The Miracle Stealer

by Neil Connelly

  “What do you mean?”

  “You’re trying to reason folks out of a position that’s got nothing to do with reason. These things are matters of faith. People believe with their hearts, Anderson, not their heads. All this story will do is make you seem pissy. Nobody’ll change their mind.”

  I knew instantly that what she was saying was right, but I didn’t want to admit it. “Print it and let’s find out.”

  She handed the story back to me. “Nah. Can’t do that. Won’t do it. Besides the fact that it’s a dumbass idea you’re too thick-headed to see, the whole town knows you work here, and publishing this would make us seem biased. Journalists are supposed to stay objective.”

  “Don’t lecture me, Gayle. This ain’t the New York Times.”

  She put the story down and aimed that white fork up at me, stared at me along it like a rifle. “No, it’s the Five Mountains Gazetteer, and it’s my paper. When you’re the publisher and editor, you can decide what goes into it.”

  I looked away from her, out the window at Roosevelt Road. A school bus painted white rumbled by, with a blue cross and words I couldn’t read scrawled along the side like graffiti. A bus like that had no place in our town, none that would make me happy at least. I scratched at my forehead.

  Gayle said, “Listen, since you’re already all riled up, may as well tell you that we’ll be running a story on the baby.”

  “The baby,” I repeated. “Miracle?”

  “It’s news, Anderson. And that’s our business, remember? Even with Paradise Days just around the corner, all anybody’s talking about is that baby girl and Daniel. You should hear what they’re saying over at Vic’s. Cooper Reynolds swears his migraines are gone. Scotty Mitchell’s stutter has cleared up. And Sally Guth is late.”

  “Late for what?”

  “Her period. She and Jim have been trying for two years to conceive.”

  I could feel my jaw sticking out. “And somehow Daniel is responsible for this? How? You know it’s all just coincidence. C’mon, Gayle, you can’t believe any of this miracle bullshit.”

  “What I believe doesn’t matter. But a lot of the people who buy papers see these things as signs and wonders. I have an obligation.”

  “Guess I just didn’t realize how many of your subscribers were royal nutjobs.”

  She spiked her fork into the salad and huffed. “Don’t be like this. You know how things are. Besides, Sylvia’s got some cute shots of that baby, and I already talked to your mom.”

  Now those two bags from Victorio’s made sense. She’d been to the Abernathys’ and found out I was coming here. I said, “So you already interviewed my mother for that story?”

  Defiant, Gayle nodded her head. “We talked.”

  “And you’re going to run one of Volpe’s pictures of Daniel and that baby?”

  “It’s a human interest story. I’m in the business of selling papers.”

  “Unbelievable. This’ll only make everything worse. You don’t even care about my side of the story.”

  “I know your side of it, Anderson. Everybody south of Scranton knows your side of it. Don’t you get it? Nobody wants to hear it. These people want to believe.”

  “Volpe and the crazies do,” I said. Before I really knew what I was doing, I was walking toward the front door. When I snapped it open, the little bell chimed stupidly on top.

  Gayle shoved her chair back and followed me out onto the sidewalk. “Come back in here and finish your lunch. We got work to do.”

  I looked up and down the street, wondering about the crazy beat-up bus, but it was gone. “No,” I told Gayle. “I think maybe I’ll take a few sick days. I need time to sort this thing out.”

  People across the road were looking now, and those walking past ducked their heads like they weren’t listening. I knew word would spread quickly that Anderson Grant had had another one of her hysterical fits, but I didn’t care.

  Gayle stepped over close to me, took my arm in her hand, and said quietly, “You’re always jumping into things without thinking them through. Be careful, Andi. I don’t want you getting hurt.”

  Looking back, Gayle was damn near a prophet, but I didn’t heed her warning. Instead I started the long walk home, knowing that I’d probably just lost a valuable ally. If I was going to save Daniel, I couldn’t do it alone.

