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SIXTEEN

  At the bottom of the hill the ground dropped another four or five feet straight down, just before the banks of the lake bed. On my right, there were wooden steps leading from Orlando’s backyard to the shoreline, but I positioned myself at the edge of the drop and jumped. My feet made a muffled slap as I landed and the backs of my heels sank an inch or so into dense, wet ground.

  Everything was quiet on the shore; even the tiny ripples licking the grit and pebbles at my feet hardly made a sound. The breeze was much higher in the canopy now, so the air down here was moist and perfectly still, just like the water, and the reservoir stretched out smooth and sparkling before me like a small captured sky. I’d never seen the reservoir at night before, and the play of moon and starlight flickering on the surface made it seem larger than it was in the daytime, as if there were somehow more to see in the dark.

  But there wasn’t. There wasn’t anything vast or mysterious about it, and it wasn’t the small captured sky that it appeared to be, or the earth’s eye, like Thoreau said. In fact, it wasn’t even a reservoir. I’d looked it up. A reservoir was a man-made lake, or a deposit of fresh potable water (I’d looked up potable, too), which was used to serve the purposes of a community. But this wasn’t either of those, because it wasn’t man-made, and it wasn’t potable because the salt minerals in the water made it unfit to drink. So, when you got right to it, it wasn’t a reservoir at all. It was just a large pond or a small lake encircled by big hilly lawns with pricey houses at the top.

  It hit me that Thoreau might’ve cared about that, because he was a stickler for words and names and stuff, and he’d put a lot of effort into figuring out why the pond was called Walden while he was there. I knew people used the wrong names for things all the time because they were too stupid to know better or just said what everybody else said or really didn’t give a shit one way or the other. Not a major news flash. But I somehow got the feeling that if Thoreau had been from these parts instead of Concord, Massachusetts, he never would’ve tried to investigate the names or nature of things or to live deep and suck the marrow out of life, not here anyway, because all he would’ve been left with was a salty taste in his mouth and not a damn thing to write about. No, if he were with me now and saw this place today, Thoreau wouldn’t conduct any experiments or build any cabins or plant any bean fields, but run the other way as fast as he could and never look back. Because today the reservoir was just like the kids who lived by it—spoiled through and through.

  But it was still water, and because I was sweaty and dirty, my skin was mud-caked and rank, my clothes were filthy, my ass was damp and itchy, there was only one answer for all of it: I was going in.

  I took off my clothes and sneakers, laid them on a rock, and dove into the reservoir’s warm black water. My cuts stung a little as I went underneath, but they were getting cleaned out and the pain didn’t last long. I hit a few chilly spots as the water got deeper and had the taste of salt and silt in my mouth. When I came up, I breaststroked for a while, gliding silently along the surface toward the center, then I turned onto my back and pedaled my feet. I was out alone after dark, far later than I was allowed to be or had ever been before, skinny-dipping off somebody else’s property under the clearest of star-and moonlit skies. I had a case to crack, a sibling to save, and maybe some demons to wrestle, but there was nothing and nobody on my back for a change. And if anybody wanted to say that was wrong, then they could go ahead and say it, because it sure as hell didn’t feel wrong to me.

  I swam back to the shore, and as I rose up out of the reservoir, I felt water rushing down my skin, mud squishing between my toes, and saw the black-on-black shadow of myself breaking up in ripples. I went over to the rock, got dressed, and reapplied the bug spray. I couldn’t find the screwdriver or the penlight, so I wrote them off. I teased my hair in case there was any gel left in it, and took a quick inventory: me, my cut-off ninja shorts and sleeveless shirt, house keys, bug spray, a mission to complete, a plan to complete it, and about damn time that I did it. That was all I had and all I needed. I was a detective on a case; nothing else mattered.

  With the reservoir on my left, the banks on my right, the half-moon and its reflection brightening my way, getting to Darren’s couldn’t have been easier. The shore itself was a mixture of sand, fine pebbles, and mud that dampened the sound of my footsteps; the downward drop at the bank’s edge provided cover from the houses up the lawns to my right; and the bug spray protected me from the few clouds of mosquitoes lingering here and there, hoping for a late-night snack.

