16. Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Sixteen
Charlie Gibson
“ I was like, hey guy with the hydration pack, two hiking sticks, and a tactical vest; a fucking five-year-old walked that same trail in Crocs carrying a naked Barbie doll. Relax,” Cal finishes talking about his morning jog while I go back through the paperwork I’m initialing that dad had emailed me.
Cal hops up to sit on his counter. “If we’re having a going away party for Remi, we’ll have to put it together fast. It doesn’t need to be anything crazy; she was happy just having the four of us with her at the cabin yesterday.”
“We can do it at my parent’s place. This coming weekend?”
“That’s excessive, we’re not inviting the whole town. What about the Funpark after hours? Skip would agree to that if you asked. For old times’ sake?” Right. When all was normal with our world. Just a group of rambunctious kids messing around, making memories that we’d look back on questioning the validity of.
“Hey, did you catch what Wilder said yesterday? About the security system at the Funpark?” Skip James gave him access to one of the protections for his business, something meant to also protect Remi. “He said there was spyware installed in it?”
Cal shrugs as he tosses an empty water bottle across the kitchen to the trash. “No. Who cares? Doesn’t that happen all the time to computers?”
“I’m having a hard time trusting Wilder. First his ‘visions’ and now he’s putting his nose in the Funpark security.” Cal gives me a blank look before narrowing his eyes at me. Sometimes he doesn’t seem to care about the right things.
“Look, I don’t get your distrust, but I will say that Skip is bonkers. The guy doesn’t have a single linear thought.”
Waking up without Remi next to us this morning, started my day off poorly. Something as simple as knowing where she is can make the worry over her safety lessen slightly. “What time are we meeting everyone to help Mitch finish clear out Lala’s house?” It was surprising to me that Grady said he’d pitch in. Carter, Grady, Mitch, Cal, and I should be able to tackle what’s left. We didn’t ask Wilder; it was my call to leave him out of the mix.
It’s not easy letting go of the past.
“If Mitchell shows up with Natalie and I’m forced to listen to them argue, I’m out,” Cal warns as he shoves some baseball equipment into a duffle bag. “Or if Carter does that annoying laugh wheeze of his constantly.”
“Is it your time of the month? Why are you so crabby?” He’s been moody before, since we’ve reconnected this summer, but the closer we inch to Remi leaving for Florida the more volatile his demeanor is getting. The Cal I knew growing up was so laidback, I wondered if he was being genuine at times. Who takes everything in stride without showing cracks in the veneer?
He stops what he’s doing, his shoulders dropping as he turns to me saying, “Nah. It’s this town… it’s getting to me, I’m not eager for Remi to leave and then.” He sighs. “My parents left me a message this morning. Detective Hemminger called them yesterday to tell them that Sara’s drowning investigation is being reopened due to new evidence.”
“What new evidence?”
After all this time, the secrets are being exposed.
It took long enough.
Cal looks down at his hands clasped in front of him. “Fuck if I know. It’s not like they’re going to offer up that information to anyone.”
Shouldn’t he be relieved that the Sheriff’s office is taking a closer look at what everyone in town can agree was a suspicious death? Why isn’t this a good thing? “I’d like to see Wilder’s face when he hears that.” I didn’t intend my comment to be heard by Cal, but the look he gives me is cold.
“Charlie? Seriously? Based on what Grady’s now saying alone… I don’t think he had a thing to do with Sara’s death. Hell, he wasn’t even around when Susanna Ross was in Lake Hollow. This problem you have with him, whatever it is. Drop it. Please. For Remi’s sake at least.”
I didn’t expect that rousing defense of Wilder from him. It’s been clear the past three years have caused us to grow apart, but maybe I don’t know Cal quite as well as I’d always thought.
“I don’t want to fight with you. Let’s just agree to disagree.” I’m not about to forget dozens of interactions from the past, because Cal thinks I need to. “Is Carter meeting us there? I don’t want to keep him waiting.” More like I’d rather stop the disagreement now, before either of us say things we can’t take back.
Orderly flew out the window when Mitchell allowed everyone to do their own thing. “How are we supposed to know what goes where? Nothing is marked, Mitch.” I throw my hands up. It’s been an hour, but we’re getting nowhere. Carter’s truck bed is empty as he stands near Grady and Cal joking around. Mitch has a donation truck from the church stopping by soon but that pile only has a rickety rocking chair from her attic, a sewing machine, and two large nature prints.
