The Homecoming

by Alan Russell

  Cheever was the only one watching Stella. He saw a smile come to her face and wondered if she remembered leaving the card.

  “What’s that I smell?” said Michael, sniffing the air.

  “We made cookies for you and Luke.” Stella’s words were for both of them; her eyes were for Luke.

  “Cookies!” said Michael, heading for the kitchen.

  “Don’t spoil your appetites,” warned Eleanor. “We’ll be serving dinner within the hour. And I’m hoping both of you gentlemen will be dining with us.”

  “Luke’s no gentleman,” said Michael.

  “Thank you for your offer, Mrs. Pierce,” said Luke, as if to show he was a gentleman. “I gladly accept.”

  Michael coughed the words kiss ass into his hand.

  Eleanor set up a buffet-style tostada bar, with a choice of black or pinto beans, shredded cheese, tomatoes, avocado, lettuce, sprouts, sour cream, and two kinds of salsa.

  Everyone sat down at the dining room table. Cheever was guessing the table hadn’t been used in more than seven years. The detective found himself being more of an observer than a participant in the conversations. He watched Stella and Luke trying to unsuccessfully avoid each other’s eyes. Luke had the quintessential look of a SoCal surfer, with broad shoulders and sun-bleached hair. His tanned face hid his blushing; Stella didn’t have that camouflage.

  There came the point in the meal where the adults were all holding their stomachs and proclaiming they’d eaten too much. The young people, who had eaten twice as much, amazingly still had room for more.

  “Who’s up for fro-yo?” asked Michael.

  Stella and Luke both said, “I am,” in unison.

  Eleanor started shaking her head. “Why don’t you stay home with us, Stella? Your brother will bring you some.”

  You didn’t need to practice mindspeak, thought Cheever, to sense the girl’s disappointment. But Duncan picked up on his daughter’s unhappiness as well.

  “You can’t watch over Stella every minute,” said Duncan. “I think it will be okay to let her go with the boys. Her big brother will watch out for her.”

  Michael flexed his arm for the table, and Luke tried to punch him on his muscle.

  “Missed,” said Michael.

  “That’s because the target was so small,” said Luke.

  “Am I supposed to be reassured by that behavior?” asked Eleanor.

  “I’ll be fine, Mom,” said Stella.

  Relenting, Eleanor sighed and said, “Okay, you can go for frozen yogurt. But I don’t want you to make any other stops, Michael. And know that I’ll be worrying every minute all of you are away.”

  “Thanks, Mom,” said Stella.

  “And one more thing,” said Eleanor. “I’d like a salted-caramel yogurt with toppings of peanuts and hot fudge.”

  Cheever couldn’t be talked into a frozen yogurt; Duncan ordered a “red, white, and blue,” which was vanilla yogurt with raspberries and blueberries and a granola topping.

  Eleanor walked her children to the door. “Promise me you’ll be back soon,” she said.

  Michael raised his right hand and said, “I promise.”

  The problem with his promise was that he was clearly crossing his index and middle fingers.

  “Don’t worry, Mom,” said Stella. “We’ll be back soon.”

  Eleanor hugged her daughter and whispered, “You better be.”

  “We’ll be back before your yogurt melts,” promised Luke.

  “It’s a good thing I’ve always had Luke to count on,” Eleanor said.

  As the children closed the door behind them, Duncan said, “You need to sit down with our guest and have a cup of coffee.”

  “And what will you be doing?” she asked.

  “I’ll be doing the dishes.”

  Eleanor let herself be led to the sofa. Duncan delivered two cups of coffee, then returned to the kitchen.

  “That’s how it used to be,” said Eleanor. “I’d cook, and Duncan would do the dishes. You never realize how wonderful normalcy and routines are until they get removed from your life.”

  Although her children had only been gone for five minutes, Cheever could see Eleanor was already getting edgy. As they sipped their coffee and more time passed, her uneasiness grew. Every half minute or so, her eyes turned toward the front door, looking expectantly for a child who wasn’t there.