  I was flying solo through the darkness—sleek, undercover, low to the ground—just like I’d thought I would, which meant at least some of this was going exactly to plan, my plan. Now I only had to get to Darren’s property, come up through the bushes and trees in his backyard, find a good place to conceal myself, maybe in the evergreens and flower bushes by the pool, watch undetected for the right moment, get the drop on Neecey and save the day.

  A tall, rectangular hedgerow vaulted up from the edge of the drop-off on my right and marched in a thick rigid column up the grassy slope, while a finger of bushy shoreline poked ten or fifteen yards into the reservoir to my left. I’d finally reached the edge of Darren’s property. I crept along the bushes and shrubs sprouting on the peninsula, staying low, keeping quiet, and wishing I knew more about nighttime sounds. The breeze was still high up in the treetops, swishing away; there were some crickets too, but further off so they weren’t a menace; there were mournful twitters of what could’ve been sparrows or ravens or bats; the faint lapping of the reservoir shifting in its bed; a few spiked voices and the barely audible throb of a bass line wafting down from the party; the distant squelch of a frog or two; and this other sound that went plunk, then slap, very softly from somewhere around the bend. All the other sounds were more or less accounted for, but I didn’t recognize that last one and had to make my mind up about it fast, because I was heading that way, and had to go that way, because I’d left myself no other route to carry out my plan. And if I was doing anything at this point, I was sticking to my plan.

  I stopped where I was, squatted on my haunches, pricked up my ears, and listened again. There it was, but this time it was more of a plip than a plunk, followed by slap-slap. It wasn’t coming from the dock at the bottom of Darren’s property, because although the dock was made of wood planks, it was solid and moored, and there wasn’t enough movement in the reservoir for the water to rise up and touch it. It could’ve been a small boat tied to the dock, but I didn’t know if Darren even had one, and if he did, it would make more of a tunk or thud than a plip, so that wasn’t it either. Besides, that wouldn’t explain the slap sound. So my best guess was a fish: a tiny fish jumping or thrashing around in the shallows as it swam, or maybe a bigger fish that had accidentally beached itself and was flopping around, struggling to get free.

  I heard the slaps again, with no plunk or plip this time. Yeah, a fish, definitely—that was its tail smacking against the shore as it tried to save itself from suffocating. What kind of fish could it be, though, if the reservoir had traces of salt in it? Jesus, I sure as hell didn’t know the answer to that. What if it was something else? Christ. It was a fish, that’s all there was to it, a hearty fish, something that was tough enough to live and breathe almost anywhere, ate whatever the hell it happened to find, and was making that sound again now—slap, plip, slap. Fuck it. I was gonna turn that corner, walk down the peninsula, find the fish, and throw it back so it would live to see a better day. I stood up. I was going. It was only a fish, or an eel, or a poisonous water snake—aw, fuck! Screw it. I had to go. I turned the corner anyway.

  I saw what it was and stopped dead in my tracks.

  It wasn’t a fish, or an eel, or a snake. It was a girl. A girl maybe fifteen yards away wearing what looked like flat open-toed sandals or flip-flops; a few rubber and sparkly anklets at the bottommost V of each calf; a short, tight patterned skirt of either stretchy cotton or some other clingy mate
rial; a tube top and a button-down blouse, the latter of which had the sleeves cut off, the collar up, and was open all the way but tied at the waist; and she was sitting on a big gray rock, hunched over with her arms stiff and straight, bracelets on her wrists, rings on her fingers, her palms pressed next to her knees, head down, black hair covering her face, surrounded by distant shadows and drenched in moonlight, as if she’d just stepped out of a dream, or a music video.

  No, it sure as hell wasn’t any scaly fish, slimy eel, or snake, although I would’ve been more relieved to find myself in a pit of water moccasins, alligators, crocodiles, and great white sharks at feeding time than to come across this. Because bumping into Stacy Sanders at night on the shores of the reservoir—the two of us all alone with the view, the dark, and ourselves—was definitely not part of my plan.

  She must not have heard me, because she didn’t look up, so I covered my mouth, tried to keep my eyes from popping out of my head, crept back around the bushes at the peninsula’s tip as quickly and quietly as I could, squatted down again, and tried to catch my breath. I wouldn’t call it panic, but my palms were sweating, my stomach was gone, I might’ve been hyperventilating, and my mouth felt like I’d just finished a seven-course meal of nothing but paste. Shit, this was terrible, truly fucking terrible. Well, seeing Stacy wasn’t all that terrible, but what it meant for my plan was.

