“Okay, so my dog doesn’t talk, talk, but everyone else does. So this quiet will be good for me. I thought,” he said, stretching his lean legs under the table, “that we could have this journal here and write to each other. Kind of like pen pals, but without envelopes or stamps. Our conversations could be right in here.” He tapped the journal with one finger.
“What do you think, Calli? Don’t answer that. Think about it, decorate the cover, whatever. I’m just going to sit over here at my desk and work and enjoy the quiet.”Mr. Wilson smiled encouragingly, stood and went to his old oak desk in the corner of the office. He settled his long frame into a chair and tucked his legs underneath the steel-framed chair, bent his slender neck over the contents of a file folder and began to read.
Calli regarded the book in front of her. She loved to draw pictures and write stories. She could write lots of words, even though she was only in the first grade. She wrote stories about horses and fairies and cities under the ocean. She never had a pen pal, never even wrote to her father while he was away—that had never occurred to her. She couldn’t imagine that anyone would be interested in what she wrote. Everyone wanted to hear what she had to say, as if the words she said would somehow drip jewels.
She flipped open the journal. Its creamy, unlined pages were oddly welcoming. The pages contained the same flecks of fibers that were in the cover, each page uniquely flawed. She softly closed the book and her attention shifted to the chalk in front of her. Selecting a purple that held the same shimmer as the dragonflies down at Willow Creek, she held it in her fingers, admiring it. In the lower right-hand corner she slowly printed her name with great care: Calli. She glanced up at Mr. Wilson, who was still engrossed in his paperwork. Calli carefully replaced the purple chalk back into the box and wiped the excess dust from her fingers onto her jeans, leaving iridescent streaks. She pushed her chair back from the table, stood, picked up the journal and carried it over to Mr. Wilson. She held it out to him.
“Just set it over there, Calli,” he said, indicating the round table. “We’ll meet again on Thursday. Have a good day.”
Calli paused. Was that all? No “You need to speak now, Calli. You’re worrying your mother needlessly. Stop this nonsense. There is nothing wrong with you!” Just “Have a good day”?
Calli turned away from Mr. Wilson and gently laid the book on the table, gave a small breath of relief and walked out the door.
Calli spent two half-hour sessions a week with Mr. Wilson, writing and drawing pictures in her journal. Often, he would draw a picture or write back to her, only if she asked him to in writing. Her favorite pictures and writings were about his dog, named Bart. He told tales of Bart being able to open doors with his paws and the time when he was begging at the dining-room table and actually said the word hamburger in his little dog voice. Sometimes Calli would have to point at a word for Mr. Wilson to read to her, but most often she could read what he wrote on her own. She looked forward to the beginning of second grade and her meetings with Mr. Wilson. She felt safe in his quiet little room with her chalk, a sharpened pencil and her journal. Mr. Wilson had said he would keep the journal over the summer and that it would be waiting for her when school began again. She had written to him, during their second to last meeting of her first-grade year, asking him what they were going to do when the journal was filled up. He’d replied, “Get a new one, of course!” She had smiled at that.
Calli wondered what Mr. Wilson had been pointing at in her dream. Which page in the journal was he trying to show to her? She didn’t know. They had written so much in it, none of it particularly important, not to an adult anyway, except Mr. Wilson had a way of making you feel as if everything you wrote and did was important.
A ground squirrel skittered by and startled Calli. She listened for the gurgle of the creek, but heard nothing but the cicadas’ steady thrumming.
Downward, she told herself, downward is where the creek will be, with cold water and silver fish. Maybe she’d see a frog and shimmering purple dragonflies that sparkled as they skimmed the water. Downward.
DEPUTY SHERIFF LOUIS
Fitzgerald and I have gone our separate ways for the moment. Fitzgerald is focusing on getting a search dog over here, and on trying to trace the whereabouts of Griff from the GPS in his cell phone. I will be meeting with the other deputies to give and receive updates on our progress in finding Calli and Petra.
