Far From You

49

NOW (JUNE)

My mother’s in the kitchen the next morning, waiting for me.

“Where are you going?” she asks over her coffee cup.

“Breakfast with some friends.” I’d texted Kyle and Rachel the night before, and they’re meeting Trev and me at the Gold Street Diner before we head over to talk to Matt.

“Do those friends include Trev?” Mom asks. Her eyebrows practically disappear, they rise so high. “Your father said he was here yesterday.”

I grab the coffeepot and pour some into a travel mug. It’s only a ten-minute drive to the diner, but I’d slept badly. “Yeah.”

“Does Mrs. Bishop know?”

I dump too much sugar into the cup, popping the lid on it. “Mrs. Bishop’s in Santa Barbara. Anyway, Trev’s twenty. I don’t think he needs her permission to hang out with anyone.”

“Sophie.” Mom’s got a worried look on her face. “You and that family…” She stops.

Mom isn’t forgiving. After the crash, she’d tried to separate me from both Mina and him, and it hadn’t worked then, either.

“What about me and ‘that family’?” I demand. “I grew up with Trev. I’m not going to throw that away.”

“I know how that boy feels about you,” she says. “Are you still on birth control?”

Anger spikes inside me. It isn’t any of her business. I hate that she automatically assumes this is all about sex; like with me, that’s the only thing it could be about.

“I’m not sleeping with him,” I say. And I wait until the relief pulls across her face. I wait, because I want to hurt her like she’s hurt me. “Not anymore, at least,” I add.

Mom flinches. I tell myself I don’t care, that this is what I wanted, but I regret it almost instantly.

“I’ll be back later.” I walk past her and out of the kitchen before she can say anything.

I lock the front door behind me and swing my bag over my shoulder, my coffee in my free hand. Trev’s getting out of his truck as I walk down the path.

“We’re meeting Matt in an hour at his apartment,” Trev says. He pauses, his eyes darting to his truck. “You want to drive to the diner?”

I know it makes him nervous to drive with me, so I say, “Sure.” I catch the keys when he tosses them and climb into the driver’s seat. Trev slides in next to me, buckling his seat belt as I turn the key in the ignition.

“I forgot to tell you last night—I talked to Mr. Wells, the reporter in charge of Mina’s internship.”

Trev’s been carefully looking out the window, concentrating on the trimmed hedges and tidy older houses that fill my neighborhood. But at the mention of Mr. Wells, he turns to face me so fast, I’m afraid he might strain something. “Tom Wells?” he demands.

“Yes.” I turn off my street and head toward the railroad tracks.

“Don’t talk to him,” Trev says, and it sounds like an order.

“Why? What’s wrong with him?”

“He was bugging Mom, after Mina…after it happened. Showing up at Mass, trying to get her to talk, wanting to do a profile on Mina. I told him to leave us alone, but then he started calling the house, saying he had some of Mina’s stuff from her desk after the cops searched it. He wouldn’t stop until I came and got it.”

“I just went over there to ask him if Mina had talked to him about Jackie,” I say. “He said she didn’t. But he tried to get me to talk about Mina on the record.”

Trev’s hands clench and unclench rhythmically; I can see it out of the corner of my eye as the truck rumbles over the railroad tracks and I turn onto a side street lined with dingy industrial buildings. The road’s rough here, bad asphalt that the county’s never bothered to replace, and the truck jerks back and forth when I hit the potholes.

“I didn’t talk to Wells about anything important,” I assure him.

“I know you didn’t,” he says, and relief unfurls inside me that at least he still knows that hasn’t changed. He still trusts me with some things.

“What did he give you?” I ask as I pull into the parking lot. The diner in front of us is a squat little building made up of two big rooms with the bathrooms on the outside instead of in. It’s painted an eye-smarting shade of yellow, with wind chimes made out of old silverware dangling from the porch.

“It was just a bunch of half-filled notebooks, some pens, and a few pictures. I didn’t really look carefully through it,” Trev admits. “I haven’t…It was right after, and Mom was still…” He stops, looking away from me. “It was hard,” he says finally. “Afterward. You were gone, and I was so mad at you, and Mom was…I didn’t have anyone. And I just—I couldn’t. I kept the door to Mina’s room shut and I put the package in the garage and tried to forget about it.”

I want to reach out and grab his hand or raise my own to squeeze his shoulder, like he’d do for me. But I’d probably make things worse.

All we ever do is hold it in. It’s the only way to keep going.

“Kyle and Rachel are waiting for us,” I say.

Trev nods. We get out of the truck and head into the diner. It’s noisy inside, the counter lined with old-time regulars on their stools, sipping black coffee and reading the local paper. The dining room is crammed with tables and mismatched chairs, with just inches between for the waitress to navigate. Rachel and Kyle are sitting in the corner next to the picture window.

