Cemetery Girl

I’d reluctantly decided to take in an effort to complete another book, and I knew my colleagues would not mix well with the evangelical crowd.

Pastor Chris continued, his voice a little high and reedy, almost like an adolescent’s on the brink of changing. “While we’re here as the result of a tragedy, the loss of a young life, we are also here to support one another as well as to take comfort from Christ’s eternal pledge to us. And what is that pledge? The pledge is that those who die having been redeemed by Christ’s eternal love shall not die, but rather have eternal life in Christ’s glory.”

Voices through the church muttered, “Amen,” including Abby’s. I studied her face in profile. Somewhere in there, I told myself, a vestige of the person I fell in love with nearly twenty years ago still remained. It must. But it was increasingly difficult for me to find it, to see her, and as I watched her mutter, “Amens,” under her breath and stare at Pastor Chris like he himself incarnated the Second Coming, I wondered if what I knew of her, or thought I knew of her, was gone forever, just like Caitlin.

“I was blessed to speak with Tom and Abby last night.” At the sound of my name, I turned back to Pastor Chris. It took me a moment to process his words. He said he’d spoken to us-to me the night before-but he hadn’t. I hadn’t seen the man. “And while they are understandably devastated by the loss of their dear Caitlin, they both told me, Tom as well as Abby, that they took comfort from the fact that Caitlin is now in heaven, reunited with Christ and basking in his divine love.”

I looked at Abby again, but she still stared forward, muttering her “Amens.” Buster leaned in to me on the other side. His breath smelled like cough drops.

“You were really shoveling it last night.”

“I didn’t say that,” I whispered.

I removed my hand from Abby’s. She didn’t seem to notice.

After the last prayer and the final song, we filed out. Abby, Buster, and I went first with Pastor Chris; then we stood around at the back of the church while people headed to their cars. Abby and I stood side by side, still not touching.

“I’m going to ride with Buster,” I said.

“You don’t want to ride with us?” Abby asked.

“Buster doesn’t know his way.”

“It’s a procession,” she said. “He can ride with us.”

“I need to talk to him,” I said, breaking off eye contact with her. “It’s fine.”

“But you’re going to the cemetery, right, Tom? You’ll be there?”

I didn’t answer. I put my hand on Buster’s arm and guided him toward the parking lot.

We stopped in Shaggy’s, a bar near campus. Students occupied most of the tables. Guys were trying hard to impress the girls, and the girls sat back, absorbing the boys’ attentions, encouraging more. We ordered sandwiches and then Buster asked for a pitcher of beer. When the waitress left, I asked him if he was drinking again.

“Just beer,” he said as nonchalantly as a man waiting for a bus. He’d been in rehab twice and then was arrested for drinking and driving. He’d also been arrested for indecent exposure, a fact that had caught the attention of the detectives investigating Caitlin’s disappearance. Buster claimed he’d been drunk and lost his clothes, but at some point he’d run past a group of children in a park and was initially charged with the more serious crime of child enticement and lewd and lascivious behavior. He’d spent two days in jail and served a thousand hours of community service. “You sure you don’t want to go to the boneyard? We can still make it.”

I shook my head. “Forget it.”

“Abby’s going to be pissed.”

I shrugged. He was right, of course. But when I heard Pastor Chris ascribing beliefs to me, actual words even, that clearly weren’t mine, something gave way. I tried to go along, to appease, but I’d reached my limit. Someone-maybe Pastor Chris, maybe Abby-decided to lie, to misrepresent my beliefs in public. I couldn’t stand being part of it, being lumped in with the flock of blind sheep.

The beer came and Buster poured it into the disposable plastic cups they provided. One of the drawbacks of living in a college town-restaurants and bars don’t invest in glassware. I took a sip and it felt good. And then another. That was all it took to start a buzz at the base of my skull.

My phone buzzed in my pocket. A text.

Need to see you. Four p.m.

“What’s that about?” Buster asked. “Abby?”

“No. Liann Stipes.”

“Who?”

“She’s a lawyer here in town. She handles the everyday stuff-mortgages, wills. Small-time criminal cases.”

“What does she want with you?” Buster asked. “You making a will?”

“Her daughter was murdered about ten years ago. She was just sixteen. They caught the guy and convicted him.”

“They fry him?” Buster asked.

“Life in prison. No parole. Are you sure you didn’t meet Liann right after Caitlin disappeared? She was at our house a lot.”

“I wasn’t around much then,” he said.

I studied his face for a moment. He took a long drink of his beer and ignored my interest. “Anyway,” I said, “she really tried to help us out. She’s become something of a crusader and an advocate on behalf of missing or murdered children and their families. She likes to see that the bad guys get punished. She doesn’t handle the prosecutions, of course, but she advises the families, sort of an informal legal counselor. That’s what she’s been doing for us. She tries her best to help victims’ families sort through all the mess of their cases. Dealing with the cops, dealing with the media. She tries to keep our spirits up. And she believes in justice.”

“A lawyer.” Buster made a gagging face.

“She’s not really a lawyer to me. She’s more of a friend. Like I said, an advocate.”

He kept making the face, so I ignored him. I wrote back and asked where she wanted to meet.

The Fantasy Club.

“Hmm.” I stared at the screen. “She wants to meet me in a strip joint.”

“Interesting place to meet a missing-children’s advocate.”

“Who knows? She meets a lot of interesting people in these cases. She gets to know the victims and their families pretty well. She seems to know everything and everybody. I just wish I knew what she wanted to tell me. She can be so fucking secretive sometimes, like she’s in the CIA. Jesus.”

“Drink up. It’ll help pass the time.” Buster drained half his cup on the first try, then polished off the rest and poured more. He nodded, encouraging me. “Tell me why we’re bailing on the graveside service.”

“I didn’t say any of that stuff at the church, that stuff about heaven. That idiot, Pastor Chris, made it up. Or Abby did. But it’s not just the stuff from church,” I said.

“Yeah?”

The beer tasted good. Real good. I felt myself reaching my limit. My stepfather-Buster’s father-drank. He drank and he raged at us and he usually passed out on the couch. I never acquired the habit, but Buster did.

“I knew Abby was going to buy the headstone,” I said. “Hell, I knew how much it cost. But she promised me it wouldn’t be up yet. She promised me. And it was there the other day when I went to the cemetery, the day I talked to you on the phone while I was walking Frosty.” Just saying his name caused a spasm of guilt in my chest. Where was Frosty? In an abusive home? Sitting in his own filth, waiting for the gas chamber? “The headstone has her name on it. My little girl. And it says she died four years ago. It’s a big fucking thing, too. You can’t miss it. Can you believe that?”

“Which part?”

“Any of it.”

Someone put coins in the jukebox, and a country song came on too loud. The steel guitar whined and someone else shouted in protest. The bartender bent down behind the bar and, mercifully, the volume dropped.

Buster put down his cup and steepled his fingers in front of his face. He looked thoughtful, sincere. “Have