Sight

by Adrienne Maria Vrettos

  We go up the side entrance to the police station, and Lucy looks at us in surprise. “Dylan?”

  Deputy Pesquera raises her hand to silence Lucy, and hustles Ben and me through the reception door.

  “Deputy,” I hear Lucy say behind us, “we have a problem.”

  Pilar is there, standing in the hall outside of Deputy Pesquera’s office. Sheriff Dean is beside her, saying something in a low voice. I don’t know why I run to her, why I don’t wonder first what she’s doing here.

  “Pilar,” I say, grabbing her arms. “Pilar, I want to tell you my secret.” I stare into her face, tears streaming down my own. “I see things, Pilar. I see little kids when they’ve died. I see them in my head. That’s my secret, Pilar. I saw Clarence, and the little girl Tessa from Salvation, and the little boy Brian from down the hill, I saw them all Pilar, I saw them when they were dying. I only see them when they’re dying. I never find them alive, and that’s why I never told you, because it’s awful, Pilar, it’s so ugly and I thought you’d stop loving me and…” I gulp. “I see a girl, Pilar. I see her in my head. I know she’s dying. I know that’s why I’m seeing her. I know that’s why I’m here, to help them find her body …” I stop talking.

  Pilar sways a little and I think she might fall. And then she opens up her mouth and screams. And screams. And screams. I look around wildly to see Sheriff Dean, the familiar beige of a file folder in his hand, reaching out toward Pilar. The picture on the front of the folder. It’s Grace.

  Pilar slaps me, hard across the cheek, whipping my head to the side. I see Ben, staring in confusion, and the deputy rushing toward us.

  Sheriff Dean pulls Pilar back, trying to move her into his office.

  “Pilar!” I cry. “Please!”

  Pilar pulls away from the sheriff and grabs my shoulders. “Tell me where she is.” She shakes me, my head whipping back and forth. “Tell me where she is!” she screams into my face, shaking me again. “Where is my Gracie!”

  They separate us. Me in Deputy Pesquera’s office, Pilar down the hall in Sheriff Dean’s, waiting for her parents to come up the hill, and Ben in the interview room.

  Deputy Pesquera sits at her desk.

  “Can’t I at least look at the picture?” I ask. My tears are gone. I feel dried out a husk.

  The deputy shakes her head. “Sheriff Dean wants to wait on that.”

  “Why’s he the sheriff again all of a sudden? He’s never around anymore.”

  “He never stopped being sheriff, Dylan. He’s just holding off retiring until we catch the Drifter.”

  “So he can take the credit?”

  “So he can sleep at night.”

  “So you think it’s the Drifter?” I ask. “You think he has Grace?”

  “We don’t know yet.”

  “Then why are we sitting here? Why aren’t we out looking for her?”

  “We’ve got the volunteer deputies—”

  I laugh. “Great. That’s just perfect. Volunteer deputies clomping around in the first snow…” The end of the sentence gets lost somewhere between my brain and my tongue. How’d that song go? I remember my great-grandmother’s question from last night.

  “You all right?” the deputy asks.

  “You ever search his house?” I ask. “Clarence’s?”

  “Of course we did. Why?”

  “He died there, you know.”

  She studies me. “Yes, I know that. How do you know that?”

  “You can’t hide under the bed,” I chant. “He’ll find you and crack your head.”

  The song loops in my mind, and then I’m there, standing in the doorway of Clarence’s bedroom. The mural on his wall is fresh and new, his toys are neatly stacked in one side of his toy box. On the empty side is a piece of notebook paper with the words “Your Side” carefully written in crayon. His closet is the same way, his clothes all pushed to one side, leaving half of the rack empty. A piece of paper hangs taped to the clothing rod. Your Side, it says. There is a collapsible cot against the mural wall, and Clarence is carrying his teddy bear from his bed to the cot, and laying it carefully on the pillow. “Yours,” he says aloud. He is halfway dressed for school, wearing corduroys but no shoes or socks, an undershirt but no sweater. He looks out of the window, and at first I think he’s waving to the falling snow. Then I see the man in the window, pulling it open and crawling through. Clarence knows him; he claps his hands and laughs. “You silly! You’re supposed to use the door!” And then I am Clarence, and the man is squeezing, squeezing my shoulders, and I am squirming out of his grip and I am crawling under the bed and he is pulling me out by my foot and I am looking up at the man’s head, haloed by the overhead light, his red, red hair looking like it’s on fire, his thick sunglasses blackening his eyes like a raccoon, just like the ones he wore in the picture on Cate’s refrigerator.

