A Sky for Us Alone Read online

  I didn’t know how much cameras like that cost, but I knew they couldn’t be cheap, and there was no reason for Nate to have twelve of them, or even one. I couldn’t remember him ever taking photos on anything but his phone. After searching the shed for any other surprises, I found one more box that had been overturned on its side, without any sign of what had been in it. Whoever had broken in must have found what they were looking for in that one.

  I pushed everything back into the shed except my saw and the box of cameras. Those I carried with me into the trailer and set them in the corner of my room. I threw a bunch of my dirty clothes over them, just in case Mama decided to snoop around. I didn’t have too much time to think about it, I just needed to get back out the door before I could change my mind about going to find Daddy.

  Of course Mama tried to make a fuss when I grabbed her keys. “You could at least ask,” she said, given up on any threats of taking them away. It actually felt worse than when she tried to pick a fight.

  “Call me if you need me,” I said before I left.

  As soon as I got in the car, I dialed Daddy’s number. It didn’t matter that he didn’t pick up after three rings. I expected as much, and put the gear in reverse anyway.

  Chapter 34

  IT HAD BEEN A few years since I’d been to the mining plant. The American Coal Council visited our school when I was in eighth grade, same as they’d done for years. They came to get us all pumped up about coal, to tell us how important we were to the rest of America—its bloodline and energy—and to ignore anyone who said it would ever go away. Daddy and Nate were underground when we went on the trip, but I saw plenty of bulldozers and ram cars from the loading dock where they gave us all hard hats and earplugs to muffle the noise of the drills.

  The chain-link fences started about a mile away from the front gates. Pieces of fabric hung here and there from signs that protestors had tied up and then miners had torn down. I drove slower and spotted a couple still intact. “Stop Poisoning Our Children,” one said, and the other, “We All Live Downstream.” Next to it the yellow boy stained the ditch dark orange and ran toward the valley. When I was about ten, Amos went to prison after thirteen people all died within a couple of months of the silicosis that ruined their lungs. But he paid the safety fines for hazardous breathing conditions and got out quick. No big surprise there. These battles had been going on as long as the mines had been running, I guessed, and probably would until they were gone.

  “I’m here to see my dad,” I said, leaning through my window toward Billy Curtis, the security guard.

  “How ya doing, Harlowe?” he asked, taking his radio from his belt.

  “I’m hanging in,” I said, unsure how to answer.

  “You gonna start up here with Red next week?” He tapped the radio against his leg and I wondered if it made a screeching sound for the person on the other side of it.

  “Not sure about that,” I said. “Hey, Billy, I know you were pretty tight with Nate, weren’t you?”

  “Yeah,” he said, and looked past me. “It’s been awful strange not having him here anymore. Sometimes I still go to call him for breaks here or beers after work.”

  “Trust me, I know what you mean,” I said.

  Billy scratched the back of his head, looking like he was trying to come up with something else to say.

  “Hey, before you call for my dad, could you do me a favor?” I asked.

  He looked up and waited.

  “I just never got to see Nate’s office. Always wondered what it was like in there.”

  Billy looked down at his watch. “It’s almost lunch,” he said. “Suppose I could take you by while it’s quiet. Let me see if Howard can take over here for a little while.” He pushed the orange button on the transceiver.

  I picked up my phone and saw Daddy had tried to call me back. I decided to hold off on telling him where I was for the moment. I didn’t want to see him before I had a chance to see the office first.

  After a few minutes, Howard came and Billy said, “All right, mind if I ride up there with ya?”

  The dust thickened while I drove, and I turned the wipers on just to try to clear the windshield a bit. Things looked a lot different than they had only a few years back. The front mine used to be almost hidden by the mountain above it, but now that, and almost everything else around, had been flat-topped. It was a wide expanse of rubble, the draglines towering higher than the neighboring mountains in the distance, all the driving equipment coated in gray dust. I felt much smaller near all the machines than I did in the valley.

