Still Life in Shadows (26 page)

What was it about this child?
Even when he stretched his arms onto the countertop and lowered his head on them, Kiki’s fingers were still attached to his sleeve.

“You have to live up to expectations,” she said. “Sheesh, didn’t they teach you that in school?”

“No.”

“You say no too much,” said Kiki. “You should go home, Gideon.”

“Yes,” agreed Mari. “Go get some sleep. Kiki and I will take care of what needs to be done.”

Even though he thought he’d made clear his refusal to take Moriah’s body to Pennsylvania, no one seemed to hear him. Kiki and Mari were determined to assist him with what was
expected
of him.

B
ut Gideon didn’t go home. When his cell rang minutes later, he was summoned to the sheriff’s department. He walked there, even though it was over a mile. He didn’t trust himself behind the wheel of a car right now. Besides, he still had no idea where his truck was, but even with that excuse, he was not about to ask Ormond if he could borrow the Buick.

The air was crisp, typical January weather in the mountains. The stark tree limbs housed a few bird nests. Smoke curled from stout chimneys as he passed three homes adjacent to the local playground. He wondered what the residents were doing this afternoon and what was on the stove for dinner. He wished he felt hungry, but he didn’t seem to have that luxury. His stomach knotted like a ball of yarn he’d seen Mebane knit a scarf from at Thanksgiving. He wondered if it was too late to pray.

“God …” He recalled the bedtime prayers he’d offered to God as a child, back when his parents taught him that he should talk to God every night before sleep. He wondered where the concept of prayers
before bed evolved. Was it biblical? “God.” He sighed. “Help.”

The steps up to the station were covered in salt to compensate for the patches of ice that shone on their bricks. Gideon felt the soles of his shoes slick against the moisture of the ice. He recalled the frozen pond on the farm, at the corner of the apple orchard, visible when you turned down Pike Level Road. That pond was a marker for telling his friends which orchard belonged to his family. “Our house is right across the road,” he always said and pretty soon the kids were saying, “I know where you live. By that pond on Pike Level, right?” He wondered how many times ice had crusted over its surface this winter. Once he and Moriah had tried their hand at ice fishing until their father told them to get back to work.

Inside the warm building, he caught a whiff of beef soup, and the distinct aroma reminded him he hadn’t eaten today. There was no sign of any food at the station though; he supposed that the soup had long been consumed. Tomlin greeted him and offered a chair. Gideon took it and sat waiting for Sheriff Henry. Before excusing himself, Tomlin said he’d be right along.

As Gideon stared at the plaques on the walls, his eyes blurred. He recalled the last time he’d been here … when Moriah had been picked up for disorderly conduct.

The door sprang open and in walked Henry. “I just need to ask you some questions.” He held a clipboard with papers attached.

His tone made Gideon stiffen. If it was just questions, why had he needed to come all the way down to the station? Why couldn’t they have discussed this over the phone? The first series of questions had taken place when Moriah’s body had been found in the Dumpster. Later there had been questions asked of Luke, Ormond, and Gideon, as well as the store owners who shared the street with the auto shop. Gideon needed to be at work now. He’d already taken too much time off over the last couple of days. What kind of example was he setting for Luke and Kiki? What if Ormond changed his mind and reneged on his previous desire to have Gideon take over the shop once he retired?

Henry placed the clipboard on his desk and rubbed the buckle on his belt. Without making eye contact, he said, “I just have to ask these questions as a matter of protocol. Just need to know where you were the night of January seventeenth.”

“Where I was? I told you.”

“We have to cover all our bases.”

Nausea coated Gideon’s stomach. “You think I—I did it?” He couldn’t bring himself to use the word
killed.
It was one thing to hear rumors at Another Cup but to now have Henry even consider that Gideon could have … murdered … his own brother…. It was incomprehensible.

Henry looked like he might throw up, himself. “I have to question you, Gideon. I’m sorry, but I have to…. Procedures, you know how it is …”

Gideon found his voice. “Am I guilty?”

“I didn’t say that.” The sheriff avoided eye contact, causing Gideon to squirm in his seat.

“Do you think I am?” He wondered why he asked. Right now he didn’t care to know if the answer was yes.

Henry adjusted his glasses. “You said you were at home?” His focus was now on his desk with its many piles of paper. Lifting one stack that sat by his elbow, crowding the framed photo of Mebane, he found a pen.

Gideon tried to remain calm, but the blood was pulsating throughout his head.
We’ve eaten meals together,
he thought.
We’ve even watched the Super Bowl together for the past ten years.
Is this what their friendship had come to? A session of accusations? Gideon tried to remember the question.

“Yes,” he said, “I was home all night long.”

“Alone?” Henry scribbled, his eyes on the sheet of paper.

“I don’t have any pets.”

Henry’s confusion cleared to understanding after a moment. He cleared his throat. “What I mean is, is there anyone who can vouch for the fact that you were at home all night?”

“Me.”

“What?” Henry’s face showed puzzlement.

“My word, Henry. I said I was at home all night from the time I got off work, and that’s all I got.”

Henry looked like he might cry. Scratching his bald head, he said, “I want to believe you, Gideon.” For a moment silence passed between them. Then Henry lowered his voice. “I
do
believe you. Of course I do. You have always been an honest man.”

With that out in the air, Gideon stood to leave.

Henry cleared his throat again. “The fact is, I need more than that.”

“More than my word?”

“Yes. Folks around here are a little antsy.”

“Antsy?”

Solemnly, he said, “Worried. We’ve always been a peaceful town.”

With Reginald and his boisterous antics? With those rednecks from Gatlinburg who came into town to harass waitresses at Another Cup just because they could?
Gideon wanted to argue but decided now was not the right time to disagree with the sheriff.

