Beneath Still Waters

by Matthew Costello

  woods, branches reaching out, scraping her skin, her face,

  while she whimpered. That was the only time she let the im-

  age of Tommy—gasping, grimly flailing at the water—enter

  her consciousness. It was also the only time she admitted,

  accepted, the terrible guilt.

  If only I had stayed, he’d be alive. 1 could have saved him.

  In a fog, she had flagged down a Ford four-by-four and

  took a ride with a beer-toting kid who, from his grinning

  face, couldn’t believe his luck. But her choking story about

  her boyfriend straightened the driver right out. He quickly

  dropped her off at the Ellerton police station.

  After that she prayed and forced herself to think of

  anything else.

  Anything. Except the guilt. And the picture of Tommy

  under water.

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  But that morning it was all there for her. Not to be ig-

  nored. And somehow it wasn’t all that horrid. There was an

  almost poignant sadness in Tommy’s death. It was a

  tragedy—the young boy who died with his love un . . .

  un . . .

  She searched for the word that Mr. Winan had used in

  his English class, talking of young Romeo.

  Unrequited.

  That’s when she knew what she’d do that day. She

  wouldn’t tell anyone. Not a soul. That would mar the beauty,

  the simplicity of her gesture. She’d bring flowers, not from

  the store but gathered from around the town’s parks and gar-

  dens. Flowers from his home. She’d bring the flowers to

  their spot, right to the secluded place where she’d last seen

  Tommy. And she’d throw them in one by one, into the water.

  A private memorial.

  Just for her, and Tommy.

  Slowly Billy Leeper found it easier to look at the lake.

  At first it overwhelmed him with a tidal wave of memo-

  ries. Biking with Jackie up to the Lakeview Hotel, where

  they would fish the small Kenicut Lake until someone from

  the hotel would come out and chase them away.

  “And don’t come back!” the caretaker would yell.

  But they did, nearly every day of the summer, talking

  about the universe of things that boys value. What’s a good

  knife? How quick would it take the U.S. to lick the Ger-

  mans or the Japs? (Never knowing that Uncle Sam would

  have to take them on together.) Swapping comic books and

  debating whether this new crime fighter, Superman, would

  make it big.

  Billy smiled a bit, thinking of those talks.

  And rainy days, God, the hours they spent at the Glen-

  wood, their Keds propped up on the seats in front of

  them, wolfing down popcorn and Junior Mints. (With

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  more high-level discussions of just how was Buck Rogers

  going to get out of his latest impossible jam.)

  A childhood gone forever, leaving only fragments, tiny

  traces of thought.

  But his nostalgia faded—quickly, as if it were a false

  reaction—and Billy felt cold.

  He rolled down his shirt sleeve over his powerful arms.

  The house is down there. Sitting and rotting under the

  water. The bloodstained floorboards. The twisting hallway.

  The stairs leading to an ever darker basement.

  (And what else, Billy? What else?)

  He was here now. As much as he hoped and prayed that

  he’d never have to do this, he knew it was almost inevitable.

  Fated.

  Sixty-three years old.

  A long enough life, he supposed. But he wasn’t doing

  this for Dan or any of them—what do they call them?—

  yuppies who lived in Ellerton. That’s not who he came

  back to this town to help.

  (It’s for you, Jackie, he thought. Unfinished business.

  Accounts to be balanced.)

  He rubbed the grizzly beard sprouting on his cheek.

  He watched Jack Russo crouched in the back of the

  small boat.

  And if he hadn’t been so lost in his thoughts, he might

  have noticed that someone was watching him.

  For the first few minutes it was no different than any other

  morning dive. Cold water touched the small bits of his ex-

  posed skin. That first disconcerting moment when up and

  down seemed a tad indefinite. Then the soothing, almost

  primeval feeling of kicking, froglike, straight down.

  And for a while he didn’t see anything too strange. Af-

  ter all, his tungsten lamp only projected a beam fifteen,

  maybe twenty feet ahead. For all Dan knew, the story of a

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  town down here was an enormous hoax, a local fable to

  drag suckers to the reservoir to look out at the water and

  imagine the buildings (and the stories) beneath such still

  waters.

  But then the first shapes appeared, a hulking corner of

  a building that nearly clipped him on his left shoulder,

  and then a flat rooftop pockmarked with holes, and a

  yawning valley of what—unbelievably enough—had to

  be Main Street.

  His equipment was performing fine. (He just wished he

  had a radio so he could talk to Russo—some chitchat and

  directions would be more than welcome.)

  But he was alone.

  He concentrated on following the directions to the

  church—straight north up Main Street, then right, onto

  Lakeview Road, toward the church. How thoughtful of them

  to put street signs down here!

