Wayward

by Gregory Ashe

  By that time, Courtney was stepping out onto the porch, zipping up a wool coat. She was still in her footie pajamas, but she’d pulled on moccasins.

  “We can’t talk inside?” Hazard said. “I’d like to meet your parents.”

  “They don’t really speak English,” Courtney said with a shrug.

  “You could translate.”

  “Not really. I don’t speak Spanish. Anyway, I asked them about the Western Union transfers, and they swear they haven’t sent Donna May any money.”

  “How is it possible you don’t speak Spanish?”

  “Well, it’s kind of easy. I took French in high school. Never studied Spanish.”

  Hazard glanced over her shoulder. “But if they only speak Spanish—”

  “Yeah, I mean, I understand some of it. Like, the stuff I’m supposed to do or whatever. They didn’t want us to be Mexican,” her tone shifted into exaggerated horror on the last word. “Why do you think they gave us these stupid Brady Bunch names?” Shifting from foot to foot, she added, “Can we go?”

  “Go where?”

  “I don’t know. On a walk, I guess.”

  Hazard frowned, nodded, and let her take the lead. They turned up the block, away from the main road that led through the trailer park. The spring day had warmed, and the sky looked like a craft project Evie might have brought home from school: a vibrant blue, cotton-puff clouds pasted in place, an uneven band of green at the horizon. Someone was doing laundry, and the clean, fresh scent of detergent floated in the air. In one of the mobile homes, a TV was tuned to Family Feud; Steve Harvey was yucking it up, doing a falsetto voice, and to judge by the studio audience, he was killing it.

  “I hate this place,” Courtney said.

  They walked another ten feet before Hazard said, “Seems all right to me. Better than a lot of places I’ve been.”

  “Ugh. It’s horrible. Like, Mom and Dad could afford a house. Honestly. They could. I know how much money they’ve got. But they’re so cheap. We grew up here. Did you know that?”

  Hazard nodded slowly. “I knew Donna May had grown up here. She had a lot of trouble with the police.”

  Courtney snorted. “That was all for attention. She’d break windows. Or she’d smoke dope on a street corner. One time, she walked right into the Dollar Tree and made a big show out of shoving these wooden nutcrackers—it was Christmastime—into a bag. She liked getting people riled up.”

  “Sounds like she knew how to do it. She made a pretty good effort of it when she came back to Wahredua a few months ago.”

  “God, you don’t have any idea. She picked people. She targeted them. Like, ok, just for the sake of example. She was twelve or thirteen. And Mrs. Jimenez—she used to live in that one—smacked her hand with a spoon because Donna May would go into the kitchen and steal tortillas. So Donna May cried and cried. Nobody cared; my mom and dad didn’t do anything because they were embarrassed. Donna May made this huge production, and nobody gave her the time of day. She couldn’t stand that. So a few hours later, she stood in the middle of the street and threw rocks at the windows on Mrs. Jimenez’s trailer until she broke one. And then she laughed.” Courtney’s expression was distant. “Not, like, mean laughter. Just silly kid laughs. Like she thought it was a joke. Anyway, it was always stuff like that. The dope? This cop got a thing for her, and she’d go out of her way to piss him off. She picked a corner right on his block. I mean, she had to take two or three buses to get over there. She just did stuff like that to make people mad.”

  “Sounds like a tough person to be around.”

  Courtney shrugged. “I guess everybody finds their people, right? I mean, she found Josh, so I guess there’s someone for everyone.”

  Hazard shoved away the thought of Somers and focused on what she had said. To a degree, it lined up with what Hazard had known and been able to infer about Donna May. When she’d returned to Wahredua under the name Savanna Twilight, she’d obviously had an axe to grind with authority figures. He had assumed it was part of her antifa radicalization, but then he had seen her police record, heard her claims of sexual abuse at the hands of police officers. He didn’t know how much truth there was to the story, but he knew that she had targeted one of those officers, calling for his death.

  “What about your brother?”

