I ride to Derrick’s, taking the back way through the woods. I can’t risk the police catching me. It’s not easy navigating through the trees in the dark. It’s better than the alternative of being taken into the station, though, leaving Amanda to fend for herself.
I try not to visit these woods unless I have to. It’s hard enough living on the outskirts of them, waking up every morning to see them outside my window. The woods where my wife died.
I remember the first time I met her. It was at a party. I’d only started hanging around with the club, looking for a way in. Derrick had noticed me sort of hanging around the fringes, had pulled me aside to ask me what I was doing there. I told him I wanted to part of the club. He’d laughed, throwing his head back. I’d been embarrassed, but I hadn’t backed down.
When he saw I was serious, he got serious, too. “You know what you’re getting yourself into when you join this club?” he’d asked, looking me straight in the eye. “Once you get in, you can’t leave. Not ever. It’s like a mafia, kid.” I’d been impressed by him, though he was only a few years older than me. He was confident, cocky. He struck me as a guy who had seen things. I’d wanted to be just like him.
He had decided to sponsor me, so to speak, vouching for me with Kenny. He brought me into the party, introducing me around. “This is my kid sister, Michelle.” She was so pretty. Like an angel. A halo of golden curls, an easy smile. She was funny, too, and tough. We spent a long time talking.
I was hooked from that first night. The way they lived. Hot girls, plenty of booze, dancing. Living it up. The image was too tempting to resist. Nobody told me that was just a good night, a celebration. Life wasn’t always that way. Normally it was gritty, rough, even a little scary sometimes. A member never admitted to being afraid, of course.
Once I met Michelle, though, there was no question of whether or not I wanted to join. I only wanted to know how to get on the fast track to a patch. If she wanted to be part of this world, so did I. I’d go anywhere she went.
Look where it got me.
I finally reach the clearing. Derrick’s house is only a mile or so up the narrow dirt road. The area back here is considerably less built-up than even where I live. I wouldn’t be surprised to find a few shacks back here. God only knows what went on in the places nice people didn’t like to talk about.
Derrick’s house is mostly dark, only one light on. The kitchen light. I know he’s sitting in there, probably drinking himself into a stupor at the table. He was always a heavy drinker, but back in the day, he could handle his liquor. That time has come and gone. Now he’s gained at least twenty, maybe thirty pounds. He looks flabby, fleshy. Not the man I used to know.
Then again, I came close to falling into a dark hole after Michelle died. I know how easy it would have been to crawl into a bottle and never come out. I spent weeks nearly unconscious once the questioning was over and it was agreed there was no evidence that could make charges against me stick. After that was over, I started drinking and didn’t stop for an entire season. I missed a whole summer, either drinking, passed out drunk or hungover before getting drunk again.
I’m not sure what stopped me. I sure didn’t have anybody in my life to offer me support. A parent, a sibling, a friend—one of them might have helped me. They could have shown me a better way, sent me to a doctor. Anything. I was all alone.
It’s all hazy, the day I decided to stop drinking. I woke up in a whorehouse on the other side of the town’s outskirts. The shady area, near where I grew up. A dirty, windowless place where girls with track marks on their arms would do just about anything for money. I hadn’t gone for sex—even though I’d hit rock bottom, I still had a shred of common sense. I just wanted to drink and be left alone. They’d serve me there. The bars wouldn’t once I got past a certain point.
I woke up one morning in a puddle of my vomit. There were girls on the floor, girls on couches. One girl was sleeping on the sticky bar. And me. The place reeked. A few girls were moaning, having just shot up. What the fuck was I doing with my life? That was enough to turn me around.
I find it hard to believe Derrick hasn’t hit rock bottom yet. Maybe he has and doesn’t know it. Regardless, I need his help and hope he’s in the right shape to give it to me. I knock on his door. Almost a minute passes before I hear him shuffling toward it. His face appears in the window.
“Hey, man. Please. Open up. I have to talk to you.” He shakes his head. “Please, I’m begging you. It’s an emergency. I’ll tell you about it but please, open the door. I’m on the run. I can’t let them find me. They can’t see me standing here.”
