The Light in the Lake

by Sarah R. Baughman

  I’m breathing hard by the time I pump uphill to the library, but I stop with my hand on the door handle. Calm down, Addie, I say. Just chill. Another deep breath, and I duck into the cool quiet.

  Ms. Allen, the librarian, looks up from the cart of books she’s shelving. We have a really tiny library, just one big room crammed with so many shelves and books it’s almost claustrophobic, but in a really good way. There’s even a brick fireplace Ms. Allen keeps going all winter. “Hi there, Addie,” she says.

  “Hi, Ms. Allen.” I smile at her. “Can I use a computer?”

  “Of course,” Ms. Allen says. “You know the password, right?”

  I don’t even have to think. “Mountain. Every time. Right?”

  “You got it,” Ms. Allen says.

  “Actually,” I say, “maybe you could help. I have some research I need to do for my summer project out at Maple Lake. Mr. Dale wants us to look up information about the lake’s history.”

  Ms. Allen’s eyes brighten. “I do know we have a book or two about Maple Lake. Let me see what I can find.”

  Just then a whoosh of air sucks the swinging foyer door open; someone must be coming in.

  Footsteps pound, and then I see Tai, one hand running through his stick-straight-up hair, the other balancing a soccer ball against his hip. He spots me. “Hey! Addie!” he calls.

  Ms. Allen smiles and gets up from her desk. “Well, hello there. I don’t think I’ve seen you before. I’m Ms. Allen.”

  “Sorry,” Tai whispers, flashing her a smile. “That was probably a little loud. I’m Tai.”

  Ms. Allen laughs. “We’re the only ones here, Tai. The books don’t mind.”

  Even so, Tai tiptoes over to the computer, gently places his soccer ball on the floor, and holds his hand out for a low five. “What’s up, Ad?” he asks, still whispering. “Mom dropped me off here. Told me to explore. So I figured dribbling a soccer ball around that sidewalk outside would be a good workout.”

  “I was just doing some more research about the history of the lake,” I say.

  Ms. Allen comes over with a book that looks like it hasn’t been checked out since probably 1990. She even has to wipe a little dust off the cover before handing it to me.

  I read the title aloud: “A Glacial History of Shoreland County.” I bet Mama’s read this book; she must have learned about glaciers somewhere. I let it fall open to a photo of the white whale, then reach back and carefully remove the tooth from my pocket, hiding it in my palm.

  Tai leans over to look. “Cool picture; I can’t believe there used to be white whales around here. Kind of makes you wonder what else could be in that lake, right?”

  My grip on the tooth loosens. I think of the way Tai barreled into the library, just like Amos used to do in muddy boots, and I know I want to tell him.

  I let my hand open and hold the tooth out in front of Tai.

  His eyes get wide. “Is that a dinosaur tooth?”

  “Sort of,” I say. “It actually looks just like a white whale tooth. The thing about it is that this tooth is big. Really big. Like, almost three whole inches, maybe—bigger than any white whale tooth I ever saw.”

  “So what are you saying?” Tai asks.

  And then I tell him what I haven’t told anyone else. Not even Liza. Maybe it’s Tianchi, or maybe it’s that Tai’s new, and safe, someone without the kind of history that could get in the way of me trying to do something different. I just let the whole story pour out—Amos’s theory about the lake creature, the clues he found, the notebook he left.

  “When we were little, we used to talk about there being a creature living in Maple Lake,” I said. “I mean, it’s not hard to see why. If you spend enough time on the lake as a kid you’re bound to come up with some stories like that. But I started getting more and more into science and trying to figure out why things were the way they were in nature, and Amos just wanted to think about what might be there instead.”

  “Hmmm,” Tai says. “I think I might be with Amos on this one. It’s neat to think about what might exist.”

  “I just like figuring out what I can know for sure,” I say.

  “Well, what do you know for sure about this tooth?” Tai asks. “You said your bus driver gave it to you, right? Where’d she find it?”

  “I… don’t know.” I guess I never asked.

