The Bargaining (20 page)

“History. No sweeping. Got it,” I say, my head to the jeep's window.

I don't think April went back to sleep last night. I think she stayed up all night, pacing the uneven floorboards of the Carver House, evaluating all that is wrong with it. I think for the first time, I'm seeing a different April. One who finally feels the immense weight of a broken-down house resting squarely on top of her. And it's heavier than she thought it would be.

When she practically tackled me this morning with the plan to visit the Point Finney Hall of Records for details on the house's history, I sensed a shift in direction. Her new strategy is evidently to play up the house's historical “charm” to distract from its decrepit plumbing and fire damage that she still hasn't had any luck finding contractors to fix. This is obviously the part of this whole summer project that April's been the most excited about anyway.

I only agreed to go along on the chance there's a public computer with a fully functioning connection to the Internet. I found a missed call from my mom this morning from who knows how long ago. My phone never rang, not that that's a shock given our nonexistent cell service. I should at least drop her an e-mail to avoid the inevitable guilt trip I'll be subjected to if I don't respond at all.

And if I'm being truly honest, after last night, I have no desire to be in that house by myself. April could have declared that she was going on a cockroach hunt this morning, and I would have grabbed my boots and told her to lead the way.

The Hall of Records is actually the Registrar's Office, which sounds way less dramatic and historical than April made it out to be. Not that it makes much of a difference to me either way, so long as they have a computer I can use. But April seems disappointed, and her disappointment deepens
as we walk through the doors of a bland, one-story office building that smells vaguely of those pinecone car deodorizers. The Registrar's Office shares space with the Department of Education's local branch, a chapter of the Elks Club, and Pierce County Vehicle Licensing Services.

April turns to me, her brow pinched.

“You know, as long as they have the information you're looking for, it really doesn't matter if it isn't pretty.”

It's clear that absolutely nothing but the oven in the kitchen is shaping up to be the treasure hunt of historical significance that April thought it would be.

We follow the marquee pointing us to the Registrar's Office and stand in the Real Estate Inquiries line. According to the nameplate on the desk of the only working employee in the office, “It's Cynthia Doom's Pleasure to Help You!”

“Doom? This just keeps getting better,” April says as I nudge her forward. We're next.

“I'm looking for some history on a property—”

“Form B12, fill out the front and back, sign and date the front,
not
the back. Bring it here when you're done. Next!”

April shakes her head. “Sorry, that was a lot of information. Did you say—?”

“B12. Like the vitamin. Next in line!” Cynthia Doom
beckons the next customer with her chapped hand while pointing April to the corner of the room where stacks of forms live.

“Do you have a computer in here that I can use?”

Cynthia Doom turns to me, making it clear that we've exceeded her patience with two more questions than she's allotted us.

“Library across the street. Is there anything else I can help you two with?” I've never heard that question asked in a more threatening manner.

April and I shake our heads, retreating to the form table.

“I'll be back in a few,” I say.

April looks at me like I'm leaving her to fend for herself against zombies.

“Please, April. I need to reconnect with civilization. I'm woefully behind on my celebrity gossip. And I haven't been able to get my e-mail to load on my phone since we got here.”

She sighs. “Fine. It's not like you could really help me out here anyway. Sort of a one-person job.”

I'm halfway to the exit before she says, “One hour, okay? Meet me back here. If you don't see me right away, call for help; I've fallen down a bureaucratic hole.”

The library across the street is exactly what April was ­looking for in the Registrar's Office. It's small, but the
­building was probably built fifty years after the Carver House was, only I'm guessing the library's toilets don't flush arbitrarily. The entire place is paneled in wood, and the air is a mixture of oak and old paper. The librarian is younger than I feel like she should be in a place like this. She can't be more than twenty-five.

“Do you have computers people can use here?”

“Do you have a library card?” she asks.

I try to remember the last time I set foot in a library. It involved a canvas bag and a summer reading list. My parents were still married.