  “Oh, shit,” I whisper. You’ll see his face in someone else. And she won’t know, even herself. The shavings would stick to his boots on the days he “walked the floor.” I am out of that room, and back in this one, lying on the grimy floor in front of the deputy’s desk, looking up at the peeling tiles in the ceiling. The deputy is bending over me, and I blink away her fingers lifting at my lids.

  “Can you sit up?” she asks.

  “The shavings—I know who left them,” I say, pulling myself back up into the chair. “You have to take me. You have to take me with you.”

  “What—”

  “I know where she is!” I shout, standing with shaking legs. “You have to take me with you! I can show you where she is!”

  “I’ll take you,” the deputy says.

  “Not without her,” I say. “Not without Pilar.”

  The Croondon houses stand at attention as the deputy pulls her truck into the cul-de-sac. Pilar and I sit in the back. She hasn’t said a word to me. In the blank house faces I see judgment, I see We’ve been waiting for you.

  “Here?” the deputy asks.

  I nod.

  “Stay in the truck,” Deputy Pesquera says, opening her door. At the same time, the cracked and peeling door to Clarence’s old house opens. “Stay in the truck!” the deputy says again, getting out of the truck and slamming the door behind her, lifting her walkie-talkie to her mouth as she does.

  The door to Clarence’s house stays halfway open, whoever’s inside blacked out by the shadow of the door.

  “Is she dead?” Pilar asks.

  I start to say I’m sorry, but I’m interrupted by Pilar screaming and lunging over me, opening the door and falling out of the truck and jumping up into a run. I get out after her and look to Clarence’s house, and see Grace standing on the doorstep in her red winter boots, stomping her feet and holding up her hands. Deputy Pesquera is running toward her, but Pilar streaks by her with a yell. I run too, but stop dead when Grace squeals “Mommy!” as Pilar swings her up and against her chest.

  “I’m here,” Pilar says, burying her face into Grace’s neck, her voice ragged with tears. “Mommy’s here.”

  “Oh my God,” I whisper.

  There is laughter from the front door, a hardened, crass version of a familiar giggle.

  “Cate?”

  She steps out of the house and onto the front steps, and even though she’s still laughing, her face looks like she’s seen a ghost.

  “Worst! Psychic! Ever!” She cackles, pointing at me, and then at Pilar, who has carried Grace back to the deputy’s truck. “You didn’t know?” Cate asks, still pointing, her hand shaking. “You didn’t know about that? God, even I guessed that!”

  “Cate? That’s your name, right?” Deputy Pesquera says, moving toward her.

  “Wait!” Cate says, pointing now at the deputy. “Just wait, please.”

  “Okay,” the deputy says, raising her hands. “Just tell me why we’re waiting and we’ll wait.”

  Cate drops her arm to her side and looks at me, her pale face pulled down into a terrible look of heartbreak. “Did you know?” she asks, shrugging.


  “Know what?” I ask.

  “I wasn’t supposed to come here today,” she says. “I was supposed to go to school. I was going to apologize to you, and to Thea, and to Pilar, and to MayBe.” She screams at me. “I was going to tell you the truth!”

  “So tell me the truth, Cate,” I say softly, stepping toward her.

  “Stop!” she says, raising her hands. She glares at the deputy, who has moved closer. “Both of you. Please stop.” She starts to cry. “Just please stop and let me figure this… I was afraid you wouldn’t forgive me for what I’ve done.”

  “What have you done, Cate?” I ask, not needing the deputy’s nod to encourage me to keep Cate talking.

  “I’ve lied to you,” she says, sobbing. “I’ve always lied to you.”

