by Chris Fabry
Preston didn’t know how long he stayed there or how many other rocks he already had stepped on or over.
Finally an older man put a hand on his shoulder. “You with Civil Defense?”
He nodded and gave his name. “I heard the engine. It sounded too low. And then this awful noise. I got in my truck down there. My dad gave it to me last year for my birthday. . . .”
“Hadley, I want you to listen to me,” the man said. “Are you listening?”
“Yes, sir.”
“I want you to go home and change clothes. Get a coat on. A rain slicker. Put on a couple of sweaters. And if you have boots, put them on too and some fresh socks. It’s going to be a long night.”
It was. The longest of his life. He did as the man said and raced home.
When he returned to the hillside, there was talk about where the plane had come from and who it might be. A news reporter had found a wallet on the ground and had called the newsroom. Someone recognized the name on the driver’s license. It was somebody from the Marshall football team. That’s when the air got sucked out of the whole hillside. Word passed along one by one. This was the Herd’s plane. Men moved like statues, stiff and aimless when they realized the truth.
“East Carolina,” someone said. “They were playing East Carolina. Lost their last game.”
People drove up, gawking, some parking and running through the brush to see what had happened. The team bus sat at the airport above, waiting. And the saddest part was when it left, empty, and snaked down the hill.
Not one of those people had a chance when the plane clipped the trees on the ridge and flipped. An airplane on approach was probably going a good 200 mph. When it hit the hillside, the violence of the crash had killed all seventy-five instantly.
Preston wondered what those last moments were like. If they had time to react. Throw their hands up. Say a prayer. Call out a name.
He spent the rest of that night taking orders from the Civil Defense leader on the ground. Their job was to pick up body parts and bag them. An arm here. A hand there. Legs. Torsos. He didn’t find any bodies intact. None of them were lying in the wet leaves like they were just sleeping. They were torn apart and scattered like a farmer scatters fertilizer. Mixed up. Burned. He had never gotten the smell of seared flesh out of his mind, and he doubted he ever would.
He’d bend over and pick up a foot, then feel the gorge rising and turn away. Soon it was just dry heaves. Then he got used to it. That was the worst effect. You could get used to the carnage more quickly when it was all around.
He came to a wooded area, combing for any sign of human life, and he stepped on a smoldering tree stump. When he got to the other side, he realized it wasn’t a stump. It was a man’s body still buckled into that part of the seat. He went down again, this time in a catcher’s crouch, trying to take in the terror of the scene.
“Here,” somebody said, offering him a swig of Jack Daniel’s. “Take it. You’re going to need this before it’s over.”
The drink burned as it went down. He took another swig and handed the bottle back. His body took over. He simply did what he was told. Just get the job done.
In the days afterward, when the funerals came and the shock of that night set in, Preston decided he had to put it behind him. He would not think of it, not speak of it, and not let it affect him. His mother had asked what he saw, and he told her it wasn’t that bad, that the people died in a split second. The worry on her face told the story.
With the diesel engine running, much like the sound of the fire trucks on that night almost forty years earlier, Hadley Preston opened his eyes. The tension on the cable grew tighter and jiggled in the water like a bluegill nibbling at bait. The rise of the car was slow—painstakingly slow.
Leason Edwards had his hands on his hips, watching the drama unfold. Hadley walked over to him.
“Grim business,” Leason said.
“It is at that.”
“And the press is already swarming.”
Preston hadn’t noticed the reporter. He turned and saw Mae pointing a finger at him and shaking her head. “You want me to run him off?”
Leason shook his head. “He’d just come back and ask the same questions. Vultures is what they are. Looking for carrion.”
“I wish you two hadn’t come,” Preston said.
“She wouldn’t stay away. Couldn’t keep her away with a good horse.”
“I figured as much.”
His deputy, Mike, waved a hand at the edge of the water. “It’s comin’ up, Sheriff.”
Leason took a step toward the reservoir, but Preston put out a hand. “I think you ought to stay back. I’ll call you over when it’s time.”
“All right,” Leason said. He wiped his forehead with his palm. “Gonna be a hot one today, isn’t it?”
“I believe it will be.”
The trunk of the car was just underwater, like a snapping turtle coming to the surface. Preston had seen this car in his mind a thousand times, and like the fire on the hillside and the smell of jet fuel, it came back to him as he studied the mud-caked license plate he’d been searching for.
You live and you die, and that’s about it, he thought. Rain falls on the just and the unjust.
His wife had always said he shouldn’t dredge up the past. Let sleeping dogs lie. He wondered what she would say about this.
6
It took me a day or two to get used to sleeping in a bed where you don’t have to worry about sitting up and banging your head against the ceiling, but once I did, it was a whole new world. And the sheets were nice and clean and didn’t have all those pebbles and sand. Dad slept in the RV, and the three of us ate breakfast together like one of those families you see on TV or in the movies. Sheila made us eggs and bacon and had orange juice with the pulp floating in it and not like that orange juice you can tell hasn’t seen an orange for a long time.