She smiles warmly, and after Cynthia Doom, I want to hug this girl.

“You can sign in as a guest for thirty minutes. Just put in this code,” she says and slides a piece of paper toward me. I thank her and grab a seat next to a middle-aged man in khakis and a bright blue rain jacket who smells like bubble gum.

I sift through celebrity news in a matter of minutes and get bored faster than I'd expected. I log in to my e-mail and shoot my mom the obligatory note, then surprise myself by deleting the entire contents of my inbox without reading a single message. I can't actually imagine wanting to hear from anyone I haven't had contact with in the past three months.

Most of it is probably just spam and more empty questions from fake friends in Phoenix wanting to know if I'm okay. Translation:
Can I get some more details about how your best friend died?

I go into a trance thinking about Rae. Thinking about all the times I almost reached out to Melissa Corey after she transferred. But what would I have said? How do you beg for forgiveness for the crime of standing still? Thinking about that night in the desert, how I blamed Rae for all of it. Thinking about how I want, with everything straight through to my bones, to stop thinking about all these parts of a life I traveled three states to get away from.

And eventually, my mind shifts to more recent horrors.

After sitting in front of the screen until it falls asleep, a little Pierce County Library icon bouncing from wall to wall, I have used up fifteen of my thirty minutes on the machine while reflecting back on the events of last night.

That hand, frozen in midair, ready to slap the face of a young, terrified Miller.

The boys in their curtain disguises.

Jack's eyes staring from the mural.

I think back to previous nights, to the girl in the woods I've been trying to convince myself this whole time was Rae. To Miller's uncle. To Roberta and George. To the
plumbers and engineers who won't set foot in the woods.

Before I know what my fingers are doing, they've woken the computer and started a news search on “Point Finney missing kids.”

A flood of headlines fills the screen, most dating back nine or so years, with a handful reflecting on the anniversary of the kids' reappearance from the years that followed.

I try “Point Finney North Woods” in an effort to narrow the results.

I'm rewarded with almost the same number of results.

I erase and try “Point Finney Jack Dodson.”

This narrows the search slightly, though with a few new headlines emerging that didn't pop up in the initial two searches. I sift through the stories about a Gail Dodson from Omaha who won the Pick 5 back in 2009 and a disputed election in Dodson, Texas.

The timer in the corner of the screen is clicking down. I have twelve minutes left.

I choose the first story, the one that has come up in every search, from the
Tacoma Weekly
. It looks to be the first article written about the kids after they went missing. The same row of school headshots is used in this article as was used in the one in Ripp's newspaper clipping.

“At the edge of the North Woods,” I say.

“What?”

The bubble gum guy next to me is leaning over, trying to hear me better.

“Sorry, I was—”

“This ear,” he says a little too loudly for a library. Or to someone he doesn't know. “Can't hear so great in this one.”

Someone shushes him from across the room.

“I was talking to myself,” I say, one eye on my computer timer.

“Uh oh. First sign you're gettin' old,” he says.

I smile and position myself away from him.

The second article is an update offering little information, aside from interviews with the investigating police and surrounding families after the kids had been missing for several days. The third article is the electronic version of the one on Ripp's wall.

TACOMA—JULY 16, 2004—The small township of Point Finney is celebrating tonight as the last of four missing minors has returned home after a harrowing six-month stay in the densely wooded land on the outskirts of town. Anna Riley (12) was found not far from the edge of the woods where the kids were last seen, before disappearing on January 19 of this year.

Found by her own father, a teary George Riley told reporters, “It's a miracle to have our kids back.” Asked what he planned to do now that Anna has been found safe, he simply said, “We're going to go home now.”

Mr. Riley's words mirrored those of the other two sets of parents, whose repeated requests for privacy have left followers of this remarkable story of tragedy and miraculous recovery of Jack Dodson (14), brothers Russ (11) and Blake (12) Torrey, and Anna Riley (12) baffled.

