Page 17

17

FLORENCE

The police have advised us all to stay put at the Oleander’s for our own safety and security, so of course we all pile into the resident van now that it’s morning and there is still no word about Bernie. We wanted Evan to drive us, but Shelby has him staying on high alert at the Ole and is trying to double his hours for a while, if she can get him to agree. I can’t say that I blame her. It’s a comfort, but one man with a small security guard gun in a building with a questionable alarm system will do little to deter a maniac who has been very creative in their means of attack.

I had forgotten how poor Herb’s driving abilities were since we had the luxury of someone else more competent taxiing us around recently.

“Why must you speed up when you approach a stop light only to hard stop behind the car in front of you?” I ask, hold ing the door handle for dear life as Herb chews on the end of an unlit cigar.

“And why is the window cracked?” Millie snaps. “It’s three degrees, are you going through man-o-pause or something? Jeez, Herb.”

“Lots of complaining for a couple of fossils with no car,” Herb smirks. He hands back a packet of Twizzlers to share, and we all drive in silence for a long while. We pass empty fields of snow, and pine forests with all the tree branches weighed down by weeks of heavy snowfall. The sky is overcast and the air is still, eerily quiet. When we get to town we stop at all Bernie’s favorite places—the VFW where Kevin Willits, who has worked there for twenty-three years, polishes beer mugs with a bar towel and watches Wheel of Fortune on the TV above the pub tables. Nobody else is there; we go to the Trout but it’s closed, then the Cupcake Gourmet, and the bait shop, and then Mario’s taco shop where we all stay and have lunch in an old wooden booth near the front window.

Of course, we don’t expect to find Bernie just sitting at one of these places in plain sight while the whole world is out looking for him, but what else can we do? We have to do something . Herb orders the chicken enchilada burrito combo and chews with his mouth open, but the rest of us just push tortilla chips around on our plates and don’t know what to say to one another.

“Who called him? Who would he have left with?” Mort asks, but he’s just repeating something we have asked each other over and over already. Nobody has a clue.

“Well, it has to be someone. He wouldn’t get too far in subzero weather and we’d have found him frozen solid in a snowbank by now within a mile of the church potluck, that’s for damn sure,” Millie says, but she has already said some variation of this sentiment a dozen times today. Still, we all nod in agreement.

Mort stirs his peppermint tea and Herb doesn’t chide him for ordering peppermint tea at a Mexican restaurant the way he usually would, and nobody gives Millie any sour looks about ordering a margarita before noon. We all stare at our phones or out the window and a sad ballad from the 1990s plays that I can’t recall the name of, but it makes Herb push away his plate and dot a tear, although he would never admit it.

Back in the van, the Styrofoam take-out containers fill the interior with refried bean and onion aromas, and Millie is sipping a third margarita from a paper cup. Mort is so quiet that I am beginning to worry about him and how he will handle his good friend missing.

I suggest that we go back to the Ole and record a live podcast where we implore anyone with any information about Bernie Adler to call in, but Herb reminds me that we only have our cell phones to take calls, and the last thing we want to do is get ourselves murdered in our beds because some nutter has our personal information, so we decide against the tip line and go with opening up an email address folks can write in to with information. We all decide this is a sound idea and the best use of our efforts, and so we drive back across snowy roads to the Oleander’s, on a mission to do everything we can to find our sweet Bernie.

While everyone is shaking out wet boots and hanging coats and hats on the hooks next to the front windows, I see Shelby through the crack in the office door. She’s sitting at her desk and staring down at a garbage bag on the floor. It looks like wires and electrical stuff, and the look across her face is one of despair, I think, but it’s just a glance so I can’t really be sure. She quickly collects herself and comes out of the office door, closing it behind her. I see Evan at the small computer desk, looking at some video footage on the computer, so I don’t disturb him. But even from just his profile, he seems to share the same distraught look as Shelby. I wonder if there has been news. My heart speeds up and I feel a small wave of nausea rise within me.

“His car’s gone,” Shelby comes out and says before any of us have even sat down. Mort is wiping his glasses and Millie is warming herself in front of the gas fireplace. Herb and I stand in the middle of the rec room staring at her, trying to make sense of what she’s saying.

“Whose car? What car?” I ask. Shelby sits on the arm of the couch and sighs.

“Bernie’s car.”

