The Eternal Ones (4 page)

After each visit, Haven would leave Dr. Tidmore’s office with the feeling that there was a life waiting for her outside of the mountains. Once the preacher even gave her a postcard—an aerial view of Manhattan with its dazzling forest of concrete and steel. Haven pinned it to her bedroom wall and studied the picture every night before she went to sleep. As she examined all the buildings and followed all the streets, her sense of certainty grew. Behind one of the windows—or inside one of those cars—was someone or something she needed to find. At times the urge to begin the search was almost impossible to resist, and she prayed that whatever it was would still be waiting when she finally escaped from Snope City. At the age of ten, Haven started counting down the days. When she turned eighteen—when no one could stop her—she would find what was waiting for her among the skyscrapers.

Even with the town preacher as Haven’s confidant, it would have been a lonely eight years if Beau Decker hadn’t shown up in the school cafeteria with a Barbie lunch box. Back then he was one of the popular kids—so good-looking, even at that age, that girls blushed and giggled when he glanced in their direction. Everyone knew that his family had fallen on hard times. His clothes were a few years out of date—patched-up hand-me-downs from older cousins. But the pink lunch box with Barbie astride a glittering unicorn was a pristine treasure. Some of the girls watched with envy as Beau proudly opened it and pulled out a sandwich. The rest of the kids knew something was wrong, even if most of them couldn’t have named it. Remarks were made. Haven heard the word
faggot
. Someone got pushed. Then a melee of epic proportions broke out.

Beau took down three older boys with perfectly aimed punches before a group of seventh graders overwhelmed him. Teachers dragged them off Beau, whose face was bloody and eyes wild. As the combatants were escorted to the principal’s office, Haven crawled through the slurry of spilled milk and trampled food to retrieve the Barbie lunch box from beneath a table. She rinsed it out in the bathroom sink, carefully dried it, and fixed the dents as best she could.

When Beau’s father arrived to collect his son from the principal’s office, Haven was waiting. She held out the lunch box to the tall boy with two black eyes and blood caked in the corner of his mouth. He smiled at her as he took it, and Haven’s heart started beating for the first time in months. Whatever he’d done, (and Haven couldn’t figure it out), Beau Decker was not ashamed.

 

AFTER THAT, HAVEN and Beau became inseparable, and her friendship with Dr. Tidmore slowly faded away. The preacher counseled Haven to keep her distance from Beau. He wasn’t a good influence, Dr. Tidmore insisted, and he shared his opinion with Imogene Snively, who lectured Haven on rotten apples and bad seeds. But Haven refused to be swayed. Once she’d found Beau, she wasn’t about to let him go. And she spent the next eight years trying to convince herself that one loyal friend was all she needed.

But there was still something missing. Something that nagged at her—an emptiness she couldn’t explain. There were mornings she woke with her heart pounding wildly and the sensation of arms wrapped around her. But the feeling slipped away the moment she opened her eyes, and no matter how quickly she squeezed them shut, she couldn’t recapture the contentment she’d felt.

In the ninth grade, she watched her classmates begin to pair off, until she and Beau seemed the only ones left. Not that Haven didn’t have her share of admirers. Throughout their sophomore year, Bradley Sutton had pursued her with a passion that was evident to all but his girlfriend, Haven’s former friend Morgan Murphy. Had Haven accepted his affection, it would have ensured her a place among their school’s most popular students. But Haven turned him down. She knew there was someone out there for her, but whoever he was, he certainly wasn’t a student at Blue Mountain High School.

With no social life to speak of, Haven was free to throw herself into the business she’d launched with Beau freshman year. To their surprise and relief, it had flourished immediately. Having promised his ailing mother that he’d attend Vanderbilt University, Beau needed money for school. Haven had her own reasons for working. She told Imogene she wanted to help pay for college in New York. But in truth, Haven had always suspected she’d need ready money for the day her destiny finally revealed itself.