  And he thought of Tom and Ed. (He didn’t want to find

  them. Not at all. Leave that for the guys with the body

  bags . . . the people who could fish someone out of the wa-

  ter and make jokes—jokes!—about the puffy, “dough-boy”

  look caused by all that gas building up in the corpse.)

  He barely looked left or right, just enough to notice some

  of the signs, all encrusted with algae but still easily readable.

  The Gouldens Falls Post Office (no zip code here), F. W.

  Woolworth’s, a red sign gone to a sickly greenish-brown,

  and the movie theater (he swam especially fast past that).

  Until he reached Lakeview Road.

  At first all the landmarks seemed to disappear. This

  was, according to the map, the end of the town. But even as

  he slowed and moved ahead more cautiously, he picked up

  some steps, leading to a massive veranda. It was the hotel.

  Closed for renovation.

  The church had to be close, just past the hotel, and up a

  slight hill.

  He found himself lower to the ground (lower than he

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  wanted to be), and he reached the gentle grade of an in-

  cline. He kicked away violently.

  I’m swimming uphill, he thought.

  Over the murky deposit of years of dead leaves and

  trash.

  The church appeared out of the water like a gray phantom.

  He was glad to see it.

  (Somehow it felt better here, even with the small build-

  ing all boarded up and its steeple nibbled down to a blunt

  stub. The
re was no cross anywhere in sight. Still, it was a

  church.)

  He circled the building, past the sign listing Reverend

  Duncan Passworthy as rector. He looked for some en-

  trance. But the doors were crisscrossed with heavy two-by-

  fours, and the windows—the stained glass probably long

  gone—were covered with sheets of wood. Damn. I could

  probably rip the door down, he thought. But how long would it take? Do I have enough air to struggle with the

  wooden cross beams and still do what I have to do?

  He checked his oxygen gauge. The pressure was down

  to nearly a half. Another thirty minutes or so left and he’d

  have to be on the surface. He wished Jack had gone closer

  to the church (but he had to give him the idea that he was

  looking for Tom and Ed, at least somewhere near where

  they were lost).

  He went to the front door and pulled at one of the two-

  by-fours. After fifty years they should be a bit loose.

  He tugged, pulling hard while his flippered feet pushed

  against the door. The wood struts didn’t move a bit.

  Nothing like old-fashioned craftsmanship.

  He aimed his lamp upward to look for another possible

  way in (or maybe guidance from heaven). He saw the

  steeple. It was riddled with small holes. Perhaps he could

  widen one of them and work his way through. Or there was

  the top itself, open.

  If it was big enough. If it was clear down to the church.

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  223

  He kicked up. ( I’m breathing hard. Too damn hard, us-

  ing up my air too quickly. Gotta calm down. Relax, don’t

  worry—)

  Right. Sure.

  No fuckin’ problem.

  He glided past the sealed windows, along the steeple,

  checking at the holes as he passed (all of them too small).

  Catching glimpses of eyes—furtive, dotlike eyes watch-

  ing his progress. The fish were about to have their hiding

  place disturbed.

  He reached the top of the steeple.

  It was open. Clear.

  (Lucky me.)

  He stuck the lamp in and aimed down.

  It was unobstructed as far as the light carried.

  Unfortunately all it showed was something that looked

  like a black hole.

  He grabbed some of the wood girding the hole and

  snapped it back. A few chunks broke off, then a few more,

  until Dan thought it was wide enough.

  (Like going into a mouse hole.)

  He kicked around and stuck his hands in, the lamp held

  out in front, and slowly kicked forward.

  Almost immediately his tanks got caught up in the hole.

  He twisted left and right. It had looked big enough, dammit.

  And he wasn’t wearing fat tanks designed for an all-day ex-

  cursion. He reached out to feel for something to pull himself

  through. But the walls, sharply arching away, were smooth.

  He wriggled around, stuck in that hole, caught. He

  breathed even more heavily, his chest rising and falling.

  His hands continued to grope until he found a hole.

  Great. Now if I can just pull myself through.

  With only one hand free, it was difficult. But he strained,

  and with a sudden lurch he slid into the steeple.

  He saw some fish scurry away. He moved straight down,

  trying to remember . . . what the hell is a church like?

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  m a t t h e w j . c o s t e l l o

  (It had been a while.)

  He couldn’t see anything.

  Then the faintest outline of—

  A floor. Heavy stones. But no pews. (Gone to some

  other church, most likely.) No altar. (Ditto.)

  No pulpit.

  In fact, he thought grimly, there was absolutely nothing

  here to suggest that this was a house of God.

  Absolutely nothing.

  Her mom wasn’t talking.

  She was mad at her, mad enough to ignore all of Claire’s

  attempts to talk.

  The only thing her mom had said when they got in the

  car was “I’ll take you with me, Claire, but I’m very angry.

  Very. And one way or the other, we’re going to get to the bottom of these fears of yours.”

