Into This River I Drown (57 page)

The light bulbs.

No fucking way could this work. It’s nuts. I’ll get myself killed. They’ll never fall for it. I’ll get caught before it could ever work.

But that doesn’t stop me. I turn back and peer around the corner. No one is at the truck. I move back into the shack, flicking the light switch off. The bulbs hiss quietly as they darken, the only light left from the lantern. I take the pocketknife out of my pocket and use the handle to break the glass of the light bulb. The glass is hot. The filament is exposed. I crack it with the tip of the knife. I do the same to the other bulb.

Abe says nothing about my insanity.

I move back to the door and out into the rain. Movement around the truck. High Pitch. Low Voice. They head back into the caves.

I reach around the corner and grab a propane tank and haul it over to me. I push through the door into the shack and set the tank down in one corner, near the garbage bags. I do my best to ignore the words in bright red that says “Flammable”
on one of the discarded bottles. My hands shake as I turn the propane canister so the nozzle faces into the stuffy room.

 Not much time.

It takes me two minutes to bring in the three remaining tanks and put them each into a corner of the room, facing toward the center of the shack. Without a second thought, I twist the nozzle. Gas starts to hiss out quietly. I move to each canister, twisting each nozzle. They’re all hissing by the time I’m finished. I’m dizzy, the room filling quickly with gas. I’ve kept the door shut as much as possible so the gas is trapped in the room.

“I’m not going to leave you in here,” I tell Abe, trying to breathe shallowly. “I can’t take you all the way with me. Not now. But I won’t leave you in here.”

He doesn’t answer, but that’s okay.

 
A single spark to light up the world,
I think.
Flick the light switch. Electricity will try and connect through the filament. It’ll spark. It’ll spark, and all will burn.

The gas is getting to my head.

I switch off the remaining light, the lantern. The shack goes almost completely dark.

I bend down near the floor and look through the crack toward the cave entrance and the truck. Griggs walks down the metal ramp, back into the cave. They haven’t noticed the propane tanks are gone. I wait another moment, breathing in the fresh air, clearing my head. There’s no one else in the truck.

“Time to go, Abe,” I tell my old friend as I stand. I use the knife and cut his bonds. For a moment, his hands don’t move, as if he’s frozen with his arms strapped behind him. Then they fall slowly until they are resting at his sides, the fingers still pointed up toward the ceiling. I swallow past the lump in my throat because he isn’t—

he is he is he is oh please he is

—sleeping. He’s—

no no no no

—gone. He’s gone, and I can’t just leave him here. I can’t leave him to burn with the rest of them. I can’t let that happen to him. He promised me one day a long time ago, when I was lost in the dark, that he’d take care of me. Every day he’s kept that promise. The least I can do is keep my promise to him.

I roll him over, slide my hands under his arms, and start to drag him toward the door. “I’m sorry,” I tell him, tears streaming down my face. “I know you don’t like to get dirty, but I can’t carry you. I hurt my ankle and I’m sorry. Please don’t be mad at me.”

He doesn’t say a word.

We reach the door and I set him down carefully, trying to ignore the way his head lolls to the side. The room is stifling now, the hissing sounding like a den of snakes. Water drips from the ceiling onto my sweat-slicked face. I open the door quickly and step through, then close it behind me. I look around the corner again. No one is there.

I turn back and open the door, moving as fast as I can. I grab Abe under his arms and pull as hard as I can. I drag him completely outside and then reach in to shut the shack door behind us. I take Abe’s arms in my hands again and pull him away from the shack, away from the truck and cave. Away from his killer. Away from my Cal’s killer. Away from the man who murdered my father. I pull with all my might, my ankle shrieking at me, the burning almost unbearable. I slide down the small embankment behind the shack and turn to pull Abe after me. He feels so much heavier now. Either that or I’m just tired. So tired.

I only get fifteen feet into the forest before I have to stop and rest. I lean up against a large tree trunk, trying to catch my breath. The walls I have built around my mind since I saw that first bullet strike Cal in the chest are starting to crumble. My hands are shaking. My mind is racing and I can’t focus on a single thing. I just want to lie down and sleep, float away in the dark.