  A tinny-sounding bell rang so loud over the drilling that I stuck my fingers in my ears with the hand that wasn’t on the steering wheel. “Where do I park?” I asked, knowing all the men would be heading to the cafeteria.

  “How ’bout over there?” Billy pointed to an open spot by the side of the cinder-block building.

  “Bet break is short and we don’t have a ton of time,” I said, crouching down in my seat. I wasn’t worried about running into Moore, since Red and I heard Amos say he was putting him on pill runs, but I wasn’t sure how often Amos came to check on things himself.

  “We got ’bout twenty minutes or so,” Billy said, and reached for the door.

  “Just one more favor,” I said, stopping him before he could get out. “Think I could have a little time alone in there? I’m just worried about someone coming in and I’ll be crying or something. Embarrassing, you know? I mean, if it’s too much trouble—”

  “I understand,” he said. “It don’t mean you’re not manly or anything, you know. Means you care. I’ll watch the door. Only for a few minutes, though. Come on,” he said. “Back door’s this way.”

  Chapter 35

  “THAT WAS HIS DESK right there.” Billy pointed. “Henry Dalton has it now. All right, I’ll leave ya to it,” he said, his hand on the doorknob.

  “Thanks,” I said. “I’ll be out soon.” It felt strange being in that room for the first time, knowing Nate had spent so many hours there. It was dingier than I’d expected. From the way everyone talked about his job, I imagined something fancy, but the desks were chipped plywood and there were no windows in the concrete walls.

  I didn’t waste any more time and sat down in Nate’s old chair and pulled open the front drawer. There were a few envelopes with Henry Dalton’s name on them, some paper clips, and a stapler. Next I opened the two bottom drawers and rifled through the papers in file folders and the bags of snacks Henry had stuffed in the back. I picked up the picture of him and his wife from the desk. They wore matching sweaters and haircuts. I’d never met Henry, but right then I was mad at him for being happy. Even more, I was mad at him for being alive and taking Nate’s desk.

  I leaned my head in my hands and stared down at the peeling coating on the plywood, then turned the chair to face the rest of the room. The desk on the opposite side caught my eye and I walked over to it. It was much neater than the other two desks in the room, and it didn’t look like anyone had used it in a long time. A Sports Illustrated swimsuit calendar that was two years old hung above it. I had a feeling about who it belonged to even before I saw Tommy Prater’s face staring up at me from the identification badge in the top drawer. Before I could look in the drawer below it, the office door opened and I jumped.

  Billy followed behind Daddy with a look that said he was sorry, but there was nothing he could do.

  “What the hell are you up to in here?” Daddy asked.

  I stood up from Tommy’s desk. “I told you I needed to talk with you. You couldn’t seem to find the time, so I came to find you.”

  “Doesn’t look like it was me you came for,” he said. “Let’s go, right now. Do you know what could happen to you if they find you nosing around in here?” He walked toward me and grabbed my arm.

  “Okay, fine,” I said, and followed him out the door.

  He spotted the car and walked over to it.

  “I think Nate was trying to get the Praters busted
for running pills,” I said, before he could tell me to leave again.

  “Shhhh,” he said tightly, and held his hand right in front of my face. “We’ll talk about this later.”

  “I can’t wait any longer,” I said, my voice cracking from being quiet for too long. “Did you know Mama’s taking them again?”

  “There’s nothing either one of us can do about that,” he said.

  “But you don’t ever do anything! You’re not even hardly there anymore. I’m the one who has to deal with her, just like Nate had to deal with her the last time.”

  He walked closer to me and lowered his voice. “Do you know what happens if I lose this job? We can’t pay for anything—not her medical bills, or yours if anything happened to you, and certainly not mine.” His face changed and he slumped against the car.

  “What’s wrong with you?”

  “Nothing that doesn’t happen to most after years of work here. Lungs. They’re not giving out too soon, but I got three years before I can get pension, and the medicine alone is thousands a month.”

