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I move to the next window and only see more of the blackened furniture. I start coughing as soon as I stick my head in to see more of the inside.
“I’m pretty sure at least some of this is black rot,” I say, speaking amid sputtering coughs. “And there’s no sign that anyone has been here in decades. Or that anyone even walked up to the house.”
“Tina!” Lily yells. “Tina, are you here?”
Her yells startle a flock of birds from a nearby tree, but that’s all the response she gets. She calls a few more times anyway, walking around the house, and I do too. With the same non-result.
She shrugs. “She’s not here. But maybe the people that live there saw something.”
She’s pointing at a plume of smoke rising into the sky in the distance. I can just about make out a roof and a chimney between the pines growing thick between us and the source of the smoke.
“We might as well go knock on the door and ask,” I say and head back to the car.
I do hope we find Tina safe and sound. But I have my doubts it’ll be in some house at the edge of nowhere. I also hope whoever lives there is friendly, but from what I’ve already seen of the locals those hopes aren’t too high.
19
EAGLE
Driving down the road,I lost sight of the house with the chimney among the trees growing ever thicker and taller, but suddenly a lane appears, leading deeper into the trees. I drove right past it, but Lily gasps and grabs my forearm.
“That was the way to the house, back up,” she says and I do it, even though I’d much prefer to just keep riding.
I stop at the entrance to the lane. It’s mostly dirt with patches of gravel here and there and only darkness at the end of it. But it looks well used and the top most tire tracks look a day old, at most.
“Come on, let’s check it out,” Lily insists.
I’d prefer to have a couple of brothers with me for this, and I’d prefer for her to be far away, but saying so now won’t go over well. It’d make me sound like a coward if nothing else, and that’s always been the last thing I wanted her to think of me.
I turn onto the lane, going fast because the pot-hole ridden surface is making the SUV bounce to the point I’m afraid whatever’s been clanking the whole way here will break soon.
The lane’s not very long and opens onto a clearing with five buildings encircled by a tall chain link fence. The gate is wide and open, and no one’s around. All the buildings look shabby, and like they were erected by someone with only the most basic knowledge of construction. I’m thinking the main house is the trailer with a boxy addition to it covered with piss-colored drywall, but I could be wrong. That’s the house with the chimney and up close, the smoke cuts right into my nose. Whatever they’re burning in there is not just wood. There’s two more trailers and a wooden barn type of thing, made of plywood and normal wood.
The huge yard is filled with garbage in the form of rusting cars and trucks with no tires, heaps of scrap metal, old tires and things that no longer even look like what they once were. I stop near the house in a spot where turning should be easy, so we can get out fast. I’m fighting the urge to tell Lily to stay in the car, preferably behind the wheel for a fast getaway.
“This place has a really bad vibe,” Lily says in a near whisper, voicing the exact thing I was trying not to.
“We’re here, let’s check it out,” I say, doubting the sense of those words before they’re even out of my mouth. Why am I even fronting before her? She knows exactly who I am.
But she’s already opening her door so there’s no way to take the words back. I follow quickly and spend the few strides to the door taking in every detail of the surroundings. Nothing is moving, but something is creaking somewhere and what sounds like a whole kennel of dogs is barking. They’re drowning out my loud knock on the door.
I take a step back from the trailer door and look around again. One of the buildings about ten paces from the trailer home is a garage—a tin roof, open front structure housing a couple of trucks, once of which is covered with a military green tarp. The rest of the space inside it is taken up by tires, tools and scrap metal.
“Is anyone here?” I yell hoping I don’t get a reply so we can leave.
But no such luck.
A wide, stocky man comes from behind the garage, wearing dirty, ripped blue jeans, work boots that were possibly orange at one point, a green and black plaid jacket and a yellowish grey baseball cap pulled so low over his eyes they’re completely hidden.
“Hello,” he says as he strides towards us. Black curly hair is peeking out from under his hat and there’s something very familiar about his dark eyes as he glances at me. “What can I do for you?”
He’s chewing on something and apart from the one glance, looks down at the ground the whole time he walks towards us.
“We’re looking for a friend of ours,” Lily says. “Tina. She might’ve gotten into an accident on the road out there. Have you seen her?”
The man shakes his head. “Can’t say that I have, little lady. No accidents here lately. Haven’t even heard a car go by in a week or more.”
He’s standing about two paces from us now, a weird distance. It’s too close. I can smell the sweat and something garlicky on him. And he’s still not meeting my eyes.
