Today's Promises (7 page)

“So,” I begin, curious to hear the rest of what happened up there. “You felt like you needed to see the place today…for whatever reason.”

“Yeah, yeah, I did,” he says, nodding.

“Why, though?” I press. “Why today of all days?”

He leans away from me and blows a puff of smoke out the open window. He then lowers the window a little when he sees me shivering.

“It’s stupid, I know,” he says, taking another drag. “Like you said, why today of all days? The whole time I lived in that fucking town, when we were apart, I avoided the Lowry property like it harbored the plague. But today, after getting the job, and after seeing Crick, I just felt like I needed closure or some shit.”

In a small voice, I ask what I suspect may be the real reason Flynn was compelled to return to the Lowry property. “Did it have something to do with trying to heal?”

He looks down. “Maybe a little.”

I nod, finally getting it, at least a little. Though I don’t plan to ever return to that house of horrors, unless there’s a damn good reason, I understand where Flynn’s head was today.

See, he’s not fully whole, either. And sometimes it’s hard. Sometimes you need to revisit the past to spur yourself to the next step in your life. We all have different ways of dealing with grief. Flynn confronts it head-on, whereas I like to bury it.

“So,” I breathe out. “What’d it look like?”

“What?” he asks. “The house?”

“Yeah, the house”—I make a sweeping motion with my hands—“but the rest of it too. How’s the barn where we worked look? And what about all the surrounding land?”

“It all looks abandoned, Jaynie. Supposedly, the state owns
everything
now.”

“Hmm, interesting,” I remark.

The cigarette is down to little more than a butt. Flynn holds it like a joint and takes one last hit of nicotine.

Then he says, “They’ve seized
all
the property. That’s what Crick told me. You should’ve seen it, though. There are all these big red ‘No Trespassing’ signs, posted everywhere you turn. They’re on the trees lining the drive, on those huge gates out front…just all over the place.”

He chuckles, and I ask, “What’s so funny?”

“Eh, not funny like ha-ha. More like funny as in ironic.”

“What’s ironic?”

“Well, no one pays any attention to the signs. People still go up there.”

“What do you mean?”

“Crick told me teens party up there all the time.” An ash falls to the ground. “And it’s kind of obvious. Remember that high wire fencing all around the perimeter, the one with barbed wire on top?”

“Like I could forget,” I mutter, recalling our prison fencing all too clearly.

“Well, despite those signs to stay out, there are all these huge gaping holes in the fence that the partiers have created. I guess so they can get in more easily. Better than climbing, you know. That’s what I kept thinking, anyway, when my ass was crawling through one of the bigger holes.”

“Crick went with you, I hope?” I ask. “Please don’t tell me you went in there all alone.”

“I can take care of myself,” Flynn assures me.

“Still…” I hate the idea of him up there all by himself. What if something had happened? “Where was Crick when you were deciding to trespass?” I add.

“He waited in the truck. I told him to keep guard in case someone showed up. You know, seeing as we weren’t supposed to be up there snooping around in the first place. He’d told me earlier that the state cops have been stepping up patrols to keep the party crowd out.”

“Well then, that was some good thinking on your part.”

I smile over at Flynn, but he’s busy staring out the window, out into the dark night.

“You should see it, Jaynie,” he says, at last. “It’s all fucked-up. The house is in pretty bad shape. Looks like midnight plumbers have hit it up a time or two…or ten.”

Midnight plumbers are vandals who raid abandoned buildings for copper pipes and scrap metal to sell.

“I’m not surprised,” I reply. “I’m sure there are plenty of pipes and stuff to rip off in that house.”

Bad things happened there, but it was a nice house, aesthetically speaking.

Flynn nods. “Yeah, there’s probably a lot of stuff of value in there. Or at least, there was. Anyway, after I checked out the house, I took a walk down to the work barn.”

Mrs. Lowry ran a lucrative crafting business, built on the backs of the kids she fostered—like us—and funded on what we later discovered were embezzled funds. Flynn, Mandy, the twins, and me—we all spent long, arduous days working in that barn, which was really a kind of child-labor sweat shop.