  Her mother was going to go to the office, and then, that

  afternoon, she would take Claire to the dam. Claire watched

  her abruptly snap the Volkswagen Rabbit into gear and back

  out of the driveway.

  Her mother was not happy.

  But she didn’t care. It was better to have her mom mad

  at her, really mad. Much better than having her go to the

  dam . . . by herself.

  Now, at least, I can warn her.

  I can protect her.

  But she never once thought that her coming along was

  maybe what was supposed to be happening all along.

  The young cops were gone, into their car to slug at some

  coffee and eat some doughnuts.

  Leaving Billy Leeper all alone on the tiny beach.

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  Jack Russo was out there, on the water, but he was care-

  fully watching the blips that indicated where Dan was.

  All alone. And Billy didn’t like it.

  Remember, he thought, ring-a-levio? Do kids still play

  that? He remembered hiding in the woods, waiting to be

  found. And sometimes no one came. It was creepy sitting

  there, expecting Jackie Weeks to come bounding around a

  tree, grabbing at his arm, yelling, “Cor, cor, ring-a-levio!

  One, two, three!”

  They played down there . . . in the woods, near Old

  Man Boozer’s hill, by the graveyard, in all the wide-open

  spaces of Gouldens Falls.

  Not so wide now. Not so open.

  The cops closed the door to their patrol car.

  It was chilly that morning. Even getting chillier as it

  grew lighter. (No sunrise. Just chunky gray clouds. Dark

  October clouds in July.)

  He rubbed his hands together.

  And saw something.

  Off to the right, away from the beach. A bit of move-

  ment that just barely registered in his peripheral vision.

  He tried to look.

  There was nothing there.

  Then, again, the movement.

  This time he turned quickly. But there was no need.

  The person stood there, just a bit inside the overgrown

  woods past the beach, looking at Billy.

  A guy in a blue suit. Damnedest thing.

  Billy stared back at him.

  Damnedest thing.

  The man smiled. Billy smiled back. Just a detective, or

  some official, or—

  No.

  Billy’s hand came up to the air, and involuntarily he

  pointed.

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  I know you. I know that face. The hair was different. But no mistake. Different. But the same.

  He took a heavy step in the sand, away from the water,

  off toward the right, toward the man.

  (Who stood there waiting.)

  And every step convinced Billy that no, he wasn’t crazy.

  It was him.

  Thirty feet away. Twenty feet. He left the beach, push-

  ing his way through the prickers and stunted maples that

  grew in the dappled shade
under the tall, fully grown trees.

  Ten feet away. The man grinned. A big, welcoming smile.

  “Billy . . .” he said quietly, almost soothingly.

  (No fear? Why aren’t I afraid? Why—)

  “Billy . . . it’s been a long, long time.”

  “Martin Parks,” Billy said (or he thought he said). He

  wasn’t sure he made any sound at all. His hands clenched.

  They were big, strong hands—he was proud of these hands—

  and the fingers pressed into his palms, cutting deep into the

  hard, calloused hands.

  “You’re back.”

  Parks laughed. “Yes. How observant of you. Unfortu-

  nately I know what you and your friend down there are try-

  ing to do.” Parks put his hands together.

  (Like some accountant delivering the bad-news bottom

  line.)

  “I’m afraid the game is over, Billy.”

  He pulled his hands apart.

  (Why aren’t I afraid? Billy thought. I ran all the way to Montauk to be away from here. Why . . . aren’t . . . I . . .) Parks pulled his hands apart.

  The pain bloomed in Billy’s midsection, bright, flash-

  ing, doubling up the old man.

  “No,” he said with a moan.

  “Yes, your time is up, Billy Boy.”

  Parks brought his fingertips together, such graceful fin-

  gers. The pain stopped. “All bets are off, Billy.” Parks

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  227

  pulled his hands apart, and it was as if Billy’s insides were

  being ripped apart.

  This time he went to his knees.

  Billy glanced back at the police car. The doors were

  shut.

  (Please, he prayed now. Finish your coffee, your dough-

  nuts, your bitching and complaining about low salaries and

  bills that just keep on coming. Please—)

  “I’m sure you’ve got it all figured out, Billy. In fact”—

  the hands went together again—

  (Oh, no, please.)

  The pain stopped.

  —“I’m sure you had it figured out fifty years ago when

  your friend Jackie Weeks ran into our little Club.” He

  laughed, a sick, hollow sound. “After all, how could he

  know that they were all supposed to be dead?”

  He moved his hands apart.

  Now his body opened. A faint tear at first, like squatting

  down and—oops—splitting the backside of your pants

  apart.

  A thin line ran from his midsection, then up, slowly, to

  his chest.

  Parks laughed louder.

  Billy fell backward, his hands going naturally to his

  skin, pressing it together, crying now—

  A small boy who had hurt himself.