  She hangs her head, crying for a moment, and then she looks up suddenly. “Why is she here?” she asks, looking over my shoulder, to where Pilar and Grace are. “Why was that little girl in Clarence’s room?” She looks behind her, into the house. “I didn’t think anyone would be here, but I found her, and I was going to call the police, but then you…” She stares at me, her mouth going slack. “How did you know she was here?”

  “I saw her.”

  “But…,” Cate says, her face wrinkling like a child’s. “You said you only saw dead kids, you never saw them alive. I always asked you and you always said you only saw them—”

  “I know, but you were right!” I say, walking toward her. “You were so right, Cate. I was only afraid. I was afraid of what I’d see if I let myself. But I saw Grace. I saw her and she was still alive. You were right, Cate, you were right all along.”

  Cate recoils, stepping back a little into the house, her face shadowed by the darkness indoors until she sticks her face back out into the light and splits me in half with her scream. “Then, why couldn’t you save my little brother?”

  My knees give out beneath me and I drop to the ground. “No, no, no,” I moan, reaching out my hands to her, understanding everything now.

  “Why couldn’t you save Clarence!” she screams. “I was supposed to come and live here! We were supposed to be a family again! You ruined everything!”

  “I didn’t know, Cate,” I cry. “I didn’t know.”

  “We were going to share a room and go to kindergarten together! He was going to give me half his toy box, and half his closet, and he was going to introduce me to all his friends! Mom and Dad were going to get back together and everything was going to be perfect!”

  “I’m sorry,” I cry, hiding my face in my hands. “I’m so sorry.”

  “You stole my life!” I look up, and she is standing in front of me. She drops to her knees. “Don’t you see?” she says, taking my hands and squeezing them too hard. “I was supposed to be in all those class pictures with you. I was supposed to make snow angels with you and help teach MayBe how to say her Rs and make five dollars an hour sweeping up at Thea’s mom’s salon. But none of that happened.” Her tears are gone. Now there is only quiet fury. “Because you are a coward. You could have saved that little girl in the desert and that boy down the hill and all those kids in between, but you didn’t because you’re too much of a goddamn coward to really ever see what you’re capable of.” She looks behind me. “Dad?”

  I recognize Cate’s father’s car as it comes racing up the driveway, spinning out as he slams on the brakes and tries to turn around and drive back down. Sheriff Dean blocks his way, pulling the police cruiser sideways and jumping out of the car with his gun drawn. Deputy Pesquera covers Cate’s eyes.

  You’ll see his face in someone else

  And she won’t know, even herself

  Sixteen

  Pilar and I walk in silence through the snow, which is finally deep enough for us to have traded in our high-tops for real snow boots. We follow the path from the village down to the frozen lake, the sounds of laughter, ice skates, and sleds meeting us halfway. With the first snow being so late, it took a long time for the lake to freeze this year. Now, though, in the ice cold of January, it has finally turned solid.

  I keep stealing glances at Pilar, seeing how her face has changed over the past several weeks. She looks rested, the dark circles under her eyes are gone, and her face is fuller and doesn’t have the squinched-up look I was starting to get used to.

  “I didn’t think you’d ever call,” I finally say.

  “I wasn’t sure I would either,” she answers. “I was pretty mad at you. I still am, sometimes.”

  I nod.

  “My parents have been homeschooling me,” she says. “But I guess you would have heard that.”

  “My mom told me. How is that going?”

  “It’s … fine. They’re pretty heavy on the insect education, though. I’m going back to school after January vacation. They just wanted me to stay out till things …” She hesitates. “Blew over.”

  “We miss you,” I tell her. “Me and MayBe and Thea. Ben, too.”

  “How is he doing without Frank and Cray?”

  “He seems all right. He’s halfway done with his community service. I help him with the horses a lot. I think he’s pretty lonely.”

  Pilar raises her eyebrows at me. It’s such a relief to see her smile. “He’s lonely?”

  “Please.” I laugh. “I’d rather make out with Marge the Wonder Pony.”

  “What about Frank? And Cray?”

  “Both being tried as adults for arson.”

  “Jesus. How’s Thea?”

