Admission (23 page)

IN THE SANCTUARY
of the car, I prayed. The only sounds were the high pitch of the engine pushed to its maximum as I headed south down the interstate.

God please don’t let this end bad please God be with Alyssa please protect her

I realized how little I’d prayed recently and how much of a fraud I felt, suddenly tossing up one of those self-serving trench prayers. But there was nothing else I could do between the hospital and Alyssa’s house. Even after calling the police myself, making sure they were on their way, I wanted to make sure she was safe. I wanted to make sure

she doesn’t end up like Carnie

she was protected and not worried.

I let out a curse in the middle of my prayer and apologized. I was so bad at this, so new. I didn’t know what I was doing, and I knew God probably listened to me and thought
What a mess
. But I knew He was watching and listening.

I wished they had a manual for dummies on this whole faith thing. Because I didn’t know the right words to say, the right actions to follow. I just knew what I felt and what I believed and the truth of that.

no judgment against anyone who believes

I thought of what Alec had told me about his innocence and wondered how he could prove it to me. Would I ever believe anything he said? I didn’t know. All I knew was that I wanted Alyssa to be safe. All I knew was that her danger had been my fault.

Help me to do the right thing, whatever that is. And help her to be okay. Please God. I’ll do anything you ask of me. Just keep her safe
.

When I pulled up to the house, there were two squad cars outside and several cops inside. Alyssa ran toward me and embraced me. She didn’t let go for a few minutes, crying into my shoulder.

“Are you okay?” I asked her.

“Now I am.”

And I couldn’t help thinking this was all my fault. All of it.

I sat with the police for half an hour, not saying anything but listening to them continue to ask Alyssa questions. Eventually they asked her if she had somewhere else to stay for the night.

I thought of my hotel room, but then remembered the stranger pilfering through our stuff and decided against it.

“What about your parents’ home?” I asked.

“What am I going to say?”

“Just tell them the truth. Tell them a strange man came to your door acting weird. Tell them you want to stay over.”

We left the house with a squad car still outside on the corner. As I followed Alyssa’s directions, she asked me what was going on.

“I saw Alec,” I told her.

“What? When?”

“Today.”

“Does this have anything to do—”

“I think so,” I said to her, grabbing her hand and squeezing it tight. “I think it has to do with Bruce, with Alec, with everything.”

“I didn’t know what to say back there—with the police—”

“You told the truth.”

“I didn’t tell them about you.”

“I know.”

“Jake—I’m scared.”

“You’ll be at your parents’ in a few minutes.”

“No, it’s not that.”

I looked over at her and saw her haunting gaze.

“What?” I asked.

“I’m scared for you.”

“I’m going to be fine. Everything’s going to be fine.”

The clock on the dashboard read 11:35.

“Don’t worry about anything. I promise you—everything’s going to be fine. Okay?”

“Why? How do you know?”

“There’s stuff I need to tell the cops. About Alec. About—about a lot of things. I need to do it and I need to do it now.

“Will it help?”

I took Alyssa’s hand in mine. “I don’t know. I just know it’s the right thing to do.”

JAKE HAD MANAGED TO GET
Carnie to come out to the forest preserve with him. This was the same place they had once gotten a pony keg and invited thirty of their fellow underage sophomores to celebrate the warmth of springtime. The same place where an inebriated Alec and Jake had swum across the lake, getting to the middle and feeling their legs cramp up and laughing and wondering if they were going to die in the Summit forest preserve. The same place they had often come for beer and conversation and to pass away the time.

Now Alec was gone. Franklin ignored them. Bruce was high most of the time. Shane was studying like crazy, ready for graduation. Mike was talking about changing schools at the end of the year.

And then there was Carnie. Jake was worried about Carnie. He didn’t usually say much, but something was different with him since spring break. Something was different with all of them, sure, but not like Carnie. He carried the look of death on his face. If he caught Jake looking at him, he would just look away, silent and secretive.

Even after a few beers, Carnie wouldn’t talk about spring break. But Jake kept hoping that they could get past it. Past Brian’s disappearance and the rumors and the secrets and the lies.

It felt like summertime had arrived, and Jake had a nice buzz going and felt the memories of three years here in the woods of this remote location.

“Where do you think you’ll be in ten years?” Carnie asked out of the blue.

Jake shrugged, staring up at the sky. “I don’t know where I’ll be in ten minutes.”

“Take a guess.”

“My guess is, uh, jail.” Jake let out a chuckle, then realized the bad taste of what he had said.

I used to laugh a lot more. Joke a lot more. But there hasn’t been much to joke about lately
.

“I’m serious,” Carnie said.

“I don’t know. Doing something outdoors. With people. Having fun. I think I’d die having a nine-to-five job.”

“Yeah.”

“What about you? What do you see?”

“I don’t know what I see anymore.”

Jake looked up at Carnie, surprised at his tone. “What do you mean?”

“I just want to get away. But I don’t know where to go.”

“Come to Europe with us,” Jake said.

“That wouldn’t help.”

“Then what would?”

Carnie was silent for a minute, then he said, “All the stuff they say in class and chapel. The stuff about God and heaven and hell. You believe all that?”

