Black Wood Read online

  Charlie turned to Samantha.

  “You okay?” he said.

  She nodded. “I’m fine. You go.”

  “You’re not going anywhere,” Mr. Pierce said. Charlie turned and started to walk out of the clearing. “Sheriff, arrest him. He assaulted me.”

  “Let it go, Harry. Kid’s in enough trouble as it is.”

  Mr. Pierce leaned into the Sheriff. “I want that boy locked away. I’m within my rights. He was out here sneaking around with my daughter.”

  “I’m not in the habit of arresting kids ‘cause they won’t do what their parents tell them. That boy’s going to find himself on the wrong end of a jail sentence either way. You know that.”

  The Sheriff started to say something else, but he dropped his voice so low, I couldn’t hear. I started to move around nearer to him to hear what he was saying, when I lost my footing, and landed on a pile of branches. The clearing rang out with the sound of them cracking. I froze. What should I do? Did I run? Did I stand my ground? There was no way they hadn’t heard it. My questions were answered when the flashlights shot in my direction.

  I jumped up and ran. Then, I heard the dog barking. Jesus Christ, I’d forgotten about the dog. I looked behind, but I couldn’t see anything except flashlight beams. The sound of the dog wasn’t getting any closer, so I presumed they hadn’t left him off the lead. Probably didn’t want him mauling an innocent young couple to death. That was to my advantage. I kept moving as fast as I could. I knew the woods better than they did; I negotiated my way through them in the dark every night. Where to put my feet, where to avoid the tree stump, the low branches. I could move fast and avoid them; they couldn’t. They were trying to keep up with me, but I heard a thump and one of them yell out, “Aw, fuck.”

  The Sheriff shouted, “Adam, are you okay?”

  “I hit a tree stump. I think I broke something.”

  I started to sprint the last couple of hundred yards as I saw the road up ahead. I broke out of the clearing and on to the open road. There were no cars. They’d obviously parked on the other side of the woods. By the time they got back to them, I’d be long gone.

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  When I get back from Concord, I arrange to meet Samantha. I suggest that we go to the place on West 4th but she says we’ve been seen there too much. She tells me to come to her apartment.

  All the way there I have butterflies. It’s like the time back in Concord, years before, when I got into her bedroom, her inner sanctum. And now, here she was, inviting me in again. Well, okay, technically she didn’t invite me in the time in Concord. But she had now. Had I started to break down the walls around her? I thought I’d felt the slight hint of a thaw in her demeanour the previous couple of times we’d met. The question becomes even more pronounced when she answers the door wearing one of those kimono-type things – light pink – that comes to just above her knee. She looks like some kind of post-modern Geisha. She sees my expression.

  “What?” she says.

  “Nothing.”

  “Jesus, have you never seen someone in a robe before? I’m coming down with something.”

  “Oh, I didn’t realise. Would you like me to go to a pharmacy, maybe get you something?”

  She ushers me in and closes the door behind me.

  “I’m fine. I want to hear about Concord.”

  Her apartment is much as I had expected. Minimalist, but stylish. Lots of black and white. She gestures to the black leather couch and I sit down. She sits in the armchair opposite me. I’m a little disappointed.

  “Well there isn’t a lot to hear,” I say. “I went back, the Black Wood is gone, they built the mall. I took a look around ... nothing.”

  “Wait, wait,” she says, waving her hands dramatically. “Slow down. So, the Black Wood is gone? All of it?”

  “All of it. They razed the whole lot to the ground. A shame, really.”

  She throws me a stern glance and looks like she’s about to reply but instead says: “And you looked around the mall?”

  “Of course. It’s a mall. That’s it.”

  “Did you talk to anyone?”

  “Yes, some old lady. She remembered me ... I have no idea who she was. But she remembered me, and she talked to me as if everything was normal. She would hardly have done that if they had any suspicions about me.”