  “A mess sometimes, but most of the time she’s okay. She was supposed to be there that night, but Cray lied to her and gave her a bogus meeting place. He did the same thing to Ben. I guess, according to Cray, he was going to try to talk Frank out of it.”

  “Do you think that’s true?”

  “I don’t know. I’d like to think it is.”

  “Who knew that new plastic crap they’re building the Willows out of isn’t flammable.”

  “Not Frank.”

  “No, definitely not Frank.” She snorts. “And what about her?”

  I know who she’s talking about. “She’s back east, with relatives. They’re trying to figure out if she is going to have to testify against her dad or not.”

  “Do you miss her?”

  Her question catches me off guard.

  “I mean,” she says, not hiding the thread of hurt in her voice, “you guys were pretty close.”

  I can’t even manage to shrug, caught up in the memory of how Gate’s body felt when it went limp against me. I’d pulled her into a hug when Sheriff Dean ordered her father to the ground and then pressed his boot into her dad’s neck. I told her not to look, but she did anyway and screamed for Sheriff Dean to stop. She shook and screamed What’s happening? again and again. When she whispered in my ear, I think it was because she couldn’t scream anymore. She whispered, sobbing, It was my dad, wasn’t it?

  “She writes to me,” I finally say. “Long letters.”

  “Have you written her back?”

  “A couple times. She called me a couple times.”

  Pilar’s face wrinkles. “What’d she say?”

  “Not much. She sounds kind of out of it. I think they might have medicated her or something. She wanted to talk about Clarence.”

  Pilar snorts. “Of course she did.”

  “Not like that,” I say gently. “She wanted to tell me about him.”

  “Like what? What’d she tell you?”

  I tell Pilar about the conversation, about how Gate kept saying that she’d send me the picture of her and Clarence in their playpen. She said they were fraternal twins, but if you saw the picture, you’d swear they were identical. She said they would crack each other up, sitting in the playpen together, gurgling jokes that nobody else understood.

  “She remembered all that?” Pilar asks.

  “I think a lot of it is what her mom told her.”

  “What I don’t get, though, is why didn’t her dad …” She lets the question trail off.
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  “Kill Gate?” I ask.

  “Well … yeah. I mean, it’s not like he just went after boys. And it’s not like the fact that she’s his daughter would have stopped him. Just look what he did to Clarence. And did her mom know? And if he was up here, why didn’t her dad’s DNA get tested?”

  “Gate thinks …”

  “Wait, you asked her about it?” Pilar says, touching my arm in surprise.

  I look away from her and watch my boots slide into the deep snow. Step, step, step.

  “We talked about a lot of things,” I finally say, letting my eyes meet Pilar’s. She nods. “Gate and Clarence’s mom and dad were getting divorced, but according to Gate, things were still kind of friendly between them. Their mom moved out here to be with her sisters, to live with other Croondons. She took Clarence with her but left Gate with her dad, and the plan was that eventually Gate and her dad would move out here too. Gate would live with Clarence and her mom, and her dad would live somewhere else on the mountain and get to see the kids on weekends or something. The day that Clarence got killed was the day before Gate and her dad were supposed to come for a visit, to look for an apartment for her dad. Cate says they came the night before without telling anybody, checked into a hotel room down the hill, and then her dad left her in the room by herself on the morning Clarence got killed. She says when he got back to the room, they went to the airport and flew all the way back home. Nobody ever knew they’d come in the first place.”

  “And she never told anybody?” Pilar asks angrily. “She never thought that maybe that was a piece of important information?”

  I shake my head. “She thinks maybe she just blocked the whole thing out. The whole trip took less than twenty-four hours, and she was asleep for a lot of it. She thinks maybe he gave her something, to make her sleep, to make her groggy. Her dad acted like the trip never happened, so she did too.”

  “But that still doesn’t explain why he didn’t just kill her too. Sorry if that’s harsh, but I just don’t get it.”

  “She doesn’t either. She thinks maybe whatever it was that made him kill Clarence went to sleep, into some sort of hibernation, when they got back east. She sounds like a little kid when she’s talking about it. It’s sad.”