Helpless

Chapter 37

“You’ve got to tell us where she is.”

Irena Kalinowski sat at her kitchen table, looking sheepish and defeated. Vern Kalinowski sat across from his daughter, glaring. Tom tried to keep his composure but found it challenging under these circumstances. Jill, who should have been upstairs in the Kalinowskis’ guest bedroom, was gone.

Earlier, Tom had called Vern from the Plenty Market parking lot. Vern’s home phone rang several times before his former assistant coach finally answered it. Tom had told Vern he needed to speak with Jill, and that it was urgent. While Vern went to get her, Tom sat in his car and watched Roland and Sullivan drive away.

He commended his own restraint.

The purpose of Tom’s phone call to Jill was simple—he needed to tell her that Mitchell Boyd, effective immediately, was officially off-limits.

Tom’s stomach sank when Vern picked up the phone again. “She’s not there,” he said. “She must have snuck out the window, or something.”

Tom sent Jill a text message.

She replied: Green.

The tightness in Tom’s chest released some. Where are you? he texted her.

In bed, she sent back.

You’re lying.

No response.

He texted her again: Where are you?

Still no response.

Now it was up to Irena, Vern’s oldest by twelve minutes, to tell Tom what he needed to know.

“Honey, this is a very serious situation,” Vern said to Irena. “You’ll be in big, big trouble if you lie to me. Where did Jill go?”

Irena let out a loud sigh. Her gaze sank to the table. Tom could see her trembling. “She went to this place called the Spot,” Irena said in a quiet voice.

Tom and Vern looked at each other.

“When?” Vern said.

“About an hour ago.”

“Who’d she go with?” asked Tom.

Irena paused. She looked at her dad, then to Tom.

“Mitchell Boyd,” Irena said in an even softer voice. “She’s there with Mitchell Boyd.”

Tom heard the music long before he saw any of the kids. It was an unseasonably warm September night, which made the Spot the ideal place for a weekend hangout. The moon stood high and bright in the cloudless sky. Almost full, Tom observed, and from its position, he could tell it was closing in on midnight.

Tom knew this place well, almost by memory. Each step brought him deeper into his past. The trail markers—yellow triangles painted on trees—were the same as he remembered from his high school days. But Tom didn’t need any markings to guide him back to the Spot. His soul was connected to this place like the deep, flowing roots of the forest trees surrounding him.

The Spot was nothing more than a large clearing of land tucked inside Willards Woods. Willards Woods occupied hundreds of acres of undeveloped land in Shilo, vigorously protected by conservationists and taxpayer dollars. The Spot had been a favored teen hangout long before Tom’s high school years, and from his work as both a coach and guidance counselor, he knew it remained in vogue to this day. Kids from Shilo and neighboring towns came to the Spot to do what Tom and Roland had done back in their heyday.

Listen to tunes.

Drink beers.

Swim in the cold quarry water.

Tom emerged from the overgrown trail and into the clearing. When he did, the chatter of teens abruptly stopped, like a hunting tiger silencing the noises of a teaming jungle. A fire burning bright in the stone fire pit cast a flickering yellow light across Tom’s face.

Teenagers, long and lanky, some with short hair, some not, some fully dressed, some soaking wet, some smoking cigarettes, some smoking something else, turned in the direction of Tom’s bright shining flashlight.

Somebody shut off the music.

Tom heard a loud splash.

Somebody yelled, “Cops!”

Tom heard another loud splash.

The frantic scramble to escape capture was in full effect. The teens packed up their illegal pleasures in backpacks and cardboard boxes and made for the woods with great haste. Tom heard branches breaking, leaves crunching. There were panicky voices shouting from within the darkness: “This way!” and “Over here!”

A flashlight cut through the dark and shone directly on Tom’s face. Somebody yelled, “It’s Coach Hawkins! It’s not the cops. It’s not the cops!”

Soon, more flashlights were shining in Tom’s eyes, blinding him. He continued to hear the sounds of kids scattering, but no longer could he see them. Movement to Tom’s right pulled his head in that direction. He stepped out of the beams of light and into the path of two boys trying to make their escape. Tom grabbed hold of one boy’s jacket, pulling him to an abrupt stop.

