“Okay, Butchie,” Molly says when she returns and pulls some kind of bone away from him. “Grandma will notice if somebody eats her walrus tusk.”
Molly opens the basement door and she and Butchie disappear down the stairs, and as Joel follows it occurs to him that this is one part of the house he has never toured.
He counts ten steps to the bottom, and when Molly turns on the lights, he discovers a much different kind of museum.
The space reminds him of the thrift store his mom makes him go to sometimes: racks of worn, thin-shouldered clothing with more of the same stuffed into boxes and black garbage bags; old, mismatched furniture standing in for shelves that stow incomplete dish sets and small electronics; suitcases full of forgotten items that no one would ever take on vacation.
“You can sleep here,” Molly says, passing Butchie’s leash off so she can move a bag of clothes from the couch. “He’ll be a good boy, right? He won’t poop or chew up stuff?”
“He’ll be good,” Joel says, dropping his backpack where the garbage bag had been.
As Molly drags the clothes across the carpet, the bag’s seam splits and an old gray sweater falls out; Butchie goes straight over to investigate.
“Hey,” Joel says to both of them, picking up the sweater. It’s a V-neck, a woman’s, the fabric pilled at the chest and forearms. He wonders why Butchie was interested and holds it to his own nose; it smells faintly like perfume and a little like sweat, but mostly like the plasticky old garbage bag it came from.
Molly snatches the sweater. “Don’t.”
Joel says, “I was only trying to help.”
“I don’t need help. You’re the one who needs help.”
“Sorry.” He turns Butchie around to sit him at the foot of the couch and notices a photo album there, on the side table. It looks like the pages are in the middle of being put together, or taken apart, and every photo is of the same dark-haired woman—presumably Mom—and on a night she wore a floor-length gown and a rich-red boa.
“What is all this down here?” Joel asks.
“My mom didn’t make it to court in time for the meditation,” Molly says, tying a knot in the bottom of the garbage bag.
“What’s meditation?” Joel knows, but the word doesn’t quite fit the story. She doesn’t make up words, but a lot of times she mixes them up.
“It’s like having a referee for your marriage,” she says. “My mom didn’t go—there was some mistake—and so my dad got everything and he moved it all here. For storage. For when she comes back.”
“When is she coming back?”
“Who cares.” Molly hurls the bag toward a trio of others in the corner, and Joel gets the idea there was no mistake. She says, “My dad and I are getting out of here when his tour’s over in January.”
“He’s been gone a long time.”
“It’s not like it was his choice.”
“My dad was called away for work once too.”
“You told me. That’s not the same thing.”
“It was still hard.”
“You still have two parents.”
“That might be harder.” Joel sits down on the couch and sees the red boa looped around the dressing table’s mirror. The evening gown is there, too, draped over the chair in front of the mirror as though the person wearing it has disappeared right out of it. A half-dozen other dresses are hangered and hooked to the adjacent file cabinet’s top drawer.
In the mirror, Molly catches Joel looking at the gown, and when their eyes meet, her reflection hardens. “What,” she says, exactly like Mike does when she doesn’t want him to ask.
Joel looks down at Butchie, whose eyebrows are raised as though he suspects the same thing: Molly’s been trying on these dresses. And she does care. Probably more than anything.
“What,” Molly says again, and so exactly like the first time that Joel wonders if she actually said it twice.
It’s then Joel feels like he’s dreamed all this tonight: every detail perfectly crisp, the situation completely sensible. But the reality is, “I’m scared.”
“You should be.” Molly carefully hangs the gown with the others and sits in the dressing chair, spinning around to face them. The owl on her shirt observes him, and Butchie, unblinking. “I mean, your parents?”
“What do you mean, my parents? What about those Redbone boys? They tried to kill us. They said they would find out where we live and kill us.”
