Bird Lake Moon (12 page)

Lolly wheeled about and wandered to the lake. She stood tall at the shore, still as a pole. A gentle breeze ruffled the silver-blue water, and clouds hurried across the sky as if they were going someplace, too.

The morning was large and Spencer was small. These limited minutes at the lake belonged to him, and what did he do with them? He continued to follow Lolly. Next she went to the front porch. She lay down on her back, precisely where Mitch had drawn the soccer ball in sugar. She spread her arms wide into the warming sun. Her hair had fanned out on the wooden planks, forming a halo, one fugitive strand curving across her face like a scar. She looked all around with noteworthy concentration, as if she were absorbing and treasuring every detail of 23 Lakeshore Drive for all time. Her brow would wrinkle slightly, but then an expression of pure tranquillity would return to her face.

Suddenly Lolly's eyes were blazing. “Spencer,” she said. She slid closer to the railing and scrutinized its underside. She stiffened. Her placid demeanor had vanished. “Spencer,” she said again. “Look.”

Spencer came to the railing and crouched. “What?”

She pointed, tracing the letters with her index finger. “M.S.,” she whispered. “It's Matty's initials.”

The power of the moment was insistent, consuming. A chill fell over Spencer.

But in a few seconds, he knew. “Oh,” he said with a broadening smile. “Oh.”

M.S. Matty Stone. Mitch Sinclair.

If Spencer had discovered the initials even a day and a half ago, he would have been frightened, just like Lolly.

Lolly had risen to her hands and knees. “What should we do? What does it mean?” She was so excited, her voice was shaking. “Should we tell Mom?”

Briefly, Spencer felt as big as the moon, and full—of secret knowledge and of so many things Lolly was not. He liked the feeling and wanted to hold on to it forever.

But he knew that he would clear things up and calm her down, turn her bewilderment to understanding. Just as he knew that soon they would pile into the car and drive away from Bird Lake.

He also knew that he'd come back again. He knew this as certainly as he knew who had carved the initials into the railing.

“Listen, Lolly,” he began, his voice rich and confident. “I can explain everything.”

June had passed, the Fourth of July was over, and the world hadn't ended.

Mitch had been back to Madison a few times to help his mother get ready for the move to the apartment in August. And he'd reconnected with his friends Aaron and Sam.

Mitch and Cherry had become card buddies. King in the Corner had opened the door to other games—crazy eights, double solitaire, gin. They played several nights a week after dinner.

The next time Mitch had had dinner with his father, the abandoned cell phone had been on the middle of the backseat of the car, no questions asked. Mitch was rarely without it now.

And Mitch had even gone on a picnic and to a fireworks show with his father and his father's girlfriend and lived through it. The woman's name was Torie, although Mitch hadn't called her anything. His mouth could not, would not frame the word: Torie. She didn't have children of her own, which Mitch took as a plus.

“How was she? How was it?” his mother had asked when he'd returned late that night to Bird Lake.

Downwind came the sounds of people celebrating. Small fireworks popped and echoed across the lake. Mitch shrugged. “Okay,” he said. Actually, she'd seemed nice enough, but he hadn't wanted to tell his mother.

Despite his apprehension and resistance, life was moving forward. Some things were ending, some were beginning.

He couldn't help but give in to the occasional temptation to replay past events in his mind, altering them, changing them from cruel to comfortable, from sad to happy, from unfair to accommodating. Anything was possible in his imagination. Any ending. If only thinking it could make it so.

Daily, Mitch thought of Spencer and wondered when he'd come back to Bird Lake. Daily, he looked to the empty house for signs of life.

Jasper still weighed heavily on his mind. The guilt worked at him, even in the night. It had become a burden.

The initials he'd carved into the railing had been a burden as well. But those he could easily do something about. One day, late in the afternoon, he gouged at them so that they were no longer legible, doing as little damage as possible to the railing. Before he had finished, something dawned on him. He realized that his initials and Spencer's brother's were the same. It was eerie, an eerie link to Spencer and his family. Maybe, he thought, we were destined to meet and be friends. Or maybe it was just a coincidence.

Mitch was grateful that, as far as he knew, no one had discovered the initials. If Spencer had stumbled upon them while he believed in Matty's ghost, he would have freaked out. What a stir that would have caused.

During the next week, Mitch sensed that Spencer would soon return. The feeling grew stronger each day. Perhaps that was why the Jasper issue was so unsettling, and the need to resolve it so urgent.

In the middle of July, on what promised to be a beautiful, sunny day, Mitch woke at dawn. Through the window, the trees were charcoal silhouettes against the clearing sky. High above, a handful of fading stars was hanging on. While looking out at it all, Mitch made a decision. He decided that he would write a note to Spencer explaining about Jasper, and apologizing. So many things were beyond his control—especially where his parents were concerned—but this was something he could fix. He didn't know Spencer's address, but if nothing else, he thought that he could slip the note under the front door of the little house with the belief that Spencer would find it at some point.

He got ready. First he turned on the lamp by his bedside. The sudden blast of light was startling. He squinched his eyes and slowly opened them as they adjusted to the brightness. He gathered up a spiral notebook and pen from his backpack, shook the box of dog biscuits (which he'd been keeping on his dresser) for good luck, smoothed his heaped bedspread, and lay on his stomach diagonally across the mattress.

Stalling, he doodled. He drew a dog and a house the way a young child might. He aimlessly scribbled the word
intruders
and immediately crossed it out. Spencer hadn't been an intruder. If anything, he, Mitch, had been the intruder.

