The Broken Girls

The wind stung her cheeks. She walked across the clearing that had once been the parking area of the drive-in, where everyone would have parked facing the screen. Her boots crunched on the dirt and old gravel. The sky lowered, angry and gray. She walked toward where the screen would have been, trying to see past the rise there. She couldn’t see anyone or any cars, but she noticed that the abandoned lot was scrupulously clean, free of litter or garbage, which didn’t compute with a place teenagers had been using for decades.

At the other end of the gravel she saw it. An old house, set back, nearly hidden by trees. A trailer, parked farther back in the shadows. A pickup truck on the drive. Hell, she thought, someone really does live here.

“Help you?” a voice said.

She turned to see a man of her father’s age, though heavily muscled, his head shaved in a military crew cut. He wore a thick parka, boots, and old army pants, but it was the rifle slung casually across his forearms that Fiona stared at, cradled in his grip a little like a baby.

“I’m looking for Stephen Heyer,” she said.

The man shook his head. “He’s not here.”

Fiona blinked. Her eyelids were cold in the wind. “He told me he sleeps here sometimes.”

“He does,” the man said, “but not today.”

Fiona felt her shoulders slump. This had been her only idea; she didn’t have another. “But I need to talk to him.”

The man looked at her curiously, and did not move the gun from his arms. “Sorry,” he said. “And I hate to point it out, but you’re trespassing.”

“I didn’t know this was private property,” Fiona said through her fog. “I thought it was abandoned. Sorry.” She looked around. “Where does Stephen sleep?”

“My trailer,” the man said. “I have a few people who come by there when they need a place. Some peace and quiet. I’ve been letting people sleep in my trailer since 1981.” He paused. Fiona tried to take in this oddly specific fact, as if there was something about 1981 she should know. It didn’t occur to her what he was waiting for until he said, “My name’s Lionel Charters.”

Oh, right. “Sorry,” she said. “My name’s Fiona. Fiona Sheridan.”

Lionel went still. “What is Malcolm Sheridan’s other girl doing in my drive-in?”

That made her meet his eyes. Malcolm Sheridan’s other girl. “I guess you were here when my sister died,” she said.

Lionel nodded and didn’t look away. “My uncle Chip started the drive-in in 1961,” he said. “When Chip died, I took it over. I ran it until 1997. Not many drive-ins lasted that long.” He shrugged. “It didn’t bring in much money, especially toward the end, but I don’t need much. My wife left in ’eighty and my son died in ’eighty-one. Ever since then, it’s been just me.” He seemed to be looking at her closely, but Fiona had lost her focus again and things were slipping. “I was here that night. I was here every night. I was here when they found her, too. I could see all the commotion when I stood at the end of my drive and looked across Old Barrons Road. The ambulances and such. It was a shame, what happened to your sister.”

Fiona swallowed, unable to speak.

“I’ve heard Stephen’s story,” Lionel said. “He’s wanted to talk to you for a long time. I take it he finally did.”

“Is it true?” Fiona asked, her voice a croak. “I’m not a good judge. Did he fool me?”

Lionel was quiet for a moment, and then he shook his head. “Stephen didn’t fool you,” he said, and the wariness in his voice was almost mixed with kindness. “What happened to Helen was real. If you’re wondering if Tim Christopher did it, he did. Just like he killed your sister. I’d swear that on my son’s grave.”

“Why?” she asked him. “What makes you so certain?”

Lionel looked away.

Something roared through Fiona. The restlessness she’d been feeling twisted hard in her gut, almost painful, and her blood jittered. She felt like screaming. “You saw something,” she said softly. “That night. You saw something.”

“I see a lot of things,” Lionel said, his face hard. “The ghost, for example. I see her.” He turned and looked at her. “Do you?”

Fiona felt her face blanch. “She comes here?”

“Not here,” Lionel said. “This isn’t her place. But over there”—he nodded in the direction of Old Barrons Road and Idlewild—“I’ve seen her walking plenty of times. Girl in a black dress and veil. The first time I saw her myself, it was 1983. I thought some teenager was playing a prank, dressing up, even though it wasn’t close to Halloween. Who knows what teenagers find funny? So I went over there.”

