Silence on Cold River

by Casey Dunn

  “If you really want to make yourself sympathetic and have a bigger impact, you have to think smaller,” Lindsey said, and a curious expression came over her face. “Younger.”

  “The school. That’s perfect,” Ama answered on an exhale. “We’ll hold a fundraiser for the high school, for the music department.”

  “Okay,” Lindsey said slowly. “Why music?”

  “The holiday,” Ama answered quickly. “Music makes people festive, makes them generous.”

  “That’s a good point. How soon are you thinking? And where? It’s going to be hard to pull something off this close to Christmas. Would you rather have it in Atlanta?”

  “No, it has to be here, and it has to be soon, very soon,” Ama said, her tone harder than she intended. She paused and tried again. “If anyone can make the right people say yes, it’s you. I think holding it here will make the effort seem more genuine. And maybe people will be willing to give more money if I’m still bandaged and limping.” She forced herself to smile.

  “That’s not a bad thought,” Lindsey mused. “Does this town even have a venue nice enough to set the kind of tone that opens wallets?”

  “It has exactly one: the courthouse.”

  The old, Southern-style building was rung with giant porches and nestled between two groves of magnolia trees. In the back, a carpet of tidy grass rolled for half an acre before butting up to the edge of Tarson Woods. Ama hadn’t seen it or set foot near it in seventeen years. When she’d lived here, it had been the crown jewel of the city. If there was anything small-town people believed in, it was justice. With any luck, both those things still rang true.

  “I have an idea. Give me the morning to get settled in and make some plans. Can you meet me here this afternoon? Maybe bring some of my clothes and some lunch for us? I’m going to need someone to help me pull this off, and the only person I trust to help me is you,” Ama admitted.

  “I…” Lindsey trailed off, visibly flustered. “I’ll be here,” she said.

  “Good.” Ama reached over and squeezed her hand, and she realized in all the years they’d known each other, that may have been the first time she’d touched Lindsey on purpose.

  There was no way she’d be able to pull together a large-scale event on her own, bullet wound or not. This was Lindsey’s territory. She’d planned weddings start to finish for a handful of paralegals in their office. The firm called on her any time a venue had double-booked something they needed, and she’d always walked away from such conversations victorious.

  After the opening arguments in the most recent case, Lindsey had warned Ama that she didn’t think they had the right jury to win for the driver in the vehicular homicide, and she had been right. Ama understood how to work the legal system and how to work criminals, and she alone understood how to work Michael. Figuring out how to draw him out, how to leave bread crumbs tempting enough for him to find and follow, would be a big enough undertaking. Thankfully, Lindsey understood how to work everyone else.

  Ama could admit to herself that manipulating Lindsey wasn’t new, but this feeling—this niggle of worry that Lindsey would be hurt should she find out—was a first.

  MICHAEL Chapter 50 | 3:00 PM, December 1, 2005 | Tarson, Georgia

  THE JOCKS FROM CHORUS DON’T recognize me here in the gas station: sunglasses, unkempt hair, and two days’ worth of stubble on my face. I’ve captured two quick glances from Jake, the ringleader, as if maybe he knows me, but he’s not sure from where.

  They’re dressed for a run. Want creeps though me, and a flat note echoes in my head. This is the second place I’ve seen them, our paths crossing in front of the refrigerated beverages section. That’s the way Fate can be; sometimes laughably simple.

  “Let’s go somewhere different,” Jake says, and I watch him tuck a Snickers bar into his palm before sliding it into the pocket of his sweatshirt. “I’m sick of the regular route.”

  “What about the Timberline trail?” a smaller boy answers. He’s wiry, one coiled muscle from the base of his throat to his ankles. I imagine he lets Jake win, even though he could probably beat him at any distance.

  I wander to the other side of the store and pretend to look through various snacks until the boys leave, falling into a fantasy about what vocal range Jake might have if he were pushed into discovery. Those kinds of kids always do best with a tough-love approach.