  “Raymond? He’s, like, totally gone. Not in the picture anymore.”

  “For how long?”

  “A year, maybe? He got a job driving long haul, and then he decided he didn’t want to come back here anymore. I think he’s in Colorado. He calls Mom and Dad sometimes, but on Christmas, you know?”

  “Any chance Donna May’s with him?”

  “No way. I told you, I don’t even know if she’s left the state. She just goes up to Columbia, gets stoned, surfs couches. She might stay a week. She might stay two years. But she’s got no imagination. She—” Ahead of them, the blinds on a trailer fluttered as though someone had brushed them or pressed against them. The movement startled Hazard; his body kicked into overdrive, and his brain followed, picturing a rifle between the aluminum slats. He had to stop walking, or he might have broken into a run, and he took a deep breath and then another, trying to shut down the flood of hormones. He forgot Courtney, forgot about everything except the need to run, to hide, until, inch by inch, he managed to bring himself back under control.

  “—a glass of water or something?”

  “What?” Hazard asked, hating the raw edge of his voice.

  “You look really pale. Maybe you should sit down.” Courtney laughed uneasily. “I don’t think I can catch you if you faint.”

  “I’m not going to faint. I just—it’s nothing. I’m fine. Let’s keep walking.” With a jerk of his chin, he indicated the trailer where he had seen movement; the blinds were still again. “Who lives there?”

  “Mr. Warner. Why?”

  “What’s his deal?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Did he know Donna May?”

  “Uh, yeah. They had screaming matches just about every day. He’s a racist. He’s horrible. He used to have one of those Bright Lights banners outside, but Donna May tore it down.”

  “Why’s he watching us?”

  “That’s his hobby. Watching everybody, but especially brown people. He thinks we’re going to take away his Social Security check or something. Or maybe we’re taking away jobs. I don’t really know. He always at his window—never goes outside. Well, except those big fights with Donna May. Remember how I said she liked to antagonize people?”

  “Did she break one of his windows?”

  “No, but I told you about the banner, right? And she’d do little stuff like rev the engine on the car. Or peel out. Or she’d come outside and play this norteño music that she liked, put it on super loud. It drove Mom and Dad crazy too, by the way. She knew it embarrassed them, all that Mexican stuff, but one time she came back from Columbia with all this talk about heritage and pride and how she wasn’t just going to be another cookie-cutter white princess. I told her that was fine, I’d be a princess, it didn’t bother me. You should have seen her get going when I told her that.”

  At the end of the block, they turned; ahead of them a black walnut dominated a scrap of yard, looming over the mobile homes beneath it. A couple of the branches, real widow makers, hung out over the aluminum shells; a bad storm, and they’d come crashing down. The rest of the yard was dead, and instead of accepting defeat, whoever lived there had decided to fight Mother Nature by unrolling strips of AstroTurf, the synthetic fibers bulging where they draped over roots and rocks. The whole thing was so bizarre and pathetic that Hazard felt his stomach turn; Courtney didn’t even look twice.

  “I don’t think Courtney is in Columbia,” Hazard said. “In fact, I’m pretty sure she’s not.”

  He waited for questions, but they walked a few more yards and Courtney just said, “Huh.”

  “Do you have any idea where she
might be?”

  “Uh, yeah. I told you. Columbia.”

  “Besides Columbia.”

  “No. I mean, she loves going up there. She says they’ve got the best weed in the state—not that she’s really been anywhere else, besides St. Louis, I guess. She’s got friends she can stay with. She hooks up with guys. She likes going to Mizzou, getting hopped up on whatever political activism is hot. She told you she was antifa, right? That was her thing last time. Savanna Twilight: warrior for justice.”

  The words were surprisingly hard, and Hazard took a moment to consider his response.

  “That was certainly what she wanted us to think,” he said.

  Courtney rolled her eyes in a told-you-so expression.

  “You said that you had all gone out together the night before she left.”

  “Yeah. I gave you the picture, right?”

  “You did. How did Donna May seem?”

  “Exactly the same as always.”

