Chapter 5: An Angry Phone Call

I sit on a couch in the hotel lobby. I’m in the corner, and it’s late at night, but I’m still in sight of the receptionist.

I call Nick. I didn’t tell the police about him because I don’t want to explain why I find him suspicious, but I know he must have had something to do with this. He isn’t the man I saw ascending the stairs, but he has to have been involved somehow. It can’t be a coincidence that I first saw him just hours before all of this happened. Mom always said Springwater was dangerous for us, and the instant someone from Springwater showed up, she died.

Nick answers. “Hello,” he says, his voice is full of warmth.

“Hey,” I say, my own voice dripping with venom. “So, funny thing happened today.”

“I’m glad you called. I was hoping to talk with you again.”

“Why’s that?” I ask.

Nick clearly senses that it’s an accusation, but I don’t think he understands why. “I enjoyed your company,” he says, his tone defensive. “I was hoping I’d get to see you again, and, come to think of it, I have a bit of a story for you as well.”

“Oh, is that so? How about you go first, then?” I’m certainly not going to tell him not to volunteer information.

“Someone tried to get into my hotel room today.”

“What?”

“I only saw them through the peephole, but someone tried very hard to get into my hotel room.”

“Why are you telling me that?”

“It really freaked me out. I suppose I thought you might know something about it.”

“Why would that be?” He’s not going to turn around and accuse me of something, is he?

“Perhaps I was wrong. I suppose I was just planning to mention it next time we talked.”

“What did the guy look like?” I ask.

“Somewhat nondescript. Fit. Light hair. Hoodie.”

The simplest explanation for what I’m hearing is that it’s a trick. He’s trying to trick me into sympathizing with him or something. It’s the people of Springwater who have been after me and my mother for our entire lives. It has to have been one of them that killed her, and Nick can’t be innocent in that.

At the same time, hearing that description, it makes me think about the grievances he expressed with the town while we were conversing. He made it sound like he didn’t get along with the place. He certainly wasn’t in power there.

I’m being too generous. I’m thinking with my p*nis is what I’m doing. The basest part of me wants Nick not to have been a part of my mother’s murder, so I’m denying the obvious. “Funny thing you should mention that. I saw someone a lot like that today, too. Just a little bit ago, in fact.”

“Oh,” Nick says. “Do you have any idea who it was?”

“He killed my mom.”

“What?” he asks. He does say it like he’s shocked, but maybe he’s just good at acting.

“Yeah,” I say. “Shot through the head.”

“G*d—” he interrupts himself, as if catching himself in a mistake, but then just repeats it. “G*d. I’m sorry.”

“I don’t suppose you had anything to do with it.”

“What? No! Of course not. Why would you even ask that?”

“Springwater,” I say. I shouldn’t have said it. My connection to it is supposed to be a secret, but I can’t help but confront him with the reason I know he was involved. I need to hear him answer for himself, if he can.

“You have something to do with it?” he asks.

“I don’t feel like elaborating further on that point.”

“I thought you might.”

“Oh really? What made you think that?”

“I… never mind—”

“No, I think I will mind. What made you think that?”

“I said never mind. Look, I’m very, very sorry to hear about what happened to your mother. It sounds like you might believe I had something to do with it, but I didn’t. I’ve been in my hotel room all night. There are others who can testify to that. The hotel’s security can verify that someone tried to get into my room.”

“Hopefully the police will follow up on that,” I say.

“Should I expect them?”

“Probably.” Now that he’s made that claim, I have to get someone to verify it. I don’t know how I’m going to ask them, though. Some way that doesn’t make them think I’m the killer, grasping at more straws after already saying there was someone else there. “What hotel are you staying at?” I ask.

“The Lamplighter. You can call them yourself if you want.”

“Maybe I will.”

“I don’t mind if you do. It’s, well, it’s certainly alarming to imagine that the same person went from me to you and, G*d, killed someone.”

“That is what I said.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Thank you,” I say, tersely enough to negate any gratitude.

“You’re sure you’re not willing to tell me what you have to do with Springwater? If you’re from here, you should know I’m with the Springsto—”

“I don’t feel about talking about that any further.”

“Fine,” he says. “Have you ever howled, though?”

“Have I ever what?”

“Howled.”

