Dark Omen: A Northern Michigan Asylum Novel

by Erickson, J. R.

  Crystal climbed from the car, and Wes didn’t look at her as he pulled away from the curb.

  * * *

  Crystal packed a duffel bag, moving listlessly between her closet and dresser, throwing shorts, tank tops and a bathing suit in a pile on her bed.

  She thought of Weston’s eyes, the tight bud of his mouth. He hadn’t been angry. No, it had been sorrow in his features, but why hadn’t he spoken? The man with so many words, with words like a steadily moving stream, had said nothing. He’d left her on the sidewalk without even a parting glance.

  She shoved the clothes in her bag and grabbed the brochure on the table beside her door.

  On the inner flap, a couple kissed across their kayaks.

  She frowned and shoved the pamphlet into her bag.

  Her excitement at signing up for the adventure had dissipated with her thoughts of Weston.

  She walked across the hall to Garret’s apartment and knocked on the door.

  He pulled it open, wearing a red button-down shirt open at the collar. Tight black jeans hugged his sinewy body.

  “Crystal, my love, come in, come in. I just opened a bottle of Chardonnay. Have a glass.”

  Crystal followed Garret into his immaculate apartment. Garret didn’t suffer dust or disarray. She heard his vacuum power on every morning at seven a.m., despite more than a few neighbors’ complaints. The landlord would never reprimand a tenant for excessive cleaning.

  “How’s the new stud?” Garret asked. “I saw him leaving your apartment the other morning, sneaking out like a fox from the henhouse. My goodness, that luscious hair. I thought of inviting him over so I might run my fingers through it.”

  Crystal laughed and took her glass of wine, perching on one of Garret’s bar stools.

  “He is delicious, isn’t he?” she asked.

  She wanted to engage in the easy banter she and Garret usually shared about their various lovers, but a knot had formed in her stomach. The wine only seemed to send it roiling.

  “I’m going out with Barry again tonight,” Garret said, sitting on the other stool. “Don’t ask me why. He’s a terrible kisser, but he’s funny. Best ab workout of my life just listening to him talk. My mother always said a man who makes you laugh is a keeper.” Garret made a gagging face.

  “I like Barry,” Crystal said, thinking of the man Garret had brought home the week before.

  He was not Garret’s usual type. He stood a foot shorter than Garret and had a mop of curly blond hair, a nose splashed in freckles, and he’d been wearing corduroy pants. Clothes that Garret called the curse of heterosexual men.

  But Barry wasn’t heterosexual. and though he dressed badly, kissed badly, and didn’t match the Calvin-Klein-men’s-underwear model types Garret usually dated, he had a smile that turned angry dogs into puddles of mush at his feet. Really, Garret had seen it with his own eyes, and told Crystal all about it.

  “I thought gay men were free from falling for the responsible, safe type,” he complained. “Hear that, Grandma?” He looked skyward. “I’m gay. Even a respectable, kind, trustworthy man won’t produce any Kasper babies.”

  Crystal grinned and took another sip of wine. Garret’s joy sent the little knot unraveling, if only slightly.

  “Don’t dismiss him yet, Grandma Kasper,” Crystal called. “There’s always adoption.”

  Garret sighed and grabbed a bottle of vodka from the counter, taking a swig.

  “I need a nip of the hard stuff to stomach that idea. But tell me, darling, Crystal. Where is your hunk on this Friday afternoon? Surely he hasn’t left you to the company of your cats and a TV dinner?”

  “I don’t have cats,” she snapped playfully, throwing an oven mitt at him.

  He caught it and quickly returned it to the little hook beside the oven.

  “He left,” she sighed. “I booked a trip to the UP for the weekend to go kayaking and… he couldn’t go.”

  Garret watched her for a moment and then leaned both elbows on the counter.

  “Okay, spill your guts, Miss Childs. You’re telling me you’re taking a last-minute, carelessly romantic trip that includes waterfalls and heart-shaped cliffs and Dream Boat isn’t joining you?”

  Crystal stood and walked to the window. The street Wes had driven down only an hour before stood empty.

