The Calling Read online

  “You have no idea how life is.”

  “Don’t I? I’m sorry, but wasn’t it my parents who were murdered?”

  “Chris,” Joey said softly, “did you ever wonder what would have happened if Adam and Eve had said—”

  “No. Whatever the fuck it is, I never wondered. I don’t care about stupid shit like that. It means nothing to me.”

  “But—”

  “Goodnight, Joey.” Deciding to walk away now than risk saying something I’d really regret. Starting to turn, starting to walk away, but then finding myself saying, “Don’t let the ghost get you,” before turning my back completely and heading up the trail.

  • • •

  IT WAS A few minutes after midnight when I returned to my trailer. I didn’t know why exactly, but I was pissed off. I grabbed the copy of Billy Budd off the bed and chucked it at the wall. I sat down on the bed, grabbed the picture of my parents, and stared at it for ten minutes. I’d done the same thing last night, just ignoring the asshole in the middle and concentrating on my mom and dad, on how happy they looked at that particular moment in time.

  Finally I turned off the light and went to bed. But I couldn’t sleep. I just stared at the ceiling and thought about Joey. About what I’d said to him and how I’d said it. About the look of disappointment in his eyes when I told him off.

  Tomorrow, I told myself. Tomorrow I would talk to him and apologize, try to make things right.

  I rolled over and stared at the wall. Even in the dark I could see where some of the mildew had formed. I decided to concentrate on that until I drifted off, but after a few minutes I realized it wasn’t working. So I rolled back over.

  And froze.

  A dark figure stood just a few feet away from me.

  This is him! my mind screamed. You didn’t believe he was after you but he is and now he’s here, he’s here to kill you, SO DO SOMETHING!

  But I couldn’t do anything. I was paralyzed. And it took a few disjointed seconds before I realized that the figure now standing in front of me wasn’t my parents’ murderer, was in fact the farthest thing from that sick bastard. Instead it was a small boy with thick glasses and whose body trembled like he was freezing, as he stared up at the ceiling with dark, terrified eyes.

  “Joey?” I whispered. But he didn’t seem to hear me, didn’t even seem to acknowledge the fact that he was in my trailer at all. Then I realized he wasn’t there to begin with, that it was just a faint image of Joey and not the real thing.

  My mind raced. I didn’t know what to think. Joey’s mouth now began moving and I realized he was talking, but there was no sound, I couldn’t hear his voice.

  Of course you can’t hear his voice, my mind said, freaking out now about a completely different matter. You can’t hear his voice because he’s not really there!

  Then Joey’s mouth stopped moving. He simply stared up. Suddenly his eyes got even wider and before I knew it his mouth opened again. At first I thought he was saying something but then I understood he wasn’t, he couldn’t possibly be saying anything because now he was screaming.

  I blinked and he was gone. A second later I realized my paralysis was gone too, so I jumped out of bed and ran to the door, went outside and stepped onto the cool moist grass. I just stood there, in my boxers and T-shirt, listening to the night.

  Moments passed and I began wondering why I was standing out here at all, why I wasn’t in bed where I should be. Of course what I’d seen was only my imagination, my overworked mind telling me I needed sleep.

  I heard it then, off in the distance, from behind the wall of pines down the hill toward the church. Behind the wind and the insects and the distant sound of a tractor-trailer passing by on 13. Behind everything else in the world at that single moment in time.

  Very faint but very real too, the sound of a little boy crying out for help.

  Chapter 10

  Night had turned to day. They had five portable floodlights and had placed them around the Beckett House. A handful of deputies and volunteer firemen combed the area with flashlights. Inside the burnt-out structure came occasional flashes as pictures were taken. That was where I’d seen the blood.

