Third to Die (8 page)

“To Greensburg?” she instantly frowned in confusion.

“Just for a few days,” Aiden hastily added.

Isla placed her fork back on her plate.

“Why are you going back to Greensburg?”

“It’s…complicated.”

“It always is with you,” Isla whispered heatedly.

Sighing, Aiden stood up and went over to the fridge. He pulled it open, letting the cool air cause his skin to prickle slightly before removing a bottle of beer. He cracked it open and sat back down opposite his wife.

“There’s some stuff I need to sort out,” he said vaguely.

“Stuff?”

“An old friend needs me.”

Isla looked down at the plateful of food, at the dinner she’d spent all afternoon carefully preparing. Since arriving in Avalon she’d taught herself to cook and, for Isla, that was quite the achievement. Back in Chicago, she’d prided herself on being the kind of woman who didn’t have time to cook. Her life was too busy, too exciting to spend hours preparing vegetables and baking dinners. Yet the majority of her afternoon had been dedicated to making meatloaf. Isla could feel herself disappearing. She feared that one day she’d look in the mirror and the old Isla Connelly wouldn’t even be there anymore.

She pushed her untouched dinner away from her and scowled at Aiden.

Unlike her, he was flourishing. His cheeks glowed from the touch of the sun and he glowed with that sought-after light of being satisfied by what you do. Aiden lived to help others; he was a great lawyer. Isla never dreamed of becoming a housewife and as he grew stronger she felt more and more wilted by the weight of her existence.

Isla wiped a hand across her eyes in anticipation of anguished tears. She’d changed for Aiden, she’d moved her entire life for him and still he locked her out, surrounded himself with secrets.

“I’m sorry, honey, I know you’re emotional right now.” Aiden reached out and gently took her hand in his. His touch was warm and reassuring. “There’s a lot you don’t know about my life in Greensburg. I ran out of there so fast when I got accepted into college and never looked back. But things happened there. I lost a friend.”

“Aid, I didn’t know.” Isla’s expression softened and her shoulders relaxed.

“I didn’t tell you, I didn’t tell anyone. It was never something I wanted to talk about.”

“So why do you need to go back now?”

“My friend who came here, John, he thinks there is more to our friend’s death than we originally thought.”

“That sounds like a job for the police.” Isla tried to pull her hand back, but Aiden held it tightly.

“There’s something going on, they need my help.”

Isla tried again and this time managed to free her hand. She folded her arms across her chest and stared at her husband as her nostrils flared.

“You can’t keep going on these hero quests,” she told him bluntly.

“That’s not what this is.”

“It’s always what it is!” Isla cried as she abruptly stood up, causing her chair to go skidding clumsily across the laminated floor of the kitchen.

“You’re so caught up in trying to save people, in trying to rewrite history!”

“Isla, I appreciate you’re angry but it’s not like that.”

“Our life is here now, Aid!” Isla gestured wildly to the room around her. “Avalon is our home. You brought us here, remember? But you keep going off on these quests, leaving me alone!”

Aiden walked over to his wife and placed a strong arm around her.

“I have to do this,” he said softly, pulling her towards him. She didn’t resist and let her head rest upon his chest, savouring how he smelled of cedar wood and beer.

“I owe it to my friend.”

“I just want to keep you here.”

“I know,” Aiden leaned down and kissed her forehead. “I’ll be gone just a few days, that’s all. I’ll be back before you know it.”

Isla wasn’t so sure. In a town where she knew no one and with little to do, each of Aiden’s trips stretched out before her like an infinite amount of time which she struggled to fill. It wouldn’t have been that way in Chicago. Back then when he left on a business trip she barely noticed as her social calendar was bursting with drinks with friends and meals out. Things were different for Isla in Avalon, things were emptier.

*

It took twelve long hours for Aiden to drive back to his home town of Greensburg. He’d stop to get gas, to stretch his legs, grab a bite to eat, but mainly he spent his time on the road, eager to get there. He’d looked at flying out there but, as he’d predicted, Greensburg was so far out from its closest airport that he might as well just drive. So he slung his suitcase into his trunk, kissed his wife and daughter goodbye and left Avalon in his rear-view mirror.

