A Grave Calling

by Wendy Roberts

“What did you tell him?” I asked.

  “I told him you were a grown-assed woman and you didn’t answer to an old man like me.”

  I laughed on my way out the door. It was best Denny didn’t know what I was up to. It would quickly become a thing. And not a good thing. Sort of a hissy fit stop-messing-with-the-devil thing.

  The wind howled and blew a small branch Wookie’s way. He hunted the stick, chomped it happily and carried it into the vehicle like a prize. When we got back to the trailer, the wind nearly ripped the door right out of my hands. The entire trailer vibrated from the breeze. Wookie carried his stick to his bed and gnawed it happily before he finally collapsed, exhausted as if he’d worked a hard day in the mines.

  Denny had left me a note on the kitchen table. It was actually a sketch of me with a thought bubble that said, I miss Denny. The drawing was good. He had my hair blowing across my face like I was standing in a breeze and my eyes half-closed looking sultry. He always made me prettier than I could ever actually be. I put the picture on my fridge using a magnet from Pike’s Place Market in Seattle.

  Denny was talented. I wish he’d use his artistic ability for more but he lacked the drive to try. Or feared success on some level. He was probably on his way to work at the casino now but I sent him a text anyway saying I’d been out running errands for the day and was home now. The lie tripped off my fingers easily. Denny thought I was messing with the devil using divining rods. Not that he was particularly religious but he’d been raised by a father with a heavy moral hand when it came to such things.

  “No different than using a Ouija board,” Denny said to me time and time again.

  It didn’t feel like that to me. It felt like a gnawing ache, and if I knew there was somebody out there needing a body to bury it felt wrong to turn away.

  Even though it was cool, the air inside the trailer was stuffy and smelled of dog and yesterday’s soup. I stripped down to my bra and panties and, even though I shouldn’t, I opened my laptop and dug up the articles I’d read about the three girls. Their pictures were everywhere. High school photos of them smiling brightly and innocently at the camera. It took only a couple clicks before I realized the girl I’d found today was the first to go missing. Luna Quinn. In the picture her brown hair was in a fancy updo and she’d carefully applied her makeup with a heavy hand around the eyes. She’d been missing for over a month. There’d been no update on the news yet to say she’d been found. I wondered why. My mind went to that white ribbon and to her twisted, naked form under the bridge, and I clenched my teeth.

  Then, inadvertently, my hand went to my cheek. Her mom’s slap across my face had been jarring. She was half-crazed with grief and I knew it was the knee-jerk reaction of someone who’d been living life on the edge of a razor for a month. It could’ve been worse. Some of the missing were never found and the hopeful left-behinds just kept on dreaming that they’d turn up somewhere with amnesia or something. That they’d walk through the door of their home one day acting as if they were perfectly fine and had just lost track of time in a fugue state somewhere. Maybe that was better than the reality. Maybe not.

  I hoped Luna’s mom found at least a tiny bit of comfort in having a body to bury.

  “Rest in peace, Luna Quinn,” I whispered.

  After I turned off the computer I clicked on the TV. I didn’t have many channels to choose from but sometimes I liked the box on just for the sound, a noisy distraction to help quiet the uneasiness in my head. Tonight it didn’t give any relief. My mind was stuck in the quicksand. Movies and television in the 1980s loved to play up quicksand deaths for comical theatrics but the public eventually learned those deaths were not a common thing. But people were occasionally killed in quicksand-related deaths. Anyone pulled into the dark place of their own mind knew that a traumatic slideshow in your brain could kill you just as often. The pictures burst inside my head.

  Tulip fields.

  Boots in the mud.

  Luna Quinn’s body.

  White ribbon.

  Pierce’s hand on my leg.

  The snippets played over and over on a maniacal repeat playlist until my head ached. Previously a bottle of wine would’ve helped ease the soreness. Another would’ve obliterated the caring. That was no longer an option. I licked my lips and tried to think of something else. I started a game of Scrabble online but kept missing my turn because my mind wasn’t in it. Whoever I was playing against called me a stupid bitch and logged off. Scrabble people could be crazy as hell.

