All the Pretty Things

by Emily Arsenault

  I was about to pause the recorder for a snack when I heard a door opening again. It was my dad’s office door, with its creepy hall-of-mirrors creak. I heard a sigh and the sound of someone flopping into the office chair.

  There was some rustling, sipping, eventually a burp. I sucked in a breath. I shouldn’t be listening to this if Dad likely didn’t know he was being recorded. But then again—better me than someone else.

  I listened guiltily to my father’s sighs and grunts—apparently he was trying to get comfortable in his chair—and wondered who would have the patience to listen to all this. After about fifteen minutes, Dad spoke.

  “Yes. May I speak to Janelle Schneider?” A pause. “Yes. You can tell her it’s Edward Cork calling.”

  A sniffle and more squeaking of the chair.

  “Helllooooo, Janelle! Yep. I just wanted to make sure you’re sending someone to our event this afternoon. There will be some great photo ops, and I want to make sure your Danville reporter speaks to me directly about the literacy angle.” Another brief pause. “Yes. You got the press release my manager sent a couple of days ago?” He waited only a beat before launching back into his pitch. “Excellent. Oh, and please don’t use any old photos you have of the park or its employees, me included, for this story. Only current photos. The park changes a lot from summer to summer, and I don’t want anything outdated running. If you can’t get the images you want and need to ask us for something, go ahead. Okay?

  “Mmm-kay. Thanks, Janette.”

  I winced. If he wanted newspaper people to do him favors, he at least needed to work on getting their names right.

  “Oh, and by the way, I’ve got something even bigger happening in mid-July. So let’s talk about that, too. I can’t wait to tell you and your reporter about it.”

  Dad had a love-hate relationship with the two local newspapers—the town paper and the larger county paper. It irritated him, last year, when the county paper’s feature on his new ownership of Fabuland seemed to be more of a goodbye to and remembrance of Mr. Moyer than a forward-looking celebration of all the changes Dad had made. He also didn’t like that the county paper ran a somewhat unflattering photo of him pointing up to the top of the Laser Coaster, squinting in the sun, openmouthed, his teeth sticking out.

  I tried not to get too nervous while I listened to the rest of the recording. After his phone conversation with my mother came and went, there was an extended series of sighs and chair squeaks, then complete silence for more than ten minutes. Dad had apparently left the office. Eventually I heard the sound of a door, shuffling, and a muttered shit that I recognized as Chris’s, not my dad’s.

  There were a couple of quiet moments, then Chris’s voice again:

  “Heyyyy.” He drew out the word, speaking so softly I had to turn the recorder way up to hear him. “I only have a few minutes. But I’m missing you. I wanted to hear your voice before things got crazy.

  “I know, baby. I know. We’re going to figure this out. Don’t worry. I’m working on it. I know it’s hard right now.

  “Oh. No. No. Don’t say that. Listen…”

  His voice got louder.

  “No. Come on, now. Don’t say that.”

  Then there was a shuffling.

  “So sorry, honey. I gotta go because…Hello?”

  Then a thunk thunk. And then, my own voice. Echoing softly because it was coming from the stairwell. Then there was silence again, and then a rustling that I recognized as me searching my dad’s desk, because there was a clunk, and then the recording stopped.

  I sat there in silence, trying to process what had just happened. I’d never heard Chris use a tender voice like that. It was kind of embarrassing since Chris always had such a businesslike demeanor. He was probably talking to Trisha. Chris had been married for about three years—I remembered Dad dressing up for the wedding.

  Was Chris’s wife angry at him? Testy because of whatever “issue” my dad had seemed vaguely aware of? Had she hung up on Chris? It was really none of my business, but the upshot was that maybe it wasn’t Chris who’d put the recorder in the office. Would he record himself talking like that? It seemed unlikely.

  I put the recorder in my backpack and put on my pajamas.

