Blue Bottle Tree Read online

  It was white—too white—and even the teeth were clean. One of the assignments we had in biology class last year was to preserve the bones of piglets. This skull looked like it had been through the process. Some of the bone tissue had dissolved, indicating a shoddy job, definitely not A-plus bone preservation going on here. One of the molars was cracked, probably from rapid temperature change during the preservation process. The intranasal suture was buckled because it had been boiled too long and shrunk. There was a crack and small hole on the left side above where the ear should be. It was not from a surgical incision, or a bone saw. I would say it was from a hammer. I closed my eyes again. Deep breath out. Swing. Swing.

  Somebody killed this kid with a hammer, boiled the flesh off, and bleached the skull, then hid it in this cave. I turned over the newspapers and found more bones, presumably the rest of the body.

  Everybody knew Seven LaVey was a strange kid, but he seemed harmless enough. He kept to himself or hung out with Mad Dog Rickey Smith. They were both weirdos but they could not kill anyone. I would not have taken him for the kind of guy to steal a clarinet either, though.

  I looked back over the edge of the rock and he was smelling my clarinet reed. Oh, my God, he just licked it. He tasted my reed! Then he held the clarinet like he knew what he was doing, like he would try to play it. He blew and got nothing but a whistle.

  The candle burned on the opposite wall and his back was turned against it. I steadied my hand, swallowed my fright, ever so slowly held the skull’s mandible in front of the candle, and cast a shadow over Seven’s head. He was engrossed in trying to figure out how to make a clarinet work and did not even notice. I was getting past my panic attack and put the skull and clavicle down. I made hand shadows until one got into his peripheral vision. He yelped when he saw it and almost dropped my clarinet. I was hidden again and the shadow was gone. He did not say anything, but moved around, scanning the area. No doubt there were bats or bugs or things that got in the cave sometimes. So, he may have thought it was something like that and went back to figuring out how to work the keys. He blew again, got a screech, and he jumped like it bit him. Served him right.

  I could not keep telling myself I wasn’t freaked. There was a child’s skull in front of me and Seven was keeping it.

  3 Seven Envisions Killing A Rabid Child

  I saw her slip in. She was making these dumb shadow puppets on the wall and trying to scare me. So I let her have her fun. Why spoil it? For a girl like Penny Longstocking, this was probably the most reckless thing she had ever done in her life.

  I decided to entertain her with some clarinet music while I waited for her to get up enough nerve to make her presence known. Or I could blow out the candle and just leave her here. No, that would be cruel. Although if I did it, and she finally found her way out—all dirty, gross, and scared to death—she’d probably give me a big hug because she was so happy to be alive. Screech.

  Damn, playing clarinet is harder than I thought. I’m getting nothing here. Oh, now with the hand shadows again. Really? Really, Penny Longstocking? Aren’t you a little old for that?

  I bet she’s come across the bones by now. I think they are mostly in plain sight. That sort of thing should scare the pants off her.

  I blew into the clarinet and made some eerie music—stuff I could probably record for a horror movie—just the sort of thing to make this experience a little more spine-tingling for Penny Longstocking. She had come to my cave and found the bones. I could at least make it memorable.

  While I hissed spooky, shrill wheezes from the clarinet, Penny was no doubt sizing me up as a murderer now. Yes, Penny you’ve finally figured me out. Some little kid snuck into my cave and got bitten by a bat. Of course he had to be restrained. Don’t you remember the case of the missing kid a couple of years ago that nobody ever found? Yes, Penny, of course you do. I fed him blind puffer fish and he drank water from the pool until he went crazy—rabid crazy. As you know, all bats have rabies. I am surprised no one heard the boy screaming before I finally stuffed a sock in his mouth. I almost got bit. Rabies. Eventually I had to kill him. I could not get very close to the little monster without him trying to bite me. He stopped drinking water and eating, got very anxious, panicked about everything. I learned that the rabies itself was a virus that colonized in the salivary glands. It was transmitted by being bitten. Because it was in the salivary glands, it made a person delirious and afraid to drink water. Then it migrated to the brain and the victim went crazy. That’s where they got the idea for zombie movies. The kid was coming after me, like a zombie. He was possessed. What choice did I have? I clocked him with a ball-peen hammer. Threw it like a hatchet. Yes, Penny Longstocking, you would have done the same.