  Hiding behind a thick pine tree, resting my face into the hard bark, I watched Jeff Cedars for almost half an hour. He was cleaning off his father’s Jet Skis one by one, sitting on each seat as the tiny crafts bobbed on the surface of the lake, scrubbing their colorful bodies with a soapy yellow sponge that he dunked now and then into a blue bucket above him on the dock. The Jet Skis were dirty from just sitting around in storage, but with Paradise Days nearing, Mr. Cedars needed them to be ready for rental. I decided that this must have been what brought Jeff home from college—his parents’ call to come help.

  Even though it didn’t really matter, Jeff cleaned each Jet Ski until it shined, taking pride in his work. Every so often, he’d climb up to the dock and blast the suds with a hose. The sun was warm, and while I watched, Jeff slid his T-shirt over his buzzed head. In high school, Jeff was always on these crazy diets to make weight for wrestling. But he worked out and stayed in good shape, and it looked like his three years at college had added more than a few pounds of muscle. Tight squares on his abdomen suggested a regimen of sit-ups. The patch of hair that had once been just a ragged little triangle in the middle of his chest had spread out to the size of a hand. I could remember when his chest was perfectly smooth, and I wondered what it might feel like to run my fingers through that soft diamond.

  I wasn’t really sure how I’d come to be behind that tree. I guess I have to give credit, or maybe blame, to my legs. It’s ironic as hell now, but all through middle and high school, my legs were the only part of me that I really liked. An ugly bump rose up on the bridge of my nose from when I busted it diving into a submerged rock. My chest was (still is) flat. My arms were too skinny, and my feet were too big. But my legs—they were slender and lean, tight and hard with muscles I’d earned. I’m not one of these girls obsessed with her looks, and I never really cared what anybody else thought of my legs. But they’d helped me win a lot of races and hadn’t let me down when I needed them most, so I came to trust their instincts. When they said move, I moved.

  As I had walked away from Gayle’s, I got to making a kind of inventory of all the citizens of Paradise, trying to think of which ones were less crazy than others and which ones might help me and which ones might have some idea of how to stop the miracle machine. The idea to try to find my dad passed through my head, but I pushed that out. The rest of my list was pretty short. All the while, though, my legs were leading me to Jeff, a fact I didn’t realize until I nearly stepped into the clearing that looks down on his family’s dock. But I heard the hose and caught myself—like waking up from a dream—just in time to slip behind that pine. If it were up to my legs, I’d have marched right out into the open, I’m sure.

  But now Jeff had wiped down the last of the Jet Skis and was climbing up onto the dock. He carried the bucket into the boathouse and when he came out, his T-shirt was on and he was making a beeline for his father’s white van. I imagined him driving that van back to school, leaving me here alone again. And with that, my legs moved me out from behind the tree. “Yo, Cedars,” I heard myself say.

  Jeff turned and found my eyes immediately, and when he did, he smiled. “Yo, Grant.” He stood where was he was, shoved his hands into the pockets of his shorts. “You interested in renting a really freaking clean Jet Ski?”

  I skirted the water, stepping from rock to rock, then jumped up on the dock before he had a chance to offer his hand. “Nah. Those things don’t have enough speed for me.”

  He grinned. Face-to-face, we had that awkward moment where we couldn’t decide if we should hug or not. Since Jeff’s a little shorter than me, he looked up to try and read my eyes to see what I’d want. We
leaned together then leaned back, as if some magnetic force repelled our bodies. Maybe it was guilt. After a few seconds, he held up one hand and dangled car keys. “I’m sorry, but my dad’s been down at Al’s getting his hair cut. My mom asked me to go pick him up. You feel like a ride?”

  I couldn’t tell if he wanted me to come along or not, but I couldn’t let him go. I shrugged my shoulders and said, “Got nothing else to do.”

  We climbed into the van and cranked the big doors shut. A Christmas tree air freshener hung from the rearview mirror, but I didn’t smell anything. It could’ve been the same one that had hung there for years. I also recognized the duct tape that patched the seat.

  “So how’s your dad doing?” I asked, just trying to be polite.

  “It’s a day-by-day thing,” Jeff said. “My mom said he’s really trying.”

  “That’s great,” I said.