The other kid kept on running.

It was every man for himself, same now as it was back in his day.

Tom recognized the boy—a senior at Shilo High School named Matthew. Matthew was holding a can of beer in his hand.

“Where’s Jill?” Tom asked.

Matthew said nothing, probably too scared to speak.

“Where’s my daughter?” Tom asked again. Tom turned his flashlight to shine it on his own face. He wanted Matthew to see the seriousness of his expression.

“She was hanging out at the ledge,” Matthew said, with each word wavering.

“Are you driving?”

“No.”

“Good,” Tom said, ripping the beer can from Matthew’s hand before crushing it.

Tom walked toward the ledge. He heard several more loud splashes. In the moonlight, he saw a silhouetted figure standing near to the quarry’s edge, facing him. As he approached, Tom knew it was his daughter.

“What are you doing?” Jill shouted.

Tom shone his flashlight on Jill’s face, fixed in a hateful sneer. She was wearing jeans and a sweatshirt. She didn’t look wet.

She hadn’t been swimming.

He got close enough to smell her breath. He didn’t believe she’d been drinking, either.

Tom shone his flashlight into the impenetrably dark water below. The kids down there were easy to spot. Their white skin glowed brighter than the moon. They were treading water, hoping to avoid detection.

“Get out of the water and get home!” Tom shouted. He followed their movement with his flashlight beam, knowing they were swimming for the water’s only exit. It was safest to jump from the place where they did—the water here was the deepest, no jutting or shallow rocks, either. Sunken railroad ties represented the only real danger here. A good leap outward ensured any jumper that they’d safely clear the lethal obstacle below. But the twenty-five-foot quarry wall was too sheer to climb back up. With luck, these kids were smart enough to keep towels and dry clothes where they’d be getting out. Tom doubted any of them would return to the Spot to dry off.

“You are totally embarrassing me,” Jill said. “Please go away. Now!”

“You need to come with me,” Tom said, keeping his voice calm, but determined. “Now.” Tom put his hand on Jill’s shoulder, but his daughter shrugged it off with a quick and violent jerk.

“Get your hands off me,” Jill snapped at him. “Leave me alone.”

“That’s not an option.”

“You can’t make me come with you.”

“I’m still your father.”

“Yeah, well, I don’t live with you anymore. Remember?”

“Where is Mitchell?” asked Tom.

Jill sighed in disgust. “I don’t know,” she said. “He probably took off when you scared everybody away.”

“Listen, from now on Mitchell Boyd is off-limits to you. His father’s dangerous, and I don’t want you anywhere near that family.”

“You can’t make that decision for me,” Jill said, shaking her head. “You can’t.”

“You have to trust me on this, Jill. It’s not safe for you to be with him.”

“Why should I trust you?” Jill said in a voice steeped with exasperation. “I don’t even know you. For all I know, you did have something to do with what happened to Mom. And you know what else? I think you are sleeping with Lindsey. I can’t trust you and won’t. Ever!”

Tom’s thoughts flashed on the whiteboard still in the Oak Street house living room—more specifically on the square around the word trust, which Jill had redrawn.

It was time, he decided. It was time.

The Spot was now completely deserted. A symphony of nighttime forest creatures buzzed in a cacophony of sound. Off in the distance, Tom could still hear the sound of kids swimming to get away. Sparks crackled and burst skyward from the fire.

“You’re right, Jill,” Tom said, nodding his head while biting on his lower lip. “I haven’t given you enough reason to trust me. But if you come with me right now, I’ll tell you why your mother hated me so much, why she tried to come between us.”

That got her attention. Jill looked as though she might burst into tears.

“What are you talking about?” she asked.

“I need you to trust me,” Tom said, resting his hand on his daughter’s shoulder. This time, she didn’t shrug it away. “For your safety, you’ve got to believe me when I tell you to keep away from Mitchell Boyd. I have good reason.”

“What are you talking about?” she asked.

“I’ve been keeping a secret from you, Jill. A secret your mother and I never wanted you to know. It will explain everything. Why Kip Lange was in the woods that night. Why your mother hated me so much. And probably why somebody is out to destroy my reputation.”