  My thoughts kept drifting to the past, into the quicksand.

  The first time I’d found a body I used just a switch of a willow branch carved into a divining rod. Gramps had handed it to me telling me a tale of how people used them to find water.

  “They called them water witches,” he’d said. “Not just anyone can do it. You have to be special.”

  He put the willow rod in my hands with a smile and told me to see if I could find some water. He was trying to keep me out of Grandma’s way because she was in a mood. She was always in a mood and I was happy to stay away. I was twelve and skeptical but still intrigued enough by his story to walk the fields near and far holding out that forked stick.

  When it finally twitched in my hands and nearly tugged me down an old abandoned well, I squealed with excitement. Then I lay flat on my belly and looked down that deep, gloomy space. The sun glinted off the pale white legs of a toddler who’d gone missing earlier that day. I ran all the way home screaming for Gramps. Breathlessly I told him what I found and where and how. Grandma listened with a firm set to her mouth and told me to stay put in the house with her while Gramps investigated my story. Once he’d left the house, she’d grabbed me hard by the arms and squeezed until I was on my knees and thought the bone in my upper arm would snap like a twig inside her fist.

  “Did you do it? Did you push that baby down that hole?”

  “No, no, no,” I shouted over and over again but she kept squeezing tighter and tighter. I could tell she didn’t believe me.

  “What will people think?” she’d hissed. “You’re stupid. Just like your mom. A dumb bunny just like her.” She’d released my arm and clucked her tongue and whispered over and over. “Not a brain cell to spare between the two of you.”

  Abruptly, I brought my fist down so hard on the kitchen table that Wookie jumped up from his bed and barked.

  “Wanna dance, boy?” I asked.

  Throwing the door to the trailer open, I ran outside into the dark to the scrub of dried weeds and rocks that was my yard. The wind whipped my hair into my mouth as I tossed back my head and laughed. Stones and coarse weeds scraped my feet and I threw my hands out to the side and twirled around and around. The March wind pinked my skin, and Wookie woofed and jumped happily alongside. The dog didn’t care how crazed it was that we danced and pirouetted nearly naked in a windstorm. Eventually I stubbed my toe on a rock, tripped over my own two feet, then landed hard on my ass. I sprawled out on my back, the weeds and rocks dug into my body, and the icy gale pummeled my skin. I looked up and took in deep gasps of the chilled air. Stars freckled the dark sky. Dust kicked up into my face and mixed with my tears as Wookie put his head on my bare stomach. We stayed like that in the dirt until the wind grew so cold that it felt like a burn.

  Wookie’s worried whimper roused me enough to go inside. Still dusty and dirty from the ground, I fell into bed and drifted into a fitful sleep. In the middle of the night my phone rang. I didn’t recognize the incoming number but answered anyway with a mumbled half-asleep “Hello.”

  No reply came from the other end but I could hear background noise. A television maybe. The clink of ice cubes into a glass.

  “Hello?” I repeated.

  I sat up in bed and strained to listen. I could hear faint breathing before the call clicked off. I knew deep down in my bones it was Agent Pierce. Aft
er that it took hours before I drifted off again.

  * * *

  When Wookie slurped my eyes awake the next morning, I was ravenous and ate two bowls of cereal before heading to Gramps’s. I chopped up a few vegetables and threw them into the slow cooker with barley and frozen chicken thighs.

  “By dinner it’ll be ready,” I told him.

  “Because you won’t be home for dinner,” he said.

  I tossed some garlic into the pot. “I’m going to be out late with Katie so I’ll collect Wookie in the morning.”

  He nodded. “If you get into any trouble, you just call me.”

  “Don’t worry.” I went over and hugged him briefly. “There won’t be any trouble. We’re just going up to the casino for dinner and fun. I’m leaving right from work. In the meantime...” I patted his hand. “I want you to think about where you’d like to go for dinner next week on your birthday.”

