Hearts Left Behind (6 page)

“OH, YEAH, AND WHO WRITES LIKE A MAN,” Paula added,
eyes cast to the side demurely.

The ladies gasped.  Their
jaws dropped.  Paula tilted her head down and put
her hand over her heart in a pose of confession.

“YOU MEAN?” said Carol and Sally.

“YOU WROTE THOSE LETTERS?” asked Phyllis.

“OH, COME NOW, LADIES.  I DIDN’T SAY THAT.” 
She smiled and batted virgin eyes.  “NOW, HAVE I SHOWN YOU THE NEW WRINKLE
CREAM I JUST GOT IN?  IT’S FABULOUS. 
THE ABSOLUTE
CUTTING EDGE IN ANTI-AGING SKIN TECHNOLOGY.”

One hour later, all four ladies walked out of
Paula’s.  Each of them carrying a bag full of Mary Kay goodies and
sporting brand spanking new Model T’s, the paint still wet.

I saw and recognized
Charlie Skinner the instant I stepped into Mustang’s Bar and Grill that
Tuesday night.  I’m not sure how I was able to so quickly recognize someone
I hadn’t seen in well over ten years, but I did.  Maybe it was his slouch
- even more pronounced than my own.  Like some street urchin, hunched over
and enclosed within
himself
to protect his last warm
thing – the beating heart inside his chest.  He sat propped atop a
barstool, elbows on the bar and a just emptied glass in front of him. 

For a long time
Charlie
Skinner was my best friend.  He might even still count as the best friend
I’ve ever had if such rankings are based on
wiffle
ball
games played, imaginary bad guys killed, and giggles.  Man, could we make
each other laugh.  

But there was a marker in the history of me and
Charlie’s friendship that was as defining for our
friendship as the carbon engine was to the horse and buggy.  It was the
arrival of Katie Cooper. 

“Son off tonight, Stan?” he said to the bartender I
did not recognize.

“Yep.”

“Well, filler up for me would
ya
?”

“Yep.”

Stan the bartender returned moments later with a full
glass. There were only four other patrons in the tavern.  The only one I
recognized was Old Man Keller who was sitting at the table behind
Charlie and hovering over a glass of something dark
and icy. 
Strange to see the Old Man sitting atop
anything other than that mower.
 
Like seeing a
cop out of uniform.

I remained standing just inside the door trying to
decide whether I wanted to turn back around and go home or sit on the stool
next to
Charlie.  There were no
other options.  “Is this seat taken?” I said.

Without turning his head,
Charlie said, “Depends.” And then he sipped the foam
off the top of his draught and sighed.  “You aren’t going to make me eat
grass, are you?”

Charlie and I
used to wrestle around a lot when we were kids.  There were a few times
that things got heated and I would pin him down, rip grass from the ground and
shove it between his lips with prying fingers until he surrendered and opened
wide.  It was such a ridiculous form of torment that invariably we both
laughed ourselves out of our rage.  At least that’s how I remembered it.

“You were always stronger than me.  Why did you
let me do that?” I asked.

“Because you were always angrier.”
 
He motioned down to the bartender that I needed a drink.  “Put it on my
tab, Stan.”

“That’s okay, I’ll get it,” I said.

“Stan, put it on my tab,” he repeated in such a way
that Stan would not question further.  In such a way that told me that he
had heard about Ethan,
which
was as close as we’d come
to actually talking about him.

We had the
how
ya
doin
’
and
whatcha
been up to
conversations.  We had
the
remember
that time
laughs.  We talked about our families without
digging past the surface of name, rank, and serial number.  And we danced
around how we had drifted apart and how different we really were back then, or
exploring how different we are now.  Sitting on the bar in front of him
was a panama hat.  I was going to ask him about it, but thought better of
it.  Wearing a panama hat was the kind of thing you did when you wanted
the world to think of you in a certain way.  Charlie wanted the world to
think of him in a way they hadn’t thought about the Charlie who hadn’t worn a
panama hat.  That was all I really needed to know.

