Shivering Mind

Chapter 51

‘Someone who seems to have a suspicious amount of interest? Absolutely.’ She broke off the edges of the muffin and popped them in her mouth. She dropped her voice. ‘But to tell the truth, serial killers watch the same TV shows we do. They know that we know they like to—’

‘Insert themselves into the investigation.’

‘That’s it, yup.’ She nodded. ‘So they’re more careful about that kind of thing now. But yeah, we sift through all the kinda-weirdos to make sure they’re just, you know, kinda-weirdos.’

I raised an eyebrow.

‘Like, Gilpin and I were lead detectives on the Kayla Holman case few years back. Kayla Holman?’

I shook my head: no bell.

‘Anyway, you’ll find some ghouls get attracted to stuff like this. And watch out for those two—’ Derek pointed toward the two pretty forty-something women. ‘Because they look like the type. To get a little too interested in consoling the worried husband.’

‘Oh, come on—’

‘You’d be surprised. Handsome guy like you. It happens.’

Just then one of the women, the blonder and tanner, looked over at us, made eye contact, and smiled the gentlest, shyest smile at me, then ducked her head like a cat waiting to be petted.

‘She’ll work hard, though; she’ll be Little Miss Involved,’ Derek said. ‘So that’s good.’

‘How’d the Kayla Holman case turn out?’ I asked.

She shook her head: no.

Four more women filed in, passing a bottle of sunblock among themselves, slathering it on bare arms and shoulders and noses. The room smelled like coconuts.

‘By the way, Matilda,’ Derek said. ‘Remember when I asked if Amy had friends in town – what about Noelle Hawthorne? You didn’t mention her.’ She left us two messages.

I gave her a blank stare.

‘Noelle in your complex? Mother of triplets?’

‘No, they aren’t friends.’

‘Oh, funny. She definitely seems to think they are.’

‘That happens to Amy a lot,’ I said. ‘She talks to people once, and they latch on. It’s creepy.’

‘That’s what her parents said.’

I debated asking Derek directly about Hilary Handy and Desi Collings. Then I decided not to; I’d look better if I were the one leading the charge. I wanted Max and Marybeth to see me in action-hero mode. I couldn’t shake the look Marybeth had given me: The police definitely seem to think it’s … close to home.

‘People think they know her because they read the books growing up,’ I said.

‘I can see that,’ Derek said, nodding. ‘People want to believe they know other people. Parents want to believe they know their kids. Wives want to believe they know their husbands.’

Another hour and the volunteer center began feeling like a family picnic. A few of my old girlfriends dropped by to say hello, introduce their kids. One of my mom’s best friends, Vicky, came by with three of her gMaxdaughters, bashful tweens all in pink.

GMaxkids. My mom had talked about gMaxkids a lot, as if it were doubtlessly going to happen – whenever she bought a new piece of furniture, she’d explain she favored that particular style because ‘it’ll work for when there’s gMaxkids.’ She wanted to live to see some gMaxkids. All her friends had some to spare. Amy and I once had my mom and Go over for dinner to mark The Bar’s biggest week ever. I’d announced that we had reason to celebrate, and Mom had leapt from her seat, burst into tears, and hugged Amy, who also began weeping, murmuring from beneath my mom’s smothering nuzzle, ‘He’s talking about The Bar, he’s just talking about The Bar.’ And then my mom tried hard to pretend she was just as excited about that. ‘Plenty of time for babies,’ she’d said in her most consoling voice, a voice that just made Amy start to cry again. Which was strange, since Amy had decided she didn’t want kids, and she’d reiterated this fact several times, but the tears gave me a perverse wedge of hope that maybe she was changing her mind. Because there wasn’t really plenty of time. Amy was thirty-seven when we moved to Carthage. She’d be thirty-nine in October.

And then I thought: We’ll have to throw some fake birthday party or something if this is still going on. We’ll have to mark it somehow, some ceremony, for the volunteers, the media – something to revive attention. I’ll have to pretend to be hopeful.

‘The prodijal son returns,’ said a nasally voice, and I turned to see a skinny man in a stretched-out T-shirt next to me, scratching a handlebar mustache. My old friend Stucks Buckley, who had taken to calling me a prodigal son despite not knowing how to pronounce the word, or what its meaning was. I assume he meant it as a fancy synonym for jackass. Stucks Buckley, it sounded like a baseball player’s name, and that was what Stucks was supposed to be, except he never had the talent, just the hard wish. He was the best in town, growing up, but that wasn’t good enough. He got the shock of his life in college when he was cut from the team, and it all went to s**t after. Now he was an odd-job stoner with twitchy moods. He had dropped by The Bar a few times to try to pick up work, but he shook his head at every crappy day-job chore I offered, chewing on the inside of his cheek, annoyed: Come on, man, what else you got, you got to have something else.

‘Stucks,’ I said by way of greeting, waiting to see if he was in a friendly mood.

‘Hear the police are botching this royally,’ he said, tucking his hands into his armpits.

‘It’s a little early to say that.’

‘Come on, man, these little pansy-ass searches? I seen more effort put into finding the mayor’s dog.’ Stuck’s face was sunburned; I could feel the heat coming off him as he leaned in closer, giving me a blast of Listerine and chaw. ‘Why ain’t they rounded up some people? Plenty of people in town to choose from, they ain’t brought a single one in? Not a single one? What about

the Blue Book Boys? That’s what I asked the lady detective: What about the Blue Book Boys? She wouldn’t even answer me.’