“You must be Trev.” Rachel smiles. “I’m Rachel.”

“What happened to your eye?” I ask Kyle as Rachel and Trev shake hands. He looks up from his coffee, his right eye swollen and purple.

“I punched him,” Trev says.

“What?”

Rachel laughs. “Seriously?” she asks Kyle.

“It’s not a big deal,” Kyle mutters.

Trev shrugs and sits down. “He deserved it.”

“Okay, no more punching,” I say, shaking my head. Punching wasn’t going to solve anything. “Let’s just all get along. We all want the same thing.”

After we order our food, we get down to business.

“I asked Tanner about Amy,” Kyle says. “He told me that she has soccer practice tomorrow from five to six. I figured you could talk to her then.”

“I just hope she’ll talk to us,” I say. “If she didn’t want Mina recording her interviews, I don’t know why she bothered to do one in the first place.”

“Her family probably just doesn’t like reporters,” Trev says with a scowl.

“Do you want me to go with you to see Matt?” Kyle asks. “He knows me pretty well because of Adam.”

“Trev’s coming,” I say. “But thanks. I think we’ve got another job for you.” I nudge Trev with my elbow. “Do you think it’d be okay if Kyle and Rachel went over to your house? They can go through the package from the Beacon. Maybe there’s something in Mina’s notebooks.”

“That’s a good idea,” Trev says. “If you want to dig around the garage, you can. It’s the only place I haven’t finished searching yet. There’s still a lot to go through.”

“I’ve got time,” Rachel says. “You in, Kyle?”

Mouth full of coffee, Kyle nods.

The rest of our order comes, and our conversation’s abandoned for the clink of silverware and some really excellent home fries. When Trev goes up to the counter to pay, I ask Kyle, “What do you think of Matt?”

“Like, as a suspect?”

“Suspect, person, whatever. He and Trev were friends; I’m looking for another perspective on him.”

Kyle leans back in his blue wicker chair. “Matt’s a tweeker,” he says. “And he’s relapsed twice. He’s clean now, has been for maybe six months. Adam seems to think this time’s different, but he always wants to think that. Their uncle had to step in this time, really lay down the law. Someone in the family has to go with Matt to meetings so he doesn’t ditch.”

“You don’t like Matt,” Rachel observes.

Kyle’s cheeks redden. “He was shitty to Adam when we were kids. But family’s really important, so Adam always forgives Matt, no matter how bad he acts. Matt is older—he should’ve stepped up when their dad left, but he just caused more problems.”

“Shitty person doesn’t necessarily translate into stone-cold killer,” Rachel says.

Trev walks back to the table. “Let’s get going,” he says, tucking some bills underneath my coffee cup for the tip. He grabs his keys off the table and twists one free from the ring, handing it to Kyle. “There’s soda and stuff in the fridge. Help yourself to whatever. Just make sure to lock up and leave the key under the rock on the porch after you leave.”

“And call us if you find anything,” I add.

“Here.” Rachel unhooks her Batman charm bracelet and fastens it around my wrist. “For luck.” She gets up and slings her messenger bag over her shoulder.

We part at the door, Rachel and Kyle heading across the street. Trev tosses me the keys again and reaches over to turn the radio on once we’re back in the truck.

“I don’t think we should tell Matt we found Mina’s interviews,” I say as we drive past the soccer field, where girls in blue uniforms are chasing the ball across the grass.

“Then what do you want to say?”

“Just that we found a list in her room with his name on it. I want to see how he reacts.”

“Okay, but let me do most of the talking.”

I nod as I pull up to the address that Trev’s given me, a squat brown apartment building with a chipped tile roof and a FOR RENT sign on the lawn. We get out of the truck and walk up to 2B.

Trev knocks, and a few minutes pass before the door opens. Matt looks like an older, worn-down version of Adam. His skin doesn’t have Adam’s healthy glow, his cheeks are sunken, and there are fading red marks on his jaw. But he’s got some weight on him and his eyes are clear.

It’s possible he’s clean.

“Trev, my man.” He and Trev do that one-armed hug thing that guys do, and he smiles at me. “Who’s this?”

“This is Sophie.”

“Hi.” I hold out my hand, and Matt takes it.

“Do I know you?” he asks.

“I’m friends with your brother. And Kyle Miller.”

“Oh yeah.” Matt’s smile widens. “Come on in.”

Matt’s place is neat and clean. Two brindle pit bulls jump and wiggle up to me, trying to lick my face as we walk through the doorway. He calls them off and opens the back door for them. I search as subtly as I can for any sign that Matt has relapsed. The house smells like smoke and there’s a china bowl with burn marks almost overflowing with cigarette butts, but when I look down, I don’t see any roaches, just yellow filters. There are no beer bottles or caps, no mysterious baggies in plain sight, no pipes—not even a bottle of Visine or NyQuil.