“Well, I-I…” He spins in a circle looking at everyone in the front yard of his new home.
“Forget it.” I clap my hands together before whistling for everyone’s attention. “Cal, can you go and bring up everything that Mitch put a red sticker on in the basement that needs to be hauled out? Carter, can you help me with the things in the living room and dining room for now? Mitch, could you and Grady finish marking the things in the bedrooms.”
Carter passes me with a mock salute. “Aye, aye Cap.” He snidely turns to Cal to say, “I forgot what a bossy fuck he can be.” There’s no point calling him out on his comment. I forgot how obnoxious he was. Time made some of us grow up more than others.
I’m pushing aside the heavy solid oak dining room table when Carter asks me, “Cal tell you about the new investigation into Sara’s death? Keep waiting to hear about Mia’s. Hers was one of the first but it’s like they have tunnel vision or something. Can’t tell me they aren’t all related in some way.” His dad is the mayor, you’d think he’d have more pull in that regard, but he’s also a weak human manifestation of a Ford Windstar and his mom has a suffering kink.
“Yeah, there’s new evidence. Wonder what that would be after all this time.”
Carter tips over a stack of patchwork quilts on a dining room chair, while he refolds them, he says, “What about Katie? It’s not like it followed the pattern, but you’ve said she’d never be near the water on her own.”
“Pattern?” What does he mean by that?
“She was the youngest at twelve and the third victim in a summer, when it had been two the other summers.” Carter Kelley doesn’t think before he talks. He never has. Would I be so blunt about Mia or Sara… both ungodly snots? Would I refer to his sister as part of a pattern?
“When I talked to the detective, she was more interested in Susanna Ross’ case.”
Ignoring Carter as he blathers on about different things he discovers as we work, my mind keeps revisiting his implication. Katie's case was different, maybe even less relevant in terms of all the drownings. She could be the most important of all. There hasn’t been another drowning since hers.
Bursts of laughter heard from Grady and Mitch while they work in Lala’s music room, draw my attention. I underestimated Grady, thinking he’d be bitter about Lala wanting Mitchell to have her home. He didn’t need it with the trust he’ll receive at the age of twenty-one, just as I had, he’ll become a millionaire. Romantic Ruin is still topping the charts, maybe money is no concern for him either, but it was his blood relative. There were times I wondered if her closeness with my siblings and I became stand-ins for the children she never had with Daniel. Lucky for her, my parents didn’t mind sharing or in some cases just dumping us on her.
Kind of makes me sound like the bitter one, but I tend to look at it more realistically. My mom tried to keep up appearances because that was important to my dad. My dad attempted to keep the legacy of the Gibson name respected. Lala was there to love us. To give us the time and attention we needed growing up.
Cal climbs the stairs backwards tugging a bulky old dresser by himself. “Where’s Mitchell? Hey, Mitch?!”
Rushing to help him, I recognize the dresser as the one she kept the bottom drawer locked in. We haul it the last couple of steps to the hallway. “Should we break the lock to see if there is paperwork inside that might be needed?”
Once her office had been ransacked not much remained to give us any hint of what she’d provided the Ross family. Cal leans back against it to catch his breath, while wiping an arm across his forehead. “That’s Mitch’s call, it belongs to him now.”
The response from Mitch is a hesitant shrug.
“Let her lawyer know maybe?” Grady suggests.
We’re all taking a break after St. James’ donation truck leaves, when Grady says to Mitch, “Hey, I was going to ask you where you found that box of medication? Lala wasn’t sick or anything, right?”
Confusion clouds Mitch’s face as he finishes his water. “What medication?”
“Those boxes I picked up that had my name on them had a metal lockbox with a broken lock that had vials of medication with a bag of syringes. She must’ve buried the damn container it was caked in dirt.” He huffs a laugh out. “It was… uh.” He closes his eyes, his lips thin while he’s thinking. “Fuck, don’t remember what it was. Was the container in the box?”
Cal sits up a little straighter, setting his water bottle on the step he’s sitting on. “Was she diabetic? My dad has Type one and used to have insulin that was in vials he had to inject. Now it’s just a pen with a needle.”
Tossing his bottle cap in the air to catch, Carter says flatly, “If it’s insulin it would need to be refrigerated so it’s garbage now.”
Mitch still hasn’t answered him, his brow furrowed, he scratches his arm. “I loaded up the boxes, but I didn’t put anything like that in there.”