A Hopeless Discovery

by Daniel Carson

  At some point I must have fallen asleep, because when a finger started poking me in the shoulder, I had no idea what was going on.

  I opened my eyes to find Dominic mere inches from my face. He was shaking.

  “I had a bad dream,” he sniffled.

  Dominic was the kid who terrorized people with Nerf guns, let the air out of your tires, and watched horror flicks with his Mama. I wouldn’t have thought it was possible for him to have a bad dream.

  “What was it about?” I asked.

  He sniffled. “Santa Claus. He… he brought me a Barbie doll!”

  So that was the kind of thing that gave Dominic Rodgers nightmares. You live, you learn.

  Without even asking, he climbed into my arms and nestled his head against my shoulder.

  “Mama holds me when I have a bad dream.”

  “She does?”

  He nodded. “And she usually whispers more of those bad words, so if you want to do that, it’s okay with me.”

  I didn’t whisper the bad words, but did hold Dominic. Within minutes, he was snoring away. I thought about this crazy chaotic life that Katie lived, that I hardly knew anything about. And I realized how much I had missed by being gone all these years.

  I finally fell asleep again myself, only to wake up what seemed like just a few minutes later. But clearly I’d been out much longer than that. The sun was pouring through the windows, and Lucy and Dominic were jumping up and down on the ottoman in front of me.

  “Bubba’s! Bubba’s! Bubba’s!” they yelled in unison.

  “I hope to God I’m having a nightmare and I actually have eight more hours to sleep.”

  Lucy smiled. “Silly Aunt Hope, today’s the day we go to Bubba’s Pumpkin Patch.”

  “Isn’t today the day you all watch cartoons and order takeout and let me sleep like a normal human being?”

  “It’s right there on the schedule Mama left you. Today’s the special day at the pumpkin patch where kids get their faces painted for free. I’m going to be a fairy princess!”

  Dominic smiled. “And I’m going to be a flesh-eating zombie vampire!”

  “Dominic, seriously—even you must be aware that you have problems, right?”

  Unfortunately, Katie’s schedule confirmed it: today, I was supposed to take the children to Bubba’s Pumpkin Patch. It was something of a fall tradition around here for parents to take their children to Bubba’s.

  Key word: parents.

  “Interesting that your mom picked today as the day for your visit to the pumpkin patch.”

  Lucy smiled. “Today’s a special day. Every kid gets in for half price.”

  “So there will be lots of kids there today?”

  Lucy smiled even wider. “Millions.”

  I’d rather not talk about the next hour of my life. About what exactly it took to get those kids and myself ready for a day at the pumpkin patch. I’m sure one day I’ll talk about it in some sort of deep immersive therapy session… but until then, I’d rather act like it never happened. All I know for sure is that we arrived at the pumpkin patch at nine thirty along with, apparently, every other family in central Idaho.

  I was grumpy and tired, carrying a backpack full of sandwiches and water bottles and fish crackers and diapers, and pushing Celia in a stroller, but Dominic and Lucy approached Bubba’s with wide eyes as if they were having some sort of mystical experience. And I’ll admit, even though I’d barely slept, most of my body hurt, and my hands smelled like a strange combination of poop and wet wipe, being back at Bubba’s started having an effect on me as well. I’d always thought of it as a pretty magical place when I was little, and from the looks of it, Bubba’s had really grown up. I remembered a modest pumpkin patch with hayrack rides, a little haunted house, and a mechanical dragon that ate pumpkins. The place we were entering looked more like Disney World.

  Lucy had gotten a Bubba’s map—that was new, too—and had it spread across Dominic’s back in order to devise a plan of action for the day. “I say we get our faces painted first, then we’ll do the bounce house explosion, then we can visit Wanda’s World, and then—”

  “Did you say Wanda’s World?” I interrupted.

  She nodded.

  “I remember Wanda’s World. That’s with the mechanical dragon that eats the pumpkins, right?” That really had me feeling nostalgic. I remembered Granny laughing while the mechanical dragon chomped down on the pumpkins, spraying bits of pumpkin juice all over the people in the first two rows. “Would you mind if we visited Wanda’s World first?”