  “We should find out,” Tai says.

  “I don’t know her number,” I say. “My mom does. She’s known her forever. But I don’t really want to ask her.” Mama and Dad would obviously wonder why.

  I look back toward Ms. Allen’s desk and see a phone book perched on the corner.

  It’s not too heavy; there aren’t many people in Shoreland County. I know Barbara Ann’s last name from hearing Mama say it so much, and when I open the book to the L section, it doesn’t take me long to find her entry: Leddy, B. A.

  I punch her number into my phone and hold my breath while it rings.

  “Um, hi, Barbara Ann?” I say when she answers, her voice sliding in slow and clear. “This is Addie. Addie Lago. I just wanted to thank you for the tooth. It’s really… cool.”

  Is it weird to say I hear her smile? Her voice stretches up at the corners. “I’m so glad you like it, Addie.”

  “I just had a question, though,” I say. “What I wondered was… well… where did you find it?” Please don’t tell me you just bought it at the Bluewater Museum for a buck, I silently beg. I want so much for it to be real, mysterious, to deserve its spot in Amos’s notebook.

  The tooth stares up at us, colossally big, bigger than the heads of the perch swimming through Maple Lake.

  Barbara Ann doesn’t say anything at first. For a second I think she’s hung up. “I found that on the beach,” she says finally. “Walking just before sunset. It was sticking out of the sand.”

  “What made you pick it up, though?” I ask. Our sand is full of stones, left over from all the mountain pieces that chipped away. A half-buried tooth would just blend in.

  “It was shining,” Barbara Ann says softly. “Shining like you wouldn’t believe. I guess people would probably say it was just the way the sun hit it, but—”

  Her voice falls away. Then it comes back. “But I don’t think that’s it,” she finishes. “I don’t think that’s it at all.”

  Part of me wants to say something else. But most of me just wants to stop the call and let this sink in. “Thanks, Barbara Ann,” I say. When she finishes telling me to have a great summer and to take care of that tooth, I hit the red End button and stare at the phone and the tooth, side by side.

  “So?” Tai asks. “What did she say?”

  I tell him about the shining tooth, and I watch his eyes. They get wide, but they light up too. I haven’t really seen them do that until now. Tai leans back and chews his lip. He’s really thinking.

  “I kept telling Amos that if he really wanted to convince me there was some creature living in the lake, he’d have to produce evidence,” I say. “So that’s what he started doing. He kept a list of clues. And I think this tooth is just the kind of clue he was looking for.”

  Tai leans forward in his seat, his elbow resting on a jiggling knee. He’s looking at me so hard I have to look away. “So your brother was trying to use science to prove that the creature was real?” he asks.

  “Basically,” I say. “But I didn’t believe him.”

  “And you do now?” Tai asks.

  “It doesn’t really seem possible,” I say. “But I do have the notebook where he kept track of everything.”

  “Don’t you see, though?” Tai stares at me, his eyes wide, urgent. “This is just like Tianchi.”

  “Same idea, I know. That doesn’t mean either creature is real.” Tai looks disappointed. I rush to explain what I want to do. “Amos saw the harmful algal blooms. He wrote about them in one of the clues. It makes me wonder what else he recorded that we could explain.”

  “He saw the blooms?” Tai’s forehead scrunches up.
“What did he say about them?”

  “Nothing, really. I don’t think he knew what he was looking at.” He really just mentioned the green parts in passing, but the fact that he noticed them at all makes me curious about the rest of the clue. “I was thinking—or, I just wonder, I guess, if we’re using your scientific method—that… maybe whatever Amos was talking about could actually be part of what your mom is trying to figure out.”

  Tai nods slowly. “I’d buy that.”

  My phone buzzes; this time it’s a text from Dad. I stiffen.

  You still at library

  I punch letters with my thumb, rushing to finish.

  Yeah tell Mama don’t worry. Be home later

  “So,” I say. “I came here to do some research. Guess I should probably start that.” And I’m not just curious about Maple Lake’s history; I want to know what might be happening now too. I type lake pollution into the search box and words float onto the screen. Watershed. Runoff. Sediment.