  Through the trees you could see the deputy and blue-lighters’ vehicles. Three-thirty in the morning, only two of the cruisers still had their roof-lights flashing. Sheriff Douglas talked with the fire chief by the path that led in from Calvary Church—as it turned out there was a smaller, narrower trail in that direction. John Porter stood with his dad and answered a deputy’s questions. Dean stood next to me, dressed in his uniform. Every couple of minutes the radio Velcroed to his shoulder squawked, as did nearly everyone else’s around the area. For the first time I noticed he wore a pin just above his name badge: PISTOL EXPERT.

  “This isn’t good,” he murmured. He popped another LifeSaver in his mouth unconsciously, began chewing it. (When he’d first arrived on scene and came up and asked me if I was all right, his breath smelled of peppermint.) He sighed, shaking his head. “This isn’t good at all.”

  He was staring right at the Beckett House. I watched him for a few moments, then glanced over at where Moses Cunningham stood in sweatpants and undershirt. He too stared at the Beckett House, but his arms weren’t crossed like my uncle’s, and his back wasn’t as straight. His broad shoulders were hunched and his dark face was screwed into a look of fear and frustration. Earlier, when he’d talked to the Sheriff, there had been tears in his eyes, but now they had stopped.

  On the other side of the small clearing John Porter stood with his father and the young deputy. John had his hands in his pockets and looked like he was half-asleep. Henry, his face masked behind his beard, stood with his back to his son. He refused to look at John, and he refused to watch the activity surrounding the Beckett House, so he mostly kept his gaze focused on the ground.

  I was wearing shorts and sneakers now, not like before when I’d run down here in my underwear and found the house deserted except for the splatter of blood on the ground. Only I hadn’t noticed that the first time, but later, when I came back with John.

  We’d been out here for over an hour now. Inside the house more flashes went off.

  Sheriff Douglas said some parting words to the fire chief and made her way toward Dean and myself.

  Looking at me, she said, “Long night, huh?”

  I nodded.

  “I hate to ask you this, Chris, but would you mind telling me again what happened when you came down here the first time? As John was leaving, I mean.”

  I’d given my statement twice already and was too exhausted to do it again. But I knew they needed to know exactly what I saw and heard and felt to get a precise idea of what happened here, so maybe, just maybe, they could find Joey.

  “I knew Joey wanted to talk to me about something. But when I came down I realized he just wanted to witness to me, and it kind of pissed me off. He was just ... he was annoying me, so I more or less told him off and went back to The Hill.”

  “You didn’t see or hear anything unusual?”

  I told her I didn’t. Then I said, “So I couldn’t sleep, and I was just lying there in the dark. And I ... I heard him cry out. It was faint, but I could tell something was wrong so I ran down here. But by the time I made it he was already gone.”

  Of course I didn’t mention the fact that I’d seen something that looked like Joey in my trailer moments before I rushed outside and then heard him screaming. Or that as I ran down the trail I knew, just knew, that Joey was gone and maybe already dead.

  “Then?” Sheriff Douglas was being very patient, understanding, and I knew she was a mother. She probably had kids of her own, maybe two if not three, and I understood the burden now on her shoulders, how as a mother she knew what Moses Cunningham was feeling and wanted to end that pain and worry as quickly as possible.

  “Then I ran back and got John. Banged on the front door until Mr. Porter answered. When I told him what happened he got John and the two of us came down here. Mr
. Porter, well, I guess he called you.”

  I didn’t want to mention how John had reacted when he first saw the blood. Just a few spots on the ground, but it was definitely blood and it was definitely fresh and there was no doubt in either of our minds who it belonged to. John had cried out Oh fuck! and his face had paled and for a moment I thought he was going to faint.

  “And you saw nothing when you came down here the second time? No footprints in the grass, nothing out of place?”

  I shook my head.

  She sighed and nodded, but said nothing else. Behind her, the deputies and volunteers still continued to scour the area. The photographer inside the house was done with his pictures, so there were no more flashes. Back in the church parking lot still came those flashing lights. Besides the faint voices of the men and the occasional crackle of static from everyone’s radios, there was silence in the trees.