“It’s not those Redbones you need to worry about. When you go home? Your parents will be the ones who subterfuge you. Sure, they’ll put their arms around you and say they’re so glad you’re safe and all that. They’ll tell you everything will be okay. But really, they’re just saying that, because they’re going to do whatever they think they have to do to make things okay. And you won’t get a vote.”
“A vote for what?”
Molly puts her hands on her knees and looks down at Butchie and the owl does, too, and she says, “They’ll probably have to youthnize him.”
She says it funny, but Joel knows the word. “That’s what that boy said. The one with the fangs.” It takes his breath. He scoots down to the floor and wraps his arms around Butchie’s big neck.
“I think it’s like, the law, that they have to put him down. If he attacked somebody? Didn’t you hear about the pit bull that got off his leash and bit that old man who was jogging along the lakefront last week? The cops shot him.”
He scratches Butchie’s ears, feeling his own get hot. “It was my fault.”
“Nobody’s going to care about that; you’re just a kid.” Molly gets up and pulls the chain to turn on the dressing table’s brass-footed lamp. Sweeping the dresses’ skirts aside like curtains, she retrieves a notebook from the file cabinet’s bottom drawer. “But here,” she says, turning the front cover around its spiral. “Everybody has a story. When you have to tell yours, to your parents or the cops, make sure it’s straight. Write it down.”
“What should I write?”
“Everything you told me. Maybe there’ll be something in there that will save you both.”
He gets the pencil he carries in the front compartment of his backpack and sets the notebook on Butchie’s withers. “Where should I start?”
“How about when you first got to Zack’s. What did you see?”
“Those boys in the Mizz Redbone car. They went into the party and we went into the neighbor’s yard to see in through the fence. I saw Danny and his gang, John-Wayne and Linda Lee—”
Molly holds up a hand, stop. “Write it down.”
“Oh. Yeah.” Joel looks down at the blank page. “What did I say first?”
“Jeez, Murph,” she says. “I’ll do it.” She takes the book and pencil and sits at the dresser and writes for a while, then says, “What comes next? After Linda Lee? Tell me what happened when the Miss Redbones boys got there.”
“Okay. I heard them talking when they came out from Zack’s. One was called Dez … and one Cee, I think? I can’t, you know, it was confusing, I don’t know who was talking. Maybe they were just saying see.”
“And one had a gun.”
“Yeah. The one wearing a sweatshirt that said … oh, it said something. In white lettering. Why can’t I remember it now?”
“Because you’re in shock. Try this: try pretending we’re playing Most Wanted. It’s a story. Tell me the story. The Redbones boys went in, and then what? What did you see through the fence?”
“Zack had these pills, or John-Wayne did, but I guess nobody wanted those, so then Danny came and they smoked some kind of pipe. Then Mike came out, and Danny—”
“What was Mike doing?”
“Forget that part about her. I don’t want to put my sister in this story. Just write that Butchie started to go crazy, so we went back out to the street. That’s where I lost control of the leash.”
“And then Butchie jumped the fence and bit somebody.”
“It was my fault.”
“I’m not going t
o write that.” Molly turns the pencil and erases before she goes on. “Then you heard a gunshot?”
“Yes. And when they came out, I heard one of them say that someone shot a boy, except he was trying to shoot Butchie. Then they wanted to find Butchie, but the cops were coming, so they said they were going to their grandma’s. I remember that. I guess that’s how I got the idea to come here.” Joel hugs Butchie’s neck.
“Do you remember anything else before Butchie found you?”
Joel thinks and thinks and all he can remember clearly is the boy with the long gold teeth. The way they caught his lower lip, eufanize. He can’t bring himself to repeat the word but he won’t ever forget it so he says, “No.”
“Here,” Molly says, handing him the notebook. “Keep this. If you think of anything else tonight, write it down. You never know what could help.”
“I will.”
“It’s your story, okay? Be brave and tell it.” She gets up and drapes the gown back over the dressing chair, straightening the beaded bodice and arranging the long skirt’s gentle pleats. She is businesslike about it, but she’s also distracted.