  Lucy smiled. “Sure, Aunt Hope!”

  As we walked past Pumpkin Alley, Dominic pointed out thirty-seven different pumpkins that he wanted to take home. Lucy, the wise older sister, reminded him that it was more fun to pick the pumpkins straight from the patch.

  We then walked down Apple Donut Lane, a boulevard for the best kinds of festival food you could possibly imagine. I’d like to say I had enough willpower to ignore the spectacular smells… but I would be lying. Instead I walked straight to the centerpiece of Apple Donut Lane: Lucinda’s Famous Apple Donuts. I bought three donuts, and the kids and I devoured them.

  So. Good. I made a mental note never to share those donuts with anyone ever again.

  And then we arrived at Wanda’s World. Its large metal sign, the same one I remembered from my youth, announced Wanda’s World with a vintage look that gave off a serious “junkyard cool” vibe.

  “It’s just like I remember!” I said.

  Wanda’s World was named after some old lady named Wanda who built these fantastic metal beasts from scrap metal and then made them move like robots. The pumpkin-eating dragon was the first of these robots, and the most famous, but over the years she’d continued to add a variety of other beasts. Bears, unicorns, a pretty good Frankenstein, and more. All made of beaten-up junk, all moving in the herky-jerky manner of someone “doing the robot.” It was like entering a mechanical zoo of misfit beasts.

  The dragon ate pumpkins every hour on the half hour, and we had just missed a feeding—well worth it for those donuts. There was no way the kids would stand around that long, so we decided to go down the dirt road to the haunted house—though I first made the kids promise we’d come back.

  Celia and I sat outside the haunted house while Lucy and Dominic went in alone. When they came back out five minutes later, Lucy was visibly shaken, while Dominic was smiling ear to ear.

  “A guy started chasing us with a chainsaw!” Dominic screeched. “It was awesome!”

  I truly think it was the highlight of the young boy’s life.

  The face-painting booth was next. We waited in line for fifteen minutes, which gave Dominic time to think of the most disturbing face paint possible. In the end, he went with half Freddy Krueger and half flesh-eating zombie vampire. Celia cried as soon as she saw him. Lucy stuck to her original plan of becoming a unicorn princess.

  We went to the petting barn, where the baby goats were a huge hit. We watched a man put a giant pumpkin in a slingshot and launch it two hundred yards, where it crashed through the windshield of beat-up old pickup truck. We attended a chicken race where the chickens were dressed like jockeys. We ate caramel corn and shared a giant turkey leg. And it’s possible I ate another warm apple donut. Or three. The only thing I refused to do was the corn maze, as I was still traumatized by a rather terrifying experience I had there when I was young. Corn maze, heavy fog, scared kid—you get the picture.

  We did lots of other things that didn’t exist at Bubba’s when I was a kid. I even changed Celia right in the middle of a dirt road while a snooty woman glared at me like I was in over my head. I definitely never did that when I was a kid.

  But by mid-afternoon, Celia was getting cranky, and so was I. It was time to get her home and hopefully down for a much-needed nap. I wouldn’t mind a nap myself.

  “But we can’t leave without getting a pumpkin,” protested the half-serial-killer, half-walking-dead five-year-old in my charge. And
so the cranky baby and her cranky Aunt Hope followed Lucy and Dominic to the pumpkin patch.

  That’s right, there was still an actual pumpkin patch in the midst of this theme park.

  Bubba himself organized the hordes of children into what looked like the starting line for the Boston Marathon. And then he raised a megaphone to his lips, and his might voice boomed. “One, two, three!”

  The children descended into the pumpkin patch like a pack of wolves, and Bubba chuckled—just like he’d done when I was a kid.

  And that’s when my phone buzzed in my pocket, and I remembered that I had a completely other life that didn’t involve wet wipes and cranky children and strollers and Bubba’s. I looked at the number and felt myself smile in spite of myself.

  “Hello, Sheriff.”

  “Hi, Hope, it’s Alex.”

