“ABPD says that they apprehended Pelle in the middle of yet another burglary and police say they are confident that Pelle is responsible for both attacks. Channel Five will bring you more information on this ongoing investigation as we have it. This is—”
I kill the sound, and then the picture. And I fly to Wil’s, my heart miles ahead of the rest of me, searching for Wil’s heart.
BRIDGE
Summer, Senior Year
I park one street over from Wil’s, my front tires wedged in a random yard. I run the rest of the way, my sneakers slamming into the glittering pavement. Wil’s block is choked with fat painted news vans, each with thick silver poles and satellite dishes scraping the sky. Sweating cameramen and reporters in too-bright suits lean against the vans, fanning themselves with scripts.
I skirt the vans and pass the neighbors who are suddenly interested in Wil’s family again. There’s a cruiser in his driveway. Porter and Yancey. I sprint across the yard. I find him where I knew I’d find him, with his saws and stains and the stereo with the cord bound with a garbage tie. He’s sitting on the workshop floor. His knees are up; his head is down. He is curled into a ball, sealed up tight.
“Hey,” I breathe. I wipe the sweat from my upper lip.
“They got the guy,” he says to the floor. “Without our ID, so.”
“It’s on the news.” I sit next to him without touching him. When Wil is sad, he has to be the one to touch first. You have to be patient. In fifth grade, when he lost the election for president of our chapter of the St. Johns Riverkeepers club, it was days before I could play-punch him in the arm without having to duck.
He shows me his face finally. It is streaked with red and not-so-red and so much pain that I swear it is rolling off him like choppy September waves. He’s been crying. “There’s gonna be a trial. We’ll have to testify.”
I nod.
“I don’t know how to feel,” he says, and he pulls my arm around his shoulder. This is real pain, meaty grief for the father Wilson was and maybe for the father he wasn’t.
“That’s okay,” I say. “You don’t need to know.”
“I mean, he’s still dead, and I—” He straightens out and scoops me up, the way men carry their wives into new homes. He cradles me against him like I’m nothing, a feather. His heart is getting louder. Searching for a way out of his body.
I think about staying here, with him, forever. I think about wearing a fine layer of Atlantic Beach sand from all my Mays to the rest of my Septembers.
“I can’t stay trapped in here all day.” Wil’s head jerks toward the door, and he lets go of me. “I can’t breathe in here, Bridge.”
“We’ll go.” I scramble to my feet and pull him up. “I’ll go with you. Wherever you want.”
He closes his eyes. “Goddamned reporters.” His breath reminds me of splintered wood.
“Screw the reporters. Hey.” I grip his head in my hands. “Screw them. They can’t keep you here. You’re not a prisoner.”
He mumbles something.
“Give me your keys.”
He digs his keys out of his back pocket and dumps them into my palm. I hold them so tightly it hurts.
“Stay here,” I tell him. “I’ll pull the truck close.” I drag open the workshop door, leaving Wil in the corner. I walk slowly, casually, across the lawn. It isn’t until I’m diving into the truck and gunning across the lawn that I catch a reporter’s curious face in the rearview.
Wil launches out of the workshop the second I pull up to the doors. He jumps into the car before I’ve come to a stop.
“Go!” he yells as he slams the door.
I press my foot on the gas and the truck leaps across the yard. We whip around the caravan of journalists and the wheels screech as they hit the pavement. We leave everyone else behind.
Wil tells me to drive to the marina. His breathing is even rougher now. By the time I pull into the parking lot, I don’t think I’ve heard him take a breath in minutes.
“Do you want to sit here or . . .” I let the words hang as I throw the truck into park.
“My dad refinished the deck on this beautiful—” His face is pinched. I look away out the window. The boats are bobbing, eager for him. “I thought we could take her out. Annemarie.”
“Sure. Anything you want.”
But we don’t move. I roll down the windows and kill the engine. The sounds of the marina should soothe me, but the slap of the water against the hulls startles me, again and again.
“Timothy Pelle. Guy sounds fake, doesn’t he?” Wil’s voice is thick with tears. I don’t look at him, because he needs me not to. “You know what I’ve been thinking all day, since the detectives came by to tell us?”
“What?” I ask quietly.
“I’ve been thinking about how the guy was a baby once. About how his parents probably loved him and maybe they thought he’d be president someday. I’ll bet he has a family, too, you know? And now that’s two families. Ruined.” His breath is like wind through a straw.
“He should’ve thought about that.” I tilt my face toward the window. There’s no breeze. “Before.”
“His life is over, Bridge. Starting today. I feel—it doesn’t feel right.” His body is tense; his lines bolded. His tears leave silvery lines on his cheeks. He is breaking, slowly.
“He took your dad’s life. It’s only fair.” I cup his face in my hands, turn him toward me. “It’s not your fault. It was his choice.”
“There’s no fair in this, Bridge. Nothing about this is fucking fair.” He twists away from me, and the heel of his hand collides with the dashboard, turning on the radio. Static-laced jazz fills the truck until I twist the volume dial down.
“Okay. I know.” I don’t understand the storm that’s happening in him. He should be glad that his father’s killer was caught. That this part of the nightmare is over. If Minna was speaking to me, she’d tell me that Wil doesn’t have to be logical. That he gets to thrash around with the meaning of his dad’s death. That he should be breathless and angry and dizzy with the unfairness of it all.
I wait for Wil to speak. I watch the sailboats bob on the surface of the water. Their movement makes me feel sick, like I’ve just stepped off a roller coaster.
“He wasn’t all bad,” Wil says while I’m studying a neglected, listing sailboat. He rubs the heel of his hand. “My dad. He had bad in him for sure, but he had good in him, too.”
“I know there was,” I say, and it’s the truth. “That good isn’t gone. It’s in you, still. You’re the best guy I know, Wil.” Finally, I turn to look at him. His face is a kind of pale I’ve never seen, except in my terrible dream.
“Don’t say that,” he mumbles.
“It’s true. You are.” Anger rises up in me. “Why can’t I say that? Why can’t you accept that?”
“Because it’s not fucking true!” he wails. “Because you wouldn’t say that if you knew!” He rests his forehead against the glove box, takes labored breaths.