In Search of the Rose Notes (9 page)

“Yeah, right,” Charlotte said, planting her hand on her hip.

“I thought you said it wasn’t scary,” I protested.

“Well, I’ll just walk you guys home, then,” Toby said. “Dad, I’m going to walk them home, okay?”

“That’s very gentlemanly of you,” Rose said, shrugging, ignoring Charlotte’s look of pleading disdain.

“Okay,” Mr. Dean said, dislodging the Ruffles bag from the couch cushion and peering inside it. “But be real careful on the way back.”

“Yes!”
Toby said, making a fist of victory so enthusiastic that even Charlotte could not protest.

Toby was so weird.

Chapter Six

May 22, 2006

Charlotte wasn’t home by five, so I tried her cell phone.

“Sorry, I’m having trouble getting out of here,” she explained. “There was this parent-teacher conference. This kid’s parents finally wake up and realize Brittany’s probably not gonna graduate. What are we gonna do to help her, blah, blah, blah… . Then I was trying to get these stupid journals graded so I don’t have to lug them all home… .”

When I mentioned beer with Toby, she said, “You ought to go. I’m swamped tonight. Go ahead.”

Atkins Tavern was packed that evening, and it seemed that about half of the clientele was on backslapping terms with Toby. We had a front table by the window. People kept saying hello to him, often coming over to chat for a few minutes. The window at least gave me something to do—gaze across the street to the old town green, which looked pretty under the setting sun. Growing up, I don’t think I ever really appreciated how idyllic Waverly would look to someone just passing through. Trees with little white flowers surrounded the wide green lawn, a small stone war memorial at its center. It was completely empty of people, which wasn’t a surprise. No one ever walked around the green, even on the most beautiful of days—just drove by it on the way to Stop & Shop.

“How’s married life?” Toby asked me between drop-bys.

“Really good, actually,” I said.

“How’d you meet your husband again?”

“College.”

Toby nodded. “So you’re like an old couple now.”

“I guess.”

“What’s he do?”

“He’s works for U.S. Fish & Wildlife. He’s an… environmentalist.”

“I think Charlotte did tell me that once. An environmentalist and a potter?” Toby considered this. “Good combination.”

I shrugged. “Sure. If you’re going for a certain hippie-yuppie balance.”

“More hippie than yuppie, I’d say. But that’s a good thing. Is that a lucrative business, selling pots?”

I smiled. “I teach ceramics part-time at a community college with a fairly big arts program. Plus, I help run an arts co-op and teach a few noncredit night classes here and there. Between all that, it’s a living. Some money comes from the actual pottery, but very little.”

I was glad he gave me a chance to explain this. When my mother first heard my intention to study ceramics, I think she started picturing me sitting sadly by a roadside with a Sale sign and a wobbly card table full of lopsided ashtrays. I sometimes wondered if she still pictured my life that way and conveyed this image to others.

“How about you?” I asked. “You seeing anyone right now?”

“Nah. Since I stopped towing, I don’t seem to get the girls.”

“Since you stopped towing?”

“Yeah. My newest guy does all the towing for me. You meet women when you tow. They’re always so damn happy to see you. Women with flat tires, snapped timing belts, whatever it is. You’re like the knight in shining armor. They just hop right into your truck and there you go. Instant rapport. Instant conversation.”

“I’m sure a lot of women come into the shop.”

“Sure, but now I’m just the guy who charges them too much.”

“Maybe you should do Match.com or something. Meet somebody who doesn’t have car trouble.”

“Everyone has car trouble,” Toby said. “Just a matter of when. Anyway, I didn’t say I was desperate.”

“I didn’t think you were. I just know some people who’ve had some fun meeting people that way.”

We both sipped our beers in the awkward silence. I deeply regretted mentioning an online dating site. I was becoming one of those obnoxious married people.

“So… the police talked to you yet?” Toby wanted to know.

“No,” I said, surprised. “They wouldn’t know I’m in town.”

“Yeah, but they’ve been making the rounds on Fox Hill.”

“They have? Charlotte didn’t mention that.”

“They talked to my brother a little while.”

“Oh, yeah? And you? They talked to you?”

“Not so interested in me, no. Joe was Rose’s friend, sort of. But I was only a sixth-grader.”

“Me too,” I reminded him.

“Yeah, but you’re special,” he said.

I sipped my beer. “I’m not special, Toby.”

“Sure you are. You were the last to see her.”

“Right. Well. I still don’t have anything to tell them. I’m older now, and Rose is dead for sure, but that doesn’t change anything I remember.”

“ ‘The last to see her alive,’ ”
Toby said, shaking his head. “That was hard on you, wasn’t it?”

