“Oh, no.” I slid behind the wheel.
These boys? Out of all the students in the local seventh grade, out of all the boys who played sports or played in a band or collected Japanese anime, he had to choose boys who hung around the square after school waiting to be old enough to talk someone into selling them beer? Joshua gave up precious video game time to hang out with members of the Future Criminals of America? With a baby thug? With—
An artistic talent, Sheriff Keller had said. An artistic talent. With a can of spray paint.
Across the street, Joshua and another boy tackled the smallest of the group with fake pummels. Steve sat on his haunches in the grass, hooting and slapping his leg. The leader, the follower, and the pudgy and reluctant mascot. Perhaps they were all in there, right now. And so, now, was Joshua.
Later, reporting back to Sherry on the phone, I gave in and said, “Do you sometimes wonder if you’re a bad mother?”
Sherry had been a little cold at the beginning of the conversation, still stung from the earlier insult. But she’d warmed up again—Sherry either couldn’t stay mad, or really liked taking reports from the field.
“When I gave Jamey his first bath in the tub, I dropped him,” she said. “He was so slippery. I still do something nearly every day that makes me wonder if I should have got a dog instead. Or a fish. Something that didn’t need me so much.”
“Just wait,” I said. “Just wait until they don’t need you at all.”
Chapter Sixteen
The next morning, Aidan’s suspicious gaze appeared in the Parks County Spectator again. He was a feature of the paper, like the sun-cloud-umbrella icons for weather in the top corner, or the box scores of all the high school sports played in the state the night before. Aidan Watch. If it had been television news, there might be some logo to ensure that everyone knew they were tuned to the right minute-by-minute coverage of the story.
I scanned for the updates. The forged credit card receipts were reported: the hotel, food charged at a grocery store (no diapers, the story reported grudgingly), a full tank of gas at the state border. Leely was out there spending her mother-in-law’s money, but it wouldn’t be long. I worried for her.
How had it happened that this family of trouble had become my trouble? First Aidan, then Leila, and now Steve.
When Joshua arrived home the night before as though he’d just gotten off the bus, I hadn’t said anything about Steve Ransey or the spray paint. I couldn’t think of the right thing to say. I couldn’t even think how to say that I’d seen him with the other boys. He’d never believe I’d been working on a project for the sheriff. He’d suspect me of recon.
I’d gone to bed early, but couldn’t sleep, tossing and turning and flipping over my pillow. Thinking of all the things I should have demanded he explain. The teacher-in-service—where had he been all day? Why was it a state secret that he had a day off school?
This morning, I was ready. I went for the paper early, then sat at the table in wait for him to come to life. He was slow this morning. Once, I went to make sure he was getting dressed. “You had better not be playing video games in there,” I said to the door.
I tapped my spoon against my mug and turned back to the paper. In lieu of real movement in the case, the news staff had adopted some gimmicks. A time line. Lapsed time: nine days and counting.
Nine days. I hadn’t realized.
The time line was sleek in the face of no facts. I focused on the pulled-out boxes that offered real-time notations for when Charity left the house (8:45 a.m.) and the discovery of the body (10:08 a.m.). On day three: Sheriff’s office consults local handwriting expert to study ransom note. Note confirmed to be written by Leila Ransey. Part of the public record again. How long before my name showed up?
Then: Sheriff’s office consults psychic to locate Aidan. Private sources say psychic provided information that could lead to Aidan’s body.
Aidan’s body?
A psychic?
It had to be a joke, a mistake. The paper had got it wrong, and Keller was on the phone with the editor right now, demanding a correction. Had to be.
The door to Joshua’s room opened, and he came down the hall with purpose, grabbing his backpack and reaching for the front door deadbolt almost before I registered his presence.
“Hey,” I said.
He stopped, hand still on the lock. “What?”
“I need to talk to you about some things. Important things.”
“I’m late for school already, Ma.”
I glanced toward the clock. “Why are you so late?”
“I gotta go.”
“Well, there are some things we need to talk about tonight, then, so you need to come home right after school. Or practice, I guess.”
His eyes shifted away. “Can’t we just talk over dinner, like normal?”
“Oh, when do you normally talk to me over the dinner table? I thought that you normally didn’t talk to me at all.”
He rolled his eyes. “Ma—”
I resisted the urge to ask him to call me something else. Anything else.
“If you’re missing your bus, I can drive you,” I said. “We need to talk about who you’re hanging out with these days.”
Joshua stared at me with eyes dark as holes. “Oh, yeah? Well, we also need to talk about who you’re hanging out with these days.” He flicked the deadbolt and reached for the doorknob.
“Wait,” I said. “What did you just say?” I couldn’t imagine who—the sheriff? Margaret? The Boosters? What hanging out had I even done?
He opened the door and stepped through it. The words he was using didn’t make any sense. I stood and started for the door, but it was already closing. “What are you—Joshua—”
“Mr. Jeffries. We need to have a referendum on that.” He pulled the door closed as my hand grazed the knob. His pounding footsteps receded down the hall and away while I stared at the closed door.
Downstairs, the tap of Margaret’s broom.
Cautiously, as though the door might explode inward, I stood back from it, returned back to the table, sat in my chair.
Who was that? That boy who had closed the door in my face didn’t remind me in the least of the boy I’d raised, the boy I had such hopes for. He seemed like an image of someone I’d once known, like the photo of Aidan, nine days into his disappearance: a face I recognized, but a boy I didn’t really know.
I looked around for distraction and saw the package Jeffries had delivered from Keller. I sliced it open and slid out the bundle of paper inside. Paging through, I found the same form, over and over. Each page was headed Evidence and divided into columns filled in by hand with times, dates, and signatures, begging for careful study.
I reached for my phone.