Dive Smack, page 14
“You went to see him about this project of yours, even after I told you to stay away?”
This is starting to feel like an interrogation. The former Ellis Hollow fire chief in action.
I plead the fifth with tight lips and a tilt of my head.
“I see,” he says. “You’ve been going to see him all along, is that it?”
This is what Uncle Phil wanted, for me to be open, but having everyone riding my jock over Uncle Phil this week makes me snap.
“I don’t get what’s with you parents. Grandparents. Whatever. I’m almost eighteen. I think I can make my own decisions about the people I want in my life. It’s not like I can count on you for anything. Not with the way you’re always drinking.”
The minute the words leave my mouth I feel like an asshole. Living with GP is no picnic, but he is my only biological family left. He used to be fun when I was a kid, taking me to the fire station, letting me ride in the trucks.
“I don’t know which parents you’re talking about, but you might wanna watch where you’re stepping, kid. A lot of convoluted shit could get dug up.” He starts coughing like his throat can’t handle when he raises his voice.
I meant Iris’s dad of course. But I don’t feel like adding Mr. Fiorello’s obvious issues with Uncle Phil into the mix right now.
“I’m just saying. I need information and photos, and even when you’re sober you avoid the topic of family like it’s a land mine.”
“That’s because it is one.” I see the need for a drink rising in GP’s eyes. “If you have half the brains your father gave you, for better or worse, you’ll end your relationship with Phil Maddox before it blows up in your face. You’re a Mackey. If you need information, I’ll get it for you. Stop looking for something real where you won’t find it.”
“Why?”
“Because you’re not eighteen yet. Until then you’re my goddamn responsibility.”
“I get that. I know he’s not my real uncle, but I need his help right now with more than just this stupid project. You don’t have to get involved.”
GP swipes a hand across his mouth. “Actually, kid, if this is how it’s gonna be you ain’t leaving me much choice.”
He walks away. End of discussion. There’s a hitch in his step as he passes the Jack Daniel’s bottle on the coffee table. I get that too. Hell, I’m ready to go upstairs and light matches until I feel better. But tonight, GP does something unexpected. Tonight, he keeps walking without taking a drink.
I wolf down the rest of my sandwich in three bites and head to my room. Next time I see Uncle Phil, I’ll warn him GP’s pissed. Hopefully by then he’ll have some information for me, but that’s not the point. My gut is telling me to remember what Coach Porter said about people leaving traces behind. I felt more than traces of Mom when I stood at the site of our old house and it has me determined to prove that theory with or without help from GP or Uncle Phil. I still have the county clerk’s office field trip, and the internet.
What I really need help with is what Mom meant at the quarry about not blurting and what Uncle Phil meant by “Do it” the night of the fire. Not that I’ll be getting answers to those questions tonight.
I flop onto the bed, exhausted, but check my phone before setting my alarm in case one of the guys on the team had a problem after we left.
There’s a text from Les sent during the carnival that I ignore. And one from Iris, time stamped at 11:30 P.M.
Thanks for inviting me into your color-coded box. I had a great time.
Me too. Looking forward to our “date” on Monday.
She responds immediately. Doesn’t that make us a throuple?
I’d rather go as a couple.
She sends an emoji of a Cupid and it makes me feel a little better about almost drowning in front of her, even if Rocco did spend half the night talking to her once we rejoined the group. Probably because he knew it would bug me. Not that it mattered in the end. I worked up the balls to kiss Iris by the end of the night and I’m pretty sure that changed everything.
I look at the text from Les. Can we talk before Monday?
Jeezus. He won’t quit. The guy might want an A more than I do.
I have a shitload of homework. We can talk on the field trip.
I reach between my mattress and box spring to touch the book of matches I keep hidden there before closing my eyes on this seriously strange day. I steady my breathing, willing sleep, but I can’t relax. The musty smell of the reservoir is stuck to my skin, blending with the stink of bonfire and the tinge of chlorine that always hangs on me in varying degrees. I don’t want to sleep at all if it only brings me back to that deserted hallways full of doors. Not to mention the murderous intention to clobber my uncle. But if the itch I’m getting under my skin is any indication, that’s exactly where my restlessness night is headed.
