Never smile at strangers

She reached out for a dandelion blossom and began picking it apart, tears stinging her eyes.

“And Tiffany still hasn’t come home. No one seems to have any idea what happened to her. I wish you were here to help us. I miss you so much.”

Sheknew that even if her father were still alive, he wouldn’t be able to do much. It wasn’t as though he were a detective or bounty hunter. He had been a bookworm, a college professor. A slight, gentle man. But it didn’t stop her from aching to see his face again, feeling his thin arms around her shoulders trying to comfort her.

She hugged her knees and looked out at the trash on the side of the dirt road that led to the cemetery. Beer cans, abandoned fishing tackle, a Wendy’s wrapper. The barb wire that was meant to shelter the cemetery was loose in places and leaning, hardly a protector of anything.

None of the headstones were as nice as her daddy’s or Nana’s. Some of the dead only had markers. Simple license plates containing the name of the deceased, dates of birth and death. Other markers were mere stones, some odd-shaped, some jagged. She noticed a lawn chair had fallen across one that read Mother in sharp, pointy letters.

She thought of her own mother. “Mama’s still in bad shape. She won’t even get out of bed,” Haley whispered. “I don’t think she wants to live without you.”

She tried to push back an awful thought, one that had come to her over and over the months since the accident. Wishing it had been her mother, not her father who had died that night. Aside from Tiffany, her father and Nana had been her best friends. And in many ways, she had been much closer to them.

While Becky had been attached to her mother’s hip, it had been Daddy who Haley was most attached to. They were able to talk about anything, and they often did. She also knew that if it had been Mama who’d died, her father wouldn’t have abandoned them as she had. He would have been stronger, even if just for his girls. His princesses.

Several feet away, a branch snapped. Haley let go of her knees. Feeling her body stiffen, she peered out at the woods, a dandelion with no petals between two fingers.

“Someone there?”

Another branch snapped.

Her breath caught in her throat. She squatted, and planted her feet firmly on the ground, prepared to run.

After a terrifying moment, she heard a familiar female voice. “Sorry. It’s just me.”

She saw a hand, then a head full of hair emerge from the brush. In the murky light, it took her a second to realize that it was Erica Duvall.

“Hey,” Erica said, nervously brushing off her t-shirt. “I’m sorry. I didn’t know anyone was out here.”

She turned to go.

“No. Don’t go,” Haley called. “You can stay.” She shuffled to the other side of the graveyard and sat down.

Erica stood still for a few seconds, as though she was trying to decide. Finally, she walked toward Haley and set her backpack down. “Any news?”

Haley shook her head. “No. None.”

Erica fumbled with her backpack and pulled out a bottle of wine. She twisted the top off and took a swig. “The wind is shifting,” she muttered, holding out the bottle for Haley, but not meeting her eyes. “It’s going to storm.”

Haley studied the bottle before reluctantly accepting it. She had only drank once in her entire life, but wondered if it might, for one teeny moment, help her forget. She took a sip of the bitter-sweet liquid. . . grimaced and handed it back.

“You visit him every day?” Erica asked, gazing at the other side of the cemetery. The side where Haley’s father lay.

Haley hugged herself against the chill in the air. The cemetery always seemed cooler than the rest of the town. “Most days.”

“I’ve seen you here before,” Erica said. “But figured you needed to be alone, so I left.”

Haley watched her down more wine and wondered how often her conversations had been overheard. “Why do you come out here?”

“There’s a different energy here,” Erica said, handing the bottle back to her.

Haley took a longer swig of the wine and winced at its sharpness. She marveled that after all these years she was actually sitting across from Erica Duvall, having a real conversation. Out of all the people she’d ever known, she couldn’t think of anyone she had been more fascinated with. The girl had a dark sense of mystery about her that no one else she knew possessed. Although barely five feet tall and rail thin, she also possessed a certain toughness. Not the feigned toughness a lot of teenage girls tried to exude, but the real thing.

The wind shifted and Haley wrinkled her nose. An overbearing, musky odor blanketed the air. “I smell a skunk.”

“Yeah, there’s a dead one on Harper’s Road,” Erica said, pointing to the dirt road to their right, easing her feet out of her flip flops and rubbing them across the grass. “Lying with his legs in the air. His beady black eyes staring up at the Lord. Not that there really is one, of course.”

Haley could tell by the way the girl slurred her words that she was drunk. She looked at her bare feet. “Aren’t you afraid to go barefoot around here?”

“No, not really. My feet are tough. Besides, it’s better to feel the world around you. People let themselves become too desensitized. How can you write if you don’t feel anything?”

Haley nodded.

Darkness blanketed the graveyard in a matter of minutes, bathing the cemetery in eerie shadows. Erica lit a cigarette and the two passed it back and forth. The orange ember was now the only light in the graveyard besides the dull bluish glow of faraway stars.

They remained sitting, passing the wine and cigarette to each other. Soon, Haley’s head was spi

“You know, this is the longest we’ve gone without talking since we were like three?” Haley muttered.

“You and Tiffany?”

Haley nodded. “If she was okay, she would have called me. But she’s not okay. She’s either hurt or she’s. . .”

The orange ember of Erica’s cigarette grew sharp against the night as she sucked in. She said nothing, but her silence spoke volumes.

“You know, it’s probably not the right time to say this,” Erica said, “but I never liked Tiffany. Not to say I hope anything bad happened to her. I just don’t want to lie to you. Just thought you should know how I feel about her.”

Haley shrugged. “Not everyone likes her. Or me, for that matter.”

“Are you kidding? Everyone likes you.”

Haley thought about it and silently agreed. After all, she’d never had an enemy. It had just seemed the right thing to say.

A branch snapped a few yards away. Haley jumped. “Did you hear that?” she whispered, not taking her eyes off the woods.

“Shhh. . . Stay still.”

Another branch snapped, then leaves crunched as something or someone made their way through the tree line. An owl screeched from somewhere up high, then a dull, circular light appeared. It bumped between the tree line and the cemetery.

A flashlight.

But as quickly as it appeared, it was gone, and darkness returned to the cemetery.

“Quiet,” Erica whispered.

Haley nodded, and held her breath.

For several long seconds the two sat quietly. Haley’s ears strained against the night, but she couldn’t hear a thing out of the ordinary. Just a chorus of bullfrogs and the night breeze stirring the leaves above them.

Then she felt Erica’s small hand on her wrist, and the girl jerked her up. Before she realized it, she and Erica were ru

Chapter 20

AT THE ANDERSON house, Tom Senior glared at his wife, his face flushed. “I’m not validating that question,” he snapped.