My Cousin's Keeper (16 page)

“Why?”

“It's from Julia. Please, you have to read it.”

Kids swarmed past us, some heading off along the sidewalk, others stepping onto the buses that would take them out of town to the farms and homes I was jealous of. I took the folded note, spread it open, and read.

Dear Bon
,

It was a girl's writing, upright, curled, and neat. The
g
's,
e
's, and
a
's looped in a rhythm my own writing had never managed without a great deal of effort. The ink was the color of peppermint ice cream.

I will not forget how I met you. Bad luck became good luck. I learned how to be patient and how to be brave, and now things will be safe and normal again. You have been my best friend and I want to give you the purple bike. I will not need it anymore. Things are going to happen quickly, but I will leave it for you. Show this letter to people so they know the bike is yours to keep. Until we meet again — Julia.

“But she doesn't say exactly where the bike is,” Bon explained. “And I don't know what to do.”

I didn't know where to begin either. Finally, I said, “I'll ask Dad.”

“No,” Bon replied.

It was strange — he sounded a little scared, and I wondered about that. So I threw my hands up, exasperated, and asked, “What, then?”

Bon shrugged.

“It'll be at the trailer park,” I reasoned. “Or maybe even at the police station. Dad can help us.”

I could tell that Bon wasn't convinced. “Can you think of a better idea?” I was quiet for a moment. “That man,” I said then. “Someone saw Julia leave the police station with a man. Do you know who he was?”

“It was her dad,” Bon replied. “He'd been looking for her. Julia was a missing person, and now she is
found.
”

Bon turned away when I sat down beside him at morning recess. He was drawing in his book, and I tried to make it obvious that I wasn't trying to peek at whatever picture he was working on. Instead, I looked out at the playground and said, “Hi,” as though I came to sit here every other day.

“Hello,” he answered vaguely.

Little and big kids shouted and played around us. It was, I thought, a little like being on a remote island, the seat where we were sitting. I felt distant from the noise and movement on the playground. I could see the boys from my class chasing a ball around. Mason and Lucas ran alongside each other, calling and gesturing to each other, favoring each other whenever the ball had to be passed. It was as though they were a team within a team. A team I was no longer part of. Bon's seat on the playground had become my seat as well.

I could hear the rapid scratching of his pen as he drew. Suddenly, it reminded me of the soft noises that had come to me in the darkness of my bedroom before Bon had disappeared into the night. Even now, days later, I swallowed hard at the memory of it, flinching at the pictures in my head — Bon and his wool hat, his backpack,
my
bike, pedaling out toward the highway with the night traffic of semis roaring past him. It was a troubling darkness I couldn't shake off, where I tossed and turned to the rhythm of Bon riding away from us.

“I still can't believe you did that,” I told him, the thought tumbling out in a rush.

“What?”

“The way you snuck out that night. It was freezing cold, and dark. You were out there by yourself.”

He looked at me then. “I've been out at night before.”

“By yourself?”

“Yes. When I was at the trailer park, and then at the hotel. I went walking.”

“How many times?”

“A few.”

“But
why
?”

“Just to look around. To see what happened in town at night.”

I stared at him. “Weren't you scared?”

“A bit. But it was like a challenge.”

“What do you mean?”

“I used to be scared of the dark. I thought I could hear noises and voices all the time. I got sick of being frightened, so I made myself go out into it — the dark.” Then he said softly, “But only when my mom had remembered to take her medication and was able to sleep. Then I could get away.”

I thought about this. “But where were you going on the bike the other night?”

Bon took a while to answer. “I don't know. Not really. I wasn't sure I wanted to come back.”

His reply made me flinch and want to say
sorry
yet again. Instead, I asked, “But the nights you went out walking, where did you go? What did you see?”

He laid the pen against the page of his drawing and closed his book over it. “The people in the bakery, they work at night. Their lights were on and I could see them through the shop window; I could hear a bit of what they were saying. Some house lights were on, and I could hear televisions playing different shows and movies. And some teenagers were sitting under that really old bridge. I heard them talking and laughing together. I could hear cans being opened and bottles clinking, and there was cigarette smoke. One time, someone else was out walking really late at night, and I think he saw me. But I hid, and it was OK.”

I sensed that Bon was enjoying my surprise.

“So it
was
like a challenge. And I met the challenge.” Then worry crossed his face. “Are you going to tell on me now?”

“No.” I paused. “But would you do it again if I came with you? We could take the bikes.”

He looked at me a little suspiciously. “Maybe,” Bon mumbled, and I could hear his voice closing down a little. “But why?”

I wondered why I had even thought to suggest the idea. It was like nothing I had ever thought or dared to do, but suddenly I wanted to see things the way Bon did. I wanted to understand his thoughts, and I wanted to understand Bon.

That night, in the darkness between Friday and Saturday, the rain woke me, but somehow not Bon. For ages, I lay listening to the clatter of water on the roof while he slept, his shape totally motionless under the blanket. And suddenly, I had been asleep, and he was awake, dressed, and kneeling beside my bed.

“
Kieran
.”
Close to my ear, he whispered my name.
“
Are you ready
?”
His breath had a faint smell of toothpaste, and when I turned to look at him, he put a finger to his lips. He had a small flashlight in his other hand, which, just once, he flicked on and off. I almost wished I hadn't made the suggestion, but the challenge teased at me. We didn't talk the whole time that we climbed out through the bedroom window, found our bikes, and carried them up the driveway. Not until we were some way down the street did we begin whispering.