  She sits back in the armchair, pulling her legs up underneath her. As she does, part of her robe slides down her leg, revealing a tanned upper thigh. She doesn’t seem to notice. Or doesn’t seem to care.

  “That doesn’t mean they don’t know about the body,” she says. “Or that they haven’t found it.”

  “No, but it means they don’t suspect me of anything.” I’m having trouble concentrating on what she’s saying. The robe has slid further up her leg and I can see a glimpse of lace underwear. Is it deliberate?

  “What about me?” she says.

  “What?” I focus in on her face again.

  “They don’t suspect you ... but what about me?”

  I shrug. “Well, I could hardly ask.”

  “Great,” she says, getting up out of the chair, the robe sliding maddeningly down her leg again. “Do you want a coffee?”

  “Yeah, sure.”

  “Christ, I don’t know why I ever let myself get involved in this mess,” she says. Her back is to me as she’s fixing the coffee and I can’t see her face. It’s the first time she’s directly addressed what went on in Concord twenty years before.

  “In fairness, Samantha, you did a little more than ‘let’ yourself get involved.”

  She glances over her shoulder at me. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “Just that ... you were a little more pro-active than that.”

  I expect her to throw some snappy reply at me, but her voice drops and she simply says: “Yeah ... well ... we all were.”

  “It was your idea, Samantha,” I say.

  “I don’t wanna talk about it. I’m sick and tired of talking about it. I just want it to be over. I’m so tired of this following me around my whole life.”

  When she says that, I genuinely feel sorry for her. I want to do something. I almost tell her there and then. But I know that would be crazy. What she needs now is my comfort; she needs to find solace in me. I get up from the couch and walk over to her in the kitchen. She still has her back to me as she pours the coffee. I reach my hand out. I want to touch her – not in that way – just comfort her, tell her it’s going to be okay.

  My hand hovers in midair. She turns around and seems surprised to see me standing so close.

  “It’s going to be okay,” I say.

  “You keep saying that,” she says.

  There is silence, both of us inches from each other, staring into each other’s eyes. This must mean something. After all these years, this must mean something. It’s not just a fleeting infatuation; this is deeper. Suddenly she pulls away.

  “I have to go change,” she says.

  Damn it. I am so close, so close to breaking her down. She moves around me and makes her way into the bedroom. I don’t hear the door close. I walk out of the kitchen and move slowly up the hall. I stop a couple of feet from her bedroom. The door is ajar.

  “I just can’t figure out who it could be,” she calls out from the bedroom. “I mean, who could know about it?”

  “I’ve been wondering that as well,” I say, quietly, so she doesn’t know how close I am to the door. I crane my neck to see in through the open door. She’s standing in front of a full-length mirror, laying out clothes on the bed. Black bra, black tights, black slip, and a sheer, black lace dress. She undoes the tie on her robe and lets it slide to the floor. It falls in almost slow motion. She’s naked save for the panties. The sight of her standing there is like a jolt to my system. I have the most intense sense memory that brings me back twenty years to those nights in the Black Wood. Her body looks the same as it did then. I remember every muscle, every indent, every mole that I memorised back
then.

  “What about that guy,” she says, “the creepy one who always knew what everyone was up to?”

  She turns sideways as she’s talking and glances at herself in the mirror. She picks up the bra and starts to put it on. I watch her back arch ever so slightly, the smooth indent below her shoulders winding its way down to the Dimples of Venus just below her waist.

  “Harold Monde?” I say.

  She sits on the edge of the bed and pulls the tights, slowly and methodically, up her legs, one leg stretching out, then the other. She’s sitting on the edge of the bed with her back to me, one leg over the side of the bed, leaning slightly forward. She looks like the girl in the Ingres painting, the one about the Turkish bath.

  “Yeah, that guy. He was a fucking weirdo. He’s probably capable of doing something like this.”

  “It’s possible,” I say.

  She stands up and puts the slip on over her head, smoothing out the creases around her body. Next, she puts the dress on and does the same thing. I could never tire of watching her dress, undress. It’s like some kind of dance.