  “I don’t need anything special,” he said but I heard the smile in his voice.

  “Of course you do.” I laughed and waved goodbye on my way out the door.

  Grandma hadn’t believed in making a big deal about birthdays. When I turned thirteen she handed me a wrapped gift for the first time ever. It was a dish towel and a sponge and she’d cackled with delight at my disappointment.

  Every person alive has a birthday. Don’t act like you’re so special.

  Gramps would still take me out for ice cream and sneak me a few dollars to buy myself something. Since Grandma died I always took him out for his birthday and let him eat whatever greasy heart-attack-inducing crap he wanted.

  It was my eight-to-four shift and a Friday so the station would be busier than yesterday. I didn’t mind busy. It kept my thoughts occupied. Jonas called my cell just as I was pulling into the lot.

  “Hey, Julie, what’s up?” he asked.

  “I don’t know.” I rolled my eyes. “Why don’t you tell me?” And it sure as hell better not be you saying you can’t come in for your shift at four because Katie will freak if I cancel on her.

  “I got a real bad toothache. It’s killing me. Only time I can get into the dentist is this afternoon. Can you stay a bit later? Five at the latest?”

  “You swear no later than five?”

  “On my mother’s grave.”

  “Your mother is still alive.”

  “Yeah, but I’ll kill her if I have to keep listening to her nag about getting my ass to the dentist.”

  I laughed.

  “Okay. Good luck with your tooth.”

  I disconnected the call and texted Katie that our evening would have to start at five. She was fine with it, said that would give her time for a manicure before I picked her up. I looked at my own nails as I walked inside the station. They were bitten short and riddled with hangnails. I wondered briefly about getting some of those fancy fake gel nails one day. Denny would think it was cool. He loved it when I got gussied up.

  I’d texted Denny that Katie and I would be at his casino later but he hadn’t replied. He didn’t always check his phone or else he let the battery run down and didn’t charge it. He liked Katie and he’d be happy knowing we’d be at the casino. The shift at the station went by fast. It didn’t start off so great because somebody puked in the restroom and I had to clean it up, but the rest of the day was same old same old. When I glanced at my phone at ten to five I started to get antsy but Jonas walked in the door just a couple minutes later.

  “Sorry,” he said. He put a hand to his cheek and shook his head slowly. “It was abscessed and they had to pull it.”

  He opened his mouth to reveal a gaping hole where a bottom eye tooth used to be. I made a face.

  “Are you sure you’re okay to work?”

  “Oh yeah, I’m good. I’ve got painkillers and antibiotics up the caboose so I’m really good.”

  He smiled then, revealing that bloody mess and I cringed.

  “Maybe try not to smile at the customers too much.”

  He laughed like that was the funniest thing he ever heard. Then I tilted my head because I knew what was different about him besides the missing tooth.

  “You’re not wearing glasses.”

  “I’ve got my contacts in. I don’t usually wear them to work but I already had them in so...” He shrugged.

  “You look good without glasses.”

  “Because I look bad with them?” He smiled again and took his place behind the counter.

  “No, because your glasses cover your face. You have a nice face.”

  It felt weird saying that but honestly I don’t think I’d ever noticed anything about Jonas except those thick black glasses. He seemed pleased with the compliment.

  * * *

  Whenever I pulled up to Katie’s house it was a weird kind of painful déjà vu. The house looked exactly the same. Same dull gray stucco with white trim. Same crack in the concrete front steps. That unnerving feeling in my bones that Grandma would hate me being here. I knocked on the door and Katie’s mom opened it.

  “Hello, Julie!”

  She hugged me tight and I was consumed in the familiar vapor of her perfume: Opium.

  “You look good, Mrs. Cole.”