“You see much of Moose
anymore?  Whatever came of him?”

“I don’t see any more of Moose Thornton than you see
of Katie Cooper,” he replied.

I let the beer swish around in my mouth as the words
swished around in my head.  I slowly swallowed everything.  “What
does that mean?”

“It means that Moose has been dead for about seven or
eight years now. 
Was hot-
rodding
in town on his Harley when some old blue-hair ran a Yield sign and pulled out
in front of him on south 3
^rd
.”

“Jesus.  Were you there when it happened?”

“I was.  Moose flew over the top of that
friggin
’ Buick and skidded about 200 feet. 
Blood and brains half-way down 3
^rd
Street.
 
Dead.
  Just like that,” he said it with a snap. 
He drained the rest of his beer and motioned to Stan for two more.  “The
old lady stopped in shock, looked over at Moose lying there, looked at us and
raced off at about twenty miles per hour. 
A hit-and-run
without much run.”

“Who was it?”

“I don’t know. 
Some
out-of-towner on a visit.
  She could have
took
off at a hundred-and-twenty and it wouldn’t have made a difference. 
Nothing happens in Willow Grove that somebody doesn’t see or know about.”

“Again, like Katie,” I offered.

He sat silent for a moment and then cocked his head in
consideration of something.  Then gazing straight ahead he said, “No, not
like Katie Cooper.”

“What do you mean?”

“
You
talkin
’
about the guy who supposedly saw Katie with
ol
’ Slim
Jim?”

“Yeah.”

“Never happened,” he said with a shake of his head and
a dismissive frown.

“What are you talking about?”

“I’m talking about that night she was found.  I’m
not even sure there ever was an
anonymous
tip
.  Even if there was, I don’t
believe any-
body
saw any-
thing
.”

The day that Katie went missing, the entire town had
searched for her.  Then, early the next morning, an anonymous tipster had
called the Sheriff’s Office to say that they had seen
a transient who had come to town a few weeks earlier
walking down the railroad tracks with Katie.  It was that tip that led the
Sheriff to Katie’s body. 

“Why do you say that?”

“Because while the whole town was out looking for
Katie that night, Moose and I was drinking a six-pack behind the lumberyard and
saw that hobo Slim Jim come loafing by ‘bout eleven o’clock.  We sat and
watched that goofy SOB walk through the
Halpern’s
backdoor and come right back out about five minutes later with a jar of peanut
butter, a spoon, and a gallon of milk.”

Sticking my fingers in my ears to clear out the wax
would have been cliché, but that’s what I felt like doing.

“Are you telling me that Slim Jim was innocent of
murder because he was guilty of stealing?”

“Kind of funny when you say it like
that - ironic like.”
  He laughed and took a swig of beer he
continued, “Gaines, you
gotta
ask yourself…does that
sound like the behavior of a man who had raped and killed a little girl? 
Even Slim Jim - dumbass that he was - would have known enough to get the hell
out of Dodge.  Instead he goes for a midnight snack?”

Behind Charlie, Old Man Keller ordered another Jack
Daniels and Coke.

“Hey boys, how
ya
doin
’ this evening?”

“Just fine, thanks. 
Hows
about yourself?”
I
asked.

Stan placed the Jack
and Coke in front of him.  Keller picked it up quickly in greedy
little grass-stained hands and turned back toward his table.  “Another day
above ground,” he said, lifting his glass in a toast and nodding.  “You
boys be good now.”

With the Old Man back at his table, I turned my
attention back to
Charlie

“Why d
idn’t the
Halperns
ever report anything?”

“Report what?  Missing a gallon of milk? 
They probably never even noticed.  Slim Jim walked into a dark house and
walked out of a dark house.”

The door front slammed behind me as unknown patron
number one left the bar.  I peeked over at Keller who coddled his drink
and chomped on ice.  “Why didn’t you and Moose tell Sheriff Buck?”