Before Sheila went to work that first morning when I’d slept in the bed, she looked at me kind of funny, like some brush fire had been sparked in her head, and she said, “Wait right here.”
A few minutes later she came back with a couple of big bags that had other bags inside them, and when she finally got all the plastic layers off I couldn’t believe it. There was this big doll with the prettiest face you’ve ever seen—it looked like a real, live person. And in the other bag were two more with different faces and clothes. I just stood there and looked at them, afraid to even touch them.
“Go ahead,” Sheila said. “You can play with them.”
I couldn’t eat I was so excited, and I carried one of them around all day with me. Sheila said I could have a tea party if I wanted, but I wasn’t much interested in that. I did have lunch outside, watching Dad work on the roof, nailing shingles and moving around up there like a cat. Before lunch he took his shirt off, and I could see the muscles and the big scars he wouldn’t talk about no matter how much I asked him.
That evening after Sheila came home, we had supper together again. She made the best corn bread I’d ever tasted that almost melted in my mouth, and we ate corn on the cob and chili. Chili’s not my favorite, but I didn’t say that because I didn’t want to be rude. She asked what I did all day, so I told her about running around the yard with Walter, riding the zip line, and staring at the horses. I’d built a little shady place by the fence with an old blanket I found in the garage, and I stayed there watching them swishing their tails and eating grass.
I went out on the porch after dinner and acted like I was in some other world, but I wanted to give Dad and Sheila a chance to talk. I was forming a plan to get them together because, as far as I could tell, this was about the best situation ever.
They started talking about the RV and that we’d be able to get on the road as soon as the part came. Sheila didn’t say anything for a while, and there was a clink of dishes, like she had started cleaning up.
Dad said something about the roof and that he’d found a hole up there; then he stopped.
“What’s the matter?”
“You just don’t see it, do you?” Sheila said. “When I gave June Bug those dolls, did you see what she did?”
“She played with one of them the whole day, didn’t she?”
“Right. With just one of them. Most kids would see dolls like that and would right away want to have a tea party and sit them in chairs and have them talk to each other. She took one and went off in her own world.”
“What’s wrong with that? Maybe she just liked that one.”
“She’s a lonely little kid, John. She hasn’t had interaction with any kids her age. It’s like she’s starving for it and doesn’t even know she’s hungry.”
My dad wasn’t quick with words, but when he spoke, I could tell there was some emotion. “I’ve done the best I could. She can read and write like nobody’s business. We need to work on the social interaction thing, but—”
“I don’t doubt you’ve done your best. I’m not saying you’re a bad father. But June Bug needs a stable place. She needs friends. She needs to have a sleepover and cook s’mores at the campfire. She needs a mother to hold her at night and tell her stories. She needs to know where she came from and who her grandparents are. She needs a home. A sense of place. While we were making dinner, she told me that sometimes she stays up past midnight reading. She needs a set bedtime and somebody to enforce it.”
A chair scraped against the floor. I could tell by the creaking wood that my dad had gotten up. “Now listen, I appreciate everything you’re doing, but you also have to look at the positives. I admit she’s no debutante. But she’s been more places and seen more things in this country than most people combined. We’ve touched the Liberty Bell. We’ve been to the Alamo. Hiked the trail Lewis and Clark walked. Have you ever seen the sun come up on the Grand Canyon?”
“No, but that’s not what I’m—”
“Just let me finish. I know I haven’t done a good job in a lot of areas. I’m not going to be able to give her everything she deserves. But I can give her love, and if she only plays with one doll instead of fifteen, I’m not going to have a conniption. Maybe it’s better to play with one instead of all of them. Ever thought of that?”
“I’m not saying it’s wrong to play with one doll. But a girl goes through stages, and she needs a mother to help her through the changes. At least an older female who can teach her about things.”
“I’ll give you that. So what are you saying?”
“Why don’t you let her stay here? I’ve been thinking about it, and I’d like to take her in. Both of you if you want. You could stay on the property and maybe find some work. There’s a church I go to sometimes. I’d bet those people would love to come alongside you. Good schools. No commitment or anything from me. I just want to help.”
“Camel’s nose under the tent,” my dad said.
“Excuse me?”
“Just an old saying. The camel gets his nose under the tent and pretty soon he’s inside.”
Sheila’s voice got an edge to it, and it was all I could do to not go in there and try to break up the fight. “I don’t appreciate that. You’re saying I’m some calculating woman. I’m not. I just care about her and it’s something I’ve been thinking about. I look at her and . . .” Her voice trailed off like somebody driving to a distant hill and then hanging there on top as they hit the crest.
I couldn’t believe somebody would talk about me that way, and it made me want to run inside the house and hug her. Except it sort of made me mad that she thought I didn’t have a good dad. I’d seen plenty of dads whack their kids just for hanging on to the grocery cart at the Kroger or Piggly Wiggly. He’d never so much as raised a hand toward me. Now, I won’t say that he hasn’t yelled at me when I get out of line, but I’ve never actually been afraid he’d hit me.