“What was it like in the barn?” I whisper.

“Shit was destroyed,” Flynn says. “Just like over in the house.”

Smiling, I say, “Well, that’s kind of poetic justice, now isn’t it?”

Nodding, Flynn wets his fingers and presses together the tip of his cigarette. The cherry-red tip—though barely burning—hisses in protest. Setting the spent butt on the sill, he closes the window.

“It really is poetic justice,” he agrees. “The barn, the house… Those places deserve to be destroyed, especially after all the shit that went down in them.” His eyes meet mine, and he lowers his voice. “There was a table that was still standing upright in the work barn, one of those bench-style ones, where we used to sit for hours and hours, making those fucking crafts. Remember?”

“I’ll
never
forget anything about that place, Flynn.”

“Yeah, right, of course.” He makes a face. “Anyway, I pushed that fucking table over till it was upside down, like a dead bug. Then I rolled it, like, five fucking times. I kicked it too. I just kept kicking it, Jaynie, over and over.” He blows out a breath. “I hate to admit it, but knocking the shit out of that thing felt really good.”

“I’m sure it did.” I release a constrained breath of my own. “I kind of wish I’d been there to kick it a few times myself.”

It’s true. Though I don’t care to return, the idea of fucking shit up in that place feels good.

“It was cathartic, no doubt,” Flynn confirms.

“So what happened then? What made you so stressed out?”

Flynn stares over at the cigarette butt on the windowsill, eyeing it like he’s wishing he had more.

Waving my hand toward the closet where he retrieved the first damn butt from his jacket, I say, “If you’ve got more, go get them. I’m sure a single night of smoking won’t hook you back on the habit.”

At that assertion, Flynn laughs.

“Yeah, actually it probably would hook me back. But it’s okay. I don’t have any more anyway. I bummed that one I had from Crick, right before we went our separate ways. I knew better than to buy a whole pack. That’s why I went with the gum.”

I’m relieved, but mostly I’m dying to know what has Flynn smoking again in the first place.

In a low voice, I ask, “What else happened up at there today?”

Sheepishly, eyes down, he says, “Uh, the cops showed up.”

Flynn

“O
h shit, no way! You’re kidding me, right?” Jaynie’s face pales.

“Yeah, no… I mean…” I let out a groan and rub my hand down my face. “Yes, the cops showed up,” I admit.

Jaynie is aghast.

“But, but, you
were
trespassing, Flynn. Are you in trouble now?” She pauses, surely considering all the possibilities, except the one she’ll never guess. “Shit, please tell me you weren’t arrested or fined?”

I let out a snort. “I’m here with you right now, aren’t I?”

“Yeah, I guess. But maybe they took you in and released you. Maybe that’s why you were so late.”

“No, that was all the bus. And we may as well get used to that schedule, because that’s the way it runs.”

I’m stalling, and Jaynie knows it.

Eyeing me warily, she says, “Flynn, I don’t care about the bus schedule. Damn it, what happened with the cops? Obviously something went down or you wouldn’t have wanted a cigarette.”

Chuckling at her fieriness, I assure her, “Nothing happened. At least, not in the way you’re thinking. No arrests were made, no citations given. It wasn’t like that at all.”

Jaynie makes a grumpy face, stumped. “Then what was it like, Flynn? You, Crick, and the cops all go grab a coffee together or something?”

I better fess up. When Jaynie starts resorting to sarcasm, she’s pissed.

And so I begin…

“Well, first off, there was only one cop in the car. And as it turns out, he’s a detective.”

“A detective…? Oh, ohhh…” Things begin to click for Jaynie, and she says, “He’s investigating that missing girl case, right? The one Mandy told us about.”

“He is,” I confirm.

She gestures over to the nightstand. “Is that what you were trying to hide? That was his business card, wasn’t it?”