  “Wasn’t he a friend of yours?” she says.

  “No.” I almost shout it, but I lower my voice at the last minute. “I am ... I was nothing like him,” I say, through gritted teeth.

  “Jesus, relax. I just thought ...”

  She makes her way to the bedroom door and I make a hasty retreat back into the kitchen. When she walks out, she looks like someone who just stepped off the fashion pages.

  “You’ve recovered ...” I say.

  “I have an appointment. I’ll let you out.”

  I’m taken aback by the abruptness of her tone.

  “Well, keep me updated ... if you hear anything,” I say, as she sees me to the door.

  “Who else am I gonna tell?” she says, closing the door behind me.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  After the discovery in the Black Wood, things got worse than ever. Charlie still wasn’t coming to school, but Samantha had returned. Though you could see by her that she was unhappy, nonetheless, she returned to her studies and her previous life as if all the things that had happened with Charlie had never taken place. I couldn’t understand it. I knew it had to be a front. There was no way they’d ended it just because of what happened in the Black Wood. They had to be still meeting, but I had no idea where and no way of finding out. So, I had to resort to desperate measures.

  What I did, I won’t say I’m proud of, but I felt it was necessary. The story couldn’t end there; it was only beginning to unfold. I had to find a way to continue documenting, to continue observing. But my compulsion – my need – to do this, led to one of the most embarrassing nights in my already frequently embarrassed youth. Thankfully, it also led to an event that would change the whole circumstance and dynamic of my relationship with Samantha and Charlie.

  I started with the easier of the two and staked out Charlie’s apartment. But there was no sign of him. I even scaled the fire escape and stared in at his grandfather. But Charlie never appeared. I couldn’t understand where he could be; he couldn’t be leaving his grandfather alone. Surely, he hadn’t deserted him? Who would take care of him now?

  While I was sitting on the fire escape, I saw the front door open, and my heart jumped. He’s back, I thought. But instead, a small, old woman walked in and stood in front of the grandfather for a few minutes, talking to him. I couldn’t hear what she was saying, but he was just nodding his head. Eventually, she shrugged her shoulders and walked back out again, closing the door behind her. Was she the landlady? A neighbour? Had Charlie asked her to keep an eye on his grandfather while he was gone? If so, where was he gone? There were too many questions, and hanging around his apartment wasn’t helping. I wasn’t going to get any answers there. I knew I’d have to take the second – and much more difficult – option: Samantha.

  One of the reasons I didn’t like observing Samantha in her home was because it was too close to my own. You don’t piss in your own backyard. I also didn’t like what it suggested about me: that I was like Harold.

  The Pierce’s house was a bigger house than ours. Ours was a three-bedroom; theirs was a five. In this much, I was in luck. If it was like mine, her bedroom would have been over the kitchen at the back of the house, and there was just a sheer wall underneath it, with nothing resembling a ledge. But hers was at the side of the house, with a small part of the roof sloping down from it. Just enough space to wedge myself under the window. This detail gave me the confidence that perhaps my mission was meant to be after all. Getting up to it, however, was another thing entirely.

  I’d seen all the movies where people shimmied up drainpipes but there didn’t seem to be anything on the side of the house to get a grip on. It was just a plain whitewashed wall. The drainpipe was towards the back of the house and was a plastic variety that looked like it would never hold my weight. I was creeping around the house, crouching under windows, when I noticed – at the back of the garden shed – a small stepladder. I didn’t know if it was going to be high enough, but more to the point, I didn’t know if I’d have the nerve to get it. But, I realised, there was no other way. That was the only way I was getting up there. Of, course, I still had to get the stepladder from the shed at the back of the house around the side, in full view of the kitchen.