  “A watched pot never boils,” said Cheever.

  “My main goal in life is to be nothing more than an overprotective parent,” she said.

  “There are worse things,” he said.

  Cheever tried to take her mind off the ticking clock. “I’ve been meaning to ask you something,” he said. “Twice I’ve interviewed Stella and asked her if there was a reason why she returned when she did. And both times she wouldn’t answer, but instead deferred to you.”

  Eleanor looked surprised. “I wonder why that is.”

  “She told me your disharmony was growing perilous. Her emphasis was on the word perilous, but she wouldn’t clarify. It was almost like she was protecting a confidence.”

  “And she said you should ask me?”

  Cheever nodded. This time Eleanor’s glance wasn’t toward the front door, but to the kitchen, where her husband was doing the dishes. Despite his being out of earshot, she still seemed reluctant to speak.

  “Stella also made me believe that she returned out of obligation and love,” said Cheever, “and said that it wasn’t easy for her to return. She likened it to the reluctance an angel might have departing heaven.”

  “She said that?” whispered Eleanor, then began nervously stroking her neck before adding, “But she couldn’t have known.”

  “Known what?”

  Eleanor shook her head, and once more cast a glance toward the kitchen. Then, in a voice that was little more than a whisper, she confessed: “I was in the process of taking my life when Stella showed up at the front gate. I was one-third of the way there, and just about ready to take my second dose of pills. I had it all planned to make it look like an accidental overdose.”

  Cheever nodded. Over the years he’d seen how much pain Eleanor was in. He wasn’t surprised that she had decided to end her life. In the back of his mind, he’d always feared she would. That was one of the reasons he visited the Pierce house as often as he did; he hadn’t wanted Eleanor to lose hope.

  “But how could she have known?” said Eleanor. “No one knew.”

  She looks like a deer caught in the headlights, thought Cheever. It was probably how he’d looked when Stella brought up the subject of his daughter.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  Three kids in a car, doing what kids do, cranking up the tunes and singing along.

  Luke was in the passenger seat, his left shoulder angled so that he could look at both Stella and Michael. Even though the music had to be new to Stella, she seemed to intuit the words, and her singing was good enough to tone down the sharp edges of the discordant male notes.

  Angelic, Luke thought. That’s how Stella’s voice sounded.

  They played some Macklemore & Ryan Lewis, then a little from Drake, before all of them teamed up with Rihanna and Eminem to sing “The Monster.” Everyone had their own groove. Michael and Luke were doing the Eminem rap lyrics, while Stella was channeling Rihanna’s voice.

  She looked at Luke and sang the words, “You think I’m crazy.”

  Just looking at her made Luke short of breath, and forced him to play catch-up with Michael’s rhyming and rapping.

  And then the song was over, but none of them wanted that moment to stop. “Again,” said Michael, tapping “Replay” on the touch screen.

  His visible wince was noticed by Luke and Stella.

  “You okay, bro?” asked Luke.

  Stella said nothing, but reached out and put her hand on Michael’s shoulder. The sound of her gasp surprised everyone.

  “What’s wrong?” said Michael.

  “Your arm,” she said.

&nb
sp; “It’s nothing,” said Michael.

  The music had started, and Rihanna was singing about getting along with the voices in her head.

  “Never do that again, Michael,” she said.

  “Do what?”

  “You could have died.”

  Luke responded to Michael’s hard glance, lifting up his right arm. “I swear to God, I didn’t say a thing.”

  “That would have killed Mom,” said Stella.

  “You’re one to talk,” said Michael. “For seven years Mom has been dying one day at a time because of you.”

  “Let’s all chill,” said Luke.

  “And you know what your disappearing act did to me?” said Michael. “Mom smothered me. She was always hovering over me. It was a big joke among all my friends. ‘Cray Mrs. Pierce,’ they’d always say.”

  “I’m sorry,” whispered Stella.

  And all the while, Rihanna sang about being friends with the monster under her bed.

  Luke turned off the music and watched as Michael let out some air and seemed to deflate.

