by Chris Fabry
“Don’t get your hopes up about my soul. But, yeah, there’re times when I feel like there’s something bigger out there watching over me. Some call it white light or good feelings, and some call it God or Jesus or the Spirit. I don’t know what it is, but I think it’s more than just hoodoo.”
“Well, that’s a start, I guess,” she said.
His cell phone rang in the bedroom, and before he could get up, she’d retrieved it for him, holding it out so he could see the tiny screen. He had to move his head back like some insect in order to see.
He answered it, went to the front room, and looked out on the yard. He needed to mow it today or tomorrow or she was going to get that Reynolds boy to do it. The kid charged them twenty dollars, and Preston thought that was a crime.
“Who was it?” she said when he returned.
“Mike’s wife. Says he’s not coming in today.”
“I can’t blame him. He might need counseling after that close of a call. Post-traumatic stress.”
Preston wanted to say if anybody needed counseling for PTSD it was him, but he didn’t. She would have agreed. She sipped at her coffee, and he grabbed his gun belt from the mantel.
“You didn’t finish your breakfast.” The biscuit with gravy was still sitting on his plate.
“Got enough to make it to lunch. It might be a long day, judging from last night.” His cell phone rang again, and he looked at the number. He just let it go.
“If you’re going to be gone, I might eat over at Brud’s house,” she said. “Leslie invited me anytime you’re working late. Unless you think you’ll make it for dinner.”
“No, that sounds good. Go on over there. If things calm down, I’ll call on you.”
“Call on me?”
“Yeah, like it used to be. Your brother never liked me much, as I recall.”
“He knew you were just after my beautiful body.” She said it like Jonathan Winters used to say it on some comedy show long gone, and they both laughed. Things were like that now. They’d been together so long all it took was a look every now and again or a word from a joke somebody told years ago and they were right with each other. Time can do that, at least partly.
He bent and kissed the top of her head and she patted his hand.
She called to him as he went through the front door. “I’ll be praying for you.”
He nodded and let the door slam. They’d been good for each other. Not the perfect marriage, but who has that?
On the road he dialed the office, and his secretary picked up. “We got a few calls from people who said they might have seen Walker’s car. I can give them to you if you want to follow up.”
“Did they see him before or after midnight?”
“Before,” Mindy said.
“Just hang on to those until I get there. Anything else?”
She went through a litany of names of law enforcement personnel willing to help with the investigation. The elephant on the phone line was what had happened the night before. He knew Mindy and Mike were close, probably closer than they should have been, but giving her information would make her dangerous with the media. He sensed she was writing down what he said.
“I’ll fill you in on what happened when I get there,” he said.
“Yes, sir. Oh, Sheriff, there’s one other call here. Some lady from Colorado said she needed to talk to whoever’s in charge.”
“In charge of what?”
“That missing little girl. She said she has information that could help.”
Preston shook his head. Probably another psychic. He’d talked with them from all over. People who had seen the news story and said they’d had a vision of where the girl was buried. Everything from the trunk of an old Buick in a trash dump to body parts being scattered along the Appalachian Highway. Every one of them as sincere as they could be but all dead ends. “She reading tarot cards when she called you or just tea leaves?”
“Not that I could tell. But she sounded upset. I think she’s legit.”
Mindy had a good sense about people. “Give me her number.”
Mindy gave it to him, and he wrote it on the side of a McDonald’s coffee cup. He dialed as he headed for the drive-through. A machine picked up, and the lady said her name and to leave a message. He was halfway through leaving his number when she answered.
“Sheriff Preston?” she said.
“You got him.”
“I saw you on the news. Thank you for calling back. I was just walking out the door to work.”
“If you want me to call you back—”
“No, no, this is fine.”
He took the new cup from the drive-through girl, and when he went to hand her the two dollars, the older lady behind her waved him on with a smile.
“Can I ask what this is about?” he said.
She took a breath, and it sounded like she was trying hard not to cry. “It’s about that little girl. Natalie. The one who’s missing.”
“What about her?”
Preston half expected her to say she’d had a dream and wondered if he knew a place where two trees crossed because the girl was buried by a bush underneath that looked like Elvis’s mother or something like that.
“I think she’s been living at my house.”
He was taking a swig of coffee and nearly choked. He coughed and held the phone away from him as he pulled into the last parking spot. “And why would you say that?”
“She was traveling with her father. At least, that’s who I thought he was. He’d parked his RV in our lot while he waited for a part.”
“He’d broken down?”
“Right. I work at a Walmart. And this cute little thing . . .” Her voice cracked.
He took a sip of coffee. Another news truck had exited the interstate heading for Dogwood. “How old would you say she is?”
“Nine, I think. If the information is right, she’ll be ten on the twentieth.”
“How would you know that?”
“That’s what it said on the missing child poster we have on our wall. She’s the spitting image of little Natalie.”
She seemed genuine enough, but Preston was skeptical. He’d tried to discourage Mae from going to those missing children people for this very reason. People see someone who looked somewhat like the missing person and then all the calls and false leads and a couple of years later some bones turn up and you realize it was all just blind hope.
