Shine

by Lauren Myracle

  “So your mama could be surrounded by beauty,” he told me every so often. I’d hug him on those occasions, because talking about my dead mama always made him feel blue. “You sure do call her to mind, sweet pea. My beautiful girl.”

  A silver mist cloaked the peaks and valleys. Golden sunshine glowed along the horizon, shifting into rosy pinks and a striking, fiery orange as the light pierced the clouds.

  I closed my eyes, and still the colors reached me.

  I opened my eyes again and turned to the job at hand: to find out who hurt Patrick. I reviewed what little I knew. Patrick was working the night shift at the Come ‘n’ Go on the night he was attacked, and he was scheduled to open the store the following morning. That’s why it was lucky that man from Atlanta came along when he did, although I supposed—if I was trying to think like a detective, though the word detective made me feel foolish—that another way of looking at it was, Huh, what a coincidence he came along when he did.

  Except Sheriff Doyle said Patrick’s attack occurred between two and four a.m., and the man, whose name was Dave Tuttle, said he left Atlanta at five thirty a.m. I read that in the Toomsboro Times. Every day there’d been at least one article about how the investigation was proceeding, and every article said pretty much the same thing. It wasn’t.

  But in one article, Mr. Tuttle was quoted as saying that he made the drive from Atlanta to Highlands once a week, and that he always left at dawn. He had a daughter in Atlanta who didn’t go with him that Sunday, and she confirmed that yes, he left when he said he did. She could be lying, but I assumed Sheriff Doyle checked out her story, and Mr. Tuttle’s as well.

  Who else might have been at the gas station late Saturday night or early Sunday morning? I needed to be open-minded. I needed to consider all possibilities. I wasn’t convinced by the theory I suspected Sheriff Doyle of pushing, the one about a gang of outsiders attacking Patrick, but I’d be doing Patrick a disservice if I didn’t give it a fair shake.

  Black Creek had one of the highest illiteracy rates in the state, but if you traveled thirty miles in any direction, you’d hit a college. Not necessarily a good college, but a college. And what did college guys like to do? Besides getting laid and picking at their belly buttons, I mean?

  They liked to party, and the Come ‘n’ Go on Route 34 was nearly halfway between Western State and Toomsboro Community College. When there wasn’t a kegger at one of the schools, the college boys would drive to the other, and they often stopped at the Come ‘n’ Go for snacks. Beef jerky, Monster Energy Drinks, chewing tobacco. Beer.

  Patrick wasn’t supposed to sell alcohol, because he wasn’t twenty-one, but Mr. Lawson, the store’s owner, wasn’t overly concerned with that law. He was concerned with making a profit, and he told Patrick to go on and sell to anyone with a valid-looking ID.

  Unlike Mr. Lawson, Patrick was a rule player, but he had a sweet job and a steady paycheck, so he didn’t argue with his boss. He took the “valid” part seriously, however. If a customer’s ID looked authentic, then cool. If it seemed sketchy—like if the name listed on the license was “Mario Mario” and the guy sliding it across the counter looked all of eighteen, then Patrick didn’t accept it, even though it would have been the easier thing to do.

  “Mario Mario?” I said skeptically when my brother relayed this particular story one Saturday night, sitting out on our porch.

  “From Mario and Luigi,” Christian said. He recited a list of what I assumed were video games: “Super Smash Bros. Mario Kart. Brawl.”

  “The little dudes with the mushrooms?” I’d seen them on someone’s handheld game at one point or another.

  “Super Mario Mushroom, baby!”

  I wasn’t his “baby.” I also wasn’t drunk, since I’d had zero beers to his, oh, five or six or seven. “That’s the stupidest name for a fake ID I’ve ever heard,” I said. “And why Mario Mario? Doesn’t the mushroom dude have a real last name?”

  “I think that is his real last name, and yeah, it’s dumb as shit,” Christian said. “If you’re going to make a fake, you might as well try to make it look authentic.” He grinned. “But holy goddamn, it made me laugh.”

  Remembering made him laugh again. Out of stinginess, I didn’t join in. My feelings toward Christian were too complicated. Also, I’d promised to help at the church nursery the next day, which meant for an early morning, and which meant I should have just gone to bed.