  I’m very good at pitching. So the hammer hit the kid in the head and he died. End of story. That’s what you were thinking, was it not, Penny Longstocking?

  “Hey!” she called out from behind the rock. “What are you doing with my clarinet?”

  “It’s about time you said something. What are you doing in my cave?”

  “I saw you steal my clarinet, and you were coming back here. Do you actually live here?”

  She stood up, ducking to keep her red ponytail off the slimy cave wall. “No, I don’t live here.” I emphasized the word more than she did.

  “It looks like you do. You’ve got a bed there. And what are you doing with this?” She held up the skull. “Are you okay? Do I need to get you some help?”

  She definitely did not need to be coming into my cave and prying around like this. I was going to tell her if she had just asked nicely, but no. Now she was patronizing me, like I was some kind of freak that lived in a cave and killed rabid children. I’m a junior in high school, as she well knows. I’m in band with her. I’m a very normal guy. How can she not know this? “Do you want your clarinet back, Penny Longstocking?”

  She grabbed it even though I was holding it out, freely giving it back to her. I had no real intention of keeping it. “My name is Langston. Penny Langston.”

  “Hmm, there’s so much we don’t know about each other,” I said.

  “Did you kill somebody?” she asked. Ha! Now I had her. She was putting it all together, putting me to the test. Did she think I was just going to admit it? Yes, Penny Longstocking. Of course I killed the missing kid with a ball-peen hammer. Obviously. Didn’t you just find a skull with a hole in it? She did not know if I really lived in the cave or not. But then I saw it—like a strobe flash above her head. She remembered that there was the kid who went missing. She recoiled and looked for the way out, peeking back at the skull to make sure it was real. I blocked the way and enjoyed the monstrous shadow she was making on the wall, her ponytail hanging from the back of her head like a broken horn.

  “Penny Longstocking?”

  “Yes?” she said, shyly, her brain going about a million miles a second.

  “Penny Longstocking, play me a song on your clarinet.”

  She was about to do it, but then she came back to her senses. “No,” she said. “Is this some kind of a joke? Where’d you get these bones?”

  “I guess it was some rabid kid that got bit by one of these bats.” I pointed to a fluttery shadow behind her and she gasped. “I had to kill him, of course, because he went crazy.” I sighed, “Ah, the killer inside me…”

  She waited, and I kept my eyes wide open, with my jaws clenched like a madman, but the moment passed. She picked up the skull. “This almost looks real. Seriously, what are you doing with it?”

  I sighed, the game was over. “It is real, I guess. I found it here, along with the other bones. I think they’ve been here a long time. This is probably an old Indian burial ground.”

  “Really? Don’t bullshit me, Seven LaVey.”

  I liked her tone. It had a soft waver in it, like she was trying to be tough. But she was secretly afraid. Afraid that something was amiss, afraid that I was a maniac. That I was truly a psychopathic killer and she could be next!

&n
bsp; She cocked her head to the side.

  “I don’t know,” I said.

  “Well, you can’t just have a kid’s skull and bones lying around in a cave. Does anybody else know?”

  “I’ve never heard anyone talk about it. Have you?”

  “No, but that doesn’t mean anything. If they’re real bones, they wouldn’t let them lie around in a cave. They would have to bury them, or figure out whose they are.”

  “I guess. I didn’t want anyone to know because this is my hideout. I don’t want anyone coming in here.”

  “Did you want me to come in here? Isn’t that why you stole my clarinet?”

  My head drooped and my eyes cut to the side. “I guess.”

  “Well, be careful what you wish for. Because now I’m here, and I’m going to get to the bottom of this.” She came around beside me, shoved me out of the way.

