Into the Deep (19 page)

24

I Went by Myself

T
he sun was setting on the horizon when we started walking. The clouds looked like glowing orange waves rolling in and crashing against the darkening sky. I would have thought it was a pretty sight had I not been so preoccupied. The bus stop may have been a logical place to start the search for my sister, but we didn’t find her there. Once we were at the corner of Sunnyside and Parkway, we discussed splitting up, but neither Brant nor Charlie knew what Sadie looked like. And, as she had never met either of them, I couldn’t imagine her reacting well to a stranger walking up to her saying that her sister and mother were worried about her and that she needed to go with them, unless that was what had already happened.
     We decided to stay together and walked across Sunnyside Lane to make our way toward the park. It seemed the most logical direction for her to walk in as Parkway was a much busier road, one that I wouldn’t have thought she’d try to cross. As we walked, my mind wandered back to Jason and the story Brant told me about his little brother. I realized then how helpless Jason must feel.  Even as I walked, I didn’t know if there was really anything I could do. Jason’s little brother had a good chance of beating his cancer and I suppose Sadie had a good chance of me finding her, but the panic and insecurity I felt surrounding it all was eating away at me.
     “Can you think of any place she might have gone? A friend’s house maybe?” Charlie asked.
     “I don’t know, maybe. I’m sure Mom’s calling all of her friends now. I just can’t imagine if she went over somewhere that they wouldn’t have called Mom first though.”
     Sadie had never done anything like this before. Never even wandered off in the supermarket or left Mom’s side at the mall. The fact that this was so unlike her was the scariest part about it.
     “How old is she?” Brant asked. He’d been unusually quiet since we started walking. I hadn’t listened in on any of his thoughts but I could tell by the look on his face that my missing sister fiasco was bringing him back to an earlier memory, that of his mom going missing.
     “She’s eight,” I said and both Brant and Charlie nodded. No one said another word after that for some time.
     It was a few minutes later that we neared the park. A long chain link fence surrounded its limits and tall trees broke up the landscape. I saw the metal skeleton of a jungle gym reaching toward the sky in the shape of a rocket ship. It cast crisscrossing shadows onto the grass from the last of the sun’s glimmering rays. There were picnic tables and a gazebo, a yellow plastic slide that twisted down from a tower, and a set of seesaws. As we got closer, more and more of the park came into view. At the far end of it was a cement patch with two basketball hoops that had long ago lost their nets. Just before a small parking lot, there was a small structure that contained bathrooms and water fountains.
     I looked around for her, praying that she’d be here. I didn’t just hope or wish to find her though. I told myself that this is where I would find her, said it over and over in my mind so much that I started to believe that this was where she was. But, as I looked around for her, as I searched for her blonde hair and purple backpack, I found nothing. The park seemed completely empty beyond our presence, but we kept walking. I wondered for a moment if Brant had done the same thing with his mom so many years ago. I wondered if he tried to convince himself that she was coming home. I wondered for how long he held on to that hope that one day he’d look and she’d be there like he expected. Did he still hope? Did he still expect to find her?
     Then finally something caught my eye. I breathed a sigh of relief and my paced picked up. Beyond the gazebo, a view hidden from my previous vantage point, was a swing set. The metal chain barely moved, but it was enough that, as I got closer, I could hear its soft squeaking. Set on the ground beside the tall metal structure was Sadie’s purple backpack and sitting on the swing with her back to us was my little sister. I ran to her, around the swing set, and her face looked up to me as I came around the corner. Her blonde hair had been braided in pigtails and she wore a pink and white striped shirt with a long-sleeved grey sweater. Her small hands held on to the metal chain links of the swing and there were tears in her eyes. I scooped her up and pulled her into a tight hug.
     “Where the hell have you been? Mom is freaking out!” I heard the tone of anger in my voice but it was only there to mask my concern.
     Slowly I pulled away from her to leave her sitting on the swing. Kneeling before her, I looked her over, checking to make sure that she was all there. In the corner of my vision, I saw Brant and Charlie hovering some distance away, but I paid them no attention. My thumb brushed away the wetness from Sadie’s cheeks and I was eager to know what had upset her.
     “Are you okay? What happened?”
     “Nothing happened, Ivy. I just wanted to go to the park.”
     I shook my head, not understanding.
     “Dad wouldn’t take me to the park, and now he’s gone so I went by myself.”
     I pulled her back into a hug feeling my heart break for her.
     “I’m sorry Sadie,” I said, “I’m really sorry… let’s go home though, okay? Mom’s really worried about you.”
     Sadie nodded at me and we both stood up. I watched as she put her backpack on and I grabbed her hand as we began to walk back towards my friends.

