Page 82 of A Sea of Unspoken Things
I took another step toward the door. Then another. Until I was standing in the hallway and watching her through the large glass windows. She paced the floor back and forth, muttering to herself.
“It was an accident.” Her voice cracked. “It was. I’m almost sure it was.”
I found Amelia’s number and dialed, holding the phone to my ear. It rang only twice before she answered.
“This is Amelia.”
“It’s James.” I swallowed. “You need to come to the high school. Right now.”
Twenty-Eight
A week after Olivia Shaw was arrested for Autumn’s murder, therewas still a wrinkled missing poster plastered to the glass door of The Penny.
Autumn’s eyes stared at me as I sat at the bar with the band playing at my back and a second glass of whiskey in my hand. I had the innate sense that I knew her now. That I understood her. The reflection of my own life that had played out in Autumn’s had bound us together in some cosmic way that I would never fully comprehend.
Micah and I had volunteered in the search for Autumn’s body that went on in the gorge for five days before they called it off. Still, no one was completely sure exactly what happened. Olivia had recounted the story in so many different versions to police that, in the end, the only common thread that wove the versions together was the fact that Autumn fell.
History repeated itself in this forest, and in the years that Olivia was Autumn’s teacher, Olivia had relived her own experience as the less talented art student who never made it out of Six Rivers. The girl who’d never really been noticed, never been given a way out. But none of that was true about Autumn.
Autumn Fischer had been standing up on those cliffs the day she was leaving for Byron, only hours away from playing out the ending to Olivia’s story. Left behind. Forgotten. A faint imprint on someone else’s life. Autumn was poised to take a photo as Olivia watched, simultaneously consumed with adoration and envy. Did Olivia actually touch her before she fell? If she did, had she meant to push Autumn, or had she slipped? No one, not even Olivia it seemed, would ever know the answer to that question.
Micah had been out on the Klamath River again for two and a half days while Smoke and I went through Johnny’s things at the cabin. I’d made three trips to the thrift shop to drop off donations, but I’d kept a few things for myself. His blue plaid jacket was one of them.
There’d been no more evidence—physical or circumstantial—that indicated that Johnny’s death was suspicious. It was generally agreed upon now that he was, in fact, out in Trentham Gorge looking for Autumn, and the town’s narrative had shifted once again, recasting into a version they could live with. Now, Johnny was being regarded as a kind of hero.
Down the bar, I could see a smudged version of him sitting with a drink. He’d been there for the last hour, his elbows up on the counter, fingers tangled together with a glass before him. As always, I waited for him to look at me, but he didn’t.
Maybe I was imagining it, but he felt just a little farther away now. Just a little more out of focus. Like he was slowly disappearing, and honestly, that scared me. Since I’d first gotten the call from Amelia, I’d never been able to digest the idea that my brother, with all his storm clouds and kinetic energy and the sheer force he used to move through the world, could ever truly be dead. And I guess that was what was so horrible about accidental deaths, like Amelia said. In a moment, with no meaning whatsoever, someone could just be…gone.
Micah came in through the door of The Penny, letting the light of the streetlamp flood into the dark bar, and I lifted a hand into the air.He made his way toward me, taking the stool next to mine, and I slid my glass of whiskey toward him.
“How was the trip?” I asked.
“Cold.”
Neither of us had brought up the fact that I was leaving in a few days for the opening of the show at Red Giant Collective. Most likely because if we did, we’d have to talk about whether I was ever coming back. Instead, we’d spent each night finding our way into each other’s arms, trying to drown out the aftermath of everything. Autumn’s death. Olivia’s arrest. The loose ends of Johnny’s life. The bottom line was, I didn’t know if I could leave my life in San Francisco unless I knew what I was leaving it for. And maybe thatwasmy answer.
“You ready to do this?” Micah asked softly.
We’d decided to spread Johnny’s ashes, just the two of us, but back in town, we’d be joined by whoever wanted to honor Johnny’s memory at the diner. My guess was that Sadie had planned the memorial as a kind of peace offering for what happened when Ben was questioned, but things hadn’t quite thawed between us. Maybe they never would.
Micah and I drove the twisting roads deep into the canyon at the heart of Six Rivers, with Johnny’s ashes on the seat between us. I’d wanted to go at night when the darkness felt like liquid black, and with the whiskey warming my belly, I could feel that it was the right decision.
Micah eased off the road onto a crude gravel track and the headlights washed over the broken asphalt. When he turned off the engine, they cut out, and that strange, muted silence enveloped the truck. We sat there for a few seconds until I looked at him. This was the last time it would be just the three of us.
We got out and walked, the urn cradled in the crook of Micah’s arm. The sound of night in the forest was like a hive of bees, and with every step, it seemed to grow louder. I didn’t stop until it felt like we were swimming in it. Until it felt like we had disappeared.
Micah waited for me to nod before he opened the urn, and we didn’t speak any special words or try to mark the moment with wisdom or nostalgia. What could we possibly say? I couldn’t even pretend to know how you could take a whole life, a whole person, and put it into words. Goodbye is a lost language. A silent one.
Micah turned over the urn, gently shaking out the ashes over the roots of a giant tree, and a hush fell over the forest that dove deep into my chest. It had taken losing Johnny to fully know him, but there was more to it than that. I had to lose him in order to even know myself.
When the urn was empty, we stood there, watching the thin veil of moonlight fall through the trees. Then we turned and left him where he could hide. Where he would find the quiet. Where he’d never be found.
We left him in the dark.
Twenty-Nine
It seemed the whole town had shown up at the diner to say goodbye to Johnny.