The Secrets of Lake Road (3 page)

But the hardest part for Jo to understand was the disappointment in Gram’s eyes whenever she looked at her. It had become a thing between them, this look of disappointment, separating them through the years. Neither one knew how to bridge the gap nor did it seem that either one wanted to try. Too many years had passed. Too much had been said or not said for either to back down now. It was as though both mother and daughter had given up on each other.

“I’m disappointed in you, too,” she whispered to herself in the car as the Commodores crooned about love.

Subconsciously, or maybe consciously, she steered toward Lake Road and headed down the hill, taking it slow, maneuvering the Chevy around the potholes nobody bothered to fill. She spied Johnny and his friends hanging out on the steps of the Pavilion. He cupped the cigarette he wasn’t supposed to be smoking in his hand and pretended not to recognize their car. As she drove past, she kept her eyes straight ahead.

Pretending not to see each other had been their unspoken agreement since Johnny had turned fourteen two years ago. She didn’t ask the typical questions a mother might ask her teenage son about where he was going and who he was going with mostly because she understood his desire for independence, for freedom. She believed Johnny appreciated the trust she had placed in him, and so far he hadn’t given her any reason not to. She understood better than anyone his need to stray.

After all, he was a lot like her.

He even looked like her—dark hair, full mouth, high cheekbones. The way he looked and behaved, it was easy to forget he was half of his father, too. More times than not she thought of him as solely hers. She didn’t rag on him about things like smoking and drinking as long as he didn’t do it in front of Gram. Besides, he only did those things while he was here. She understood that, too. There was something about this place that brought out the best and worst in you, pushing you to extremes.

“There’s something in the lake water,” she had often joked, but she never laughed. A part of her believed it was true.

Caroline had always been a different variety of kid. From the moment she had entered the world, she had made demands Jo struggled to meet—the feedings every hour, the crying, the fussing, the tantrums when things didn’t go her way. “Mommy, you stay here,” a three-year-old Caroline had said, stomping her foot whenever Jo had tried to leave the house.

The image of Caroline standing in the yard outside of the cabin cut across Jo’s mind. The way she had looked at her, the yearning in her eyes, had scared Jo. A part of her felt threatened by Caroline’s demands of constant love and attention. No matter what Jo said or did, no matter how much of herself she felt she gave, it was never enough. It would never be enough.

For a long time she tried to give her daughter what she could, all the hugs and kisses and affection she demanded, but somehow she’d always come up short. Her biggest fear, her failure as a mother, was simply that she didn’t have anything left to give.

At thirty-two-years old, Jo felt used up.

*   *   *

She continued driving past Johnny and his friends, and parked on the other side of the Pavilion. The lake poured out in front of her. It was beautiful on the surface, glimmering in the hot summer sun, the water dancing in rhythm against the shore. And yet, underneath all that refreshing sparkle, deep in its belly, its true form lay waiting, where its cold dark reality lurked.

Laughter drew her attention to the beach on her left. Already she could see it was crowded. Families spread out on blankets and chairs. Kids jumped off the low dive and raced to the floating pier in the middle of the lake. Younger kids stayed in the shallow water closer to their parents, where it was safe.

The lake had been her summer haunt since childhood. Gram and Pop had bought the cabin in 1984 at a time when the resort was considered one of the hottest vacation spots in the Poconos. It was at a time when the beach had been overcrowded with vacationers, and a young Jo had to race through hordes of people with her towel and Gram’s beach chair just to get a spot near the water. Pop had to reserve even the smallest of rowboats two weeks in advance if he wanted to do a little fishing.

The lake had held the Trout Festival, the largest festival in the county. But it was the Pavilion that Jo had loved best as a kid. It was always bustling, the second-floor bar hosting concerts with some of the biggest local names in the music industry. Sometimes late at night, when she should’ve been asleep, she’d sneak out of the cabin to listen to the band. She would press her cheek and palms against the Pavilion’s outside wall, the whole building vibrating with sound as though it were alive and dancing with the occupants inside.

Over the years the lake’s popularity had waned and the crowds had thinned, with new vacation spots opening for competition. But the regulars—the cabin owners and locals—kept coming, and together they remained loyal. Once you fell in love with the lake, the Pavilion, it was unlikely you’d fall out.

