Cicada Spring

by Christian Galacar

  Sam’s sight continued to adjust as he inched his way out into the parking lot, black slowly turning to navy-blue. He unclipped the strap over his holster, readying his weapon.

  Something cautioned in his head: It’s probably just Jo messing around. She’ll walk out from the dark any minute with an empty trashcan, a silly grin across her face. Don’t go drawing that pistol yet. You’ll look like a scared, rookie fool.

  Sam stepped aside, out of the glow from the restaurant so he could see more clearly. When he did, the light travelled beyond him, revealing a red pickup truck at the far end of the lot, fifty feet away.

  At first it was nothing, only a vehicle he didn’t recognize. Then there was a Red Sox cap hovering in the night, two eyes, then four eyes, tucked back in a corner beside the truck, between the dumpster and the fence. From there the scene filled itself in. All the pieces connected and clicked into a clear, coherent understanding.

  The man had his hand over the woman’s mouth, her eyes wide with terror. “Joanna,” Sam whispered to himself in disbelief. Then he yelled it: “Joanna!” His adrenaline pump kicked in, and the world became fast and electric. Vivid. “Joanna? What the hell is going on—” Sam began to say, as his slow, cautious movements quickened and he moved toward her.

  Joanna managed to pull the man’s hand away from her mouth “Sam, no, stop,” she yelled.

  But Sam was already charging in her direction, pulling his pistol from its holster. Then he saw why she was screaming. Sam caught sight of the man’s gun, and his world, his life, immediately slowed. Everything stopped, and for a moment his eyes locked with the man’s, shadowed beneath the brim of his hat. Sam’s only thought was a quick and simple one: Okay, fine. It didn’t make a lot of sense, but Sam understood it. The darkness around the man flashed yellow, and his gun clapped twice.

  Sam felt it before he heard it.

  The first shot caught him in the gut. The second caught him in the chest and spun him sideways—a one-two punch that sent him reeling to the ground. For a moment he thought his ears were ringing, but it was only the sound of screaming.

  “Sam!” Joanna yelled, her shriek cutting the night.

  Sam rolled onto his side and coughed. Blood sprayed from his mouth and ran warm down his chin. Reaching for his dispatch radio, there was another sharp clap and another searing punch of pain. This time the bullet struck his back. Immediately his legs went numb. But he still continued pulling the radio from his chest and bringing it to his mouth.

  He pressed the call button. “This is Deputy… This is Deputy Sam Hodges. Dispatch… I…” He coughed again and tasted the hot iron in his blood. His vision began to tunnel and fade to gray. His tongue felt fat and clumsy, as if from too much Novocain. “Dispatch… This is… This is…” He couldn’t get the words out. Everything was happening so fast, and he was suddenly so tired. But as his mind muddled, a thought stuck with him: Thank God Carol went home and somebody else is working dispatch.

  A boot-clad foot landed against Sam’s shoulder and rolled him over. There was a scrape as the man slid Sam’s gun along the pavement, out of arm’s reach. Sam could see the man clearly. He didn’t recognize him. Joanna stood behind him, her face bloodied, her wrists bound together with what looked like tape. She was crying.

  “You couldn’t just leave us alone, could you?” the man said. His eyes were wild and frantic. “You had to be a goddamn hero. Now look at her. Look what I had to do to this perfect woman. The sign said closed. Couldn’t you read?”

  “Go for dispatch. Sam, is that you?” a man’s voice crackled on Sam’s radio.

  Bill bent down and clicked off the receiver. Standing, he raised the gun, the barrel opening wide and black to Sam, who was panting in shallow, quick breaths. Then Sam set his eyes on Joanna, and his face slowly lifted into a bloody smile. His lips limned with blood and his face paling, he resembled a clown dressed in cop’s clothing. With a last effort, he brought a hand to his breast pocket and rested his palm over the engagement ring meant for Carol. He looked Joanna hard in the eyes, hoping she understood that something there was important.

  The gun barked a last time, and Sam’s world went black. And that was okay. He wasn’t scared, only sad for those who would hurt for him.

  Like that, Sam Hodges was dead.

  Joanna felt the blood drain out of her face. Something inside her had snapped.