“What do I care? As long as I don’t open the door, they’ll leave me alone. Get off my property!”
“Please, Derrick. I need you. We can have this out tonight, but after that I need you. It’s life-or-death.” It looks like he’s thinking this over. Finally, I add. “I’ll tell you everything you want to know.” It’s the last thing I want to do, but I know it’s the only thing that will make him trust me.
“Everything?” His voice just barely makes it to my ears.
“Yeah. Please, Derrick. I need your help. I’ll tell you everything, anything.”
The lock flips, the door opens. “Come in.”
I hurry inside, shutting the door behind me as fast as I can.
“Where’s your bike?” Derrick slurs, turning on one of the lamps in the living room before flopping onto to the couch. The room is dark even with the light. Dank. Dirty. Bare walls, secondhand furniture. What happened to him?
“In the woods, maybe five minutes’ walk from here,” I explain. “I don’t want them to see it here. And I don’t want to get you in trouble.”
“Wow, thanks,” he says, sarcastic.
“Derrick, please.”
“Listen, I only let you in here because if you’re on the run, I don’t want cops seeing you outside. I don’t want to hear anything you have to say, though. Your words don’t mean anything to me.”
“Derrick, come on! I told you, I’m ready to admit everything that happened. I need you to trust me.”
“Like my sister did? The way she trusted you to love her when you married her? That was a joke, just like this is.” There’s a bottle of whiskey sitting beside him on the end table. He uncaps it, raising it to his mouth. Damn it. The drunker he is, the less likely he is to listen to me.
“I did love her. I still do. Why do you think I stay in this shitty place? In that house? With reminders of her everywhere I look?”
“Because you need to, so you look innocent. Hey, I’ve thought this all out before. I’ve wondered what the hell you’re trying to prove, staying there. You’re right. You could go anywhere. You have no ties. No parents, no kids. The club wants nothing to do with you. Nobody here wants anything to do with you. You only stayed so you’d look like the good guy. And to piss the rest of us off.”
I sigh. He’s not far from the truth. “You’re right, partly. I did want to piss you off at first. I wanted to prove I had nothing to run from. If I had left town, it would have been enough to make people’s minds up for good that I’d killed Michelle. I couldn’t do that. Because I didn’t kill her.” He laughs. “I didn’t. I loved her. I haven’t wanted to let go of her in all this time. I swear it.”
“You swear?”
“Yes. I do.”
“On a stack of bibles?” He laughs again, taking another swig.
“Look, damn it.” I sit on his coffee table, facing him. Cigarette ash covers it, the ashtrays overflowing. It feels vaguely sticky. “I don’t know any other way to tell you this. I didn’t kill your sister. I loved her. Everybody assumed it was this bullshit crime of passion, or whatever. The truth was way deeper than that, man.”
“Oh, really? How long did it take you to come up with some big story? Two years? Why couldn’t you have just told the truth back then, if it was so deep?”
I look at the floor. “Because it would have hurt you too much.”
I hear his hysterical laughter. “It would have hurt me? Are you fucking serious?” He laughs again, and I hear the tears threatening. He’s on the edge of a breakdown. “Because this doesn’t already hurt? My sister’s dead either way, man. Don’t pretend you were trying to spare my feelings but not telling me this big truth, this deep story. That’s the biggest load of crap you’ve laid on me yet.”
I look up at him, sitting there. He’s practically falling over. I have to get this out before he loses all control. “I told you I’d tell the truth. I will. But you have to listen. Okay? Stay with me. You keep drinking, you’re gonna pass the fuck out before I get the chance. And I can’t be here long.”
“What’s the big hurry? Why are they after you?”
“I’ll tell you in a minute. First, I have to tell you the story. I need to get this off my chest, man. And I don’t know…if I’ll make it back. You deserve to know the truth before I go.”
“Fine.” He waits for me to continue.
I take a deep, shuddering breath. I’m sorry, Michelle.
“I didn’t kill Michelle in the woods that day. I followed her there when I realized she took my gun. I was trying to keep her from killing herself.”