Our sheriff, Harold Motts, is getting on in years, and has taken a mostly hands-off approach to his job in the past year. He’s passed as many of his duties that he could over to me. There has even been talk that I should run for sheriff in the next election. Most of the staff have been accepting, though grudgingly, of my leadership role, but one. Deputy Logan Roper has tried to make job as a deputy sheriff hell. I figure it had more to do with Roper being a close pal of Griff Clark more than any genuine dislike that he has for me, but who knows? We’ve come to a mutual understanding. We show professional respect toward one another and communicate when we need to, but that’s all. It’s too bad, actually, but as long as our tension doesn’t interfere with the job, I can live with it.
Griff and Logan were five years ahead of Toni and me in high school. I never really knew much about them, just that they were wild and could be mean. I’m not sure how Griff and Toni were first introduced, but I suspect it was through her job as a clerk at the Gas & Go, a convenience store on Highway Ten. Toni worked there on weekends and after school. I told her I didn’t like her working in a gas station so late at night and so close to the highway; anyone could take off with her and would be well on his way without anyone knowing. Toni would just laugh and call me “cop boy.” I hated that.
By April of our senior year of high school, Toni wasn’t talking to me and was dating Griff, apparently hopelessly in love with him. I thought she was trying to make me jealous and it worked, but I wouldn’t give her the satisfaction of letting her know that. I didn’t think, however, that a year later she would be married to him.
November of our senior year was when Toni and I really started talking about our future together and what we wanted. We had spent a chilly early winter morning walking through the woods. She wore an old brown barn coat that belonged to one of her brothers and a multicolored hat knit by her mother, who had died earlier that fall. She had cropped her hair short and it made her face seem even younger than her seventeen years; she had lost weight since her mother passed and she looked breakable. I was excited. She knew I wanted to go to college. Toni said she was supportive of that, but I could tell she wasn’t really. I couldn’t afford the tuition at St. Gilianus so a state college was my only option. The problem was that the University of Iowa was over a hundred miles away from Willow Creek. I had already filled out my application and had been accepted; I would leave the following August.
As I told Toni, she wouldn’t even look at me. She sat on the edge of the fallen tree we called Lone Tree Bridge because it fell across a portion of Willow Creek. Her normally unguarded face went stony as I described to her that the college wasn’t really all that far away and that I’d come to see her on holidays and on weekends. I went on to say that there was nothing stopping her from coming with me. She could enroll in classes or get a job. We could still be together.
“Everybody leaves me,” she whispered, tucking her arms into the pockets of her coat.
She meant her mother dying and her brothers moving away. It was just her and her dad in their house, and according to Toni, her dad was thinking of moving to Phoenix to be with Tim, his oldest son.
“I’m not leaving, not for good,” I told her. But she shook her head.
“You won’t come back. You’ll go to college with all these important people and important ideas. You’ll outgrow this place,” she said matter-of-factly.
“No,” I insisted. “I will never outgrow you.”
“All I’ve ever wanted was to live in a yellow house,” she said softly before she walked away, leaving me standing alone among
the naked trees. I could hear crispy leaves crunching under her feet long after I couldn’t see her anymore. We tried to carry on as we always had for the next month or so, but something had changed. She would shrink from my touch, as if the feel of my hands on her hurt her somehow. She would become uncharacteristically quiet when I talked about college and a shadow came across her face whenever I tried to make love to her. I hadn’t even left yet, but she was already gone.
She broke up with me at the beginning of December and from then on, it was as if I didn’t exist. She didn’t take my phone calls, didn’t answer the door when I came over, walked right past me in the hallways at school. I finally cornered her in Willow Creek Woods. She was walking slowly, her head down, her eyes on the trail before her. It was snowing, the flakes impossibly big. I briefly considered scooping up a snowball and pelting her in the back with it. I was pretty pissed at her. But I didn’t. There was something about her walking there alone that made her seem as naked and vulnerable as the giant, leafless trees. “Toni,” I called softly to her, trying not to startle her. She whipped around, clutching her chest. On seeing me, she dropped her hands, fists tight, as if preparing for a fight. “Hey,” I said. She didn’t respond. “Can we talk?” I asked.
