure out what happened, Jessie. Don’t worry.”

  Ain’t No River Wide Enough

  The last time I was in the river was a month ago. It was flowing real fast, even then, on account of the warmer temperatures in the spring, and I knew that, but I was trying to impress you with how fierce and daring and wild I was.

  You called, “Hey, tangerine girl, come out. I’ve got something for you.” Like you were nervous. I loved making you nervous.

  “I got something for you.” I sprayed the silty water up from my mouth. “Why don’t you come in and get it?”

  You waved your hand in that patient way of yours, with that smile, like you were too cool to get wet.

  “There’s nothing better than doing it in the river,” I said, even though the truth is I’d never done it in the river. Or in any other body of water. Only with you. On land.

  “Too cold for the dude,” you said.

  “The dude?” I laughed, cause that was weird for you to say “the dude.” It wasn’t a thing you said. “Come on! It’s warm.” I splashed you. “See?”

  “Aah!” you screamed. “That’s cold.” Your dimple twitched on your cheek.

  I climbed out, half-naked, and grabbed your arm. “Come on! I dare you.” Your foot slid on some mud, and your eyes flew open, a raw fear that I’d seen before, when kids are drowning. You were terrified.

  “What? Are you scared?”

  You let out an uncomfortable laugh. “Hell yeah.”

  “But you know how to swim,” I said. You’d come to the pool a couple times. I’d seen you doing your head-up crawl. It didn’t make sense.

  “I don’t like rivers,” you said. “They’re creepy. The current. The undertow. All those weeds.” You made a face.

  “I can’t believe you never told me that.”

  You shrugged. “I didn’t want you to laugh at me.”

  “I would never laugh.” I grinned, unable to stop myself.

  You pointed at me. “You’re laughing.”

  “You are such a city boy,” I said. “What if I was on the other side of the river and the only way you could get me is if you swam across?”

  “I’d do it.” You grabbed my hand then and you sang that Marvin Gaye song: Ain’t no mountain high enough, ain’t no valley low enough, ain’t no river wide enough, to keep me from getting to you, babe.

  It made me grin, I couldn’t help it. You and your Marvin Gaye. “You’d probably go find a boat to cross that river.”

  And you laughed. “You know it.”

  9 AM Monday, Matheson Trail parking lot

  Above, dark clouds are rumbling in. This morning when I left home, it was just a little cloudy, no big deal. I’m never much of a planner. You’re the one who checks the weather. At least the weather finally feels appropriate.

  Josh and I walk slowly up to the back of a huge crowd. You wouldn’t believe how many people have shown up. I count over two hundred. And school buses are still driving up. Josh told me the principal said kids can skip school.

  The search and rescue guys are huddled up in their red jackets beside the red SAR truck. There’s an ambulance here now, and some cop cars too.

  It feels surreal. Like one of your races, except nobody has on numbers and people are more serious. Josh’s mom, dad, and brother slide in beside Josh—I say hi, but I feel kind of awkward. It’s just so weird being around them without you here, too. His mom gives me a smile. “How you holding up?”

  Her sympathy almost does me in. “Okay.” My eyes heat up. Do not cry. I suck on my lip.

  Most of the people here now are adults, but the buses are still arriving with kids from school. A lot of the people in their twenties look like Seattle/Portland types, nose rings and dyed hair, and all shades of brown and white, the kind of mix we never see around here, but I wish we did.

  All your friends are here. Tim, Tamara, and the rest of them are standing at the front, like they want to win the race to find you. But Steph isn’t coming. Spiders and all that—you know how she is. I told her it was fine, I’d be with Josh. She helped with the posters and she’s been posting stuff online. It’s not like she doesn’t care.

  I kind of thought Michael would show up, but he hasn’t texted, nothing. Some people suck when times get tough. They just disappear. That happened when my mom got sick too. Her friends disappeared.

  Your mom and Raffa are staying by the phone, in case you call. Your dad’s coming, though—that’s what your mom said—I don’t see him yet.