“Bernie doesn’t drive,” Millie says unnecessarily loudly and with unearned authority.

“His old Firebird in the back parking lot?” Mort asks, putting his glasses back on. “I thought it didn’t run.”

“And he doesn’t drive!” Millie says again, tipsily, carefully trying to sit herself down on the brick hearth.

“I know,” Shelby says, “but it must run, because it’s not there. And I suppose just because he let his license expire however long ago doesn’t mean he’s incapable of driving. I just can’t imagine the reason behind it—where he would have gone without telling anyone.”

“But maybe it’s a good thing,” Herb says. “If he drove on his own, even for some crazy reason, there’s a better chance he’s safe.”

“I don’t see anything,” Evan says, hitting Pause on the video and swiveling towards us on his chair. “I think we need to add cameras on the light pole in the parking lot since the ones we have don’t catch that dark lot way back there…and it butts up to the woods, so it’s pitch-black. See?” he says, rewinding the video as Shelby goes to look over his shoulder and scan the footage he shows her.

“Shit,” Shelby mutters at the grainy, useless footage.

“He was here yesterday at breakfast you said, right?” Evan asks.

“Yes,” Mort says. “He put maple syrup on his scrambled eggs and I told him he was a Neanderthal.” He hangs his head at the memory, and I suppose he wonders if it’s the last thing he said to his friend and wishes it were something kinder, even if he was just poking fun.

“And what time was that?” Evan asks.

“Around eight,” I say, because I was at the table having my coffee then myself.

“So between 8:00 a.m. and when it was noticed that he was gone, which was 12:40 you said…it seems like that’s when he would have taken the car—either before the potluck, or he came back and got it. But I don’t even see him on camera walking back that way.” Evan scans the footage ahead and pauses on different spots.

“Unless he went out of his way to walk around the wooded area and access the lot from behind if he was avoiding the cameras. Which he probably was if he was planning some strange escape without telling us,” Herb says, and I nod in agreement.

“Maybe,” Evan says. “But if someone else wants to look through the video with fresh eyes to make sure I’m not missing anything, feel free.”

“Thanks, Evan,” Shelby says. I walk to the kitchenette and microwave a mug of hot water, putting a Lipton tea bag inside, then sit on the ottoman next to Herb, and we’re all quiet again. There is a palpable sense of dread, and even though the car might be a good thing, it’s bizarre, and for some reason, I feel this overwhelming suspicion that it’s actually very, very bad, and I don’t quite know why.

“We thought we’d do an episode this afternoon—a live one, and set up an email address for people to write in with tips,” I say.

“Good idea,” Shelby says. “Let me know if I can help,” and then she stands and disappears back inside the office again, closing the door with a soft click.

We decide to use the computer in the rec room. Evan promised to stay vigilant near the main doors, so Mort shuffles around, setting up mics and untwisting cords, and I can’t help but think over and over about that sign-in sheet at the hospital. The whole place is still in the dark ages, so when a visitor signs in, they don’t always write down the patient or room number. I can’t imagine anyone has even looked at that sign-in sheet in a decade.

The last name Blacklock was signed in many times over the last six months, but often with different first names. Odd first names: Duke, Cornelius, Buster…it was as if somebody was trying to make sure their real name wasn’t recorded and wrote down ridiculous fake names, but why, and what does that mean? I went as far as to look up this surname in the town records and I didn’t find anything. This is significant. I’m sure Riley is looking into it since I brought all of this to his attention, but I need to understand how it’s connected. Blacklock.

“Earth to Flor,” Herb hollers.

“Sorry,” I say. “Ready?”

We start to record and we don’t know what we’ll say, but Millie is half-drunk so she starts. “Please, everyone, we are putting a photo of Bernie Adler up on our channel. If you have seen him, please write to us with any information,” she manages, but the waterworks start almost immediately, and Mort takes over.

“Hello, everyone. This is Mort from Mort’s Literary Musings , which you probably know if you are listening right now. We’ve paused our literary analysis, and now our true crime series, in order to focus our attention on finding our dear friend, Bernie,” he says, and I hear his voice crack. I give him a thumbs-up to tell him he’s doing well and he continues. He reads out the email address that he and Evan have just created, and it’s amazing to me that, just like that, we have a line of communication. Technology never ceases to amaze me.