  “How were things between her and Josh?”

  “The same as always. I mean, she talked about making things permanent, but she still was the same with Josh.”

  “What does that mean?”

  Courtney stopped walking and planted her hands on her hips. “Like I told you: she treated him like dog poop. That’s how things were between them. Have you met Josh?”

  “Briefly.”

  “He’s this cute guy, his family’s got money, and, yeah, they’re like crazy racists, but he doesn’t want anything to do with their politics. He’s nice to people. He’s funny. He’s sweet and thoughtful. He loves his little girl. I mean, he’s trying to be a good dad, ok?”

  The question hung in the air.

  “Ok,” Hazard said.

  “And she treats him like dog poop. Like—” Courtney seemed to work up to it. “Like shit, ok? She wanted to fight all the time. She’d break up with him, go to Columbia, mess around with other guys, and come back. And he’d . . . he’d take her back. Honestly, I think she bullied him into it, but I guess it worked for them. Like, they’d pick back up right where they’d left off. One time I told him—” She cut off, putting her hand over her mouth, the movement so playacted that Hazard wanted to get her enrolled in a remedial drama course.

  “What did you tell him?” he asked, feeling tired all of a sudden.

  “Never mind. It was stupid. But I just think you should know how things stand. Yeah, that last night, they were both pretty heated. And Josh did some dumb stuff; I can’t pretend he didn’t. But he’s a good guy, and Donna May has never treated him right. Honestly, if it weren’t for the custody thing and how bad it’s upsetting my mom and dad, I’d say it’s better for her to be gone.”

  “So they had a fight the night before Donna May left? Why didn’t you tell me this when we talked the first time?”

  “I mean, I wouldn’t call it a fight.”

  “What would you call it?” Hazard asked as they turned down the next block, heading toward the main street, now three-quarters of the way back to the Vega home.

  “She was just jealous. She’d go off, be with as many college guys as she wanted, and then she’d come home and act like she expected Josh to be waiting for her. She didn’t even like him looking at another woman.”

  “Who did she think he was seeing?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Is he seeing someone?”

  Courtney seemed to consider the question and then asked, “You said you met Josh?”

  “Briefly.”

  “Maybe you should check on him one night. If his parents are home, you can follow him. Or if his parents aren’t home, just watch the house.”

  “No,” Hazard said, catching her arm and spinning her to face him. “Drop the cloak-and-dagger bullshit. Who’s he seeing?”

  “Ouch. Hey, lay off. Melissa, ok? I mean, I didn’t want to come out and say it because, well, you know.”

  “Her career?”

  “What?”

  Hazard realized he had missed something. Again. He tried to backtrack. “What do you mean, you didn’t want to come out and say it? Why not?”

  “Uh, because Josh’s parents hate her.” Courtney’s mouth ran faster now. “She’s like ten years older than us, she’s kind of got this creepy cougar vibe, like, one time I was out with Donna May and we almost ran into her, only she didn’t see us. She was talking to these boys who were in high school. I mean, ew.” Disgust set Courtney in motion again, and she started walking. “She had on these yoga pants, and she kept changing how she was standing, kind of keeping her legs wide but trying not to look like it, and the boys—they were sitting at this patio table at a burger place on Jefferson—and I swear they could see, like, the whole show. Her hoo-haw. You know? And she’s a crazy liberal, according to Josh’s parents, so, yeah. I just didn’t want to get Josh into more trouble.”

  Hazard tried to parse the story. “So, wait. Josh is the one who wants to keep it a secret?”

  “Yeah, I mean, he’s had a really hard time getting a job, so I guess he’s lucky his parents will pay for stuff right now. If he pisses them off, though, they’ll just leave him high and dry. They’re like that. Totally insane. He had to fight like crazy just to get them to let him see Melissa as his therapist.”

  His next words, Hazard chose carefully. “Josh didn’t seem interested in talking to me. Do you think he might have any idea where Donna May has gone?”

  “Uh, no. She just drops him. Besides, he’s totally obsessed with Melissa now.”

