Celeste

  "Who could that be?" she muttered and went to the door. I stood in the living room doorway and watched.

  A policeman and Mr. Fletcher stood there. The policeman was still wearing a raincoat, but Mr. Fletcher was in a sports jacket and slacks and looked like he had just come from a social event.

  "Yes?" Mommy said. She looked at Mr. Fletcher.

  "We're here to see if your son has seen my son recently," he said.

  "What?" Mommy brought her hands to her hips.

  "Mr. Fletcher's son Elliot has been missing for a few days. Mrs. Atwell," the policeman said. His car and all his things are at the house, but he's not there, and no one has seen him. He hasn't been to school. We've questioned all his friends at school, and the only thing left to do is speak to your son."

  "Why would Noble know anything about him?" she demanded.

  The policeman looked at Mr. Fletcher. "My daughter suggested he might." "Why would she say that?"

  "She said he had seen him recently," he told her. and Mommy slowly turned to me.

  "Is that true. Noble?"

  "No," I said quickly, maybe too quickly.

  "I'm very worried. son," Mr. Fletcher said. "He's done some silly things, but he's never done anything like this. He's not here by any chance, is he?"

  "Of course not," Mommy snapped. "Do you actually believe I would permit such a thing?" "I was just--"

  "We're checking every possible lead. Mrs. Atwell," the policeman said. "I'm sure you can appreciate what Mr. Fletcher is going through, having lost a child yourself."

  Mommy's upper body snapped back so fast and so sharply, she looked like she might topple.

  "Of course I appreciate it. I'm just telling you that we don't know anything about him." She looked at Mr. Fletcher. "I warned you he was into very bad behavior," she told him. "This doesn't surprise me. It doesn't surprise me at all,"

  He nodded and looked down.

  "I know," he said softly, his voice couched in a tone of defeat.

  "Well, we can't help you." she said. "I'm very sorry for Your trouble."

  "You sure you haven't seen Elliot?" the policeman asked me again.

  I shook my head.

  "No. not for a while," I said. My heart was pounding. Mommy didn't even look at me.

  "Okay. Thank you. If you think of anything, please call the station," the policeman said, and they turned away.

  Mommy closed the door immediately. For a moment she stood there looking at it. Then she spun on me, her eyes small. suspicious.

  "Did you know where he has gone?"

  I didn't, so I was able to shake my head.

  She didn't look convinced, but she breathed easier and then, without another word, returned to the kitchen.

  I stood there feeling numb all over.

  I heard Mommy rattle pots and pans as she sifted through them, looking for something. When she made noise like that. I knew she was upset.

  The sounds seemed to echo inside my chest.

  At dinner Mommy went on and on about how much of a burden children were to their parents today.

  "If you're blessed with a responsible, obedient, and loving child, you're a very lucky person, but the truth is, they reap what they sow. That was why I couldn't be as sympathetic to Mr. Fletcher as the policeman would have liked me to be. I know it's a hard face to wear, but if we don't wear it, things will only get worse,

  "That," she said. "is why I feel so fortunate having a child like you."

  She got up and walked over to me to kiss me on the forehead and then hold me tightly against her. I said nothing. I couldn't help but wonder if she felt me shaking. The trembling I had felt when the policeman and Mr. Fletcher came to our door was still going on inside inc.

  It followed me into sleep and turned every shadow in my room into a dark threat.

  The search party came late the following morning. It brought back horrid memories, both for Mommy and myself. We could hear the voices of the men shouting to each other in the forest. From our front porch, we saw the cars parking on the highway. A fire engine was brought up as well.

  Only an hour or so after they had begun, we heard a gunshot to signal the others. That was followed by the sound of an ambulance screaming up to our road.

  Mommy walked out and down the driveway, where she could speak with people.

  Then she returned quickly.

  "What's going on?" I asked her.

  "They found him," she said.

  "Where?" I asked, my voice not much more than a whisper.

  "Washed about a mile downstream."

  17

  The Gift

  .

  Before they had found Elliot, they had found

  his blanket by the pine tree. We didn't know it all immediately, but they also found remnants of his marijuana cigarettes. However, it was what they had found in his pants pocket that brought the police back to our front door. They didn't come until early in the evening. I was upstairs in my room when I heard the doorbell ring. The sound made my heart race. With all the sirens, the sounds of far more traffic and people on our road and around our property. I couldn't help being anxious.

  After we had heard that Elliot was found apparently drowned and washed ashore farther downstream. I had gone off to be alone as quickly as I could. I was sure Mommy would take one glance at my face and know I had lied to her and had kept things from her. I was more afraid of her

  disappointment in me than I was of her rage.

  As I sat there thinking about the horror of it all. I told myself that even though I had seen Elliot get carried farther down the creek and around the turn. I had good reason to assume he would be all right. From the years when we didn't have much of a snowfall and spring rain, I knew the creek had so many rocks and hills under it, making it very shallow in many places.

  I had good reason to conclude he would eventually find his footing and pull himself safely to shore. He didn't really scream for help. I had no idea he wasn't a good swimmer, and in the beginning, when he dipped his foot in the water and even after he fell in, he was laughing about it and clowning around.

