D. MacHale: SYLO

Deputy Donald wasn’t any more impressive. He looked like he had graduated high school last week. He was a little guy who wore his sheriff uniform really tight, like some badass state trooper. Maybe he thought it made him look bigger. I think it just made him look like he was wearing a Halloween costume that didn’t fit anymore. I wasn’t even sure if Donald was his first name or his last. They were both good guys but not crack detectives. I was glad that they had called in the Coast Guard.

When Laska and Donald got there, they instantly separated Quinn and me. It didn’t take Sherlock Holmes to realize they wanted us each to separately give our version of what had happened to see if the stories matched. Laska questioned me and Donald took Quinn. I told the sheriff everything with as much detail as I could remember. The only tricky question came when he asked me why we were riding our bikes out there in the middle of the night. But I had a good answer for that too: I couldn’t sleep after what had happened to Marty so we took off on a ride to blow off steam. It helped that it was the truth. Besides, what had happened over the water was a lot more disturbing than finding out a couple of guys went out for a late-night bike ride.

After asking me the same questions about five times, Laska told me to wait in the back of his Jeep while he went to talk with Deputy Donald. Quinn was in the back of the other Jeep, out of earshot. I caught his eye and he gave me a big smile and a thumbs-up. Dork. He was actually enjoying himself.

Our parents drove up shortly after and were asked to stay by their cars. After they loaded up our bikes the four of them stood together, talking and looking—what? Nervous? Angry? Worried? Probably all of the above. They’d just gotten calls in the middle of the night to say their sons were witnesses to an inexplicable explosion on the other side of the island. That had to be a shocker. But were they anxious about the explosion? Or the fact that Quinn and I were on the other side of the island when we were supposed to be at home in bed? That was a toss-up.

I didn’t think we’d catch any serious flak, though. Quinn and I were usually upright citizens. Okay, we were always upright citizens. Our parents shouldn’t be too upset that we went out for a nighttime ride, they should be grateful that we were normally pretty boring.

Living on an island like Pemberwick makes it tough to find good friends. It’s not like you have unlimited choices, and I was lucky to find a guy like Quinn. The island sits five miles off the Maine coast. The only way on or off is by boat or small plane. The entire island is about eighty-five square miles with a town on either side: Arbortown, where I live, is on the west coast facing the mainland and Memagog sits on the east coast facing open ocean. The rest of the island is grassland, farmland, or beach. To the north is a separate island called Chinicook, which you can only get to by a half-mile-long bridge. I think they used it as a submarine-spotting outpost during World War II, but nothing’s out there now but scrub and seagulls. The south end of the island is made up of tall cliffs of red clay that loom over the sea. It’s all very postcard picturesque, and that attracts two very different kinds of people: those who live here year-round and those who vacation during the summer. Quinn and I fall into the year-round category, though neither of us had been born on Pemberwick.

Quinn’s family came from Philadelphia when his parents chose to trade the high-pressure life of working in a city hospital for a more laid-back island lifestyle.

My family’s journey was more out of necessity. Dad was a civil engineer who worked for years in city planning in my home town of Greenwich, Connecticut. When the economy went sour, he got laid off and decided to move us to Pemberwick to try something new, which turned out to be starting his own gardening business. It wasn’t the most glamorous job but there was definitely a need, seeing as so many rich people wanted their summer places to look brochure-worthy. So Dad went from planning the growth of a city to planning the growth of petunias.

Though he was raking in a lot more grass than money, Dad seemed to like living here. Mom did too. She was an accountant who did freelance work for many of the small businesses on the island. She often talked about how much fun she was having meeting new people and helping them with their work. As far as I could tell, neither missed our former life—which was cool—but it didn’t seem fair that somebody like my dad could work so hard to get through school and earn a big fat degree and slave for years to build a career only to be tossed on the trash heap because some budget needed to be balanced. That wasn’t right. My parents always tell me to work hard in school because it’ll lead to a good career and a good life. Well, my father did exactly that and got dumped like a dead battery. If it could happen to him, a guy who does nothing but the right thing, it could happen to anybody.

It makes me wonder what the point of it all is. Why work so hard to try to get ahead if the rug can be pulled out without warning? Or you drop dead during a football game? Maybe that’s why I don’t try all that hard in school. I figure that whatever comes my way I’ll deal, but I won’t bother sweating about it until then. That way I’ll never have to feel as though I got burned.

Quinn doesn’t agree with that. He’s all about piling on the AP courses and building his resume to get into some great school and set himself up to do something important…whatever that might be. It’s pretty much the only thing we don’t agree on. But that’s okay. Whatever happens, we’ll always have each other’s back.

As I sat in the cruiser watching the helicopter make passes over the ocean, another vehicle drove up. The headlights were right in my face so I couldn’t tell exactly what it was, but it looked to be a pickup. It stopped about thirty yards away. The driver got out as Sheriff Laska came over to greet him. He was an older guy wearing a plaid shirt and jeans. Because he was backlit by his own headlights I didn’t recognize him, but he looked to be tall and solid—your basic islander. He spoke to Laska and they shook hands as Deputy Donald joined them. Laska introduced them and started back toward me. As he walked, he motioned for Quinn and our parents to join us. We all converged at his Jeep.

“Who was that?” I asked, pointing to the guy in the plaid shirt.

“Another witness,” Laska replied. “Guess he was the fella you two saw riding his horse on the bluff. Deputy Donald’s taking his statement now.”

“So he’s okay?” I asked. “We thought he got hurt by the explosion.”

“Seems fine,” Laska said. “And his story matches yours.”

“Of course it does,” Quinn exclaimed. “Why would we make this up?’

“Quinlan!” Quinn’s mom scolded.

“Aw, c’mon,” Quinn protested. “We’ve been getting grilled like we’re trying to pull off some kind of prank. Is that what happens to people who do their civic duty?”

“Enough,” Quinn’s dad snapped.

“It’s okay, Doctor Carr,” Laska said. “We have been putting them through the ringer.”

“See?” Quinn exclaimed. “Whose side are you on, Dad?”

Doctor Carr rolled his eyes. He was used to Quinn being argumentative.

Quinn gave me a quick wink. I knew what he was doing. He was putting everybody else on the defensive so we didn’t have to be. There was no way we were going to get in trouble for lying about being in bed and riding our bikes out there.

“Look,” Laska said with patience. “You have to admit it’s a wild story. You can’t expect us to buy it just like that. We have to do our job.”