When the visions had returned, Haven had known it was almost time. She pored over her savings account statements when they arrived in the mail, ensuring that the twelve-thousand-dollar escape fund she’d stashed away was still safe in the coffers of the First Citizen’s Bank. Now, thanks to Imogene, it would stay there just a little bit longer.

The bedroom door creaked opened, and timid footsteps crossed the room.

“I’ve got something for you, Haven.” Splayed across her bed with her eyes squeezed shut, Haven refused to acknowledge her guest. She didn’t need to look to see her mother’s stooped figure and anxious smile. It was a posture that made the best people want to protect her and the worst want to kick her.

“I know you’re upset about school and all. But I think you might want a look at this,” said Mae Moore, this time in a whisper. Haven opened a single eye and saw her mother clutching a shoe box to her chest.

“What is that?” Haven threw her legs over the side of the bed and drew herself upright.

Her mother sat down beside her. Her gaunt cheeks were flushed and her eyes flashed. For the first time in years, she almost looked alive. Her hands caressed the box as if it were human skin.

“Something Ernest did a long time ago. I brought it with us when we moved here. Mother doesn’t know about it. But I thought it was time you took a look.”

Goose bumps sprouted on Haven’s arms. Mae Moore had mentioned her husband only a handful of times since the accident. Hearing his name spoken aloud was like hearing someone summon a spirit.

When Haven was younger, while her father was at work, her mother had told her countless stories. How she’d met Haven’s father on his very first day in town. How they’d eloped three weeks later, young and poor and crazy in love. How he’d slaved fifteen hours a day to earn the money to open his store. Haven hadn’t found it hard to believe that the hero of all of Mae’s stories was the man with a crooked nose and an unruly thatch of curly hair who shared their home. When seen through her mother’s eyes, Ernest Moore was the very picture of perfection—the fairy-tale prince who had rescued Mae from a wicked witch and with whom she was fated to live happily ever after.

The stories had stopped after Ernest Moore’s death. But Haven sometimes wondered if Mae Moore still told them to herself late at night when she didn’t think anyone could hear her crying.

 

MAE MOORE SLID the box onto Haven’s lap. Afraid at first to touch it, the girl let it sit there for a moment, heavy as granite slab. Its exterior was warped and stained, and when Haven looked inside, she found it stuffed with paper. Scraps torn from notebooks. Pieces of copy paper folded into tiny squares. Words scribbled on gas station receipts. Haven reached into the box and pulled out a propane bill. Her father had used the other side to print out the draft of a letter he’d written. Haven skimmed across the paper and landed on a line halfway down the first page. “
Ethan’s not a doll. He’s
real
.”

“Oh my God.” Haven’s eyes met her mother’s. She knew in an instant how much Mae Moore was risking.

“He wrote it down,” Mae whispered. “Every word you ever said. He never believed there was anything wrong with you.”

“What about you?” Haven pressed her mother. “Do you think there’s something wrong with me?”

Mae Moore studied her hands, which lay clenched together in her lap. “No,” she admitted. “I don’t. And after you take a look at all that, you might not, either.”

Haven watched silently as her mother rose and prepared to leave the room.

“I’m sorry, Haven,” Mae said before she left. “I shouldn’t have kept it hidden so long.”

The door closed. Haven’s eyes returned to the box that lay in her lap, and she picked out another scoop of paper. Soon the things Haven had tried to forget began coming back to her.

[Draft letter dated December 7, 2001]

 

 

 

 

 

The page ran out, and the rest of the letter was lost.

 

 

[Written on the back of a receipt for $9.00 from Cope’s Gas and Mini Mart]

 

Haven looked all frustrated, and I was afraid she’d stop talking.
“I don’t remember right now.”

“What’s
your
name?

 

 

 

[Written on the bottom of a spelling test. Date at the top: September 15, 2001]

 

“Everything,
Daddy.”

[Spiral notebook paper]