  I glanced again at Moses Cunningham. He still stood facing the Beckett House. His shoulders were still hunched forward, but now his eyes were closed.

  Beside me, Dean said, “What?” which brought my attention back to him and the sheriff. I noticed Douglas was staring at me. She was biting her lower lip, deciding on something. Finally she nodded.

  “Listen,” she began, “it would probably be best if Chris—”

  The commotion started in the trees behind the house. First someone shouted, “Over here!” and then all the flashlights began bobbing that way. Sheriff Douglas turned and started immediately in that direction. Dean didn’t hesitate either; he followed right behind.

  I glanced at Moses once more. Even though there was now activity going on—the voices louder, the sound of grass being trampled and sticks snapping—he remained in his spot, his eyes closed. John and Henry Porter remained where they’d been standing for almost an hour, only the deputy who’d been with them had left. Henry’s attention was now fully on his son, whispering angrily.

  I doubted I’d be able to see anything but I started forward anyway. Passing the house and stepping through some trees, I stopped a few feet away from the crowd. There were too many people, and I wasn’t about to push through. It didn’t matter though. Dean had seen. He shoved his way out of the crowd and was headed back toward the house when I grabbed his arm.

  “What is it?”

  “I need to talk to Mr. Cunningham.”

  “What did they find?”

  He’d been staring ahead, intent on his mission, but now he looked at me, and I saw it in his eyes, the hesitation as to whether he should tell me, and the dread that he would now have to tell Joey’s father.

  “They found Joey’s glasses.” His voice was clipped, hurried. He paused, swallowed, stared straight back at me. “There’s blood all over them.”

  Chapter 11

  When I was eight years old a kid in the class below me got sick and died. His name was Tyler Madden and he had leukemia. Our mothers were friends, so somehow I knew him, but we weren’t close. When he died, the school held a memorial service in his honor. I remember the pastor—it was James Young, no doubt with lollipops in his suit jacket—allowing his friends and classmates to stand up and say something nice about him. I hadn’t said anything and just sat there listening the entire time.

  That wasn’t my first encounter with death. I didn’t begin questioning it at that age. Already both my grandparents on my mother’s side had died—my grandfather seven years before my grandmother—so I knew what death was, why they were no longer around.

  But then with someone my age—even younger—I began pondering my own mortality.

  Driving with my father a week after the funeral, I asked him about Tyler.

  “Did he know he was going to die?”

  My father looked at me, seemed to choose his words carefully, and said, “I think so, yes.”

  I thought about this, wondering why I didn’t know when I was going to die. “Do you know when you’re going to die?”

  “No, Christopher. You have to understand, Tyler was very sick. He had a disease that was killing him. But me, Mommy, and you, and almost everyone else—we don’t know when we’re going to die. That’s just the way it is for most people. It’s all in God’s hands and we simply have no idea.”

  I asked, “So if it’s in God’s hands, why couldn’t God make Tyler better? Why did He let Tyler die?”

  And my father, never wanting to lie to me, said, “I don’t know.”

  I thought about this the morning after Joey’s disappearance, as I lay in my trailer, staring at the ceiling. According to my watch it was almost three o’clock in the afternoon. I’d gotten maybe eight hours of sleep and had already been up for two hours just lying there thinking.

  I thought about Tyler Madden and how sometimes people know they’re going to die.

  I wondered if Joey somehow knew what would happen to him.

  After I took a shower and got dressed, I went outside where the sky was clear and the day was warm. A white and red-striped deputy’s cruiser was parked up beside the Rec House. At first I thought it was my uncle, but as I walked toward my grandmother’s trailer I realized it was someone else.

  Inside, I expected to find Grandma playing cards or dominos with Mrs. Roberts, but she was alone. Sitting at her little table, a large box of Cheez-Its open before her. She looked up, startled, when I opened the door, then gave me a weak smile. She asked me how I slept and I lied and told her fine. Next she asked if I was hungry and I told her I wasn’t. Then there was a silence and I saw something in her eyes, a sadness that expressed so many different things.