W
hen we walked through the front door, I heard Mom hang up the phone and rush into the entryway. Her eyes immediately found Sadie and she grabbed her and pulled her into a hug. As she held her tight, she threatened her to never do that to her again. I let them be and walked outside with my friends. We hovered on the front step for a moment and stood in silence in the now dark night.
     “I’m sorry about dragging you guys on that goose hunt,” I said.
     “It’s no problem,” Brant said, “we’re just glad she’s okay.”
     “Yeah, really, Ivy, we were glad to help,” added Charlie.
     Their sentiments warmed my heart and I offered up a grateful smile.
     “Well, thank you,” I said.
     After that, I gave Charlie a hug and she left. I waved and watched as her headlights cut through the dark then disappeared around the corner. Brant and I sat down on the stoop, sitting side by side, and enjoyed the quiet of the night. I looked to him. His face was cast in dark angular shadows created by the porch light. He was hunched over with his hands folded between his legs. I sat with my hands resting lightly on my knees. We listened to the soft chirping of crickets and felt the cool breeze rush past us, but we didn’t move. Didn’t say a word, and I didn’t need to nor need him to. Just being in his company was comfortable.
     After a short moment, Brant unbraided his fingers and reached over to grab my hand. My fingers intertwined with his and I squeezed, comforted by the feel of his skin against mine. Wordlessly, he stood and I stood up beside him, keeping our hands linked. With his free hand, he brushed a stray hair out of my face then kissed me softly on the lips. After that, we said our goodbyes and I went back into the house.
     Sadie was lying on the couch, her head on Mom’s lap and her eyes closed. She snored lightly and Mom ran her fingers through her hair. There was a calm that came over the room. It contrasted heavily with the chaotic atmosphere that had been when Sadie was missing. Quietly, I sat down in the oversized chair that was adjacent to the couch. Mom looked to me with a grateful smile.
     “I like your new friends,” she said. “They seem like good kids.”
     I nodded in agreement.
     “What was the boy’s name?”
     “Brant.”
     “Right, of course, he’s the one that’s not your boyfriend? He seemed to like you.”
     Her words were soft and observant as she looked at me, her eyes expressing the insight and wisdom that was rooted within their green orbs. You would have thought my mother had lived on this earth for a thousand years to absorb every bit of information there was about life and love just from the depths of her eyes.
     I smiled. “I’m not so sure of that anymore,” I said. “About him not being my boyfriend… he’s a good guy.”
     Mom didn’t say anything after that. She just smiled with that knowing look in her eyes.

25

Sneaking In

T
he next two days at school, we searched for Eric. Charlie printed off a copy of his schedule and we waited for him after every one of his classes. We never saw him. I grew anxious. We needed to find him, to talk to him. Not that any of us knew exactly what to say when we found him, but we had to at least try to change his mind. Our intentions, however, never developed past the goal stage of our plan as he wasn’t at school on Tuesday or Wednesday. Brant figured he was getting everything prepared for Friday, and I had to admit that it seemed likely. Part of me hoped that Eric had changed his mind on his own. I didn’t care whether or not he had an epiphany or chickened out, but if he just would have decided not to blow us all up, it would have saved me a lot of trouble.
     The time between thinking about Eric Thompson and the looming death of all Alta Ladera High students was spent fairly normally. Knowing that the bomber was Eric had put our minds at ease some. We never expected that we wouldn’t see him again until Friday. So on Tuesday and Wednesday, the three of us would meet to hang out before classes as casually as if it were any other day. Brant and I would eat lunch together on the common and visit Charlie in the library before the bell rang. After school, I found myself talking with Charlie on the phone over homework which would usually lead into a conversation about something else-Brant, school, Eric, music, the winter formal. We talked about everything, and I found that she and I had much deeper conversations then I ever had with Christy or any of my previous friends. Being friends with Christy, Ti and Eliza had been a comfortable place to be, but I realized that I’d only felt that way because I’d never really gotten to know anyone else.
     Both Tuesday and Wednesday night, I talked on the phone with Brant before I fell asleep. I’d lay in bed with the phone to my ear and my eyes half-closed as we continued to get to know one another. Both nights, I fell asleep with my phone in my hand and woke the next morning needing to dig for it beneath my blankets and pillows.
     Things with family also went well those two days. Dad picked Sadie up after school on Tuesday and took her out for ice cream. Both Mom and I knew the things that had been happening couldn’t be solved with frozen yogurt, but the sentiment seemed to help. Dad and I talked for some time that day after he dropped Sadie off at home. He didn’t tell me anything that I didn’t already know. It wasn’t my fault, he still loved me. He even tried to sweeten the pot by reminding me that this meant twice the gifts for Christmas, but it came off like a bad joke. Of course he didn’t know that I knew why they were getting a divorce. I just nodded in agreement and tried to enjoy the time with him. More than anything he said, the fact that he took the time to talk to me was what meant something.
     Thursday morning, when Eric was again missing from school, we realized that we needed a backup plan. We couldn’t count on hoping to run into him before the assembly. It was starting to look like things would be working down to the wire and my mind scrambled to figure out what to do next. Brant suggested calling in a bomb threat if all else failed. The only thing I could think to do was to talk to him and try and convince him to change his mind, but I needed to find him first.