  I had a lot to do tomorrow. I’d start by approaching Chris. And I still wanted to talk to Reggie, plus the two other kids who’d been with Ethan the night he died. I was also curious what Zach Crenshaw might say if I brought up Morgan. Not to mention that I should add Jason’s friend Katy to my list of people to talk to. I still wasn’t sure what I was trying to find out. But maybe somewhere in all of it there was a path to figuring out what had happened to Ethan.

  I lay in the dark and wished Jason and I had talked a little longer. Tucked under the covers, I remembered when we were small and Jason and I had spent all night in one of his expertly constructed living room forts. There was something that had made it a special occasion, but I couldn’t pinpoint exactly what. Jason’s birthday, maybe, or the celebration of Dad’s opening another Doughnut Dynasty branch. Around then he had opened several in quick succession. In any case, my parents, for that one time, let us spend the whole night in the fort, all snug with our pillows and blankets. They even let us decorate the outside of the fort with sprinkles, which stuck to the blue knitted afghan that Jason had used for part of the fort’s roof. I didn’t remember why our parents had let us be so crazy-messy, but I remember Mom absentmindedly humming and vacuuming up the next morning before Jason and I whipped the afghan around the yard to shake off all the sprinkles.

  TEN

  Before Fabuland opened in the morning, I spotted Chris in the middle of the central park path, where the Kiddie Town, Food Zone, and Thunder Way roads meet. He was holding one of those superlong measuring tapes that comes on a reel, streaming it from the Starship 360 area to the other side of the road that led to the carousel.

  “Hey,” I said, jogging up. “What are you up to?”

  “Your dad wants me to measure this spot.”

  “Why?” I asked, looking around.

  Chris reached into his pocket and handed me a folded piece of lined paper, then continued measuring. I unfolded the paper and saw a crudely drawn map of Fabuland. Food Zone, Pavilion, WaterWays, Starship 360, etc., were labeled in my dad’s thick, all-caps style. At three different spots on the map, someone had drawn a circle with a red marker.

  “He wants to figure out which spot we should use for the big doughnut gala.”

  “Gala?” I repeated. I wasn’t sure if that was the right word. My dad must have come up with it, because Chris looked slightly uncomfortable when he said it.

  “He’s got his sights set on July sixteenth.”

  “That’s not really enough time to get a lot of press first….” I trailed off, considering that it would probably fall on our shoulders.

  Chris shrugged. “Maybe you ought to tell him that. I already tried.”

  I glanced at the map again, and then at Chris’s slouched shoulders as he straightened and tightened his measuring tape. It occurred to me that maybe he didn’t approach my dad’s ideas the way Jason and I did: support the doable ones, but try not to feed the crazy ones too much. We all let Dad talk about making a giant doughnut spectacle someday. But no one expected him to ever do it. Did Chris not understand this? Was it possible he had forgotten? That he was distracted somehow?

  Poor Chris.

  Was his wife still angry at him, as she had been on the recording?

  Or— I had a sudden suspicion that somehow hadn’t occurred to me last night.

  Maybe that wasn’t his wife he was talking to on the recording. Maybe that wasn’t his wife he was calling baby.

  Chris took the paper from me and silently marked something on it after looking at the tape measure one more time.

  “Wouldn’t the Food Zone be the natural place?” I a
sked.

  “Your dad was very clear he wants it to be a whole-park spectacle, not just a food event.”

  “Uh-huh,” I said. “But it would be kind of crowded in this spot, right?”

  “He thinks it would be good for pictures, for one. And if there’s a big crowd and a need for overflow seating, people could be seated in the Starship 360.”

  “Right,” I said, eyeing the long, boat-shaped ride. It could probably seat about fifty, max. If people squished in.

  “Your dad’s talking aerial photographs, maybe aerial footage.”

  “Of course he is,” I mumbled.

  “What?” Chris said.

  “Umm…nothing.”

  Ben was walking by as I said that, sipping a coffee.

  “Hey, my friend!” he called. “Caught you looking at the 360 again. You’re not seriously thinking of becoming an upside-downer, are you?”

  “Umm…,” I said, glancing at Chris.