  “Sir?” the cashier’s voice breaks through my haze. I’m standing at the checkout counter empty-handed. “Did you want to buy anything?” he asks.

  I glance at the cooler where the Gatorade is stocked. I must’ve put mine back, but I can’t remember doing so.

  “I, uh. I think they may have stolen something from you,” I say.

  “Really?” He slides off his stool. “I’ll check the security tape. Thanks.”

  “Anytime,” I say, and leave the store.

  I cross the road and head straight into the trees. I won’t take the Timberline trail, won’t set a single foot on it. If I run into Jake again, would it count as a third time, or am I tempting Fate, playing God?

  No, I decide. I’ll head into the woods and see where it takes me. If our paths cross, so be it.

  I don’t see a soul for the first forty minutes. Then, ahead, a flash of red catches my eye. Jake had been wearing a red shirt. I increase my speed, turning uphill when I come across a trail marker. I force myself to slow down. I can’t hunt Jake. That wouldn’t be authentic, and Lady Fate is easily offended.

  “Mr. Walks! What are you doing out here?” an unmistakable voice calls from behind me.

  It’s Hazel.

  “This is the last place I’d expect to see you,” she says.

  The taste of metal floods my mouth. A third crossing has presented itself. Fate has led me here, no doubt as a test. Hazel is as close to a friend as I’ve had. How could I not have seen this before? Her range will be unmatched, her tones clearer than any other contributor.

  Hazel is no test. Hazel is a gift.

  I turn, smiling. “This is the last place I’d expect to see you, too, Hazel. Want to walk a ways with me?” I ask.

  “Sure,” she says, and we walk up the rise toward the peak overlooking Cold River together.

  HAZEL Chapter 51 | December 25, 2005 | Tarson, Georgia

  IN THE DARK OF THE underground room, I feel for the second screw head joining the two metal panels of the kennel. The first screw is in my pocket, and my left thumb is raw. When I stick it in my mouth, I taste blood and I can feel where my nail is cracked.

  That’s why you have two, Hazy. I imagine my father’s voice in my head, and it drives me on.

  I twist and pry at the screw with the nails of my thumb and pointer finger. Something rattles to my right, a dull sound coming through the locking cabinet door I see Mr. Walks crawl through sometimes, and I freeze. He doesn’t usually come in that way unless he used it to leave. He says it goes to the river. I wonder if the water is rising, pushing debris up the chute. I wonder if the door will cave and water will rush in, washing everything else in this tiny room back out, so all that will be left for him is me.

  Between my still fingers, the screw moves. It isn’t much, maybe a quarter of an interval. But it moves. I dry the sweat from my fingers and try again. It spins all the way around, looser now. I wiggle and pull, wiggle and pull. It comes out in my hands, and the burn of relief floods my eyes.

  I put a hand on each panel and push out. They give, but barely, still held in place where they join the ceiling and the floor. Desperation swells inside. I cannot be found with a half-finished escape. If there is the slightest gap, he’ll see it. I don’t want him to see this hole until it is giant and I have slipped through and have run far from here.

  He’ll see my nails, I realize. He’ll put me somewhere different, somewhere smooth. He only wants me to experience pain if he’s present to hear it. I have to force my way out now.

  I heave against the cage. I grunt, biting back any other sound, and push harder sti
ll. My shoulders burn. My hands throb and shake. I hear metal pop loose above my head. The top panel has given way. I go still for less than a second, disbelieving, but I press my fingers on the ceiling of the cage and it moves.

  I smile in the dark, my breath coming fast. The ceiling is still held down in three places, but with this corner blown and the adjacent wall undone, I can squeeze through. The joints bite into my skin, and the pressure of the panels longing to rejoin is tremendous, but the pain is nearly euphoric—it is freedom. I am forcing my way out. I am a goddam butterfly.