  “Yeah, he said he had a meeting this weekend. I’m fine. I’ve been wanting to go. I’ve driven by that travel place a half dozen times and today was the right day, you know?”

  “Oh yes, I know all about your spidey sense,” he told her.

  “So I made Wes stop, and we went in and I booked it. I thought we’d go together. I wanted to, but he said he had a meeting in Traverse City and he couldn’t stay here through the weekend, which is fine. It is,” she insisted at the look on Garret’s face. “But then he was so quiet on our drive home and he barely kissed me goodbye. It felt… I don’t know. Like I’d screwed something up. And since when do I think like that?” she demanded, spinning away from the window.

  Garret smiled and shrugged, moving to the couch and patting the space beside him.

  She sat down and snuggled into his armpit.

  “Since you fell in love,” he murmured.

  Crystal sighed, leaning forward to set her glass on the table.

  Garret moved faster than her and slid a coaster beneath it.

  “Sorry,” she mumbled.

  “Au contraire, I fancy myself a coaster-wielding magician. I prefer to slip it in there before you even know it’s happened,” he chuckled. “That sounded far more sexual than I intended.”

  Crystal laughed and squeezed the cushion beneath her with both hands. “I feel like an adolescent girl with hurt feelings. And worse, that’s what he acted like. A teenage boy sulking in the car.”

  Garret shifted to face her on the couch.

  “Love does that, you know? Makes us crazy and stupid. But you’re doing the very best thing. You’re going off on a grand adventure without him. Leaving him pining for you this weekend, and by Monday he’ll be ramming his head against your door and begging your forgiveness.”

  Crystal grinned.

  “I hope not. I like his head. But I wish we’d had a better goodbye. You know? I feel conflicted now. I hate that. I wanted to go into the weekend clear. Instead, I’m all muddied in my head and…” she trailed off and placed a hand over her heart.

  “Call him, then. It’s a simple answer, Crystal. But you won’t, right?” Garret challenged.

  Crystal sighed and looked at her watch.

  “I don’t know. Maybe.” She kissed Garret on the cheek and stood.

  “I have to go. The bus for the UP leaves in an hour and I have to check in.”

  Garret stood and carried her glass to the sink.

  “Call him, Crystal. And then have an amazing time. Don’t give him another thought until that bus crosses the Mackinac Bridge on Sunday.”

  She smiled and nodded, backing through his door. They both knew it didn’t work like that. If only you could wipe someone from your mind for a weekend.

  21

  Now

  “Did you find anything?” Bette demanded before Hart had made it across the threshold into the house.

  Homer popped into the hallway, face anxious. Lilith followed, holding Oolong in her arms.

  “Yes,” Hart admitted.

  Bette froze, her breath catching.

  “Not Crystal,” Hart quickly assured them. “But I have a few questions.”

  Bette ground her teeth and walked into the kitchen, where Lilith had made spaghetti, baked cookies, and arranged fresh flowers in a clear vase on the dining room table. Lilith had always been good at that, making things seem okay, softening the sharp edges of tragedy.

  None of them were hungry, but they were trying to do the responsible thing and eat.

  “Can I get you something? Tea or—?” Homer asked. He reverted to host when in the home where he’d spent so much of his life.

  Though Bette had
lived in the house alone for over two years, when Homer returned, they unconsciously assumed their former roles as father and daughter. He’d never been much of a host, but he was better than Bette, who rarely remembered to offer guests a glass of water unless they were there for dinner.

  “No. I’m fine. Thank you,” Hart said.

  Lilith set Oolong on the floor and offered Hart her hand.

  “Hi, I’m Lilith Hawkins.”

  “Oh, sorry, yes,” Homer said, sounding embarrassed. “Lilith was my wife’s best friend. Lilith this is—”

  “Officer Hart,” the policeman told her before Homer finished.

  He shook her hand.

  “We can sit in the living room,” Homer said, motioning toward the front room.

  “Or you’re welcome to join us for dinner.” Lilith gestured at the table.

