December Park(2)

The tented black hats of two more uniformed officers materialized on the other side of the guardrail. A fourth officer stepped out from one of the cruisers and leaned against the vehicle’s hood, appearing cold even in his fur-lined jacket.

Scott nodded in the direction of the police cars. “Come on. Let’s check it out.”

“They might grab us for truancy,” I said. “I’m already in the doghouse with my dad over that whole Nozzle Neck thing.”

Mr. Naczalnik, otherwise known as Nozzle Neck due to his faucet-shaped profile and a neck like Ichabod Crane’s, was my English teacher at Stanton School. Last month, I had failed to turn in an assignment, and Nozzle Neck, forever at the ready to make some poor student’s life miserable, had wasted no time telephoning my father. I had been grounded for a week.

Peter checked his Casio. “School’s been out for twenty minutes already.”

In tandem, we crossed the intersection and walked up the slight incline of Counterpoint Lane toward the police vehicles and the ambulance.

When we reached one of the flashing sawhorses, the bored-looking cop approached. “Sorry, fellas. Street’s closed.”

“What happened?” Peter asked, trying to peer around the cop.

“You boys need to get out of the street. You can watch from the other side.”

“Did someone drive off the road again?” I asked.

“No.” He was a young cop, almost familiar. I glanced at his name tag but didn’t recognize his name. “Come on, guys. Shake a leg.”

“It’s a free country,” Peter said but not with any force. He was still busy trying to look over the cop’s shoulder.

The cop arched one of his eyebrows. “Yeah? Well, you can be as free as you want across the street.”

“Can’t we just take a quick peek?” Peter pushed.

The young cop’s eyes settled on me. “Get your friends back across the street, Angelo.”

His use of my name didn’t surprise me. My father was a detective with the Harting Farms Police Department. Policemen frequently recognized me, even if I hadn’t met them before. “Come on, guys,” I said and stepped onto the sidewalk.

“Thanks.” The police officer nodded at me, then glanced at my friends. “You boys are too young to smoke.” Then he checked his watch, perhaps recognizing that it was maybe too early for us to be so far from school already, and strutted across the street.

There was increasing commotion over there now, although most of it was on the other side of the busted guardrail and farther down the embankment. Two men in white smocks milled about, smoking cigarettes and talking to each other while gazing at their shoes. At one point they spoke briefly with a uniformed officer. Their languid movements and casual air made me think that nothing too urgent was happening on the other side of the guardrail.

“You know that guy?” Scott whispered, even though the cop was too far away to hear him.

I shook my head.

“It’s freezing out here.” Peter zipped up his coat and blew into his hands. “What are they doing, anyway? What’s going on over there?”

I shrugged. For the first time, I was aware of the faint, tinny sounds of Metallica spilling from the headphones Scott had hanging around his neck.

Loyal to his surname, Scott Steeple was tall and slender and possessed the coveted body of a natural athlete. His features were subtle, handsome, his eyes introspective and haunted. Having just turned fifteen one month earlier, Scott was the youngest of our group. He should have been in the grade below ours, but his academic prowess had enabled him to skip second grade. Thus, fate had dropped him in the empty desk beside me in Mrs. Brock’s third grade class, consequently forging a friendship between us.

“You guys going down to the docks tonight?” Peter asked. He was pacing, his hands in his pockets, sometimes pausing to balance on one foot while the other hovered half an inch off the ground.

“I guess,” Scott said.

“Angie?”

“I don’t know, man,” I said. “What time are you heading over?”

“Maybe around nine.”

“I guess it depends if my dad’s home or not. I’ve got that new curfew.”

“But it’s Friday,” Peter said.

“You know how my dad is.” Generally, I was allowed out until eleven o’clock on weekends, but since the disappearances, my father had cut my curfew back an hour. If everyone was getting together at nine, it left me precious little time to hang out. I wondered if it would be worth it.

Peter frowned. “Dude, you gotta come. Sugarland’s gonna sink that stupid cow, remember?”

“Yeah, I know.”

“Look,” Scott said, taking a single step off the curb. “They’re coming up.”

More heads emerged from behind the slope of the embankment, rising like buoys on a gray sea, and I immediately felt both excited and dismayed. The officers leading the pack were the only ones conveying any sense of urgency; they moved quickly ahead of the rest and dispersed along Counterpoint Lane, presumably to make sure no vehicles disobeyed the roadblock. Two of them turned their heads in unison and looked straight at my friends and me. If they were considering shooing us away, these plans were aborted once the full surge of officers, so dense in their numbers that I couldn’t count them all without losing my place, joined them.