“Now, that’s a fair question.  I actually thought
about it.  I did,” he said with a rehearsed nod.  “But Moose talked
me
out of it.  We would have caught
ourselves some serious licks for sneaking out and drinking like that. 
Hell, we were only, what, thirteen?  Plus Moose said that Slim Jim still
could have done it and we’d be risking our necks for some psychopath who we
already knew for sure was at least one kind of criminal.”

I imagined the entire scene in my head, trying to make
sense of it.  I could see Moose and
Charlie
leaning up against that old lumberyard shed, drinking Old Milwaukee or Pabst
Blue Ribbon or whatever they could get their underage hands on.  Along
comes Slim Jim, walking under the moonlight in his torn pants and blue-jean
jacket.

“Why wouldn’t you guys have called him over when you
saw him?  He was your
buddy,
you hung out with
him earlier that very day, didn’t you?”

“Well, for one we figured he would have wanted some of
our beer.  For two, playing with
Ol
’ Creepy in
the park in broad daylight is one thing.  Hidden behind that barn at night
is something different altogether. 
Especially
that night.
”

So
Charlie and
Moose had watched everything.  Everything that happened that night and the
days that followed.  And they knew. 

“I know I should have said something.  Even knew
it then.  But it was easier not to.  And with every day that passed,
it got easier. 
An easy decision to make, a hard secret
to keep.
  Know what I mean?  Like something heavy was hung on
me that night and I’ve walked with it ever since.  Shit, you realize that
up until this very moment Moose and I were the only two who had ever known that
secret?  And for the past seven years it’s been mine alone." 

He drained his beer.  “Hell, I feel a little bit
lighter already.” 

“I don’t know, man.  It doesn’t add up.  Why
would someone lie about seeing Slim Jim that day?  It just doesn’t make
sense.”

“I don’t know,” Charlie said.  “I guess you
gotta
ask yourself what motivates a man to say something he
know
ain’t
true.  No
reward.  No glory really.  What was in it for him?”

He motioned for Stan to bring another round of drinks
over and then returned his attention to me.  “And let me throw one other
thing at
ya
there, Gaines.  You know that Slim
Jim is R-I-
P’ing
out in the Willow Grove cemetery,
right?”

“No, I didn’t know that, but so what?”

“So, he died in prison.  He didn’t have any
friends or family to claim his body – not here in Willow Grove anyway. 
You know what they do with guys like that when they die in prison?” 

I shook my head. 

“They cremate them.  The only way he gets a plot
and a tombstone in Willow Grove is if somebody pays to bring his body back here
and pay for the burial. 
Would take a person feeling a
whole lot of sympathy to do something like that.”

“Or someone feeling a whole lot of guilt,” I added.

“Exactly.”

Stan slid two fresh drinks in front of us, although I
hadn’t yet taken a sip of my last one.

“On the tab, Stan,”
Charlie said as he rose from his bar stool.  Then turning to me,
he said, “I’ve
gotta
hit the head.  Maybe you’ll
have the mystery solved by the time I get back, Sherlock.”

For the two hours that followed,
Charlie and I made like we were best friends once
again.  After all the talk of Katie and Slim Jim, we returned to the
comforts of
remember when
and
whatever
happened to so and so
.  We
laughed and slapped each other on the shoulders, but Katie Cooper was walking
around in the back of my mind the entire time.  Charlie and I closed
Mustang’s down that night and as I walked home in my drunken stupor, I felt
heavy. 
Heavier than the alcohol.
 
Heavy like that secret that Charlie had hung around my neck.
 
If Slim Jim didn’t kill Katie, who did?  And what would have led someone
to pay for his burial if not the gnawing guilt of a killer’s conscious?

Still echoing through some back corner of my mind was
another question. 
The question that Swinging Girl had
asked me that very first day in the park.
 
What are you doing here?
  I was starting to think the answer to that
question was much different than I had originally thought.  Like this trip
wasn’t about Ethan at all. 
Like it was about Katie
Cooper.