C
harlie looked up Eric’s address on the school computers and immediately after class we drove to his house. We took the Lumina and I felt my nerves grow as we neared his block, which was in a slightly shadier part of town than I was used to visiting. Not that any part of Alta Ladera was all that shady, some streets were just less maintained then others. We pulled up outside a house with a lawn so overgrown, I wondered if it’d ever been cut. Next door a group of middle school kids sat on the porch eyeing us, and across the street a yellow lab had his head buried in the ground as he dug up a bone.
     I took a deep breath, feeling nervous. Charlie and I glanced at one another and then we got out of the car. Brant, who’d been sitting in the backseat, followed. We walked up the steps and stood on the stoop. I knocked on the door. There were no lights on in the house and no car in the driveway. It appeared as if no one was home. I couldn’t give up yet though. I rang the doorbell and held my breath in anticipation. No one came to the door. Beside me Brant had his hands up to block the sun as he peeked into the window.
     “I don’t think anyone’s home,” he said.
     “Now what do we do?” I asked.
     “I picked up a few other things from the library today, just in case we didn’t find him,” Charlie said.
     I was about to ask her what they were, but it was then that I noticed Brant was no longer peeking in through the window. I looked over just in time to see him vanish around the corner of the house. Charlie and I glanced at one another then we both followed after him. We picked up our pace as we rounded the corner to see Brant already disappearing behind the house.
     The backyard was fenced in by rusting chain-link, but the gate didn’t have a lock. Charlie and I walked through the gate and saw Brant holding open a worn screen door and twisting the knob of the back door.
     “Wait,” I said.
     Brant stopped. “What?”
     “We can’t break in.”
     Brant twisted the knob and let the door swing open. “It’s not a B and E if the door’s unlocked.” He stepped inside and, cautiously, Charlie and I followed.
     “How’d you know it would be unlocked?” Charlie asked.
     “I didn’t, just thought it was worth a shot. My dad forgets to lock the back door all the time.”
     Brant was peering around corners and quickly eyeing up every room he entered. Charlie and I followed him through Eric’s kitchen, then the living room which smelled like coffee grounds and wilting flowers. His parents seemed to have an accumulation of secondhand furniture and flea market finds as nothing matched. They also weren’t very tidy as everything was covered in a fine layer of dust. Brant peered into the dining room and then we all walked up stairs.
     “What are we doing here?” I asked. “I mean, it’s obvious Eric isn’t home.”
     “Eric might not be, but this bomb he’s been building has to be somewhere.”    
     We reached the top of the stairs. Brant started pushing open doors. The first was a bathroom we passed by, the next the master bedroom. Finally we found Eric’s room and Charlie and I followed Brant inside. From the second Brant pushed the door open and the smell of sweaty gym socks and stale potato chips assaulted my senses, it was obvious that this room belonged to a teenage boy. The floor was a mess with discarded clothes; the desk was cluttered with papers. The bed was unmade with its navy comforter lumped half on the floor. The curtains were pulled shut, and the walls were lined with band posters that appeared to have more Satanic references then musical ones.
     “No bomb,” I said, eyeing up one of the posters. It hung crooked on the wall, held up by thumb tacks. A zombie stood center stage, complete with green skin and dripping gore, but said zombie was also a woman and overtly sexualized with heaving breasts and ripped clothes. It was a disgusting mix of horror and soft-core porn.
     “Good band,” Brant said as he walked up behind me.
     My eyebrows lifted. “Ew.”
     “Guys, come check this out,” Charlie said.
     Brant and I spun around to see her standing before Eric’s desk, sifting through the papers that were scattered there.
     “He’s definitely our guy, look at this.”
     Looking over the papers, I saw that Eric had researched how to build bombs. One sheet held the pros and cons of pipe bombs; another had doodles of mushroom clouds and scribbled skeletons. It had my stomach flipping, just seeing all of that written in his handwriting. For a moment, it was hard to believe that the boy who had drawn them was the same one we used to call ‘Teddy Bear Thompson’.
     “So where’s the bomb then?” Brant asked.
     “Basement?” I suggested and he nodded.
     We left Eric’s room and made our way to the kitchen then down the basement steps. The light in the stairwell was burnt out and I gripped the metal railing tight as I moved down the stairs into the musty, cold dark.
     “Guys?” Charlie asked, “What are we gonna do when we find it?”
     Brant thought for a moment. “Take it apart if we can. Call the police, we could say Eric showed it to us.”
     “You don’t think they’ll think we helped him build it, do you?” I asked.
     “I think if we turned him in, they’d let us off the hook.”
     We reached the bottom of the stairs and stood in the dark while Brant fished for a string to pull and turn on a light. It was absolutely pitch black, so dark that I couldn’t distinguish between closing my eyes and opening them. Then I heard the sound of a beaded chain clink against a glass bulb and the click of that cord being pulled. Suddenly there was light, not much, but enough to see the space around me. Nothing was down there, no bomb, just a washing machine and a dryer with a rusting lid. A pile of dirty clothes sat on the cement floor and a spider pulled himself along a dangling line of his web.
     Charlie sighed. “Where is it if it’s not here?”
     “I don’t know,” Brant said, his voice sounding edgy and rough, “but we should go before someone comes home.”
     “Couldn’t we just call the police and show them Eric’s notes?”
     “I don’t think that’d be enough, and we’d get in trouble for being here.”