  “C’mon,” Bill said, turning back to her and grabbing her neck. “Get in the truck. It’s time to go.”

  But when he faced her squarely, Joanna pulled her hands out from the front pocket of her apron, wrists unbound. She had managed to cut the tape. The blade flashed dully in the moonlight as she threw her weight forward and drove the butcher’s knife into Bill’s gut up to the hilt. She didn’t think she’d be able to, but something—survival or seeing her friend shot—provided more than enough strength. She felt a hard scrape as the blade sank in and slid against his spine. Bill let out a guttural groan, stumbling backwards and dropping the Luger to the ground. Joanna stood back from him as he looked down at the knife sticking out of his torso, his hands palm-up at his sides. There was an honest look of confusion on his face.

  Bill fell to one knee, holding his gut and doubling over. His camera, still hanging around his neck, seemed to pull him down in slow motion. Finally it slammed off the ground as he collapsed, and the lens shattered.

  Joanna stepped forward and kicked his gun as far away as she could into the dark and ran to Sam, kneeling beside him. “Sam, Sam, Sam,” she said—pleaded—but he was gone. His eyes stared blankly out into the night sky, searching the stars for something beautiful.

  After a moment, the sirens started. Very faint at first—the station was a few miles away—but they were coming. Someone must’ve heard the gunshots, or whoever had been on dispatch when Sam had radioed had known something was wrong. Joanna placed her hands over Sam’s eyes and shut them. Then she lifted the hand he had placed over his chest in his final moments and felt his breast pocket. She’d seen him gesture to it right before Bill had fired the final shot. There was something there. She opened the flap, reached her fingers in, and felt something cool to the touch, something hard but delicate. She slid it out. The diamond ring shimmered in the ambient light of the parking lot.

  Her heart sank. “Jesus,” she said, and sighed heavily.

  The still moment was broken by a wet gurgle. Bill rolled onto his back, gasping and trying to pull the knife from his stomach with no luck. He lifted his head off the asphalt and touched his chin to his chest, trying to analyze his wound. “What did you do to me?” he said deliriously, letting his head fall back against the ground with a hard thud, like a dropped melon.

  The sound of sirens was steadily growing louder. It wouldn’t be long before they squealed to a stop in front of the diner.

  Joanna pocketed the ring. It didn’t belong in an evidence locker down at the station; it belonged with its intended recipient. She’d known Sam Hodges and Carol Matthews were a couple, and she could only imagine why he was carrying around that ring. Young love that never got to grow. What a terrible, sad thing to understand.

  Another cough and a long gurgle spurted from Bill. Joanna reached over and picked up Sam’s gun, scooted backward, and held the revolver clumsily in both hands. She had fired one once before, with her father when she was just a little girl, and so she knew the basics. Cocking the hammer back and pointing it at Bill, Joanna decided if that bastard moved again or made another noise, she’d fire a shot of lead right into his ear.

  “Don’t move, you hear me?” she said, and waited a few beats.

  She received no answer or acknowledgement.

  Then after another thirty seconds or so, she noticed Bill wasn’t moving at all. He had stopped breathing. His eyes stared coldly off-angled back at her, black and deep-set. A bead of blood ran from the corner of his mouth and pooled on the ground. In the darkness, it looked like motor oil.

  Joanna dropped the gun and stood. There was too muc
h death back there in that parking lot, and she wanted to feel the safety of bright lights and open space now. Slowly, she made her way to the street.

  Red and blue flashers were flickering up the street as she took a seat on the curb. But it was too late; there was nothing left to save.

  While she waited under the orange glow of the street lights out front, a cicada landed next to her on the hood of a car. She looked at it. It lazed about for a moment, jerky and chaotic, fluttering its wings occasionally but making no sound. It stopped, and for a moment Joanna was sure it was staring at her, its head turning from side to side, analyzing her. She gazed back at it, her mind numb, her nerves seared and raw. Then in some strange association to what had just happened, a sour thought emerged: There really are some hideous creatures in the world, creatures humanity could get along without. And she didn’t feel like tolerating that at the moment, whether she was right or wrong about it. Suddenly she had no patience for seemingly useless, ugly things.

