Envious Moon(28)

She leaned against one of the large doors and was dressed as I had never seen her before. She had on a long dress, almost to her ankles, and her hair was up. She looked remarkable, to tell you the truth, but I didn’t focus on that because I knew she was upset about something. I was too far away and Hannah was partially in the shadows so I could not tell if she was crying. But from her body language I saw that something was not right. Her arms were crossed over her chest and her head hung to one side and downcast toward the floor. Her mother moved back and forth in front of her. I wished I could hear what she was saying because it looked like she was really giving it to Hannah. I hated to see her upset. She seemed so sad. She wouldn’t look up at her mother. At one point her mother just stopped and glared at her. And I saw Hannah shaking her head over and over and for the first time it occurred to me that somehow they might be talking about me. But how was that possible? She wouldn’t have volunteered anything. She was clear about that. And as I was thinking about this, I looked to the other end of the ballroom and I realized that they were not alone.

He was against the far wall, the way he stood a mirror image of Hannah, though he looked more bored than distressed. His arms were crossed in front of his chest. He had on a white long-sleeve shirt and beige khakis and maybe this was why I had not seen him before. He blended in with the colors of the room.

But there was no mistaking that slicked-back hair and the leathery sun-beaten skin. Sheriff Riker.

You might have thought that my concerns right then were about getting caught. That I would have immediately broke into a sprint back to the hillside in the rain to get my things and figure out where to hide. But seeing the sheriff made me realize that the only reason he was there, the only reason for the sadness Hannah wore in the very way she stood, was because of me. And if this were true, it meant that the sheriff knew I was the one on the stairs that night. He had told Hannah that I had killed her father.

I was not worried that this meant I could go to prison. Instead I was worried that all we had built in the time we had been together might fall apart. That Hannah might not want to see me anymore. That she might even hate me. And I could not live with that. I needed to reach her somehow, reach her without getting caught, and explain everything. How it was all a mistake, how important she was to me. I needed to lay it out for Hannah and pray that she understood.

I stood in the soaking rain and stared through the fog and into the tall windows. My eyes moved back and forth from Hannah to her mother to Sheriff Riker. At one point Hannah stepped out of the shadows and I saw how hard she was crying and her mother went to her and tried to hold her but she shrugged her off. Then Hannah extended one arm out and pointed toward the back of the house, toward the cove and the beach. When she did, Sheriff Riker brought his hand to his mouth and in the dark to my right, toward the front of the house, I suddenly heard the crackle of his voice, and, more alarming, a human voice in response, some twenty yards away from where I stood.

I took one step back, my boots sinking into the wet earth. I strained my eyes through the blackness and I heard the voice again and then another one. “This way,” one of them said. I couldn’t see anything at all. The rain fell all around me. I was happy for the dense fog. I glanced back at the window and Hannah’s mother held her now. The sheriff was gone. A beam of light swept across the trees behind me. I saw them. They were in the driveway. Two flashlights and then three. Voices. I turned toward the cove and in the fog I broke into a light jog. I looked over my shoulder at the lights. They were moving this way but not quickly. They did not know yet where I was. I started to run. I ran behind the house and across the wet lawn. I kept close to the tree line and it was so foggy it probably did not matter. I could have run right down the middle of the grass and there was no way they could have seen me. I reached the path and sprinted down it. The path was so muddy my boots made big sloshing prints in the dirt. The earth was so soft from the rain that they were deep impressions. This was a problem. If they shined their lights on the ground, they would know exactly where I went.

I did not have much time. I crashed through the grove of trees to my makeshift camp. I left the raincoat up between the trees but I grabbed the oilskin bag and returned to the path. I climbed back up toward the house, moving as fast as I dared, my eyes peeled ahead for any lights. When I reached the grassy lawn I looked ahead through the fog. The house was still lit like a Christmas tree but I did not see the flashlights or the sheriff’s men. I got on my knees with the oilskin bag in front of me. I moved backward on the path, dragging the bag across my footprints as I went. It wasn’t perfect but it seemed to be working. If they came while I was doing this, I would need to stand and sprint for the beach, hope for the best. But I made decent time. The path would have the wipe marks on it but no one would make those out until the morning, if then. My prints, on the other hand, would have been plain as day. I crawled backward and I slid the bag and I looked ahead and I listened. The bag made a scraping sound as I went. The rain continued to fall. I worked as fast as I could. Any moment I expected to see flashlights moving on the path above me. But I made it to where my makeshift camp was and I lifted the bag and went through the trees. I sat again under my raincoat and I listened.

I wanted a cigarette so badly. Now that I was no longer moving, my heart raged in my chest. There was the rain and the heavy fog and the sound of my breathing. I did not hear anything else. Maybe they weren’t looking for me at all. Maybe they were after something else altogether. I mean, I didn’t know for sure that the sheriff had discovered somehow that I was the one in the house that night. I’ll give it ten more minutes, I thought, then I’ll have a cigarette. That’ll calm me down.