Page 14 of All Good People Here

But Luke wasn’t at Granny’s Pantry or the pharmacy or Shorty’s, and no one she asked in any of those places had seen him. And when she checked the time and saw that she’d been driving around for almost an hour, she began to panic. How far could he have gotten? Did she need to get on the highway and widen her search, or was he simply somewhere she hadn’t yet checked? In her car, in the lot outside the grocery store, Margot tried to think of all the places her uncle frequented, but her mind was maddeningly blank. She slammed her palms against the steering wheel. She knew Luke better than anyone in the world, and yet here she was, unable to find him in one of the smallest towns in the country.

From the seat beside her, her phone chimed with an incoming call. Margot sucked in a sharp breath and spun to grab it, her heart leaping to see the Wakarusa area code. Maybe this was Luke borrowing someone else’s phone. But when she answered, she didn’t recognize the voice on the other end.

“Hi,” a man said. “Is this Margot Davies?”

“Yes?”

“Yeah, hi. This is Officer Finch down at the Wakarusa police station. I’m calling because we have your uncle here.”

Margot squeezed her eyes shut in both relief and dread. Why was Luke at the police station? “I don’t understand. What happened? What did he do?”

“Oh. He’s not in trouble or anything. I, uh, found him walking around. He seemed…sort of out of it.”

Margot sighed. “Shit.”

“I was calling to see if you could pick him up. Give him a lift back home. I’d be happy to do it, but he refused to tell me his address, and, well, I think he may respond better to someone he knows.”

“Yeah. No. Thank you. I’ll be there in five.”

The Wakarusa police station fit the town in which it served to a tee. It was small, provincial, and from the look of the faux-woodpaneling on the walls and dingy green carpet of the lobby, it was clearly also stuck in the past. The receptionist jotted Margot’s name down on a visitor’s log, then led her through the door at the edge of the lobby. Margot followed, her heart skittering in her chest. She wished she could somehow anticipate what mood this episode had put her uncle in so she could prepare. Would he be angry, sad? What year would he be in? Would he recognize her face, or would he look at her as if she were a stranger?

“That’s Officer Finch,” the receptionist said, stopping in the middle of the hallway and nodding to a young man in uniform at the end. He was leaning against the back wall next to a glass door, his arms crossed over his chest, his eyes focused on something through the door beside him. “He’ll take it from here.” The receptionist waved to catch the officer’s attention, then left Margot standing alone.

Officer Finch nodded, pushing off the wall, and strode down the hallway to meet her. “Hi, Margot,” he said. “Thanks for coming.”

Margot opened her mouth to ask where her uncle was, but stopped before she could. “Oh,” she said instead. “It’s you.” It had been twenty years since she’d last seen him, but the face of the officer had just clicked in her mind. She and Pete Finch had gone to kindergarten through fifth grade together, and while their local high school was relatively big, merging students from Nappanee and Woodview with those from Wakarusa, the elementary school had served only their little town. With all of about twenty-five kids in her grade, Margot would have recognized one of her old classmates anywhere.

Pete smiled. “Been awhile. I heard you were back in town.”

“Yeah. Hi.”

Despite spending six years corralled in a classroom with him, Margot didn’t know the adult version of Pete at all. As a kid, he’d been sporty and popular, while she, in the years after January’sdeath and as her parents’ relationship got more and more contentious, had turned inward. Where Pete had played soccer with the rest of the boys at recess, Margot had spent the forty-five minutes by herself in a tree, reading books about kids who solved mysteries. She supposed the two of them must have interacted plenty over the course of those six years, but the only real memory she could dredge up was of him helping her pick up her books one time after Bobby Dacey slapped them out of her hands.

“Good to see you,” Margot said, hoping that was enough pleasantry not to appear rude. All she could think about was her uncle huddled in a police room, scared and confused. Meanwhile, if she didn’t get him home fast, she was in danger of missing the press conference altogether. “Thanks for picking up my uncle. Is he—?”

“He’s in that room back there,” Pete said, hooking a thumb over his shoulder. “I was waiting with him, but then it seemed like maybe that was upsetting him.”

“How long has he been here?”

“Half an hour maybe? It took me awhile to track down your number. He didn’t seem to know it. Eventually, though, I discovered he’d had his phone in his pocket the whole time, and when I got him to pull it out, well, your number was all over it.”

Margot thought about the twenty or so times she’d called Luke over the past hour and found it unsettling to discover he’d had his phone with him all along. He must have been more out of it than she’d even realized. “Yeah. I was worried.” She glanced down the hallway behind him. “Can I?”

“Of course.” Pete turned, and the two of them walked to the room with the glass door.

When she reached it and looked through, her chest clenched. Her uncle was standing against the far wall, but instead of facing outward, he was facing in. His head was bowed, his forehead pressed against the wall, the fingers of one hand wandering gently over its surface. The red bandanna she’d given him, which was tiedaround his neck, looked damp and filthy. The sight made Margot want to cry.

She took a deep breath, then placed a hand on the handle and twisted. She’d expected Luke to turn at the sound, but instead he remained where he was, unmoving as if he hadn’t even heard it. She stepped into the room and walked quietly around the little table and chairs to his side.

“Uncle Luke?” she said gently.

But again, he didn’t react, didn’t move.

“Uncle Luke?”

Nothing.

She reached out to place a gentle hand on his shoulder and the touch must have snapped him out of whatever dream he’d been in, because he whirled around, flinging his arm out as he did. His hand connected with the side of Margot’s mouth and she stepped backward, clapping a hand to her face.

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