  Ben must’ve realized then that Chris and I were talking.

  “Oops…sorry!” he said, and turned toward the Rotor.

  I stared wistfully at his back for a moment, wishing I’d had a chance to say hi. It took me a moment to recover, and to remember what I’d meant to ask Chris in the first place.

  I took the recorder out of my backpack.

  “Did you lose this?” I asked.

  Chris studied it. “Is that some kind of recorder?”

  “Yeah. It’s a digital recorder.”

  “It’s not mine, no,” Chris said. “Why do you ask?”

  His answer was as quick and casual as my dad’s had been.

  “I found it and can’t figure out who the owner is.”

  “Well, where did you find it?”

  “My dad’s office,” I answered, and then watched his reaction.

  The skin over the bridge of Chris’s nose wrinkled quizzically.

  “Then it’s probably your dad’s.”

  “It’s not. I asked him.”

  Chris shrugged and started to suck the measuring tape back into its dispenser. “Then ask Tim Malloy, I guess. He’s the only other person who goes in there.”

  Tim Malloy. Winnie’s brother. Of course. I wasn’t sure why I hadn’t thought of him—maybe because he had kind of a dopey and unconniving air. Tim was, however, part of the custodial staff and regularly cleaned Dad’s office.

  A familiar whirring sound came from behind the Starship 360. The Laser Coaster operator was doing the initial tests for the day.

  I could understand why my dad would want to have his big spectacle here, with the Laser Coaster visible in the distance. It had the highest climb and the farthest drop of all the three big coasters in the park. Its tracks were a striking neon green, its cars alternating purple and black. It looked like an exotic snake zipping along the grass when it was moving. It was cool and dramatic and very photogenic. Of course Dad wanted it in the picture.

  I checked my phone. There were only a few minutes until nine o’clock, so I said bye to Chris. I was supposed to be ready and smiling at my cotton candy post near the entrance.

  Walking back the way I came, I grudgingly took my post, stowed my purse, and started the cotton candy machine. Dad liked for me to be pulling out the first few batches of pink puffs just as the guests were walking in. I watched as various employees hurried to their stations, my mind wandering back to Chris’s words on the recording.

  We’re going to figure this out.

  I know it’s hard right now.

  And in that instant a few things clicked in my head.

  Winnie on the phone right before the Princess Parade—right before I’d gone up to my dad’s office and run into Chris and found the recorder. I’d stopped the recorder when I’d found it—and the conversation Chris had had was right before that. Roughly the same time Winnie had been on the phone during princess prep time. So could they have been talking to each other? There definitely seemed to be anger or frustration coming from whoever Chris had been talking to. And then, about an hour later, Winnie had hurled a necklace at Chris.

  Not to mention the fact that Winnie and Chris were both unexpectedly off duty at Fabuland the night of Ethan’s death—and both for somewhat vague reasons. And that my dad had mentioned that Chris and his wife were having some kind of “issue.” In my dad’s roundabout way, did that mean they were on the cusp of divorce?

  I was so stunned by the possible connections that I was just staring into space when Zach Crenshaw walked by my booth.

  “Zach!” I yelled at his back, after I’d had a moment to wake up. I had to scream his name several times because he had earbuds in. “Can I ask you something?”

  “Your dad’s going to be mad if there’s not a row of fresh pizza dough balls rising in my kitchen in twenty minutes,” he said, pulling out the earbuds as he stopped reluctantly.

  “But nobody orders pizza in the morning,” I reasoned.

  “It doesn’t—” Zach hesitated.

  It doesn’t matter. I knew that was what he wasn’t sure he could say to me. It doesn’t matter to Mr. Cork. It’s all about how things look.

  “Listen, I was just wondering how you think Morgan’s been doing the last week or so. If you guys talked a lot after she found Ethan, or how you think she’s holding up?”

  “Well, I heard she maybe wasn’t holding up so well…if you know what I mean. And I think you do, since you were the one who got her down.”