  “I know it’s Alex. There’s this thing called caller ID. Been around for thirty years or so. Common to one hundred percent of cell phones.”

  “You’re really delightful to talk to, you know that?”

  “Says the man who bamboozled me into a goat murder case.”

  Alex laughed. “In fact I was just calling to see if you’d made any headway on your investigation.”

  “I bet you think you’re pretty funny.”

  “I do, as a matter of fact.”

  I imagined him smiling as he said it. Chiseled jaw. Brilliant green eyes. Smile that made me go weak. Easy, Hope.

  “Well, Sheriff…” I started.

  “It’s Alex,” he interrupted.

  “I know it’s Alex, but when you’re being a butthead, I call you Sheriff. So, Sheriff, I have no leads at this time. Not that I’ve had any time.”

  “I heard. Apparently Hope Walker has opened a day care.”

  “Katie told you?”

  “She could hardly stop laughing. I think this brings her a great amount of joy.”

  “And what, you’re just calling to rub it in?”

  “Pretty much. I also heard there’s a fancy-pants Hollywood guy in town to see you.”

  “How’d you know about that?”

  “I’m the butthead sheriff—it’s my job to know about stuff like that.”

  “It’s your job to know about the men in my life?”

  Alex paused. “I didn’t know he was a man in your life. The way I heard it, he wanted to talk to you about a job.”

  “And yet somehow he asked me out on a date in the process.”

  There was a much longer pause.

  “Alex, you still there?”

  “He asked you out on a date?”

  That tone. I knew that tone. That tone wasn’t curiosity. That tone was something else.

  Lucy emerged from the pumpkin patch with a giant pumpkin, Dominic the horrible right behind her. “Sorry Alex, gotta run. With kids and goat murders and dates with hot Hollywood guys, I’ve got a busy life.”

  I ended the call before Alex could say anything else, and yes, I felt quite satisfied with myself. Did I lie about having a date with the Hollywood bigshot? A little. But did Alex lie to me when he told me he had a murder for me to investigate? A little. Now we were a little even. Maybe better than even. Because now I had secret information.

  I was making Alex Kramer jealous.

  Lucy was holding her perfect pumpkin like a proud mom holding a newborn baby. She had chosen well.

  And then Dominic stepped from behind her to show me his.

  Unfortunately, it was not a pumpkin. Which was probably why he was so happy. It was a bone. Make that two bones. Human arm bones, by the look of it.

  Of course, this was Bubba’s Pumpkin Patch. They probably kept spooky artifacts like this scattered about to amuse little psychopaths like Dominic. But I had a bad feeling about this.

  I grabbed Dominic and ushered him quickly over to Bubba. Bubba gave me the peculiar look that I’d become used to over the last few weeks. Of people recognizing you but not sure why they recognize you.

  “Hi, Bubba. Is there any chance you hide fake skeleton parts in the pumpkin patch just for kicks and giggles?”

  “What are you talking about?”

  Dominic excitedly hoisted his arm bones into the air for Bubba to see.

  “I’m talking about this,” I said. “This adorable little child just found these remarkably human-looking bones in your pumpkin patch.”

  The horrified look on Bubba’s face was all the answer I needed.

  I called Alex back.

  “Hope, are you really going on a date with that—”

  I cut him off. “Alex, you know how dead bodies keep popping up around me?”

  There was a long pause on the other end of the line. “Hope, you’re not serious.”

  “No, but I am humerus. And… maybe radius or ulna? It’s hard to be sure.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “Just come down to Bubba’s, make your way down Apple Donut Lane past the haunted house, and you’ll find me at the pumpkin patch, where a pint-sized Freddy Krueger has just discovered what I’m pretty sure are the partial remains of a human body.”

  Chapter Seven

  Within twenty minutes, Sheriff Kramer had set up yellow police tape around the area of the pumpkin patch where Dominic had found the bones. Then the sheriff and his shovel got to work.

