If Only (13 page)

Pam

Nothing happened to Billie.
Thank you thank you thank you
.

Her mom refused to give Paul any money and told him to get lost. End of story.

It's not the end for Billie.

I still want her to tell her mom what Paul did to Nancy. And I
hate
Carol living next to someone as horrible as Paul. It's
creepy
that he would lie to Carol and tell her his name was Matt.

We're invited to stay for dinner, but Danny says he has to get home. He mumbles something about homework. Just as we're about to leave, Billie's dad drives up, and he says, “Hop in. I'll give you a ride.”

He drops us off in front of the house. When I open the door, I smell sausages cooking. Dad's back. “You can help me in here, Pam,” he calls from the kitchen.

I peel potatoes, cut them into tiny pieces and put them in a pot to boil. Then I start to make a salad. Dad finishes cooking the sausages. We work side by side, but there's nothing to talk about.

By the time I've finished the salad, Dad has moved to the living room. He's not doing anything, just sitting slumped in an armchair. He looks tired.

“It's ready,” I say.

“Go get your brother,” Dad says.

I go down the hall and stand in front of Danny's bedroom door. I tap softly. “Supper.”

There is no answer.

“Danny? Supper!”

I open the door and peer inside.

He's not there.

Danny

Danny walks and walks. He's going to be in major trouble for leaving the house without telling anyone, but he doesn't care. He needs to be by himself. He needs to think.

He was wrong about Raymond. It's Paul. He goes over and over the facts. Paul lives beside the railroad trail. He lied to Carol about his name. He has a green army jacket. And for some reason, Billie is terrified of him.

Danny wanders up streets he has never been on, makes a circle past the school and then slowly heads toward home. He stops when he realizes he's at the end of Carol's street. His heart starts to beat faster. The duplex is three houses in. The rust-speckled car is parked in front.

Danny moves closer and stands behind a Jeep on the opposite side of the street. He's not directly across from the duplex, but he can see it clearly. On both sides, the curtains are pulled across the windows.

Danny
hears
Corporal Stoneridge's voice. Confident.

We'll catch this bastard
.

And then softer.
You've been helpful, Danny.

How? How has he been helpful? Danny swallows. He did nothing. He hugged the tree. He did nothing.

Dad knows.

Why the hell didn't you protect your sister?

The front door on Paul's side of the duplex opens, and Paul comes out. Danny freezes for a second and then lowers himself into a crouch behind the Jeep. Paul stands on the walk for a moment. Looks up and down the street.

Danny's heart bangs in his chest. He hardly dares to breathe.

Paul walks to his car, inserts a key in the lock at the back and flips open the trunk. He takes out a small brown sports bag. Glances up and down the street again. Then he grabs the handles of the bag, walks to the side of the duplex and disappears through a gate.

The gate must go to the backyard. Danny tries to picture what's there. He's seen it enough times from the trail, through the chain-link fence—on Carol's side is Prince's doghouse, on Paul's side, a shed with broken windows and weeds growing around it. That's all he can remember.

What is Paul doing?

What is in the sports bag?

There's an identical gate on Carol's side of the duplex. Danny licks his lips.

Why the hell didn't you protect your sister?

Danny takes a big breath, then stands up and runs across the street. He slips around to the gate on Carol's side, eases the latch open and goes through. He squeezes himself against the side of the house. He inches forward to the corner.

He's looking into the backyard. Scrubby grass, Prince's doghouse with a plastic ball lying on the ground in front of it, the garden shed.

The shed door is open.

Danny pulls back a little and presses himself against the wall.

A moment later, Paul comes out of the shed and shuts the door behind him. He crosses the yard and climbs the stairs leading up to his deck. Danny hears a door open and then close.

Danny counts the seconds. When he gets to one hundred, he edges away from the wall. He glances up at the back of the duplex. The curtains are pulled across the windows. Danny runs across the yard to the shed.

He has to tug the shed door to open it. It makes a grating sound. It's dim inside, but there's enough light coming through the broken windows to see. It's full of garden stuff—rakes and shovels and old flower pots and a leaking sack of peat moss.

Danny knows the brown sports bag is in here somewhere. He'll give himself five minutes, that's all. His heart is beating so hard, it feels like it's going to explode out of his chest. He scans the wooden shelves, cluttered with watering cans and a plaster garden gnome and scattered packets of seeds. He pulls some sacks of grass seed away from the wall. He peers into a barrel full of bamboo stakes.

That's when he finds it, crammed between the back of the barrel and the wall. Danny drags it out. He sets it on the floor. His hands are shaking so hard, he can hardly pull open the zipper.

Inside is a black balaclava, the red eye holes staring up at Danny like some kind of grotesque goblin.

And a knife.

Danny wants to throw up.

Through the broken window, he hears the back door of the duplex open. He stays crouched, eases over to the window and peers up.

Paul is standing on the deck, leaning against the rail and smoking a cigarette. He's gazing at the shed.

Sweat trickles down the back of Danny's neck.