Stalling some more, he chewed on his pen, his fingernail. He remembered his splinter, looked, and realized that it was gone. It had worked itself out without his knowing. Frowning, he examined his finger closely. The only evidence of the splinter that remained was a slight red mark on his skin.

After taking a deep breath, Mitch flipped to a blank page in his notebook. It would be like jumping into the lake first thing in the morning. That inaugural plunge into the water always thrilled him. He wouldn't call it fear, exactly, but something related to it—that feeling when you decide to pitch yourself into the water and anticipate, for a long terrible, wonderful moment, the jolt upon entry. But he would always barrel ahead and do it. He would never chicken out.

The pale blue lines on the paper made him think of ripples on the lake. Already he could feel a lightness inside. He took another deep breath, and he began to write.

Inside. The turtle had been back in its usual spot on the mantelpiece for weeks. Out of curiosity, Spencer checked to see if it was still where it belonged. It was. It was such a tiny thing, but now, for Spencer, it meant something big.

Outside. The sky was so blue, clear, and smooth, it looked like blown glass. The warm sunlight poured through Spencer. Excited, he fairly leaped between the house and the car while he waited to leave.

It was mid-July, and Spencer couldn't have been more content. The weather was perfect, the start of school seemed far, far away, and he was going to Bird Lake.

Spencer, his father, and Jasper would spend a few days at the little house. Among other things, they'd loaded fishing gear and a toolbox into the car. The kayak was strapped in place on top.

When he'd known for sure that he'd be going to Bird Lake again, Spencer had decided to call Mitch to tell him. He'd used the number that Mitch's grandmother had given him. It was Mrs. Burden, Cherry, who'd answered the phone. Her sharp, penetrating “Hello?” had surprised Spencer, and his throat had tightened. He did not say a thing, could not utter a sound. Although he'd known that it was impolite to do so, after her third “Hello?” Spencer had hung up. He had Mitch's address and could write him a note, but he'd finally thought that he might as well surprise Mitch. It would be a good surprise.

Spencer's mother had wanted Lolly to stay home with her. At first, Lolly had protested, but after devising a schedule packed with art projects, a picnic with friends, a plan to make ice cream, and a promise to sleep in a tent in the yard one night, she was more than happy not to go.

“I don't even have F.M.S.,” Lolly had said to Spencer as he toted his things to the car. “Maybe
you
do.”

“I don't,” Spencer had replied. He didn't have it at all, not a trace.

“I get to work at the frame shop with Mom, too.”

“Uh-huh.”

“I get all the scraps of mat board. To keep.”

“Good.”

Spencer's father wanted to get moving. He'd arranged for a meeting with a carpenter to inspect the house at Bird Lake and discuss needed repairs. “I don't want to be late,” said Spencer's father. “Are you ready?”

“Yes,” said Spencer. “I'm ready.”

After Jasper jumped into the rear of the car, the family huddled together. They hugged. They kissed. Spencer's mother hugged him so tightly and for so long that he thought she might never let go. He squirmed away but then leaned into her and hugged her back as hard as he could.

“I love you,” she whispered into his hair.

“Love you, too,” he told her quietly.

Earlier in the week, Lolly had bought an old camera at a garage sale for a dollar. It had no film in it. She'd acquired the irritating habit of taking pretend pictures of her parents, Jasper, and Spencer whenever the whim struck her. “Smile,” she'd say, pressing the button. She'd brought the camera with her to the car.

“Smile,” she said sweetly to Spencer. “Say cheese for Birdy Lake.”

Spencer stuck out his tongue and crossed his eyes.

Click
.

“Perfect, dear,” said Lolly.

Spencer and his father slid into the car.

“Wait!” said Lolly. She ran to the house and quickly returned with a piece of paper. “This is for Mitch,” she told Spencer, passing the paper to him through the open window.

It was a drawing of Jasper, done with markers. Jasper was tied and padlocked to a tree. The padlock was as big as Jasper. Lolly had drawn the lake in the background, and she'd made the full moon so large that it bled off the page.

“Tell him it's from me,” said Lolly. “From Lolly, not Birdy Lake.”

“I think he'll know,” said Spencer. He flipped the drawing onto the seat beside him.

Lolly poked her head into the car. She was so close to Spencer that he could feel her breath on his face. “Remember everything,” she said. “Tell me everything when you get home.” Then she stepped back, raised the camera, and aimed it at her brother.

Spencer looked at her—directly at the camera—and smiled nicely for her sake.

Click
.

He would remember everything. But he might not tell.

T
WO OF THE THINGS
Benjamin Hunter received for his twelfth birthday took him completely by surprise: a room and a letter. The room was from his parents. The letter was from his uncle.

The room was on the second floor of the house, in the tree-shaded corner of what until a few months earlier had been a musty, unused attic. Ben's parents had reclaimed the attic by having it remodeled to add extra living space to their small, cramped bungalow. Two dormers had been raised—one on the front and one on the back of the house—and three rooms had been built. The largest room was for Ben's mother to use as a weaving studio. The other good-size room was for Ben's father; he had been dreaming for years of a quiet space all his own where he could work on his poetry and listen to his jazz CDs. And the third room, long and low roofed, had been planned as a reading room with a comfortable overstuffed chair, a skylight, and plenty of shelves to accommodate the overflow of books that seemed to multiply in stacks all over the house, starting in corners and spreading to end tables, countertops, and ottomans like some persistent growth.

Ben had watched the progress of the renovation with great interest. Seeing the exposed structure of the house fascinated him—the beams and wires, the ancient plaster and lath stripes. The crew working on the house, he thought, wasn't unlike a surgical team performing an operation. At the height of the project, the house was a body, skin peeled back to reveal muscles, bones, veins, arteries, and organs.