  “How?”

  “I’m going to figure it out.” She focused on the wall of the cave above the skeleton and said, “What’s that mean—Goat Without Horns?”

  “Where did you hear that?”

  “I didn’t hear it, I read it.” She pointed and I squinted at the flickers on the wall.

  “I don’t see anything.” I really had not seen it before. But as my eyes relaxed and I had the idea of what I was looking for, I saw it. Goat Without Horns was written, very faded, and covered by dampness. I shrugged, masking my surprise with indifference. My grandmother had talked about the goat without horns. Whatever it was, it was bad. And written above a kid’s skeleton. That can’t be good.

  Penny harrumphed, exasperated with me. She crawled out and was quicker about it than I thought she would be. Penny Longstocking was actually pretty nimble. She scurried using only one hand, clutching the clarinet in the other. She looked pretty good doing it too. Her cute little butt stuck up in the air, more impressive than I would have expected. As far as I know, she might even have good arches. I followed right behind her.

  The sun burned our eyes and it took a minute to adjust, standing at the mouth of the cave. We peered down on the little town of Bellin, and the field of Kentucky bluegrass on the hill beyond the forest. Bellin looked peaceful. One car went down the main street, then a truck. We were so far away we could not even hear them. Houses dotted the road on the other side, each one further from the last. A river snaked between hills to the east. “What do you think?” I said. “Did somebody in Bellin do it?”

  “Maybe.”

  “I think it’s from a long time ago.”

  “Nope. Chemicals burned those bones, like we did in chemistry. I’m pretty sure.” She walked down the hill in long strides, like a clock wound too tight and that red ponytail was ticking double time.

  “Wait, Penny. What are you going to do?” I jogged up to her, not even pretending my tough guy routine anymore.

  “I’m going to find out.” We got to her tree and she picked up the newspapers, folded them, and cleaned up her little area.

  “I wish you wouldn’t do that. I don’t want anyone to come up here.”

  “Why not?”

  I slouched and looked away. “Because I don’t have anywhere else to go.”

  “You do live there?”

  “No! But I just need a place, to get out of the house. If you bring the police, they’re going to find out about me, and probably call social services. Then I’ll have to go live in some group home, or wherever they put kids like me.”

  “I didn’t know…”

  “Listen, it’s not terrible. I mean, it’s just like, I need a little getaway. That’s all. Not all the time. Just sometimes.”

  She looked down the road and saw her father was coming home. “Okay, I won’t tell the cops. But I am going to find out.”

  It occurred to me that I could go back and snatch the bones. Then if she couldn’t stand it and just had to tell someone, they wouldn’t find anything. They would forget about it and nobody would bother me.

  So I breathed a little easier and watched her walk home. She did not look back, did not seem to mind if I was with her or not. Her ponytail caught the light, a brilliant streak of flame swinging from side to side.

  Back in the cave, I lay down on some newspapers and lit a candle. The blind puffer fish swam toward the light. Whippoorwill.

  I heard someone call my name, but that was impossible. The stillness of the cave, the density of silence was impenetrable. But there it was again, “Seven. Seven LaVey, we need to talk.” It was my mother’s voice, coming from the field. How could she be there? She was not supposed to even know about this place. No one did. And she never even left home. But there it was again, “Seven? I know you’re in here.”

  “Okay,” I said. “What?”

  “Someone’s coming for you, child. The goat without horns wants you.”

  “I don’t want to talk right now. I’ll be home later.”

  “It’s getting late, too late for you to be here.”

  My mom was not likely to actually be there. I don’t know why I even responded. “I’ll be home later.”

  “Seven, baby, I want you to come home right now!” She sounded sweet but she was worried. When I stopped answering, she gave up.

  With that problem solved, I lit a second candle and picked up four of the long bones. I held two in each fist and moved them like they were running. I thought if I concentrated hard enough, I could make Penny Longstocking come back to me.