“What did she show you?” Fiona asked.

Lionel blinked, his gaze going cold. “That’s none of your business. Just like it’s none of my business what she showed you. What that girl does is cruel, a violation of everything that’s good and right. I never believed in ghosts until that day, and even now, I don’t believe in them—except for that one. I believe in that one. And I’ve seen her walk the road and through the trees, but I’ve never gone back across Old Barrons Road again. What she showed me, I’ll take to my grave.”

Fiona’s throat was raw; it felt like she’d swallowed razor blades. Still, she said to him, “November 21, 1994. What did you see?”

Lionel shook his head. “This isn’t going to help you, girl. Just like what that abomination across the road shows you isn’t going to help you. It’s only going to cause pain. He’s already in prison for what he’s done.”

She tried not to sway on her feet. “Tell me.”

He sighed. A crow flew overhead, giving off its hoarse cry. A cold wind whistled through the bare trees past the old lot. The first dry flakes of snow landed on Fiona’s coat.

“The cops came that night,” Lionel said, surprising her. She’d never heard that before. “Said there was a complaint call, but I know I never made it.” He looked around. “It was November, and there were four kids here, maybe five, sitting in a circle, drinking God knows what. They’d made a little fire, but it didn’t bother me. It wasn’t big enough to spread, and I knew that eventually those kids would get cold and go home.” He raised his gaze to the dirt-and-gravel drive Fiona had driven up, and lifted one hand from his rifle to motion to it briefly. “I was just telling the kids that no one had better puke in my bushes, when Garrett Creel himself came walking up that path.”

Fiona stared at him, shocked now. “Garrett Creel?”

“In the flesh,” Lionel said with contempt. “That old fucker never liked me. Never liked that I go my own way, living on my land, and I don’t care about his rules. He’d come here plenty of times, asking if I’m growing weed out here or cooking meth or something. As if I’d do that shit after what happened to my boy. But that night was different.” He turned back to Fiona. “He came walking up the drive, you see. From the bottom. Parked his cruiser down on Old Barrons Road and walked the rest of the way instead of driving. Why’d he do that?”

Fiona shook her head. She didn’t know. None of this had ever been covered in the papers, in the trial. She felt like she was Alice in Wonderland.

“So Creel comes up here, scares the shit out of the few drunk kids who were sitting here, gives them a lecture. Something about lighting fires—suddenly he’s Smokey the fucking Bear. He turns to me, tells me I’m liable if anything happens, just the same as if I was sitting there drinking shitty brew with those kids. All bluster. He took his time. He thought I didn’t notice, but I did. So when he walked away, going leisurely back down my drive, I cut across the hill over here”—he motioned to the left, where all Fiona could see was overgrown weeds—“and got a view of the road. It was dark, and Creel didn’t see me. His cruiser was parked on the side of the road. He got in, and the interior light went on for a second, and I saw Tim Christopher. Clear as I’m looking at you right now. Sitting in the fucking police cruiser with the chief of fucking police. Then Creel turned the car around and drove away.”

Her head pounded. This was like a crazy dream. Tim Christopher in Garrett’s police cruiser, and twenty years later, through the media coverage and the trial, no one had heard it. “Why would you lie about this?” she asked Lionel. “What reason would you have?”

“Why would I lie about anything?” Lionel said. “Ask around about me, Sheridan girl. Ask your daddy if you want. I’m an open book, always have been.”

“Then why wasn’t any of this evidence in Tim’s case?”

“Because I was told to shut up about it,” Lionel said. “Clearly. By people who meant business. Those kids never saw Garrett’s car, but they saw Garrett. He lectured them. But when they were interviewed, not one of them mentioned it. Because the people who got to me got to them. It was Garrett’s force, and they were Garrett’s cops, every last one of them—none of them was honest. Kids are easily scared. I’m not, but I know when to shut up for survival. And that was one of those times.” He looked at her carefully. “Besides, they got him. Tim Christopher’s been in jail for twenty years. I had to choose the lesser evil.” His gaze cut over her shoulder, and she heard the hum of a motor. “Come to speak it, I think the greater evil is on its way.”