by Joe Clifford
Alex and Nick took a seat on each side. Nick ordered a beer, Alex a whiskey. She asked Cole what he was drinking but he didn’t answer. Not sure it would’ve mattered; he was already feeling no pain. Or maybe he was feeling too much of it.
The bartender set down their drinks. Nick paid cash. This wasn’t a place where you ran a tab.
Alex spun her stool sideways. “You’re Cole Denning. We went to high school together.” Alex didn’t remember people in her own class, let alone a guy who wasn’t even in high school when she graduated.
Cole didn’t take the bait, or maybe he wasn’t used to pretty girls making the first move, not unless they wanted to sell him company for the night. And even those girls had their standards. Not enough money in the world for some things.
“You were friends with Kira Shanks,” Nick said. “I remember you.”
Cole glanced at Nick, then looped around to Alex, before drooping his head.
“Hey!”
The bartender stomped over. Big slab of gut, hairy forearms, miniature baseball bat in hand, the kind they give away on minor league baseball promotional nights.
“What are you bothering him for?”
“No one’s bothering anyone,” Alex said.
The bikers stopped playing pool.
“I think you two might be more comfortable with your own kind.”
“Our own kind?”
“I’ve had enough of you Uniondale kids coming in here.” The bartender slapped Nick’s cash down. “I don’t want your parents’ money. Go slumming somewhere else.”
“I don’t go to Uniondale,” Nick said.
“No,” he said, nodding at Alex. “But she does. Boys like you are their charitable contribution to the lower class.”
“You think I go to Uniondale?” Alex looked down at what she was wearing, tee shirt out of a ten-pack, ripped jeans, and Chuck Taylors, ratty black hoodie, bracelets jangling on her wrist, and realized she didn’t look all that different than Noah Lee, or any of the other kids at Uniondale acting poorer than they really were. Who was appropriating whose culture? She didn’t know whether to be offended or feel pride for finally having passed as one of them.
Cole Denning lifted a languid hand. “It’s okay, Lou.”
Lou the bartender grunted, before retreating to the other end, one eye on the tiny television under the counter, the other stuck on them.
“You want to talk about Kira?” Cole said, not giving either a chance to answer as he pulled a wad of crumpled bills from his pocket, sifting singles from the lint. “Kira Shanks was the only real friend I ever had. Not a day goes by that I don’t think about her. I miss her more than you could possibly know.”
Cole swilled his drink and staggered off. He threw open the doors, jamming shaky hands in pockets, returning to a cold, uncaring world.
“What you think?”
Alex stole a peek at the bikers, who still hadn’t resumed their game of eight ball, at Lou, choking up on that bat, tapping the barrel impatient against his meaty palm. “Probably time to leave.”
When they got outside, there was no sign of Cole. A second later Alex’s cell buzzed with a text. Not the message she was expecting.
She showed the screen to Nick.
Meaghan Crouse.
“What’s it say?”
“Party tonight in Rotterdam. We’re invited.”
CHAPTER TWENTY
Apparently the party was in the middle of nowhere. They’d veered off Route 5S a while ago. Past Schenectady, beyond Rotterdam, deep into the forest. Streets turned darker, signs ebbing less frequent, until they were deposited in this no-man’s land. More than once, Alex considered turning around, insecurity getting the best of her. She flashbacked to painful elementary school memories when Linda and Jennifer Swanson invited her over to Jennifer’s house and then refused to let her in, stifling giggles behind the door. Silly now, but in fifth grade, those’re the kinds of wounds that leave deep and lasting scars.
How had Meaghan gotten her number anyway? Alex didn’t remember leaving her name at the pharmacy, let alone a phone number. When Alex got the text (Wazup? Its Meaghan. Party tonite. U shud stop by), Alex played it cool and asked for the address (Cool. Addy?). No reason to risk spooking her. Alex knew Meaghan wasn’t looking for a new best friend, but whatever her angle, this was a chance for Alex to get a closer look, perhaps glean something about the night Kira went missing. Alex felt excited but wasn’t sure why. A job was a job, and two thousand bucks didn’t hurt. But aside from her current “boss” being an affluent piece of shit (who was threatening to pull the plug), Alex could only ignore the obvious for so long: she needed this to mean something more.
