Andrew Pyper - The Guardians

"She's probably already at home, wondering where everybody is, and they're al out in the woods with bloodhounds."

"They check with the boyfriend?"

"They're stil looking for him."

"I bet the two of them are under a sleeping bag in a parked car somewhere."

"Maybe they should look out by the walnut trees in Harmony."

"That where you used to go too?"

"I was talking about you."

"Me and Sarah."

"Anybody else I might know?"

"How'd you know we'd go out there?"

"You told us," Randy says, shaking his head. "We told each other pretty much everything back then."

Randy looks down the length of the table as though expecting to see others seated around us.

"Think we should go see him?" I ask.

"See who?"

"Todd."

"Me and you popping by after half a lifetime to say sorry for your missing only child? I don't know, Trev. Let's just wait on that one."

Randy moves to stand, but then his eyes catch on the hands I've planted on the tabletop. The hands stil, but the elbows vibrating like a pair of idling engines.

"Don't say it," Randy says.

"Say what?"

"What you're thinking."

"You're a mind reader as wel as an actor now?"

"I don't need to read minds. Not about this. And not with you."

"So tel me."

"This missing girl. Heather. The house. How it feels the same al over again."

"For the record, you were the first to say it out loud, not me."

Randy draws his sleeve over his forehead as though to wipe away sweat, but his skin is dry, the cotton rasping.

"How's the executor duties going?" he asks, both of us happy to change the subject.

"I'm not sure actualy."

"You need some help?"

"No. Thank you, though."

"It must be kind of strange. Going through Ben's things."

"He kept a diary."

"Yeah? You read it?"

"Enough to know he wasn't wel."

"I think we knew that."

"He thought there was something in the house across the street. Something he believed was trying to get out, and would get out—"

"If it wasn't for him."

"That's right."

"You said it. He wasn't wel." Randy's not looking at my elbows now, but squinting severely right at me.

"Or he was right," I say.

"About what?"

"That the Thurman place needed to have an eye kept on it."

"Wel, let's see," Randy says, lifting his hands to count off the points he makes on his fingers. "One, nobody lives there, so there was nobody to keep an eye on.

Two, Ben was an anti-social shut-in with delusional tendencies—and that was him in grade eleven. Three, even if there was something in there that was trying to escape, how would staring at the front door stop it from getting out? Four, Ben was talking about ghosts. And people with ful decks don't believe in ghosts."

"You haven't used your thumb yet."

"Okay, then. Five, you're grieving, whether you think you're immune to that particular emotion or not. And grief can make you stupid."

"Aren't you grieving too?"

"In my way. God knows I raised my glass to his memory enough times last night."

We laugh at this. In part because we need to in order to move on to the next chance for normal to settle over us again. In part because Randy's mention of the word

"ghost" feels like it invited one into the room.

"What about some dinner tonight?" Randy says, rising.

"Sounds good."

"I was thinking the Old London."

"Is it stil there?"

"Was when I walked past it last night."

"Perfect."

"I was going to hit the coin laundry this afternoon. Want me to grab some stuff from your room and throw it in too?"

"I'l use the washer here if I need to. I'm staying here tonight anyway."

Randy turns around on the porch. "Here? Overnight?"

"Betty asked if I would. I think she needs the company."

"Where you going to sleep?"

"Ben's room."

"That's fucked. Got to say"

"I think it was your point number four, wasn't it?" I say, pushing the door closed. "People with ful decks don't believe in ghosts."

The next couple of hours are spent back up in Ben's room, fitting his belongings into boxes and stuffing the clothes from his closet into bags for the Salvation Army ("Take whatever you and your friends might want," Betty McAuliffe had invited me). I put aside a pair of ties, though I did it just to please her.

They are activities that keep my fidgety hands occupied, but not my mind. Over and over I return to Tracey Flanagan. Odds are that she's fine, and that Randy was right: starting an official search after less than a day was nothing more than the over- reaction of smal-town cops. Yet the news struck me as hard as it seemed to have struck Randy. Maybe it was the way she reminded us of Heather. Maybe it was Randy saying how, now that we'd let it see us, the Thurman house knew we were back.

And then there's the house itself.

By mid-afternoon the clouds had not quite lifted but thinned, so that, from time the time, the sun found a square to poke through. It would flash across the Thurman windows and reflect into Ben's room, beckoning me to turn and look. Each time I did I'd have to close my eyes against the light, and when I opened them again, the sun was gone, the glass dul. The effect was like a leering wink from a stranger, so swift and unexpected you couldn't be sure if it was a signal or just a twitch.

It happens again. The sun, the blink of light.

Except this time, as I'm returning to the pile of Ben's clothes at my feet, something changes. Not in what I can see in the house, but in my peripheral vision.

Something in the room with me.

I spin around to face it. And it is a face. Mrs. McAuliffe's, her head popping up another foot where she's come halfway up the stairs.

"Phone for you," she says.

"I'l take it up here, if that's okay."

I start for the phone on Ben's bedside table, but Betty McAuliffe waves me over. Tugs on my pant leg until I bend down, my ear close to her lips.

"It's a girl," she whispers.

Once Mrs. McAuliffe has started back down I pick up. Wait to hear the click of the downstairs receiver.

"Trevor?"

It's Sarah. Sounding nervous, her voice slightly higher than yesterday. The way my own voice probably sounds.

"Hey there."

"I tried you at the Queen's," she says. "When you weren't there, I figured I'd see if you were at Ben's."

"What was your next guess?"

"A bar somewhere. Maybe the back row of the Vogue. The entertainment options haven't changed much around here."

"I can tel you that folding up Ben's underwear isn't too entertaining either."

"Want some company?"

"Sorry?"

"I've got the afternoon off. Just wondered if you thought it might be easier with an extra pair of hands."

She wants to see you. A distinctly external voice, not the boy's. Mine. She's been thinking of you as much as you've been thinking of her .

And then a different voice.

Ask her over, the boy says . Take her across the street. We can all have a good time .

"I'm fine. But thanks for offering," I say.

"It was a dumb idea."

"No. I'd like to see you, Sarah."

"Realy?"

"What about dinner. Tomorrow?" There's a pause, and the foolishness of what I've done hits me square. "Listen to me. It's like I'm sixteen al over again, caling you up for the first time."

"I caled you."

"Which I appreciate. And I'm sorry if I've made this awkward. You're probably married or have a boyfriend. I didn't even ask—"

"What time?"

"Time?"

"When do you want to come over?"

"You tel me."

"There's a Guardians game tomorrow night. You could come by here first."

"Sounds wonderful," I say, because it does.