I get up to take a hot shower like washing away the smells from Monarch Night will undo the fact that I freaked out in front of the team, then smacked and saw Mom in that secret place beneath the reservoir where people who refused to leave their homes got trapped and died.
I press the top of my head against the white tiles and let the hottest water I can stand run into my open mouth and over my sore muscles. I picture Rocco coming out of the water right after Iris saved me from drowning. The set smile he gave me when he said, “I’m good at keeping secrets. But you’re gonna owe me one,” like he knew exactly what that meant.
The smell of bonfire and musty water intensifies for the first few seconds, then starts to fade away. I fucked everything up for my family. And Rocco, for better or worse, was there right before it all happened. Sneaking around with me in the woods behind our house when we should have just stayed home.
I’ll keep your secret.
That’s what I whisper-yelled to Rocco as he took off through the woods that night.
Maybe I owe him more than one.
I recognize the sensation of a memory tugging at me this time and relax, letting it rise with the steam pulling away from skin.
* * *
I flinched when I recognized the sound of Dad’s fist slamming onto the dining room table. I’m surprised to learn my parents fight the same way whether I’m home or not. Their voices are muffled. I can’t make out what they’re saying, but I stay in my room. Thinking about what just happened between Rocco and me in the woods.
I struck another match and watched it burn.
My parents thought Rocco and I were sleeping over at Chip’s. They don’t know Chip had to cancel, or that I stole a few pinches of Dad’s weed from the garage, or that Rocco and me snuck into GP’s and took a bottle of Wild Turkey from the liquor cabinet while he was sleeping. They definitely wouldn’t like to hear I pushed one of my best friends on the ground before I came home and crawled into my room through the window by way of the trellis. I reached for one of the small boxes of matches I kept under my mattress, then laid there, lighting them one by one until I felt calm again. Watching the flames devour the wooden matchsticks until there was nothing left but charred worms always made me feel better. I wouldn’t flick them out until the flames were so close to my fingers I felt the threat of being burned.
I stopped lighting the matches when I heard a few faint ticks on my bedroom window. When I pulled back the blue plaid curtains I saw Rocco in the middle of the trellis. I wasn’t sure if he was climbing up or down. When he saw me, his face folded in an apology, but I didn’t open the window to hear what he had to say, or let him in. I just shut the curtains, hoping he’d go away and forget the whole thing.
I went back to lighting matches until my eyelids grew too heavy to keep open.
Mom and Dad were quiet. I hoped that meant they’d made up and their argument wouldn’t spill over into the morning. I imagined a big pancake breakfast waiting for me. Mom would smile as she poured syrup over melting butter on a triple stack with a side of bacon.
I love the smell of bacon, fried to a well-done crisp.
I was jolted awake by my bedroom door bursting open. A heavy blanket was thrown over me like a net before someone wrapped me tight and lifted me from my bed.
“Let me go,” I groaned. Thirteen felt too old to be carried, and the blanket made it hard for me to breathe.
The temperature dropped suddenly and whoever had me started to run. I got bounced around like a rag doll and tried to fight my way free, but the arms clamped around me tighter.
“It’s okay. You’re safe.”
I didn’t know who or what I was safe from until my butt was plunked down on a slab of freezing metal and I punched away the blankets. A woman dressed in official blue was leaning away to avoid being struck. When I stopped swinging she helped me rewrap the blanket around my shoulders.
I looked past her and saw a burly fireman jogging away in the snow. He must have been the one who carried me outside. I stared at the neon-yellow stripes stretching across the back of his canvas coat as he rushed back toward our house.
* * *
I’M SHIVERING under the spray of water that’s run cold. This time, my flashback lines up with some stuff I already remembered, making it a little easier to start putting the whole night back in order.