“[email protected],” he says.

And even with the heaviness of the moment, Herb can’t help but roll his eyes and say, “At least we know that address hasn’t been taken already.”

“Well, yes, and actually, Evan and I have decided to partner in the podcast world. He’ll be videographer and editor, and I’ll be the talent.”

Herb sighs. “Uh-huh. Super.”

“We’re still thinking on our new name and I didn’t want to confuse anybody by announcing a change right now,” Mort says, looking to Evan for approval, and Evan high-fives him.

“Mort and Evan’s show about all things murder and macabre,” Mort adds.

“Catchy,” Herb says, reaching his limit, so he goes to the minifridge and grabs a Dr Pepper and rolls his eyes to his heart’s content out of sight. Truth be told, I think he’s a little jealous of the friendship between Mort and Evan, and I suppose between Mort and Bernie, but he’d never admit it.

“Murder and what now? My-Cob? What the hell is my-cob? You can’t just make up words,” Millie adds. “That title is terrible.”

Shelby comes out of the office when Herb hollers for her, and we all take turns talking about things Bernie loves, like feeding blueberries to the pigeons at Sunflower Park, and a good pint at the Trout, and scrambled eggs with maple syrup, and his favorite pendant (which Shelby adds and explains he hasn’t taken it off in twenty years, and we didn’t even know about that), and pickleball, and his new friend, Gus, who he wouldn’t leave behind…and places he liked to go. We read off the license plate of his car and the time frame when he disappeared, and then we wait.

I don’t know what I expected—maybe the magic of the ten seconds it took to create a new email address to apply to receiving messages on it, but there is nothing coming in.

After a couple of hours, though, there are nine emails. All of them say how sorry they are for what’s going on with Ber nie and ask how they can help, to which Herb replies you can help by only emailing if you have something useful to add, which I don’t think is at all a helpful thing to do, but I can’t blame him. We are all on pins and needles every time the email pings, but nothing.

By 10:00 p.m. Evan is off shift and Heather has taken over for Shelby and Millie has fallen asleep in front of an episode of Andy Griffith . The rest of the building is quiet except for the low hum of radios or TVs in residents’ rooms down the hallways, and I finally accept that there will be no more news today from police or email tips, and so I go to my room to bed.

I don’t sleep, though. I lie awake thinking about Blacklock. Blacklock … and Shelby’s phone at Riley’s, and Otis’s notes, and Leo somewhere deep-sea fishing with all Mack’s money, and I especially think about Bernie.

We were all given the password to the new email tip line, so I slip on my glasses and take my phone from the nightstand and log in one more time. It’s pushing midnight and I’m certain there won’t be anything new, but I feel compelled to keep looking, and when I see a new email, I sit up straight in bed and turn on the light. The sender’s address is not Ted Walters or Leslie Katz or Jamie Knutsen from church or the VFW. It’s a very scary-looking address with a bunch of numbers and symbols instead of a name.

When I click it open it says, “There is something in the parking lot where Bernie’s car used to be. Go look.”

I feel my heart beating against my chest and a prickle of heat climb my spine. I shove my feet into the snow boots by my bedroom door and wrap my robe around myself, marching down to Herb’s room and tapping on the door.

“Christ,” I hear from inside, so I open the door.

“Herb, get up. Let’s go,” I say, walking over to his bed. I show him my phone and he squints to make out the email, then grabs for his glasses and sits up fully and stares from it to me. He doesn’t say anything, just stands and starts grabbing for his coat on the armchair near his bed. Together, we hold hands and walk through the yard, the snow crackling under our feet in the impossibly silent and still night, the light from our flashlight apps leading the way.

When we reach the back lot, I notice that Bernie’s car has left a large clearing in the snowy ground, and there is only a chain-link fence and a couple of junker cars next to a shed in the entire area. We flash our lights around, trying to see what this email means—what in the world could be in the spot where Bernie’s car was? What the hell does that even mean? The words repeat in my mind as we search. Then, I aim my light down, and I see it.

My hand flutters to my mouth, and I inhale sharply.

“There,” I say, pointing to it. Herb turns around, his eyes widening as he sees what I see. He leans down and picks up the shining metal object, holding it up to the light. I move in close to him and we both examine it.

He wipes snow off and reveals the image of a border collie. It’s Bernie’s pendant.