Timothy Johnston - The Current

This cop, this guy. He said he knew it. He recognized it.

The two girls looking at each other, their faces close, their eyes locked in the dark.

Was it Moran?

Who?

Deputy Moran. The sheriff’s deputy.

I don’t know.

What’d he look like?

I don’t know. He looked like a cop.

Did he have big eyes, like bugged-out eyes?

Maybe. A little. Yes.

Yeah, shit. That frog-eyed goon stopped me one time for speeding. Wanted me to step out of the car. I said, Step out, my ass, Officer, you haven’t even asked for my license. I put it in his face and he took a good long look at it and handed it back. Yeah, I said, that Ginny Walsh. I believe you know my mother?

What’d he say?

Said, Get your ass home.

Did you tell her—your mom?

Tell her what? There was nothing to tell her. And nothing she could do about it anyway, except get herself fired.

You can’t tell her about this, Ginny.

Katie, what happened? What did he do?

He let me go.

Katie…

Promise me.

Katie, the guy’s a piece of shit.

He’s a deputy sheriff piece of shit.

So?

Katie said nothing.

That’s exactly what he’s counting on you thinking, Katie.

So, what—just go in there and tell the sheriff?

Why not? Why would you make something like that up?

No. No way. I’m going to college in the fall. I’m going to college, Ginny. This is not going to be my story. This ass-backwards little town. Everybody knowing, everybody talking? My parents—oh God. Danny?

You didn’t do anything wrong, Katie.

Katie hanging her head. Crying again. She’d stopped at a gas station and had bought a big Coke and washed out her mouth and chugged the rest until her throat burned, and still the taste was there.

Can we just go to bed now, Ginny? Can we just go to bed and never talk about this again, ever? Please, Ginny?

AUDREY HAD SEEN tissues on the bathroom counter. She got up and went down the hall and found them and brought them back and they both took the tissues and blew their noses and wiped their eyes and set the damp wads on the coffee table at the feet of the toy horses. Down the hall the little girl slept, dreaming a little girl’s dreams.

“Katie,” Audrey said. “He would have believed you. My father. He would have.”

Katie looked at her red-eyed, and smiled. “Audrey, why are you here?”

“What do you mean?”

“How did you find me?”

“Gloria Walsh.”

“Gloria Walsh,” said Katie. “Ginny broke her promise. She told her mother, and her mother told your father.”

Audrey’s heart slipped. She shook her head.

“I’m sorry, Audrey, but she did.”

“How do you know?”

“Because he came to see me.”

“When?”

“I don’t know, a few days later. I was home by myself. I saw that sheriff’s car and just about pissed my pants.”

“What did he say?”

“He wanted to know did I have anything I wanted to talk to him about, and I said no, not that I was aware of. And then he stood there for a long time just turning his hat in his hands.”

Audrey waited. Her heart pounding.

“He said, ‘Miss Goss, if you don’t tell me I can’t take any kind of action.’ I said, ‘What kind of action?’ and he said, ‘Legal action,’ and that was the end of it. I said, ‘I’m sorry, Sheriff, but I just don’t know what you’re talking about.’ And then he got back into his car and drove off.”

Audrey sat staring at the toy horses. They all seemed about to turn and run, to stampede.

Katie took a breath and sighed. “He knew, Audrey. I’m sorry, but he did.”

“But,” said Audrey. She swallowed, with difficulty, some rawness in her throat. “He didn’t know enough. If you’d told him more, if you’d come forward, then maybe…” She couldn’t say it. She could hardly bear to have it in her mind.

“Then maybe what? Maybe Holly Burke might be alive?” Katie looked at her with her red eyes. She shook her head. “No, ma’am. Nobody knows what happened that night, least of all you. A deputy sheriff runs over some girl in the park, throws her body in the river, then tries to pin it on some poor schmuck who just happens to be driving by? I never would’ve believed it even back then, when I knew what he was. And now, ten years later, Danny Young starts waving around a piece of cloth and telling this story and—what, I’m supposed to corroborate that or something? Just hop up suddenly and start yelling rape? Against a sheriff?”

“But there were others,” Audrey said. “Gloria said there were other girls.”

“Oh, really? Where are they? Why haven’t they come forward? Why aren’t they responsible? Why didn’t they say something before it happened to me?”

“They’re scared too.”

“Scared?” She spat a piff of air from her lips. “You think I’m scared? I’m taking care of one hundred old people, including my mother who doesn’t even know my name, and I’m raising my four-year-old daughter on my own. I left scared behind a long time ago.”

Audrey was silent. Staring at the toy horses on the table. When she looked up again Katie was watching her, but her eyes had gone away somewhere, and in a quieter voice she said, “He came to see me again, your dad. After they found Holly Burke.”

Audrey said nothing. Waiting.

“He wanted to know if I’d seen Danny,” Katie said. “I hadn’t. He wanted to know if Danny had called me. He hadn’t. He wanted to look at my cell phone just to be sure, and I said, ‘Don’t you need a warrant for that?’ and he said he hoped he wouldn’t need one and I said he would.”

Audrey thought about that: ten years ago… Even back then he wouldn’t have needed the phone itself; he could’ve just subpoenaed the records, same as a landline.

She said as much to Katie and Katie nodded.

“Yes, I know that now. Back then I just, you know…” She began tapping with her forefinger at something in her opposite hand.

Audrey looked up from the empty hand and into her eyes. “You deleted the call history?”

“I did,” Katie said, and said no more. As if this said everything. Then finally she added: “Danny never called me, but I called him. I called him that night and he was in the park. Chasing his dog, he said.”

Audrey’s heart was beating in her temple again. “Why did you delete the call history?”

Katie didn’t answer. She sat staring blankly at Audrey.

“Because you believed him,” Audrey said. “Or because you didn’t.”

“It didn’t matter what I believed.”

“It might have to him. It might have to my father.”

Katie shook her head. “After everything that happened…” She took a breath and let it out. “I just couldn’t do it, Audrey. I just couldn’t be a part of it. Then they let him go, and he never tried to call me again, and I never called him. We never spoke again.”

Audrey sat looking into Katie’s eyes.

“What?” said Katie.

“I just,” Audrey began, and stopped.

“You just what.”

“I just wish you’d given my father a chance, that’s all. About Moran.”

Katie reached and tucked Audrey’s fallen hair behind her ear, then returned her hand to her lap. “Sweetie, it wasn’t about that. If I’d told him, it would’ve meant telling everyone. I was eighteen years old. I just wanted to live my life. I didn’t want to be Holly Burke.”

“HEY, BUDDY. BUDDY…”

The shoulder twitched under the blanket and there was a low groan and Danny shook him once more, “Buddy, come on, wake up,” and at last Marky rolled over and opened his eyes and lay blinking up at him in the dark.

“Danny… what are you doing?”