  Thing was, the trees, shrubs, and bushes that I’d intended to use for cover as I snuck up Darren’s backyard to the pool area were on the opposite side of the property from where I was freaking out now. In order to get there, I’d have to pass right in front of her, and there was no way in hell I could do it without her seeing me. Shit. Worse than that, if I tried to follow the hedgerow on this side and wriggle between its branches somewhere further up, I’d not only make a buttload of noise breaking through, but the ruckus I made would also announce my presence to any-and everyone within a good fifty yards in all directions, even with the music on. Shit.

  It had never once occurred to me that someone might be down here by the water, blocking my way.

  I had to stay calm. My head and stomach were reeling, I was having trouble breathing, and I would’ve licked the condensation off a garbage truck’s exhaust pipe just to wet my whistle, but I had to stay calm. I had to come up with my next move and execute it. Right now my biggest problem was Stacy. What could I do about her? She was alone, so I could go in hard and fast, leaving no witnesses, and bump her off without so much as ever having said hello to her. Yeah, right, that plan sucked. What else? I could create a diversion, like throw a rock or something so she’d turn her head at the moment I slipped by. Maybe, but if I threw a rock into the water, it’d only make her lift her head up so she’d be looking right at me. I could throw one into the woods behind her, sure, but would the slight sound of something clicking in trees and bushes attract her attention long enough for me to jet past? I was fast, sure, but not that fast. No one was.

  I was stuck. I realized that with Stacy blocking my path, I’d come to a dead end, but it struck me that I hadn’t heard the plip or plunk-slap sound for a while. Maybe she’d just walked away; it was a party after all, and down here was far away from all the action. I crab-walked in the mud to the edge of the bushes, peeked my head around, and saw Stacy sitting on the rock, just like before, only she was bouncing her heels against it now, and taking a swig out of what looked like a glass soda bottle, but fatter at the neck. Shit, shit, shit! I crept back, squatted on my haunches, and heard the ploop-slap-slap sound again.

  What the hell was she doing here? Okay, I got that one. Stacy might not have been the prettiest girl in town, but she had that thing and it was hot—scorching—and everybody knew it, and even though it was a high-school party and she was just going into junior high like I was, one of the older scavengers buzzing around her had probably asked her to go, and she’d said what she always said, which was “Okay,” only he’d gone to do a keg-stand or a bong hit or some shit and left her alone and she’d wandered down here to be on her own, because she was like that.

  Wait a minute—that was it! The word I’d heard Stacy say more than any other was okay; she was always saying it, no matter the situation. So if I just walked around the bushes, down the peninsula, over to where she was sitting, and said, Hey, what up, real deep-voiced and suave, nodding my chin at her, and then told her not to tell anyone she’d seen me as I went on my way, chances were she’d say okay! What else would she say? Nuh-uh, that’s your ass, dickhead, I’m telling everybody, and scream? No, I couldn’t see that happening, Stacy was too laid-back for that. So all I had to do was play it cool, act chill, take my time, and it might just work.

  Then again, it might not. But I couldn’t come up with anything else, and I sure as hell wasn’t going to let a girl scare me off the case, or keep me from saving my sister. All I had to do was go over and try to talk to her for the very first time in my life, whether I wanted to or not, because there was no other choice. I cleaned my hands off in the reservoir, patted some water quietly on my face, straightened my clothes as best I could, tried to fix my hair, sighed heavily, gave up on it, and walked around the bushes so I could totally destroy any chance I’d ever have with Stacy. Nobody ever said being a detective was easy, and I was glad nobody ever said that, because this was the hardest thing I’d ever tried to do.

  SEVENTEEN

  On my way down the other side of the peninsula, I figured out the second rule for my new top-secret detective manual: never attempt to strut—you know, put a little swagger and tilt in your walk—if your legs are shaking uncontrollably. You shouldn’t even think about trying it, because you’d just wind up lumbering through the night like Frankenstein or the Creature from the Black Lagoon toward the chick who drove you nuts, and the first time she lifted her head and caught sight of you, she’d flinch, jerk back, and tense up, ready to bolt, like a cat sprayed with a garden hose, and that was not the reaction you wanted when you were trying to make a cool entrance, or a good first impression. No, it sure as hell wasn’t, but that’s what happened, and there was nothing I could do about it, so I kept stiff-legging it toward her.