  “I’m not telling you what to do, Michael,” Stella said in a soft voice, “but I hope if you ever make that kind of leap again that you do it for the right reasons. At least Luke did it out of love.”

  “More like stupidity,” said Luke.

  “I won’t argue that,” said Stella.

  Michael laughed and said, “Burn!”

  Not burn, thought Luke, but fever. He couldn’t stop looking at Stella.

  Tiffany Milton’s BMW 340i, with its personalized license plate of PURRRR, was parked in front of Yo, Fro, Yo!

  “Did you know the Y-Girls were going to be here?” Luke asked.

  “Courtney mentioned something about them maybe stopping by,” Michael said.

  “Great,” said Luke, then turned to Stella. “I’m not a fan of your brother’s sometimes girlfriend.”

  “What about Courtney’s BFF, Tiffany?” Michael asked. “Are you more of a fan of hers?”

  “After listening to them cheering for you to jump,” said Luke, “I can do without any of the Y-Girls. How about we go to Seaside Yogurt instead?”

  “Girls were cheering for Michael to jump from that cliff?” asked Stella.

  Luke still wondered how Stella knew about Michael’s plunge. He thought about deflecting her question by asking one of his own, but instead found himself nodding.

  From inside of Yo, Fro, Yo, a young blonde woman began waving at Michael.

  “We can’t take off now,” said Michael. “Courtney spotted me.”

  Luke looked at Stella and said, “You can avoid the drama if you want by staying in the car. I would.”

  “I’ll be fine,” she said.

  Luke held open the door to the frozen yogurt shop for Stella. He wasn’t doing the door-holding to be polite; he wanted to do it. Since first seeing Stella, Luke had felt all stirred up inside. He had always been self-reliant, had always structured his world around the ocean, but now it seemed there was an even bigger world out there.

  As Stella entered the store, lots of inquisitive eyes looked her way, but then the attention turned to Michael and Luke, and many of those there began to clap and cheer. All seven of the “first team” Y-Girls were there, along with at least two dozen of their friends from Torrey Pines Academy.

  Courtney came up and kissed Michael. “Since yesterday there have been almost a hundred thousand YouTube views of you leaping off Dead Man’s Cliff. The footage has gone viral!”

  Tiffany wasn’t about to be outdone. She extended a long red fingernail, running it up and down Luke’s sternum. “There have been all sorts of comments from girls who wanted to know about ‘the sexy guy’ who jumped in after his friend.”

  Luke cast a side-glance at Stella. Michael was also nodding knowingly. That explained how Stella had known about their cliff jumping. But Stella didn’t meet Luke’s eyes. Her attention was on the movements of Tiffany’s nail along his chest.

  “I guess you two haven’t met,” said Luke, taking a step back and out of nail range. “Tiffany, this is Stella. She’s Michael’s sister.”

  “Really?” said Tiffany. “You’re that Stella Pierce?”

  Stella nodded.

  “You’re like the Boogey Girl, did you know that?”

  “I am not sure what the Boogey Girl is,” said Stella.

  “Everyone who grew up around here knows your name,” said Tiffany. “You’re like this huge cautionary tale of stranger danger and how you always have to be careful. All the parents were afraid their kid might end up as the next Stella Pierce.”

  Courtney and Michael came over and joined them. “You mean this is your sister, Michael!” screeched Courtney. “I heard about her on the news. What’s your name, Michael’s sister?”

  “I’m Stella.”

  “And you’re like fifteen, aren’t you?”

  “In a few months,” said Stella.

  “Will you be going to TPA?”

  When Stella nodded, Courtney said, “We could call you Elly.”

  Luke wondered who looked less enthused at that prospect—Tiffany or Stella.

  “We’re kind of in a rush,” said Luke. “We promised Mr. and Mrs. Pierce we wouldn’t be long.”

  “But you just got here,” said Tiffany. “We’ve all been waiting for you.”

  “I didn’t know everyone was going to be here,” he said. “And I have a ton of homework.”