  “And you’re sure Donna May knew about them?” If that was the case, Hazard thought, Melissa and Josh would both have a reason to make Donna May disappear, and it would explain their hostile reactions from the night before.

  “What? No.”

  “You told me she was jealous. You said that’s why they fought the night before Donna May took off.”

  “Yeah, but, like, she wasn’t jealous of them in particular. I don’t even think they had started dating at that point. She just, like, got jealous sometimes.”

  “But what would have prompted the fight that night?”

  “I don’t know,” Courtney said, hugging herself now. “Look, it wasn’t about Melissa. You’ve got that picture, right?”

  Hazard extracted the photograph from a pocket and showed it to her.

  “Look at how they’re standing,” Courtney said. “Like they’re best buddies. Trust me: if Josh and Melissa had been fooling around, Donna May would have clawed her eyes out right there in the bar. Like, the stuff you see on those TV shows when the girls come charging out and go crazy.”

  Nodding, Hazard studied the picture again. He couldn’t detect any hostility between Melissa and Donna May in the picture, but he would have liked Somers to take a look. And, more importantly, a photograph captured only a single moment; in this picture, nobody looked upset. The fight, whatever had prompted it, had come later.

  “Is that all?” Melissa said, rocking back and forth now, arms still wrapped tight around her torso. “I want to get home.”

  “Do you have something you need to do?”

  “Yeah.”

  “What?”

  Courtney’s eyes darted to the side. “I’ve got my shift starting at the Kum & Go soon.”

  “Which one do you work at? In case I need to swing by and ask some follow-up questions.”

  “Yeah, you can’t do that. My boss would go out of his mind. Just—don’t do that, ok?”

  “Sure,” Hazard said, folding the picture and returning it to his pocket. “Are you sure there’s nothing else you want to tell me?”

  “Like what?”

  Hazard shrugged and let the silence grow thin and tinny.

  “I mean, I told you everything, right? You’re the one who’s supposed to find her.”

  “That’s right.”

  “So, ok. That means I would have told you everything.”

  “I guess so.”

  He
r face screwed up like she wanted to go after that and pick at it, but then she let out an exasperated sound that reminded Hazard of high school, flounced down the block, and shot him one last look over her shoulder before she turned the corner.

  Hazard let her go. Something was cooking there, and sometimes it was better just to let things cook. Besides, he’d come to The Oaks at Emerald Point to talk to someone else, besides the Vega family. He checked the address Courtney had given him and glanced across the street, where he was about to conduct his next interview. He wondered, as he moved toward the trailer, if Courtney had led him to Daniel Minor consciously or not.

  CHAPTER NINE

  MARCH 27

  WEDNESDAY

  1:20 PM

  AT LUNCH, SOMERS SAT at his desk, staring at a store-bought tuna sandwich with its paper cuffed back. Dulac had run out on a personal errand—doubtless, something to do with Darnell—and Somers tried to convince himself today was just another day. He picked up one sandwich half. Then he switched to the other. He slid the ruffled potato chips over the waxed paper like he was playing checkers. And then he realized, if he ate the gray gloop spilling out of the sandwich, he would probably kill himself, so he wrapped it up and threw it in the trash.

  The door to Cravens’s office opened, and the chief came out. She walked across the bullpen, her steps carrying her straight toward Somers. When she reached him, she put her hands on her hips and looked down at him. Somers had been on the receiving end of that look a few times in his life. His grandmother—his mother’s mother—had worn it once or twice; Somers had only known her when he was very young, before she died. She had been wearing an expression a lot like this the first time Somers spent a night at her house as a child, thinking it was an adventure, and then had started screaming hysterically after she’d turned off the light and shut the door to the guest bedroom. He had spent the rest of the night in bed with her, and he remembered the strange, slightly off-putting smell of her, and he remembered the cool, crisp sheets. But mostly he remembered the look: a combination of what-am-I-going-to-do-with-you and what-am-I-getting-myself-into.