  The guys on your regular baseball team are wearing their white-and-black leather baseball jackets. But not all the guys on your travel team are here. Not Johnson.

  I feel a drip of rain on my cheek. And then another. Why didn’t I wear a rain coat?

  A strong hand claps me on the back, startles me. I turn around. It’s Steve, full of that fiery organizer energy, even here. “Hey, Jessie. You got a good crowd.”

  My eyes tear up and I gush, “Thanks so much for everything.”

  “No problem.” He holds out his arms, gives me the warmest hug, and then he clasps Josh’s hand in this special kind of handshake. How do guys learn those things? They hardly know each other. It’s like a special handshake club.

  An older search and rescue guy moves to the front, facing the crowd. He plants his feet apart, like an old oak rooted to the ground, and raises an orange bullhorn. Anyone who was talking shuts up real fast.

  “Thanks for coming, everyone. My name is Bill and I’m in charge of this operation. We believe Chris Kirk ran down here on Friday night. Dogs caught his scent here. We’re going to head out in both directions, off the trail.”

  I thought I heard dogs yesterday. They caught your trail? Ugh.

  He points a thick finger up at the dark clouds. “We’re going to hand out some rain capes.” Just as he says that, the rain starts coming down harder, not the normal wispy rain of the Northwest, but hard pellets beating on my head, my shoulders.

  I almost wore your jacket today, but I didn’t want people to stare. It’s in my closet still. This morning, I smelled it, and man, it was nice, that deep salty sweet smell of you. But don’t worry, I’m not going to turn into some smelling perv. Unless you don’t come back soon. Then I might. The first thing I’m going to do when you get back is smell you. Or maybe kiss you and then smell you. You’ll laugh that beautiful laugh of yours, my nose buried deep in your neck.

  A familiar voice slides up next to me. “Hey.”

  My heart squeezes. My eyes cloud up. It’s Steph.

  “You’re here.”

  “I wouldn’t miss it.” Steph gives me a big old kiss on my cheek, then wraps an arm around me, opening her jacket, so we can share. It shields my back from the pouring rain, and even though I’m still soaked, her warm body next to mine makes all the difference.

  Can you believe she came?

  Finally, the capes get to us. I slide away from the warmth of Steph’s body and pull the cape over my head.

  “Hey.” Josh pokes me in the shoulder. “Isn’t that Chris’s dad?”

  A lone African American man is moving up past us, at the far right, dressed in black in a sea of yellow. Must be your dad. He looks like you. Almost as tall.

  He’s wearing a long black trench coat over what looks like black slacks, and nice boots, now dirty with mud. Is he really going to search for you in those? Maybe he has all kinds of dressy boots.

  He stops next to some kids from school who barely know you. Someone passes him a yellow cape, and he takes it, ducking his head under the plastic, says thank you. He has a quiet way. Reminds me of you.

  I heard your mom talking to him on the phone once. She was in the kitchen and I was going in to get a drink, and I heard her ask him if he was taking his medicine. And then I guess he said he wasn’t because she got mad at him and said it didn’t matter if it made his brain fuzzy, he needed
to take it, or go on a new one. And so, I turned around and didn’t get the water, and I didn’t tell you about it either. Maybe I should have.

  Search and Rescue Bill lifts his megaphone and shouts out instructions. “We’re going to walk straight through the low growth, off the trail. Everyone needs to walk two arm lengths from one another, like this.” He stands next to the young guy, and they both reach their arms out so their fingers are nearly touching. “Be careful of where you step. We’re looking for clothing. Fabric on a branch. Something caught on a tree. Anything. Even if it looks like garbage.”

  The rain is really coming down now and he has to squint through it. “If you see something, put your hand up and we’ll come to you with an evidence bag.” He waves a zipper-type bag in the air. “Don’t pick it up. We will pick up the items.”

  He holds up a black iPhone, like the one I bought you for Christmas. It’s getting wet, which bothers me. Is he about to say no listening to music? A bunch of people have their headphones in.