He drove through an impressive amount of nothingness. Vast quantities of land blurred by him, devoid of any signs of life or inhabitation. When he went on long road trips like this he was reminded of how empty America could be. He could drive for hours without seeing a single home or gas station. The isolation began to creep in on him. Even the bright melodies of his radio couldn’t suppress the loneliness which comes from being out on the open road. Instead of feeling free, Aiden just felt lost, like a solitary leaf floating on the surface of an immense lake.

Finally, as the light began to fade, he entered Greensburg. It was a strange sensation to return to the town he’d so eagerly fled, the town where his parents were laid to rest. He rolled into town and stopped at the cross-section lights.

Greensburg was larger than Avalon, but only slightly. It boasted a town square with three cafes, a library, doctor’s surgery and police station. All the store fronts were well maintained but worn; their colour faded by time.

If Aiden kept driving, he’d pass by his old high school. But instead he took a sharp left and headed back out of town, towards the motel on the outskirts of Greensburg which would be his bed for the night. The streets in the town square were already empty; all the stores locked up for the day.

*

It was dark when Aiden pulled into the motel parking lot. The night didn’t creep up in Greensburg, it arrived suddenly and without warning and within the blink of an eye shadows existed where previously there had been sunlight.

The neon sign which was rusted in places indicated that the motel had vacancies. Aiden moved to his trunk and retrieved his suitcase. It squeaked like an angry mouse as he dragged it along behind him towards the small motel reception.

A portly old man sat behind the counter, his feet raised and resting just by the signing-in book as he leaned back in his chair and observed the baseball game being shown on a small portable television which intermittently lost its signal. He glanced up when Aiden walked in, accompanied by the chime of a hanging bell, but didn’t move.

“Evening,” Aiden greeted him politely. “I’d like a room for two nights please.”

“Sure.” The old man wiped a hand across his mouth and straightened, pulling his boots back off the counter. He turned on an aged computer and slowly typed upon a grime-covered keyboard.

“Name?” he asked, staring at the monitor not Aiden.

“Connelly,” Aiden instantly replied. He didn’t consider that the name might be familiar to the old man. He noticed the gleam of recollection flitter across his old eyes. He turned from the monitor and glanced at his guest with renewed interest.

“First name?” he asked. The old man’s white hair was collected madly around his head and his cheeks were unshaven and dirty.

“Aiden.”

“Aiden Connelly.” The man strung the two names together and smacked his gums together thoughtfully. “I knew an Aiden Connelly once,” he declared wistfully. “Smart guy, went to the local high school. He’d be around your age.”

The old man leaned forward slightly, scrutinizing Aiden. But it was Aiden’s recollection which proved to be sharper. He stripped the old man of his rotund midriff and saw who he had been a decade earlier. His hair had been darker then, his physique leaner. His name was Carl Kellerman and he’d worked as the school janitor. ‘Creepy Carl’ had been one of the kinder nicknames the kids at school had given him. He always reeked of alcohol and was eventually unceremoniously fired for selling his homemade moonshine to some of the seniors.

Aiden wasn’t in the mood to start answering questions about his sudden return to Greensburg. He wanted his visit to remain as low key as possible.

“It must just be a coincidence,” he said brightly.

“Yeah,” Carl stroked the fuzz on his cheeks and a glazed expression fell across his face. His devotion to homemade liquor had dulled his memory enough so that he could only recall Aiden’s name, not his face. And Aiden’s name had become known following Justin’s accident. Like most small towns, Greensburg’s residents had an unhealthy fascination with death and liked to immortalize the fallen in their relentless gossip.

“Two nights?” Carl checked.

“Yeah, thanks.”

“Not many folk visit Greensburg this time of year,” Carl said slowly as he booked Aiden in. “Had you come in the summer, when we grow them watermelons, it would have been very different. All the rooms get booked up then.”

Aiden had fond memories of springtime in Greensburg. His father would grow watermelons in the back yard and his mother would use the smaller ones in recipes. She’d make flavoured pastries, drinks; even cure meats in the watermelon juice. Then there would be a local fair and competition on who could produce the largest watermelon and the tastiest dish containing the fruit. One year Aiden’s mother won. He remembered how delighted she’d been when she brought home the trophy.

“Enjoy your stay.” Carl handed a key emblazoned with the number four to Aiden.

