“Yes?”
“Everett Duncan—he never went to Vacation Bible School, did he? On account a’ his dad.”
I was wrong: lulled into a false sense of security, a false sense of superiority.Thisquestion, delivered so casually, is why the sheriff has come to talk to me. Me, of all people. Because I’m Everett’s only friend.
“Right.”
“He ever have any dealings with the Blanchard family, to your knowledge? Say anything about Herman or Augustus?”
Slowly, I shake my head, heavy with the weight of the lie. “No, sir. I never once heard the name Blanchard come out of his mouth.”
25
JUNE, TWENTY-ONE YEARS OLD
We were inside a fairy tale, the still water of Starry Swamp a black mirror reflecting the night sky, a thousand stars shining on the surface, one great glittering universe above and below. As we glided through the water, caught somewhere between Heaven and earth, I thought about how none of this should be happening. Two summers ago, when we were nineteen, I’d done a great and terrible thing. Gotten involved in something Everett had expressly forbidden me to and made a deal with the Devil. It had caused Everett to move away. Back then, I’d been convinced I’d never see him again. Yet here we were two years later in the lovely dead of night, our canoe parting the stars. It was the surest proof I had that redemption existed.
He rowed, biceps straining under the sleeves of his black shirt, paddles dipping into the water. “‘The lights begin to twinkle from the rocks,’” he recited, in time with his movements. “‘The long day wanes. The slow moon climbs… Come, my friends, ’tis not too late to seek a newer world.’” Silence hung for a moment, then he asked, “Do you remember that?”
I looked around. The moon was half-shadowed, so the light in the swamp was low. Still, I could see the cypresses rising from the water wellenough to duck their branches as we drifted past, push aside the curtains of Spanish moss. It was quiet tonight, the frogs and crickets subdued, only the faintest hooting of owls. As if the swamp shared my melancholy.
“Of course I remember.” The muscles in my back stretched as I rowed. “Lord Tennyson, from English class.” I would never forget the day Ever recited it. It was the first time I’d felt like I wasn’t alone. But that was four years ago, and so much had passed between us since then. “‘And though we are not now that strength which in old days moved earth and Heaven,’” I recited quietly, “‘that which we are, we are.’”
“You missing our glory days?” The corners of Ever’s mouth lifted. “Feeling nostalgic at the ripe old age of twenty-one?”
We navigated a narrow passage between two trees, their low branches dipping into the water like a woman bending over with cupped hands. Moonlight reflected off a pair of slitted eyes resting just above the water. The alligators weren’t afraid to come close, though they usually remained still as statues. Only their eyes tracked, waiting.
The branches, the gators, and me. Quiet longing everywhere.
“It’s different now that you’re only here for the summers,” I said.
He grew still at the other end of the boat. I knew talking about it made him uncomfortable. But it was the truth. He’d moved away from me, and now each time he came back, a clock started ticking, counting down our time together. Each minute felt precious. “You’re sitting right there,” I continued, “and somehow I already miss you.”
It was wrong of me to push. It was just… The first summer he’d returned after my terrible sin, I’d simply been happy to see him. But this summer, I was finding it hard to feel grateful for the short amount of time we got together, hard to remind myselfIwas the one who’d caused him to move in the first place, a consequence of my betrayal. This summer, it seemed the more I tried to hold on to Ever, the more he slipped away. And on some nights, like tonight, I found myself haunted by what I couldn’t have.
The canoe rounded another corner and the narrow passage opened into a wide bayou, ringed by hardwoods. The half-moon shone a path across the water to our boat.
We stopped rowing and let ourselves drift. Ever leaned over and picked up a bottle of Boone’s Farm from the middle of the canoe, untwisted the top, and handed it to me. “You’re sad tonight. Here.”
“Don’t make fun of me.”
He nudged me with the bottle. “I’m not. I’m trying to distract you.”
I took it, fingers brushing his, and drank, eyes closing. The wine was sweet, more dessert than alcohol, but ever since we were eighteen and Ever stole me a bottle from the Dollar General, I’d loved it.
“Look,” he whispered, and I opened my eyes to a blanket of mist rolling over the water, fast and purposeful as a sentient creature. “A warm front must be closing in.”
“Here it comes,” I said. “Watch out.”
I’d no sooner spoken the words than the fog swallowed us. In the dense, wet air, I could only sense Ever as a darkness at the other end of the canoe.
“Ruth.” His disembodied voice emerged through the fog. “Did you notice how strange Herman Blanchard acted at the store?”
I leaned and extended the wine, which he found by feeling through the fog. I listened to the sound of his throat working, and when he was done, he laughed. “It continues to surprise me how much I don’t hate this stuff.”
I settled back into my end of the boat. “Herman has always acted strange around me.” While we were picking up the Boone’s Farm at the Dollar General—paying this time—we’d turned down an aisle and there he was, carrying a green plastic shopping basket with nothing inside but crayons and strawberry hard candies, the kind we gave out at church. The minute he saw us, he’d turned and fled, not even a hello. “Well,” I corrected. “He’s been that way since the summer before sixth grade.”
“What happened then?”
