Behold the Bones Read online

  “Dad’s making hot chocolate,” she says, tugging at an earring.

  “I just want to go to bed.”

  She doesn’t move but studies me as though considering an exercise in matriarchal agitation.

  “Okay,” she says after a long minute. “Get some sleep. We’ll talk in the morning.”

  “Can’t wait,” I mutter as she pulls the door shut.

  I turn my music up again and plant my face in a pillow. I’m tired of looking at things. For that matter, I’m tired of thinking about things. That voice—Mary’s voice—repeats in my mind on an endless loop: take a stone, take a flower, these will only last an hour and on and on and on until her final words dominate everything, She’s mad, mad, mad.

  Now that I’m alone, my mind is pulling threads together, weaving a story I want no part of. She’s mad, mad, mad. But sometimes stories catch you off guard. Sometimes, a story catches you the way a hunter snares its prey. And suddenly, things you thought you could ignore become the burning center of your world.

  She’s mad, mad, mad.

  I thought I could ignore it. But no matter how I try to convince myself otherwise, the truth is I recognize the words and the voice. They’ve been in my head once before, the night I went to Leo and Red’s for stitches.

  Shut up, I think, stern as can be. Shut up, shut up, shut up.

  I wish I could be like Abigail and let music obliterate my mind until I’m asleep. But even focusing on sound, my thoughts are weedy. Instead of fading, they blend with the song. My panic over having banished a ghost in front of my entire town, my girlish and aimless concern about Gage’s reaction. Beneath it all, the deep, thudding drumbeat of Mad Mary’s song, and the dread of having seen a ghost . . .

  And that she saw me.

  She looked right at me. In all the stories I’ve heard so far, that’s never happened. The ghosts are ambivalent creatures, unaware that there’s a flesh-and-bone person standing anywhere near them. Even when Quentin Stokes touched the one at the Flying J, he did nothing but turn his hobo head and walk away.

  This was different. In every way it was different.

  Desperate for distraction, I go to my bookshelf and yank the books into a chaotic heap. Then I let my mind sink into the task of returning them to alphabetical order by subject and author. I let that task lead to another and another until my entire bedroom is in a controlled space. On any normal night, this would be enough to relax me. But this is not a normal night.

  It’s years before I get anywhere near sleep. Eventually, I do, and it’s as smooth as hopscotch. I don’t even dream. I just swing in and out of this mad, desperate swirl in my mind. When I wake, and shuffle down the hallway in my pajamas, my parents wait in the kitchen, as promised. Mom’s working the toaster with none of the skill of a human. The air’s already slightly burnt from at least one failed attempt. Dad’s chicory is fresh and thick as sap in the pot. Its chocolate smell is heaven. He raises an eyebrow when I pour a mug.

  “Possum,” he starts, ever gentle on approach. “We want to talk about last night.”

  The sip I take is too much, too fast. It burns my tongue and brings me to my senses with an unpleasant aftertaste. Bless chicory for being at once so tempting and so foul.

  “Milk,” I croak, perching on one of the stools at the kitchen bar.

  Dad lifts a pot from the stove. Knowing that I prefer milk to tar, he transforms my cup into a decadent café au lait. He lifts his brows to communicate that he still wants to talk.

  “I’d rather not.” I reach for the sugar.

  “That doesn’t change much,” he says, finding his backbone in my rebellion. “We’re concerned about how this might affect you, so we’re going to discuss it sooner or later.”

  I don’t answer, but Mom fills the space, sliding a piece of singed toast under my nose.

  “Listen, Candace, if you don’t let us help you, you’ll be harassed by everyone in this town, and wouldn’t you rather talk to us? You want raspberry jam or fig preserves?”

  I take the figs. “Harassment, I can handle. I go to high school, in case you’ve forgotten. I’m not worried and there’s nothing to discuss.”

  It’s the way Dad clears his throat. Unnecessarily loud and obvious. He looks away and I look to Mom.

  “What?” I demand.

  “There is something to discuss, actually. Something I think is really rather exciting.” She presses her hands to the cabinet, a pleased smile twirling her lips. My stomach clenches. “You see, we’ve had a call from Mr. King this morning—”

  “No.” I push my toast away. “No way. I know what you’re going to say and no way.”