But even before I can hear my father, before Abe speaks in my head, before the sweet rumble of Cal’s voice breaks me apart, I stand on my own, pushing myself away from the tree. I can do this. I can do this. I’ll leave Abe here and hoof it back to town. I’ll find someone—
anyone
—and they’ll take over and I’ll never have to worry about it again. Someone else can worry about the problems of the world. I have to find Cal. I have friends to bury.

I’ve turned to grab Abe to pull him a little further into the trees when I see four people approaching the shack. High Pitch and Low Voice are in the front, glancing nervously at each other, their shoulders brushing together as their lips move, as if they are whispering to each other. My Aunt Christie follows behind them, a determined look on her face. Griggs follows behind her a few feet, the hunting rifle slung over his shoulder, my Colt in his hands. He cocks the Colt back and snaps a bullet into the chamber.

Boom,
I think.
Boom. Boom.

High Pitch and Low Voice reach the shack first and wait anxiously at the door. Christie says something to them, and they shake their heads. She scowls and turns back to the sheriff. She says something to him, but he doesn’t answer. He’s looking down at the ground and frowning. Christie speaks again, and he holds up his hand, silencing her. I don’t know what he’s looking at. I can’t see from where I stand. He bends over and I can only see the top of his head. I look up the embankment and my heart starts to thud.

Drag marks, down the embankment. Through the mud. He’s seen the marks left by Abe’s feet.

Christie opens the shack door. She grimaces as she takes a step back.

High Pitch and Low Voice peer over her shoulder.

She says something to Low Voice. He looks tense but steps around her and into the shack.

Griggs stands, looking down the embankment. He sees me. His eyes widen.

I smile up at him.

He jerks his head toward the shack. “Don’t!” he roars as he spins.

Christie turns to him, startled.

The shack explodes in a burst of fire much larger than I expected. There’s a bright flash, and then a concussive blast hits me like a heated wave. I’m knocked off my feet and onto my back. Rain falls on my face. I open my eyes and see the trees dancing in the sky above me, branches waving in the wind. An arc of lightning. A ripple of thunder, though it might be an echo of the blast, rolling down into the valley. Black smoke starts to smudge against the dark-gray clouds. Leaves and grass press against my back. It’s all wet. Everything—

i have is blue

—is wet, and I need to get up. I need to get off my back and up. I have to run. I have to run.

I sit up. My ears are ringing. My eyes are focused, unfocused. Focused, unfocused. I shake my head and push myself to my knees. Up the embankment, fire rages, hissing in the rain as if angry. It sparks in reds and oranges, but also blues and greens. I wonder how hard I hit my head until I remember the chemicals that were in the garbage bags.

I need to leave, but I have to know.

I make my way up the embankment, coughing at the smoke and smell of burning plastic. I slide in the mud, avoiding a burning piece of wood. I pull myself up until I’m at the top. The shack itself has been leveled completely, bits and pieces strewn out in a twenty-foot radius. A piece of the roof has landed on the hood of the truck, the front tires now completely flat.

Run
.

A burnt body lies on the ground in front of me. I can’t tell if it’s High Pitch or Low Voice, but I’m assuming its Low Voice since he was the one who turned on the light. Off to the right, the door to the shack remains somehow intact, and I can see an arm sticking out from under it. I hobble over to the door and lift it. Christie is underneath, and next to her is High Pitch. He groans, but doesn’t open his eyes. Some of his hair has burned off, and his left eyebrow, but his skin doesn’t appear charred, just red, as if he has a really bad sunburn. My aunt looks the same. I watch as her chest rises and falls steadily. She’s alive. I toss the door to the side. I reach down and go through their pockets. There’s no phone on either of them. If Low Voice had one, it’s burned up like he is.

Run. Please. Run.

I tighten my hand around the knife as I turn to Griggs.

Griggs, the man who killed my father, who killed Abe. Who killed Cal. Griggs, who lies fifteen feet away, his jacket slightly smoking but otherwise looking intact. Bullets for the rifle he’s carrying spill out of a pocket where the zipper has broken. I take a step toward him and realize how easy it would be to bury the knife in his throat, to slice his neck from ear to ear until it opens like a bloody red mouth. It would be so very easy to watch his eyes flash open as he gurgles, blood bubbles popping out his lips, painting his face in a spray of crimson mist.

