I never forgot that summer.
My father had burrowed deeper inside himself. Us kids were told to leave him alone and stay out of his way. He stopped going to work, and my mother tightened the household spending. Meals were smaller. Meat was infrequent. We ate a lot of potatoes. She talked about finding a job. My father blew up when she suggested it. “No wife of mine needs a job! I can support this family!”
There was lots of yelling in their room that night, and the next morning her eye was black and blue.
My father started to wander at night. At first he’d pace up and down the hallways, and the boards would creak every time he passed our room. His mumbling continued. The only phrase I could make out was his regular “Stop talking to me,” even though he was alone.
Then he started pacing outside, and I’d watch from my bedroom window as he wandered our few acres. Sometimes he dug holes with a shovel. Sometimes he cleaned the pens. Sometimes he’d sit and simply stare at the stars. I would check the holes the next day. There was nothing in them; they were just random holes. Everywhere.
I wondered about the ghosts that tortured him.
Then he started to run. He started wearing shorts at night and running our long driveway out to the main road and back. He’d run for nearly an hour and be dripping with sweat when he stopped. I’d sneak out of the house and hide in the bed of the truck, spying on him from a wide crack in its metal side. I’m not sure why I watched; his actions were boring. But I wanted to know what drove him, why he constantly needed to move. Was something chasing him?
Several weeks after I walked through the Deverell house and saw the blood, I spied on him from my regular spot from the truck, slightly nervous because the moon was full and bright, and I felt exposed. That night he threw down his shovel as he finished a hole. He disappeared into the barn and came out with a large hammer. This was new, and I wondered what repetitive task he’d tackle. Instead he walked directly toward me.
I couldn’t move. I froze in place as my heart tried to pound its way up my throat.
He sees me.
He will hit me with the hammer.
I’m about to die.
Instead he got in the cab and the truck started. I lay flat, as close to the cab as possible, and tried to melt into the floor of the truck bed. My relief at not being spotted was brief, and I feared where he was taking me.
A few minutes later he turned off the paved road and onto a gravel one. The ride turned rough, and the moon highlighted the dust clouds rolling behind the truck.
He stopped, and I held my breath, clenching my eyes closed as if that would save me from being seen. His door opened and quietly shut, and I listened to his footsteps crunch on the gravel as he walked away.
Silence.
I opened my eyes. He’d parked under an outdoor security light and it was as if a spotlight shone on me. I scooted on my stomach to the crack in the truck bed and peered through just in time to see him enter a house. My heart still running a race, I slipped over the side of the truck bed and moved into the shadows of the trees and tried to slow my heartbeat.
I felt secure in the dark, and I crouched behind a thick trunk, keeping an eye on the house. I hadn’t been to this home before, but I knew where we were. We’d driven west from our home on the main road and the only turn my father had taken was onto this long driveway.
He’s having an affair.
The thought shot through my young brain. I knew what an affair was. He was in love with another woman. Relief for my mother swept through me. Maybe he’d leave her to stay with this other—
The female scream from the house jolted every nerve I had.
In the silence that followed, I felt as if I were drowning, desperate for another sound to help me breathe again.
Instead I only heard the noises of the night. Crickets. Tree frogs. The leaves in a breeze.
A minute later he came out, leaving the front door wide open. He took ten steps and dropped to his knees, covering his face with his hands.
His piercing scream wasn’t human.
The hairs on my arms shot upright.
After a moment of silence, he tipped back his head and screamed again, his arms raised to the night sky, the hammer in his right hand.
He’s finally cracked.
He lurched to his feet and went to their garden hose on the side of the home, washed his hands, rinsed his hammer, and then aimed the hose at his face and let the water wash over him.
I held my breath.
He finally stopped and shook his head like a dog, water droplets flying everywhere. He threw down the hose and strode toward the truck.
It was too late for me to get back in the truck’s bed.
I watched as he drove away and exhaled, briefly closing my eyes. I would walk home. I preferred that to another nail-biting ride.
My legs shook as I stood up, making me put a hand against the tree for balance. I sucked in deep breaths and was relieved at being alone. I started to walk down the driveway to the road.
That scream.
I stopped, horrible visions bouncing through my head.
What did he do?
I remembered the hammer. The determination in his stride as he walked with it gripped in his hand.
I know what he did.
I knew what had happened as surely as I knew the color of my hair, my eyes, my skin.
I turned around and looked at the house. It was silent, and the air around it felt weighted and heavy with pain. Even the normal noises of the night had stopped.
I couldn’t think as my feet moved me toward the home. It silently called me, compelling me to go inside. My mind blank, I went up the wooden steps and through the front door. Inside was a dead man on the living room floor. His jaw had been destroyed, and he had several bloody areas on his head. I watched his chest for movements. It was still.
My father did this.
I left and went down the hall. A woman lay on the floor in my way. Her nightgown was up over her hips, showing her underwear. Her hair and head were bloody. I crouched next to her and saw her brain. Blood pooled around her head and streaks of it went up the wall. In the small bedroom beside her, I saw a set of bunk beds and a single bed. Walking silently, I stopped at the bed. A small girl. I could see pieces of bone above her bloody ear. For the third time I saw a bloody, abused mouth and teeth.
The mouths. Was he trying to stop these people from talking to him?
Her hair drained blood onto her pillow, and I recognized a female Smurf on her pillowcase. Her body curled under her covers as if she were still sleeping. I turned around and another girl was in the bottom bunk. She lay in the exact same position, but he’d struck her right eye and her mouth, and her sharp jagged bones poked through her skin.
He couldn’t have heard them talk. These two girls never woke.
It’s all in his head.
I couldn’t see the top bunk. I wanted to.
I stepped on the first rung of the small ladder. Then the second and third. In the bunk was another girl.
Her mouth was bloody, her eyes were open, and she lay in absolute stillness.
A flawless round drop of blood was in the center of her forehead. I reached out and touched it, wanting to spoil its perfection.
She blinked and sucked in a ragged breath, making eye contact.
I gasped and grabbed the railing of the bunk to keep from falling backward. I let go and leaped to the floor. I dashed out of the room and sprang over the body in the hallway.
She saw me.
I tore out of the house and didn’t stop running until I reached the road. I stopped, bent over, and rested my hands on my thighs, sucking in deep gulps of air.
She saw me.
She’ll be dead by morning.
Repeating this assurance in my head, I walked toward home, reviewing everything I’d seen in that house. I was simultaneously horrified and curious.
Did my father kill the Deverells too?
In my heart I knew he had.
During my long trip home, I considered my options. I could go to the police. I could tell my mother. I could do nothing.
The choices tormented me the whole way home.
I fell into bed, no decision made. The girl’s eyes haunted my dreams.
Within a few days, they arrested another man.
I kept my mouth shut.