The second time he saw her, she brought him the sign from over the bar.
“I saw you looking at it. I thought you might want to have a memento from your brief stay at my uncle’s house,” she said.
“Work is the curse of the drinking class,” he read aloud. “So classy.”
Amber laughed.
“Thank you,” he said. “So you’re leaving?”
“Yes,” she said. “After last time, I promised myself that I would never drive from Maine to North Carolina again, but here I am, six-months later…”
“You have company this time,” Ricky said, pointing to Albert. The dog wagged his tail.
“He hates this car,” Amber said. “I spent a small fortune on that last rental car, so I downgraded for this trip.”
“Have you decided anything?”
She shook her head. “I’m just going to, I don’t know, play it by ear? I’d like to find work, but I don’t want another temporary job. I’m tired of spending money that I don’t feel like I earned.”
“Yeah. Must be tough,” he said.
“Shut up.”
She turned to head back towards her new rental car and Albert bounded ahead. Amber stopped in her tracks, turned and came back. “Thanks, Ricky.”
“For what?”
“Just thanks.”
“Thank you, too.”
She smiled.
Forty-Six: Alan
One month later…
“Joe!” Alan called.
His son’s feet thundered down the stairs.
“Send a message when you get there,” Alan said.
“Okay,” Joe said as he stuffed his feet into his shoes. He opened the door without bothering to tie them.
“I mean it. You don’t message and we’re going to show up.”
“Dad. Seriously.”
“I am being serious.”
“Have fun,” Liz said.
“Thanks, Mom.”
Joe waved and slammed the door shut behind him.
Liz turned to the window and watched Joe get in the car. She waved and then sighed as she turned back around and leaned against the sink.
“He’ll be fine,” she said.
“Who are you trying to convince?” Alan asked.
Liz folded her arms.
“We have, what, an hour to kill?” she asked.
“Sounds right,” Alan said.
# # #
“You like it?” Alan asked, gesturing to the truck as she got in.
“It has a certain charm,” Liz said. “It definitely seems like it’s ready to go anywhere.”
“I thought maybe this could be our new thing,” Alan said. “We can be those kind of people who take a truck into the middle of nowhere and stay for the weekend, you know? Maybe explore some of the logging roads up north? I hear there’s a place where they parked a bunch of old trains. The trees have all grown up through them and stuff. Supposed to be a good place to take pictures.”
Alan turned left at the end of the driveway.
“You check it out and bring me pictures,” Liz said. “Joe and I will stay home and rent a nice movie.”
Alan shook his head. “My family has no sense of adventure.”
“Oh, really?” she asked, laughing. “Our son is spending the night camping on an island and you and I are going out vampire hunting. How much adventure do you need?”
Alan laughed and took a right on the Mill Road. They crossed the stream on the little bridge that kids liked to jump from on hot days.
“You can’t call it vampire hunting,” Alan said. “That would be like going out stegosaurus hunting. As far as we know, they’re extinct.”
“You can hunt things that are extinct. You’re just likely to have a very low success rate,” Liz said.
“Fair enough.”
When they pulled up to the spot, Ricky was already there. The sun was setting and Ricky was getting stuff out of his trunk. Alan pulled up behind him.
“Nice truck,” Ricky said. “Did the base price include all that rust, or was that extra?”
Alan responded with a dry laugh. He rolled up his window and got out.
“How’s everything?” Liz asked.
“Quiet,” Ricky said. “All the stuff with Romeo and Jan is officially closed. It went a lot longer than I thought, all things considered, but there were no red flags. Lots of theories circulated on his motive for killing his cousin. In the end, the evidence overruled the lack of motive, you know?”
“All too well,” Liz said. “How’s George?”
“He’s on track to graduate,” Ricky said with a big smile. “It was touch and go, but he pulled it out.”
“Awesome,” Alan said.
He left Liz and Ricky and started walking towards the train tracks. They were talking about Ricky’s parents—catching up. After everything that happened up at Romeo’s house, Alan had entertained the idea that Mary was warming up to him. So far, invitations for dinner had been politely declined.
“Maybe the Dunns just aren’t social,” Liz had suggested. Alan thought that maybe the Dunns just weren’t social with them.
He climbed the small hill and looked both directions down the train tracks. According to the schedule, the train would be coming from the north. It was supposed to be bringing a load of logs down from up beyond Romeo’s house. Alan, Ricky, and Liz were there to make sure it didn’t bring anything else.
The first planets began to appear. Alan wondered if Joe was pointing at telescope at any of them.
His smile disappeared when he saw something else twinkling on the horizon.
“It’s coming,” he called to Liz and Ricky.
They got ready.
With flashlights and wooden stakes, they climbed up and sat on the hood of Alan’s truck. Liz clicked her flashlight on to test it. The light was bright and strange. Alan had fitted them with white and UV light.
“Turn it off, just in case,” Alan said. “If they’re on the train, I don’t want to tip them off.”
She nodded and turned it back off for the moment.
The red signal lights began to flash. In the distance, on the other side of the tracks, they saw a pair of wide-spaced headlights as a vehicle pulled up and stopped. There was still time to cross the tracks—the gates weren’t even down yet—but the person exercised caution and stopped anyway.
About the time they heard the rumble of the train’s engine, the gates descended.
Alan saw Ricky tighten his grip on his spear.
If they were on the train, it would slow down or maybe even stop.