It would be so easy, I think as I find myself standing above him. His skin has pinked slightly, his hat knocked off his head. His hair is plastered wet against his skull. His eyes are closed. There’s a small piece of shrapnel sticking out of his right thigh, blood leaking slowly, soaking his pants. But still he breathes. His life is not threatened by injury. He’s alive. He doesn’t deserve to be. He deserves pain, agonizing pain. He deserves death in all its forms. I can do this. I can avenge the men I love and have lost. I stand above him and raise Estelle’s gift high above my head, ready to bring it down on him again and again and again. Once he is gone, this nightmare will be over and I just need to
do it. Do it!

As I raise the knife as high as I can, I hesitate.

You are not the judge,
my father whispers.

You are not the jury,
Abe murmurs.

You are not the executioner,
Cal says, and it’s so loud he could be standing right next to me. A tear slides down my cheek.
You are the protector.
You are a guardian. It’s time to go home, Benji. It’s time to—

A hand reaches out and seizes my leg.

I look down. Griggs is awake and snarling up at me. I try to step back, but he has a vise grip on my ankle. “I’ll kill you,” he says, his voice a low rasp. “I’ll fucking kill you.”

Run!

I jerk my leg away, using my good leg to kick him upside the head. He howls as he rolls away from me… directly toward the hunting rifle he used to kill Cal. He lands on top of it, and I’m already taking off toward the forest. I can still hear him screaming as I jump down the embankment, rolling as I land to avoid putting all the weight on my ankle.

I’m sorry, Abe,
I think as I reach him and run right past.
I’m so sorry
.

There’s a loud crack behind me that can’t be anything but gunfire, and a tree branch above me explodes. I hear Griggs scream after me. I glance over my shoulder.

Sheriff George Griggs tears after me, the rifle in his hands.

mile marker seventy-seven

The
rain continues to fall as Griggs chases me through the darkening woods. Branches slap against me, and I raise my arms to protect my face. Thin cuts form when the wood slaps against my skin. The blood from my damaged wrist has soaked through the strip of shirt I used to tie it off. My ankle and foot are going numb. But still I run.

I know where I’m heading. I run toward the place where much of my life ended, and much of it began again. I run there only because I don’t know where else to run. My mind is like a static screen, snowy white and almost incapable of broadcasting. I’m not following logical thought. I’m following my heart, and it’s leading me to the river.

I can hear Griggs crashing through the underbrush behind me, booming steps punctuated by shouts and screams. He’s going to kill me, he bellows. He’s going to kill me like he did my father. He’s going to hold me underwater until I stop kicking and my skin turns blue. He’s going to cut off my head and mail it to my mother and he’s going to
laugh
, he roars after me. He’s going to watch the look on her face and he’s going to just
laugh
.

I zigzag around a tree just as he fires the rifle again. The bullet smashes into another tree just ahead, bark flying in the air, pitch leaking like black oil. Like the tree is bleeding after getting shot. He swears behind me and starts to move again.

There are times when I’m so far ahead of him I can barely hear him behind me. These are the times I think about taking cover, trying to find someplace to hide, but something tells me to keep going, that I need to get to the river, that everything will be okay as long as I can reach the river.

Other times it seems he’s so close I can hear him wheezing as he runs. It’s only the terror of knowing he could reach out and grab me that allows me to put on an extra burst of speed, putting more distance between us. If he catches me, I know, I will die in the middle of the woods, and no one will find me again.

I think of many things in the fifteen minutes it takes me to reach the river. I am hyperaware of everything around me, yes, but it’s like I’ve detached from myself, floating high above my own body, tethered to myself only by a thread of brilliant blue.

I remember a time my father broke his leg, when I was eight. He was laid up in the house for six weeks. “Gonna need you to be my right-hand man, Benji,” he told me seriously. “Gonna have to be the man of the house for a bit. You okay with that?”