The Lost Causes of Bleak Creek(64)

“Why do you get to decide who goes first?” Leif whispered, simmering with resentment at yet another display of Rex trying to take charge.

“Wow, okay. I was just being nice,” Rex said.

“No, you were doing what you always do. Trying to be in the driver’s seat. Just like the funeral. I was having, like, a nice moment up there, talking about Alicia, and you couldn’t deal with it, so you had to make it about you!”

“That’s not what I was doing!”

“Oh yeah, right. And here you go doing it again. Ladies first, my ass. What if I think the gentlemen should go first? Huh? What about that?”

“Dude, you’re not making any sense.”

“You’re not making any sense!” Leif shouted in frustration, realizing he might not be making any sense.

“Guys!” Janine whisper-shouted, a finger to her lips. “We really don’t care who goes first. Either go or stop blocking the way.”

Rex and Leif looked surprised, as if they’d forgotten they weren’t alone.

“Oh, sorry,” Rex said, sure that Janine was second-guessing going on a mission—after midnight, on a Thursday—led by two kids she hardly knew. “We were just…working some stuff out.”

“That’s great news,” Janine said, “but maybe you should do it some other time when we’re not about to investigate a magic murder spring.”

“Good point,” Leif said, stepping aside. “Ladies first.”

They all passed through the fence, then marched in silence up the hill into the woods. Rex scanned the forest for the two-trunked tree. It was notably darker tonight, an overcast sky obscuring the moon, and he couldn’t spot it. As they continued walking toward the spring, Rex noticed that they were all tiptoeing like the four members of Mystery, Inc., from Scooby-Doo. Maybe Leif should have brought Tucker along to help us get to the bottom of this, he thought, as he looked left and realized they’d missed the double tree by a good fifty feet.

“Shoot,” he said. “Um, follow me.” He motioned to Janine and Donna and caught a sour look on Leif’s face. “I mean, follow us.”

Once they arrived at the tree, Rex grabbed his goggles out of his pocket and put them around his neck. “So, there it is,” he said, pointing through the sparse woods to the spring, shivering as he realized he’d be in it in a matter of moments.

“Yup, okay,” Janine said, pulling out her camcorder, which she had thoroughly covered with clear plastic wrap, every part of the camera sealed, including the tripod mount itself. It was a camera waterproofing technique she’d employed while shooting one of Dennis’s crappy short films called The Man Who Met a Mermaid.

“Cool,” Rex said. “So that’s gonna work?”

“It should. I’m not interested in ruining my camera.” Janine grabbed the homemade extended tripod contraption from Donna and carefully fastened the camcorder to it. “Okay, all set.”

Rex nodded, and the troop began slowly descending the hill toward the spring. When they neared the edge of the tree line, Leif stopped.

He pointed across the spring, beyond the grassy expanse on the opposite side, to the Whitewood School. On the near side of the school, next to a row of three little buildings, they could see a small, blackened concrete slab where a fourth building had stood.

“That’s…” Leif said, his voice cracking. “That’s where she…died.”

Rex placed a hand on his shoulder. “And that’s why we’re here. So no one else will.”

Leif nodded and wiped his face.

“I’m gonna go ahead and start filming,” Janine said. She pressed the record button through the plastic wrap, looked in the viewfinder to confirm she was rolling, then awkwardly raised the camera to her face, not an easy task given that the length of the aluminum pole taped to the tripod was nearly her height.

Janine pointed the camera toward the school. She guessed it was about a hundred yards away. Far enough to get the hell out of here if someone comes outside, she thought. A single porch light shone next to the back door.

Seeing the school from the rear gave her the sense that she was somewhere she shouldn’t be, like being on the wrong side of the barrier of the lion exhibit at the zoo. She shuddered, then noticed Donna staring at the spring and trembling.

“You okay, Don?” she asked her cousin.

“I don’t know,” Donna said quietly.

“I told you, you don’t have to be here. I completely under—”

“No,” Donna said. “I need to do this.”

“All right, here we go,” Rex said. He stepped out of the woods into previously uncharted territory, feeling naked once he was out in the open; the spring was only a few dozen steps away, but without the cover of trees, it seemed like miles. Rex was grateful for the clouds, as this brazen trespassing would have been much dicier on a bright night. He looked toward the school. No signs of life.

They reached the water’s edge and were hit by a pungent stench.

“Whew. Was that you, man?” Leif whispered to Rex.

“No,” Rex said. “It’s the spring. Sulfur, I think.”

“Oh,” Leif said. “Right.”

Now that Leif was standing next to the dark, slow-moving water where they had seen things he still couldn’t explain, he felt a tightness in his chest.