  I tip blindly over the panel, my hips still caught, and throw my hands out for balance. I am too far from the floor still to touch it. I sink as much weight into my feet as I can, and then dive sideways. The crate rocks, and then resettles. I leap again and again, faster and faster, and at last the cage tips over, and I crash to the side. The corner digs into my navel and the ceiling pushes on my spine. I kick and writhe and fight. I am free to my thighs. The metal scrapes along my skin. It is a meter of progress. Knees, calves, my feet are through, and I am free.

  I stand and nearly topple back over.

  How long has it been since I stood all the way up?

  Between the rush of blood and the utter darkness, I have no sense of balance. I reach my fingers out and feel the counter, which runs along the left arc of the room and to the main door, I know.

  The sound of my breathing fills the little room, hammers in my ears. Then the dial to the door is in my fingers. I turn it clockwise as I have seen Mr. Walks do. I feel the clicks coming through the metal. When it stops, I try to push it open, but it doesn’t budge. It must be some kind of combination lock. I spin again, listening to see if there’s any change in the sounds, feeling for any tension in the dial, but there’s nothing. I try again and again. I spin the dial counterclockwise, then back to the right, like we do on our lockers at school. In my fingers, I swear I feel a new resistance. I must be close. The second the dial feels like it wants to stop, I let it and shove my shoulder against the door. I pound on it with my fists. I feel around for the seam of the doorway. The crack is so narrow, the sides so smooth, there’s no way to gain leverage.

  I am all at once too heavy for my legs, this defeat a stone in my belly. I sink to the floor. My sweaty skin grips the cool metal, and my descent makes a squeaking, screeching sound. Tears pour down. My heart shudders in my chest, and every piece of my skin I sacrificed to wriggle out of the cage now flares with acknowledgment. Every inch of me hurts—every ounce. But it is better than feeling numb.

  I work my way to standing and feel out into the dark, searching for a light switch, when my fingertips graze the stiff, thin, curled edge of what Mr. Walks has called his instruments—pairs of lungs slit down their middles and pinned open, something thin and yellow and hard strung across the widest part, and I recoil, my hand trembling as if I’ve been shocked, my gasps echoing in the dark.

  I stumble back and collide with the cool plastic of a fold-out chair. I lower myself into it. The sound of the dial turning fills the black air. Mr. Walks is back.

  I could bolt for the door, which he will block, try to climb the ladder, which he’ll yank me down from, shimmy through the sewer lid, which is secured with a padlock, and try to sprint across the field on legs too weak to stand.

  I close my eyes and imagine the day on the Tarson Woods trail when Mr. Walks approached me, a smile on his face and despair in his eyes. As we walked along the highest bank of Cold River, I asked him what was wrong. In my mind, I rewrite the moment, and as he begins to answer, I shove him off the cliff.

  MARTIN Chapter 52 | 2:00 PM, December 4, 2006 | Tarson, Georgia

  MARTIN WALKED DOWN THE HALL of Tarson High School, two steps behind an armed school resource officer. Tangerine lockers lined both walls, and Martin wondered if everyone here felt like a hamster in one of those plastic tunnels, or if it was just him.

  In the past six hours, he’d lost almost every piece of the puzzle, and he damn near lost the case, again. If not for the lead on Jonathon Walks and confirming the existence of the little footpath that led from the rest stop where Toni was found to the edge of Tarson Woods, Captain would have pulled the plug.

  Ama had checked herself out of the hospital against medical advice and hadn’t yet shown back up at her apartment in Atlanta. No one they contacted admitted to knowing where she was, although Martin would’ve bet money Lindsey, who had yet to answer her phone, had a pretty good idea where she’d gone.

  Martin also hadn’t been able to track down a single address listed for a Jonathon Walks that matched Eddie’s description of the teacher. He was almost glad Eddie was still semi-detained at the station. Otherwise he might vanish, too. Did a case exist if every person involved evaporated into thin air?

  The officer stopped outside the door to the main office. Martin stepped past him and approached the desk.

  “I’m Detective Martin Locklear. I called earlier,” he said to the receptionist.

  The receptionist stared at Martin as if he ought to have a name tag on. “Mrs. Brownlow is in her office.” She pointed to the closed door behind her.