  She’d been doing her hair the identical color and cut for as long as I’d known her. She was a cookie-cutter version of her younger self. If that cookie had been left to dry out and get a ton of cracks in it. Mrs. Cole ran a beauty shop in town and Katie worked there too whenever she was around. I’d never known Mr. Cole because he’d been long gone and replaced by husband three or four by the time Katie and I met, but Katie’s mom still insisted on being called Mrs. Cole. The house always smelled faintly of cooked cabbage which was odd because she didn’t cook much. I glanced around and swore the porcelain figurines hadn’t moved from their shelves and ledges over the years or been dusted. Mrs. Cole claimed that housework was a waste of her time and considerable attributes.

  I found Katie in her room shimmying into a skintight red dress.

  “You’re not going like that, are you?” She looked with horror at me standing in front of her in blue jeans and a T-shirt.

  “I’m not a complete idiot.” I hoisted a backpack to prove it.

  Although I didn’t own anything as tight as Katie’s dress, I could still get my shit together and look nice when I tried and, for Katie’s sake, I always tried. Before long I was in a black skirt and silver blouse with low heels.

  “Let me do your makeup,” Katie insisted.

  “Not too much,” I protested but I knew it was like talking to the wind.

  “With your gorgeous eyes less is always more anyway,” she told me.

  She took me to the bathroom and sat me down on the toilet while she lined my eyes, rouged my cheeks and stroked on layer after layer of black mascara. Once she was done I glanced in the mirror and smiled.

  “Not too shabby.”

  She’d actually listened and my face still looked like my own. I shooed her out of the bathroom so I could pee. The bathroom had a small window that looked out onto the street. After I was done I adjusted my skirt in the mirror and caught a glimpse out the pink-patterned curtains and frowned. I moved to the window and craned to see down the road. I could’ve sworn it was Agent Pierce’s car that just drove by.

  “Hurry up or we’ll miss happy hour.” Katie was banging on the bathroom door.

  “Coming!”

  We were halfway to the casino when Katie finally looked up from her phone and regarded me curiously.

  “You going to tell me what climbed up your ass and died or you gonna make me guess?”

  “What? Nothing.” I flashed her a quick smile to prove it.

  “I’m calling bullshit. Is it the drinking thing? Because, if you’d like, I won’t touch a drop if that bothers you.”

 
I almost burst out laughing at the thought of the look on Katie’s face if I took her up on that offer.

  “No, of course not. It’s just been a while since I’ve been out. Probably since the last time you were here actually.”

  “Gawd, that long?” Katie sighed. “Well, you are long overdue then.”

  She reached over and cranked up the radio.

  “Oh my God, remember this song?!” she shrieked.

  It was Leona Lewis belting out “Bleeding Love.” She cranked up the radio as loud as it could go even though that distorted the bass through my poor speakers. We sang along with abandon and screamed the words at the top of our lungs. When the song ended I lowered the volume.

  “That brings back memories, don’t it?” She poked me in the ribs. “I remember sleeping over at your place and then sneaking out your window to go and meet Tyler and Dustin. We smoked some weed and drank a couple beers out behind the high school and then your grandma pulled up and had a complete cow! I thought she was going to kill both of us. She drove me home and told my mom what we’d been up to.”

  “Your mom said, ‘Why, that girl is going to be in big trouble,’” I quoted.

  “Your grandma...” Katie let out a low whistle and shook her head slowly. “She was the toughest motherfucker I’ve ever met. Sorry, I know she’s dead and all, but it’s true.”

  I just nodded. I still had scarred grooves on my back from the metal-tipped whip Grandma used to beat me in the garden shed that night. Katie never knew about that, she just thought I’d been grounded since I didn’t see her for a few weeks. When Katie did call, Grandma told her I got chicken pox but I needed to wait for the lashes to heal well enough so I could wear a shirt without them sticking to the fabric. Quicksand thoughts.

  “What happened to make you come home?” I asked, wanting to talk about anything except Grandma.

  “I like to party.” She looked at me with a smile. “You know I do but it was getting to be too much. Every single night. The band wasn’t getting gigs at the good places and, you know, it was such a drag hanging out in dive bars all the time without even any money to go out and do something. The last night the band got paid in cash.” She opened her purse, pulled out a wad of bills and held it out to me.