I wrench my eyes from his boots.
“It’s called self-defense, you hear me? You had a right to protect yourself and your sister.”
His eyes shift to the mound, but I’m woods-smart; I can see he’s shocked. I can feel the distance, falling cool between us. I stand frozen like Jenessa, bean-spoon bouncing off the leaves. His voice fills the woods from far, far away as I remember what I spent the last year desperate to forget.
“Carey?”
And then he looks like him again. Looking at me.
He believes me.
He extends his hand.
But hands hurt too much. Again, I pretend I don’t see.
It’s almost dusk when we reach the camper. He sits on a stump, the one I used to sit on when I played for Nessa, the notes weaving through the firelight, the music adding its own color to the yellow, orange, red.
He lights a cigarette, the tip glowing like a star that’s fallen to earth. Finally, as the shadows grow long, he turns to me.
“And that’s when Jenessa stopped talking,” he says, but it’s not a question.
“Yes, sir. What happens in the woods stays in the woods.”
He inhales, then exhales a trail of smoke.
“We’re going to need to tell the police. Fill out a report. We’ll have to take them back to the body.”
“I understand, sir.”
“I want to be honest with you, Carey. I don’t know what might happen. I’ll do all I can to help you.”
“Saint Joseph’s son said, ‘The truth will set you free.’ I reckon it’s true.”
“It’s a good start. And I want you to tell them everything. You hear me? Everything that was ever done to you. Everything that happened that night. You know why?”
I have no idea.
“You were the victim, Carey. Not him. And sweetie—”
My eyes well, the eyes of the girl from before the woods.
“You have nothing to be ashamed of.”
I nod at his boots.
Flooded with feelings I don’t have words for, I bend down to fetch the old lantern, which is lying on its side under the picnic table. When I turn the key, the light shines out of my hands.
He waits on the steps while I enter the camper, holding the lantern in front of me and searching for anything salvageable. I never thought I’d cry over this place. I push aside debris, the remains of Nessa’s blankie blackened and hard to the touch. It’s gone, all gone—our old life is gone.
“You tell anyone about this and I’ll come back and snap both your necks,” he grunts, each thrust like a bolt of lightnin’ rippin’ through my body.
I slip my skin and rise into the inky dark, sit on the arm of one of the white stars, my legs swingin’.
“I might have to hit this again sometime,” he says. “I’ll give your Mama a discount.”
One hundred dollars, I think. One hundred dollars, for breakin’ and enterin’. Before the white-star night, that was one of the lucky things. None of those men ever had one hundred dollars.
I’ve detailed every mole, freckle, and mark on the dark underbelly of the Hundred Acre Wood. Looking through the doorway, my father’s eyes are bright, but I don’t feel it, none of it. I am ice over the creek. I am as emotionless as a hundred-dollar bill as I close the camper door forever.
Standing in the snow, I reach into my pocket, the key cold against my palm. Using all my might, I fling it far into the trees.
The man didn’t know that I knew his name—Josiah Perry—or who he was, his evil, gap-toothed grin a photo negative of the angelic smile that sleeps each night in the bedroom across from mine, Shorty curled up around her like an aura.
A trick baby. A fuck for a fix. The words are as ugly as what Mama did to bring Nessa into the world.
“You’re making a big mistake!”
I reckon I’ll take the secret of his identity to my grave, but not for my sake. For Nessa’s.
When we leave camp, the only thing I take with me besides my g’s and Gran’s watch is my dad. Until he offers his hand. This time, I take that, too.
The ride home is silent but different. We’re both different. Somehow, I’m older. Somehow, he’s realer.
If the newness had a sound, it would be the sound of the last puzzle pieces snapping into place, the kind that fit even when you don’t want them to.
“May I ask you something, sir?”
He takes his eyes off the road just long enough to glance at me, his face thoughtful but worried. Really, really worried.
“Shoot.”
“It seems you like Jenessa and all. I mean, it seems like you really care about her. I know she isn’t your blood. But please”—I choke back the tears, the sticky, tangled tears—“you’ll keep her, won’t you? She doesn’t deserve to suffer because of me.”
“Keep her? No one’s going anywhere.”
“But if I go to prison . . . she isn’t even yours.”