77. A Way Out

I can see his car under the shadows of trees along the driveway leading up to Jocelyn’s still dark and vacant house. Just as I did many thousand nights ago, I rode my bike here and slipped through the trees to wait and watch. The unmarked car drives up right before eleven. I wait for a moment, then see the sheriff roll down his window and light a cigarette.

“Sheriff?” I say a short ways from the car.

Making sure. Just in case I have to turn around and bolt. If the driver happens to be someone like Wade, Jocelyn’s sicko quasi-step-uncle.

“Get in.”

I recognize the voice and do what I’m told. He finishes his cigarette as we sit in silence.

“I saw you when I drove up,” Sheriff Wells says. “You get an F for your covert skills.”

I just sit there, uncomfortable in this old car, the smoke tickling my nose.

“Nobody’s around here, not anymore,” he tells me.

I wait, wondering where this is going.

“You said on the phone you went down into one of those tunnels.”

I nod.

“What did you find?” He reaches over and grabs my wrist and forces me to look at him. “Chris, look. I’m not—I’m not proud of what I’ve done, but this is far worse than I ever—what did you see down there?”

“The passageways go for miles, it seems.”

“But where did you end up?”

“I don’t know.”

“You saw nothing?”

“No. I—I don’t know what I saw. Some creepy old man.”

He lets go of my arm and looks out the front window. He rubs the back of his head and then his goatee, then lights another cigarette.

“Look, Chris. I don’t know how, but every single thing you do and say and probably even think, they know. They just know.”

“Who?”

The sheriff doesn’t answer my question. “They’re not watching me, not like you. They don’t have my car bugged, and they’re not monitoring my every move. But they are yours. And that’s why—that’s why we’re here.”

“For what?”

He looks at me and curses, then shakes his head.

“I’m sorry.”

I don’t expect these words to come from the sheriff’s mouth.

“I’m sorry and I don’t—I can’t—look, I’m frightened and you don’t—you can’t believe what that can do to a man like me. I’m not supposed to be scared. I’m supposed to guard and protect guys like you. And I just—I don’t know what I’m to protect you from. But I know that it’s ugly and that it’s everywhere and it has threatened my family.”

I think of the pastor’s words to me at the restaurant.

Fear. It will drive a person to do anything.

The sheriff sighs and takes a drag of his cigarette.

“I knew something was up, but when the whole thing about Jocelyn happened—when you told me what happened—I chose to believe the lie. Everything in me said not to. But they came around—men came to my house and talked to my wife and greeted my children as if they were warning me. They were warning me. And that warning is still there.”

“So you believe me?” I ask.

“I’ve heard—I’ve seen some crazy things. And that tunnel. It confirms that there’s evil here and it’s real and it can’t be stopped.”

“We have to tell others.”

“No. Listen to me. I mean this. We can’t.”

“Why?”

“I don’t know how much you love your mother, but I love my family very much. Nothing’s going to happen to them.”

“But you can—you can take them and leave.”

“It’s not that easy, Chris.”

“Sure it is.”

He shakes his head. “No. I’m not willing to sacrifice one of my own in order to try … I can’t.”

“What’s happening here?”

I can hear the crickets and the cicadas in the night as the sheriff waits to answer.

“Who’s doing all of this?” I ask again. “Is it—does it have to do with Mr. Staunch? Or Pastor Marsh?”

“I don’t know.”

“You must know something.”

“I know that the best thing I can do is do my job.”

“And your job is to let people like Jocelyn die?”

The sheriff curses, and for a second I wonder if he’s going to punch me in the face.

“I had nothing to do with that.”

“But you knew?”

He shifts in his seat. “No. Everything I’m telling you is truth. I was told specifically to watch you—to watch Chris Buckley carefully—but to also give you some slack. But I knew nothing about Jocelyn. And I still don’t—I still can’t believe everything that’s going on.”

“I gave you some proof. Today. There are tunnels in our house. And I swear someone’s coming in at night and terrorizing my mom.”

“But why this strange interest in you? What are you to this town?”

“You think I know?”

“What did Jocelyn say?”

“The same thing everybody says. Very little. Not enough. ‘There are evil people here, but oops, I can’t say anything more.’”

“I’m telling you everything I can.” The words coming out of his mouth sound like defeat. “I believe you, Chris, that’s one thing you have to know. And I know now. It’s just—I’ve seen people try to leave this place, and they can’t. They don’t. Some leave, but they come back in coffins. I don’t want to be one of them.”

“Can’t we go to the FBI or out of state somewhere?”

“You think that Solitary is the only place where evil exists?”

“But I … but if …” I can’t finish my thought.

“Chris, listen. Yesterday I still refused—I still chose to believe that Jocelyn moved away with her aunt. That the rumors I have a whole file on were just that—silly rumors. I chose to ignore them. Including the rumors about the tunnels.”

“Others have reported them?”

“I’m surprised you haven’t heard talk at school or with other kids. You haven’t told anybody about the tunnels?”

“No.” I leave out Poe’s name. For now.

“When I got here, the stories about the underground tunnels were among the first of a whole bunch of supposed urban legends I heard.”

“And what? What’d they say?”

“That underneath the town of Solitary there are secret passageways that allow vampires to come prowling in the night and slip into people’s homes and drink their blood.”

I wait to see if the sheriff is joking.

“That’s the legend. So of course I laughed it off. I knew there were some old mines around here, but tunnels for vampires? Next thing I knew there was going to be a cave that led to that school Harry Potter went to.”

“But there really are underground tunnels.”

“I know. And that’s what I’m saying. When I saw that today—I can’t just ignore it anymore. I tried to. This spring—” He lets go a really nice curse word that Mom would ground me for. “It’s not a good thing, living in regret. You wake up with it, Chris. You go to sleep with it. But it just picks away. Day after day.”

He’s lighting his third cigarette since he got here.

“What do we do?” I ask.

I watch the smoke swirling from his mouth toward the outside window. I wish I could escape from Solitary like that. Just fade away into the night.

“I’m sorry, Chris. I’m sorry I didn’t believe you. I’m sorry that I—that I was scared. That I am scared. But you can trust me.”

“Others have told me that too.”

“Yeah. And you have every right not to trust me. But you gotta give me some time.”

“How much time?”

“That I don’t know. I just—I don’t know.”

For a long time we sit in the front seat in silence. I can’t help looking at the shell of a house in the distance and thinking of the light that used to live there.

“I can do better,” Sheriff Wells says. “I’m better than this. This sneaking around and apologizing and being scared of the dark. I’m better than that. And I didn’t become a cop to hide. That’s not what I’m about. If there’s one thing you understand, then understand that. Okay, Chris?”

“Yes, sir.”

“There’s a way out. Out of here. I just gotta find it. Give me time to find it.”