  But didn’t. I guess it was nice sitting on the front porch and listening to Christian laugh.

  “I’m assuming Patrick turned Mario Mario down?” I said.

  Christian filled me in. Apparently, Mario Mario came in with three other guys, all of them dudded out in college-boy button-downs over T-shirts with logos for skateboards and ski wear. They browsed the aisles and plunked their selections on the counter, including two cases of Budweiser. Patrick glanced at Mario’s ID to be polite, but, he told Christian later, he’d known from the moment the guys came in that none of them was legal.

  “I can ring up the food, but not the beer,” Patrick told him. “Sorry, bro.”

  Mario hadn’t liked it. Patrick held firm. So Mario and his friends started ragging on Patrick: calling him a fag, telling him to not to be so gay, checking his plastic name tag and shortening his name to Trish. Normal old normal, and nothing Patrick hadn’t endured before.

  “Then they laid into Gwennie,” Christian said.

  “Gwennie?” I said. “What was she doing there? Was she alone?” Gwennie was fifteen years old and too innocent for her own good.

  “Uh, no, she was with Patrick.”

  “Yeah, but . . .” I shook my head. “What about Beef? Was he there?” I guess part of me still clung to the belief that big brothers took care of their little sisters.

  “Hush up and I’ll tell it,” Christian said. “Beef wasn’t there, just Gwennie. When Mario and his buddies couldn’t get a rise out of Patrick, they went off on her.”

  “How?” I said.

  “Just, you know. Making rude comments and stuff.”

  “Like what?”

  He rubbed his neck.

  “What did they say?”

  “Fag hag,” he said, shifting his gaze. “But don’t worry, ‘cause right about then is when me and Tommy came along.”

  He got his groove back. “Patrick had Gwennie behind the counter with him. The college boys were up in their faces, and we got there in time to see Patrick pull himself tall and let them have it.” Christian slapped his knee. “He told them to exit the premises or he’d call the police.”

  “And they did? They left?”

  “Well, Tommy and me gave them a helping hand.”

  “Good,” I said vehemently. “I’m glad you were there.”

  Christian looked at me with a funny expression, which I pretended not to see. Maybe I didn’t send love his way all that often, but that didn’t mean I couldn’t.

  As I sat on our porch now and watched the sun rise, I thought about those underage party boys. Maybe they held a grudge against Patrick. Did they return with thoughts of revenge? If so, how could I find out?

  I could go to the Come ‘n’ Go, I supposed. But, no. If any of them had attacked Patrick, they’d never come back.

  So, okay. My suspects so far were out-of-town college boys or some random sadist who just happened to be driving along Route 34, and who just happened to brutally assault a guy he didn’t know from Adam.

  I’d keep those options in mind, but my money was on someone from Black Creek, possibly aided by one or two of his buddies. My money was on the redneck posse, and the only member I exempted was Christian. He wasn’t perfect, but I knew with absolute certainty that my brother didn’t go after Patrick with a baseball bat. He would never.

  It was possible he knew who did, though.

  The first order of business was to find out what happened in the hours prior to Patrick’s attack. Patrick went out that night with my brother and some others, including Beef and Tommy, and I ne
eded to know what happened when he was with them, before he was beaten up, strung to the gas pump, and left to die.

  Christian wouldn’t tell me. I’d bugged him and bugged him, and he flat-out denied that anything had happened. Yet with every denial, he’d get the same stubborn look I’d seen him wearing all week. One time he said, “Just lay off. It’s nothing you need to worry about.”

  If it was nothing for me to worry about, what was the “it”? If he didn’t want me worrying, why not come clean?

  There was no point asking Tommy. He’d lie, and a lie was no better than Christian’s closed-lipped agitation.

  So that left Beef. Beef and I weren’t as close as we used to be, but maybe I could get a straight answer out of him anyhow. He was almost a second brother to me, after all. We had a lot of history between us.

  Once, when I was a fifth grader, a bigger boy at school told me to move. When I didn’t jump to it, he elbowed me in the face and barked, “Move!”

  Beef found me huddled on the side of the playground with Gwennie, holding a scratchy brown paper towel to my bloody nose.