  I looked at him and opened my mouth to say something, but closed it again.

  “You understand a little better now? Didn’t think it’d do any good to burden either one of you with it.”

  “I’m sorry,” I said. “I just can’t let it go. I don’t understand how you can be here, knowing what they did to Nate.”

  “Hang on,” he said, and took his phone out of his pocket, the ring becoming louder while he lifted it to answer. “Yeah,” he said. “Oh no. God damn it. All right, I’ll keep an eye out.” He hung up the phone and frowned at the dust covering his boots.

  “What was that about?” I asked.

  “Go home, Harlowe,” he said. “Go straight home and stop asking so many goddamn questions.”

  The doors of the cafeteria opened, and all the workers filed out, putting on their hard hats, goggles, and masks they used to try to keep the dust from coating their insides as much as it did their outsides.

  David Jenson spotted me and Daddy and came over to say hello, extending a gloved hand my way. “Did you hear about Tommy?” he said to Daddy.

  Daddy only nodded, but I could tell he felt me watching and listening close.

  “It’s a shame. Hospital said it was a freak accident. Dogs in the house were dead too. Fentanyl powder. Guess he thought it was coke or something. Heard that stuff is everywhere, now,” Mr. Jenson said.

  I stared harder at Daddy, my jaw dropped open.

  “Go home, Harlowe,” he said again. “If you don’t go right now, I’ll drive you back myself.”

  There were so many thoughts and questions simmering to a boil in my mind. I needed to leave before I started spouting them without thought to whoever was within earshot. I turned to get in the car when a truck pulled up beside us. There was nowhere for me to hide when I saw Moore behind the wheel. “What’s he doing here?” He pointed at me but looked at Daddy.

  “I left my medicine at home, and he had to bring it for me,” Daddy said. “He was just leaving.”

  “That’s right,” I said, swallowing hard and wanting to get away from Moore as fast as I could.

  “Wait just a minute there.” Moore stopped me before I could close the car door. “I reckon you’ve all heard about the tragedy. Amos feels certain it was no accident. Thinks someone was out to get Tommy. He’s offering a reward if anyone knows anything. Spread the word. Don’t think I have to tell any of you that now’s not the time to screw anything up around here. Or anywhere else.”

  I nodded and chewed the inside of my mouth to stop from saying that Tommy got what he deserved.

  “One more thing,” he said, before I could get inside. “Be sure to ask your friends if they know anything. We’ll be looking everywhere.” He squinted at me.

  I wanted to ask him if he meant like he’d looked for all of us at the Draughns, but bit my cheek even harder. “What about the sheriff?” I asked instead.

  “Oh, he’s looking too,” Moore said. “You can be sure of that.”

  I drove away, my heart pounding. All of Strickland might be looking for the person who killed Tommy, but I wasn’t about to forget that he was the one who killed Nate. Even if I was the only one who still remembered.

  Chapter 36

  THE PHONE SHOOK IN my hand, as I tried with the other to keep the wheel steady.

  “Hello?” Powell said.

  “It’s Harlowe Compton,” I said. “I just heard about Tommy Prater.”

  “I see,” he said, and cleared his throat. “Is there something you’d like to report?”

  “Yes,” I said. “I overheard Amos and Bob Moore talking the other night.”

  “Go ahead,” he said, and I repeated the conversation as exact as I could remember it.

  “I’m sorry, and what do you think this has to do with Tommy’s dying?”

  “I heard them talk about clinics and pill runs, don’t you understand? Amos said he took Tommy off of them after Woodvale, and Nate had written about that and other places in his notebook. Working in the same office, he must have gotten their schedule somehow. And there was a text.” I stopped talking, realizing I was about to get Jacob involved too.

  “A text to who?”

  I took a breath and told myself to slow down. All of a sudden, I was unsure of everything I had set out to say. “Um, I just—I think Nate knew what the Praters were doing, and that’s why Tommy killed him,” I said.