  “Candy, just listen,” Mom urges. “He’s reviewed the footage from last night and he says it’s some of the best they’ve ever managed to capture. You in that dress with the light on your hair and that haint rolling out of the fog? Well, can’t you just imagine how cinematic that must look? He says it’s exceptionally rare for something to come across so clearly.”

  “No. Way.”

  “Well, I can. I think it must be stunning,” she continues in the way of mothers, unwilling to concede a point until it’s bruised and bloody. “And he wants to use it.”

  “In. Hell.”

  “Candace.” Dad’s chastisement is as sharp as it is dull, cutting and soothing all in one stroke. I’ve never been able to master the technique and it galls me to no end.

  “Now, he has a good point about why you ought to consider letting him do so,” says Mom. “He says when something like this happens in a small town like ours, you’ve got to get out in front of it. Show folks you’re not ashamed of what happened by letting word get out that you’ve agreed to have it broadcast. The more open you are, the less they’ll come knocking at your door to get answers.”

  “No. No. No, Mom. No.” My feet slip from the rung of the stool, cold with sweat.

  “I think—your father and I think it’s a good idea. Not only will it dissuade folks from talk, but it might just have a few unintended consequences. Don’t you remember that story of the girl who was discovered because she was singing at a gas station, of all places?”

  Her cheeks have gone rosy with the prospect. As if this alone can compensate for my useless uterus. She’s so busy imagining some famous future for me that she can’t see my horror. Let Mr. King use footage of me in his show? I might as well set fire to every college brochure I’ve ordered over the summer. Even if I got out of Sticks, I’d be Sticks wherever I went.

  “I’m not interested,” I say, slow, steady, and without a stutter.

  “And he’ll pay you. A few thousand up front and then some percentage when it’s aired. Just think how that would help pay for college,” Mom argues.

  College money. So that’s how he’s going to play it. I have to admit it’s a good tactic. But I’d rather bet on myself than easy money.

  I hold a stony expression as I repeat, “Not interested. But thanks for asking.”

  Mom’s eyes flutter toward Dad and it plants a rotten feeling in my gut.

  “What?” I demand.

  “We gave him permission,” Dad says.

  “You what?” I don’t know if I said it out loud. My ears cloud and ring all at once.

  “Don’t overreact.” Mom frowns and flaps a hand in my direction. Like I’m nothing. Like I’m a child throwing a tantrum because I don’t get ice cream for breakfast. “This’ll be good for you. A line on the résumé at the very least.”

  “Mom. Have you ever written a résumé?” I spit, my mouth full of rage. “I’m not applying for small-minded hick of the year!”

  “That was uncalled for, Candace Craven Pickens.” Again, Dad both incites my anger and makes me regret it. I’m full of piss and vinegar. “Maybe you should go to your room and pound sand.”

  “That’s your first great idea of the week!”

  My stool scrapes the floor as I leave. Mom cringes, but I don’t give a single damn about scratches on the hardwood. Let my parents appl
y their magnificent brains to something that isn’t me for twenty seconds.

  I slam my bedroom door so hard my junior high diploma falls off the wall. The frame doesn’t shatter. It flops against the carpet with a dull and useless thud. I kneel to pick it up, brooding over the fact that my chances of getting a fresh start, free from the clinging hands of this small town, will be nonexistent if my parents make a public spectacle of me on Local Haunts. No one will think it was forced. They’ll all assume that I was so anxious for a minute of prime-time glory that I’d debase myself by talking to ghosts in front of ten thousand strangers. Who gives a scholarship to that? Who takes that person seriously ever again in their lives?

  And suddenly, my hand is through the glass frame. My knuckles against the paper. When I pull away, blood falls in fat drops, obscuring the curling script of my name. My hand, I realize. The blood falls from my hand. It should hurt. Shouldn’t it hurt? There are pieces of me, my blood, falling away and I’m pretty sure that’s supposed to hurt.

  But I feel no pain. Only anger so loud it sings in my ears.