  Jeff started the car and pulled out. Just that spring, Chief Bundower had picked up Jeff’s father, drunk and asleep behind the wheel, two blocks from the Dog Bar Cantina. Word around town was that the Chief had overlooked two previous incidents, including one that ended with Mr. Cedars’ van in a ditch. So after his third strike, Jeff’s dad puttered around town on a red bicycle with a basket on the front or had Mrs. Cedars drive him wherever he needed to go. I didn’t want to tell Jeff, but a couple times, I’d seen that red bike outside the Dog Bar.

  As we headed north on Roosevelt Road, I started squirming with the silence. I asked, “So how’d your classes end up this semester?”

  “Not too bad,” Jeff said. “Got A’s in Sociology of the Family and Environmental Science. Got a B in Applications in Critical Thinking, and a C in History of Landscape Architecture.”

  “Landscape Architecture?”

  “Yeah, it’s like designing parks and stuff like that.”

  Even though the road twists and curves like crazy, Jeff rested his palms loosely on the steering wheel. I saw that his fingernails were trimmed neat and tight. All during high school, he’d had a bad habit of biting at them when he was nervous.

  Jeff honked twice and waved as we neared three backpackers walking on the side of the road. I guess he was assuming he knew them. But as we passed, they turned their heads and we saw they were strangers. I wondered why they were in Paradise, on foot.

  “So what happened to all your hair?” I asked. “You lose a bet or something?”

  He ran a hand over his crew cut. “Coach talked a few of us into an off-season tournament in May. We buzzed our heads to show solidarity, or something like that. It’s comfortable for the summer, but come fall I’m going to let it grow out again.”

  “You should keep it,” I said. “It looks nice.” Then I wished I hadn’t said something that might sound like a come-on. It was just strange, because Jeff had always been funny about his hair, keeping it long to cover a cauliflower ear he got from all those beatings on the wrestling mat. Now there it was, bumpy and exposed for all the world to see.

  “Still running?” he asked.

  “About every day,” I answered. “Penn State’s got a good gym, I guess.”

  He smirked. “About six. And they’re crazy nice. Even the crappiest one is better than Paradise High’s workout room. It’s funny, though. I snuck in with the football team the other morning, and it was good to get back to those beat-up free weights. Maybe we just like things that are familiar, you know?”

  “Maybe so,” I said distractedly. Other than track, high school wasn’t something I missed a whole lot.

  “You still heading for Lock Haven come August?”

  “That’s the plan,” I said, but it came out without energy or enthusiasm. I rolled my window down and let the air push against my face. It was good to see Jeff, but our conversation felt forced and awkward. It seemed like both of us were searching for questions just to keep the silence from filling the van.

  What I wanted was to tell Jeff I was doing great, that my decision to defer my track scholarship for a year had been the absolute right one, no questions asked. I wanted to say that now I felt like Daniel was safe and when the fall rolled around I could leave for Lock Haven and get on with a life of my own. All this, of course, would have been a lie. “Jeff,” I said without thinking, “I need to talk.”

  Jeff nodded and turned into the dirt parking lot of Amazing Animals, a roadside zoo that housed a dozen lame exhibits—an obese porcupine, anxious prairie dogs, a stuffed bison with a missing horn. After fallen pine trees smashed through a retaining wall during the ice storm, Samson the blind bear and a puma had escaped. The puma got hit by a snowplow over on Highway 71, but Samson disappeared forever in that ice storm, like my father. Now and then you’d hear a story about somebody spotting the bear, but he had surely died of starvation long ago.

  “Keep driving,” I said. “You shouldn’t keep your dad waiting.”

  Jeff shut off the engine. “I heard about Daniel,” he said, staring straight through the windshield. “I should’ve called you.”

  “Well,” I said. “It’s a weird deal.”

  “I didn’t know if you’d want me to call.”

  I understood how he felt, but didn’t know what to say back. “So what did you hear?”

  “For starters, that Daniel walked across the lake last Saturday night when the Abernathys called.”

  “You got to be shitting me.”

  “Nope,” Jeff said. “I also heard that Mrs. Abernathy’s baby was born dead. Daniel prayed and brought it back to life.”

  I thought of Daniel’s song and the smell of vanilla. I felt strangely conflicted but didn’t want Jeff to know, so I asked, “Did you hear about Scotty Mitchell?”