“Are you okay?” he asks. He gets up.
“Where will you go?” she asks, instead of answering. “Tomorrow?”
“I don’t know.” But Joel does know. It’s the only way to save Butchie.
“You don’t have to tell me,” Molly says. She turns her dad’s watch around to look at the face. She says, “It’s eleven thirty. I’m going upstairs. Does that silly watch of yours still tell time?”
Joel checks. It reads 23:33. “It works fine.”
“Good. On Saturday mornings, my grandma gets up for Mass. You’ll hear her—the bath running, and her teapot. A lot of times, she sings.”
Butchie sits up and watches as she climbs onto the back of the couch and reaches up to unlock the window latches.
“She’ll be gone by seven fifteen, and she never ever comes down here, but just in case, this is your escape route, up and out the well.” She pushes open the window a crack and jumps off the couch. “Once she’s gone, you can come upstairs. I’ll make cereal, and Butchie can have some of my grandma’s summer sausage. We can turn on the TV and see if you two are on the news. Then we’ll figure out a plan. Like, which direction you should run.”
Joel didn’t have to tell her; she already guessed.
“Seven fifteen,” he says, “I’ll be ready.”
“Here.” She finds a wool blanket in one of the garbage bags. “Try not to get dog hair all over it.”
“Yeah, right,” Joel says, and hands it back to her.
“If you’re cold,” she says, and puts the blanket aside.
She takes Butchie’s face in her hands, kisses the top of his head, and whispers something in his ear; then she faces Joel and salutes. “Sleep tight.”
Joel returns the salute and Molly crosses the room. She turns out the lights, leaving the brass-footed lamp to cast long shadows. Instead of pit-patting up the stairs, though, she lingers, and Joel wonders if she’s looking at her mom’s stuff, thinking about her.
“Molly, are you okay?”
“Lisa told Jenny Trask that my grandma’s crazy. Jenny told everybody at school today.”
“Your grandma isn’t crazy.”
“Yes she is. But a friend doesn’t tell your secrets. Crazy or not.”
“So you won’t tell mine.”
“Crazy or not. Good night, Joel.”
When the door clicks shut at the top of the steps, Joel tries to get comfortable on the couch, but then Butchie sits back on his haunches and begins to pant, watching Joel steadily.
“What is it, boy?”
The dog gets on his feet and sits back down again like he’s the one who asked first.
Joel looks at Molly’s mom’s boa over the mirror, catches his reflection. “I don’t know, puppy,” he says. “I think she ran away, too.”
Butchie’s wet nose twitches, his eyes like glass.
“Maybe that’s what Molly told you about just now,” Joel says, sitting down with him on the carpet. He can smell her perfume on him, same as what he smelled on the old gray sweater. “Does Molly tell secrets?”
Butchie isn’t talking.
Joel lifts the dog’s front feet to get him to lie down, head on his lap. Then Joel leans back, his head on the couch, and tries to close his eyes; he should rest a little bit.
But he can’t shake the feeling that resting is the exact same thing as waiting to get caught.
He gets up. “Come on, Butchie. We’ve got to go.”
Butchie looks up, tilts his head.
Joel gets his pack. “Those boys know we’re on the run, but what they don’t know is we’ve got a place to run. A place to tell what happened.”
Butchie yawns, unimpressed.
“The judge, Butch!” He leans over and thumbs sleep from the inside corners of the dog’s eyes. “That Redbone boy shot someone and he shot at us, too. He’s the one in trouble. You were protecting me. We don’t have to run away—we just have to get to the courthouse. I know Judge Crawford will take our case.”
Butchie looks up, grumbles, “Hurmm.”
Joel puts the notebook in his bag. Then he climbs up onto the back of the couch, pushes the window all the way open, throws his pack up onto the lawn, and says, “Butch: Hier!”
11
“Joel!” Sarah is wide awake now and a good half block ahead of Pete as they canvass the neighborhood.