  There’s a knock at my door and I hear my father’s voice calling, “Possum? Everything okay in there?”

  Snatching a dirty T-shirt from the floor, I wrap my hand, and shove the broken diploma out of sight.

  “Yeah,” I call. “I’m fine. Go away.”

  He doesn’t. Not right away. I can hear his stillness on the other side of the door and I can imagine his face, frowning, conflicted, wondering if he should press. But he doesn’t. No surprise. I listen as his footsteps recede down the hallway.

  11

  AFTER QUIETLY CLEANING UP MY mess and bandaging my hand, I pull out my cherished collection of the homebound books Old Lady Clary sells to kids and tourists. They contain every swamp story I’ve ever told. I flip through each one, looking for some kind of clue.

  It was an accident that I fell in love with these stories. It’s impossible for anyone to remember how old they were or where they were the first time they heard one. This town all but bleeds swamp lore and I’d call anyone who claimed to remember hearing their first tale a stone-cold liar. But somewhere along the way, I do remember a sleepover where hater Hallie Rhodes told one so poorly I snored until she stopped.

  “Aren’t these supposed to be scary?” I’d asked.

  “If you’re such an expert, you tell one,” she’d countered.

  And since I’m incapable of backing down from a challenge, I did exactly as she asked and whipped those girls up into a satisfying frenzy of fear and delight.

  After that, I very naturally became the queen of terror and have been responsible for recounting swamp stories on demand. I’ve never minded. I don’t understand the thrill of being scared the way others do. I’ve been scared—really, truly scared—only once in my life, and there was nothing thrilling about it. When you’re truly scared, something has gone horribly wrong and it’s completely out of your control.

  But that’s not what these stories do. These stories give everyone a chance to be safe scared—they’re imagining something horrifying from the safety of a sleeping bag, and in some strange way that’s fun.

  I’ve always seen the stories for what they are—tools of the very fine art of manipulation. I understand their parts in a way that lets me tell them again and again while keeping the thrill of fear very close. In some way, they’re a skill of mine and I love that I’m good at it.

  Right now, I feel like they’re manipulating me and I don’t love that much at all.

  The image of Mad Mary Sweet lingers in my head. The events of last night play over and over in my mind until they feel as mythologized as any swamp story, until I could tell the tale of it as if it were any other piece of fiction.

  Except it’s not. It’s a real thing that happened, and I’d like to know why.

  It’s hard to find clues in stories I can recite from memory. The tale of Mad Mary Sweet tells me what I already know: that she was a poor girl who went mad and roamed the swamp looking for her mother. I pass dozens of others that I know just as well: “The Hollow-Eyed Cur,” “The Shine Child,” “The Roving 52nd.”

  Then I land on an old favorite, a story called “Jack of the Trade,” about a man who lures children into the swamp with the promise of toys. He’s said to wander the streets with a long, ratted coat, a deadly grin, and his collection of toys hanging from his belt.

  Exactly like the ghost Hallie Rhodes told us about that evening at the Flying J. Like Mad Mary Sweet, that ghost perfectly mirrored a swamp tale.

  And reconsidering all the ghost sightings I’ve heard about thus far, I find that I can match half of them to various stories from these very books. Sticks isn’t just being haunted, it’s being haunted by its own ghosts.

  The realization stuns me for a full minute. I should tell someone—Sterling, Abigail—but what good will it do?

  I let my phone buzz all morning. It seems like the perfect kind of day to douse my mind in the rest of The Bell Jar, so that’s exactly what I do. I curl up in my bed and read about someone else’s madness for a while.

  When I finally check my phone, there are text messages and calls from people who should really know better than to assume we’re this friendly. I scroll through until I find the names that are after more than gossip. I have two missed calls and five texts from Sterling, one call and one text from Abigail, and two texts from Quentin Stokes letting me know there’s a race at the track tonight and he’ll be there. There’s no love between me and Quentin, but he’s pretty and uncomplicated and a good kisser. The kind you catch and throw back. One final Saturday night at the racetrack before school starts sounds like the sort of night I could use.