“What the f*ck does that mean?”

“Never mind.”

“No. You don’t get to say never mind to that. Was that some kind of code phrase, or—”

“You should know that I can’t answer that question.”

“Why not?”

“Unfortunately, if you’re going to keep your secrets, I’m going to have to keep mine as well.”

“Fine,” I say. “Just know that if you had anything to do with killing my mom—”

“I didn’t. I swear I didn’t.”

“If you say so.”

“I’ll call you again,” he says. “When I learn more, I’ll call you again.”

“You do that.”

I hang up.

I look up the lamplighter’s number, and I call them, but I get an automated message reminding me it’s the middle of the night and telling me that I’ll have to call in the morning.

Alright, then. What to do until morning. I could stay at a friend’s place. Kevin might let me crash with him for the night. Except, there’s probably a murderer after me, and staying with someone will put them in danger. I can be somewhere crowded because Springwater’s people don’t act in plain view of crowds, but if they came after me and there was only one witness, that person would probably die.

I could pull an all-nighter. Just loiter somewhere—maybe the same bar I drank at earlier—until the bank opens tomorrow morning. Then I could try to get a new card, except that would be completely worthless because it would take days to arrive in the mail. Would I get checks any quicker? Checks are just pieces of paper, right? Hopefully they can give me at least a few of those. Either way, it won’t help me tonight.

I’ve never been homeless. Me and mom have gone through rough patches, but mom has always managed to keep us from that. Maybe I shouldn’t be comparing my current predicament to that, but if I had experienced it before, that might have left me with some knowledge of where to go when you don’t have a place to sleep for the night.

I look at my phone. It’s just past twelve thirty. Mom died over an hour ago now. I still have the candy I was getting her in my pocket, on top of the candy in my bag. The candy I should have just seen and given her.

Maybe that wouldn’t have made a difference, though. Maybe being there would have just meant I got killed as well. Maybe it was a stroke of extraordinary luck that I happened to be out of the apartment when he came. I survived. My mom died, and I survived, and now I’m going to have to figure out how to live without her for the rest of my life.

How pathetic. That’s the kind of thought you’re supposed to have about your spouse or child. Everyone loses their mom eventually.

It dawns on me that there is a bed that would be open to me. A place where I can go to sleep. Nick invited me to his room thinking we would do more than sleep, but he doesn’t strike me as someone who would insist in that point. He really did sound sorry for me.

I can’t do that, though. I can’t sleep in the same room with someone who might have had something to do with her murder. Someone who might also want to kill me.

I wish mom had told me more about Springwater. I wish she had told me exactly what our relationship was with it and why people from there would want us dead. She must have thought she was protecting me from that information, and that anything I needed to know could be divulged to me when it became clear that I needed to know it.

The universe has played a sick joke on the both of us. If I knew more about Springwater, about the place in it she and my father once had, I would be able to make a better decision now. I might even be able to trust Nick. As things are, I’m left with only vague cautions as to what sorts of things might be dangerous, but no power to assess something that straddles the line between threat and safe.

My eyelids are heavy. Crusty fatigue floats behind them, beckoning them to close. I have to disobey that urge. Unless I plan on settling down and sleeping somewhere public, I’m going to have to stay awake. So, off I go, to search the city for somewhere to stay the night.

I can’t go back to the same bar where I met Nick. The man who killed my mom is still at large, and if Nick had anything to do with what happened, the killer might think to look for me there.

That’s not a huge problem, though. There are plenty of other clubs in town, including one I go to every now and then that I know is open twenty-four hours, and whose policies should let me get as drunk as I wish I were right now. Not to mention the place will be quite crowded, so if I am found there, I’ll have that protecting me.

For a moment, I consider walking there. It’s not like I don’t have the time to kill. I’m too tired, though. Too tired to walk a few hundred feet, let alone several miles. Crossing St. Louis on foot in the middle of the night also isn’t a great idea even if there’s no gunman after you. Mom wouldn’t want me to take risks like that. She would want me to get to the safe place as soon as I could and stay there no matter what.

I call a cab. Luckily, there is some cash in my wallet. About forty dollars. Enough for the trip there—and the trip back to my apartment to drop off the bag I packed—as well as the trip to the bank, and maybe some drinks in between.