  When I was about ten or so feet from the rock, Stacy whispered, “Genie?”

  The sound of my name in her high, soft voice caused my heart to sizzle from my chest and burst in the nighttime sky like fireworks. There was only one problem—that wasn’t my name anymore. But if I’d learned anything from being surrounded by three females all my life, it was that chicks never liked to be contradicted, especially when they were wrong, so I whispered back, “Yeah?”

  “Ohmigod,” she sighed heavily. “It’s Stacy, Stacy Sanders, from sixth grade? You like totally scared me for a second.”

  “Sorry, I didn’t me-uh-ahn to.” No! That squeaky, gasping sound could not have been my voice. I felt the blood rising in my face. I wanted to die.

  “That’s okay,” she said.

  It was okay; everything was okay; the sky lit up again. I was getting closer, and Stacy was still seated on the rock, the same way as before, but her head was up now and slightly tilted, like it usually was, and she was looking at me, with her black bangs hanging to one side while the rest of her face was lit by moonlight, her hazel eyes widening, her nose bunching, and smiling, so that the little gap between her front teeth showed like two slightly parted knees. Liquefied was probably the closest word for what I felt, and I stopped to catch my breath.

  “You wanna sit down,” Stacy whispered, still smiling, tilting her head, and slapping the rock with her left palm, “and keep me company?”

  I could hardly believe it—she’d invited me into her bubble, holy shit—but that didn’t mean it was part of my plan. I was supposed to walk by—cool, real cool—tell her not to tell anyone she’d seen me, and get on with it. On the other hand, I’d made a promise to grandma that I’d be a gentleman, and a gentleman always obliged.

  “Okay,” I said, in what was far closer to my normal voice. But my throat was so dry at this
point that sooner or later it would split open and I’d bleed to death all over her.

  “Cool,” she peeped as she tossed a small pebble from a pile on her right into the reservoir (plip), and then swatted her legs three times in rapid succession (slap, slap, slap). “The mosquitoes are totally killer, though,” she warned.

  As I sat down on the rock next to Stacy, I felt the warmth of her next to my frantic limbs, the lumps in my pockets pressing against my thighs, and then I remembered.

  “I have some bug spray,” I said, and felt, for a second, as if I ruled the world.

  “Ohmigod! You’re like an Eagle Scout. That’s so cool!”

  No, I wasn’t any goddamn Cub or Boy or Eagle Scout or fucking Weeblo either; I was a detective on a case, goddamn it, but I didn’t want to blow my cover, so I tried to play it cool.

  She took the cap off the bug spray and squirted it on her arms, neck, and collarbones, then untied her shirt, took it off, and handed it to me, so she was wearing nothing but her yellow tube top, and sprayed the rest of her shoulders and stomach. I looked at the stars, the half-moon, the water, the dock, the faraway trees on the other shore, the mud and pebbles well below our feet, but the only thing I saw was Stacy rubbing bug spray on her stomach. I almost wiped my drool with her shirt, blouse, or whatever it was, but I turned my head and used my wrist instead. Not like that made me any more composed when she bent forward and sprayed her feet and ankles, one at a time, going around the straps of her flip-flops and her anklets, then the front of her tanned shins, knees, and thighs, up to the edge of her too-short, too-tight, orange-and-yellow tie-dyed skirt.

  I felt fluttery and warm, pressed my eyes shut to stem the giddiness in my head, and the next thing I knew I was on my feet, facing Darren’s lawn, with my back turned to Stacy. I could’ve told myself that I’d stood up because I was still on the job and that I’d taken the opportunity to case the joint while she was occupied. But that would’ve been a lie. Maybe it was instinct that got me off that rock, or a reflex, like when the doctor tapped you in the knee with a rubber mallet and your leg jerked forward automatically, no matter how hard you tried to keep it from moving. Whatever it was, I’d put a couple of feet between us, wiped the sweat off my palms, steadied my breathing, and shifted my gaze toward the party.