  But what fascinated and even frightened me somewhat the whole day after I had heard the news was the possibility that this was what Daddy's spirit had meant when I thought I had heard him whispering in the wind to be patient. I recalled the way Elliot had toppled into the water. He did cry. "Who pushed me?" Had he really felt some force knocking him off the rock or was that shout and the surprise just part of his joking around with me?

  Could it really be that our spiritual protectors had done this? If so, wasn't it all ultimately my fault? If I hadn't done what I had done that day and exposed myself to the world and to Elliot, none of this would have happened. Complicating it even further, I had not told Mommy. I had kept it all a secret. and I had let it continue. Now what would happen to us?

  I heard Mommy calling for me from the entryway. Slowly rising from my bed. where I had been sitting and thinking, I walked to the door and then descended, feeling like a convicted felon approaching the gallows. Mommy stood there looking up at me with her arms folded under her breasts so tightly, they looked locked in place forever. The policeman and a man in a dark gray sports coat and tie stood just behind her, waiting for me. He had a chiseled face with a brow that hung like a cliff s edge over his eves. His lower lip drooped just enough to show most of his lower teeth.

  As I drew closer. I saw the fire in Mommy's eyes, each holding the tip of a candle flame. Her lips were pursed, pressing up the crests of her cheeks. Some loosened strains of hair fell over her temple and down to the right side of her mouth.

  "Officer Harold and Detective Young want to ask you some questions. Noble. I want you to answer them honestly." Mommy said, pronouncing each word with crystal clear and sharp consonants and vowels, which I knew was how she spoke when she was battling to control the rage roam' g m' side her.

  I nodded and turned to them. Detective Young stepped forward, "Do you recognize this?" he asked and op
ened his fist to show me the red coral amulet.

  I couldn't help looking up from it quickly at Mommy. She stared, her face a closed book to anyone else, but to me speaking volumes and volumes of angry disappointment. She knew it was the one she had (riven me, of course. Her eyes flickered, rage feeding the fire.

  "Yes," I said in a voice so small. I wasn't sure myself that I had spoken.

  "Elliot's father and his sister told us he didn't have this when they had last seen him, and in fact they had never seen it. They have no idea how he got it or even what it is, but his sister thought you might know."

  "Why did she think that?" Mommy demanded, spinning on the detective,

  Detective Young looked at her for a moment, obviously considering how to reply.

  "Her brother told her things about your son and you that led her to believe it. I guess he described what your son is wearing right now," he said, referring to my amulet. He turned back to me. "What is it, and how did Elliot Fletcher come to have it in his possession at the time of his death?"

  "It's an amulet." I said. "Red coral."

  "An amulet?" Officer Harold muttered, "What is that. exactly?"

  I looked at Mommy.

  "An amulet is a talisman, a good-luck charm, if you will," Mommy explained for inc. "Red coral is said to have certain beneficial properties for the wearer."

  "This was yours. then?" Detective Young asked. Still holding it out as if he was showing something to a jury in a courtroom.

  "Yes," I replied.

  "And you gave it to Elliot Fletcher?"

  I nodded.

  "When exactly?" he asked.

  Again. I looked up at Mommy first.

  "When?" she repeated for Detective Young.

  "A few days ago," I said.

  Mommy released a trapped breath like someone who had just been given terrible news.

  "When I was here earlier, you told me and Elliot's father that you hadn't seen him for a while," Officer Harold said, practically leaping at me. "Now you're saying you gave him this thing a few days ago. Why did you lie to us?"

  I felt panic running down the sides of my legs, freezing them in place. by was this happening to me? If the spirits were protecting me, why did they let this happen? What was I suppose to say, to do?

  I didn't look at Mommy. I shifted my eyes guiltily toward the floor and shrugged.

  "Elliot made me promise not to tell," I said and recalled Mommy once telling me that lies pop out of people's minds like pimples sometimes.

  I don't know what makes someone a good liar, if there is such a thing, but I suppose it has something to do with his or her ability to create, to perform, maybe even believe in the lie him or herself first. I thought.

  "Why did he do that?" Detective Young followed.

  "He was smoking something bad, and he said his father would take away his car if he found out." I said in a very convincing tone of voice. I felt confident that really wasn't a lie anyway.

  "So? Why wouldn't you tell his father you had seen him?" Officer Harold asked, his face dark with exasperation and outrage, "You saw how concerned he was,"

  I bit down on my lower lip and kept my eyes fixed on the floor. I couldn't think of any excuse that would make me look good or even make sense.

  "Was it because you smoked something bad as well?" Detective Young offered.

  I looked up quickly. Mommy's eyes hadn't changed, hadn't moved. They were so fixed on me, I felt like she was boring a hole through my forehead.

  "Noble?" she said. "Answer the question."

  I nodded. The detective's theory was an unexpected gift, a way to rescue myself.

  "yes."

  Both Officer Harold and Detective Young settled in the comfort of being right about me. I could see it clearly in the way they glanced at each other. They had probably discussed it before they had arrived at our door.