  “Bring the notebook to the station, and any other evidence you have,” Powell said. “In the meantime, if you see or hear of anyone finding packets of powder, whatever you do, don’t open it. All it takes is one spill, taste, or touch of that stuff. Don’t know why anyone would even bother with it. There were about twenty of them stuffed inside a camera box, if you can believe it. Tommy definitely didn’t know what he was dealing with.”

  My pulse pounded so loud in my ears that I could hear nothing else. “Okay, I have to go,” I said. “I’ll bring that notebook sometime soon,” I muttered before I hung up and dropped the phone onto the passenger seat.

  Sweat poured down my face and neck, and a wave of nausea almost forced me to pull over to the side of the road, but I didn’t want to stop anywhere before I got home.

  Mama was asleep in the recliner with the TV on loud, and I rustled her a little to make sure she was okay. When she shook her head and opened her eyes halfway, I said, “Never mind, everything is fine,” and rushed back to my room.

  I threw the dirty clothes aside and picked up the box underneath. I looked inside at the smaller camera boxes and considered taking the whole thing to the dump without looking any further, but I couldn’t turn away from the pieces now that some of them were finally fitting together.

  I took out one of the camera boxes and turned it over in my hands, looking for the best way to open it. Sheriff said the powder was in packets, but still, I worried. I lifted the back flap of the small box enough so I could see inside. As soon as I saw something white wrapped in clear plastic, I closed it shut.

  My room wasn’t close to big enough for the amount of pacing I needed to do, but still I walked back and forth across the floor, wondering what the hell I was supposed to do. I definitely couldn’t tell Mama about it. And I don’t think she’d be desperate enough to open a packet of powder without knowing what it was, though I couldn’t be sure. Really, for anyone who found them, it wouldn’t be strange to open one and smell it, maybe even taste it a little. Why the fuck did Nate have it in the shed?

  Walking the same steps over and over wasn’t getting me anywhere, so I put everything back in the box and taped it shut. I took my school backpack from the closet, dumped the papers still left in it from last year, put the box and notebook in, and then added a couple pairs of pants and shirts from my floor, some underwear and socks, a flashlight, and my toothbrush and toothpaste from the bathroom. I took the twenty-three dollars out of Nate’s wallet and put it in mine alongside the pie money, then hid his wallet and phone behind
a stack of old board games at the top of our closet.

  My phone rang as soon as I got outside and when I picked it up, I saw it was Mama calling. “I know,” I said, “I keep leaving,” before she could say anything. “Just please trust me that I have to right now. If Daddy asks you, tell him you don’t know where I went, because it’s the truth. I’m not taking the car. And Mama, call Mama Draughn if you need any help at all. Promise me that.”

  “But what about—” she said.

  “I’m sorry,” I said. “I really have to go.”

  Chapter 37

  “WHERE ARE YOU?” I asked as soon as Red answered my call.

  “Swimming, come meet me,” he said.

  “Is it just you?”

  “Yep, sad to say.”

  By the time I got to Mohosh, my shirt was soaked through with sweat and I wished I had thought to grab a drink before I left the house. I saw Red’s cooler on the rock before I spotted him and hoped he had more in it than only the liquor he’d carried with him the other night. Two cans of lemonade along with a pack of cold cuts, saltines, and the bottle of bourbon were inside when I opened it. I popped the top off one of the lemonades and drank almost all of it in one go.

  Red waved and started swimming toward me from the middle of the pond. I took a couple of saltines from the sleeve and ate them, hoping they’d soak up some of the nervous juice in my stomach. He pulled himself up on the rock and sat on his towel. “You getting in?” He shook water from his hair like a dog after a bath.

  “No,” I said, washing down the crackers with the last drops of lemonade. “Don’t have time.”

  “Got an interview or something?” he laughed. “Oh, right, busy with the girl,” he added.

  “Neither,” I said. “Well, I mean, I do need to see Tennessee, but that’s not why I’m in a rush.”