  Martin rapped his knuckles against the wood and let himself in. Mrs. Brownlow sat at her desk, her face bathed in the light of a computer screen.

  “Detective, take a seat.” She scooted herself closer to her desk and turned off her monitor. “I understand you want to ask some questions about Hazel Stevens. What would you like to know?”

  “Hazel began working with a vocal coach she met through a career day here,” he started, straining all accusation from his tone. “Do you have records of the people who come to talk to the students during the event?”

  “There’s a flyer that goes out about a month beforehand—we send it home with students and post it at all the businesses in town. The school counselor lists his email as the contact, and if a professional is interested in attending, they sign up via email. Then there is a sign-in sheet the day of.”

  “Do you conduct any kind of checks on the people who come?”

  “Mr. Locklear, I understand you’re new in town, but for the most part around here, I see a name, I know the background.”

  “What can you tell me about Jonathon Walks?”

  “He’s quiet, polite, all-business type. He moved here a couple years ago. He’s a vocal coach at a music shop in town, and he also volunteered as a teacher’s aide for our chorus teacher for almost a year. The teacher has been battling some health issues for quite some time. Mr. Walks was a godsend, really. Very dedicated, very good with the students.”

  “So if he subbed, you have records for him.”

  “He wasn’t technically a substitute. He was an aide; a volunteer.”

  “But he had access to your students,” Martin stated.

  “I’m sure he filled out the necessary paperwork, if that’s what you’re asking. He knows how to play every instrument we have, and he has ten years’ professional experience in a recording studio. He exceeded every job qualification and then some, and while he was in the classroom he was consistently monitored by a school employee.”

  “Do you know where he lives?”

  “Well, here, I imagine.”

  Martin dropped his pencil on his pad of paper, exasperated. “Do you know his address?”

  “I would need to look through last year’s archives. We haven’t used him this year.”

  “I have time,” Martin offered, leaning back.

  “I don’t, unfortunately. I’m actually running late for an important meeting. Now, on the phone I believe you said you wanted to speak to Hazel’s teachers. This isn’t really a good time, since students are present. Perhaps if you came back after school hours are over?”

  “Perhaps I’ll find the teachers on my own,” Martin said, standing. “Thanks for all your help.” He strode for the door.

  “Mr. Locklear, you can’t just wander school halls!”

  “I have a badge and a gun. Looks like I have all the necessary qualifi
cations to sub for your resource officer,” Martin replied. “I’ll stop back by on my way out. Do you think you can put your hands on that paperwork between now and then?”

  Martin walked out of her office without waiting for a response, Mrs. Brownlow barking his name at his back.

  Martin tucked his pad of paper, still blank, under his arm and walked down the main corridor, checking names on doors. Eddie had provided him a list of all of Hazel’s teachers he could remember. Classes were in session, and a distracted teacher wasn’t worth an interview, but he at least wanted to make initial contact. When he saw a name matched from the list, he waved to get the teacher’s attention and handed them his card. On the back of each he’d already written: Please call ASAP. Re: Hazel Stevens.

  Before returning to the parking lot, Martin swung through the main office. All Mrs. Brownlow had left was a handwritten note with the name and address of the music shop where Mr. Walks once worked, which Eddie had already given him.

  Martin glared at the note as he shouldered through the door. For a man who’d been in Tarson for roughly two years, people didn’t seem to know anything about him. The night-shift cashier at the grocery store already knew Martin on sight and knew to tell him when cashews were on sale if she saw he hadn’t put any on the belt. How could a man fly under the radar so successfully, and, more important, why?

  He was halfway across the lot when a flash of movement caught his eye—a woman walking slowly and gingerly from the side door of the school to the drive-through pickup area. She stopped at the curb and wrapped one hand around her side, fingers pressed into her back. He stopped in his tracks. A black car pulled up in front of her. Lindsey Harold hustled around the front of the car and opened the passenger door. The other woman turned, as if feeling Martin staring. It was Ama.