December Park(156)

Yet nothing happened.

At December Park, kids played baseball on the diamond, and others ran in undisciplined circles playing a game of tag. I barreled past them all. At the edge of the woods, I leaned my bike against one of the metal trash cans, then hopped the fence.

The woods were hot and buggy. I forged my way through the dense trees, fanning clouds of gnats away from my eyes. When I came upon the clearing, all that remained were the headless statues. The trash bags of stuff we had collected all year were gone. So was the beer cooler where we’d kept the fleur-de-lis, the walkie-talkies, the flashlights. Either the cop had returned and taken our stuff . . . or Adrian had come by and cleaned us out.

I climbed out of the woods and retrieved my bike. Out across the park, the ballplayers cheered.

I biked up the pathway to Solomon’s Bend Road, leaning over my handlebars and racing through the Point-Counterpoint intersection. On foot, the shortest way to the Patapsco Institute was to cut through the woods. Since I had my bike, I could take the longer—and easier—way around.

At the edge of the park, I veered off the main road and followed the curve of the woods along a nameless gangway of packed dirt. The trail pitched at a gradual incline as it rose out of the residential streets and joined the cliffs at the edge of the bay. Soon I was pedaling along a narrow strip of dirt with the woods to my right and the yawning still grayness of the Chesapeake Bay far below on my left. Against the horizon, the Bay Bridge was a ghostly mirage simmering in the midsummer haze.

When I reached the plateau where years earlier I had sailed a balsa wood airplane through the air, I coasted to a stop, then dropped my bike in the tall grass. I stood at the edge of the cliff, peering down at the triangles of sailboats carving white foam on the surface of the bay. I closed my eyes and inhaled, remembering that day Charles and I had taken the johnboat out. A sepia-toned filmstrip of memories flickered across the underside of my eyelids.

I turned away from the cliff’s edge and headed for the woods. This close to the water, the foliage was of a different breed. I swiped through the huge sweeping ferns, ducked the jungle-like vines garlanding the trees, and stepped over the colorful bouquets of wildflowers.

After a time, the Patapsco Institute reared out of the trees like a living giant dressed in ivy and stone.

There was the window we had gone through, only now there were two thick tree branches trailing up from the ground and leaning against the sill. They looked like rails, like handholds. The sight of them caused my body to grow cold.

Despite my mounting discomfort, I trekked up to the building and stared at its ugly, empty eye-socket window. The darkness beyond was infinite. “Adrian!”

Birds exploded from the underbrush.

I shouted his name a second time, my voice echoing over the chasm of cliffs. Things moved in the trees all around me.

A fine sweat dampening my brow, I trudged around the side of the building and repeated the call. This time, my voice shook the treetops. I moved around to the front, where the great twin doors stood like steel palates beneath the stone arcade, and repeated my call once more—“Adrian!”

. . . rian . . .rian . . . rian: my voice crystallized in the air.

The only response came in the form of that familiar, inhuman yowl of the wind transmitting through the stone walls and pouring out of all the broken spaces in the masonry.





When I arrived at the Juniper, my friends were already in the theater waiting for the show to start. The double bill was Village of the Damned and House of Wax with Vincent Price. I sidestepped down the aisle and sat next to Peter, who had a tub of buttered popcorn on his lap. On the other side of Scott, Michael leaned into the aisle and chucked a Jujube at me.

As the previews crackled onto the screen, I told them about finding the two tree branches propped up against the window at the institute. “I think Adrian went back in there.”

Peter shook his head. “No way he went in there alone.”

“But those tree branches,” I said.

“And even if he did,” Peter said, “he’s probably home by now.”

“He’s probably still pissed,” Michael said. I had previously told them about Adrian getting upset with me and running away. “Quit worrying about it. He’ll get over it.”

Someone shushed us from two rows back. Michael threw Jujubes at them.

Then the first movie started, and I attempted to lose myself for a few hours.





Keener’s truck was still parked on the curb at Haven Street.

Against my better judgment, I braked, got off my bike, and went to the driver’s side window. The interior light was dimming, draining the battery, but I could make out the refurbished upholstery, no doubt redone after Michael Sugarland deposited his little gift on the front seat. There was a pack of Camels on the dashboard, a container of Skoal that looked like a hockey puck wedged in the console, and a few empty Budweiser bottles on the floorboard of the passenger side. The dome light was on, because the driver’s door had not been shut all the way.

It made me nervous. The whole damn thing.

I hurried home.





Midway through a meal of oven-roasted chicken, artichokes, mashed potatoes, and elbow macaroni simmering in a soup of melted butter, someone knocked on our front door. My grandmother made an attempt to get up, but my father rose more quickly and moved out of the kitchen and into the vestibule. My grandparents exchanged a look. It was unusual to be disturbed during dinner.