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I go through the files one by one. They’re a jumble of information. Old police files, including an autopsy report with photos of a dead man, shot three times in the chest. The file says he died in Alaska. It happened the year my dad came for Christmas. The year he disappeared for good.
There are pictures like surveillance photos. Names and dates I don’t recognize. Some of them are just men talking to one another on the street. One set is a man in a business suit meeting a woman in a motel—and then losing the business suit over the course of ten or twelve photos. I don’t need to be an expert in crime to recognize blackmail material.
At the end of the box is a slender book filled with names and numbers. I don’t know if it’s code or accounting. Either way, I don’t understand it. I flip through—and stop.
Green, C.
My father’s name and a string of numbers next to it. Money? Dates?
I flip through, desperate to find more details, but it’s the only mention of him I can find. I don’t recognize any of the other names. There are plenty of Rs and Ds that could be Raph and Daniel, but I can’t be sure. Some of the names are crossed out.
Would they cross out my dad’s name next time they came looking for these files?
One of the other folders holds a bunch of bank statements. In another I discover a folded-up map and plans for a building. And there’s a fat stack of paper in the back of the box with a binder clip and a rubber band on it. The first page is marked AGAINST TYRANNY.
The rest looks like a typewriter vomited onto the page—every line of text nestled up against the ones above and below it, to fit as many words as possible onto every page. Eerily like the way I wrote in my journal.
It gives the impression of an intense, manic mind—and one that really, really doesn’t like the government. This must be their manifesto.
I think of Albert, wonder if he wrote it. Or if he’s a follower of the man who did. I wonder how much of this my dad agreed with. How much he just went along with. Because he didn’t stand up to them, didn’t refuse to help them, didn’t turn them in.
Not even when they put me in danger.
I lay the files and the slim book and the manifesto in front of me. I wait for meaning to come, for information to turn into understanding. I know what they are, these men. A militia. Criminals. Terrorists, even. And this is evidence. They needed to hide it; they hid it here.
I know all of that, but it holds no real meaning. Whatever this group wants, whatever they’re doing back in civilization, it doesn’t matter. It’s too distant from me, from this place, for me to care. What matters is Raph. The man who killed my father.
Their plan was a good one. Hide this evidence where no one would think to look for it. Out here, you could be certain no one would disturb it. That it would be exactly where you left it.
Except it won’t be, will it? These men, these dangerous men, will be so confused.
I pack everything back into the box. Everything but the grenades. I’m terrified to touch them, but they’re the most lethal weaponry I have, and I might need them.
I drag the crate into the woods. I don’t bother to bury it again, just cover it up with branches. It’s as good as buried. There’s so much forest, they’ll never know where to look for it.
When they look for it, when they look for me, I’ll have to be smart. I’ll have to hide, and move quickly. I’ll have to go after the pilot first. He’ll be alone. And with him dead, they’ll be stuck.
Then I have to get Raph alone.
When they come, I’ll be ready.
