Burn (20 page)

“You’re right-handed, Cameron?”

“Yes.”

“Feels like you cut up your hand.”

Good Cop tries to turn over Cameron’s hand, but he holds it steady and then Jeffries places his hand on top of Cameron’s.

“You a nurse now?” Jeffries wants to know. “Just take the prints. The warrant doesn’t entitle you to a search of his body.”

“Well, maybe we’ll just go back and get that,” Bad Cop says.

“You do that,” Jeffries invites. “I like it when we go by the book. Everything’s so neat and tidy.”

Good Cop tucks the card with Cameron’s prints on it into a plastic bag and slips it into his pocket. He packs up his plastic box and turns to Jeffries.

“We like it that way, too. Keeps the cases in the courthouse.”

“Adult court this time,” Bad Cop says. “The D.A.’s already talking about moving this one out of the juvenile system.”

“That’s premature,” Jeffries says.

“But likely,” Good Cop says. “All these cases are getting tried in adult court.”

“Some of them,” Jeffries says. “Not all.”

Good Cop shrugs.

“My money’s on adult court,” Bad Cop says. “What do you think about that, Cameron?”

“You can ask him about the clothes,” Jeffries says. “That’s it. Then I’m taking Cameron down to the lab for the blood sample.”

“You left your backpack in your gym locker,” Good Cop says. “You know we found that. But we haven’t found your PE clothes, or the street clothes you were wearing on Friday.”

“I had my PE clothes on when I left,” Cameron says. “I went to the lake. I went running.”

“Yes, your PE teacher says you left in your PE clothes, but where are they?”

“In the wash, I guess.”

“What about your street clothes?”

“In the wash?”

“Then you left wearing your PE clothes and brought your street clothes home with you?”

“Yes.”

“You sound positive about that.”

“I brought my gym bag home instead of my backpack,” Cameron says.

“Why?”

“It was a mistake.”

“You wanted to take your backpack?”

Cameron nods. “I had homework for history I wanted to do.”

“Your teachers say you don’t do homework,” Bad Cop says.

“I do some of it.”

Good Cop checks through his notes. “Hit and miss, that’s what your history teacher, Mr. Hart, says about your homework.”

“Move on, then,” Jeffries says.

“Did your mom do the laundry this weekend?” Bad Cop asks.

“Maybe.”

“How is he supposed to know?” Randy asks.

“It doesn’t matter,” Bad Cop says. “You know you can’t wash blood out of clothes, Cameron? It’s set for life, even if you can’t see it with the human eye.”

“Where are we going to find your clothes,” Good Cop asks. “Your room? The laundry room?”

“My room, maybe.”

“What about the gym bag? Where’s that?”

Cameron shrugs. “My room?”

“You don’t sound sure about that.”

“I’m pretty sure.”

“Maybe you could go get it for us,” Good Cop suggests.

“Get it yourself,” Jeffries says. “You’ve got a warrant, use it.” He puts his hand on Cameron’s shoulder and says to him, “Go get your jacket. We’ll pick up your mom on the way to the police lab.”

Cameron walks into the living room and picks up his coat from the couch. He can hear them talking, Randy mostly. His voice is raised and strained.

“The city’s really pushing this into adult court? They don’t even know yet who they’re trying.”

“They’re making noise.” Jeffries sounds confident.

“They can and will move it,” Bad Cop says.

“We don’t know that this case is going there or that it will even involve us,” Jeffries cautions. “It’s insane, really, to be talking about adult court when a viable suspect isn’t even in the picture.”

“Well, that’s a matter of opinion, isn’t it?” Good Cop says.

“Opinion is all we have,” Jeffries says.

TUESDAY

2:30AM

The cops (Cameron counted thirteen of them) weren’t done searching the house until two in the morning. Cameron stuffed the cushions back into the couch and curled up there while they picked through his bedroom. Robbie spent the night at a friend’s house and his mom dozed in the armchair close by. Randy stood outside, in the glow of halogen lamps, and watched cops dig through the garage, which included the laundry area and the trash cans lined up against the outside wall. When they were done, Randy shoveled the trash back into the cans, picked up the clean clothes that were in the dryer but were tossed around by the detectives, and loaded them back into the washer, then he straightened the furniture on the deck and came inside.