“I know which places have dogs that bark,” Bon told me, something I could easily have told
him
.

I felt cold and nervously excited. I had strained to listen for any other movement in the house as I'd dressed, and I would have jumped straight back into bed at the first sound of Mom or Dad awake.

We launched ourselves onto the bikes and pedaled silently along the middle of our avenue, keeping our wheels away from crunching gravel. My watch told me it was a bit after two o'clock. A haze of fog was in the air and my breath came out in cloudy puffs. All the houses I could see had darkened windows and only the soft moon glow to show gardens, fences, and cars parked in driveways or on front lawns. But farther down the hill was the central part of town, bathed in a golden glow of streetlights. Everything was utterly still and quiet, but my heart was pumping quickly. Bon looked from left to right; he looked behind, to where we had come from. He was watchful and cautious.

We rode in shadow until we reached the edge of the main street shops.

“Now what?” I asked.

“Listen,” Bon instructed.

I could hear murmuring voices and small bursts of laughter coming from the direction of the bridge.

“Duane and Annie and Mitch, Melanie, and Rob. I think that's all the names I've heard from there,” Bon said. “Each time I've been out, I've heard them sitting there under the bridge. It's like their secret meeting place.”

I heard the clink of a bottle and saw a faint drift of cigarette smoke.

“We should keep moving,” I said.

“There's somewhere we need to go to next,” Bon whispered, and pedaled his bike ahead. It was the Imperial Hotel that we stopped at. Not at the main entrance, but at the plain side door marked
GUEST ROOMS
. Bon fumbled in a pocket and suddenly had a key in his hand. He unlocked and opened the door as confidently as I might have opened our front door at home. We pulled our bikes inside the entrance, away from the streetlight glow.

“Wouldn't someone else be staying in that room?” I whispered in alarm.

Bon shrugged, then suddenly hissed, “Car!” We tumbled inside as the engine sound came closer. The bikes were a nuisance at this moment, and we clunked and bumped them awkwardly through the doorway. Bon had pushed the door quickly and quietly shut, and now we stood in total gloom. The car drove past along the main street, then made a turn somewhere nearby and began to fade a little from our hearing.

“What now?”

“There's stairs,” he whispered, setting his bike against the wall. “Follow me.”

It was nearly impossible to see him, and I put a hand on his shoulder so as not to lose him. I could hear his hands reach out and find the walls with his fingertips, his nails making a soft tapping sound until he got his bearings. He began to walk, and I followed. The steps were carpeted and smelled musty. We reached a landing and climbed a last short stretch of steps before stopping at another door. I heard Bon's key in another lock, and the door opened.

My family and I had never visited Bon and his mom here. A streetlight shone in through the only window and showed a small room. There were two beds, a wardrobe, a sink and mirror, and a bedside table with a digital clock that blinked the wrong time, over and over. I could smell musty carpet and something else, a lingering sweetness of wine or beer. It felt creepy, and I almost expected someone to sit up in one of the beds, stare at us, and scream.

“No one else is staying here,” Bon said, raising his voice beyond a whisper. “But don't turn the light on,” he warned, walking over to the window.

“How come you've got a key?” I asked. My voice was shaky, and I could feel the goose bumps on my arms and legs.

“Mom gave her key back to the hotel manager,” Bon said, “but I'd already had another key cut.”

“Why?'

“Because my mom would lose things,” he answered. “Especially things like keys.”

I walked over to the window as well. “You can see everything from here,” I said. “The whole town, and all the way to the highway. Even the old railroad bridge. It looks like a black skeleton.”

“Yes,” Bon agreed. “I like this view. I used to stand here sometimes at night and look at everything. In the daytime as well. I drew pictures of the town and the way everything looked.” After a pause, he added, “I even thought maybe Mom and I were going to live here for good. It was better than lots of other places we'd stayed. And way better than staying at the trailer park.”

“Like Julia had to?”

“Yes,” he answered softly.

There was something I had to ask. “Did you know Julia before you started school here? Because it was like you did. Like you were already friends.”

“How could you tell?”

I thought quickly of the first moment I had seen Bon and Julia together, and then of everything Julia had told me about Bon. And about myself.

“It was as though you knew lots about each other.”

I heard him let out a long sigh that seemed to mean,
OK, I'll tell you now.

“Mom told me she was taking me up to Nan's. We left the last place we were staying and drove for hours. Then our car needed gas. We came to one of those big highway service centers.” He paused. “And Julia was there with her mom. Their car had broken down; there was oil on the ground
everywhere.
Her mom was really worked up and asked my mom where we were going. She offered us money to bring them along as well. So that's what happened.”

It took me a moment to think all this through, to add it to what little I had known to start with.

Beside me in the darkness, Bon fidgeted with the blind cord. Then he said, “Her mom sat in the front with my mom, and they spent the trip talking about all sorts of stuff. Julia's mom was really nervous, as though someone were after them.” He paused again. “I didn't like her. She made the inside of our car feel
really
weird. And Julia was so quiet at first; she stared out her window and didn't say anything. My mom put some music on,
loud
, and she and Julia's mom kept talking. They smoked just about a whole packet of cigarettes, too. That was when Julia started talking with me, and the rest of the way to the trailer park, we whispered little bits and pieces about ourselves to each other. It was harder at the trailer park, because Julia's mom wouldn't let us be together much. She told Julia not to tell me anything, but it was too late by then.”