“You sure that’s the right address?”
Alex held up her phone for Nick to read.
“Don’t you think it’s strange? Meaghan inviting us to a party in the middle of the woods?” Nick scanned the surrounding wilderness.
“I’m not worried about some high school poser.”
“She’s not in high school anymore.”
Alex squinted at the GPS overview.
“What the hell? Are we going camping?”
“Says seven minutes.”
They’d been on the same dark, twisting road for a long time. No streetlights. No street names. Just the skeletal outlines of bare-boned trees. There was nothing in the remote vicinity. Briar patch flourished by the roadside, dry, thorny blackberry bushes minus the fruit. Cloud cover drifted across muddy skies, obscuring moon and stars.
“This sure isn’t Rotterdam,” Nick muttered.
Alex fished her smokes.
“At least roll down the window.”
“Fuck that. It’s cold.”
“Then don’t smoke. Christ, Alex, I have to sit in this truck all week. If you’re not a smoker that shit stinks. Have a little consideration. I’m going on this mission with you—”
“Okay, okay. Like you had anything better to do. When I stopped by your place the other night, you looked like you were already in bed. At nine-thirty.”
“I get up early for work.”
“What do you do, exactly?”
“Thanks for taking an interest in my life. We’ve only been hanging out a week.”
“I figure I might as well get to know you in case we die tonight.”
“Funny.”
Alex checked her phone. “Take the next right. Fox Hollow Road. Half a mile.”
“Oh, boy. An actual street name. My uncle runs a hauling company. Among other things. Side business. I move the sensitive stuff. TVs, computers, artwork.”
Alex craned over her shoulder, out the back window, to the dirty flatbed cluttered with a toolbox and moving blankets, gunny straps, and bungee cords. “In this thing?”
“I’ve got a gentle touch. People feel better having sensitive items personally transported.”
Nick turned onto Fox Hollow. Paved asphalt surrendered to dirt and gravel. Alex jostled about the cab, back teeth chattering with the jarring bumps. The road splayed open and the skies parted, naked stars brighter than the sun. Still waters glinted in the moonlight. Coming to a fork, they saw the sign for the Plotter Kill Preserve, and drove further into the hidden jungle.
Birthwort and wakerobin threaded tall pines and oaks, slippery elms covering the basin, valley floors caged by rockwall, slabs of stacked stone. Soon the big Queen Anne cottage came into view. Nick peered over, nonplussed. Loud rock music bled through the bulrushes. Half a dozen cars peppered the torn-up lawn, people sitting on the hoods, drinking beer in the cold moonlight.
Thin Lizzy blasted out the bottom floor. Despite the chill, windows had been thrown wide open. And why not? No neighbors to complain. The trip was a haul but Alex could see why they’d party out here. On the edge of the preserve, there wasn’t a soul for miles. In the summer, when days don’t end, Alex imagined no one ever went home. It was that kind of place—a communal crash pad where everybody comes to han
g out and get wasted. Pills and powders, powders and pills.
Nick killed the engine. Alex dipped low to look out the clear part of the windshield. Everyone appeared college-aged. Although Alex knew none of this bunch was in school. Reine comprised two distinct groups. The boys and girls who went to Uniondale. And everyone else. This was everyone else.
As much as she could use a drink or drug, Alex quickly regretted coming. Like attending music festival after twenty-six, Alex was too old for house parties.
Nick picked up on her unease. “They aren’t much younger than us.”
“Yeah,” she said, “they are.”
Walking up to the front door, the pair received odd looks, but that had less to do with age than it did their outsider status. The community projected insular, guarded, a secret club. The boys all retained that hard look, miscreants with something to prove; the girls, like they peaked in high school.
