Gillian Flynn - Dark Places

I’d once been to Chicago, seen Lincoln’s death artifacts in a museum: thatches of his hair; bullet fragments; the skinny spindle bed he’d died on, the mattress still slouched in the middle like it knew to preserve his last imprint. I ended up running to the bathroom, pressing my face against the cold stall door to keep from swooning. What would the Day death house look like, if we reunited all its relics, and who would come to see it? How many bundles of my mother’s blood-stuck hair would be in the display cabinet? What happened to the walls, smeared with those hateful words, when our house was torn down? Could we gather a bouquet of frozen reeds where I’d crouched for so many hours? Or exhibit the end of my frostbitten finger? My three gone toes?

I turned away from the boxes—not up to the challenge—and sat down at a desk that served as my dining room table. The mail had brought me a package of random, crazy-person offerings from Barb Eichel. A videotape, circa 1984, titled Threat to Innocence: Satanism in America; a paperclipped packet of newspaper stories about the murders; a few Polaroids of Barb standing outside the courthouse where Ben’s trial was being held; a dog-eared manual entitled Your Prison Family: Get Past the Bars !

I removed the paperclip from the packet and put it in my paperclip cup in the kitchen (no one should ever buy paperclips, pens— any of those free-range office supplies). Then I popped the videotape into my very old VHS player. Click, whir, groan. Images of pentagrams and goat-men, of screaming rock bands and dead people flashed on the screen. A man with a beautiful, hairsprayed mullet was walking along a graffiti’d wall, explaining that “This video will help you identify Satanists and even watch for signs that those you love most may be flirting with this very real danger.” He interviewed preachers, cops, and some “actual Satanists.” The two most powerful Satanists had tire-streak eyeliner and black robes and pentagrams around their necks, but they were sitting in their living room, on a cheap velveteen couch, and you could just see into the kitchen on the right, where a yellow refrigerator hummed on a cheery linoleum floor. I could picture them after the interview, rummaging through the fridge for tuna salad and a Coke, their capes getting in the way. I turned off the video right about when the host was warning parents to scour their children’s rooms for He-Man action figures and Ouija boards.

The clippings were just as useless, and I had no idea what Barb wanted me to do with the photos of her. I sat defeated. And lazy. I could have gone to the library to look things up properly. I could have set myself up with home Internet access three years ago, when I said I would. Neither seemed like an option right now—I was easily wearied—so I phoned Lyle. He picked up on the first ring.

“Heeyyyy, Libby,” he said. “I was going to call you. I really wanted to apologize for last week. You must have felt ganged-up on, and that wasn’t what was supposed to happen.” Nice speech.

“Yeah, it really sucked.”

“I guess I didn’t realize that all of us had our own theories, uh, but none of them included Ben being guilty. I didn’t think it through. And I didn’t realize. I didn’t take into account. Just. You know, this is real to you. I mean, I know that, we know that, but we don’t at the same time. We really just never will. I don’t think. Totally get that. You spend so much time discussing and debating it becomes … But. Well. I’m sorry.”

I didn’t want to like Lyle Wirth, as I’d already decided he was a prick. But I appreciate a straightforward apology the way a tone-deaf person enjoys a fine piece of music. I can’t do it, but I can applaud it in others.

“Well,” I said.

“There are definitely members who’d still like to acquire any, you know, mementos you want to sell. If that’s why you’re calling.”

“Oh, no. I just wondered. I have been thinking a lot about the case.” I might as well have said dot dot dot aloud.

WE MET ATa bar not far away from me, a place called Sarah’s, which always struck me as a weird name for a bar, but it was a mellow enough place, with a good amount of room. I don’t like people up on me. Lyle was already seated, but he stood up as I came in, and bent down to hug me, the action causing much twisting and collapsing of his tall body. The side of his glasses poked my cheek. He was wearing another ’80s-style jacket—this one denim, covered with slogan buttons. Don’t drink and drive, practice random kindness, rock the vote. He jangled as he sat back down. Lyle was about a decade younger than me, I guessed, and I couldn’t figure if his look was intentionally ironic-retro or just goofy.

He started to apologize again, but I didn’t want any more. I was full up, thanks.

“Look, I’m not even saying I’m sold on the idea that Ben is innocent, or that I made any mistakes in my testimony.”

He opened his mouth to say something, then snapped it back shut.

“But if I were to look into it more, is that something the club would be able to help finance? Pay for my time, in a way.”

“Wow, Libby, it’s great news that you’re even interested in looking into this,” Lyle said. I hated this kid’s tone, like he didn’t realize he was talking to someone with seniority. He was the type who, when the class was over and kids were tapping toes and the teacher asked, “Any more questions?” actually had more questions.

“I mean, the thing is, we all have theories about this case, but so many more doors would open for you than for anyone else,” Lyle said, his leg jittering under the table. “I mean, people actually want to talk to you.”

“Right.” I pointed at the pitcher of beer Lyle had next to him, and he poured some into a plastic cup for me, mostly foam. Then he actually swiped his finger against his nose and put it in the beer, oil-flattened the foam, and poured more.

“So. What kind of compensation were you thinking?” He handed me the cup, and I set it in front of me, debating whether to drink it.

“I think it would have to be case by case,” I said, pretending I was just thinking of this for the first time. “Depending on how hard it was to find the person and what questions you’d want me to ask.”

“Well, I think we’d have a long list of people we’d want you to talk to. Do you really have no contact with Runner? It’s Runner that would be tops on most lists.”

Good old fucked-in-the-head Runner. He’d called me once in the past three years, mumbling crazily into the phone, crying in a wee-heee! shudder and asking me to wire him money. Nothing since. Hell, not much before either. He’d shown up sporadically at Ben’s trial, sometimes in an old tie and jacket, mostly in whatever he slept in, so drunk he listed. He was finally asked by Ben’s defense to stop coming. It looked bad.

Now it looked even worse, with everyone in the Kill Club saying they believed he was the murderer. He’d been in jail three times I knew of before the killings, but just podunk crap. Still, the guy always had gambling debts—Runner bet on everything—sports, dog races, bingo, the weather. And he owed my mom child support. Killing us all would be a good way to be quit of that obligation.

But I couldn’t picture Runner getting away with it, he wasn’t smart enough, and definitely not ambitious enough. He couldn’t even be a dad to his lone surviving child. He’d slunk around Kinnakee for a few years after the murders, sneaking away for months at a time, sending me duct-taped boxes from Idaho or Alabama or Winner, South Dakota: inside would be truck-stop figurines of little girls with big eyes holding umbrellas or kittens that were always broken by the time they reached me. I’d know he was back in town not because he came to visit me but because he’d light that stinky fire in the cabin up on the ridge. Diane would sing “Poor Judd Is Dead” when she saw him in town, face smudged with smoke. There was something both pitiful and frightening about him.