Marjorie Torrey, mother to brothers Russ and Blake, whose returns marked the beginning of the end of the terrifying journey for four Point Finney kids, was the first to comment, saying in almost the same words that her sons' return was a miracle, and that they wished to be left alone while they waited for the remaining youths to come home.

Sergeant James Meckel of the Pierce County Sheriff's Department—who has led the investigation from the beginning—has assured the public that after talking to the children, parents in the area have nothing to fear.

Says Sergeant Meckel, “I've spoken with each of
the kids in detail, I've talked to the parents, and this is basically just a case of kids wandering off where they're not supposed to and getting lost. They're lucky to be alive. We're still investigating the precise location of where they disappeared and have apparently been living for the better half of a year.”

No arrests have been made in the case, and no suspects have been identified in what police are saying is an ongoing investigation.

Adds Sergeant Meckel, “We'll have more questions for the kids, of course. We'll want to know how they kept alive in that sort of weather. It really is a miracle that they've come back in such good ­condition.”

But police and the press will have to wait for now. As the families of each of the missing children continue to request privacy, many are left wondering how the parents knew where to find their kids upon their return, leading some to wonder if it was all an elaborate hoax for media attention.

Janet Brewer of Port Orchard is skeptical: “There's no way those kids were missing that whole time. They came back one after another, right in a row, like they were being called back by a dog whistle or something. And now those parents don't
want to tell the police what happened? Come on.”

Still, some locals are quick to point to longstanding superstitions about the dangers this section of the Kitsap Woodlands Reserve—better known as the North Woods to Point Finneyians—holds for children who misbehave.

“Nobody from around here would dare to let their kids go anywhere near those woods. Everybody knows that. Ain't no place for children. Ain't no place for anyone, really,” says Delinda Major, whose family has lived in Point Finney for five ­generations.

Roberta Wallochuck, who clerks for Point Finney's only grocery store, agrees. “We've got a saying here. You do something stupid, that means you're taking the fork on the right.” The fork on the right, according to Ms. Wallochuck, leads to the North Woods from the only road in town that travels in that direction.

But superstition or not, few can argue with the relief felt across the small, historic township of Point Finney now that the youths have turned up.

In addition to the four pictures of the kids used in the print version of the story, one more picture is included in the electronic version, this one capturing all four kids together
after their rescue, at least one parent at each side.

Even as a digital image, the picture is slightly out of focus and taken at a distance. It's difficult to make out much, but what isn't hard to see is that each of the four kids is staring in the same direction, off to the side, as though someone made a loud noise somewhere outside of the frame right before the camera clicked. The only thing visible from the frame in that direction is the woods.

And while each parent holds the child who belongs to them, not a single kid holds their parents in return. Instead, their arms are limp at their sides, their faces slack.

I stare at the picture for another moment, unable to tear my eyes from what it's showing me, which is basically nothing. But something about it is so unsettling, I can't seem to look away.

My timer is down to seven minutes by the time I click on one of the last stories, which is the shortest of them all. Barely enough to justify space in a newspaper.

POINT FINNEY—AUG. 23, 2012—A Point Finney man died in the early hours of August 22 after veering into a tree on the Magnolia Parkway. Burt “Scoot” Dodson (52) of Diamond Creek Road was last seen by acquaintances at The Washingtonian,
a bar located less than a mile from the scene. Owner of Scoot's General in Point Finney, Dodson was the father of Jack Dodson, one of the Point Finney Four, whose disappearance and miraculous reappearance in 2004 remains a mystery to police to this day. Jack's whereabouts have been unknown for some time, according to neighbors. He could not be found for comment. Burt Dodson's wife, Doris, took her own life in 2010. The Pierce County Sheriff's Department offered no statement on the matter, only responding that it was a tragic accident. When questioned about the Point Finney Four case, a sheriff's deputy stated the case was closed, and that the officer heading up the investigation was no longer available for comment. Sergeant James Meckel retired in 2009 to the Toronto area.