The inside of the house was torn to hell, holes in the drywall and empty kegs tipped on their sides. Crap everywhere—empty liquor handles, flattened chip bags, random articles of clothing, wet underwear from midnight swims. A nitrous tank leaned against the wall like a discarded Christmas tree waiting to be hauled to the curb.
Weaving through narrow halls, Alex squeezed between garbage bags leaking pools of fetid liquid. Extension cords wriggled along molding, opposite ends connecting lifelines. She peeked in various bedrooms. Each one, the same listless scene: three or four blissed-out kids copping feels on floor mattresses, milk-crate end tables safekeeping valuables. Chain wallets, lighters, pipes, condoms. Limp hands pawed body parts, trying to grope tit, wriggle down pants for uninspired rubs, half-hearted tug jobs, reciprocation unlikely, recipients damn near passed out. Alex could smell chemicals burning, the unmistakable preparation of harder narcotics wafting down the hall—acetone, paint thinner, ammonia, baking soda. This was what she wanted, right? Something to take the edge off, make her forget. Suddenly the thought of getting high had never seemed less appealing.
At the back end of the house, the noises grew louder, voices booming, music cranked higher, laughter more raucous. Alex realized what she’d thought was the front was actually the back. She’d gotten it all mixed up. There was an actual driveway, from an actual paved road. Somehow she and Nick had gotten turned around, going in through the backdoor.
The front porch was more like an observation deck at a museum, extended and spacious. The landing overlooked a picturesque pond. There was even a little waterfall beyond the reeds. The party up here was reserved for the cool kids, who all lounged on tattered couches and gashed leather La-Z-Boys, the air a haze of marijuana smoke. To hang here, you had to be invited. Soon as Alex stepped foot on the deck, a couple guys cut her off, burly bouncers at an uptown club.
“Hey, Alex,” Meaghan Crouse said, like they’d been tight for years. She was sitting on the lap of a boy who had his face nuzzled in her neck. She was smoking a joint, which she held out for Alex, who couldn’t say no.
Alex took a hit, then passed it to Nick, who succumbed to the peer pressure, or what he perceived as peer pressure since no one gave a shit whether he took a hit or not. Alex made a mental note not to call him a pussy again.
Meaghan nodded toward a couch in the darker shadows, where three other girls sat in silence. “Patty, Jody, Trista.”
Patty, Jody, and Trista returned the silent head bob. The too-cool-for-school crew. A handful of dudes loomed past their shoulders, drinking beers and taking turns sparking a broken light bulb, sucking thick white smoke through a straw. Another boy sat on the porch railing, aiming a shotgun at an imaginary target in the trees, lifting the gun in slow motion with each report, making soft exploding sounds like a twelve-year-old playing army. Meaghan nodded, and one of the boys stepped forward, offering Alex the light bulb.
“No, thanks. I’m cool.”
“I thought you partied?” Meaghan said.
“Sometimes I do. Sometimes I don’t.”
Patty, Trista, or Jody whispered something, and all three giggled.
The dishwater blonde, Trista, was bigger than the other two. Not fat, just taller. Hard to tell with someone sitting down, but Alex wouldn’t be surprised if Trista White topped six feet.
“I had to call your cousin,” Meaghan said. “To get your number. In case you were wondering how I got your cell.”
“I wasn’t.”
“You don’t live up here anymore,” Trista said. It wasn’t a question.
“No,” Alex answered anyway. “The city.”
“The city,” one of the girls repeated.
“Shut up, Patty,” Meaghan said.
Patty had on a vintage Zeppelin tee, Houses of the Holy, naked urchins crawling up stone stairs to an altar. “What’s your boyfriend’s name?” She was looking at Nick.
“He’s not my boyfriend.”
“Hi. I’m Nick.” Nick took a step into the circle in case anyone wanted to shake his hand. No one did.
“Not him,” Trista said. “She means that detective from Reine. What’s his name?”
“Sean Riley. But he’s not my boyfriend either. Beer?”
