Chapter 19 - A Promise at the River

"What's the promise?" I asked.

Caleb looked suddenly serious. "You have to stop going back into bad dreams to find him. He's not there."

I turned to Leah. She shrugged, crying and smiling at the same time. "He comes up with things."

I knelt until I could look Caleb in the eye. "I'll try, buddy."

"You have to really try."

"Okay," I whispered. "I promise."

We drove to Merritt Creek that afternoon. The memorial stone stood above the crossing, where the county had installed a warning siren and barriers. The water moved quietly under the bridge, indifferent to everything it had taken.

Brody arrived alone. He held a small cardboard box. Inside were the plaque, clippings, and newspaper photographs Charlene had displayed for six years.

"I thought about burning them," he said. "But then nobody could see how easy it was to let a lie become history."

"What will you do?"

"Give them to the archive with my statement. Let the record show both things: what people believed, and what happened."

That was the first answer from him in years that sounded like a grown man.

"I'm sorry," he said again. "I know you're tired of hearing it."

"I'm tired of being expected to say it's okay."

"You don't have to."

We stood side by side watching the creek. We had been raised as siblings, then spent half our lives performing for the same broken household. I didn't know what we would become. That, at least, was honest.

"I still remember you reaching for me," he said. "Even when I was going under, you looked furious."

"I was furious."

He laughed once, surprised. Then his face sobered. "Why did you save me after what Mom did to you?"

"Because you were drowning." I looked at him. "That was the whole reason."

He nodded. Tears fell onto his jacket.

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As we started back toward the cars, Charlene stepped out from behind the memorial wall. She had heard every word. In her hands was an unopened envelope with Dad's handwriting on it.

"This was for both of you," she said. "I was too afraid to give it to you while I still had the chance."