The Turtle Boy

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

Summer ended, and as per the rules of the seasons in Ohio, there was no subtle ushering out of the warmth; the weather dropped in temperature and the earth darkened on the very day the calendar page turned.

Spurning all attempts his father made at trying to come up with something fun for them to do on what might be the last Saturday of good weather for quite some time, Timmy took a walk.

Fall was already setting up camp on the horizon, prospecting for leaves to burn and painting the sky with colors from a bruised pallet.

He wanted to forget, but knew that would never happen.

There were three reasons why the fear would always be with him, dogging his every step and making stalkers out of the slightest shadows.

First, the reporters. In the months since Pete’s and Mr. Marshall’s deaths, the newspapers had played up the ghost angle, delighting in the idea that an eleven-year-old boy had helped solve a murder through an alleged conference with the dead. There were phone calls, insistent and irritating, from jocular voices proclaiming their entitlement to Timmy’s story.

They were ignored.

But this only led to speculation, and Timmy’s face ended up in the local newspapers, topped with giant bold lettering that read:

Then the curiosity seekers started showing up, some of them from the media, most of them just regular folk. Their neediness frightened the boy. We just want to touch him, they said. Others wept and begged his mother to let the boy see if he can bring my little Davey/Suzy/Alex/Ricky/Sheri back. And they were still coming to the house, though not as much as they had in the beginning.

The second reason was that even if Timmy managed to dismiss the calls, the desperate pleas of strangers, the newspaper reports and the occasional mention of his name on the television, there were still the nightmares. Vivid, brutal and unflinching. In his dreams, he saw everything, all the things he had been able to look away from in real life. All the things he had been able to run from.

Every night, he drowned and ended up behind what Darryl had called ‘The Curtain.’ In the waking hours, the name stayed with him, conjuring images in Timmy’s mind of a tattered black veil drawn wide across a crumbling stage. He imagined a whole host of the dead crouching behind it, waiting for their chance to come back, to find their own killers. And perhaps they would. Perhaps also they would only be successful if they had someone to draw strength from, as Timmy was sure Darryl Gaines had drawn strength from him and Pete.

Or perhaps it was over.

Believing that required the most effort.

Because the final reason, the last barrier stopping him from releasing the dread and shaking off the skeins of clambering horror was the recollection of something else The Turtle Boy had said: You don’t know who did it. When you do, remember what you saw and let it change you. He had mulled over this every day and every night since the discovery of the bodies. It would have been simpler to forget had he not realized something about the murders, something that came back to him weeks later—Wayne Marshall was Darryl’s uncle. The story had it that Darryl had been visiting his uncle and that’s why he was there in the first place. But Timmy had been there, however it had happened, standing on the bank of the pond when the big man had come strolling over the rise. Among the things he’d said had been: I’m a friend of your uncle’s. We’re practically best friends! Which meant Darryl’s murderer had not been his uncle.

But every time it got this far in Timmy’s head, heavy black pain descended like a caul over him and he had to stop and think of nothing until it went away. It was too much. Maybe in the years to come it would make sense. For now, it would hang like an old coat in a closet, always there but seldom worn.

Maybe he deserves to die.

His walk took him back to the pond, to where bulldozers stood like slumbering monsters next to a smoothened oval of dirt. They’d drained the pond and ripped away the banks. The telltale signs of man were everywhere now, the animals quiet. Despite his relief at having the dark water gone, Timmy couldn’t help the twinge of sadness he felt at having the good memories buried beneath that hard-packed dirt, too. All around him the land was changing, becoming unfamiliar.

He sighed, dug his hands in his pockets and walked on, unsure where he was heading until he was standing staring down at the railroad tracks. A cold breeze ran invisible fingers across his skin and he shivered. A quick glance in both directions showed the tracks were deserted. No trains, no funny tireless cars with flashing yellow beacons.

School would begin soon, and he hoped it would be the distraction he needed from the crawling sensation he had been forced to live with, the sense of always being watched, of never being alone.

It’ll pass, son, his father had told him, I promise.

Timmy prayed that was true.

Because even now, with not a soul around, he could feel it: a slight thrumming, as of a train coming, the air growing colder still, the sky appearing to brood and twist, the hiss of the wind through the tall grass on either side of the rails.

And a droning, faint at first.

A droning. Growing.

Like a machine. Or an engine.

Pete’s voice then, disgruntled, whispering on the wind: They were stupid to ride that close to the train anyway.

Not an engine.

Muscles stiffening, Timmy drew his hands out of his pockets, held his hands by his sides. He felt his knees bend slightly and knew his body had decided to run, seemingly commanded by the small fraction of unpanicked mind that remained. He looked to the right. Nothing but empty track, winding off out of sight around a bramble-edged bend.

He looked to the left.

The wind rose, carrying the stench of death to him and he felt his heart hammer against his ribcage. A child, limping, trying to prevent himself from toppling over, all his energy focused on keeping the mangled dirt bike—and himself—upright.

I wish that kid hadn’t been killed up there.

The bike, sputtered, growled, whined. Or perhaps it was Danny Richards making the awful sounds—Timmy couldn’t tell.

The child’s bisected mouth dropped open, teeth missing, as he lurched forward, the weight of the bike threatening to drag him down and Timmy bolted, ran for his life. The wind followed him, drowning out his own screams, thwarting his attempts to deafen the mournful wail coming from the stitched-together boy hobbling along the railroad tracks.

“Where’s my sissssssterrrrrr?”

Timmy stopped for breath by the memory of the pond. He could still see the boy, a distant figure lurching along the tracks—a pale, bruised shape against the dark green grass.

Something’s wrong, something’s broken. Timmy knew it then as if it had been delivered in a hammer-strike blow to the side of his head. He sobbed at the realization that the They Darryl had mentioned, the They who would show him what he needed to learn, were the dead. He would see them now. Again and again.

Everywhere.

And there was a truth he had missed, a truth he was not yet ready—not yet able—to figure out on his own. All that was left were questions:

Why did he want to hurt Dad?

Why did he ask me if I’d die for him?

Why did he say maybe he deserved to die?

As he straightened, struggling not to weep at the thought of what might yet lay ahead of him, he flinched so hard his neck cracked, a cold sheet of pain spreading over his skull.

A voice that might have been the breeze.

A whisper that might have been the trees.

And a face that peered over his right shoulder, grinning.

Timmy choked on a scream.

“Mine, now,” said Mr. Marshall.