  “There’s such a thing as putting it off until tomorrow morning,” she said, “but let me guess: you have a date with a mermaid?”

  “Midtide’s at six,” he said, “so dawn patrol starts early. The waves are supposed to be cranking.”

  “If I were you, the wave I’d be concerned about getting is a good-bye wave,” said Tiffany. She turned to Stella. “What about you? Do you surf?”

  “I never have, but it looks fun.”

  “Looks are always so deceiving, though, aren’t they?” said Tiffany.

  “I’m not sure I understand.”

  Tiffany answered by offering up a not-altogether-pleasant smile. “So what happened to you all those years ago?” she asked.

  “I went away,” said Stella.

  Michael stepped forward, partially blocking Stella from Tiffany. “Let’s go put our order in,” he said.

  “You’re so pale that wherever you went, there must not have been much sun,” said Tiffany.

  “You’re right about that,” said Stella, and then she let her brother lead her away to the counter.

  “Really?” said Luke, but whatever else he might have said to Tiffany was swallowed by the approach of others.

  “Dude,” said Joey Gold, taking off his trademark fedora and waving it in homage to Luke, “you were awesome!”

  “I don’t think I would have made that jump,” said Nick Watson, “even if it was Bella Thorne in the water calling for help!”

  Nick’s parents owned a beachfront home in Del Mar; it was a frequent setting for the Y-Girl parties.

  “That was one great tape,” said Joey.

  “I haven’t seen it,” said Luke.

  “Your jump was way cool,” said Joey, “but the ladies liked what came afterward even more. When you guys got up on the rocks, Tiffany zoomed in on you bare-chested, squeezing water out of your shirt.”

  “That’s why it’s getting so many likes,” said Nick.

  By then the other Y-Girls were surrounding Tiffany and Courtney. Luke heard Tiffany say, “I’ll bet she orders vanilla,” which was enough for him to roll his eyes and shake his head.

  “Later,” he told his friends, then walked over to join Michael and Stella.

  Luke listened to his best friend order for his parents, then put in his usual of Cookies on Cookies, which was cookie-dough frozen yogurt topped with crushed Oreos. Stella carefully considered her selection before announcing she wanted S’mores, which was frozen yogurt with marshmallow sauce, chocolate chips, and crushed graham crackers.

  “It’s been
a long time since I’ve had S’mores,” she said in a voice that sounded nostalgic.

  “I’m going with a Blue Greek,” said Luke, which was frozen Greek yogurt with blueberries and granola.

  As they waited for their orders, Stella asked, “What’s the dawn patrol?”

  “It’s what I practice and your brother doesn’t,” said Luke.

  “I need my beauty sleep,” said Michael.

  “No argument there,” said Luke. Then he offered a better explanation for Stella: “When you’re a member of the dawn patrol, you’re usually out in the water before first light.”

  “And what is midtide?”

  “Sometimes, but not always, it’s that sweet spot between low tide and high tide where there’s a lot of wave action.”

  “Do you surf every day?” she asked.

  “Most days,” he said, “but I usually pass on ankle-buster days.”

  At her questioning look, Luke explained, “Small waves.”

  Their to-go order was handed to them, but it took them another two minutes to pass through the gauntlet of friends and well-wishers.

  When they left, Tiffany pretended not to notice that Luke held the door open for Stella.

  “The Y-Girls,” said Michael. “You gotta love ’em.” In an aside meant only for Luke, he added, “And if you do, you better glove ’em.”

  “Why are they called the Y-Girls?” asked Stella.

  “Why, oh why,” said Michael.

  “It’s a group of seven girls that hang around together,” said Luke, “and all of their names happen to end with a y.”

  “So they’re kind of like the Seven Dwarfs,” said Stella.

  Both Luke and Michael started laughing, and the more Stella tried explaining her reasoning to them, the harder they laughed.

  “You said there were seven of them,” she said. “And their names end in a y. That’s how it is with the Seven Dwarfs except for Doc and Bashful, and since another word for bashful is shy, which ends in a y, you could pretty much call them the Y-Dwarfs.”