  “We think he was holding a phone. This is really what we’re most interested in finding. Even something as small as an ear bud.” He lifts the headphones in the air; they swing around like a lasso.

  I know how to spot stuff that’s out of place. If there’s one thing being a lifeguard has trained me to do, it’s this.

  SAR Bill shouts in his megaphone. “If you see some ground that looks disturbed, maybe some blood, or something dark brown on the ground, let us know. We’ll check it out. But we’re not searching for a body.”

  A dramatic gasp escapes out of my mouth, and a middle-aged woman in front of Josh turns around and squints at me, like she’s waiting for me to freak right out. Steph pats me on the back and Josh gives me a worried look.

  Did that man really say body? Yes, he did.

  Steph whispers, “Nobody would blame you for leaving.”

  “I’m fine,” I say.

  The Search and Rescue guys put us into rows—each row is supposed to have twenty people, but they don’t. I count them because I’m compulsive like that. There are eleven rows, each with between eighteen and twenty-four people.

  The first row moves forward, into the woods, in the direction of the Pitt. The search and rescue people didn’t tell people how to scan. It’s a technique, the zigzag scan, and I worry people will miss something important. Search and Rescue Bill sends off the next row. There’s a gap of about fifteen feet between each row.

  Tim, Tamara, Becky, and their group are in the second row, behind your dad. I bet Tamara has already introduced herself and told him how you looked over the fence and said you’d see her later.

  When it’s our turn to go, I step forward into the woods, two arm lengths from Steph, two arm lengths from Josh. Soon we’re passing our spot and I can see the cops in there. Blue uniforms flash through the mossy trees. Your dad steps out of the line to talk to them.

  Josh pushes off his hood. “I can’t see with this.”

  The rain flattens his curly hair. His parents plod along beside him, steady, glancing over at me every now and then. His brother, Billy, looks totally miserable, like he doesn’t want to be here. I guess none of us do. But we’re here for you, all of us. It’s cool that you have so many people who care about you. I wonder how many people would show up for me.

  The brush gets denser. Steph is avoiding anything spiderish. Walking around the creepy bushes with webs. She pauses to wipe her eyes—her makeup is dripping down her face, typical Steph, and I love it a little. She makes a face, then bends down and pulls her socks over her pants.

  “Thanks,” I whisper.

  She nods and sucks in a shaky breath. It’s scary down here for her, and not just because of the spiders. I never told you what happened.

  We were thirteen.

  We were walking along the path, past the Pitt, and we ran into some older guys drinking by their campfire. It was after school, not the kind of day you expect to see anyone. One of them grabbed Steph’s arm and said she was pretty.

  She tried to yank her arm away, but he wasn’t letting go. I don’t remember much about him except that he had a Hawks cap on and he was missing a tooth, but he wasn’t homeless or anything, just randomly didn’t have a tooth. Steph struggled like a little weasel, but she couldn’t get away. He pressed her hard against a tall birch tree. She was so much smaller than him, but still, she spat in his face. He slammed her backward. That’s when I knew we were in big trouble.

  “Jessie, run!” she screamed.

  I was a quiet kid back then, not really a fighter, but I wasn’t about to leave her. I ran up and kicked the guy hard in the shin. That’s what my dad always told me to do: kick him in the shin, not the balls, and then jab him in the neck. I didn’t jab him in the neck. The guy doubled over, and we took off.

  Steph and I hid behind a rotten log, wrapped around each other. The guy searched in the woods, calling us little bitches (that’s why I hate that word). His friends were laughing, like it was hilarious. That’s the thing I hear when I remember our terror.

  As we were hiding, a spider crawled across Steph’s face. She started to scream, but I gripped her mouth hard so he wouldn’t hear.

  Her face shook under my fingers. Later, she told me all she could think was brown recluse spider because I’d just told her that they were the only dangerous spiders in our area, that if they bit someone, that part of the person’s body would rot off, but she shouldn’t worry because they liked to hang out in rotten wood. I’d meant it to be reassuring. I didn’t know we were about to find ourselves in a situation near rotten wood with a spider crawling across her face.