  “No, thank you. I can’t stay for long.” The officer followed Homer into the living room and stood near the wall.

  “What did you find?” Bette demanded, unable to sit.

  She paced to the window, flicked open the curtains and watched a gray van drive by.

  Homer sat but immediately started tapping his socked feet. Lilith sat opposite him on the couch and her eyes flicked to his bobbing toes.

  “We found a pregnancy test,” Hart told them. “It was positive, and Wes admitted it belonged to Crystal. She told him she was pregnant two days before she disappeared.”

  Bette gasped and yanked the curtain. The rod pulled from the holder and crashed to the floor, startling all four of them. She made no move to pick it up.

  “She was pregnant?” Bette asked, unbelieving. “No, she would have told me. She tells me everything. She calls me if she stubs her toe.”

  Homer said nothing, but he folded his hands in his lap and stared at the gold band on his left finger. He’d never remarried after their mother died. He’d never gone on a date, as far as Bette knew.

  Lilith stood and walked to Bette, putting a hand on her low back.

  “Wes is married, and Crystal is pregnant…” Bette shook her head.

  “Just breathe,” Lilith murmured.

  Hart knelt and grabbed the curtain, reaching up and replacing the bar in the holders, pushing the fabric to one side.

  “What did he do to our Crystal? What did he do to my little girl?” Homer’s voice caught. He touched the gold band and stared at the floor.

  Hart shook his head. “We don’t have evidence of foul play. If something happened to Crystal, I doubt it happened in Weston’s house. His story, his newest story, is that Crystal visited him on Wednesday. They were only in the house for a few minutes when she told him she was pregnant. He was shocked and didn’t say much, which seemed to upset her. She ran out the door and drove away. That was the last he spoke to her.”

  “What bullshit,” Bette snarled. “And what was the story before? She stopped by to say hi and left. I knew he was fucking lying.”

  Homer pulled off his ring, slid it on his pinkie and started rotating it around and around.

  “Where did you find the pregnancy test?” Lilith asked.

  “In the master bedroom on his dresser.”

  “Did he try to deny it was Crystal’s?” Bette demanded.

  Hart shook his head. “No. He told us right away it was Crystal’s. He said he reacted poorly when she showed him the test. Not angry, but not happy. Later, he said he realized it would complicate things, but he was happy.”

  “Liar,” Bette muttered.

  “You searched his trash cans?” Homer asked. “His cupboards? Any place he could have hidden evidence of a crime?”

  “Yes, but the trash goes out on Mondays, which means he could have taken stuff out already.”

  “God damn it!” Bette shrieked, pulling away from Lilith.

  She stalked across the room, but there was nowhere to run.

  “Was his house clean?” Homer asked. “Were any spaces unusually clean compared to the rest of the house?”

  Again, Hart shook his head.

  “We looked for that, but no. His place has an air of neglect. It’s not dirty, just not very lived in. Like I said, he divides his time between East Lansing and Traverse City. Most of his stuff is up north. This house has a lot of textbooks, papers, but otherwise…” Hart shrugged. “He had framed poems and art on the wall, a guitar in the living room. We found one photograph in the whole place. It was a series of photobooth images he and Crystal had taken at a tourist shop when they went to the Upper Peninsula.”

  “Where he tried to kill her!” Bette shouted.

  Her father winced.

  “I sent an officer to Michigan Mayhem this afternoon to get the tour guide’s story,” Hart told Bette.

  “Why doesn’t he wear a wedding ring?” Homer asked, pulling his ring off his pinkie and returning it to his ring finger.

  “He said he lost it a year after he got married,” Hart offered.

  “Yeah right,” Bette spat.

  “I’d better get going. I just wanted to let you guys know what we’d found,” Hart told them.

  “Thank you, Officer.” Homer stood and extended his hand.

  Hart shook it.

  Bette followed him onto the porch.

  “Hart,” she said.

  He turned back to her, clearly wanting to rush to his car and escape the despair oozing out from the Childs’ home.