  “I’m going back home, aren’t I.” I didn’t even bother making it a question.

  She nodded slowly. “Sheriff Douglas ... she mentioned it to Dean, and he agrees. With what’s just happened to that poor boy, it’s not a good idea to stay.”

  But what happened to Joey, I wanted to tell her, might not even be related. In fact, I was pretty certain it wasn’t related. Whoever had abducted Joey, it was a different shadow in the corner. It wasn’t mine.

  “When?” I asked.

  “Sometime tomorrow. Your uncle wants to take you back personally, but he can’t do it until then. Also, he wants to get you out before your name gets leaked to the papers.”

  She went on to explain how Sheriff Douglas was afraid the reporters might force a connection with what happened to me down in Lanton. So far neither John’s name nor my own had come up to the press when the official statement was made. They hoped to keep it that way, at least for the time being.

  “Christopher,” she said then, after a lengthy pause, “I’ll miss you.”

  I looked at her but didn’t say anything at first. I noticed there was some crust around her eyes, and it took me a few moments to realize that they were dried tears. I wondered how long she’d cried after she found out her only grandchild would be leaving her so soon after they’d been reunited. For some reason beyond my understanding, she really did love me, and it made me sad because I didn’t think I could return the same amount of love.

  “Yeah,” I whispered finally. “I’ll miss you too.”

  • • •

  LIKE I’D HOPED, Sarah answered the front door. She held her copy of Billy Budd at her side, her index finger keeping her place between the pages.

  “Hey,” she said, stepping out onto the porch and letting the screen door close. “How are you? I heard what happened. It’s awful.”

  “How’s your brother?”

  “Grounded. My dad’s pretty angry. He won’t let John leave the house except for school. He’s not even allowed to work on his Firebird.”

  I opened my mouth but wasn’t able to speak. There were so many words in my head right at that moment I just couldn’t pick which ones to say. Sarah watched me closely, her blue eyes nervous. They reminded me of how they’d looked yesterday, when she sat on the lawn chair outside my trailer, and I wondered how often that particular look in her eyes surfaced.

  “I’m leaving tomorrow,” I managed after a mome
nt. “I just wanted to say goodbye. And, you know, good luck with the baby.”

  “Thanks,” she said.

  “It was just—” I didn’t know how to continue without sounding cheesy. Then I realized it didn’t matter. “It was nice meeting you.”

  “It was nice meeting you too, Chris.”

  I tried to smile but couldn’t.

  “Also ... I kind of lied to you earlier.”

  She frowned. “What do you mean?”

  “When we were up on the Lookout yesterday. I said I don’t believe in God. That ... that wasn’t true. At least, not completely true.”

  Still frowning, she said, “Chris, what are you talking about?”

  “I just ... I felt bad lying to you. Telling you that I don’t believe in God like I did. Because I do believe in God. I believe he’s an absent God. An indifferent God. And lying to you made me realize I’d lied to my parents. They thought I was this perfect son who respected everyone, even God. But I wasn’t even close. I partied on the weekends. I slept around on my girlfriend. I even got her pregnant and then forced her to have an abortion. And the worst part is my parents died thinking I was someone I’m not.”

  “Why are you telling me this?”

  “Because when it comes down to it, you can’t trust on God for anything. My parents trusted Him their entire lives, and you know where it got them? It got them murdered. I trusted Him when I was younger, and you know where it got me? It got me being stalked by a psychopath who wants to kill me too. So just keep that in mind with your baby, Sarah. Because even if you believe in God, He doesn’t give a shit. It’s just going to be you and that baby, nobody else.”

  I stepped back, turned away.

  “Bye, Sarah,” I said, and walked off the porch and across the lawn, toward Half Creek Road. As with Joey, I didn’t look back and just kept walking. Where I was headed, I didn’t know, but ten minutes later I found myself in front of Shepherd’s Books, the old man on the porch taking his muddy boots off the railing and leaning forward.