All of it could be hidden somewhere. When getting high is the only thing you can think about, you get pretty smart about keeping it a secret.

“How’s your mom doing?” Matt asks Trev.

“You know.” Trev shrugs. “It’s better for her, being with my aunt, I think.”

“That’s good. What about you?”

Trev shrugs again. Matt reaches out, claps Trev on his shoulder. “I’m sorry, man.” He looks at me. “Hey, you guys want something to drink? I’ve got soda and water.”

“I’m okay,” I say.

“So what’s up?” Matt asks after we’ve settled on the peeling vinyl couch. He sits down across from us in an armchair.

“Well, it’s kinda weird,” Trev says. “I’m going through Mina’s stuff; I want to have it packed up when my mom comes home. I found this list of names in her desk, and yours was on it. I was wondering what the list was about. I didn’t know you guys were friendly.”

“We weren’t,” Matt says. “Not really. She didn’t tell you about the story she was doing on Jackie?”

“No,” Trev says.

“It was for the Beacon. She said she was doing a profile for Jackie’s birthday and asked me for an interview. I said okay and talked to her. When I never saw anything come out in the paper, I just figured she hadn’t finished it before…” Matt trails off uncomfortably.

“What did she want to know?” Trev asks.

“Normal stuff. How Jackie and I had started dating, what our plans had been.”

“Did she ask you about the case?” I ask.

“Nah,” Matt says. “Mina knew I had nothing to do with it. Detective James is an asshole on a power trip.”

I keep my expression neutral, thinking about how Mina had Matt as Suspect Number One on her list.

“What else did you guys talk about?” I ask.

“Um, she asked how long we’d been together. We talked about soccer, how Jackie ran for student body president junior year. She must have bought a case of glitter glue for all those signs we put up.”

Trev grins. “I forgot about that. She freaked out when she ran out of pink.”

Caught in the memory, Matt laughs, then sobers suddenly, running a hand through his black hair. “Sometimes it’s like she was here just yesterday,” he says. “She always made me laugh, even when everything else sucked.” Absently, he digs something out of his pocket, flipping it over in his fingers, and I see it’s a six-month sobriety chip.

“Six months is awesome.” I gesture at the chip.

His fingers tighten around it. “You in the program?”

“I’ve got a little over ten months.”

“Good for you,” he says. “The meetings are a big help, but it’s still hard sometimes.”

“Yeah, it’s tough. But you know, it’s just one—”

“‘One day at a time.’” He finishes the slogan and looks up at me with a rueful smile. “That’s all we’ve got, right?”

“Something like that.” I smile back, letting it be my excuse to stare into his eyes. Had it been him that night? It’s so hard to clearly remember the killer’s voice, to remember exactly the shape of his eyes through that mask. Three little words punctuated by gunfire, and I…I can’t be sure.

But I can be sure of one thing: addicts lie.

Matt rubs his fingers over the edge of the chip, like he’s drawing strength.

“Did you happen to mention to anyone that Mina was doing a story on Jackie?” Trev asks.

“I think I told my mom,” Matt says. “She thought it was nice that the Beacon was doing a feature on Jackie. Mom loved Jackie.” His green eyes go bright, and he grips the chip tightly, swallowing hard. “It’s just tough,” he says, “thinking about her. Not knowing what happened.”

“Do you think she ran away?” I ask him.

Matt shakes his head, his eyes still moist. “Nah, Jackie loved her family—she’d never leave them, especially Amy. Jackie was excited about college. We even talked about us getting an apartment near Stanford, me going to community college. She wouldn’t have run—no reason to. Someone took her.” He breathes deep, his chip clutched tightly in his hand. “And all I can do is pray she’s out there somewhere, that she’ll get away if someone’s got her, that she’ll come back home.”

“You think she’s still alive?” The second it’s out of my mouth, I know it’s a mistake. He looks like he’s about to burst into tears; pushing this way won’t do any good.

“I hope so,” Matt says. “More than anything.”

There’s an uncomfortable stretch of silence when I don’t know what to say. He could be lying, laying it on thick to mislead us. He could be telling the truth—he could really believe that she’s alive after all these years, because he can’t stand to imagine the alternative.

“We should go,” I say. “I don’t want to take up any more of your time.”

“You cool, Matt?” Trev asks. “I can hang out.”

“No, no, it’s fine.” He waves us off. “Just…bad memories.”

“Thanks for talking to us.”

Matt nods and walks us to the door. “See you around.” He smiles, but his eyes aren’t in it. The door shuts behind us, and I hear the sound of the bolt sliding into place as we head to the stairs.

“Well, what do you think?” Trev asks when we get to the truck.