“There’s really nothing to talk about,” she said, her voice as cold as the air around us.
“Do you really want to do this?” I asked.
“Do what?” she asked as if she didn’t know what I was talking about.
“This!” My voice echoed through the trees. She took one step toward me and then stopped, as if coming any closer to me might make her change her mind.
“Lou,” she said firmly. “For months I watched my mother die…”
“I know,” I said. “I was there, remember?”
“No, you weren’t there. Not really. For months I watched my mother dying. There was nothing, nothing, that I could do to make her better, to make her live. Now I’m losing my dad. In a completely different way, but the minute I graduate he’s out of here. Out of Willow Creek forever. He can’t stand the thought of living here without my mother. I do not want to end up like that. Ever!” She looked at me fiercely.
“It’s not the same,” I pleaded with her.
“It’s exactly the same,” she shot back. “You’re going to leave, and that’s fine, whatever. But I’m not going to spend the rest of my life waiting for you. I spent way too much time on you as it is.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?” I asked angrily. “That I was just a waste of time?”
“It just means that I’m not going to invest one more minute in someone who isn’t going to stick around, who doesn’t love me enough to stay. Just leave me alone!” She turned away from me and moved noiselessly through the woods. I shouldn’t have done it, but I did. At that moment, I hated her. I bent down and scraped up a handful of the wet snow, forming a perfect white ball. I didn’t throw it hard, but at the last second she turned to say something else to me, and the snowball pelted her right in the face. She stood stone still for a fraction of a second and then turned and ran. I tried to follow her, to apologize, but she knew the woods better than anyone, plus she was faster than I was. I never caught up to her, never said I was sorry. Never found out what she was going to say to me before the snowball hit.
In the end, she outgrew me, or maybe I outgrew her, I guess. I knew I was starting to look like a fool. Everyone knew I loved Antonia and that she wanted nothing to do with me anymore. She married Griff that next year, while I was away at school, and had Ben soon after. I learned about Toni the way strangers learned about her, through newspaper clippings and idle gossip. We had become strangers, she and I.
I met Christine four years later and we married. She reminded me nothing of Toni, and I didn’t mean to hold that against her, but I guess I did. I’m surprised, actually, that Christine was this patient with me, especially after I brought her here to Willow Creek to live and raise a family. She never quite settled in, always felt out of place, unwelcome. It’s not her fault that the people of Willow Creek are intertwined by a common history and by blood. Maybe she doesn’t fit in because she doesn’t want to, or maybe because I don’t want her to. I don’t know. But I don’t have time to waste on this; I have to focus on the matters at hand.
As soon as I walk into the station, Officer Tucci is there, waiting for me.
“We got some info on some of the names you wanted run,” he tells me. “There’s not much. Mariah Burton, the babysitter, is completely clean. Chad Wagner, one of the students, was arrested when he was in high school for underage drinking. Got a hold of him and he’s home visiting his mom and dad in Winner. Nothing’s come up on this Lucky Thompson, but we can’t contact him. He isn’t at home or he isn’t answering his phone. The men from the furniture store are accounted for and are being interviewed. We’re also checking on all the teachers at the girls’ school. Calli spent a lot of time with the school counselor, a Charles Wilson. We haven’t been able to contact him, either. Only other red flag was on Sam Garfield. He teaches at St. Gilianus. Been here for about three years. Before that he was at another college in Ohio. Left under a cloud. Had an affair with a student.
“Oh, and Antonia Clark called about twenty minutes ago,” Tucci says. “She says she’s found footprints that look like Calli’s, and a man’s footprints, too. She was very upset, crying and carrying on. Couldn’t make much sense of her after that.”
“What did you tell her?” I ask.
“Told her I would let you know as soon as I could. She said she wanted to talk to you. Had to talk to you. I tried to explain to her that you weren’t available at a second’s notice.” Tucci sounds irritated. “That you’re a busy man.”
“Who’s over there now?” I ask, already heading back out the door.
“Logan Roper,” he says.