“The body was found at your shop. Who found it?”

“I told you before. I found it.” Technically, Kiki had discovered it first, but Gideon wanted to keep the child out of this.

Henry wrote a few lines and, as his pen skittered across the paper, Gideon felt the clickety-clack of his own heart in his ears.

“And your truck? Where is it?”

What does my truck have to do with my brother’s death?
Gideon had seen a few episodes of
The Twilight Zone
, and now he was certain he’d been cast in one of them. “What do you mean?”

“Your truck isn’t parked at the auto shop or at your apartment. Where is it?”

Gideon felt it was odd that he was being watched and someone had come up with the fact that his truck was missing. “Moriah took it on Christmas Day.”

Henry made a note of that and then without raising his eyes from
his paper said, “We’ll get back to you, Gideon. Just stick around.”

“Where would I go?” asked Gideon. “I hope those antsy people realize that Twin Branches is my home.”

“They do.”

Gideon knew that some in this small town recognized him as one of their own, but others would never feel that way about him. He was one of those Amish; his roots were not Scots-Irish. He was a transplant; his parents did not believe in electricity to light a home or in telling children stories of Santa Claus. Like those foreign men who had come into the tearoom the other week, he was an outsider.

Gideon could not remember a time he had felt more alone. As he left the station, his mind spun back to when he was seven. Some English boys at the little grocery store in town had teased him about his suspenders and straw hat. They’d called him a freak. At home, he’d cried. His mother had cuddled him for a minute, and then she’d pushed him off her lap.

“You are a strong lad,” she’d said, “and this will only make you stronger. The Millers are God-fearing, and those boys will get their justice. Nothing goes unnoticed from God’s eyes.”

At the time, Gideon had felt reassured, plotting ways that God could borrow from him to show vengeance to those boys. God could zap them with a bolt of lightning in the next storm; he could infest their bedrooms with termites. Mother was right; those boys were going to suffer for what they did. At last, Gideon dried his eyes and was glad that nothing escaped God’s vision.

On this evening, he couldn’t gauge how he felt. The word
outsider
raced across his brain and lodged in it like the nagging yelp of a dog. He’d always been good at diagnosing his emotions. But now he wasn’t sure if he was tired or just sad or hungry or restless. To think that folks here could even think that he’d be the type to pull a gun on his own flesh and blood made his chest constrict. Reaching for the bottle of Tums, he took two. Chewing, he closed his eyes, only to see Moriah … Moriah, tall and broad-shouldered, handsome and healthy. How could he have let
his brother waste away into a wispy shadow of that creature? Why couldn’t he have made him go to rehab, forced him to stop his antics and get clean?

Opening his eyes, he expected to see Moriah seated before him. But there was only an empty chair.

When his cell phone rang, he grabbed it like it was a lifeline, a respite from his heavy thoughts. “Hello.” His own voice scared him, sounding dull, foreign.

“Hello,” said the female voice on the other end. “I’ve been thinking about you.”

“Mari.” Her voice was a soothing lullaby, familiar and serene. He took in a breath and before any other words could form, he let out a sob. And then another.

“I’m on my way over.”

“No … no …” He tried to stop, but his chest was like a heaving wave, pounding out of control.

“Gideon, stay there. I’ll be right over.” The phone clicked, and he listened to a voluminous wailing that filled all of the spaces in his apartment. Covering his ears, he hoped to block it out until he realized the loud noise was from his very throat.

W
hat if they put me in jail?” Gideon swallowed hard as the severity of the situation hit him. “What if they lock me up?” If only he had a solid alibi for the night of January seventeenth. “Can they do that? Until they find the real killer?”

Mari, seated next to him on the sofa, tried to ease his worries. “They have no proof.”

“Are you sure?”

When she arrived at his apartment ten minutes ago, he’d been wiping his face with a dish towel. Although he tried to hide his tears, he knew she knew.

As he thought of Moriah lying cold in the morgue, he choked up again. Turning from her, he stood and walked toward the farthest living-room wall. With his back to her, he said, “Don’t look at me.” The words sounded like that of a child. Father never allowed him to cry. Especially not in front of a woman. That was weak, uncalled for. “You can’t see me cry.” It was not only Father’s rule that boys and men didn’t cry; according to him, neither should women. “We came here from religious
oppression,” Father was known for saying. “We fought for the freedom of religion so we could openly be Amish. We didn’t get here by giving up and crying.”

“Gideon.” She was at his side.

“No.” Abruptly he turned away. “You just can’t. Don’t.”

“Why not?” She resumed her spot on the sofa.

Blinking back tears, he waited a moment, sniffed, wiped his nose with a balled-up tissue he found inside his pants pocket. He had no recollection of how it got there. Did he even own a box of tissues? He wasn’t sure.

“Is it …?” She tried again. “Is it because of your dad and the whip?”

Gideon wished she wasn’t so good at remembering things. He wondered if he should have ever told her in the first place. After that picnic in November, she’d never mentioned his father to him again. He hoped then that she wouldn’t look at him with pity and that she’d eventually forget that he had told her the whole story of the boy and the shed. Now she was bringing it up as though she could see through him, as though she knew more about him than he might even admit to himself.

When he didn’t reply, she prompted him. “Gideon …?”

“Tears are a sign of weakness. I hate them.” He was relieved when he gained his composure and was able to rejoin her at the sofa.

“Tears show you have heart. There’s nothing wrong with them.” Gently, she said, “In Japanese,
kokoro
is the word for heart. But it can also translate into spirit, soul, and even mind. Mama told me from the
kokoro
come tears.”