Chapter 8 The Way Lost #2
The forest wasn’t more than five acres. This path had to lead out—they all did.
There was a maze of trails in here, for hiking and dog walking, but they all linked up, and they all led out.
Yet I saw no other branches to take. And I saw no end to this trail.
No glow of houses through the trees. No landmarks I recognized.
That wasn’t possible. I’d spent the last two Halloween nights in this forest. I knew every stump. Every dilapidated fortress. Every shoe hung over a branch. But nothing here was familiar. Nothing showed me the way out.
He lost his way.
It happens, now and then, in the forest.
I finally understood how it happened. How kids who knew better ended up in the woods on Halloween.
They chased another child, someone like Richie.
They chased him into the forest and then something happened, and suddenly, they weren’t in our forest anymore.
And it wasn’t a lost child they were chasing—it was a monster, and there was no way out. No way but lost.
I left the path. It was the only thing I could think of.
A path is supposed to help you find your way. Keep you from getting lost. But this one wasn’t. It was getting me lost. Keeping me lost. So I left it.
I veered off the trail and into the forest. I dodged bushes and leaped over trees, and I ignored the thing behind me. I focused on running. Nothing but running.
And then I saw it. A light. Just up ahead.
Even as I ran for the light, I expected a trick. That I would never be able to reach it. That I would reach it…and run right into another monster. It was my only chance, though, so I hunkered down, and I ran as fast as I could and—
I burst from the forest so fast that I slid across the damp grass and fell flat on my face. I flipped over, ready to fight off whatever had been chasing me. But there was nothing there. Just me, lying on the grass, in someone’s backyard.
I lifted my head and looked around. I was two houses from the spot where I’d gone into the forest. That was it. I’d run for what felt like hours, and I’d barely traveled a hundred feet.
I blinked and looked around. Then I smiled.
I’d done it. I’d solved the mystery. I’d survived. I hadn’t lost my way, and I had survived.
When I could breathe again, I rose and brushed off my jeans. Then I fetched my bag of candy from two yards down and went home.
The next morning at school, I waited for kids to discover that no one had disappeared the night before. It might take a while, but kids would talk, as they always did. They’d whisper until they figured out that no one had an empty chair in his class.
It wasn’t until after school that one of my friends caught up with me and said, “Did you hear about Richie?”
I looked over sharply. “Richie Gibson?”
“Yeah. Poor kid. He’s the one.”
“The one…”
“From last night. The one who disappeared.”
After school, I walked into the kitchen to find my mother chopping onions. Or that was what I thought she was doing. Her eyes were red. Nose red, too. Her hands trembled as she chopped.
“Here, let me,” I said, and she jumped, knife flying up, as if under attack. She saw me and quickly lowered it. Then she returned to her work, and I saw she was only chopping walnuts.
“Is everything all right?” I asked.
She said nothing, just kept chopping. I climbed onto my stool. My feet touched the floor now, and the seat felt too small under me, but this was still where I sat, my favorite spot.
“You heard about Richie,” I said.
She tensed.
“I’m sorry,” I said.
No answer.
I shifted on the stool. “He was a good kid.”
“Yes, he was.”
“But he lost his way.”
She resumed chopping. “I guess so.”
“It happens.”
“It does.”
She pulled over the bowl, and as she dropped in the nuts, I saw chocolate chip batter.
I smiled. “My favorite.”
She nodded.
As she stirred, I watched, and there was a long silence before she said, still stirring, “I thought you promised to stay out of the forest.”
“I did.”
Her gaze lifted to mine, and I realized she knew I’d been there last night. That was why she was so upset. Someone had spotted me by the forest.
“I’m too old for Halloween anyway,” I said. “That was my last year. I’m done now.”
Her gaze bored into mine. “Are you sure?”
I smiled. “I am. I promise.”
“Good.”
I grew up. I left Franklin. And, to my shock, I discovered that children in other parts of the country did not disappear every Halloween.
In retrospect, I realize how strange that sounds. Growing up in Franklin, though, that was the reality I knew, and I presumed it was the same everywhere else, and if they never talked about it on TV or in the newspapers, well, we didn’t talk about it either, did we?