  He raised his eyebrows at me, conveying a reluctant sort of admiration. Maybe. It was hard to tell with such a decidedly cool individual.

  “Okay. Yeah. But I mean, before that. I was away for a couple of weeks right before that. And I’d heard you two had gotten closer.”

  “Closer?” Zach frowned. “Maybe the first few days of summer. But not last week. I’ve barely seen Morgan for the last couple of weeks since she wasn’t working Pizza to the Rescue.”

  “She wasn’t?”

  “No.” Zach was starting to glance nervously at the Food Zone—apparently still eager to make it to his post at the official start time. “I guess you didn’t know since you were away.”

  “Was she working a different food booth?”

  Chris often shuffled people around to accommodate for last-minute no-shows and new hires. But I was surprised Morgan hadn’t mentioned it when we were still texting.

  “No. She hasn’t been in the Food Zone at all.”

  “What, she hasn’t been working these past couple of weeks?”

  “No. She’s been lifeguarding at the waterslides,” Zach said, in the same tone one usually said well, duh.

  “Morgan?”

  Zach sighed. “That’s who we’re talking about, right?”

  “You must be confused. Morgan’s not—”

  “I saw her in the lifeguard chair,” Zach interrupted. “Sorry, Ivy, I’ve got to go.”

  “But—”

  I was stunned silent for a second as an image flashed in my head. The new red bathing suit Morgan was wearing in the picture she’d posted.

  Zach either didn’t hear my protest or decided to ignore it. He took off, jogging toward the Food Zone. I stared into the whirling metal of the cotton candy machine. Usually watching it spin didn’t make me dizzy. So the feeling in my stomach must’ve been from the things I didn’t have time to say to Zach.

  But Morgan’s not a lifeguard.

  Morgan can barely swim.

  ELEVEN

  Can I come visit Morgan tonight?

  I typed and sent the text before I’d spun a single cotton candy cone, but Morgan’s mom didn’t reply right away.

  It wasn’t until I was in the Food Zone eating my bagged lunch—I was still sick of hot dogs and pizza—that my phone dinged with her response.

  Morgan is actually coming home tomorrow morni
ng and there is a lot going on at the hospital tonight to prepare for her release. So text me (or Morgan, she’ll have her phone back) tomorrow and we’ll see how it goes. Thank you for supporting Morgan, Ivy.

  Despite all my new questions for Morgan, I felt a weight lift when I read that. Suddenly I had an appetite again. I scarfed down my red pepper sticks and turkey wrap, and was still hungry when they were gone. I didn’t want any of the Zone’s fried offerings, so I wandered down to the ice cream kiosk between the Food Zone and the WaterWays.

  I ordered my favorite, black raspberry. While Drea Tomasetti started scooping, I watched a couple of kids plunking simultaneously into the water from the parallel waterslides.

  “You have a pretty good view of the WaterWays, don’t you?” I asked Drea. She was on ice cream duty almost every day.

  “Yup,” she replied, digging deep into the black raspberry. She put her whole body into it, almost disappearing into the cooler before popping back up. “Really entertaining. I get to see all the weird dad bods and the teeny toddler bikinis.”

  “Someone just told me they saw Morgan working the lifeguard chair a week or two ago, while I was gone,” I said, trying for a casual tone. “But I think they must have mistaken someone else for her because she’s always been at the Food Zone, right?”

  Drea positioned a perfect purple orb of black raspberry onto the top of a sugar cone. “Actually, I saw her there. It was just for a couple of days, though. I guess she was filling in for someone?”

  An uneasy feeling came over me, making the ice cream look like something unappetizing. Like a purple bodily organ—a spleen or a kidney.

  “Filling in…for who?” I asked, trying to keep my voice steady.

  Lifeguards were supposed to be certified, of course. A crappy swimmer like Morgan was definitely not supposed to fill in.

  “Liam Banister,” Drea said, handing me a couple of napkins. “He quit at the beginning of the summer because someone got him a job at the lake in Coventry.”