F. Wilson - Secret Histories

strange men had been digging up the earth in search of … what?

Or had they? He couldn’t be sure. How could something that had felt so real then seem so unreal now?

He noticed a smal , dark-brown lump on his left forearm. A closer look showed it had little legs.

A tick.

It hadn’t buried its head too deeply yet, so he flipped it on its back and pul ed it out. He studied it as it crawled across his palm. A simple brown wood

tick, not the tiny deer tick everybody was being warned about. Get bitten by one of those and you could catch some new infection cal ed Lyme disease,

whatever that was. What’d it do? Turn you green?

Watching the tick he realized that here was proof of sorts that he’d been in the Barrens last night—the place was lousy with ticks. But he could just as

easily have picked it up during the day.

He took it between his thumb and forefinger, ready to crush it.

“You have attacked me,” he intoned, holding it up at eye level. “You have bitten me. For that you must die.”

And then he realized it hadn’t hurt him—hadn’t even had a chance to suck his blood. Just a tick being a tick.

He stepped to the window, opened the screen, and flicked it out onto the lawn. Then he checked the rest of himself for more but couldn’t find any.

Since he didn’t see any more sleep in his immediate future, he decided to get dressed. He’d just put on his jeans when his mother knocked on his door

and stuck her head in. She looked concerned.

His gut tightened. Don’t tel me there’s a trooper at the front door! Please don’t!

“Jackie?”

“Jack, Mom.”

“Weezy’s here to see you.” She frowned. “She looks upset. I asked her to come in but she said she’d wait for you in the front yard.”

Weezy! She could tel him if last night had been real or not.

“Great. Thanks.”

As he squeezed by her she put a hand on his shoulder.

“She couldn’t be in any … trouble, could she?”

Jack froze. Did Mom know? But how could she? It was—

When he saw how uncomfortable she looked he realized what she was talking about. He didn’t know whether to laugh or get mad.

“Weez? Are you kidding? No way! How can you even think—?”

“Wel …” She looked even more uncomfortable. “You two do spend an awful lot of time together … disappearing for hours …”

Now he laughed. “We’re just friends, Mom.”

“Famous last words.” She looked stern now. “Don’t you go jumping into anything you’re not ready for. Remember to use your head.”

“Okay, okay,” he said on his way to the front door. “Message received and understood.”

Why’d she have to think that? Weezy got upset a lot—a lot. It certainly didn’t mean she was pregnant.

And certainly not by me, of al people.

He found her in the front yard, leaning her back against the big oak. At first sight of her he couldn’t help thinking of him and Weezy … together. He never

thought of her like that. They’d known each other forever. They’d hung out in her bedroom lots of times and he’d never thought about …

But he remembered her kiss. Nice …

JackandWeezysittinginatree…

When she saw him she ran over. For an awful second he thought she was going to throw herself into his arms. Not that that would be so bad someplace

else, but not here. Because sure as Tuesday fol owed Monday, Mom was watching. That’d be al she’d need.

But she stopped short and grabbed his arm and began pul ing him toward the sidewalk.

Jack saw what his mom had meant about looking upset. Her eyes—no liner this morning—were bloodshot and her face was blotchy, as if she’d been

crying.

“It’s gone, Jack!”

“What?”

“The cube! It’s gone! So are those tracings I made. And the photos too. Everything is gone!”

They stopped at the sidewalk where she’d left her bike.

“What do you mean, ‘gone’? Maybe Eddie’s got them.”

“He swears he doesn’t and I believe him. Besides, I had them hidden and Eddie can barely find his own shoes. He’d never find the cube.”

“Your folks?”

She shook her head. “No. They were sound asleep when we sneaked out last night, and just as asleep when we sneaked back in. I know the cube was

in my room when I left—I had it out, trying to open it, before I heard the helicopters.”

“And you put it away before you left?”

“Absolutely.”

Her face scrunched up as tears fil ed her eyes. She looked like she was going to break down and start bawling. Jack raised an arm to put around her

shoulders, but a glance at his house revealed his mom watching from a living room window, so he settled for a hand on her arm.

He could sense how much she was hurting. That cube and pyramid meant so much to her—as if she’d been looking for something like them al her life.

But he didn’t know what to say to make her feel better. Was there anything anyone could say?

“Weez …”

She took a deep, shuddering breath, then seemed to pul herself together. She looked back toward the Barrens.

“Somebody took it, Jack. Someone sneaked into my room last night while we were out and stole it.”

“But you’re on the second floor.”

“I know.” She crossed her arms across her chest. “It gives me the creeps. But how did they know?”

“Maybe because they couldn’t find it in my room.”

Her head snapped around. “Your room?”

“When I came back from Steve’s Thursday night, I sensed some stuff in my room had been moved. I thought it was Tom, looking for a way to get even

for the pistachios. But now … I wonder.”

“But only a few people knew we had it. Mister Rosen is the first one we showed it to.”

“Yeah, but he wouldn’t tel anybody. I mean, he hasn’t got anyone to tel .”

Weezy’s eyes narrowed. “What makes you so sure? I mean, what do we know about him —really know about him? He comes to Johnson from who knows where, opens a store that sel s junk, doesn’t even live in town, and—” “His trailer is just up the highway. You know that.”

“Right, with dozens of antennas on the roof and the biggest satel ite dish I’ve ever seen. I mean, that thing belongs at Lakehurst.”

“He can’t get cable out there so he pul s in the signals with the dish.”

“How do we know al that stuff’s just for receiving? Maybe some of it transmits. Who’s he communicating with?”

Jack saw Weezy’s new suspicions as good news and bad news. The good was she seemed to have pul ed back from the meltdown point and returned

to her old off-the-wal -conspiracy-theory self. The bad was she was talking down Mr. Rosen, and he didn’t like that.

“He’s a good guy, Weez, and he’s not communicating with aliens.”

“Who said anything about aliens? He could be—”

“He’s not doing anything but watching TV. Trust me. But I’m not so sure about Steve’s old man.”

“Mister Brussard?”

“Yeah. Add it up: I showed him the box and mentioned that we’d found it. Since he saw me with it, wouldn’t it be natural to assume we were keeping it at

my place? And if he wanted it, wouldn’t my room be the first place he’d look?”

“But since he didn’t find it in your room,” Weezy said in a soft voice, “mine would be the next best choice.” She shook her head. “But wait—I can’t see

him climbing up on my roof to get to my room.”

“Maybe he used the back door. Isn’t that what you used going in and out? And you said no one heard you.”