“Well, he lived to tell about it.”
Dunk’s eyes narrowed. “Or did he? Have you ever seen him? He looks like a zombie.”
“Zombies aren’t real.”
“If there are zombies anywhere, they’d be here in Pittsburgh. This place is a shithole,” he said. “Chicago was a happy place. Look at the films set around Chicago—The Breakfast Club, Sixteen Candles. In Chicago, we had Molly Ringwald down the road in Evanston. Nothing bad ever happens in Evanston.”
“Anthony Michael Hall could easily be a zombie. That Ducky kid, too.”
He thought about this. “You got me there. They’re some creepy-looking dudes. Molly’s a fox, though. I’d do her.”
“You don’t even know what that means.”
“Of course I do. A gentleman never kisses and tells, though. You’ll have to fumble through the art of love all on your own, Mr. Thatch, now that you have a girlfriend.”
I had told Dunk everything.
He knew about my first meeting with Stella through the incident with the old woman. I didn’t know what else to call it. The incident seemed right. He knew about the money, too.
“She’s not my girlfriend.”
“Whatever, Romeo. Is she here?”
I didn’t need to check the bench to be sure she wasn’t here, and wouldn’t be, until next August. I gave up attempting to find her any day other than August 8, and that day was still very far off. “No, I haven’t seen anyone.”
“Then why are we here?”
I needed to know more about her. I need to know something about her. Lately she seemed to occupy nearly all my waking thoughts, and I figured it was because I had so many questions. If I answered those questions, if I figured out who she was, maybe I could get past this. Maybe I wouldn’t want to see her so bad. Maybe I wouldn’t bother to go to the bench next August at all. “Her name is Stella Nettleton. I want to check all the headstones in here and see if I can figure out who she visits every month.”
Dunk’s mouth was open slightly, and his bushy eyebrows seemed to touch. “That may be the stupidest idea I’ve ever heard. How many stiffs do you think are buried here?” His face went red, then, “I mean, besides your mom and pop, because they’re not stiffs, they’re, I mean were, I mean—”
“We need to watch for any headstones dated August 8, too,” I interrupted. “Just in case whoever she visits didn’t have the same last name.”
He nodded toward the small white building next to the adjacent parking lot. “Isn’t there a log or something in the office? That seems much easier than running around Satan’s waiting room, checking names. Not that your parents would be…oh heck, this is awkward. Can’t we just go play ball or something? I saw some kids at Carnegie Park. Justin was there. He’ll let us play.”
“I can do this myself, if you don’t want to.”
Dunk sighed. “No, if this is how you want to spend your night off, I’ll help. We should start at the office, though.”
“I tried that a few weeks ago. They didn’t have any records for people named Nettleton, and I found three people who died on August 8, two others who were born on that day.” I pulled a piece of paper from my pocket and showed it to Dunk. “All five of these are on the far end of the cemetery, the newer part. I tracked them down yesterday. The bench is in the oldest portion of this place, nowhere near these. The man at the office said a fire destroyed all the records prior to 1926, all the old stuff, so the only way to be sure there is nobody else is to check all the gravestones, one by one.”
Dunk scratched at the side of his head. “How many are there?”
“One hundred and twenty-four thousand.”
The color drained from his face. “You know that’s impossible, right? You realize how long that would take? Like a thousand years. Maybe longer. Maybe a lot longer.”
“I don’t think we have to check them all. Whoever she visits must be near that bench. We start at the graves near there and branch out until we find what we’re looking for.”
For the next three hours, we did exactly that, moving from stone to stone, row to row. We found nothing.
August 8, 1987
Eleven Years Old
Log 08/08/1987—
Subject “D” restless.
Audio/video recording.
“Is there anybody there?”
“What do we do? Should we answer him?”
“Naw, he’ll pipe down in a few minutes. Just ignore him.”
“I had a bad dream. Can you turn on the lights?”
“Should we do it?”
“I’m not gonna do it—he’s on a schedule. Ignore him. It’s your move.”
“I can’t concentrate with the kid jabbering in there. He creeps me out.”
“I’ve got checkmate in two more moves anyway.”
“No you don’t, not after I take your…oh, shit. I’m an idiot.”
“Yep.”
“Your name’s Carl, right? If you can’t turn on the lights, can you at least talk to me until I fall back asleep, Carl?”
“Fuck! How does he know my name?”
“Calm down.”
“Screw you.”
“I don’t want to hear my name coming out of his mouth. Not now, not ever.”
“He can’t hurt you, not with the audio delay.”
“Can’t we just switch him off? Mute him?”
“Then it won’t record. Something important gets missed, and we’re both looking for new employment.”
“You’d be all over that switch if he said your name.”
“Well, let’s just hope he fixates on you, then.”
“Has he ever been outside his box?”
“Not since I’ve been here.”
“When did you start? ’81?”
“Fall of 1980.”
“That’s insane. That room can’t be more than ten by ten.”
“He’s got a window.”
“Overlooking what? The parking lot?”
“I heard he was out when they first brought him in, but that didn’t last long. One other time two years ago. The kid’s got a nasty temper.”
“Do you have any kids, Carl?” David said.
“Christ! Shut him up.”
“Do you want to play again?”
“Naw. I can’t focus.”
“Do you ignore your own kids, too, Carl? You really shouldn’t.”
“Fuck me.”
“I heard his dad did that to him, to his face.”
“I heard that, too.”
“Something snapped then, in his head. He’s not right.”
Carl let out a nervous chuckle. “He’s nowhere near right. That’s why they keep him in a box.”
“Still, just a kid, though.”
“What does that mean? You want to talk to him? Cheer him up?”
“Hell no.”
Carl pressed the microphone button. “Would you like Warren here to read you a bedtime story?”
Warren slapped his hand off the button. “What the fuck? Why’d you tell him my name?”