  Bubba had moved his customers way back, but he and his wife, Mary, held each other and looked on in stunned silence. Surrounding them were other employees, all looking on intently as this body was uncovered in their midst. An older man with blue overalls and a green John Deere cap stood right behind Bubba and Mary, and beside him was a younger guy, maybe late twenties, black spiky hair, slightly nerdy. Most important was a sturdy young woman with brown skin who must have been from Apple Donut Lane, because when she saw me with the kids, she disappeared for a bit and came back with a wide smile and a paper bag of donuts for us. The donuts were a big hit, and Lucy and Dominic and even Celia munched down on that warm chewy goodness while Dominic kept boasting with pride about the greatest day of his young life. “Can you believe it, Lucy? I really found a dead person’s arm!”

  After an hour of careful digging, Alex had uncovered the rest of the skeleton. He stepped away from the body and made a phone call, then he motioned for Bubba and Mary to come over. I took that as my cue to join them.

  “So I just called the forensic anthropologist with the FBI in Salt Lake City. They’re going to try and identify the body for us. But if either of you have any idea who this might be, that would really help me out.”

  Bubba and Mary looked at each other somberly, then turned toward the sheriff and said, “Wanda.”

  “Wanda from Wanda’s World?” I asked.

  Bubba nodded.

  “I take it this Wanda worked for you?” Alex asked.

  Bubba got choked up, so Mary answered. “Her name is… or was… Wanda Wegman. She’d been with us for… well, forever. From almost the beginning.”

  “And what makes you think this body is hers?” I asked.

  Bubba wiped his cheeks. “She ran off three years ago, at the end of the season. We haven’t heard from her since.”

  “Did you report this to Sheriff Kline?” asked Alex.

  Bubba shook his head. “There wasn’t a reason to. You see, Wanda… she was brilliant, but she was also stubborn and willful and a bit of a pain. We didn’t always see eye to eye.”

  “You’d argue?” said Alex.

  “Sure. But not just me. Wanda argued with everyone.”

  “It was just her nature,” added Mary. “But we loved her. Deep down, everyone loved her.”

  “Then why didn’t you report her missing?” I asked.

  Bubba shrugged. “Because it wasn’t the first time she’d left. Over the last twenty years, I bet she left, oh, how many times would you say, Mary?”

  “Three or four at least.”

  Bubba nodded. “One time it was a few weeks. One time she went on a cruise and came back in the spring. Heck, one time she did
n’t show up until a few days before the season began.”

  “And this time?” asked Alex.

  Bubba shrugged. “When she didn’t show up for the next season… I figured she’d gone and left for good. That she’d finally had enough.” He sniffled. “I had hoped to see her again one day.”

  Mary sighed. “But not like this. Not… murdered.”

  Sheriff Kramer held up his palms. “Let’s just take a breath on that. All we’ve got right now is bones. I know you think this must be Wanda, but until we’ve got a positive ID, we won’t know. And we don’t know if this was a homicide.”

  Mary looked up with a strange look. “What else could it be?”

  Alex shrugged. “Sometimes people just die.”

  “And bury themselves?” Bubba asked.

  Before Alex could answer, Mary said, “How long will it take before there’s a positive ID?”

  “If they can match dental records, not too long. Otherwise, weeks.”

  “Can… we stay open?” she asked.

  Bubba shot her a look, and Mary shrugged.

  The sheriff looked around as if considering, then finally nodded. “You’ll have to have this section of the patch closed, but otherwise, I don’t see why not.”

  “In the meantime, what can we do to help?” Bubba asked.

  Alex handed Mary a card. “Can you email a list of all your employees along with their contact info?”

  “We have a lot of employees. Many weren’t here when Wanda was around.”

  “How about your full-time employees?”

  “Other than me and Bubba, there was Wanda, and…” Mary looked over to where the other employees were clustered. She pointed at the kind donut lady. “That’s Lucinda Meadows, the Donut Queen. Next to her is Kip Granger, the farmer, and next to him is Johnny Driscoll, who handles our computers.”

  “Well, get me their contact info, along with the info for any part-time employees who might have known Wanda when she was here.”

  “Will do,” said Bubba. “Anything else?”

  Alex took his hat off and ran his hand through his hair. “I’ll let you know.”