It seems like an eternity before Paul goes back inside.

Danny has watched enough cop shows to know not to touch the balaclava or the knife. He zips shut the sports bag and stuffs it back behind the barrel.

He closes the shed door carefully behind him and runs.

Pam

I'm on my third cup of watery hot chocolate. I'm sitting on a plastic chair in the police station. It's eleven o'clock, and we've been here for two hours. I can see Danny through a window. He's sitting at a table in a small room, with two cops. One of the cops is Corporal Stoneridge, and the other one I don't know. Dad's in there too. It looks like Corporal Stoneridge is doing most of the talking. The other cop is scribbling in a notebook. Danny is finally giving his formal statement.

When Danny had come home and told us what he'd done, I burst into tears. Every bit of color drained out of Dad's face. “Are you insane?” he said. “I had no idea where you were. Do you know what could have happened to you?”

Then we'd piled into our car and come here.

A police station at eleven o'clock at night is not like in the movies, with radios crackling and cops rushing in and out and sirens in the background. It's actually pretty dead. And depressing. Glaring lights, pea-green walls,
Wanted
posters of scary-looking guys. I keep my eyes away from them. There's a woman behind a long counter, typing. She keeps offering me hot chocolate, but otherwise she ignores me. That's okay with me. I want to be left alone.

One of the first things Dad said to the cops when we got here was, “There's a young woman living in the duplex next door to this guy. She lives by herself.”

Carol. I'd felt a stab of fear. Then I'd remembered. “She's in Toronto,” I said. “She won't be back until the weekend.”

I'm glad Carol is safe. But I also wish she was here with me right now.

A cop with a German shepherd on a leash comes in from outside.

“Can I pet him?” I say.

The cop smiles. “Sure. He won't hurt you. His name is Rory.”

I scratch Rory behind his ears. He reminds me of Prince.

The cop and the woman behind the counter talk for a few minutes in low voices. Then the cop leaves, Rory walking obediently at his side. Not much like Prince after all.

Through the window, I see Danny and the cops and Dad stand up.

I stand up too and set my half-empty mug of hot chocolate on the floor.

The door to the small room opens and everyone comes out. “What happens next?” Dad is saying.

“We're waiting on the search warrant,” Corporal Stoneridge says. “As soon as we get that, we'll go in.”

He turns to Danny. “Like I told you in there. No more vigilante stuff. That's how people get hurt. Maybe even killed. Save the cops' job for the cops.”

“Yeah,” Danny says. His eyes are shadows in his white face. “I know.”

I'm going to bawl again.

Dad lays his arm across Danny's shoulders.

“He did it for his sister,” he says.

Danny

“It was a dumb-ass thing to do.” Pop grins.

“The cops were pissed off.” Danny feels older now, like it's okay to swear in front of Pop. “Dad too. At first.”

Pop glares at Danny. “Language,” he growls.

“Sorry,” Danny says.

Pop says it's been on the news on the
TV
in the lounge all week. There've been pictures of Paul, pictures of the duplex, an interview with a former teacher. Pop knows all the details—how the police have made an arrest, how they're talking to the police in Alberta about an unsolved rape. He says he's told all the zombies in the nursing home how his grandson cracked the case but no one will believe him.

Danny's in Pop's room, helping him sort through his things. In the ten months he's been at Shady Haven, Pop has let things get into a horrible mess, and he's told Danny he wants to get rid of some stuff. His drawers are full of chocolate-bar wrappers, hankies twisted into balls, socks without mates, an alarm clock with no batteries, old Christmas cards, bent paper clips, a broken glass wrapped in an undershirt. Danny got two big garbage bags from the storage cupboard at the end of the hall, and he's already filled one.

When they finish the dresser, Danny opens the window to let in some fresh air. It's only the end of April, but there's a freak heat wave, and it's as hot as it is in August.
Danny has counted how many weeks are left until the summer holidays. Nine. He's got lots to look forward to. He's signed up for basketball camp in July, and someone (Dad?) has folded over the corner of a page in the newspaper that has an ad for bikes, even though the twins' birthday isn't until August.

Danny starts on the cupboard while Pop coaches from his armchair. They argue over a sweater with moth holes in the sleeves. “I'm keeping it,” Pop says stubbornly. “Never know when it might come in handy.”

Danny lifts down a shoebox from the shelf. It's the one full of newspaper clippings about Janice.

“Throw them out,” Pop says.

“Are you sure?” Danny says.

“For Nana,” Pop says. “I'm sure.”

Danny tips the pieces of newspaper into the garbage bag. One piece catches on the edge of the bag, and Danny sees the headline
WHERE IS JANICE SANDERS?
It blurs, and Danny blinks hard. Then he crumples the paper into a ball and pushes it into the bag.

One day, he's going to tell Dad that he knows. He wants
to tell Pam too, but not yet. He takes a big breath, and then looks up at Pop. Pop is leaning back in his chair, his eyes closed. In a few seconds, he's snoring, his mouth hanging open.