  Joanna flicked her hand in the direction of the bug and it took to the air, vanishing beyond the light, one of God’s own mistaken creations darting off into an unknown future, in pursuit of some hardcoded purpose that would never be fully understood by it or anything else.

  CHAPTER 27

  According to the ID Gaines pulled from the man’s wallet at the scene, Bill Sexton, the photographer from Woodstock, was actually Leslie Charles Millis from Belchertown, Massachusetts, a small town about forty miles east of Heartsridge. Gaines put in a call to the police department in Belchertown at a little past midnight but only got some rookie from the nightshift who didn’t seem to know much of anything. Gaines said he would call back in the morning.

  Also found in Millis’s pocket was a room key belonging to the Heartsridge Motel. Attached to the key was a little brass key fob with the motel’s emblem—the silhouette of an eagle perched prominently atop a roof—stamped on the side. Below the emblem, a large 6 was engraved. On the reverse it read: PLEASE RETURN KEY UPON CHECK-OUT.

  Now laid out before Gaines on the two folding banquet tables they’d set up in the basement evidence locker of the Heartsridge sheriff’s station was everything they had found in Room 6 of the Heartsridge Motel.

  “You okay?” Catherine asked as Gaines unpacked another box of evidence. “I know Sam and you were friends. He was a good guy, always liked him. Me and his sister were real close when we were younger. I just can’t believe this. It doesn’t seem real. It hasn’t sunk in yet, you know?”

  She was opposite him, talking as she worked, labeling evidence bags. Mostly photography equipment they’d found set up in the bathroom of Room 6.

  “I’m fine,” Gaines said. He wanted desperately to talk about something—anything—other than how he felt. “Let’s just get all this stuff checked in so we can get outta here. It’s been a long night.”

  “Okay… was just trying—”

  “I know, and I appreciate it. But now just isn’t the time.”

  The door opened behind Gaines, and one of the younger rookies—Deputy Gerund—walked in with another box. “This is the last one,” he said. “Where you want it?”

  Gaines let out a long breath and squeezed his temples. His head pounded and stomach acid nipped at the back of his throat, either from the beers he’d had earlier or from the guilt he felt for having sent Sam to the diner in the first place. Probably both. He knew it should be him laying on a cold steel slab across town in the coroner’s office, not his deputy… his friend.

  “Wherever. Find a spot,” Gaines said sharply, and pointed to the end of the table. “There’s fine.”

  Deputy Gerund set the box down and lingered for a moment.

  “You need something?” Gaines said.

  The rookie looked down. “Sir, just want to say I’m sorry. I didn’t know Deputy Hodges all that well, he was a few years older’n me, but from what I gather he was a good guy and good at his job. It’s a shame to lose someone like that.”

  Gaines softened. “Yes… Yes it is. Thank you, Deputy.” He paused. Then sincerely, “How many hours you been on, Sean?”

  Gerund looked up. “Since yesterday morning… so going on eighteen now, sir. But it don’t matter, I could do twenty more if you need.”

  “No sense in killing yourself. Catherine and I can handle this stuff. You should go home and get some rest,” Gaines said. “The festival’s starting Thursday, it’ll be another long few days, and I can’t have my guys falling asleep on duty.”

  Gerund smiled politely. “Yessir. I’ll see you tomorrow then.” He turned and walked out.

  Gaines flipped the lid off the box Deputy Gerund had brought in. He recognized the items from when they were back at the motel. There were a few bags of photographs, mostly improperly developed pictures they had pulled out of the rubbish bin in the room. There were a few nature shots: some trees and rocks and clouds—amateur stuff. There were some pictures of feet (presumably Millis’s own), and some of random things in the room: the TV, the bureau, an ashtray, the bed. There didn’t appear to be any rhyme or reason behind the shots. They all seemed so elementary and random. In fact, the only universal truth that all the photographs shared was that none of them revealed anything about Leslie Charles Millis other than if he actually was a photographer (and Gaines doubted that now), he was a piss-poor one. So why was he in Heartsridge, then? He imagined the guy was probably just passing through. But Gaines wasn’t so sure the answer really even mattered anymore. Millis was dead, and so was Sam. Nothing would change that. Sometimes these things happened for no good reason whatsoever. There had been both crime and punishment. Wasn’t that enough to start the healing process? Gaines’s mind was a blizzard of unrelenting thoughts that screamed like high gales: Hodgesisdeadhodgesisdead… the festival… the festival… fuck… leave me alone… this is too much… don’t forget about Kara Price… don’t forget Harry Bennett is probably a rapist who will get away with it and you’re just as bad for letting him skate… people protect their own, they kill for their own, remember that… and oh yeah, almost forgot, Hodges is dead and his blood is on your clean hands.