  “Eh,” Tai says. “Mr. Dale gives us time during the day to research that stuff. I kinda care more about your brother’s clues right now. Do you have his notebook?”

  “I always have it,” I say, reaching into my pocket. I’m actually really glad Tai seems to care about Amos’s clues. I know Amos would have appreciated it too. But when I touch the notebook’s edge, I stop for just a second. Part of me doesn’t want to pull it out. Amos gave this to me. He wanted me to see it.

  But then I feel it again. A big squeeze around my arms, like someone’s pressing them into my sides. It’s not Tai; he’s just sitting on the chair in front of me, waiting for me to say something.

  Go ahead. Did I say that out loud? Or did I hear it? Think it?

  Show him. My arms relax; the pressure’s gone. And where the pressure was, there’s just warmth now.

  I’ve never really let myself think this before, not clearly. But these things that don’t quite make sense—the too-big tooth, the notebook with its strange clues—tell me that even though I can’t explain it scientifically, the warm feeling that squeezes me so hard sometimes I almost gasp is Amos, telling me he’s here. That everything’s okay.

  The truth is I feel him everywhere. Not just here in the library, surrounded by dusty books we checked out over and over again when we were little, but also on the lake, wind slicing through my hair and waves rolling at my feet.

  And if Amos—who isn’t really here, who can’t be here—is all around me, what else might be real that I can’t see? I owe it to Amos to find out just how real his clues are. If I do, I can help him the way I never did while he was alive.

  I hold the notebook out for Tai, like I did the tooth. He looks at me softly, not saying anything.

  “Go ahead,” I tell him. “It was my brother’s.” The warm feeling stays, swirling around me. “I signed up for this Young Scientist position so I could research pollution on the lake. But I have to research the clues my brother left too.”

  Tai looks up at me fast, his eyes wide. But I nod, and he lifts the notebook out of my hands. Now we’re sharing it.

  Chapter 12

  I pull on pajamas and sit in bed, thumbing through Amos’s notebook. Last week at the library, Tai told me that based on what Barbara Ann said about the whale tooth, I should add to clue number five, and I did: mysteriously shining. But just as I take the tooth out to look at it again, hoping for the millionth time to see some of that shine, the doorbell rings.

  Then I hear Dad down the hall. “Liza!” he says. “Come on in. You too, Mary. Where you headed?”

  Oh no, I think. I was supposed to go help with Rascal yesterday, but I forgot and went to the library again to read about harmful algal blooms.

  Still, why is my stomach flip-flopping on itself like this? I should want to see Liza.

  I hear Mama telling Aunt Mary to come sit down, have some tea, and then, sure enough, she calls my name: “Addie!”

  I can’t quite read the expression on Liza’s face when I walk down the hall.

  “Hey,” I say. Seeing Liza feels so normal, but strange too, even after only a few days. It reminds me of when I broke my arm in fourth grade. All those weeks in a cast, I forgot what this really important part of me looked or felt like. When the doctor finally cut the plaster off, I remember staring down at my arm and feeling like I didn’t even know how to move it anymore.

  “Let’s go to my room,” I say, and reach out. Liza hesitates, then lets me pull her down the hall.

  She doesn’t have much time to prepare for the Shoreland Art Show, and I should have invited her over before. I meant to, I really did. But it also feels like the only things I have enough energy for are Maple Lake and the notebook.

  Liza goes in ahead of me, and when I turn back after shutting the door, she’s staring at me, her eyes pooling.

  “I haven’t been in here,” she says. “In—in a long time.” She wipes both eyes and looks up at the ceiling.

  I know right away what she means. She hasn’t been in here since… Amos. She walks over to the bed, reaches up to the top bunk, and just rests her hand on the wooden railing.

  I look around my room, at the emptiness that grew there. The desk with no papers or comic books or pencils piled on it. The bed with no blanket or pillow. Mama and Dad boxed all those things up and put them in the closet where his clothes still hang. And then they shut the door.