I’m stepping into a pair of sweats when a sharp ping taps against the windowpane in my bedroom. I jump into the legs quickly and open the blinds, then the window. The cold blast of air that hits my face doesn’t convince me this isn’t still part of the same flashback; the similarities are too real.
I lean out farther and scan the empty yard. I’m about to shut the window when I think I catch a glimpse of movement along the edge of the woods. Rocco is the only person who’s ever knocked on my window in the middle of the night. So whether or not this is real, I owe it to the guy to hear him out this time. I grab my E.H.H.S. hoodie from the hook behind my door and head downstairs as quietly as possible, snatching my running shoes from the foyer before heading outside.
I want to call his name, but I’m afraid to wake GP so I slip into my shoes and jog toward the trees, my eyes slowly adjusting to the darkness.
“Rocco!” I whisper-shout and wait.
But there’s nobody out here.
I trudge back to the house, worried I’m starting to hear things too.
New information from the night of the fire swims in my fully conscious mind: the paramedic, the fireman who carried me from my room.
I stop short when I spot something flapping on Bumblebee’s windshield.
Maybe all the bats haven’t left the belfry after all.
I’m expecting it to be another E.H.H.S. school paper. Maybe an article Iris wrote. We dropped her off over an hour ago. That’s enough time for her to hop in a car and drive over here to leave me a surprise. But the Monarch Monthly is just that, monthly. I doubt she would have written an article about our team before coming to one of our meets.
What I don’t expect to find is my own photo above a photocopied article from the Ellis Hollow Gazette. It’s a profile shot, but mostly the back of my head and a bit of my cheek and nose. I’m wrapped in the blanket that got thrown over me. Our house ablaze in the background.
SUSPICIOUS FIRE PROMPTS INVESTIGATION
Ellis Hollow Fire Chief Bruce Mackey found himself in for quite a surprise when he and his crew were called to the scene of a fire at his son’s home on Eight Moon Hill. The fire, originally listed as accidental in a report filed by the chief and county fire marshal, Curtis Jacobs, has come under investigation after an anonymous tip was received, claiming the veteran fire chief may have falsified reports to dissuade an investigation into this and a correlating fire that devastated his own home several years ago. Fire Marshal Jacobs and Chief Mackey were unreachable for comment. However, a source close to the family tells us that his daughter-in-law Sophia Mackey, a former championship springboard diver who has been the subject of headlines herself over the years, died in the unfortunate house fire in question. She is survived by her son Theo, a promising young springboard diver in his own right, and her husband Mitch Mackey, a revered sports psychologist known as The Mack Attack.
What the—
Is it possible GP knew I started the fire this whole time and covered for me? That’s almost worse than me not telling him, because it means he knows I’m a liar. I search the photo for any trace of my mom near the tree line for Blood Woods, but she isn’t there. Which means whatever I thought I saw when I went back to the empty lot was all in my head.
The only person who might leave this for me is Les if he really is trying to get inside my head so I’ll sabotage myself, like Uncle Phil said.
“Les,” I whisper-yell his name, once, twice. “Are you out here watching? You want to talk to me so bad. Here I am.”
My only answer comes as a car engine starting, at least a block away.
It’s a hard to believe anyone on the team would do something this shitty. Then again, it’s hard to believe Les had it in him to rip 4½ Twists in the first place, which makes me wonder if we can really know another person at their core. For all I know, this is the real Les Carter and everything else is just an act. It’s not like I don’t know a thing or two about façades.
EIGHTEEN
Fail Dive: Zero points are given to dives if a diver gets help via call-out during the dive, steps off the board after assuming the starting position, takes more than one minute to begin the dive after a warning, performs a dive other than what was announced, or refuses to execute a dive.
