Trips to the library together and spending an afternoon in the Murphys’ porch rockers while we snapped off the ends of sweet peas. Popping over when we saw the inviting flames of a bonfire or helping Cal pick tomatoes for the roadside stand. The scent of Beth’s peaches-and-cream soap. The way Cal whistled for Betsy to follow. His sunbaked brown skin. It’s over, all of it. They’re gone.
I’m weeping by the time I stumble into the parking lot of Jericho Lake, my knees skinned from falling and arms prickling with mosquito bites from the humid night, the proximity of still water. It’s the calm before the storm, and just as I reach my car, the first cool raindrop splashes on the back of my hand. It hisses against my feverish skin and I turn my face to the sky, wishing for more. Nothing comes. The clouds are pregnant, overdue, and the atmosphere crackles with the hint of lightning, but for now there is nothing the world can do but wait.
Just as I’m about to wrench open my car door, I see the flashing blue lights of a police cruiser. A second later the sound hits me, the whirring scream of a siren as it races down the road. Before I know it, I’m on the ground, bloody knees now scabbed with gravel as my heart pounds hard enough to crack my ribs.
Jonathan made the call. What does that mean? What will they think when they find him there, stained with Calvin’s blood?
But I can’t think about that now. When the cruiser is gone, I slip into my car and start the engine, then pull slowly out of the parking lot. I’m driving without my headlights, on a night filled with shadows and the low rumble of thunder, but our farm isn’t far, and I know the way by heart.
I don’t even realize that I’m aching for my mother until I pull down our long drive and see that the house is dark. That’s not unusual, Law and my mom are often in bed by now, but Law’s truck is gone, and there’s an air of abandonment over the entire homestead. I’m alone.
Pulling my car as close to the front porch as I can, I cut the engine and sit inside the quiet vehicle for a moment. The night is coming back to me in gasps and starts, still frames that have been taken by an unsteady hand because the edges are blurry and indistinct. Already I wish I could forget. I want to scrub the memories from my mind the same way I’m suddenly itching to scour every square inch of my body. I hold up my hands and there is dirt under my fingernails, but also something darker. Something that looks a lot like blood.
I stumble out of the car, leaving the keys in the ignition even as I understand in some small way that this will look unnatural. My car parked helter-skelter on the grass, my keys dangling, and the driver’s seat speckled with grime. I run my hand over the faux leather, trying to sweep some of the mess to the floor, but I only manage to smear it.
Headlights lurching down our driveway make my breath hitch, but there’s nowhere to hide, so I stand slowly and watch the vehicle come. If it’s a police cruiser, the sirens are not on, but already I know that the slant of light is too high for a sedan. Dad’s truck? Jonathan’s?
Sullivan.
My body starts to tremble, but even before he’s put the truck in park I’m sprinting across the grass toward him.
“Hey,” he calls, jumping from the cab. He catches me at the last moment, strong arms enfolding me as he pulls me to his chest. “June, what happened?”
I can’t get close enough. I can’t burrow deep enough into the hard lines of his body, and I wish for just a second that I could crawl right inside his clothes, press myself against him skin-to-skin. I bury my face against his neck and breathe him in, praying that this has all been a bad dream, a terrible nightmare, and I’m waking up beside him, his fingers laced through mine.
I’m not.
“They’re dead,” I gasp, the entire awful story folding in on itself until it’s nothing but a few essential snippets. “Jonathan called the police. We were together. You have to tell everybody that we were together.”
“What are you talking about?” With one hard heave, Sullivan thrusts me away from him so he can look into my eyes. “Who’s dead?”
But I don’t even have to answer. I can see the moment the truth clicks into place. “Oh my God,” Sullivan says, and slams back against the side of the truck, one hand in his hair.
“Who did this?” I ask, thinking for one unreal moment that he knows, that he’ll tell me and make sense of this tragedy and ensure that everything will be okay. But Sullivan is already shaking his head. Another thought takes stubborn hold. “Where have you been? I haven’t seen you all day. Not since the pancake breakfast. I called and called. I texted… What have you been doing?”
It’s like he doesn’t hear me. Now both hands are in his hair and he’s bent over, angling toward the ground as if soon I will be the one who’ll have to lift him out of the dirt.
“Get up!” I shout, because I’m scared and in shock and all at once very, very angry. “Get up!”
Sullivan stands and looks at me as if I’m crazy. Maybe I am.
“Where were you?” I want to shake him. I’m thinking, If you would’ve been there, everything might have been different. I know that’s not fair, but I’m past logic, and all my rage is suddenly directed at the man I love.
“With my brothers,” he says numbly. “All day. I couldn’t leave them, not knowing that today…”
Was the day. We knew that. It was really all we knew, but history had shown us a pattern of small infractions—kid stuff—and we had been lulled into a false sense of security. Or maybe we were so caught up in each other we couldn’t see the warning signs. In my wildest dreams I could have never imagined this.
“What did you do, Sullivan?”
“Nothing, June. I swear to you.”
I step toward him and lay my hand over his heart. He softens.
“We drank,” he admits, and up close I can see his eyes are glassy and bloodshot. “We shot trap. Jonathan was with us for a lot of the day.”
“And then what happened?”
“Some of us went to the Pattersons’ party.”
You? The question is in my eyes; I don’t even have to voice it.
Sullivan gives his head an almost imperceptible shake. “When it got dark, I drove with Wyatt to the Murphys’ farm. I didn’t want to let him out of my sight.”
My pulse cartwheels.
“Wyatt shot out the floodlight.”
I can’t help it, my hand bunches Sullivan’s T-shirt as I hold on for dear life.
“Cal must’ve heard the shot because he came running outside. He went for his truck. I think he was going to grab his gun.” Sullivan inhales hard, steadies himself. “So we drove away. I don’t know if Cal got a make and model on the truck, or even if he called the police. No one showed up at the farm, anyway. I convinced Wyatt to lay low for the rest of the night because if Cal saw us, he had us dead to rights.”
“Did Wyatt go back? Sterling? Dalton?” Each name spills off my tongue, barely a whisper.
“I don’t know. I’ve been driving around, trying to figure out how to tell you, how to make this all right. I was thinking about going to the police station and confessing to what we had done.”
“Shooting out a light?” My head feels gritty, my thoughts wrapped in knots. “I don’t get it.”
“That was just the beginning. The plan was to go back later and set the roadside stand on fire.”
I should be stunned. Horrified, even. But in light of everything I’ve seen, the image of the quaint roadside stand ablaze is almost frivolous. It could be rebuilt. Insurance money would have probably allowed the Murphys to design something even bigger and better. But nothing can fix their bodies broken on the ground.
“They figured they could get away with it if it happened on the Fourth. An errant firework, a drunk drive-by…” Sullivan trails off, and I carefully peel my fingers from his shirt. Step back.
“They’re dead,” I tell him again, unnecessarily. The haunted look in his eyes assures me he knows. “Somebody shot them. I was there.”
“Oh, June.” Sullivan raises a hand and touches my cheek, running the tip of his finger along my jawline before I turn my head away.
“Did you…?” I ask, hating myself for having to voice something so vile.
“Of course not.”
“Do you know who did?”
“No.”