  “Who did it?” he said, his face darkening, and before recess was over, that bigger boy knew never to bother me again.

  Another time Beef came over to see Christian and found me crying at the kitchen table.

  “Uh . . . what’s wrong?” he asked with all the finesse of a farmer in a fancy ladies clothing store. He’d gotten a new buzz cut, and I remember thinking he looked like a baby chick, all scalp and fuzz.

  I swallowed and waved my hand to indicate my book, lying facedown on the table. It was To Kill a Mockingbird. I’d just finished the chapter where Scout finally meets Boo Radley, who she always thought was scary, but who turned out not to be. Turned out, he was just scared to death of the world. Even so, he put his life on the line and saved Scout from a truly bad and scary man. Afterward, Scout’s daddy said to Boo, “Thank you for my children.” It killed me every time.

  “Just a sad part,” I told Beef. “I’m okay.”

  “Haven’t you already read that book?” he said.

  “Only a couple hundred times.”

  “Do you cry every time?”

  I sniffle-laughed, seeing how he might not understand that sometimes it was good to cry.

  He squinted, unsure what to do. He wanted to go shoot things with my brother, but because he was Beef, he didn’t feel right about leaving me behind when I was all weepy. “Well . . . wanna rub my head?”

  I laughed again. I loved rubbing his freshly mowed head. He knelt on one knee before me, and I moved my palm over his bitsy chick fuzz. Sure enough, it stemmed my tears.

  I’d grown up with Beef. I could trust what he told me, and—a big bonus—I could be in the same room as him without wanting to shrivel up and die. But mainly, I needed to get up off my butt and do something. Anything.

  I’d made a promise—to Patrick, to Mama Sweetie, and to God—and I was going to keep it.

  AFTER BREAKFAST, I BIKED TO BEEF’S HOUSE. His dad, Roy, answered the door.

  “Well, well,” he said. “Look what the dog drug in.”

  He thought that was funny, but then, he thought most everything he said was funny—or smart, or clever. He considered himself to be a pretty big deal, and most of Black Creek agreed. He wasn’t rich like Tommy Lawson’s daddy, but Roy Pierson was the wrestling coach at the high school, and he was good at it. Beef was the star of the team until he dropped out.

  “Is Beef here?” I asked.

  Roy stretched, his shirt hiking up to reveal his abs. His long hair was in a ponytail, and his frame was lean and mean, though on the smallish side for a man. Beef was built the same way, but Beef was a good guy, and goodness, rather than meanness, shone through him.

  “You wanna see Beef, do ya?” he said, leaning against the door frame. “Whatcha wanna see that sack of shit for?”

  I stood my ground.

  “Aw, I’m kidding ya.” He nudged my shoulder, making me rock back. “What’s a fella gotta do to make you smile, dumplin’?”

  “I was just wondering if Beef was here,” I repeated.

  Gwennie, Beef’s little sister, appeared behind her daddy, peeking at me from under his propped up arm. Gwennie and I used to spend a lot of time together, and she told me things about how her daddy treated her. Nothing sick, just lots of yelling and hitting and cruel remarks. Just one more reason I didn’t think Roy was “cool,” like most of Beef’s and Gwennie’s friends did.

  “Cat,” Gwennie said from behind her daddy. She was surprised to see me. “What are you doing here?”

  The sight of her made a pit open in my heart.

  “Hey, Gwennie,” I said. Her dishwater hair was shot through with blond and done up in an attempt at fancy. Half of it was falling down, framing her round face. “I like your hair. When’d you do the streaks?”

  “‘Bout two weeks ago. I used Sun In. You like it, for real?”

  Roy grew bored and dropped his arm, making Gwennie have to duck to avoid being whacked. “I’ll leave you girls to your girl talk,” he said. “I’ve gotta see a man about a horse.”

  He moved past me in a way that required I step back. He sauntered to his truck, hopped in, and cranked the engine. He reversed out of the yard and onto the road, roaring away in a cloud of dust.

  “He means get more beer,” Gwennie said. She stepped aside. “Come on in.”

  I did, and it brought back memories. Same old linoleum on the floor. Same pictures hanging in the living room. The kitchen, where Gwennie led me, still smelled of bacon, even. Their kitchen always smelled like bacon.