MR. MALONE has us line up with our project partners at the county clerk’s office on Monday afternoon. I’m standing with Iris talking about Monarch Night, trying to ignore Les who’s been on his phone texting someone and smiling the whole time. I imagine he’s bragging about the stunt he pulled with the article Saturday night and I have to fight a full-blown urge to throw him up against a wall and shout: What’s your goddamn problem?
But I don’t.
Because I’m Theo Mackey, fulfiller of expectations.
We move forward two steps as one of the groups ahead of us gets their information and leaves.
“You ready?” Iris asks, leaning into me. “We’re almost up.”
“Ready as I’ll ever be.”
I’m eager for anything I can add to the photo Uncle Phil gave me after listening to everyone chatter-bragging for the last hour about the all information they already have.
“Next,” the woman behind the counter calls.
“You guys can go first,” Les tells us. “I’ve already got more than I need for this thing.”
Of course he does.
I look down the line behind me for Chip so he can see how annoyed I am by Les and he gives me the most sarcastic thumbs-up I’ve ever seen. And then we step forward, all three of us in tandem, like we are in fact a throuple.
The clerk gives us a limp smile, examining us over half-moon glasses secured by a beaded chain.
“Parents’ names?” Her eyes are on me.
“Sophia and Mitch Mackey.”
“Maiden name?”
“Rogan.”
The clerk writes that down, then looks at Iris.
“Bert Fiorello and Ioana Dalca.”
“That’s a mouthful,” the clerk says. “Mind writing that on this slip of paper?” She slides a phone memo pad to Iris.
“My mom was off-the-boat Romanian. Fiorello is Italian,” Iris whispers to me.
“Hence the cards,” I say. “We’re Irish. At least on the Mackey side.”
“Hence your obsession with rainbows and leprechauns and pots of gold.”
“More observation than obsession.”
The clerk gives us a slight eye roll and continues typing at warp speed, pausing only long enough to whack the return key as hard as humanly possible. Her wispy eyebrows are knit so tightly they’re almost overlapping.
“I’ve got Mitch Mackey’s birth certificate and, oh.” She looks up. “We have his death certificate, as well. I’ll print that stuff up for you straightaway, but I can’t seem to find anything in our database for a Sophia Mackey or Rogan. Do I have the spelling right?” She states each letter of my mom’s maiden name like I’m hard of hearing.
“That’s correct.” I rub the back of my neck where it’s heating to a low boil.
“Don’t sweat it, Mackey,” Les says, leaning forward. “I’m sure you’ve already got the important stuff. This is just perfunctory. It doesn’t really tell us anything about our families that matters.”
I give him a dismissive nod, even though my hackles shot up with his backhanded jibe.
“Let me try yours,” the clerk says to Iris, sliding her pink memo pad closer to her keyboard. As she types Iris’s mom’s name she repeats it long and slow. “I-o-a-na Dal-ca. Well, there you go. I have a marriage certificate and a…” She stops midsentence and meets Iris’s deep blue eyes. “I’m sorry, dear. Her death certificate is here, as well, but no birth record.”
The clerk looks between us, trying to conceal her horror as it dawns on her that three out of our four parents are dead.
Because it’s weird, like I said.
“Thank you,” Iris says. “My mom wasn’t born in the United States.”
“I can check immigration records as well.”
“That would be great. What about Theo’s mother? Sophia Rogan. Do you think you’ll be able to find something for him, too?”
I’m thankful Iris took over for me, but have a feeling I’m shit outta luck.
“There may be something in physical storage, or on microfiche. Would you like to fill out a form so someone can look into that?” She slides a clipboard across the counter to me. “Just put Rogan-Mackey at the top, and unless the records are sealed, we should be able to find something for you by the end of the week.”
A different clerk, unable to mind his own small-lipped business, creeps up behind the woman that’s helping us and says, “Not to eavesdrop or anything, but someone else came in here early Saturday morning asking about those records.” He studies me with dark beady eyes above a crooked nose underscored by a cop ’stache.
“Tall guy, dark hair?” I ask. Uncle Phil is the only person who would have come here on my behalf.