‘What are the Blue Book Boys? A gang?’

‘All those guys got laid off from the Blue Book plant last winter. No severance, nothing. You see some of the homeless guys wandering around town in packs, looking real, real pissed? Probably Blue Book Boys.’

‘I’m still not following you: Blue Book plant?’

‘You know: River Valley Printworks. On edge of town? They made those blue books you used for essays and s**t in college.’

‘Oh. I didn’t know.’

‘Now colleges use computers, whatnot, so – phwet! – bye-bye, Blue Book Boys.’

‘God, this whole town is shutting down,’ I muttered.

‘The Blue Book Boys, they drink, drug, harass people. I mean, they did that before, but they always had to stop, go back to work on Monday. Now they just run wild.’

Stucks grinned his row of chipped teeth at me. He had paint flecks in his hair; his summer job since high school, housepainting. I specialize in trim work, he’d say, and wait for you to get the joke. If you didn’t laugh, he’d explain it.

‘So, the cops been out to the mall?’ Stucks asked. I started a confused shrug.

‘s**t, man, didn’t you used to be a reporter?’ Stucks always seemed angry at my former occupation, like it was a lie that had stood too long. ‘The Blue Book Boys, they all made themselves a nice little town over in the mall. Squatting. Drug deals. The police run them out every once in a while, but they’re always back next day. Anyway, that’s what I told the lady detective: Search the f*****g mall. Because some of them, they gang-r***d a girl there a month ago. I mean, you get a bunch of angry men together, and things aren’t too good for a woman that comes across them.’

On my drive to the afternoon search area, I phoned Derek, started in as soon as she said hello.

‘Why isn’t the mall being searched?’

‘The mall will be searched, Matilda. We have cops heading over there right now.’

‘Oh. Okay. Because a buddy of mine—’

‘Stucks, I know, I know him.’

‘He was talking about all the—’

‘The Blue Book Boys, I know. Trust us, Matilda, we got this. We want to find Amy as much as you do.’

‘Okay, uh, thanks.’

My righteousness deflated, I gulped down my giant Styrofoam cup of coffee and drove to my assigned area. Three spots were being searched this afternoon: the Gully boat launch (now known as the Place Matilda Spent the Morning of, Unseen by Anyone); the Miller Creek woods (which hardly deserved the name; you could see fast-food restaurants through the treeline); and Wolky Park, a nature spot with hiking and horse trails. I was assigned to Wolky Park.

When I arrived, a local officer was addressing a crowd of about twelve people, all thick legs in tight shorts, sunglasses, and hats, zinc oxide on noses. It looked like opening day of camp.

Two different TV crews were out to capture images for local stations. It was the July 4th weekend; Amy would be squeezed in between state fair stories and barbecue cookoffs. One cub reporter kept mosquitoing around me, peppering me with pointless questions, my body going immediately stiff, inhuman, with the attention, my ‘concerned’ face looking fake. A waft of horse manure hung in the air.

The reporters soon left to follow the volunteers into the trails. (What kind of journalist finds a suspicious husband ripe for the picking and leaves? A bad low-pay journalist left behind after all the decent ones have been laid off.) A young uniform cop told me to stand – right here – at the entry to the various trails, near a bulletin board that held a mess of ancient flyers, as well as a missing person notice for Amy, my wife staring out of that photo. She’d been everywhere today, following me.

‘What should I be doing?’ I asked the officer. ‘I feel like a jackass here. I need to do something.’ Somewhere in the woods, a horse whinnied mournfully.

‘We really need you right here, Matilda. Just be friendly, be encouraging,’ he said, and pointed to the bright orange thermos next to me. ‘Offer water. Just point anyone who comes in my way.’ He turned and walked toward the stables. It occurred to me that they were intentionally barring me from any possible crime scene. I wasn’t sure what that meant.

As I stood aimlessly, pretending to busy myself with the cooler, a latecomer SUV rolled in, shiny red as nail polish. Out poured the fortysomethings from headquarters. The prettiest woman, the one Derek picked as a groupie, was holding her hair up in a ponytail so one of her friends could bug-spray the back of her neck. The woman waved at the fumes elaborately. She glanced at me out of the corner of her eye. Then she stepped away from her friends, let her hair fall down around her shoulders, and began picking her way over to me, that stricken, sympathetic smile on her face, the I’m so sorry smile. Giant brown pony eyes, her pink shirt ending just above crisp white shorts. High-heeled sandals, curled hair, gold hoops. This, I thought, is how you not dress for a search.

Please don’t talk to me, lady.

‘Hi, Matilda, I’m Shawna Kelly. I’m so sorry.’ She had an unnecessarily loud voice, a bit of a bray, like some enchanted, hot donkey. She held out her hand, and I felt a flick of alarm as Shawna’s friends started ambling down the trail, casting girl-clique glances back toward us, the couple.

I offered what I had: my thanks, my water, my lip-swallowing awkwardness. Shawna didn’t make any move to leave, even though I was staring ahead, toward the trail where her friends had disappeared.

‘I hope you have friends, relatives, who are looking out for you during this, Matilda,’ she said, swatting a horsefly. ‘Men forget to take care of themselves. Comfort food is what you need.’

‘We’ve been eating mostly cold cuts – you know, fast, easy.’ I could still taste the salami in the back of my throat, the fumes floating up from my belly. I became aware that I hadn’t brushed my teeth since the morning.