“Did you get a good look at the guy in the RV?”
“Not just a good look, he stayed here.”
She briefly explained how that happened; then Preston asked for his name and she gave it and he wrote it down. Something about the name rang a bell, but he couldn’t place it.
“What about the license on the RV?”
She’d written it down in her room and she went to the other extension.
“Is there any other reason you think this might be the Edwards girl?” Preston said.
“Yes. From the things he said on the phone, from Arkansas. He said she’s not his daughter.”
“Johnson told you that? Why did he call?”
“The girl was supposed to stay with me, but she left with him. He had to make a trip to Arkansas. I’m not sure why. And when he called, he said she had stowed away and he didn’t know she was there.”
“You don’t believe him.”
“I don’t know what to believe. But in the middle of that conversation I put everything together.”
Preston was jotting more notes.
“Honestly, Sheriff, he’s a good man. He’s a good father to that girl, even if he isn’t really her daddy.”
“As far as you can tell.”
“That’s right.”
He thought a minute. “What took you so long to call?”
She paused and he could hear the tears. “I think something inside me just wanted to think the best. Wanted to think it could work out for all of us. I would adopt that little girl as fast as anything. She’s as smart as a whip and she can read better than
most adults, so she hasn’t lacked for an education. But I couldn’t get that family out of my head. There’s somebody out there with an empty bed where that little girl deserves to be.”
Preston thought of Mae and everything she’d gone through. This could be some crackpot or some publicity hound, but he didn’t think so. Maybe Mae had been right all along. Maybe there wasn’t a body in a shallow grave. Maybe there was a living, breathing little girl riding around with a fellow in an RV. A fellow who had abducted her, like Dana Edwards had said. And what did that mean for Walker?
He let the thoughts sift through his mind. He wasn’t going to figure this out with a phone call, and if there was one thing he knew, it was that people were very seldom what they appeared to be. A lonely woman who took in strangers from a Walmart parking lot probably did not know the whole story. If this guy was using the girl in some unseemly way, he was a monster. And monsters ought to be hunted down and locked up or killed.
“Please let me know if you find him,” the woman said. “I think they’re headed back your way.”
“Why would you think that?”
“Because he’s from there. The hills. I think there’s something there he has to do.”
“I’ll keep an eye out for him.”
“Don’t hurt him, Sheriff. Something really bad happened to that little girl a long time ago. But hurting him won’t erase any of that.”
22
I liked curling up with Fred on the bed as Big Mac drove. We went back by the RV and there were lights flashing all around and Big Mac saw a couple being loaded into the police cars. I hoped they’d get what they deserved. There was news of some drug-related shooting on the radio, and Big Mac said he bet those two were responsible.
As we passed the RV it felt like what some people must feel like when their house gets hit by a tornado or a flood. Losing the RV was all in my head until I saw the mangled thing on its side.
I grabbed Dad’s arm. “When this is over, can we go back to Sheila’s place?”
He was staring out and watching the white lines go by. “I don’t know, June Bug.”
“But my bike is back there!”
“We’ll see.”
“Why do you call her June Bug?” Big Mac said. I don’t think he liked it when I raised my voice. “That can’t be her real name.”
“It’s all he’s ever called me,” I said.
“Take a look at her,” Dad said. “If you can think of a better name, go ahead.”
“I don’t know,” Big Mac said. “Maybe something like Julie or Carrie or Guinevere. Anything but June Bug.”
I laughed when he said Guinevere, and Dad put an arm around me. “Minute I first laid eyes on her I thought, ‘June Bug.’”
“And when was that?” Big Mac said.
“Long time ago. It was in June, which is another reason the name fits. You can call her whatever you want, but she’ll always be my June Bug.”
Fred gave a big sigh and put his head on my leg. It was a good feeling to hear my dad say that, but it was sort of empty too, knowing what my real name was. Sometimes the best feelings come with other feelings you can’t escape.
We were heading west, away from our destination, but Big Mac told us not to worry. He knew another driver that would be coming from the other direction who owed him a favor. He called the guy’s cell phone and left a long message. I must have been asleep when he called back because the next thing I knew Dad was waking me up and Fred was going crazy about something and I had drool running down my arm.
Big Mac was standing in an empty Best Buy parking lot talking to another fellow whose truck was parked alongside. There was fog all over the place, and the sun hadn’t come up to burn it off yet.
I only got to pet Fred one more time before Dad lifted me into the truck and set me down on the sleeper again. This man’s name was Bill, and he went by Coyote on the CB. I guess because he howled sometimes. He didn’t seem happy about us riding with him, but like Big Mac said, he owed him.
“I could get in big trouble doing this, you know,” Bill said to Dad as we pulled away.
“We’re not telling anybody,” Dad said.