I took another long swallow of my beer. That designation was already starting to get on my nerves again.

“There are harder things than that, I think,” I said, shrugging.

Toby rolled his eyes. “That doesn’t mean it wasn’t still hard.

“So,” he continued, “did you come here thinking you might heal some old wound?”

“What’re you, Dr. Phil?”

“No. I’m not Dr. Phil,” he said flatly. “I’m just curious.”

“I don’t know what I was thinking, to be honest. It’s starting to feel like there was very little thinking involved, coming back here.”

“Well, that’s okay,” Toby said, then blew a low toot into his beer bottle. “Sometimes thought is overrated.”

I giggled at this typical Toby statement, feeling oddly relieved by it. He was apparently letting the topic drop.

“That’s true,” I said.

“You two are both funny, you know that? Maybe you bring it out in each other.”

“Who?”

“You and Charlotte. Remember that day you two bribed me into kidnapping Rose’s cat? You thought he was gonna help you find her or something.”

“I don’t remember any bribing.”

Toby hesitated. “Charlotte gave me a two-liter bottle of Pepsi.”

“Well, a bottle of Pepsi was nothing to her. Her dad mainlined the stuff, kept a closet full of it. But I didn’t know you two had a deal.”

“You don’t know how hard that was, getting that nasty little bastard to Charlotte’s. I poked around the Bankses’ house for a couple of days before I got him. The first time I scooped him up, he scratched my arms and neck to shreds and practically took an eye out.”

“Not your good eye, I hope.”

“Whichever, he didn’t get it. And I got him eventually. ’Cuz I put him in a heavy-duty garbage bag.”

“That’s terrible!” I said. “You could’ve suffocated him.”

“On my way over, I opened it and gave him some air every minute or so. You girls wanted that cat in your hot little hands. And cats don’t follow when you whistle. You had to know it was gonna be rough.”

“I never wanted him that badly.”

“But Charlotte did.”

“If Charlotte knew you were going to risk suffocating him…”

“Oh, but Charlotte knew.”

“She did?”

“Oh, yeah. She’s the one who answered the door when I showed up with the squirming Hefty bag. He’d practically clawed his way out of the bag by the time I got there. We threw him in the bathroom and kept him there till you arrived.”

“Charlotte never told me how you caught him.”

“Of course she didn’t. And she told me not to tell you either. She didn’t want you getting upset and screwing up the ceremony.”

“Yes, well, my delicate sensibilities often got in Charlotte’s way.”

“I know,” Toby said, rolling his eyes. “Seems if she’d been smarter, she would’ve used them to her advantage. Another beer?”

“Sure,” I said.

Toby waved down our waitress. As we waited for our new beers, I listened to the hum of people chattering at the bar. One of them had a loud, frequent laugh that had occasionally distracted me while I’d talked to Toby. Now that I focused on it, I found its unabashed quality familiar, and I kept staring at the back of the dark-haired head that seemed to be producing it.

“Oh, right, Joe,” the bartender was saying. “Like they’re not all on ’roids.”

Joe.
I turned to Toby. “That your brother?”

“Yep.”

“This just a coincidence?”

“Nope. He heard where I was going, so he hitched a ride.”

“Should I say hello, you think?”

“Sure. You ought to. Hey, Joe!” he called before I could protest. “Come over here a second.”

Joe turned, hopped off his stool, and sauntered over to our table, beer in hand. I thought, from his lethargic expression, that he might be a little drunk.

“Hey there, Nora,” he said, bumping Toby so he could slide in next to him in our booth. “Toby told me you were back in town.”

“Thanks,” I said, then blushed. Joe hadn’t actually said anything for which I should thank him. I’d always had a crush on Joe. I think, when I finally gave in and went out with Toby, it was probably because he physically resembled Joe. Joe was way too old for me, of course, but Toby was at least like a mini-Joe, minus the brooding intensity or the artistic leanings. I think Toby must have known—I’d always go speechless when we were with his brother.

“What brings you back? Is it your ten-year reunion already? Or did the police haul you in to talk about Rose?”

I looked Joe over before answering. Same intense brown eyes and thick black eyebrows, but he was puffy in the neck, the chiseled quality of his face now cushioned in jowls. His face reminded me—just slightly—of the aged Elvis. Seeing him made me wonder how Rose would’ve fared—how she’d look now, if she’d made it to her thirties.

“No,” I said. “I’m visiting Charlotte Hemsworth.”

“That’s cool. How long you staying?”

“I’m not sure.”

“Where you living now?”

“Northern Virginia.”

“Virginia! What the hell are you doing there?”

“I teach pottery at a community college.”

