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“What do you mean, ‘good’? It’s vandalism, and it’s all over the news. ”
He kicked my dashboard with his torn-up shoes and swore loudly.
“Goddammit, woman—people are dying, and you’re worried about a few broken windows?”
“First of all, I don’t know of anybody who’s actually dead yet, and second, those are windows in the place where I intend to live in a few weeks. So at the risk of sounding callous, yes, I’m more worried about the broken windows. I know you had something to do with it, too. ”
He dropped the adolescent whine, and, just for a sentence or two, he sounded his age. “If I did—and that’s if—then it would have been an attempt to alert you to the underlying problems of that location. ”
“You’re an idiot. And get your feet off my dashboard. ”
“A prophet is never loved in his own land, I know, but this is important! Look outside, and what do you see?”
“Rain. Lots and lots of rain. ”
“Exactly. It’s the water. At first I thought it was just the river, but now I think there’s more to it than that. It’s all the water—the rain, the river, the creeks and the runoff. It feeds a greater system. It sustains the chaos. It . . . ” He fumbled for words.
I interrupted while I had the chance. “What are you talking about? And I mean it—I’m asking like a serious human being here, and I’d appreciate it if you’d do me the courtesy of answering like one. Drop the bullshit, and drop the slam-poetry speak. You’ve got exactly one minute to explain to me why I shouldn’t make an anonymous tip to the cops about the North Shore vandalism. ”
“Tip all you like. They’ll never find me. ”
“And again I say, you’re an idiot. It took me about thirty seconds to find you. ”
“But you knew where to look. I wanted you to find me. I orchestrated this. I made myself available. ”
I rolled my eyes and pushed the back of my head against my seat. “You’re down to forty-five seconds, asshole. Behave like a grown-up, or get the hell out of my car. You’re making the place smell like wet dog. ”
He pulled his feet down off the dashboard and turned to face me, drawing one leg up underneath himself. “All right. Something nasty is buried down there, by the river. Somethings, I guess I should say. At first I thought it was just one—whatever they are—but now I know better. There’s a handful of them, at least. And they are pissed’”
“Why?”
“I have no idea. But they’re coming up more often. Eden, I swear to you—” he held out his hands, palms forward. “I swear. No bullshit. No bullshit this time. They’re killers. And they don’t just come out whenever, it’s got something to do with the river. It has to be a certain level, maybe. That’s all I can figure out for now. That’s all that makes sense to me. ”
I thought again of Lu, and her one stupid argument for keeping me away from the North Shore apartments. “The water rises,” I said slowly. “The banks flood. And . . . and what? Something’s buried in the banks? What, do monsters reconstitute themselves like sea monkeys? I still don’t get it. ”
“I don’t either,” he admitted, again with his thirty-year-old man voice. “But the more weird shit happens, the more I’m sure of it. And I think—I don’t know, but I think—they’re working their way farther up into the city each time. They’re looking for something. ”
“Now you’re just grasping at straws. ”
“I’m brainstorming. At first, the only people who went missing were right down by the water’s edge. But now they’re disappearing from farther and farther uptown. It’s only a matter of time, especially with the rain like this. They’re tied to the river somehow, and when the river rises, it—I don’t know. It might expand their reach. And with all this rain, the river’s bound to rise. ”
“That’s what the TVA is for. ”
“Yeah, and the TVA has never fucked up. ”
“I didn’t say that. ” His minute was up and we both knew it, but I didn’t kick him out of the car yet. “This is crazy,” I told him instead. “There aren’t any monsters down by the river. ”
“Then where’s Pat? Where’s Catfood Dude? And where’s Ann Alice? Has anyone seen her lately? Because I found her jacket down under the Walnut Street Bridge. And I can’t find any other sign of her. ”
“Wait—what? For a guy who’s afraid of the river so much, what were you doing down under the bridge?”
“Looking for Ann Alice!” He almost shouted it at me, and in the added volume I heard a hint of real despair. “She used to meet a dealer down there—she sold off her ADD prescription for lunch money. But he went missing last week, and I tried to tell her not to go down there looking for him. Now they’re both gone. And I found her jacket. ”
He mumbled the last part, as if he wasn’t sure how to finish and he was becoming aware of how silly it sounded.
“Okay,” I said, trying to tie it all together in my head.
He hunkered down in the bucket seat and crossed his arms over his chest. “At first I thought that you could go talk to them like you talk to ghosts, and then it would all clear up. But now I don’t know. Now it seems weirder than that. It seems worse than that. ”