After tucking her hair behind her ears, Jo climbed out of the Chevy. A delivery truck pulled into the lot. She waited while it backed up to the stairs leading to the second-floor bar. A man in a gray uniform emerged with a clipboard in his hand. He opened the back door of the truck where the kegs and cases of beer were stacked.

Jo hustled past and trotted up the steps. Inside, the heat smoldered like an oppressive cloud. Eddie leaned on the bar, looking over a stack of order forms.

“We’re closed,” he said without looking up.

“Hey, stranger.” Jo sat on the stool in front of him.

He lifted his head and smiled wide. “Hey, Jo. I thought that was your boy I saw earlier. When did you get in?”

“This morning.”

“You look good.” His dark eyes settled on hers. His long hair was tied in a ponytail, and a sweat-stained red bandanna was wrapped around his head. “Do you want a beer?”

“I thought you were closed.”

“Not to you.” He popped the cap off a cold bottle and set the beer down in front of her. She took a long swallow before reaching for a cigarette. He was quick with a light, and when she leaned into the flame, she couldn’t help but notice his missing thumb tip, the one the snapper had bitten off when they were sixteen years old.

He glanced at his thumb, and she was embarrassed to have been caught staring. After all these years, she struggled to shake the image of him flapping that turtle through the water, screaming, splashing, and later, sitting on the beach, staining the sand black with his blood, his then girlfriend, Sheila, holding him.

She had been Billy’s girl back when it had happened. Everything in her life, good or bad or in-between, always led back to Billy.

*   *   *

She polished off the bottle of beer and set it on the bar, raising her pointer finger, signaling to Eddie for another. She couldn’t remember the last time she had gotten drunk in the middle of the afternoon. Maybe as far back as last week when she had split a bottle of wine with one of the other maids while they were scrubbing the floors in the half-a-million-dollar mansion they were hired to clean back home in New Jersey.

“So are you planning to stick around for a few days?” Eddie asked.

“It looks like it.” She didn’t have much choice. Gram was adamant about needing her help, although she still had to clear it with Rose, her boss. She raised the bottle to her lips. “Apparently, I have chores to do around the cabin,” she said before taking a long drink.

“Is Kevin joining you?” he asked.

“He had to haul a load to Arizona.” Although he was most likely on his way back by now. Kevin drove a big rig for a trucking company. He was on the road more than he was home, and she was okay with that. She understood it was easier for him to be away. He had given up so much, sticking by her when she became pregnant at sixteen with Johnny, marrying her when he could’ve walked away. She loved him for it. Sometimes she loved him so much, it hurt.

The delivery guy made an appearance with several cases of beer stacked on a dolly. Eddie rushed to help him. While the guys unloaded the order, she continued to smoke and drink, wondering how she was ever going to get through the next couple of days.

By the time Eddie returned to the bar, she was feeling dizzy from the heat. Frank Heil, the owner of the Pavilion, the bar, and the beach, was too cheap to leave the air conditioning on when the bar was technically closed. Eddie had to work in the heat until the sun went down and the doors were opened to customers.

“Here.” He opened another cold bottle and set it in front of her. “You know, I didn’t want to say anything earlier, but your boy was all over one of those Chitney girls.”

“So soon? It didn’t take him long.” She picked up the cold bottle and placed it on her cheek.

“Those Chitney girls are, well, you know what I mean. I’d make sure Johnny knows what he’s getting into. The oldest sister, she’s got two kids, and she doesn’t even know who their father is.” He was about to say something more but then stopped.

People were shouting on the beach below. Their voices traveled through the open balcony and to the second-floor bar. Eddie looked at her. “That doesn’t sound good, does it?”

“No, it doesn’t,” she said.

A woman screamed.

CHAPTER THREE

Caroline crashed into the circle her friends made on the beach. She peered at the object in Adam’s hand. It looked like two pieces of rusted metal joined by an even rustier circular ring.

“What do you think it is?” Adam asked.

“It’s definitely old.” Ted picked it up and turned it over.