  Jeff nodded. “He lost his stutter. Anybody tell you about Mrs. Richardson’s hemorrhoids?”

  I held my hands up to stop him. “This town is so freaking lame. Even its miracles suck.”

  Jeff laughed. Then he asked, “So how’s Little Man doing?”

  “He’s great,” I said. “Always great.”

  Jeff smiled at the thought of Daniel, and I realized I was smiling too. I remembered the times the three of us went off together, for trips around the lake in one of Mr. Cedars’ canoes or on afternoon hikes in the mountains. How easy it used to be for me to pretend we were a family of sorts. Of course, one of those long walks is what got us all into trouble in the first place.

  “It’ll blow over,” Jeff assured me. “Just like last time.”

  “I’m not taking that chance.”

  “Chance of what? Come on, we’re talking about hemorrhoids and stuttering. The town’s just looking for a little excitement to spice up the summer.”

  I took a breath and, same as I told Gayle, I gave Jeff the story about Scarecrow. He listened closely, and when I finished, he shook his head. “Guy sounds certifiably nuts. You think he might show up at the church, cause trouble?”

  “I’m not real interested in finding out,” I said. “But it isn’t just him. I saw Volpe’s eyes. I saw Mr. Abernathy. And I remember last time. What if it gets worse, Jeff? What if people keep coming this time, keep wanting Daniel to be a miracle worker?”

  Jeff shrugged. “They’ll be disappointed?”

  “It could get ugly,” I corrected him. I wondered again about those three backpackers, and the white school bus. “Sometimes, not all the time, when he gets praying real hard, something happens to Daniel.”

  “Something like what?”

  “He gets sick or something. Starts running a fever, gets all sweaty. A couple times, like when he was praying for Mrs. Bundower, it looked like he was going to die. Some of those nutjobs thought he could bring the fish back to life! We got lucky last time around, plain and simple. Daniel didn’t get hurt or too screwed up. I’m not risking that again.”

  Now Jeff looked worried. “I don’t see a whole lot you can do about what other people believe.”

  “I could take him,” I said quietly, looking down Roosevelt Road. “I could run.”

  Jeff’s hand ro
se up to his mouth and he ran his front teeth over a nail, but he didn’t bite. A delivery truck pulled in behind us and a guy got out, walked up to the gates of Amazing Animals and cupped his eyes to the window. Jeff honked and yelled, “They ain’t open on Saturdays till noon.” The guy stared at Jeff like he thought this was stupid, then walked back to his truck and pulled out a cell phone. Jeff watched him for a minute before turning back to me. “You’re going to kidnap Daniel?”

  I shook my head. “It’s only kidnapping if you demand a ransom, technically speaking. I looked it up online.”

  “Technically speaking? Oh, hell then, it’s a fine idea. I’m sure your mom wouldn’t have the freaking state police on your ass in like two seconds flat. Where would you go? How would you get there?”

  This was something that had crossed my mind. Maybe Penn State, I wanted to say. Maybe we could hide with you.

  But Jeff didn’t offer sanctuary. “Running’s in your blood, everybody knows that. But this, this’d just be crazy.”

  I knew he was right. My escape plan was the worst kind of fantasy. I decided then to ask him what I hadn’t dared to ask Gayle. “You think I could convince a judge that my mother is endangering Daniel’s health?”

  “What could a judge do?”

  “Give me custody.”

  “Legal custody of your brother? That makes sense. After all, your mom only feeds him dog food and makes him live in that ratty cardboard box. You’ve had crazier ideas, but I can’t think of one right now.”

  I’d figured the same thing, but I guess I had to have somebody else say it.

  Jeff asked, “Any chance your dad might help?”

  Looking out my window, I pictured his Jeep driving off in the snow. I said, “No chance.”

  “But are you sure he even knows—”

  “Drop it.”

  “Just asking. I didn’t realize it was bite-Jeff’s-head-off day.”

  “I don’t mean to be pissy,” I said. “I just don’t know what to do.”

  We fell quiet again. That delivery guy drove off in his truck.