  Liza knows how this room is supposed to look. It feels like she knows too much. Like she can’t look at me without seeing him.

  “Where were you yesterday?” she asks. She blinks fast, wipes her eyes.

  “Um,” I say. “The library.” But I can feel my stomach twisting up in knots. I’m not telling Liza the whole truth, and she knows me well enough to know that.

  She squeezes her lips together, then lets out a breath. “Rascal missed you,” she says.

  I stare at the wall only so I can avoid her eyes. “I was just there,” I say. “I mean, it wasn’t that long ago that I was there.”

  “Every day counts with a calf,” she says. “I led her around the barn. It wasn’t so bad. She’s basically gotten used to the halter. But she needs to get used to you too.”

  My mouth suddenly feels super dry. “I’ll come over tomorrow. For sure.”

  Liza runs her hand across the bunk bed railing and looks up at the ceiling. She smiles, but it’s a sad smile. “Remember when you and Amos helped me make those baloney sandwiches?”

  “Of course,” I say.

  “It was just supposed to be for DeeDee and Sammie,” she says. “And we made that assembly line.”

  “You had the bread, I had the mayo, Amos had the baloney.” I can see us standing there in the kitchen. It’s like I’m looking through a window at a different version of myself. The one that could still grab Amos by the shoulder for support when I started laughing too hard.

  “And whose idea was it to pair a movement with each part of the line?” Liza asks.

  But she knows. We both know. It was Amos.

  Liza lets out a laugh. “What was mine again? A hip wiggle? Then I had to give you a high five.”

  “And then I had to do a pirouette and give Amos a high five,” I say. “And then—”

  We both snort at the same time, which happens a lot when we laugh.

  “Break dancing!” we both yell, and the fact that we say that at the same time too makes us laugh harder. I don’t think either of us will ever forget Amos spinning on the floor, popping up into a handstand, then twisting back up again to slap baloney on a piece of bread. Pretty soon Liza is wiping tears from her eyes again. This time, I’m not sure if they’re laughing tears or the other kind.

  “And we made way too many sandwiches,” I say, “just because the assembly line was so fun. Didn’t we end up with like ten before we realized how many we had?”

  Liza nods, sniffling.

  Those were our days. More baloney sandwiches than we needed and doubled-over laughs. Teaching Baby Katy how to clap and Bumble to shake. The
silence between us now is weird. But I don’t want to tell Liza about anything I’ve been dealing with this summer. Why do I feel fine about telling Tai instead?

  I want to reach out and grab Liza’s hand, but at the same time, I don’t. “Do you want me to take another look at your portfolio?”

  “I don’t have it,” she says. “Mom and I were just driving by, and I asked if we could pull in. You definitely should come over tomorrow. I think I figured out how to fix the problem you told me about. I found something to add.”

  “Oh yeah?” I say. But even I can hear the distraction in my voice. I want to help Liza, but I keep thinking about everything else.

  “I need to help you more with Rascal too,” she says. “I wanted you to be the one to show her in the ring. But you don’t know anything yet. Like, what stuff the judge will be looking for or anything.”

  Guilt pricks me all over, a million tiny needles. “I know,” I say. “I’ll come.”

  After Liza leaves, I shut my door and go back to thinking about Maple Lake, and Amos’s notebook. There’s no way Amos would have wanted me to tell my teacher and another scientist about his clues, not until we could really prove what they meant. But I think I’ve figured out how to get out on the lake alone, without Dr. Li or Mr. Dale right there, so Tai and I can investigate.

  I pull out the notebook and record everything I can about what Dr. Li told me, plus descriptions of the harmful algal blooms and where we saw them. I make sure to write dates and times, just like a scientist would.

  It feels a little strange to put data about pollution next to information about the creature, but I’m starting to think there might be more science in Amos’s magic than I thought.

  Chapter 13

  At the biological station, Mr. Dale asks us for a research update. Tai and I run through different possibilities—logging, lawn chemicals, traffic, and the construction Mama talked about.