Page 40 of The Ghostwriter

June 3, 1975

Ten more days of school. It’s all anyone can talk about. That and the end-of-year carnival at the high school. What rides there will be. Which cute carnies will be returning. What the kids are going to really do while their parents think they’re at the carnival. I take a bite of roast beef—my mother overcooked it again—and chew, trying to ignore the simmering anger radiating off Vince. The show of indifference from Danny. Trying to shake off the memory of the sound of their bodies hitting the wall. The way Vince seemed to want to kill Danny. And then literally admitting that to me later.

My mother keeps trying to make small talk. Little attempts to draw one of us out. “I heard that the federal government has done away with separate PE classes for boys and girls. Next year, you’ll all be in PE together,” she says, looking at each of us in turn, hoping we’ll chime in with an opinion.

“Gerald Ford is a stooge,” my father says to no one. “He’s a placeholder, nothing more. Totally useless.”

I can’t resist. “It’s his wife who should be president,” I say. “She’s the one with the real vision, talking about breast cancer and abortion.”

“,” my mother warns.

“Come on, Mom. You can say the words. ‘Breast cancer. Abortion.’”

“You’re being ridiculous,” my father says to me. “A woman will never be president.”

“Why not?” I challenge.

“Enough,” my mother says, and we all look at her, trembling in her seat, trying to hold a happy expression on her face but failing miserably. “Not at the table.”

My father ignores her, holding his knife up to make his point. “At least Ford got one thing right—pardoning Nixon. That would have been a real mess.”

“You know what’s a real mess,” Vince says. All eyes draw to him, mostly because he’s barely said two words to anyone other than me since his fight with Danny. “’s closet.”

I hesitate, my fork frozen in midair.

“Go on,” Vince says, goading me. Not letting me sit there and pretend I didn’t hear the clue.

I push my chair back and walk toward my room. Behind me, I hear my mother say, “Do you have to play that game at dinnertime?”

I kick through the scattered clothes and books on my floor and go straight to my closet, sliding the doors open. I push my dresses aside, my gaze traveling across the back for anything he might have hidden there. Then I sift through the jumble of shoes on the floor, scattering them all over the place.

“Come back to the table, ,” my mother calls.

I pick up each shoe, feeling around inside it for a piece of paper. I won’t let Vince know that my heart isn’t in this hunt. That he’s starting to scare me. I stand and slip my hand under my sweaters on the shelf, but there’s nothing.

“Is it too much to ask that we have a nice meal without people tearing my house apart?” my mother says.

I pull everything out and pile it in the middle of my room. Still nothing.

“,” my father calls, his voice a warning. I have about thirty seconds left before there’s real trouble.

I grab my flashlight from under my pillow and shine it around the now empty closet. Into every corner, every crevice. That’s when I see it.

Written on the interior wall in marker, my brother has given me the key word that will unlock the puzzle.

Someday soon, you’ll be dead.

All thought seems to drain out of me, replaced by fear. His words from the other night— I wish he was dead —and now this.

“!” My father calls. Louder. No longer willing to wait.

I leave the mess and return to the table. Vince stares at me but says nothing, spearing a piece of asparagus on the end of his fork. I take another bite of mashed potatoes and try to swallow them.

“Well?” Vince says.

I set my fork down.

“It goes with the clue you found in the garage,” he tells me when I don’t say anything. “You have to put them together.”

A request? A threat? I run through the last two lines, plugging in words that rhyme with dead . “Someday soon, you’ll be dead, you’ll find your prize in the…bed?” I say, looking at him. Hopeful this game will be over soon.

My mother gasps. “Vincent,” she scolds. “What a terrible thing to say to your sister.”

“Relax, Mom. It’s not a fortune cookie,” he says. “It just has to rhyme.” To me he says, “Does a bed fit the theme?”

Our mother huffs and takes another sip of wine.

This is the first time a clue hasn’t been written on a piece of paper, but rather graffitied onto a wall, and I wonder if this is another clue to a different mystery. Whether Vince is trying to tell me something else.

I push the thought away and return to the puzzle at hand. “Someday soon, you’ll be dead. You’ll find your prize in the…shed?”

Vince looks pleased.

There’s no way I want to go out to the shed alone. But Vince is staring at me, waiting, and I don’t want to let on that I’m scared or do anything to make him angry. So I look at my father. “May I be excused?” I ask, hoping he’ll say no. Hoping he’ll put an end to our game.

He looks at my plate and says, “Finish your milk.”

I drink it slowly, then carry everything to the sink and walk to the back door. It’s dark outside, the shed just a faint shadow in the corner of the yard, the vast, empty field pitch-black behind it. It’s a tiny structure with only one window, the place where my mother keeps her gardening tools. I walk toward it, glancing over my shoulder to make sure Vince isn’t following me.

When I step inside, it takes a moment for my eyes to adjust to the dark space, and then I see it. The bright-yellow Kodak box. Air rushes out of me as relief floods in. This is typical Vince. Never able to talk about his feelings. Never able to apologize in words, he does things like this instead. He makes these gestures that show you all is okay.

I return to the house, holding it up, triumphant. “My eleventh roll of film, and it has sound!”

Danny rolls his eyes. “Great,” he says, rising from the table without asking permission. He carries his plate and cup to the sink and sets them down. “Now she can eavesdrop on us too.”