Page 11 of Icy
Granite
“Pete,” I say to the boy as soon as the cops have left the room. I speak in a low whisper because I am sure they are probably listening in on the room. “What happened? What are you doing here? Where’s your mother?”
Pete looks up into the corners of the room where the cameras are and then pretends to cough so that he can cover his mouth when he speaks, smart kid!
“She fell into a river and drowned,” he says.
“Oh Pete,” Amber says as she tries to console him.
It looks genuinely like she is playing the part of child psychiatrist even though she is simply just expressing her sympathy.
“I’m really sorry for the loss of your mother.”
But Pete doesn’t look at all upset about it. I don’t blame him one bit; his mother was a violent lunatic. If Lana had been my mother, I would have been happy if she died too.
“She wasn’t my mother,” Pete says.
“What?” I ask. “Then who was she and where are your real parents?”
“I don’t have real parents,” he answers. “I never knew my father, and my mother died in a car accident. Lana took me in after my mother was killed. I knew she was crazy the whole time and I tried to warn Tom. I think he knew it too. But he was too in love with her to think she would ever do what she did, and he thought he could help her.”
He looks between Amber and me. “Can you guys get me out of here? Please?”
“We’ll try,” I say. “But why did you come here? I saw you run away in the other direction. It looked like you were heading toward Asheville. Why didn’t you go there and where have you been this whole time?”
“When I saw that the two of you had run in the other direction, I thought that maybe you would be heading to a town on this side of the mountain. I wanted to go with you, but I didn’t want to lead Lana toward you. So I ran in the other direction and ran around in circles for a while to throw her off. She lost her footing on a slippery rock near the river and fell. When she hit her head, it knocked her unconscious and she drowned in the river. After that, I started to make my way here to find you.”
“You’ve been living on your own in the mountains this whole time?” Amber asks in amazement. “How?”
“I went back and took some supplies from Tom and Lana’s house. I stayed there for a little bit and then started on my way here. Please don’t let them keep me here. Please get me out, just like I helped to get you out.”
Pete looks scared and tired. I glance over at Amber and I can already tell that she is coming up with some sort of scheme to try to get the kid out of here and bring him with us. I have no idea what we’ll do with him once we get him released. Maybe we can find a nice couple to take him in or something. I sit with Pete while Amber gets up to go talk to the police officer again. When she returns, the officer is with her and has a small stack of paperwork in his hand that apparently Amber has signed with a false signature, indicating that she is a certified guardian and that Pete is able to be released into her care. The officer tells Pete that he is free to leave with us and we get up to follow him out of the jail. I shoot a confused look over to Amber, but she just gives me a small shrug and a smile. I don’t think she had expected her little attempt at jailbreaking the kid to work either.
When we get back to the cabin, it is very apparent that Pete is exhausted. Amber cooks him some food and I grab him a clean shirt and a pair of sweatpants that are way too big on him but will at least keep him warm and cozy for the night until we figure out what else he needs and what to do with him.
“Thank you,” he says as he sits at the table across from us and gobbles up the food that Amber made; mac and cheese, every kid’s favorite.
“Do you remember anything at all about your parents?” Amber asks.
I think she is trying to either get to know him better or to get him to think about happier times before he ended up with a set of psychotic pseudo-parents.
“Not much,” he says. “I don’t remember anything about my father. I never met him. Sometimes I wasn’t even sure that he existed, but my mother always told me that he did. I remember a few things about my mother, but none of my memories of her really stick. Someone told me after she was killed in the car accident that it was normal for me to repress the memories of her because it was easier than dealing with the pain of missing her. I don’t really know whatrepressmeans, but I guess that makes sense. The only think that I can really remember about her at all, is her name.”
“What was her name?” Amber asks with a comforting smile.
She really is quite good with kids.
Just as I was getting ready to pour myself a drink, Pete uttered the one word that stopped me in my tracks.
“Anna.”
* * *