Meaghan nodded to a boy in the back who reached into a cooler without ice, tossing Alex and Nick each a warm Miller Lite.
“Whose place is this?” Alex asked popping the tab. She could feel more feet step onto the porch behind her, taking up position. She wasn’t turning around.
“Mine,” Jody said, speaking for the first time. She had a high, squeaky voice, like a balloon with a teeny pinhole leaking air.
Alex didn’t ask how a girl her age owned a house this big. If she had to guess, someone left it to her when they died. Jody Wood didn’t strike Alex as an overachiever, let alone someone with enough credit to secure a mortgage.
“Why are you up here?” Jody asked. “In town, I mean.”
“She’s looking into Kira’s disappearance,” Meaghan answered. Facial expressions said the girls already knew that. “Newspaper article, right?”
Alex nodded.
“What paper did you say you worked for again?”
“Uniondale’s.”
“You go to college?” Patty relieved the boy of his light bulb cooker, bottom charred black, holding flame to glass until it glowed hot and billowed smoke.
“No,” Alex said. “I don’t.”
“She’s helping someone,” Nick said. “On a piece.”
“A piece of what?”
“You want to ask us questions about Kira?” Trista said. “Go ahead.”
Someone switched off the music.
“Yeah, ask away,” Meaghan said. “You drove all the way out here. What do you want to know?”
“Why is she here again?” Jody said.
“She’s working on a piece, remember?”
“Oh, yeah. Right.”
Nick tensed. She could feel it too, the circle tightening. Whoever stood guard behind them had one purpose: make sure they didn’t try to bail before the girls made their point.
“Since you don’t feel like talking,” Meaghan said, “let me start. We think it’s real fucked up that you would come back here and start stirring up shit. You think because of what happened to you that you’re special? Kira was our friend. Not yours.”
“Yeah,” Patty chimed in. “It’s fucking rude.”
“No one likes strangers poking their noses where they don’t belong.”
Alex pulled her Parliaments, footsteps encroaching. They were almost on top of her. She fought to keep her hands steady as she lit the cigarette.
When someone bumped her back, she whipped around. Three men stood there, older, more seasoned, Buscemi eyes extracting the price of long-term drug use.
“Hey. You mind? There’s such a thing as personal space.”
Alex was surprised when they retreated.
“No one is stirring up anything,” Nick said. “She told you. She’s working on a newspaper story with another reporter.
”
“Not stirring up anything?” Meaghan said. “What do you call stalking Cole?”
“We weren’t stalking him. I had a few questions.”
“Cole isn’t too good with words.”
“He’s got water on the brain.”
Alex caught the girls on the couch exchange a look.
“He seemed fine to me.”
“Yeah?” said Trista. “And what did Cole say?”
“Sorry.” Alex drew on her Parliament. “Can’t reveal my sources.”
“I’m sure.” Patty took her turn on the light bulb. The acrid stench of cleaning chemicals hit Alex from across the porch. The smoke tasted like bleach and dentistry, making her lightheaded. If the drugs were impacting Alex ten feet away, she could only imagine the damage being done to Patty’s brain.
Another set of heavy boots landed on the porch. Like at the bar, Alex knew whom they belonged to before she saw his face.
“We were just talking about you,” Meaghan said. “You need a drink, Cole? Looks like you can use a drink.” Meaghan gestured to the cooler boys. “Get Cole a drink. And not that schwag beer. Get him a shot of something.” She turned to Cole, his turtle shoulders calling him back to the shell, oversized glasses absorbing his face. “Bushmill’s good? You need a fix? Load that baby back up and pass that shit to Cole.”
Cole’s gaze crossed Alex’s.
The look was not unlike Benny Brudzienski’s.
It screamed: help me.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
They got back to Nick’s a little after midnight, neither of them sure what they’d seen at Plotter Kill. Other than they’d been warned off in big way, and that Cole Denning knew more than he was letting on.
Alex fell on the couch, splayed out, wrecked. Nick brought back a couple beers from the fridge, dropping beside her.
“That pot fucked me up.”