  "But I didn't think anything terrible had happened to him." I added quickly.

  "Tell us what occurred the last time you saw him." Detective Young said.

  "We smoked that stuff in the woods, and then we parted and he started for home and I came home."

  They stared at me, four eyes searching my face like spotlights sweeping over a prison wall, looking for cracks. I held my breath. Out of the corner of my eye. I could see a small movement in Mommy's lips. It was impossible to lie to her. No matter how good I was with other people.

  "You didn't have any arguments or anything like that?" Detective Young asked.

  "What are you suggesting? That Noble drowned him?" Mommy snapped at him.

  "Then why ask such a question?"

  "It's what we do. We try to get all the information we can in order to understand what happened. Mrs. Atwell. A terrible family tragedy has occurred here."

  "I think I know something about terrible family tragedies," Mommy told him, speaking so sharply, he reacted as if he had been slapped.

  "I'm sorry. We're just doing our job."

  "Well, do it quickly and leave us he she said. He turned back to me.

  "So you didn't know Elliot was in any sort of trouble when you left him that day?"

  "No." I said and nodded at the amulet he was holding. "I thought he was protected."

  Maybe that was the wrong thing to say; maybe it was the right thing to say. I didn't know, but it widened the eves of both policemen.

  "Huh?" Officer Harold said. "What do you mean. protected?"

  "Red coral is a powerful gemstone. It can make the wearer courageous and have a very strong calming effect, reducing tensions. It has healing powers," Mommy explained. "Noble had good intentions in giving the boy the amulet, but the boy shouldn't have depended on it to protect him in every possible way.

  "In fact." Mommy continued. "one problem with red coral is it might make the wearer too confident, too courageous. You know that saying about fools rushing in where angels fear to tread." she added in her typical educationalist tone of voice.

  The two policemen stood speechless, staring at her. Finally. Officer Harold turned to me.

  "You did a bad thing, not telling us you had seen Elliot Fletcher recently. We would have concentrated on the woods a lot faster, and even if we couldn't do anything to help him, his father and his sister wouldn't have been left in limbo so long."

  "Withholding information from the police is a criminal act, you know," Detective Young said.

  I said nothing, and neither did Mommy. They looked uncomfortable.

  "Here." Detective Young said, handing me the amulet. "Mr. Fletcher doesn't want it."

  "We don't want it either," Mommy said, stepping in between me and the policeman. "Tell Mr. Fletcher he should bury it with his son. There are ways to protect us in the afterlife as well, and that can be even more important."

  Officer Harold smirked. Then he turned away and shook his head.

  "Okay." Detective Young said. He put the amulet back into his pocket. "If your son thinks of anything else that might help us understand what happened--"

  "Why is it so difficult to understand?" Mommy practically shouted at them. "From what we've heard, the boy drowned in the creek. You said he was smoking something bad, and you just heard Noble confirm it. I'm sure it was marijuana, and that can affect your perception, can it not? I was a public school teacher once." she added. "We were always talking to the children about why using drugs was bad for you."

  "Yes," Detective Young admitted. "The pot might have had something to do with what happened."

  "It's a tragedy.Its terrible, but parents have to be on top of their children more vigorously these days," Mommy lectured. "I've said it before. and I'll say it again. I feel scaly for Mr. Fletcher, I know what he's suffering. No one knows better about that suffering than I do, but in the end, he has to live with his own failings. We all do," she concluded. "Now if you're finished here --"

  She opened the door for them.

  "Thank you," Detective Young muttered,

  Officer Harold just glared back at me and followed
him out of our house.

  When Mommy closed the door. I felt like she had closed the lid on my coffin. Slowly, ever so slowly, she turned to me. I fumbled words in my mind, trying to find the right way to say I was sorry.

  "Don't try to explain anything to me," she said. "I know exactly what happened."

  Did she know? Exactly?

  "Evil spirits have been at us ever since your father died.

  They have tried every way they could to pierce our protective shield. They made me sick once and gave me headaches. They even resorted to entering the body of a dog. It is no surprise to me that they concentrated on spoiling you. Noble, and tried to spoil you by using that young man. I should have been even more diligent when I learned of your initial contact with those people and you had told me of the bad things they were doing. Its not all your fault. I was too trusting, too dependent on those that watch over us.

  "But thankfully, they continue to do so. I am not surprised about what had happened. Of course. I am disappointed in you, and there is work to do now to cleanse you. but I am grateful we are still safe, still being watched over and blessed."

  She paused, squeezed her temples with her right thumb and forefinger, and took deep breaths. I held mine in anticipation. Finally, she looked up at me and nodded as if she had just been told exactly what to do.

  "Go upstairs and get undressed," she said.

  "Undressed?"

  "Yes. I'll be right there," she said and walked toward the kitchen and the pantry.

  For a moment I was too frightened to move. What was she going to do? I started up the stairs slowly and then walked quickly to my room. where I began to undress. I was in such a daze I didn't hear Mommy come charging up the stairs and into my room. Suddenly, she was there rushing past me into the bathroom. I heard her turn on the faucet for the tub.