“I'll come back tomorrow,” Danny whispers.

Pam

Carol and I break into Silver Scissors.

Well, not exactly.

Carol has a key. But it's Sunday night and the shop is closed, and it feels like we're doing something illegal.

We've just come from the White Spot, me and Carol and Danny. Carol was really shocked about Paul. She saw it on the news and she came home a few days early to talk to the police. She's even thinking of moving, because she says it's ruined living in the duplex for her. But she promises she won't move far away, and we'll still be able to hang out.

We've dropped off Danny at home and now we're at Silver Scissors. Carol turns on only one set of lights, and the room is half in shadow. The shop smells like hairspray and shampoo. There's a counter with a cash register at the front, two rows of big swivel chairs, six along each side, and four sinks at the end of the room.

“Shampoo first,” says Carol.

She drapes a black plastic cape over me. I slip into a chair in front of a sink and stretch out so that the back of my neck rests on the sink edge. “Have you ever had your hair shampooed in a salon?” she says.

“Never. Nana used to trim my hair. Since she died, I just let it grow.”

“It's a sensory experience,” Carol says. “So we won't talk anymore. Just lie back and enjoy it.”

I do. Carol turns on a spray of warm water and soaks my head. Then she pours on a glob of shampoo that smells like strawberries. She massages it into my scalp. Her strong fingers dig in, and my entire head tingles. Even my ears.

More warm water, and then conditioner—pineapple, I think, sweet and perfumy.

“I'm going to turn you into a tropical fruit salad before I'm done,” Carol says.

One final rinse. I sit up and Carol twists a towel turban style around my head. We move over to her station and I sit down in the swivel chair. While Carol rubs my hair with the towel, I study photographs stuck in the side of the mirror. Two of Prince, one of a smiling woman who must be her mother.

Carol gives one final rub and pulls the towel off. We both stare at my head in the mirror. My hair is sticking out in spikes.

“What do you think?” Carol says.

“I don't know,” I say. “But remember, not too short. I'm growing it long again.”

“Agreed,” Carol says. “But you don't have to look like a fright while you're doing it.”

She hums while she cuts. I watch every snip anxiously for a few minutes and then let my mind float away. I'm surprised when she says, “That's it. Don't judge it until I've blown it dry.”

Carol fluffs my hair with her hand while it dries. When she's finished, I have a cloud of soft hair with slanted bangs.

“Well?” Carol says.

I study myself in the mirror. “I like it.”

“Me too.”

“But—”

“I know, you're still growing it long.”

Carol reaches down to the floor and picks up a small shopping bag. She puts it on my lap. “For your new look.”

I reach in and take out a plastic case. Eye shadow, two rows of every fantastic color you can imagine. Pink, purple, amber, gold, turquoise.

“I bought it in Toronto,” Carol says. “I talked to your dad, and he says it's okay. For special occasions.”

There's a soft green that would be perfect with my eyes.

“Do you think this is a special occasion?” I say.

“A new haircut?” Carol says. “What could be more special than that?”

Everyone meets at our house. Billie, Hugh, Daphne and Celia. It's on Billie's route to school, but the others have to come out of their way. I'm amazed that they would do this for me.

It's the middle of May, a sunny, warm morning, and we're taking the railroad trail to school.

Billie is wearing her wildest outfit—her purple pants and orange tie-dyed T-shirt. She biked over, a pink balloon left over from Mary's first birthday party tied to the handlebars.

“It's a celebration,” Celia says. “Take back the trail!”

“Right on!” Billie says.

I'm the only one who knows what Billie is really celebrating. Last night she told her mother about Paul. She said they called Nancy and they took turns talking on the phone and everyone was crying. Nancy's coming home for a visit, and then Billie might go back with her to Prince George for a little while. Nancy wants some Billie time. I'll miss her when she's gone, but it won't be for long, and I'm happy for her.

Everything isn't perfect. Sometimes I have nightmares about Paul breaking out of jail and coming to our house. Now that I know what his face looks like, it's almost worse. I still won't walk to the store or to school alone. Billie and I have had lots of one-ring phone calls. (Dad says he's going to call the telephone company because he thinks there's something wrong with our phone!)

I have one bad moment when we open the gate in our backyard and step onto the trail. Do I really want to do this?

Danny bumps my shoulder. “You okay?” he says.

Everyone is talking so much that I'm the only one who hears him.

“I'm fine,” I say.

I
am
fine. I know I'll never be able to walk here by myself. But I don't have to. I have Danny.

I smile at Danny and he smiles back. The old Danny smile, where he looks right at me.

Twin power.

The five of us walk in a line stretching from one side of the trail to the other. The sun is warm on our backs, the leaves on the trees, brilliant green.

Billie bursts out singing. “
Oh when the saints, oh when the saints, oh when the saints, go marchin' in
…”

“
Oh Lord, I wanna be in that number
…” we all chime in.

We sing like lunatics all the way to school.

We are a force to be reckoned with.