LITMIR.BIZ

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my old man, he’s got some kind of obsession with him,’ another laugh. An almost beautiful sound but for its sour edge, a strawberry picked too early.

      ‘He asks after your dad too,’ he said to Gloria and she sighed, arms crossed over her chest.

      ‘Maybe he’s got a thing for old Wakefield,’ I teased, ‘wants to hold hands and kiss him.’

      Rudy made smooching sounds and Gloria punched him in the arm, called us both gross.

      ‘Sorry, sorry,’ he said, ‘must be Mrs Wakefield. That red dress she had on at the parade raised a few eyebrows.’

      Jenny laughed; it sounded hot and strained from first-time smoke. ‘Not just eyebrows. Gloria’s mom walking down Main Street in those dresses of hers raises a whole lot else, especially with Mayor Wills.’ She wolf-whistled and grinned wide.

      ‘That’s the least of it going round town about dear Mother,’ Gloria said with another sigh.

      ‘Your mom’s got more lipsticks than a New York tranny, and the jugs to match.’ Rudy slapped his knee and filled the forest with laughter. Birds fled their perches and I waited for Gloria to skin the boy alive.

      ‘You’re a jerk, Rudy Buchanan, you know that?’ she said.

      ‘But you love me still.’ He puckered up and planted a fat kiss on her cheek. A red blush spread over them both.

      ‘I hereby declare it, Gloria’s got half my heart,’ then he jumped up and grabbed Jenny’s hand, kissed it. ‘Jenny has the other half and Johnny has my whole butt!’

      Then he pulled his shorts down, showed off his backside. We all screamed and fell about laughing.

      Rudy the charmer. Rudy the handsome prince. Rudy had more hearts carved into trees around Larson than anyone, at least that’s what he said. But it was never a brag. He could say, I’m the best-looking guy in three counties, and you’d nod along.

      There weren’t any girls in Larson carving a heart around my name.

      ‘Enough bullshit, you guys. Can we talk about what we came here to talk about?’ Gloria said. ‘Rudy, tell them what you told me earlier.’

      Rudy went quiet, all the joking gone. ‘After you guys left the Backhoe yesterday, I stuck around. After the parade, everyone went to the football field for the fireworks. That’s when Samuels and that skinny one, Robin or Roberts, whatever, came in for their two-dozen doughnut snack. That sheriff, man, two bites and poof, no more doughnut, now you see it,’ Rudy waved his hands like a party magician, ‘now you don’t.’

      ‘So what?’ I said. ‘Samuels is a lard-ass, that isn’t a secret.’

      ‘Shut up. Point is the place was empty and they didn’t see me at the next booth, just minding my own with my chocolate shake. They were talking hush hush but I could hear them.’

      ‘What did they say?’ Jenny asked, rapt.

      Rudy leant forward, like we’d be overheard out here. Ears in the trees, eyes in the leaves.

      ‘They were talking about when they found the girl,’ his eyes flicked to me. ‘Robin said the doctor who examined the body said she was maybe sixteen or seventeen.’

      Four years, if that, older than us. I felt a lump grow in my throat. Gloria nodded along to the story.

      ‘Shit,’ I said, ‘that it?’

      ‘Messed up, huh?’

      ‘Do they know who she is yet?’ Jenny asked.

      ‘If they did, it’d be all round town,’ Gloria said.

      Jenny shuffled closer to me, awkward with her leg. She scratched at a smear of dried blood on my t-shirt. ‘I can’t believe they don’t know her name.’

      ‘It’s awful, just awful,’ Gloria said.

      ‘She’s just … nothing,’ I said. ‘Without a name they can’t do anything. They can’t tell her mom or dad, or have a funeral without anything to put on the headstone. But it’s just a couple of made-up words, they could give her a new name if nobody claims her.’

      ‘Names are everything, Johnny,’ Rudy said with a scowl. ‘Those made-up words are all some idiot needs to brand you a no good thief or a pussy. Sure you can sign a piece of paper and change it, but that’s just like putting on a pair of pants. You still got an arsehole underneath. Bet some folk in town think all sorts about the Royals, especially now you’ve been sleeping with dead bodies.’

      Rudy, all flashing smiles and eyes, threw a twig at me. I threw one back.

      ‘Shut it, Buchanan.’

      Gloria snapped her fingers like old Mr Frome did when we were horsing about in biology class. ‘Shut up both of you. Rudy, keep going.’

      He stuck out his tongue at her then carried on. ‘The sheriff said the doctor reckons she’d only been in the water two or three days but dead for four or five. At the most.’

      ‘How did she get in our lake? Who knows it’s even there?’ Jenny said.

      ‘She must have been dumped elsewhere and, like … dislodged her upstream.’ Gloria raised her hands. ‘Samuels hasn’t got a clue.’

      ‘Get this,’ Rudy said. ‘Samuels said something about paint. He said they couldn’t find a match to the green paint they found on her back. Did you guys notice any paint?’

      We shook our heads. We hadn’t seen her back. We’d dragged her and laid her out face up. Maybe she’d been lying in spilled paint that mostly got washed away.

      ‘It gets worse,’ Gloria said.

      Rudy leaned in, pointing and stabbing at the air with a twig for emphasis. ‘That lardo’s too lazy to even go looking for her. It’d take too much time away from stuffing his face. Samuels said, word for fucking word, “Let’s check the missing person notices, if there ain’t nothing there, fuck it.” Fuck it, he said.’

      Disgust transformed Jenny’s face. ‘He’s going to give up? That was a bullet hole, right? Someone killed her, didn’t they?’

      Gloria punched the ground. ‘Exactly.’

      ‘How can nobody care?’ Jenny rested her head on the wall, puffed out a sigh.

      None of us had an answer to that. It deflated us. Maybe some cop in Mora’s town was fretting, wringing his hands and sticking her picture on a pin board while our cops were scratching their balls.

      Gloria stood up, brushed off her skirt. ‘That’s why I asked you here. We are going to solve the murder.’

      ‘What?’ I asked. This was the big idea? The plan she couldn’t talk about in the Backhoe?

      Gloria nodded. ‘We have to find out who she is and who hurt her. Someone has to.’

      ‘Stellar!’ Rudy jumped up.

      Jenny’s eyes widened. ‘I’m in.’

      ‘If Samuels can’t find out who she is, what makes you think four kids can?’ I said. I didn’t want to go digging, I didn’t want to see pictures of Mora, I didn’t want more rumours circulating. I didn’t want to see what that would do to Jenny.

      ‘Samuels isn’t looking,’ Gloria said. ‘He’s just ticking boxes. If he really wanted to find out what happened, he could. Everyone in this town knows everyone’s business.’

      ‘She’s right.’ Rudy stuck his hands on his hips. ‘Someone will know something. People don’t talk to cops.’

      ‘People don’t talk to kids either,’ I shot back.

      Then Jenny pushed herself up. ‘We have to, Johnny. She can’t be nothing. She can’t be nobody.’

      ‘This is stupid.’

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