Page 71 of We Already Dug the Grave

“Frances. Tell me.”

“Let’s get out of here.” Her voice squeaked as she turned away. “Please.”

I shook my head. “No. No, you tell me what’s going on.” I held the helmet up. “You know what this is?”

“Of course I do. That’s Casey Montgomery’s. He wore it everywhere back when he was in love with you in high school.”

I nodded. Swallowed. “Why…why do you seem so…so unmoored by it?”

“Unmoored?” She snorted and shook her head, spinning back to face me. “Why do I seem fucking unmoored? I don’t know. Maybe because my sister finding a dead boy’s helmet in my husband’s office is pretty fucking ‘unmooring.’”

Those words—dead boy—flew from her mouth and into my sternum like a punch.

“What did you say?” I asked. I couldn’t move. Couldn’t blink.

Frances said nothing. We stared at each other, me clutching the helmet, her clutching the wristwatch.

“Frances. I’m going to need to you to be very honest with me, you understand?” My heart pounded and I leaned against the desk, using its support to remain upright because, dammit, I was losing it. “You called Casey a dead boy. Why?”

My lungs burned. Breathe.

Inhale. Slow exhale.

Frances swiped at the tears glistening like small diamonds down her cheeks. “I’ll tell you, but you’re going to hate me forever.”

Chapter 27

Then

In the end, Casey didn’t drive us home. It was Frances who took the keys from him. Frances who told Casey she had it from here before getting behind the wheel and leaving him behind. She parked in our yard next to Ruth’s truck and cut the engine.

“I’m going to take a shower.” She opened her door without looking at me. “Do you think dish soap would help get the stains out?”

“Huh?” I looked at her, bewildered.

“Of my Converse.” She shook her head exasperated. “Forget it. You’re drunk.” She slammed the truck door. I watched her disappear into the house.

For a long time, I stood alone in the yard, listening. Transfixed. The whirring sound was faint but unmistakable. Ruth’s bone grinder. I’d never had the stomach for helping Aunt Ruth process game, but if the grinder was whirring tonight, if my aunts were in that shed—it could only mean one thing.

I walked toward the sound like it was the sirens’ call, reverent dread building in my chest, the ground unsteady beneath my feet. The melodic whir of the bone grinder cut through the night sounds like music of a steady, terrible murder ballad.

The idea of Mr. Fortenberry’s limp body hanging from the gambrel in Aunt Ruth’s game shed, slit from clavicle to crotch, the bucket filling beneath him—stopped me in my tracks. I retched violently onto the ground, then spit, wiped my nose on the back of my hand.

In the dark, with the everything swaying, I bumped into the sawhorse-table that Ruth kept in front of the shop, knocking her most recent collection of bones to the ground.

Always bones. Bleaching, drying in the sun, waiting for their purpose. I left them in the grass and dirt.

My hand was on the doorknob of Ruth’s shop, but before I could twist it, Hattie-May cracked it open as if sensing me.

“No dearie. You can’t come in here. Go get some rest. Be with your sister.” She touched the side of my face, and if she could tell I’d been drinking, if she could smell the vomit on my breath, she kept it to herself.

My lip trembled, and I opened my mouth to speak but a pitiful mewling sound escaped. And instead of pulling me forward, instead of dragging me into her warm embrace, Hattie-May grabbed my shoulders, and anger laced her tone. “Now, that’s enough. I’m sorry—but this won’t serve you.”

I sniffed back the last of my tears, longing for her scent of tomato vines and comfort to envelop me. I wiped my eyes with the heels of my palms and nodded.

Stop crying or I’ll give you something to cry about!

No. No, my great-aunt wasn’t Daddy. If she told me to stop crying—she had a good reason.