  4 Whippoorwill Wish Me Luck

  I walked faster so Seven would not try to come after me. Frankly, I did not want to have anything to do with him. I knew he was weird, but I thought it was mostly contained to retro cowboy shirts and Harley boots. It’s not a crime to eat lunch by yourself. He was sad about something, about whatever happened to his mom, I guess. The only kid who ever hung out with him was Mad Dog Rickey Smith. I knew he was not really fitting in. But having bones, human bones, in a cave? I may need to revisit my past indiscretions with him.

  The next day was Sunday and I was out early walking, taking in the fragrance and warmth of spring. Sleepy Bellin was waking up to coffee and bacon. Everyone getting ready for church. I went down the hill and past my tree, onto the street that encircled Bellin like a satellite, then two, three more blocks, and I was at the city center. The beating heart of Bellin, which was a single flashing red stoplight. On one corner was the police station and across from it the fire station. Another block away was the diner and the bank across from that. There was a grocery and a post office. The hardware store had closed before I was old enough to remember it. A lot of the stores had closed. Some buildings had burned, leaving gaps and rubble which no one seemed very concerned about changing.

  Bellin had eight churches and one bar—that pretty much said it all. And not a single Catholic church among them. At seventeen years old, I had never met a Catholic. I had seen them on TV and in movies. Their preachers wore black suits with white notches at the top. But as a Baptist, we did not agree with that. We did not believe God would approve of specialty clothes and hats and nuns living all closed off from everyone else.

  I ducked around the corner of our little city park and saw Ray Dimple there, lounging in his slick blue car. He was shrouded in shade, watching the world go by. Ray had been held back once, but he did graduate a couple of years ago. Now he had a job with the city and was living the swank life of a young man whose life goals had been amply achieved. At the ripe old age of twenty-one, Ray Dimple was already balding and had stringy hair to his shoulders, compensating for the losses up front. His Adam’s apple was too big and made his neck look like it bent on a hinge. His car stereo was the loudest in town. No doubt some death metal was playing in there now. As I came closer, the music got louder—he punched it up another notch to show off.

  I ran my fingers along the edge of the swooping hood. It was slick as glass. “Hey, no! I just waxed it,” he said. He’s the kind of guy that waxes his car almost every day. His sunglasses were too wide for his head and stuck out on the sides. He believed
this was the shrewd disguise of an old-school outlaw, and he peered over the oversized lenses now, indicating his eyes were raised to mine as opposed to leering he had done when I strutted up.

  “I’m not going to hurt it,” I said, finger to my lips all slinky, tasting the deliciousness of his candy apple wax.

  “You’ll leave prints. Not cool, Penny.” A couple of months ago he had asked me out and I had turned him down.

  “Ooh, too hot to handle, is it?”

  Then he got the picture. He was probably stoned. “Come on, Penny, why don’t you get in? Let’s go for a ride.” Code for, Let’s go park on some backroad and I’ll try to get you high while I play some terrible song with a great guitar solo. Then our wonderful outing will culminate in me trying to feel you up.

  I pretended to be considering it. After I fended him off, he would get upset and weirdly paranoid at the same time. Then he would slowly drive us back into town with the sounds of hell blaring through speakers that filled the whole trunk, not speaking again. “No thanks, Ray.”

  “I’ll tell you about the time I got busted. Did a nickel inside.”

  “Pass.”

  “You don’t know what you’re missing.”

  “I think I do. You got caught stealing a case of Eskimo Pies from the school cafeteria. They put you in juvie for five days.”

  “Do the crime, do the time.”

  “But you were a legend just for trying. I remember how they said it, ‘Old Ray Dimple ain’t scared. He’ll do anything!’” I gave him my best curvy smile, flattering him like he was way too wild for me and totally out of my league. I was just a timid little schoolgirl compared to an experienced offender like him. “But listen, Ray Dimple,” I said, reeling him back, “do you know Seven LaVey?”

  “I know everybody.” He was looking down in his lap. I think he was rolling a joint. When I stepped closer he hid it and cocked his head to the side.