  “Can we talk? Just for a minute?” She gestured toward the porch, where a rocking chair and a swing sat.

  He wanted to say no. She saw it in his face, but he gave a tight nod and walked to the rocking chair.

  He sat in the chair, both feet planted on the ground as if he preferred stability rather than the uneasy swaying of the chair.

  Bette opted for the porch swing. It rocked forward and back — the cyclical movement, like everything - reminded Bette of her sister.

  Crystal had spoken often of cycles, the in and out breath, the rise and fall of the sun, the highs and lows of emotion. Crystal loved the shift from one end to another, the ever-swinging pendulum.

  Bette felt just the opposite. Crystal’s disappearance had left no great rift in the fabric of the world. People carried on. Even those who loved Crystal continued to get up, put on their socks, drink their coffee and go off to work. Why hadn’t the whole world slid to the edge alongside Bette?

  How did everyone else do it? Even the tiniest thing, the in and out breath, had become near impossible.

  “Do you think he killed her?” Bette asked.

  He took a long time to answer.

  “I don’t know, Bette. And I’m not just saying that because I’m a cop and I’m not supposed to assume anything. Sometimes you meet a perpetrator and in your guts you’re sure he’s guilty. Other times, you think you’ve met the husband of the year only to find out he’s been beating his wife for a decade, and strangled her a week ago, despite crying at press conferences and begging for her abductor to bring her home. People are unpredictable and if their own skin is on the line, they can become very convincing. I don’t have a gut feeling about Weston as a killer. But everything we’ve found…” He trailed off.

  “Makes him look like a killer,” she finished.

  “It doesn’t look good. I’ll say that,” Hart agreed.

  “Crystal’s always been the brighter daughter,” Bette began. “Not brains wise, though she is smart. But brighter in light. Her light has sometimes made me feel kind of small. Insignificant, maybe.”

  Bette touched a strand of her hair and then lifted it, gazing at the dark color, void of light.

  “Do you think one daughter is always less compared to the other?” she wondered out loud. “All the things I’ve coveted in Crystal’s life are phantoms. The beautiful men are ugly on the inside. The bright clothes wrinkle and fade with time. The feelings that ignite poetry die. All of it is temporary. Some of it is not even real at all.”

  Hart didn’t look at Bette as she talked.

  “I don’t think one sister is always les
s,” he said. “Different, but not less. I have three siblings, in some ways we’re similar. In others, we’re like aliens from different planets and that’s good. Right? We’re meant to be different. Snowflakes and all that.”

  “Snowflakes,” Bette laughed, and the laughter cut deep because Crystal had loved snowflakes.

  She’d gone through a phase somewhere in her teen years when she talked of snowflakes constantly. She studied them on the windowpanes. She lay in the yard on freezing cold days and watched them fall one after another and pillow on her long dark eyelashes.

  Bette would run out, join her for half a minute and then race back inside to warm up.

  She’d never had Crystal’s devotion, her strength, her willingness. Crystal was all in. That’s how Lilith had once described her. She was all in on life for every single hand.

  “Are you going to arrest him?” Bette asked.

  Hart stood and offered her a sympathetic smile. “Not yet, but I promise you’ll be the first to know.”

  He said nothing more as he walked down the driveway and climbed into his car.

  22

  Then

  “Great to meet you, Crystal. I’m Dan. Your dashing, daring and deviant tour guide for this Michigan Mayhem Adventure.”

  Dan grabbed Crystal’s duffel bag and hoisted it into the back of the Michigan Mayhem van.

  Dan was tall, six foot five at least, with tanned skin and sun-bleached hair that hung past his collar. He had big brown eyes, a wide smile and an energy toward which Crystal would have previously gravitated. He was just her type.

  Instead, as he flirted, she thought of Weston.

  A German shepherd jumped from the passenger seat of the tour van and ran over to lick Crystal’s hand.

  “Hey there, Willy, how are you today?” she asked, rubbing the dog’s scruffy neck.

  “Whoa, how d’you know his name?” Dan asked, holding his hand out for the dog to lick.

  Crystal paused.