Bill didn’t have a dog, but his bed smelled like he’d had one a long time ago and there were enough crumbs and stuff back there to feed a couple of pups for a week. I was so tired I closed my eyes. The next thing I knew we were stopped at a Bob Evans and the sun was up and it was getting hot even with the little fan Bill had stuck on the curtain between the bed and the front seats.
Dad helped me down, and we walked across the parking lot because you can’t park one of those big trucks in a regular spot.
“Where are we?” I said.
“Bob Evans,” Bill said, and he snorted like he thought that was funny.
“Kentucky,” Dad said kind of soft. “Not too far from West Virginia.”
I asked Dad about my journals again, and he got down on my level. “June Bug, I want you to listen. We’re in a bind. A big one. I have to get to this place I haven’t been in a lot of years and find something. And then . . .”
“And then what?” I said.
He stared over his shoulder, keeping his eyes from me. I thought for a minute he was looking at the Bob Evans, but when he turned back his eyes were watery and red. “And then we figure out what to do next. Let’s get something to eat, and we’ll get back on the road. One step at a time.”
After that I decided not to ask too many more questions because I don’t know about you, but I hate to see anybody cry, especially my dad. We sat down and the waitress came. She was an older lady with funny colored hair. She smiled at us but it was one you know doesn’t come from the heart and is there only because you’re supposed to smile and you know you’re not going to get much of a tip if you’re not pleasant.
I got some orange juice and happy face pancakes with warm syrup.
Bill watched me as he ate, cutting up his sausage and biscuits, and he snickered. “She can really put it away for a little thing. How long you two been on the road?”
Dad looked at me, and from that I figured he didn’t want me saying anything.
“Didn’t know it was top secret,” Bill said when we didn’t answer. He stuck another whole sausage in his mouth, and the grease rolled over his lips. “So Mac told me you wanted to get to West Virginia, but he never said whereabouts.”
“About an hour across the state line,” Dad said.
“Dogwood,” I said. “You heard of it?”
Bill wiped his mouth with a napkin. “Seems like I have heard about it on the news lately.”
Dad crumpled up his napkin and put it on his food. Then he stood, reached inside his wallet, and pulled out a couple of twenties. I could see Bill’s eyes going wide as he looked at the wad of cash from Mrs. Linderman.
“We’d better head out,” Dad said.
“Hold on,” Bill said. “I’m nowhere near finished.”
“I’ll make it up to you at lunch,” Dad said. He put the money on the table without even getting the bill.
“I need to use the toilet,” I said.
“It’ll have to wait,” he said.
“Daddy, I have to go!”
He picked me up and held me close to his whiskery face like he used to when I was little. Now that I’ve grown up, he doesn’t do that, so it surprised me. But then I noticed the police car parked outside.
Bill caught up with us at the door and Dad turned. “Get in the truck and meet us across the way at the gas station.”
Bill answered him with not very nice language saying something about him not being the boss and he should just pull out and leave us behind. He had a soggy biscuit in his hand and was still complaining about not being able to finish breakfast.
“We’ll make it worth your while,” Dad said, and then he didn’t say anything more. He marched out the door, put me on the ground, and took my hand. I didn’t let go once as we crossed the street and went inside the little store to the bathroom. Boy was I glad I didn’t
have to wait until some rest stop. I think orange juice has a way of making you glad there’s a bathroom nearby.
When I came outside, Bill was there and Dad handed him a brown coffee cup through the window. I guess to make up for what he was missing at the restaurant. We climbed in and Dad craned his neck to see the police car.
Bill flipped on the radio, and as it turned out, he liked listening to Rascal Flatts really loud which was okay with me. One time I heard this preacher say that the only musical instrument God ever created on earth was the human voice, and I like that. Angels are supposed to have harps and stuff and they sing too, but listening to Rascal Flatts made me glad God made people who could carry a tune.
We got back on the interstate, and the first thing we did was go over a bridge which made me plug up my ears and sing. Bill heard me because he turned around and said a few more of those bad words. Dad tried to explain about my being afraid of bridges, but the guy just didn’t understand. I curled up again with the taste of those pancakes in my mouth and the loud music going and the wind rushing through the windows. But all I could think about was the tears in my daddy’s eyes.
I was pretty tired because the next thing I knew Dad was shaking me and pointing to a sign that said, “Welcome to Wild, Wonderful West Virginia.” I looked out the window and saw we had gone over a big old bridge, and that just shows how much my dad loves me, that he would wait to wake me up.
By this time Bill had turned off his music and was listening to the CB. I didn’t understand half the words he used. I did find out he was going to Charleston with the load he was pulling, but my dad said we’d be getting out before then.
As soon as we hit the state line, the roads started going up and down, and there were so many trees and bushes at the side of the road that it looked like a garden. The whole place just screamed life at me, and I wondered what it would be like to live in one of the houses I saw up in the hills with the big columns in the front and the yards that looked like they went on forever. Then I got to thinking about our RV and all my stuff and that it would feel lonely in a big old house without any of my journals.
“I have a brother who went to school over there,” Bill said, pointing to a town I could just barely see off to the left. “Played football for the Herd.”