“No,” he said. “Hold on a sec and let me see who it is.” Stubby darted off, and I was left to wait anxiously for him to return. It took about fifteen minutes, but he finally came back and tried to smile at me encouragingly. “That was them,” he said, referring to Wallace and Faraday. “I told them you were here the whole time yesterday after school, studying with me for the chem test.”
I relaxed a fraction. “Thanks, buddy. What else did they ask you?”
“They wanted to know if I believed you were really psychic. I told them I didn’t know about being psychic, but I knew you could read deathdates. And then they asked me how I knew that, and I told them that you’d told me about my grampa dying right after Christmas last year, and he died the exact day you said.”
“Did they believe you?”
Stubby frowned. “I don’t think so, but they left after that.”
I swallowed hard and looked down at my lap. This whole thing was so bad, I didn’t know what to do. When I looked up again I saw that Stubby was studying me. “You gonna be okay?”
I shrugged. “Yeah. I hope they find him soon, Stubbs. I hate to think that Tevon is out there somewhere where no one can find him.”
Stubby was quiet for a minute, then he said, “You don’t think somebody…?”
“What?”
He grimaced. “Murdered him.”
My eyes widened. “In Parkwick? No way.” Parkwick was known for its big houses, big money, big parks, and its nearly nonexistent crime rate. It had its own police force, which had a reputation for stopping anybody who looked like they didn’t belong in the neighborhood.
But Stubby seemed unconvinced. “Then what happened to him, Mads? And why doesn’t anybody know where he is?”
I shrugged, feeling incredibly sad. “I don’t know, Stubs. It could be that he simply wandered off into the woods and fell and hit his head or something. Or maybe he got hit by a car and no one’s found his body yet. Anything like that might explain it.”
Stubs sighed. “Yeah, okay. Listen, I gotta go start dinner for Mom. FaceTime me later if you wanna talk.”
After I got off the computer with Stubs, I headed downstairs and found Ma pacing back and forth in the kitchen, her plastic cup nearly empty. She jumped when I entered the room. I could tell she was having a tough time dealing with the visit from the FBI. “I spoke to Donny,” she said. “He’s had court all day and he had to go back to the office to work late on a case, but he told me that if those agents come back to call him right away.”
With a pang I noted that Ma was starting to slur her words. “Want some dinner?” I asked, trying to distract her.
Ma moved over to the pantry where she kept her booze. “No, honey. I’m not hungry. There’s some turkey in the fridge, though. I got some from the deli today.”
I made myself a sandwich and avoided looking at Ma while she poured a refill. I made a half of a sandwich for her, too, just in case, and set it down in front of her in the TV room.
I then took my sandwich upstairs to eat it while I did my homework, but it was nearly impossible to concentrate, and I barely got through it. I finally called it quits around eight and went back down to check on Ma. She hadn’t touched her sandwich, but she’d nodded off, plastic cup in hand.
It took me a little while to get her up to her bedroom, but at last she was settled for the night. I went back downstairs, where I tried to watch some TV, but I was too wound up and anxious.
For a long time I sat in the dark, listening to the light rhythm of Dad’s clock. Now that he was gone, its constant ticktock was the closest thing we had to his heartbeat. I loved listening to it—and to the chimes, soft and sweet, like the first notes of a lullaby.
Dad’s photo was on the mantel right under the clock. As the minutes ticked by, I found myself staring at his image and missing him like crazy. In my heart I knew that if he were here, he’d get Faraday and Wallace to believe me. It was yet another example of how little Ma and I mattered to a world without Dad. He’d been our center, the glue that held us together and gave us purpose. His absence was greater than the sum of our parts, and I didn’t think we’d ever feel quite whole again.
With a sigh I turned away from the photo and went to the window. Peering out into the night, I saw a sedan come down the street and park a bit up from our house. I could see that the motor was still running, because the tailpipe was giving off vapor, which sparkled in the light from the streetlamp. Squinting, I could just make out the figures of two people in the car. My heartbeat ticked up. It was Wallace and Faraday. I waited for them to get out of the car and come to the door, but as the minutes passed they remained where they were. Finally, after about fifteen minutes, the agents slowly pulled away from the curb and drove off.
I knew then that no matter what alibi I’d offered them, this wasn’t over.
The next day passed in a fog. I was jumpy and on edge the whole time, and even Stubby couldn’t make me feel better. “They can’t prove you had anything to do with it, Maddie,” he said as we rode home together.
But I didn’t have a good feeling.
Stubby and I parted ways at the midway point between our houses, and I pedaled hard toward home. It was Halloween, and I had to make sure we had enough money in the grocery envelope for candy for the few kids brave enough to ring our doorbell. There’re lots of kids in the neighborhood, but our house never sees much traffic. Too many people have heard the rumors that Ma and I are witches.
As I sped down the street, my thoughts were occupied by the need for a backup plan if there was no cash in the envelope. As I turned the corner onto my block, I had to lean to the side to avoid the large truck parked between our house and Mrs. Duncan’s. Taking a quick glance over my shoulder to make sure there were no cars behind me, I was ready to begin making the turn into our drive when I turned back to the road, and all of a sudden, two men, hoisting a plastic-wrapped sofa between them, stepped out from the back of a delivery truck and right into my path.