“Thanks,” Aiden nodded politely and walked away, unsure if he’d enjoy anything about his stay. The Greensburg he’d known was long gone, it was part of the reason he’d left in the first place.

*

Aiden approached the small bungalow with trepidation. Above him the sky was clear and blue, but the sun’s warmth failed to penetrate through his dense cloak of nerves. He stood on the doorstep of Maureen Thompson’s home. It was a place he hadn’t visited since before Justin’s death but it had the same red front door, the same bedraggled shutters. Taking a deep breath he knocked against the painted wood.

Moments later the door opened, creaking loudly in protest. The stench of stale cigarette smoke flooded out and mingled with the fresh, crisp morning air. Maureen squinted out uncertainly into the morning sunlight. She was still wearing her stained housecoat and slippers that had once been fluffy and a vibrant shade of pink.

“Maureen, hi, it’s me, Aiden. Aiden Connelly.”

“I recognize ya,” Maureen nodded stoutly.

“I’m sorry to drop by like this.”

“I was expecting ya,” Maureen stepped aside so that Aiden could enter her home. “John said he reckoned you’d be stopping by someday soon.”

As Aiden entered Maureen’s home, he stepped back in time. Everything was how he remembered it, from the threadbare shag carpet in the lounge to the mounted bass which hung over the fireplace. It was as though it had all been preserved since Justin’s accident. Even the air felt putrid and old. All of the windows were closed; their blinds sealed tightly, preventing any sunlight coming in or any last remnants of Justin’s essence getting out.

“I don’t get many visitors these days,” Maureen wandered towards the kitchen where she pulled open the lime-green fridge door and began rummaging inside. Aiden watched her with a strange sense of melancholy. He remembered seeing Justin do exactly the same thing, only he was searching for bottles of beer. Maureen was always the most lenient parent, allowing the boys to drink when they were underage. She’d turn a blind eye and proclaim that “boys will be boys”.

Maureen returned to Aiden with a fresh glass of iced tea in her hand.

“Thank you.”

“You’ve grown up so polite,” Maureen pulled her thin lips into a smile. “Your mother would have been proud.”

She dropped onto her sofa, sending up a small cloud of dust as she did so. Aiden lowered himself more cautiously onto a nearby chair. His lungs were already feeling heavy from inhaling the dense air of the house.

“John told me he went to see ya.”

“Yes, he did.” Aiden nodded.

“Said you’re living in some small town south of here. Bridgeton, Aston…”

“Avalon.”

“Never heard of it.” Maureen shook her head. Her greying hair hung in ringlets; the remnants of a long-abandoned perm.

Aiden remembered how Maureen Thompson used to always look immaculate with her dark hair tightly permed and a slick of ruby-red lipstick lighting up her face.

“John said you’re some hot-shot lawyer now, said he saw you on the TV.”

“I…” Aiden modestly lowered his head.

“You always were the brainy one.” Maureen pulled a pack of cigarettes from her house coat pocket and promptly lit one up.

“Mind if I smoke?” she asked a little late as she raised it to her lips.

“Go ahead.”

Maureen took a deep, long drag of her cigarette, her eyelids fluttering in satisfaction.

“Justin, he was a wild child,” she declared after she’d blown the smoke away. “I could barely keep track of him!”

“He was certainly spirited.”

“Spirited,” Maureen pointed her cigarette at Aiden. “That’s a nice way o’ putting it. I like that.”

Aiden nervously sipped his iced tea.

“Few folk believe he skidded out on the road that night,” Maureen announced, her tone remaining light and casual as though she were discussing the warm spell Greensburg had been experiencing.

“Justin was reckless and spirited, as you say, but he could handle that bike. He drove it into the ground. I never believed he died in an accident.”

“You didn’t?”

“No,” Maureen shook her lacklustre curls. “I should show you this.”

She reached into her other housecoat pocket and produced a folded piece of cream paper which she passed across to Aiden. The ends were tattered and worn as if she’d been carrying the document around for the past decade. Carefully, he unfolded it. It was Justin’s death certificate.

He felt the air get knocked out of him as he read the name. He’d seen countless death certificates, but when it bore the name of someone you knew, someone you cared about, it was hard to feel detached, to see it as only a legal document.