Midnight Crossroad

29

When he saw all Fiji’s preparations for Halloween, Manfred looked around his own yard and found it wanting. He didn’t know when he’d stop feeling the compulsion to work, so the next afternoon he walked down to Gas N Go to ask Connor if he’d be interested in cleaning up the outside of his house.

On the occasions Manfred went to Gas N Go—which Manfred had very precisely calculated could only be every third day, to avoid raising Shawn’s hackles—Manfred had observed that while Creek was usually genuinely busy, Connor was not. Manfred didn’t know if Connor was incompetent, or if Shawn had no faith in his son’s ability, but either Connor was doing his homework or he was employed with some job a monkey could do.

Connor seemed profoundly bored. In Manfred’s not-too-distant experience, a bored teenager was a teenager who got into mischief. And Connor seemed reasonably intelligent and likable, on Manfred’s brief acquaintance. If there was no one in Midnight who was closer to Creek in age than Manfred himself, there was no one who even spoke the same language as the fourteen-year-old.

When Connor arrived at Manfred’s house after school, Manfred led the boy through the room full of computer equipment. He looked back to see that Connor had stopped, transfixed.

“This is so cool,” he said. “What do you do?”

Manfred tried not to sound embarrassed or apologetic when he explained his psychic online business, which was obviously not a hundred percent honest. But Connor didn’t remark on that aspect at all, a little to Manfred’s surprise. Instead, he was enthralled with the computers and Manfred’s ability to make a living from them.

“We just have an old laptop,” Connor said. “And Dad won’t let us go on Facebook or anything.”

Manfred tried not to look as astonished as he felt. He could not imagine two young people being without social media, especially when the Lovells lived in such an out-of-the-way spot. But given Shawn’s aversion to his kids being noticed in any public way, it made sense.

“There are lots of ways to get into trouble with a computer,” Manfred said, trying to hold up the flag for Shawn. He didn’t want to undermine the man; that was not the way to win Shawn’s trust, which was Manfred’s current goal.

“Yeah, that’s what Dad says,” Connor muttered. He clearly didn’t think the better of Manfred for having echoed one of his father’s opinions.

Manfred felt about fifty years old. “Let me show you what I want you to do,” he said, thinking a change of subject was called for. He led Connor out into the fenced backyard, which was overlooked by the pawnshop on the left and a dilapidated and empty cottage on the right. Bobo had told him that the empty cottage, even smaller than the house Manfred was renting, had been left by its previous owner to a distant cousin, and the cousin had never taken possession of the place. It sat in dusty silence with the curtains drawn and the doors locked, and its yard was a straggly mess. Manfred had realized that his own place very nearly matched it.

“What I want you to do,” he said briskly, “is pull all the weeds that have grown up out here and pile them in that barrel. I’ll burn them when they dry out.” The old metal barrel, which had clearly been used for the same purpose in the past, was positioned just outside the overgrown hedge that encircled the backyard, just inside the chain-link fence. “Once the weeds are all up, the hedge needs trimming with these hedge clippers. Once those clippings are all gathered up and in the barrel, you can mow the yard. I’ve got an old-fashioned push mower right here.” He still hadn’t had a chance to get into the toolshed. The mower was parked under the eaves behind the house and covered with a tarp.

The hedge clippers were more exciting. He’d bought them at the Home Depot in Davy, and they were gleaming.

“At least they’re sharp,” Connor said. “But electric ones would have been better.”

“This isn’t that big a yard, and the manual ones are fine for the job,” Manfred said, suppressing a scowl with some effort. “Also, this’ll take you longer so you’ll earn more money.”

“All right.” Connor looked a bit happier.

“You are on your honor, keeping track of your time,” Manfred said. “I can’t keep looking out here to police you.”

“What does that mean—on my honor?”

“That means I’m trusting you to keep an accurate account of the time you work.”

Connor brightened. “Okay. I can do that.”

Though he prided himself on being able to read people, Manfred couldn’t decide if Connor was excited about being trusted or if he was simply pleased at the idea of being able to hoodwink Manfred out of a few extra bucks. Maybe because the kid himself didn’t know how he’d react? He definitely didn’t give out a vibe that was easy to interpret.

Connor was apparently hard at work the couple of times Manfred went into the kitchen to get water or a cup of coffee. The kid’s going to be a good-looking man, he thought, but his social adjustment is going to be all off. I wonder what his dad thinks is going to happen when Connor and Creek are too old to keep at home, when he has to let them go out into the world? What did Shawn do that he has to keep them hidden?

Not for the first time, Manfred wondered if the family wasn’t in some witness protection program. After she’d taken Creek to the funeral, Fiji had run into Manfred when she was checking her mailbox, and she’d told Manfred the idea had crossed her mind. That scenario made sense to Manfred. It would explain so many things about the Lovells. But it also felt too TV-plot to be real. Besides, Shawn seemed so commonplace. What could he have done to earn him a place in the program?

Or was the man some kind of isolationist? Did he think he’d keep his children free from all modern influences if he raised them here?

Manfred added a little sugar to his coffee, shrugged, and went back to work. Though he was curious, Manfred was honest enough to admit to himself that Shawn Lovell’s issues were only important to him because they affected Creek.

It was still light when Connor stopped for the day. He had done a lot of clearing. He told Manfred that he’d worked for two and a half hours and taken two breaks. The boy seemed very proud of himself. Shawn had come by to bring Connor some water. Manfred only knew this because he’d looked out the window to see Shawn walking down his driveway, bottle in hand. I should have known Shawn would check up on him, he’d thought, shaking his head, before he returned his attention to the screen.

Then Teacher Reed came by, just as Manfred was paying Connor.

“Hey, man,” he called. “You taking my jobs out from under me?”

Connor looked startled, and a little flattered. “No, sir,” he said, grinning. “I’m just weeding for Mr. Bernardo.”

“I’d better watch my back,” Teacher said with mock anxiety, and strode off about his business, whatever it had been. Manfred thought it was odd that Teacher was down this way, unless he’d been visiting the pawnshop and just happened to spy Connor working.

“I have to go home to cook supper,” Connor said. “I’ll come back tomorrow to finish.”

“Good job,” Manfred said, pleased.

“If you need that old stump pulled out,” the boy offered, “I can tie a rope to it and pull it out with Dad’s old pickup.”

“Your dad might have something to say about that. Might damage the truck.”

“It’s a junker,” Connor said dismissively. “He taught me how to drive on it. Course, I don’t have a license yet. But I drive around town sometimes.”

Manfred laughed, and said, “I guess I’d better check with Bobo before I do anything that drastic to the backyard.” Pulling up a stump—in an area where graves had to be blasted with dynamite—might be a serious undertaking.

Manfred was just closing the door when he spotted Sheriff Smith parking his car in front of Fiji’s place. The sheriff’s visits were getting fewer and farther between. Apparently no new information had surfaced about Aubrey’s murder. For the first time, the thought crossed Manfred’s mind that the mystery of her death might never be solved. It would hang over Bobo forever.

And not for the first time, Manfred was profoundly glad he’d moved here after Aubrey’s disappearance.