“They’re just about done,” Randy says, looking Cameron in the eye, even through the dimness of the room.

“Good.”

“They didn’t find what they’re looking for,” he says.

“My clothes.”

“That and your gym bag.”

“I know.”
Because they’re buried in the woods. For now.

Randy nods. “Your lawyer told you not to talk to me about the case. That’s a good idea.”

“Yeah, I think so, too.”

“Are you scared?”

“Sometimes,” Cameron admits. “Mostly, I don’t feel anything at all.”

“Your mom made an appointment with a doctor in Philadelphia. You know that’s a confidential relationship? Not even the court can break it.”

“Okay.”

“I just want you to be straight with the guy.”

“I’ll try.”

“Sorry to break up the pillow talk,” Bad Cop says, walking into the room. “But we’re done.”

“You’re an ass, Finney,” Randy says.

Cameron sits up on the couch.

“This is the first I’ve heard of it,” Bad Cop says. “You’re taking this personally.”

“Real personally,” Randy agrees.

Good Cop walks into the room, smiles, and says. “We’re leaving. Empty-handed.”

“Bull. You’re too happy. You found something,” Randy says.

“We’re confident the blood is all we need. We’ll let you know the preliminary results on that later today.”

“You mean you’ll either clear Cameron or you’ll be back to arrest him?”

“That’s right,” Good Cop says.

“We’ll see you tomorrow, Cameron.”

Randy lets them walk themselves out. Cameron hears them packing up. The halogen lamps outside are shut off, plunging the room into darkness. Car doors slam shut. Engines turn over and tires crunch on the gravel, skidding on the last patch of driveway before making the state road and clinging to the blacktop. His eyes adjust and he finds Randy, sitting now in a chair near the window.

“I’m going to jail,” Cameron says.

“Maybe.”

“Am I going to die?”

“It wasn’t murder,” Randy says. “It wasn’t planned.”

Cameron didn’t know he was going to kill Pinon. It wasn’t a decision but an action. And maybe this will save his life.

TUESDAY

9:45AM

His mother is in the kitchen, sitting at the table drinking a cup of coffee, when Cameron enters from outside. She’s still wearing the makeup she didn’t wash off the night before, but her hair is combed into a ponytail and she changed clothes. She’s not going to work. He thought maybe she’d go in late, but she’s wearing a velour sweatsuit and is in no hurry to get out the door.

She told him not to go to school today. Last night, after he gave his blood at the police lab, they sat in Jeffries’s car in the parking lot and talked about the immediate future. They no longer talked in days but hours. Cameron shouldn’t go to school. Before the end of the day the police would return and if the blood was a positive match, Cameron would be arrested.

“And if his blood isn’t a match?” his mom asked. “What then?”

“The police will move on, look for another suspect,” Jeffries said. He paused and tapped the steering wheel with his stubby fingers, then looked into Cameron’s mom’s face and warned, “We have to think about what we’ll do if the blood does match. We need a plan for that.”

His mom’s face got tight, smaller somehow. Air rattled in her throat as she drew a breath. “You’re supposed to believe he’s innocent.”

“He has bruising, a pretty deep cut on his right hand. They’re consistent with having handled a combination lock.”
Violently.
Jeffries didn’t say it. He didn’t have to.

His mom’s lips peeled back from her teeth. Cameron thought she was going to defend him, but the words never came. Instead, he heard a thin hiss like air escaping out of a balloon and even as he watched her she grew distant, out of reach.

When Jeffries dropped them off at home she got out of the car and walked toward the house, surrounded with halogen lamps on tall metal poles and strangers picking through and setting aside their stuff. She stopped on the deck, a dark, haloed figure, her fingertips pressed to the railing, and swayed on her feet.

“She’s in shock,” Jeffries said. “She won’t give up on you.”

She stood in his bedroom door that morning, her fingers barely touching the doorjamb, as if testing its reality, and told him to stay home. He already knew that so he guessed she was finally accepting that she had a killer for a son. She looked at him a long time, so long he felt like she was trying to memorize him. He felt her eyes on his hair, cut so short now and the color of bark. Her gaze settled on each feature of his face individually. She didn’t just look into his eyes, she dove in. Stayed. Searched. Then she approached him, cupped his face with her hands, and kissed his forehead, beneath the burn scabs. She loved him no matter what he did.