  I’d managed to crawl from the side to the back of the house by staying down underneath the windows, but the shed was halfway down the garden – if I went there, I’d be exposing myself to whoever was standing in the kitchen. I decided to go for it. I crawled slowly across the garden towards the shed, but I’d barely gotten a few yards when the whole garden was awash with bright, white light. I froze. They had a security light. I couldn’t even turn around to look at the window to see who was looking at me. I waited and waited but nothing happened. Finally, I turned my head around slowly and looked at the window, but there was nobody there. Could it be that there was nobody in the house? I hadn’t thought of that. There was a car parked out front, so I presumed her parents were at home. But what if they’d gone to a neighbour’s house for dinner, or gotten a cab somewhere?

  I waited another couple of minutes and when no one appeared, I moved quickly to the back of the garden shed. The security light went out, and I stayed behind the shed staring at the kitchen window. But there was no one there. Then, the thought struck me: could the whole house be empty? Had the whole thing been for nothing? I decided I had to see; I couldn’t leave the house without checking to see if Samantha was in her bedroom.

  I took the stepladder and moved as quickly – but as gingerly – as I could back around to the side of the house. I opened the stepladder quietly and made my way up the steps. The sound of the metal creaking under my weight seemed to me ten times louder than the noises of the neighbourhood dogs and TVs in the background. Then, I heard the sound of a TV closer to me as I reached the top of the stepladder. She was home: there was a TV on in her room.

  Now came the hard part. The stepladder wasn’t high enough to reach. I had to stand tip-toe and grasp the edge of the roof and pull myself up. I was halfway there but my feet were flailing in the air. I kept on trying to get a grip on the wall but there was nothing; my feet kept sliding down. Eventually, I managed to pull myself up to my waist and heave myself up onto the sloping roof. With all the commotion, I was sure she’d heard me. I lay there in a foetal position, underneath her windowsill, my heart pounding, until I was sure she hadn’t heard, and that it was safe. Slowly, I lifted my head and peered into the very corner of the window.

  And there was the room I’d wondered, puzzled, even dreamt about.

  To be honest, it looked pretty normal. It was a little bigger than my room. There was a desk filled with school books. There was a stereo and a CD rack. The door to the built-in wardrobe was open and various tops and jeans and dresses were poking their body parts out. There was a dressing-table that was cluttered with make-up, jewellery, and various other “womanly” knick-knacks. Final
ly, there was a chest of drawers with a portable TV sitting on top.

  And there she was, lying on the bed. She wasn’t wearing the nightdress and dressing-gown that I’d often imagined her in; instead, she was wearing grey sweatpants and an oversized T-shirt. Her hair was tied back in a ponytail, and she had no make-up on. She was so unlike the made-up, coiffed, well-dressed Samantha that I and the rest of the school knew.

  Though the TV was on, she didn’t seem to be watching it. She had a pair of headphones on, listening to a Walkman, while she wrote something in a notebook. I watched her, her lips moving almost imperceptibly as she wrote each word, the way some people do. She looked so small and vulnerable there that I could have watched her all night.

  But then, it happened.

  To this day, I still don’t know why she looked up at her window at that precise moment. Did she stop writing and look out of the window thoughtfully while she was trying to think of the next thing to write? She had her headphones on and the TV blaring in the background, so she couldn’t have heard a noise. Did she sense something, a presence at her window? Afterwards, she never told me why, and I never thought to ask, there were too many other important things to think about then. But whatever the reason, she did it. She glanced up, and straight into my eyes.

  I don’t know what she did next because I immediately ducked my head down underneath the windowsill and resumed the foetal position I’d been in earlier. But this time, I knew there was no getting away from the fact: I was caught.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  If it had been any lesser girl, that would have been the end of my mission that night. Any other 17-year-old – spotting a man lurking outside their bedroom window – would have immediately run to the phone and dialled 911. But Samantha wasn’t any ordinary girl. She didn’t even pause to think about it; she just jumped up from the bed and ran straight for the window to confront whoever it was. I was only in the foetal position a few seconds when I heard the window slam open.