“Yeah. His name is Detective Silver.” I release a pent-up breath. It feels good to come clean. “Anyway, when he found out who I am, and, more importantly, my recent connection to our kind and caring Lowry friends”—I let out a sarcastic cough, and Jaynie grimaces—“he couldn’t have cared less about me trespassing up there. Instead of the citation I was sure was coming, he gave me his business card.”

“So he wants something from you?” Jaynie correctly guesses.

“Yeah, yeah, he does.” I lean my head back against the wall and say, “He wanted to know if I’d be willing to help.”

Skeptically, she says, “Help with what, exactly?”

I sure wish I had another smoke when I have to tell her, “He wants me to help with the missing girl case.”

Carefully, voice level, Jaynie wants to know, “And in what way,
exactly
, does this detective think you can
help?”

I lean forward and take both her hands in mine. We need solidarity, now more than ever.

“Jaynie, Detective Silver thinks the body of the missing girl—her name was Debbie Canfield, by the way—may be buried somewhere up on the Lowry property. Maybe in the woods.”

“Flynn,” she counters, “the woods are endless. There are acres and acres of fields and forest. If that poor girl… Debbie, right?”—I nod—“Well, if this Debbie really is buried up there, she could be anywhere.”

Our hands still intertwined, I squeeze and say, “Yeah, but think about it. If Allison or Mrs. Lowry—”

“You know it had to be Allison,” Jaynie interjects. “Mrs. Lowry is wicked, but she’s no killer.”

She’s probably right, as Allison
is
a sociopath.

I blow out a breath. “Okay. So if Allison murdered this Debbie girl, and we’re looking at the event happening about seven years ago, she would’ve only been around fifteen at the time. Allison, that is,” I clarify.

“A psycho even then,” Jaynie murmurs.

“Yeah, well, psycho or not, she wouldn’t have been strong enough to drag a body all the way up into the woods. And then, on top of that, dig a grave and bury said body.”

“She disposed of that poor girl somewhere, Flynn.”

“I know, I know. So hear me out.”

Jaynie nods and I continue with my theory. “I think something happened. Probably down at the house… Or more likely in the work barn. Think about it, Jaynie. Those were the places where all our own altercations with Allison occurred.”

She’s quiet for a moment. Pondering, I guess.

At last, she says, “Yeah, but the barn where we worked wouldn’t have been in existence back then. My social worker told me the day she dropped me off that
our
work barn was relatively new.”

“Good point. And true, before our work barn was built, all the crafts were made up in the old barn.”

Jaynie looks appalled. “You mean the one up on the hill? The one where we used to play freaking Hide and Seek with the twins?”

I nod grimly. “Yeah, that would be the one.”

Letting go of my hands, Jaynie hangs her head. “God, Flynn. If that girl
is
buried up there, we probably tromped all over her grave dozens of times.”

“Hey, we don’t know if she’s buried there.” I try to sound reassuring. “In fact, we don’t know anything yet. But even if it turns out to be true, how could we have known?”

“I guess,” Jaynie grudgingly concedes. And then she asks, “Did you tell the detective all of this?”

“No, not yet.”

“Wait, why not? I thought he wanted your help with the case.”

“He does, but he wants more than guesses and theories. He wants me to do some kind of an official walk-through on the property with him. That way I can point out
all
the places I think Allison could’ve buried a body. The old barn’s the most likely place, seeing as it was
the
work barn when she was there. But, I don’t know, I could be wrong.”

“So,” Jaynie says on a loud sigh. “You’re completely set on doing this, aren’t you? Even if it means spending more time in a place we both hate.”

I think it over carefully before I respond. But, really, I have no choice but to say. “If it helps keep Allison behind bars—and, more importantly, away from you—I’ll sleep up in that damn place if they need me to.”

“You will do no such thing, Flynn O’Neill.”

“Okay. But I’m going to help, Jaynie. In any way I can.”

She just about blows me away when she then declares, “Well, you’re not doing this alone. If you’re going to help with the case, then damn it, so am I.”