“Oh. Pottery.” This piece of information seemed to focus Joe’s attention somewhat. “That’s cool. I haven’t done my sculpture for years, but I wish I’d stuck with it.”

I hesitated. “I remember you had some interesting pieces.”

“Yeah, right,” Joe said with a snorting laugh. “
Pieces.
Pieces of crap, you mean?”

I didn’t know how to reply to this. I’d liked Joe’s wood-and-metal animals the way a kid usually likes everything that has to do with animals. I couldn’t tell if I’d been obnoxious to call them “pieces” or if he was obnoxious to call me on it.

“Pretty terrible about Rose, huh?” Joe said after a moment.

“Yeah,” I replied.

“Poor thing.” He shook his head and stared into his beer glass. “And her poor parents.”

“Toby said the police talked to you about her.”

Joe’s head jerked up, and he glanced at Toby, who remained silent. “Yeah. Yeah, they did.”

“What’d they ask you?”

“Oh, just… did I see her that day, in the neighborhood… did I know of anyone they should talk to. Basically the same stuff they asked sixteen, seventeen years ago. They’d heard we’d hang out sometimes, she and I… .”

“Did you? I don’t remember that.”

“On and off. Weren’t exactly in the same crowd, but we were buddies when we were kids. You know, Rose was one of those girls who liked to hang out with guys more than other girls. Plus, girls didn’t like her much.”

I didn’t offer that Charlotte and I had liked her. Being prepubescent at the time, I guess we didn’t really count.

“You know,” Joe went on, “I was lucky I was bagging groceries all that evening, three till close. Otherwise the police woulda had a
lot
more questions for me. They never liked the look of me, the Waverly PD. They’d already caught me with weed once by the time Rose disappeared.”

“Really?” I said. I hadn’t a great deal of experience with the Waverly police, but I knew they’d never had quite enough to do. It seemed plausible they’d hound a stoner like Joe just to pass the time. “But it’s the state police doing the investigation, right?”

“True,” Joe admitted. “Anyway, they didn’t ask anything new. Now that she’s dead, they gotta cover all the same bases, I guess. Talk to the same old people.”

“I guess.”

Joe shook his head. “Poor Rose. God, that girl was something. Kind of a nut, but I liked that about her.”

“A nut?”

Joe took a sip of Toby’s beer, then leaned back in the booth and closed his eyes for a moment. “Yeah. A nut. A good nut, but still a nut.”

“Can I ask how you mean?”

“Well, I’ll give you an example. Remember the One-Acts?”

“Yeah,” I said. Every winter each of the four classes would put on a short one-act play, and a panel of teacher judges would select the best. The winning class would get a small amount of prize money from the PTA, to be put toward their prom or whatever.

“Well, Rose had a bit part at the end of the sophomores’ play. I guess that would be the year before she disappeared. She was supposed to wear this jacket—it was part of her costume. But right before she came onstage, she took it off, and she was wearing this black T-shirt with this great big neon middle finger sticking up on the front.”

“A T-shirt with a middle finger?” I repeated.

“Oh, the early nineties,” said Toby, who’d clearly heard the story before. “The age of Spencer Gifts.”

“That’s weird,” I said. “I didn’t think she was that kind of kid.”

“Well… she wasn’t, really,” said Joe. “No one would’ve expected it. That’s what made it so goddamned funny.”

“Oh,” I said, trying—and failing—to cough up a giggle for Joe’s story.

Joe frowned, then scratched his head. “Yeah. Listen, I should leave you two to catch up.”

“Oh, you don’t need to—”

“If you’re still around on Memorial Day, maybe you could come by for a burger or something. We might be cooking out.”

With that he was gone, headed back to his barstool. His eagerness to leave us kids alone reminded me of the last time I’d seen him—the night of Toby’s and my senior prom. Toby had brought me to his house in the middle of the night, after the prom and after a few swigs of vodka on the Waverly Elementary playground had rendered me loudmouthed and silly. We’d tried to sneak quietly into Toby’s house but found Joe up and watching
Goodfellas
on the VCR. His dark eyes sparkled with amusement at our shiny prom garb and our clumsy attempts to explain that we were just looking to watch a little TV.

“I was just leaving,” he’d said good-naturedly, turning off the movie and grabbing his keys as if he had somewhere to be at 1:30
A.M.
But then he’d hesitated in the doorway, making us squirm for a few seconds more. “I know you two aren’t stupid,” he said
.
He didn’t say it in a scolding way, but rather matter-of-factly. Still, I’d wished I could disappear. The guy might as well have handed each of us a condom and patted us both on the head. And seeing him had made the prospect of fooling around with Toby seem like a sad sort of consolation prize.