“What are you doing?”

His mother’s words break through his thoughts. Her voice is high and thin and charged with accusation. He takes another step toward her, clutching the blue gym bag to his chest.

“You shouldn’t bring that in here,” she says. “They’re coming back, the police.”

“I don’t want to die,” Cameron says. His voice breaks and so he says it again.

She pushes up from her chair. Coffee spills and pools around her cup.

“Give me the bag.”

She opens her hands but Cameron clings to the bag and instead he moves into her arms. He puts his face on her shoulder, his nose turned into her neck, and smells her flowery powder, watches his tears wet her jacket.

“I wish this had never happened,” Cameron says.

She lays her hands on his head, strokes her fingers through his short hair, rubs his temples, and promises him she’ll try to fix it. All of it. And Cameron doesn’t mind that she seems to include him in that statement or that her record for repairing what’s broken is unimpressive.

TUESDAY

7:00PM

Cameron watches from his bedroom window as his mom removes the steel rack from the grill, stuffs his jeans into the trough, and pours lighter fluid on them. His gym bag is on a deck chair, the zipper open, T-shirts, shorts, and socks falling out the top. His mom steps back from the barbecue and strikes a match. The fire catches fast, flames a foot long leaping into the air. She waits with her arms folded over her stomach, bent a little at the waist, like she’s leaning into a muscle pull. He can’t see her face, but he knows she’s crying. He knows her eyes are dark, unfocused, confused. She looked like that a lot of times when they were still with his father.

She burns his clothes and the gym bag, then scrapes melted plastic off the barbecue while it’s still hot, gathers the metal zippers and buttons, dumps the hot ashes into a brown grocery sack, and leaves the deck.

He hears the garage door open. She had told him she was going to burn it all, that he should stay in his room and not think about it. She didn’t tell him what she planned to do with what’s left over.

He had told his mom that he did it. He had killed Pinon. But she’d already known. It was like she had just been waiting for him to say it. Her hands had shaken a little. The breath caught in her throat and tears spilled off her cheeks, but she hadn’t said anything. Not then, and not much since. He could tell, though, that he had broken her heart. She had that bruised, scared look she wore living all those years with his father.

And maybe that hurt him more than all the beatings he’s taken this year. It might even hurt more than knowing that he killed a boy.

Confessing was, at first, like losing all the marrow from his bones. It was excruciating, but he felt suddenly weightless. Able to soar above it all. Now his heart is kicking against his ribs, and he thinks about how some birds die scared, their hearts bursting in their tufted chests even as they’re flying.

He doesn’t want to be a killer.

He doesn’t want Pinon dead.

But there’s no way to change who he is and what he’s done.

He hears his mother’s feet in the gravel driveway and then she’s in the yard, carrying the brown bag and a shovel. She walks through the grass then slips between the trees and into the woods.

TUESDAY

7:50PM

They’re finishing dinner when two police cruisers pull into the driveway. His mom gets up from the table and walks to the window.

“Randy is here,” she says. “And those two cops.” She turns and looks at Cameron. “Jeffries is going to meet us at the police station. Remember not to say anything.”

Cameron nods.

“The therapist, from Philadelphia, he’ll drive out the day after tomorrow.”

His mom believes that what happened in the boys’ locker room is the culmination of a year’s abuse. It makes sense to Cameron. His freshman year of high school made him a soldier.

“I’ll talk to him,” Cameron promises.

Robbie stands up, bounces on his feet, pushes his hands into his pockets then pulls them out again. His mom walks to him, places her hand on his arm and says, “Remember, we’re thinking positive.”

Cameron looks at his brother’s face, the fear in it making Cameron’s stomach lurch. He remembers how he wanted Robbie to be afraid of him, just a little. Now it feels as wrong as everything else. Anyway, Robbie is afraid
for
him, not
of
him, and that’s even worse.

“You worry too much,” Cameron tells Robbie.

“That’s the way I am,” he says.

“I know.”

Randy knocks on the door. Everything by the book. Cameron’s mom has to open the door, give her permission for them to ask Cameron questions. She lets them in but tells them, just as Jeffries instructed, that Cameron isn’t speaking about the crime with which he is charged.