  Opening a new message, I hit Abigail and Sterling at once: racetrack? 8pm?

  Sterling responds first. Yes. u ok?

  I return a picture of The Bell Jar along with, i am, i am, i am.

  Abigail’s response takes a few minutes. She says, I’m in.

  I always assume that when she’s home, she has to leave her phone where her parents can see it and they screen everything that comes in. Therefore, I don’t send her a picture of my parents’ liquor cabinet.

  Lucky for me, the house is empty when I leave. Mom and Dad left a note on the fridge about hanging with Nanny tonight, which makes swiping a nearly full bottle of vodka from their stash less than sporting. They’ll never miss it. The way things have been going lately, chances are Mom’ll assume she polished it off on one of her late-night “Why has my daughter forsaken me?” benders.

  It takes some doing, but I convince Sterling to trade my practical yet unremarkable Ion for her brother’s Chevelle. He left it in her care while he’s away at college and she’d never move it if I didn’t push. But sometimes I think Sterling likes to be pushed into doing things.

  She’s perfectly petite behind the oversized wheel of the old car, perched at the edge of the seat. This is one of the things I love most about my friend. She’s as imposing as a spiderweb, but she’s tough as bullets.

  We rumble through town with the music up and the windows down. Together, we play the street like our own personal band: heads turn, boys whistle, and cars honk. I spot Quentin Stokes’s blond crown and the rest of his sunbaked crew milling around their cars at the Flying J gas station, prepping for the race. I blow them a kiss and they reward me with a chorus of howls.

  “You know, if my stepdad sees us, this night could get really short really fast,” Sterling warns, but she’s smiling, wishing she’d ever dare to throw a careless kiss to anyone.

  We stop for Abigail first, who’s dressed for school, not for fun, but her mother stands at the door with stern lips. I hop out, suddenly concerned that my short shorts could get Abigail into trouble by proxy, then jump into the back. It wasn’t fast enough. I see Mrs. Beale’s eyes on me; I see her judgment. She’ll probably go inside and light a candle for my soul.

  Or not.

  Abigail waits until we’ve left the driveway to shimmy out of her puritan
shorts and into a skirt she’d stashed in her purse. The change transforms the top from vaguely frumpy to loose sexy.

  “Much better,” I say. “Shannon’ll be there?”

  In a display of uncharacteristic candidness, Abigail nods.

  “Candy, are you going to volunteer to talk about last night or do we have to beat it out of you?” Sterling’s foot has become far too light on the gas pedal. She means to have this out before we get Heath.

  I lean back, stretching my arms to rest my fingertips against the sides of the car. “What do you want to know?”

  “For starters, are you okay?”

  “Why wouldn’t I be?”

  Sterling doesn’t answer right away, and I see from the arch of Abigail’s eyebrows that there’s definitely something to be said.

  “What is it?” I demand, leaning as far forward as the seat belt allows. Which isn’t far. Old cars are selfish.

  “People are talking.” Abigail says talking the same way she might say stupid. “They’re saying you exorcised the ghost.”

  I might have anticipated this. If I hadn’t been so distracted by the fear of the entire known world learning my name from Mr. Roosevelt King, I might’ve had room to worry about things happening much closer to home.

  Sterling accurately interprets my silence as the slow boil of rage. “On the bright side, now we know for certain that the ghosts are connected to Shine. You dispelled it with a touch. Exactly like Shine.”

  “Her,” I say. “Not it!”

  Sterling and Abigail share a brief look as we turn up the drive to Heath’s fortress and stop, headlights off. I guess taking a stand at Gage’s party didn’t work as well as they’d hoped.

  “How did you know it was Mad Mary Sweet?” Abigail asks.

  “The song she was singing. Didn’t you hear it?” They shake their heads. Sterling isn’t a surprise. I have no idea where she stood when everything happened, but Abigail was close. I thought close enough. “Well, it was Mary’s song.”

  Just mentioning it sends a fresh chorus through my mind, but without the crashing, out-of-control feeling it had last night. I let it spin like a merry-go-round for a minute, the end feeding seamlessly into the beginning until it’s time for the ride to stop and I pull the plug.