  “What’s going on?” she said.

  “Oh, you know,” I said. “Nothing, really.”

  The lie felt awkward, because Gwennie and I used to be close, even though we were a grade apart and even though she was kind of not so bright. I didn’t say that to be cruel. God gave everyone different gifts, that was all, and hers wasn’t brain smarts. Something I learned from Gwennie was that being smart wasn’t the only quality that mattered in a friend.

  Anyway, we used to hang out in youth group and stuff. It was easy to make her giggle, and being around her was just . . . nice. She looked up to me. Then, in the summer after eighth grade, I dropped her cold, just like I dropped the rest of my friends.

  “Is Beef here?” I asked.

  “Nah, I don’t know where he is.” She opened the refrigerator and pulled out a plastic pitcher. “You thirsty? I just made some Crystal Light. Want some?”

  “Um . . . sure,” I said, taking a seat at the table.

  She brought me a glass of bright yellow lemonade so fakely sweet it made my teeth hurt. She plopped down beside me, and before I even swallowed, she dove straight into talking about Patrick. She said how awful it was, just awful, and a lump rose in my throat. Unlike the Crystal Light, her reaction wasn’t one bit artificial.

  Most people were shocked and upset about Patrick’s attack, but also excited, the way people got excited when they saw a car wreck, and the bloodier the better. But Gwennie had a big heart, same as Beef, despite being raised by her full-of-himself daddy and her hardly-ever-home mother, who was a nanny to some rich kids in Asheville.

  She also had a big body. She’d grown a lot since we were thirteen. Unlike Beef, she’d always been plump, but now she had to angle her chair out from the kitchen table to make room for her thighs. Her breasts were big, too, and her upper arms puffed out of her tank top like marshmallows. I felt bad, knowing the sort of comments Roy surely made about her weight.

  She was doing something about it, though. She told me so after we’d said all there was to say about Patrick. She wiped her eyes, blinked a few times, and pushed a fresh smile onto her round face.

  “Guess what?” she said. “I’ve gone on a new diet, and it’s awesome. I think it’s really going to work. It’s actually more of a lifestyle approach. Can you tell?”

  Fondness made my lips curve up. A “lifestyle approach.” She must have read the phras
e in one of those magazine articles saying only eat grapefruit or only eat steak or don’t eat anything at all, just drink diet lemonade all day long.

  “Um, yeah,” I said. “You look pretty, especially your hair.”

  “You look pretty,” she said wistfully. “Gosh, I wish I had your figure. And eyes. And pretty much every single thing about you.” She giggled. “Wanna trade?”

  “Ha-ha,” I said, pretending she was teasing. “How does the new diet work?”

  She told me about it, enthusiasm animating her features. She was a pretty girl underneath her extra pounds.

  “. . .which means that in three months I’ll have dropped two full sizes,” she marveled. “Can you imagine? And then, once I’ve gone down another couple of sizes, well . . .”

  Instead of finishing her sentence, she blushed. A heavy duty, this-is-serious blush.

  “Omigosh,” I said, catching on. I shoved her shoulder. “Gwennie, you man-eater. Are you seeing someone?”

  “No,” she said giddily. She tried to stop smiling, but couldn’t.

  “Who is it? You know you have to tell me.”

  She shook her head.

  “Gwennie.”

  She shook her head more, still beaming.

  “Gwenn-ie,” I sang.

  “Hush,” she said. “And don’t you say a word. Promise?”

  I lifted my eyebrows and didn’t, just for the pleasure of teasing her.

  “I’m serious, Cat,” she said. “You can’t tell a soul, especially with him laid up in the hospital and everyone and their mama already gabbing about him. Okay?”

  My eyebrows came back down as I tried to put together the meaning of what she’d said.

  She realized her goof a moment too late. “Never mind,” she said quickly. “I didn’t just say that. Nobody’s gabbing about no one.”

  I half-smiled, because it was so Gwennie to think she could rewind the tape and erase her part of the conversation. Then the humor of the situation dribbled away. Gwennie had a crush on Patrick? How could Gwennie have a crush on Patrick?