“Great,” I mutter under my breath.
“Well, he was there and available,” Tucci blusters, sounding confused. “Shouldn’t he be the one?”
“That’s fine,” I say regretfully. “I just want to be made aware of any developments in this case. Call me no matter what from here on out.”
“Do you think it’s like that McIntire girl?” he asks.
“I don’t know. But that outcome is the one we want to avoid.” I pause at the double doors. “Is there anything else I need to know before I head on back to the Clark place?”
“Actually, yes. Channel Four’s been calling all morning asking about the missing girls. They want a statement. And Mrs. McIntire called twice. She wants you to call her back. Wants to know if she can be any help to the families of the missing girls. Says she’s driving over this afternoon.”
“Dear Lord,” I mumble. “Get me Fitzgerald. We need to get an official statement written up for the press. When was the last time you spoke with Mrs. McIntire?”
“About forty minutes ago, I guess. She should be here anytime now.”
I retreat to my desk. I’d have to see about Toni later. For now, I had to trust my department, especially Roper, to do what they were trained to do. I quickly jot down a rough copy of a statement that could hopefully satisfy the press, and my phone rings. “Deputy Sheriff Louis speaking,” I say.
“Yeah, Louis,” Fitzgerald begins, “I just got word about the footprints at the Clark house. The state crime lab should be pulling up there momentarily. Who do you got over there?”
“Officer by the name of Logan Roper. Should be fine, except…” I hesitate.
“Go ahead. Say it. Something’s bothering you,” Fitzgerald prods.
“He’s a decent cop, but he’s also great pals with Griff Clark. Conflict of interest, maybe,” I say. Like I was one to talk, but I didn’t trust Griff and I didn’t quite trust his buddies, either.
“I see what you mean,” says Fitzgerald. “Pair him up with someone you completely trust. How ’bout you?”
“Well,” I begin, “there could be a bit of a problem with that, as well.”
Better t
o get it all out now, Toni and my history together. Shouldn’t matter, but it does. I settle in to tell Fitzgerald all about it when I hear a soft clearing of the throat, and at my desk I see the tired, sad face of Mrs. McIntire.
“Hey,” I say to Fitzgerald. “Let me call you back.”
We disconnect and I face the woman I had hoped not to see again until we had the man who destroyed her life and lives of her family members, the woman whose battered, abused daughter was found dead in a woody area ten miles from her home on the other side of the county. The woman who I had to help pick up off the floor of the morgue after she identified the body as her Jenna’s, and the woman who cursed me last time she talked to me for having to bury her daughter without knowing who had done this to her.
“I want to help,” she says simply.
I offer her a chair and try to figure out the best way to tell her that the last thing the Gregory and Clark families want is any sort of reminder that their daughters could be dead.
MARTIN
I can’t sit around and wait. I tell Fielda’s mother that I am going to check on the investigation and I drive back toward my home. I park on the shoulder of Timber Ridge Road. Something is going on at the Clark house. A flurry of activity. Several police cars drive past and turn down the Clarks’ lane. My heart quickens and for a moment I think that I am having a heart attack, but I do not collapse, though I feel a heart attack would be preferable to what is going through my mind right now.
The sun is bearing down more ferociously now, if that is possible. The car thermometer reads ninety-nine degrees, and that does not even include the heat index. I step from my car and make my way toward the Clark house.
The woods and this quiet, uneventful neighborhood were what brought Fielda and me to our home. We like the fact that, while we have neighbors, there are only four close by. The Olson and Connolly families live to our right and the Clarks and old Mrs. Norland are on the left. One hundred yards separate each of our homes, so we are close enough to call each other neighbor but far away enough for privacy’s sake. We never let Petra visit the Clark house when Griff was home from wherever he works, the Alaska pipeline, I believe. We don’t tell Petra that Griff is the reason she cannot go over there at times; we simply say that Calli has so little time with her father that we must not disturb their family time. Petra accepts this good-naturedly, and I do not believe she knows of Griff’s illness. Calli certainly never speaks of it.
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