  He didn’t know how to even begin to process it all, so instead he did his best to shut it all out. Just focus on the moment. One thing at a time.

  HODGES IS DEAD PEOPLE PROTECT THEIR OWN YOU DIDN’T WANT TO DRIVE BECAUSE YOU’RE A COWARD THAT’S WHY HE IS DEAD THAT’S WHY KARA WILL NEVER SEE JUSTICE.

  He shook his head in an attempt to cleanse his mind and continued logging the evidence.

  The last item in the box was the metal ammo can they had found hidden under the bed, the one full of cigarettes. It was an old ammunition can that read .50CAL in faded yellow stencil letters along the side. Gaines took it out and set it on the table next to the bags of photographs. He opened it, removed the five packs of Marlboros, and slid the ammo can to the end of the table, giving it no further inspection.

  “You calling the Staties in on this?” Catherine asked.

  “I don’t think so. What’s the point? Maybe if the man responsible for shooting Sam wasn’t sitting stiff across town I would. But as it stands, there isn’t really anything to investigate.”

  Gaines expected a contrarian view from Catherine on the subject, but instead she said, “That’s probably for the best. They’d only bring a media circus, and that’s the last thing any of us need this week.”

  “No, you’re right, we don’t need that,” Gaines agreed. “Best thing to do is wait until we hear something from the Chief of Police over in Belchertown. Maybe he knows something more about this Millis guy that’ll shed some light on the whole thing. Either way, we’ll run his name and the plates on that truck. For now, he can stay on ice until we figure out what to do with him.” Gaines paused in thought for a second. “And I’m positive I’ve heard that name before.”

  “What? Millis?”

  “No. The fake he gave me when I first met him: Bill Sexton. I know I know that name. It’s been buggin’ me since I pulled his real ID back at t
he diner. I thought so when he first said it, and I’m even more sure of it now. But I can’t for the life of me remember where I heard it.”

  “Can’t say it sounds familiar to me,” Catherine said, picking up the evidence bag with Millis’s driver’s license in it. She looked it over for a second, her eyes thinning. “Bill Sexton, huh?” she said softly to herself. “We even sure this is our guy’s? I mean, I know whoever is over at the morgue is our shooter, but are you sure this is his license?” She gestured to the ID photo. “I guess it looks like him enough, the red hair and all. But this is expired, and the DOB on this is faded and illegible.”

  “I noticed that. Here, let me see it again,” Gaines said, extending a hand. Catherine tossed him the bag. He caught it and studied it for a moment.

  The man in the license picture had a full beard and short, copper-colored hair. Take away the facial hair and it was a dead ringer. Same nose, same deep-set eyes, same thin face.

  “Try and picture him without the beard. It’s him. I had a conversation with the guy a couple days ago and looked him right in the eyes. This is him, I’m sure of it.”

  But he wasn’t sure of it. He was nearly certain. He was pretty confident. He was a lot of things, but “sure” wasn’t one of them. Thinking about it, Gaines couldn’t actually remember the last time he’d really been sure of anything. He’d spent the better part of the week, ever since Kara Price, living in some strange gray area where every decision he made felt like suicide. Maybe he just wasn’t cut out for this job anymore. Maybe he never had been. The last decade had been nothing more than speeding tickets, drunk drivers, and the occasional fist-fight or property dispute. It had softened him… or at the very least, he’d allowed himself to get comfortable. And that was dangerous with a job like this, where he never knew what the next day might have in store. Just because rape and murder wasn’t something that happened in Heartsridge didn’t mean he should be so unprepared to deal with such atrocities when they did.