“Butch,” Pete calls, though he knows both the dog and the boy would obey if they were anywhere in earshot. He wishes they’d appear—from a stranger’s yard or up the street or down the alley or, fuck, out of the blue. From anywhere.
“Joel!” Sarah calls again, her voice scratched-through.
Without discussion, they left McKenna, and Pete followed Sarah out of the house on a crisscrossed, double-backed search for Joel with stops at every known hideout and every possible hangout. Though Sarah isn’t aware of the tendency for people to err right—that is, to subconsciously choose the right side or right turn whether wandering, fleeing, or discarding evidence—Pete is programmed for it, so in the past hour they’ve covered four square blocks. Still, no sign of boy or dog.
And though Pete might have been able to find a complete stranger, he was ashamed he didn’t know the first place to look for his son.
Sarah turns around, a shiver, her face flushed. “They’re not here. They’re not anywhere around here.”
Pete takes off his coat so she can wear it. “Let’s go home and regroup.”
She shrugs off the coat. “I want to go through the neighborhood again.”
“You just said they aren’t here. Covering the same ground isn’t logical.”
“Our son is not logical. We have to keep looking.”
Pete supposes there is no strategy here; someone who’s run off either winds up lost or doesn’t want to be found, and there’s no right way to search for either.
“We can work toward home and go out again,” Pete says. “That way we can stop in and get you a coat.”
“If we go home, I’m going to call the police.” She has announced this, a threat, once every block.
“Sarah, I told you, I would’ve called in if I thought they’d help. I’m sorry, but as far as the police are concerned, Joel’s just another kid who hasn’t come home yet.”
“He was already home. He ran away. Why won’t you call? Can’t you pull some strings? Can’t they put out an APB?”
“They won’t issue a bulletin unless they believe he was stolen.”
“Oh my god—” She covers her mouth.
“There’s no way Joel was stolen. Not with Butch there.”
“What about a missing persons report? Won’t they have to search for him then?”
“Yes, but we have to file a missing persons report. That means at least one of us has to go to the station and fill out the paperwork. After that, they’ll assign a detective, and in a day or two, the detect
ive will start here—right here, where we are. It’s senseless. It takes too much time.”
“I don’t see why you can’t call in a favor. After everything.”
“I told you. If we don’t find them soon, I’ll make some calls.”
She starts down the street, furious. “You’re embarrassed,” she says over her shoulder.
“Me? This is about me now?”
“Of course! Because your son is missing and your dog got away, and if anybody finds out, you’ll definitely be right back on the front page.” She rounds the corner, a left turn. “I don’t care. I’m calling 911.”
“Sarah,” he says as he tries to take her by the elbow, slow her down.
She shakes him off. “Save it for the press.”
If that was meant to hurt him, it worked. So: “I’m not taking the blame this time. I wasn’t here.”
“Fuck you, Pete.”
“What are you going to tell them when you call? That tonight while you were jabbering on the phone, plowing through a bottle of wine, your son just happened to disappear? You might’ve noticed, of course, but you were exhausted.”
“You’re cruel.”
“No, actually, you were right before: I am embarrassed. Because of you.”
He wants to tell her about McKenna, too; make her feel like shit. Like he feels. But then she stops walking and doubles over and begins to sob. “Joel—”
Pete takes her in his arms, finally; a cathartic release. Her arms are crossed between them, her heart’s only shield now that her anxiety has materialized—turned what if to what is, her worries to worse.
She does feel like shit. And he is cruel.
He stands, holding her, and he wants to say It’ll be okay or We’ll get through this or hell, I’m sorry, but it all seems so selfish. Maybe he is worried this will wind up in the news. This, with everything else.
“He had another headache,” Sarah says, when she can manage. “I put him to bed. I put Butch in his cage. I was in the front room the rest of the night. I was reading. I don’t know how he got past me.”
The Good Boy Page 13