It took a long time to acknowledge that what happened in Franklin was not normal. And that’s when I began to expect a knock at my door.
Someday, that knock would come. The outside world would discover what happened in Franklin. We all had televisions now, and radios and telephones. People traveled, and secrets traveled, too.
I saw something that Halloween night when little Richie Gibson disappeared, and I knew that had not gone unnoticed. The day would come when someone would knock on my door and say, “I want to talk to you about Franklin.”
And so, I waited.
It happened while I was in a basketball court, shooting hoops with Shane. He was only eight but already beating me, and he was laughing at another of my failed throws when a voice said,
“Mr. Tucker?”
I turned to see two police officers.
“It’s about Franklin, isn’t it?” The words came before I could stop myself.
The officers glanced at one another, surprised. Then the taller one nodded gravely. “I’m afraid it is.”
I walked to Shane and bent. “It’s okay. These men just have some questions.” I ruffled his hair. “Go on home to your mom.”
He took off. I scooped up the basketball and let the policemen lead me to their cruiser.
The officers put me into a room for questioning. I sat there for at least an hour before two men in suits walked in. One introduced himself as Detective Myles, the other as Detective Walker. Both sat down.
For at least a minute, they just watched me. Then Walker said, “Tell me about Billy Carson.”
My instinct was to clam up. Claim to know nothing. That’s what people in Franklin would expect. But this wasn’t Franklin. These were city police—smart men who might be able to prevent more deaths.
I told the detectives how Billy had disappeared on Halloween all those years ago. Then Walker asked me about Sue. And finally Richie.
I told the truth about Sue—how I’d spotted her that Halloween night, heading to the forest. With Richie, I only said that he’d asked to come trick-or-treating with me, and my mother said no, and I wished she’d let him. How I wished she’d let him.
I didn’t admit that I’d seen Richie that night.
I certainly didn’t tell them I’d faced the monster in the forest. That would have meant confessing to my greatest regret—that I hadn’t run home and told my mother about Richie.
I presumed I’d seen the monster—not Richie—and the little boy was fine.
But I never checked, and I couldn’t forgive myself for that.
“Let’s go back to Billy,” Walker said. “Your old neighbor. You didn’t like him much, did you?”
“No, I didn’t. We had a dog, Scamp, and Billy used to tease him through the fence.”
“But you did like Sue Parker, right?”
“I did. We went to Sunday school together, and we used to talk.” I smiled. “I think I had a crush on her.”
“You tried to kiss her when you were cleaning up together. She said no, but you kept trying until she told the pastor, who had a talk with you.”
I frowned. “That’s not how I remember it.”
“And what about Richie? You were jealous of him, weren’t you? It was just you and your mom, and then Richie comes along—”
“And he brings his father,” Myles cut in. “It looked like you were about to gain a brother and a new dad, and you really weren’t happy about that, were you?”
I looked from one detective to another. “What are you implying?”
“We’re not implying anything. We’re pointing out the fact that three children died in Franklin, and you knew all of them. Had a grudge against all of them?”
“Grudge? No. That’s not how I remember it. Yes, I knew three of the kids who disappeared, but that’s normal in Franklin. Everyone knows at least three…” I realized where I was going and trailed off.
Myles leaned forward. “At least three what?”
I should have kept my mouth shut. I should have just kept my mouth shut. But I couldn’t, could I? Not when they were insinuating that I’d done something to Billy and Sue and Richie.
So I told them Franklin’s secret. I told them about the kids who lose their way.
They looked at each other. There was a long moment of silence. Then Myles said, “So you’re saying that a kid disappears every Halloween? Just disappears. No one investigates. No one questions. No one even mentions it.”
“Sure, they mention it. We were told that he—or she—wouldn’t be coming back to class, and we got to divvy up their stuff. But we weren’t supposed to talk about it.”
Walker folded his hands on the tabletop. “All right, Dale. Name one other child who disappeared on Halloween.”