  Eventually, the guy gave up, headed back to his fire, and we ran home.

  She never came down here again. That’s why she hates spiders. So it’s a big deal she came today.

  The rain picks up, bangs on my plastic-hooded head, like a little kid on a piano, random, incessant. We move through the woods. It smells of wet dirt and pine needles. Ahead, the people in yellow capes are spread out, bright flashes of yellow in a forest darkened by rain.

  Steph takes a big step over a fallen log and swerves to avoid a web that looks like a spiderweb, but is not. She lets out a short scream. People turn to look. She waves her hand, like it’s fine.

  “Most of the webs are from tent caterpillars,” I say. “Not spiders.”

  “Don’t say that word.” She shakes her leg like she has the heebie-jeebies.

  I’m shivering. The skin on my legs is frozen. My running shoes are drenched. My teeth start to chatter.

  “You want my jacket?” Josh whispers.

  I shake my head. “I’m okay.” That would be weird, right? Even though I’m cold, I don’t want to be blanketed in another guy’s smell, not even Josh’s.

  “Hey!” A man shouts out in the row behind us, sticking up his hand, victorious, finding something I did not.

  A SAR guy puts the object in one of those clear zipper bags, which we normally use for sandwiches. Looks like the outside of a black iPhone. I wonder if they know your phone has your initials. I bought it for you for Christmas with my guarding money and I got it engraved. It was your first Christmas present; when I found out you’d never got one before, when you were a Jehovah’s Witness, I wanted it to be special.

  “What is it?” I ask Josh.

  He shakes his head. Doesn’t know.

  We search for another hour and then there’s lunch and Josh’s parents leave and guess what? His mom brings me back some sweatpants before she goes to work. It’s like she handed me a million dollars. Steph shields me with her jacket and I change. They are so soft, so warm.

  We keep searching all afternoon while it continues to rain.

  When the woods open up to the river, I do a lifeguard scan across the water. See your arm reach up. Your body pulled away fast with the current, the hand disappearing behind the trees, and into the rapids. Thanks, brain.

  I keep walking.

  A middle-aged woman with dark hair and a big-ass mole on her
nose in front of Josh keeps sniffling and whimpering. I want her to shut the hell up.

  She kicks at a pistachio bag, still half filled with nuts. My stomach clenches. The receipt in your wallet. I pick it up and half the nuts fall to the ground. Josh’s eyes widen. I told him about the receipt.

  I put up my hand to tell the SAR people, but then there’s a shout.

  Up ahead, in the middle of the yellow capes, a man with long hair yells, “There’s blood!”

  Everyone moves forward in this big surge, and Bill shouts out for everyone to stay in formation. The search and rescue guys and the cops huddle in a circle around the area, next to a mossy cedar tree. They look like they’ve found a body part and they’re trying to hide it.

  Detective McFerson slides on a blue surgical glove, bends down, and scrapes at the ground. When he lifts up his hand, I see something brownish red on the plastic. I clench the pistachio bag. It crinkles in my hand. Nuts dribble down around my feet.

  The younger search and rescue guy takes this little shovel, like the kind you use to plant flowers in a flower garden, and he scoops the dirt covered in blood into one of the zipper bags. Are they digging you out?

  My stomach twists. I gag.

  “Jessie?” Steph’s voice stretches toward me.

  I have a brief, sure moment of knowledge that I’m going to puke. And then it comes. All my lunch. The ham. The cheese. The bread. The cookies.

  People leap out of the way. I’m pretty sure I got the hiking boots of the man in front of me, but he didn’t say anything. Mostly, it lands on the tall grass, and on the leaves of a nearby bush, steaming in the cool air.

  “Are you okay?” Josh says.

  I’m hanging my head down, trying to get my hair to cover my face. Are the camera crews still here? People are murmuring. Someone is sobbing, a woman.

  “Jessie?” Josh rests his hand on my back. “Come on.”

  I wipe my slimy mouth with my sleeve and stand up, blurry-eyed.