I heard her trip behind me, and I paused in spite of myself. There was broken glass and and beer cans were everywhere. This underpass was a hangout on the weekends. More high school kids got drunk here than any other place in town, if the empty cans and bottles were any indication. I didn’t want her to hurt herself. I walked back to her and took her hand, escorting her back to her truck.
“Go home, Georgia,” I repeated, but this time I tried to say it a little more kindly. I opened the driver’s side door to the rust bucket she had named Myrtle because it rhymed with turtle and that’s about how fast it drove.
“Why did you paint that girl? On the overpass. Why did you do that? What does it mean?” Her voice was sad, almost like she felt betrayed. Betrayed by what, I couldn’t guess.
“I saw her picture. So I painted her,” I replied easily. It was mostly the truth. I really didn’t see her picture, not the way I made it sound. Not on a flyer—though there was one on the post office bulletin board. I actually saw her in my head.
“You liked the way she looked?”
I shrugged dismissively. “She’s pretty. It’s sad. I like to draw.” Truth. She was pretty. It was sad. I did like to draw.
“Did you know her?”
“No. I know she’s dead.”
Georgia looked horrified. Even in the moonlit darkness I could see how much I had upset her. I think I wanted to upset her. I wanted her to be afraid.
“How?”
“Because kids on flyers usually are. She’s from around here, right?”
“Not really. She’s from Sanpete. But it’s a small town like this one. And it’s weird that she just disappeared. She’s the second girl to disappear like that in the last year. It’s just . . . weird. Scary, you know?”
I nodded. The girl’s name was Molly. And she was definitely dead. She kept showing me things. Not about her death. About her life. I hoped now she would leave me alone. This had been going on long enough. I had no idea why she’d come to me at all. Usually there had to be some connection. I’d never met Molly. But she would go now, I hoped. Paint them and they leave. It was the way I acknowledged them. And usually that was enough.
“So you being out here in the middle of the night, painting her . . . That’s weird too,” Georgia said bravely, her eyes holding mine.
I nodded again. “Are you afraid, Georgia?”
She just looked at me like she was trying to get in my head. My little horse whisperer, trying to whisper to me. I shook my head, trying to clear it. She wasn’t my horse whisperer. She wasn’t my anything.
“Yeah. I’m afraid. I’m afraid for you, Moses. Because everyone is going to see this. The police are going to see this. And people are going to think you did something to that girl.”
“That’s what they think everywhere I go, Georgia. I’m used to it.”
“Do you always paint dead people?”
Her voice rang out like a whip, and I felt the truth slash across my face with all the crack and sting that secrets wield.
I stepped back, stunned that she had so easily unraveled this piece of me. I walked toward my Jeep, wanting nothing more than to run, run, run and keep running. Why couldn’t I just keep running? I had seven months until the school year was up, but I was working on my GED and saving up all my money. Seven months. And then, as much as I loved Gi, as much as the thought of never seeing Georgia again hurt me, I was leaving this funny little town with all its nosy people with their suspicious minds, interfering hands, and busy mouths. And I would keep moving, painting as I went. I didn’t know how I would survive, but I would, and I would be free. As free as I’d ever be.
Georgia trotted behind me, “You painted a picture of my grandpa on the side of our barn. He’s been dead for twelve years. I was five when he died. You painted the lightning on Charlotte Butter’s barn too. Her husband was killed in a lightning storm in that barn. You painted a man named Ray on Ms. Murray’s whiteboard and I found out that Ms. Murray’s fiancé was named Ray. He was killed in a freak accident two weeks before their wedding. You’ve been painting the walls inside the old mill. I saw those too. I don’t recognize the faces you painted, but they’re all dead too, aren’t they?”
There was no way I could answer her without telling her everything. I wanted to tell her everything. But I knew better. So I just kept walking.
“Moses! Wait! Please, please, please don’t keep walking away from me!” she cried in frustration, so close to tears I could almost hear them gathering behind her eyes. My heart ached and my will shattered. I did the only thing I knew would make her forget her questions, make her forget her doubt in me. Make us both forget.
I let her catch me.
And when she did, I turned to meet her and wrapped my arms around her so tightly that our hearts pressed together and found a similar rhythm. Mine pounded into her breasts and hers pushed right back against my chest, challenging me like she always did. I kissed her lips over and over, letting the color of her mouth drench my troubled mind, drowning out the pictures in my head, until there was only Georgia, only rose-colored kisses and moonlight, only heat. I touched her body and warmed my hands against her skin until her questions just floated away on the wind. And the girl I had painted on the concrete underpass kept her face lifted to the sky and left us alone.
Georgia
I DITCHED SCHOOL BEFORE the day ended and took Myrtle on a drive-by of the overpass so I could get a look at Moses’s painting it in the daylight before they made him cover it up.