I had to think. Ten years of trying to forget, and now I needed to dredge up those memories.
“June Michaels. Or Mitchell.”
Walker took a sheet from a folder and ran his thick finger down the page. “June Mitchell. Abducted by her father. Found alive and well ten years later. Still alive and well, it seems.” He looked at me. “Name another.”
“I was a kid. I don’t remember— Wait, Martin. I remember a Martin.”
Another scan of the page. “Yes, I’m sure you do. Because Martin Bowers was hit by a car, right outside your school.”
“That’s just what they want you to believe,” I said. “The truth is that every year, a child disappeared on Halloween—”
“Martin Bowers died in January, during a snowstorm. June Mitchell was abducted by her father on the last day of school. In the spring. Yes, Richie disappeared on Halloween. So did June. But Billy went missing in September. You and your mother joined the search party that eventually found his body in the forest. He’d been hit in the head with a rock and hidden under some brush. ”
“That’s not how I remember it.”
Walker put the paper down. “When we picked you up, you were playing basketball with a kid. Who is he?”
“My son. Well, stepson.” I gave a wry smile. “Okay, technically, not my stepson yet, but soon. I’m engaged to his mother.”
“You’d better tell her that, then. We had a squad car follow the kid, and two of our boys chatted with his mother.
She says you work at the factory together, and you won’t leave her alone.
Keep pestering her to go out with you. She had no idea you were playing basketball with her son. Seems you told him it was a secret.”
I chuckled. “That’s Maura. She has a strange sense of humor. She’s probably just mad at me for making Shane walk home alone and—”
His fist hit the table so hard I jumped. Myles slapped down a photograph of a boy about eleven.
“Want to tell us about him?” Myles said.
I looked down at the photograph. “He looks familiar but…” I shook my head. “I don’t think I know him.”
“He lived in your apartment building. Disappeared three years ago. Everyone in the building was questioned. Including you. But you don’t remember it?”
“Did he disappear on Halloween?” I picked up the photograph. “Poor kid. That happens sometimes. They lose their way.”
Myles squeaked his chair back and started to rise, but Walker eased him down and said, “Tell us about your mother, Dale.”
I lowered the photograph as grief surged.
“Died last month, didn’t she?” Walker said. “Cancer.”
I nodded, my chest tight.
“Before she died, she mailed a letter to the Franklin Police Department. She said that after Billy disappeared, you told her Scamp would be safe now…even before his body was found in those woods.”
“Because I knew he was dead. We all did.”
“After Sue disappeared, your mother found blood on your Halloween costume.”
“I tripped and cut myself. I told her that.”
“People in Franklin remember seeing you hanging around the forest. Were you visiting Sue’s grave? Reliving her murder? Or finding new hiding spots for new victims, like Richie Gibson?”
“Richie got lost. He disappeared. It happens some—”
“Your mother said she worried about Richie. She knew you were jealous. She tried to tell herself she was wrong about Sue, that it wasn’t her blood on your costume.
Still, she didn’t want Richie going trick-or-treating with you that night.
You did take him, though, didn’t you? Your friends said you quit early.
You found Mr. Webster and snuck Richie away. ”
“That’s not how I remember it.”
“But that’s how it happened.”
Sweat trickled down my temple. I took a deep breath and blurted the truth.
“There’s a monster in that forest. I saw it the night Richie disappeared.
I went into the woods to save him, only it wasn’t him—it was a monster.
I ran away, and it chased me, and I almost got lost, but I found my way back.
Other kids don’t. They lose their way, and they’re never found.
The monster takes them. Every year, the monster takes one. ”
“No, Dale,” Walker said. “There were only three kids who disappeared in Franklin. Billy was found in the forest a week after he went missing. Sue and Richie were found just last week, with cadaver dogs, after the local police received your mother’s letter.
The letter where she confessed to her suspicions. Where she pointed us to the truth.”
“And that truth?” Myles leaned across the table. “The only person who lost his way was you. The only monster in that forest was you.”
They’re wrong. They must be.
Because that’s not how I remember it.
Not at all.