“If you’re cut,” Ned said to Adam, “you’re going to need a tetanus shot.”

“I told you, I’m not hurt,” Adam said.

“Where did you find it?” Caroline asked.

“Right there.” He pointed to the area near the pier where the water was shallow. “I did the pencil jump,” he whispered. “And my foot got caught on it.” He stammered and looked around for his mother, who was always yelling at him to be careful.

Megan took the metal object from Ted. “I think I know what it is.” She squinted in an ominous way. “I think it’s a horse’s bit,” she said. “From the horse in the legend.”

They huddled in close as they passed around the newfound treasure, an expression of awe on their faces. In hushed voices they agreed that yes, it certainly looked like a horse’s bit and appeared to be very old. Yes, it could be from the horse in the legend. More mention was made concerning tetanus shots. Adam kept shaking his head and saying over and over he didn’t get cut.

“What’s this about a horse’s bit?” The woman wearing the wide-brimmed sun hat, Sara’s mother, stepped forward. She had obviously been eavesdropping on their conversation.

“Didn’t you ever hear of the legend?” Megan asked.

Caroline hit Megan in the arm as a way of shutting her up. The mention of the legend, something the kids talked about in private, wasn’t something a newcomer to the lake would have heard about. Heil and many of the other members of the lake association forbade anyone to talk about it and scolded kids when they did. The legend brought back bad memories, a link to a past drowning most people wanted to forget. Any mention of the legend between Caroline and the younger kids was discussed in the privacy of clubhouses and dugouts, places where parents were nowhere to be found. But Sara’s mother appeared amused. She squeezed her way into their circle and stood in front of Megan.

“Go on,” she said to Megan.

An uneasy silence fell over the group. Other sounds were magnified: a duck flapping its wings, the water lapping against the pier, the sound of a pinball machine inside the Pavilion.

“We’re not supposed to talk about it,” Adam said, and glared at Megan. “Besides, I found it and I want it back.” He reached for the bit, but Megan held her arm up so he couldn’t get it.

“It’s his, Megan,” Ted said, and tried to pull her arm down. The two danced around in a game of Keep Away.

“Hold on.” Sara’s mother pulled Ted and Megan apart. She took the horse’s bit from Megan’s hand. “Tell me what you know about it.”

Everyone but Megan stared at their feet.

“A long time ago, like, I don’t know, in the early 1900s,” Megan said, “they used to cut the ice on the lake for refrigeration and stuff. But one time the ice cracked and a horse and carriage fell through. Legend says the horse and driver drowned, and their bodies were never found. On certain nights during a full moon some believe you can hear a horse whinny.” She lowered her voice. “Others claim they’ve heard the sound of the horse’s hooves clip-clopping across the ice.”

“And you think you found the bit from this horse?” Sara’s mother’s thin eyebrows raised and disappeared underneath her sun hat.

“Maybe,” Adam said, and wiped his hands where the rust from the metal had stained his skin orange.

Everyone stopped talking when Adam’s mother crossed the beach to where they were standing. “Hi, I’m Betty, Adam’s mom,” she said to the young woman.

“I’m Patricia.” Sara’s mother stuck out her hand.

“It’s mine, Mom,” Adam said. “I found it.”

“What is it?” Adam’s mother asked.

Patricia handed the metal piece to her. “The kids were just telling me about the lake legend.” She smiled as though she had conspired with them, and tilted the wide-brimmed sun hat just so.

“Were they now?” Adam’s mother wasted no time and jumped in to explain that the legend was a myth told around campfires. “Something the kids made up a long time ago and nothing more than folklore.”

“Is that so?” Patricia looked at Caroline as though she just now recognized her. Then she eyed the rest of the kids. She looked all around them and past Adam’s mother as though she were searching for something. She continued looking around the beach, turning in circles.

Adam’s mother gave the bit back to him. “Take this to Mr. Heil. It’s his beach, and whatever it is, it belongs to him.”

“But I found it in the lake,” Adam said.

“Go,” his mother said. “All of you.”

Adam sulked but did as he was told and headed toward the Pavilion. They all followed him, dragging their feet in the sand. Behind them, Caroline heard Adam’s mother ask Patricia if everything was all right.