2247 Oak Tree Lane.
We stand on the porch of Sarah Bauer’s house. It’s white with blue shutters and flowers in the window boxes. A nice place. Warm and inviting. But I’m not here to relax. I need facts. Answers. And if Sarah Bauer has any of them, then I need to speak with her.
“Maybe no one’s home,” says Owen, a little too hopefully.
Mercy nudges me with her elbow. “Knock again, Nate.”
I knock, and the three of us wait, but there’s no answer.
Just then a black van pulls into the driveway. A woman in a nurse’s uniform hops out, holding a bag of groceries. “Can I help you?”
“We’re looking for Sarah,” says Mercy.
The woman squints at us before glancing up at the second floor. “I’m her mom. Sarah’s not feeling well,” she says. “You kids might not have heard, but she lost a friend of hers—”
“He’s not dead.” The words fall out of my mouth on their own, and everyone stares at me.
“Oh god,” Sarah’s mom says. “They found him?”
I shake my head. “I just meant—” I start, but Mercy steps in front of me, changing the subject.
“We’re from Camp Clearwater, ma’am. We’re friends of Mike Elliot.”
She nods sadly, making her way up the porch. She opens the door. “I can’t guarantee she’ll want to see you.”
We follow her inside. The interior is bright and warm, like the outside. There are flowers on every table and shelf. The air smells like lavender.
“Sarah’s been a wreck since she found out,” says Mrs. Bauer. “She hasn’t really even left her room much. So I don’t imagine she’s up for visitors.”
“We understand,” says Owen kindly.
Mercy glares at him. As far as Mercy is concerned, this is an investigation. And there’s no room for kindness in a serious investigation.
Sarah’s mom puts the bag of groceries on the counter and heads for the stairs. “I’ll just go let her know.”
The three of us stand silently, listening to the footfalls upstairs. We can hear the murmurs of two people talking.
“Do you think she’ll want to see us?” Owen whispers.
“If she doesn’t,” says Mercy, “then we’ll know it’s because she’s hiding something.”
“And how exactly does it mean that?” asks Owen.
Mercy rolls her eyes. “Why else would she refuse to see us after we drove all this way?”
“Guys!” I hiss. “Be quiet.”
I hear the floorboards on the stairs creaking. Sarah comes around the corner. She’s in pajamas, her hair up in a messy ponytail. Her nose is red, and there are dark circles under her eyes. “Nate Andersen,” she says, surprised.
“Hi, Sarah.”
“What are you guys doing here?”
Mercy and Owen look nervously at me, not sure how to answer. I don’t really know how either.
“Can we talk?” I ask her.
“What about?”
“Mike.”
Her chin quivers, and she looks away.
“Sarah?” her mom calls from upstairs.
“It’s fine, Mom,” she says. “I’m fine.” She walks toward the front door, holding it open for the three of us. “Let’s talk then.”
We all shuffle out onto the porch. Sarah takes a seat on the top step.
“So,” she says, folding her knees up to her chest, “you drove all the way here to talk to me about Mike?”
I take a seat beside her. “We did.”
She nods, her finger chipping at some white paint peeling off the step. “How was the vigil?”
“It was all right, I guess. Lots of people turned out.”
“We noticed you weren’t there,” says Mercy. I shoot her a look. Mercy doesn’t do subtle.
“I just, uh…” Sarah trails off, dabbing her eye on her sleeve. “I just couldn’t be there, you know?”
“No, we don’t know.”
“Mercy,” I warn.
“No, seriously,” Mercy says, ignoring me, “we all went there to show our support. Why didn’t you?”
“What is her problem?” Sarah asks.
“We saw your post online, Sarah.” Mercy holds out her phone, the selfie of Sarah and Mike at Witch Rock, blown up on the screen. “If you guys were such besties, why couldn’t you show up for his vigil?”
Sarah doesn’t answer. As she stares at the picture, her eyes well up.
“I mean, what kind of friend are you that you wouldn’t make the drive out?”
“Mike is not my friend,” Sarah snaps, tears falling from her eyes. “He’s my boyfriend, okay?”
“Your boyfriend?” I am shocked. The way they acted around each other, I never would have thought they could like each other that way.
Sarah points at Mercy’s phone. “That was our nine-month anniversary. We went out on the Starling together. He planned a picnic for us at Witch Rock.” She glares at Mercy in that way only Sarah Bauer can. “That’s why I couldn’t go to the vigil, all right? It was too much, too real. It was like if I went, then I’d be admitting he was gone.”
Mercy takes a step back and puts her phone down. I can see she’s regretting coming at Sarah so hard.
“Sarah?” I say. “Did anything happen when you guys went out on the Starling? Did Mike say anything or—”
“What?” Sarah snaps. “You’re a detective now? I’ve been over everything with the sheriff from Guilford Falls already.”
“What did you tell the sheriff?”
“We hit the Starling—it was good water.”
“Did you tell anyone you were going?” I ask.
She rolls her eyes. “We’re not newbs, Nate. Yes, we checked in at the ranger station. Launched from Shoal Point, hit the Kessel Run and the Milky Way on our way to Witch Rock.”
“The Milky Way?” Mr. Evans takes the second-years down the Milky Way as a beginner lesson in the kayaks. Class One. It’s basically a big Jacuzzi. And as for the Kessel Run, Raina and Sarah take the first-years in the big rafts for their first taste of white water. It’s barely a step up from the Milky Way. Pretty tame waters for paddlers as good as Sarah and Mike.
“That’s how you get to Witch Rock, Nate.” Sarah glares at me. I don’t mean to sound suspicious. I just want to understand what happened to Mike. “We were going to hit the Nebula after our picnic.”
The Nebula. Class Four. That’s more like it for Sarah and Mike. And beyond the Nebula…
“Did Mike say anything about trying the Black Hole?” I ask her.
She looks away, swallows. “No…but I did.”
Mercy looks to me, her eyes going wide. I am sure she’s thinking what I’m thinking, that maybe that’s why Mike took on the Black Hole alone. To impress Sarah.
“What did Mike say?” I ask.
“What do you think he said?” Sarah snaps again. “No, obviously. It was a stupid idea. And he set me straight.”
That sounded like Mike. But still, he had done it. He’d taken on the Black Hole not two weeks after Sarah suggested it. Did she tease him for not wanting to try it? Did it eat at him until he just had to try to prove to her that he wasn’t afraid? No. Mike wouldn’t be that stupid.
“Besides,” Sarah continues, “by the time we were done the Nebula, it was nearly sundown. There wouldn’t have been time for the Black Hole anyway, thanks to his obsession with the environment.”
“What do you mean?”
She sighs, rubbing her knees. “After the Milky Way he spotted some swamp grossness onshore and climbed out to take a look. I told him to leave it, but he was all This is Camp Clearwater property and had to investigate.”
“What do you mean, swamp grossness?”
“I don’t know,” Sarah says. “It looked like swampy pools of green from the shoreline. It was stupid. Just pond scum, you know? But he made us spend, like, an hour there while he took pictures. Ate up our entire morning.”
“Did you tell the sheriff about that?”
“What?”
“The pond scum.”
Sarah looks confused. “No, why would I?”
“But it was on Camp Clear water property?”
She shrugs. “I think so. I mean, I don’t know. Not any part of the grounds I’ve been to. But Mike said it was. It was just north of camp. Why, what are you thinking? Do you think I should have told the sheriff about it?”
I don’t know.
Maybe this pond scum is more than nothing.