Sheila’s words stirred up something. Maybe it was the fact that I’d never seen any pictures of my mother. Maybe it was those movies I’ve seen we rent for a dollar from the Redbox. Some are about families having problems and some mom wants to leave her husband because he works too much or kisses other women. I just wish I had those kinds of problems. I wish I had a mom who might run off with me. And now that I’d seen my face on the wall at Walmart, I thought there might be somebody out there waiting.
“I do appreciate it,” Dad said. “You’ve been kind to both of us, and I know your heart is in the right place. I just don’t think it’d be good to get tied down right now.”
My heart did a flip-flop, and it felt like the air in my lungs got replaced by molasses.
“Why don’t you talk with her?” Sheila said. “Give her a choice. Maybe you’d be surprised at what came out.”
* * *
Mae set her jaw as the car emerged from the water and just hung there, years of sludge and slime and algae running out like sand from an hourglass. A weaker woman would have looked away or buried her head in her husband’s shoulder, but Mae was not weak. Never had been. And she wasn’t about to start.
Sheriff Preston asked them to move back, said that what they were about to see might not be pleasant, but again, Mae wouldn’t be moved. Leason tried to turn her around as the car rested on dry ground, but she pushed him away and edged closer.
A Channel 3 News truck pulled into the reservoir entrance, then past the barricades. The reporters would probably want the car back in the water so they could get their video. And this is how it starts. The national attention. The stories of a missing little girl found after all these years. It would be the top story on the Internet for about a day, and then everybody would forget and move on to something else. An Olympic runner who loses a medal. Or a pastor’s wife who guns down her husband while he’s in the pulpit. Or some sixth-grade teacher taking liberties. Mae didn’t understand how a handful of people had the power to deem a story important or not. How could a select few gauge the interest of a nation?
The sheriff called his deputy, and they draped a tarpaulin over the side of the car. The camera guy from Channel 3 came running, shooting video as he went, finally getting close enough to have the deputy reach out and shove the camera away. The scene would be replayed over and over in the coming days on CNN and other news outlets.
“Is she in there?” Mae heard herself saying. She pushed through the gauntlet, and the deputy held out an arm like he was trying to hold back the tide with a toothpick.
“Mae,” Leason yelled behind her. “No!”
She reached the car as the sheriff opened the back driver’s-side door. The window was cracked and broken, and a good-size bass fell out and flipped and flapped on the ground. A guy in a wet suit grabbed it and took it back into the lake.
After seven years, the backseat didn’t even look like a backseat. Black mud and minnows and crawdads mixed together in a scene trapped in time. On the seat, wrapped in mud and algae, lay a child’s blanket and a stuffed animal of some sort, almost unrecognizable.
The sheriff leaned in and worked on something at the edge, moving his shoulders like it was some great struggle. Finally there was a dull click and he backed up, revealing a car seat with nothing in it but mud and sludge. The buckle was still fastened, but the straps—what was left of them—lay limp and lifeless. He put his head inside the car to examine the rest, then emerged and looked at Mae. “She’s not in there.”
Leason came up behind her, grabbing her shoulders to turn her away, but she shook him off. “I knew it. I told you all along she was taken. Just like Dana said. I told you!” She turned and a camera was on her and she nudged it. “Get out of my face.”
“What happened to the girl?” Bentley, the reporter, said.
“She’s not in here,” the sheriff said, placing the black tarp back on the window. He instructed the divers to get in the water again.
The TV reporter shouted something, and Mae pushed her way through the gauntlet. She’d seen enough.
“Do you have any comment, Mrs. Edwards?” Bentley said, trailing the two of them.
“Nothing you could p
rint,” Leason said.
Mae stopped. “I’ve told you people all along that Natalie Anne is alive. She’s been alive for seven years, and not a one of you has had the guts to believe me. Maybe now you will.”
The dew had burned off, and the access road was dusty as Mae and Leason drove from the scene. The TV news camera took a shot of them leaving. Mae turned from the window as an officer lifted the yellow tape and Leason drove through.
“They should have believed Dana from day one,” Leason said.
“Why should they? You didn’t.”
They rode home in silence, Mae’s mind spinning with who and what questions. It was going to be a long day of people calling and asking more questions and coming by with food to ask questions. But now she had something concrete that she hadn’t had for seven long years. Mae had reason for hope.
7
Sheriff Preston had the car loaded onto the back of a tow truck and hauled away, a grim picture frozen in time. The news truck left soon afterward, and all the onlookers headed home. A young girl who looked to be no more than ten laid a handful of daisies and wildflowers at the edge of the water. Preston watched her walk away and shook his head.
The diver approached him with something, asking for a plastic bag. The sheriff went to the cruiser and poked through the backseat and the trunk, finally finding a white trash bag. He opened it and the scuba guy held out a long-handled knife.
“Looks like this could do some pretty serious damage,” the scuba guy said. “I don’t know if it has anything to do with it, but I uncovered it in the mud where the car was resting.”
Preston studied the knife in the morning sunlight. That long in the water had left its blade rusted and the handle covered with growths, and there wasn’t much chance of getting anything from it other than the serial number. Even that was dubious. But he’d seen this type of knife before.