“I don’t know. Some of it. I believe in God.”

“What if it’s really true?”

“About God?”

“About everything. Eternity and hell and damnation and all that.”

“That’s the stuff I wonder about,” Jake said.

“Yeah. Like—how can God really do such a thing, you know? How can He send people to hell? That’s what I always wonder, what I can’t get my mind through.”

“Yeah.”

“I was listening to Metallica the other day—”

“Ah, such good taste.”

“Their song ‘Nothing Else Matters.’ And I wondered—does anything matter? Does it really matter if we’re drinking beers or having sex with someone we barely know or if someone disappears and nobody knows the story behind it? Does any of it matter in the first place?”

“Are you trying to tell me something?”

“I told you a hundred times, Jake. I don’t know what happened.”

“You’ve acted different ever since spring break.”

“I know,” Carnie said.

Jake watched his friend, took a sip of his beer, and then waved a hand. “I don’t know what happened, and frankly, I don’t care anymore.”

“You believe in that notion of joining your friends in hell?” Carnie asked.

Jake laughed out loud. “You’re drunk.”

“Maybe. But do you?”

“Do I what?”

“Do you believe it will be better to have a fun time in hell with your friends than spend eternity with a bunch of holier-than-thou people in heaven?”

“This past semester has been a journey into hell,” Jake said, trying to make light of the conversation.

“Do you really think there is a hell? Honestly?”

Jake looked at Carnie. He felt like a teenager having a talk with his father about sex.

He didn’t want to tell Carnie what he really believed.

In the first place, he didn’t know exactly what he believed. But it scared him, just like a lot of things deep down scared him. But he could put a Band-Aid and a case of beer over them and the fears would subside. The fear of tomorrow, the fear of the unknown, the fear of ever after. The fear of what really happened to Brian Erwin.

He had grown adept at ignoring those fears.

“Carnie … a week from now, we’ll be walking down getting our diplomas, and all this madness will be over and we’ll be free.”

“Free to do what?”

“Free to be adults. To do whatever we want.”

“Haven’t we been doing that the last couple of years?”

“You know what I mean,” Jake said.

But Carnie seemed distant, lost in his own ocean of doubts and insecurities.

“It’ll all work out, man,” Jake said.

And he believed it too. That he really, truly believed.

“JAKE.” ALEC’S VOICE SOUNDED
harried on my cell.

“What is it?”

“Where are you?”

“Heading to the cops.”

“Jake—”

“It’s over. I’m through. With everything.”

Alec cursed. “You said you wanted proof.”

“Proof of what?”

“I’ve got it.”

I had left Alyssa ten minutes ago. I wasn’t exactly sure where I was driving and what I was doing, but I wanted this to be over. Tonight.

“I’m supposed to actually believe you?”

“This one time,” Alec said. “One last time.”

“I’m tired—”

“Come to the campus.”

“To
Providence?”

“Just meet me there in an hour. And I promise you, you’ll understand.”

Something in me still believed him. I didn’t know why.

Another part of me was scared that Alec’s lie would be his last.

I could remember driving these same streets, a different person. It wasn’t that long ago. The past decade didn’t feel that long. Thirty-three years old didn’t feel that old. But I wouldn’t have recognized that kid driving that car. I wouldn’t have known what to say to him.

Had I been given this chance only to discover the truth about myself? The truth I had suspected all along? That I was guilty, that I was more guilty than I realized? That they had been covering up for my sins. That they had taken the blame for me.

There’s only one person who can do that, who’s ever done that
.

I saw the shimmer of the street lamp. A nearby church I’d never visited still remained on the corner. A restaurant. A health club.

I spent three years existing around here but never really living. Never really opening my eyes to the world around me
.

I turned onto the street where the sign said Providence College.

If I could go back, I would. If I could simply go back and try again, I would try harder. I would change and do something good. I would stop ridiculing the so-called phonies I labeled and judged without knowing them. I would finally acknowledge that I couldn’t do it alone and that I needed help and that God was the only person who could help me.

Help me now. Help me tonight
.

I’d spent so much time running and I’d tried running far away but God had caught up with me.

I don’t understand why, God. Why me?

It wasn’t fair and it wasn’t right but that’s why it was called grace. I was learning about such things. I’d heard about it but hadn’t really understood it until a year ago.

The college parking lot was empty except for a lone car with its headlights on.

Let this be the end
, I thought.
Let this be over and done with, regardless of what happens
.

I opened my car door and breathed in the cool summer night.

“This better be good.”

The voice I heard belonged to Mike. He turned off his car and opened the door, leaving the parking lot suddenly coated in darkness.

“Alec called you too?” I asked.

“He said I needed to get down to the college. That it was urgent. I figured—after everything with Bruce—is that what this is about?”

“It’d better be.”

It was closing in on one o’clock. I watched Mike light up a cigarette.

“This is crazy,” he said. “I thought we’d go the rest of our lives without bringing all of this up.”

I wanted to reply, but for the moment I leaned against his car looking up at the stars. It was a brief moment of relaxation.

Then I heard the engine approaching and knew Alec was near.