“He’s tall enough to be the killer,” I say, stepping up into the cab. I fasten my seat belt and turn the key in the ignition. “I know he has guns. Adam goes hunting with him all the time.”

“Just about every guy has a gun around here,” Trev points out as I back out into the street. “I have a gun.”

“You have your dad’s old pistol. Have you ever even shot it?”

“Sure. It’d be stupid to have a gun I didn’t know how to use. I taught Mina, too.”

“When was this?” I don’t remember Mina ever mentioning it.

“When you were in Portland. She asked me to. She…” Trev frowns. “She asked me right around Christmas.”

“When she was getting the threats.”

“So why didn’t she take it with her that night?” Trev asks, and there’s this angry note in his voice that makes me flinch. “She knew where it was, how to use it. She could’ve protected herself.”

“She didn’t bring the gun because she didn’t suspect whoever she was meeting,” I say.

We slow to a halt at the stoplight at the end of the street, and out of the corner of my eye, I can see a muscle in Trev’s jaw twitching. It’s eating at him, that Mina knew she was in enough danger to want to learn how to shoot but had kept her secrets too long.

“Matt doesn’t think much of Detective James,” I say, because I hate how well Trev can blame himself. I need to steer him away from this.

“Neither do you,” Trev points out.

I roll my eyes. “That’s because Detective James gets an idea in his head and won’t budge from it. How much progress has he made in all these months chasing after nonexistent drug leads? If he’d done his job the first time, Mina wouldn’t have had to go after the guy who took Jackie. He’s failed to catch the same killer twice. That’s his fault, too.”

“Look, I’m pissed at him, too, but eventually, we’ll take all of this stuff to him. We’ll have to get along.”

“He’s an ass.”

“Well, let’s say that Matt is responsible,” Trev says. “What’s his motivation for getting rid of Jackie?”

I flip the turn signal at the stop sign, looking both ways. “Did they fight?”

“Sometimes. I think she was pissed he was smoking so much pot. She was trying for a scholarship so her parents wouldn’t have to pay for college. Spent a lot of time working out, running drills, studying so her grades were good enough. She wanted him to keep up.”

I raise an eyebrow. “So, what—he kills her ’cause she’s bugging him about weed?”

“Maybe it was an accident,” Trev says. “She disappeared out on Clear Creek; that’s getting into the woods. Maybe they went hiking or they were fighting and she fell?”

“Then why wouldn’t he just call the rangers and tell them it was an accident? Accidents happen in the Siskiyous all the time. No, someone took Jackie and killed her and probably dumped her somewhere. That’s why no one’s ever found her body.”

“This is so messed up,” Trev says under his breath.

“I know,” I say. We sit in silence for a long moment. “You still up for going to talk to Jack Dennings?”

“I can’t let you go alone,” he says, which isn’t really an answer, but I’ll take it.

“Then get my phone out. I have the directions on it.”

We’re quiet on the drive to Jack Dennings’s place out in Irving Falls. Trev fiddles with the radio, finding an old-school country station, and Merle Haggard’s worn voice fills the cab of the truck as I focus on the road.

I don’t know what to say to him when it’s about normal stuff. So I keep quiet and roll down the window, trying to get some relief from the heat, but the hot air blasts me, blowing my hair back in my face. The truck’s AC has been broken for as long as I can remember, and though it’s not even noon, it’s in the triple digits already. Sweat collects at the small of my back, and I pull my hair off my neck with one hand, slinging it over my shoulder.

He watches me out of the corner of his eye. I pretend not to notice. It’s easier.

The air cools as we keep driving. Climbing up and out of the valley, we’re surrounded by mountains on both sides, thick with pines, the houses set in the far reaches of the woods where privacy is paramount. About twenty miles ahead is the waterfall the town is named for, but Jack ­Dennings lives on the outskirts, a real backwoods sort of man.

“This is it,” I say, slowing down at the life-size iron turkey nailed on top of the wooden mailbox. We weave through the thickets of digger pines and barbed wire fencing that line the dirt road, and it twists and turns for a few miles before we come across the house, set far back in the taller trees. It’s a simple little one-story rancher, stretched out low on the hilly terrain.

Trev and I get out of the truck and walk up to the door to knock. Dogs bark frantically inside, but there’s no answer. After a minute, Trev steps back and shades his eyes against the sun. He gestures to the old two-tone Ford parked underneath an oak tree. “Maybe he’s around back?”

I follow him, a foot behind as we circle around the house. There’s a neat vegetable garden with sunflowers planted around the border, and beyond that a huge chain-link enclosure, brimming with lush green plants.

Then I hear it.

A click.

It’s familiar.

Dread surges through me. I’m blocking Trev. Maybe I can save him, like I should’ve saved her.

I spin around, instinctually, toward the noise, and for the second time in my life, I’m looking down the barrel of a gun.