Page 4 of Our Daughter's Bones
With that, Melody left again. It was easier now that he had a cloth covering his battered face. But there was blood everywhere. Mackenzie tiptoed around the sprays of blood to the frying pan. She didn’t expect it to be so heavy. She felt the pressure on her wrist and had to use both her hands to lift it. The blood on it had dried and looked like gunk. She stared at the depression in the pan for several minutes. A chill crept up her spine. Outside, her mother bellowed a fake conversation with a dead man.
“Look what you did, Robert!”
“Robert! Come out!”
“I don’t know where that is!”
She turned on the faucet and let the water rinse the pan. The scrubber didn’t remove all of the blood. She rubbed harder and harder. It felt peaceful to watch the pieces of dried blood fall into the sink. Some of it still stuck to the pan, and she had to use her nails to scrape it off. She didn’t dare breathe. She didn’t dare think. She was cleaning.
It’s just paint,she told herself over and over again.
From the corner of her eye, she saw a pair of shiny black shoes by the wall, under the curtain. Since when did her father own such nice shoes? Why hadn’t she seen them before?
She took out the bleach and soaked the pan in it. Then she cleaned the sink with bleach too.
Melody returned, breathing hard. She held her daughter’s tiny face in her hands. “You’re doing the right thing, sweetheart. You’re helping your mother. You are so brave. Very brave.” She kissed her forehead. “There’s a shovel here. I’ll do all the digging. I just need help with lifting. Are you ready now?”
Mackenzie didn’t know what disturbed her more: her father’s corpse or her mother’s apparent calmness.
Melody thrust the shovel under the layers of the sheet, on top of the body, and opened the door that led to the backyard. Together they lifted him and carried him out.
As Mackenzie carried the body, her mind wandered into dark places. What if they were caught? Would she be arrested too? Would her school expel her? Would the police allow her and her mother to stay in the same prison?
As they entered the woods, her heart slithered further down her chest. The woods always scared her. It was where the bad men roamed. Now, they were just like them.
She focused on the balmy air, the lingering smell of pine and cedar, the faint glow from the silver moon, and the sticks and stones digging into the bottom of her feet. She hadn’t put any shoes on. The woods were dizzying. Everything looked random and similar. She couldn’t tell where they were, but they were going deeper into the belly. She counted their steps. They were both panting. They were both on edge. Occasionally, they looked around. They paused briefly after every crunch of twigs and flapping of leaves.
What am I doing? I shouldn’t be here.
The woods were notorious for teenagers coming to party at night. But it was a Tuesday.
“This seems good enough.” Melody wheezed and lowered him.
They’d stopped after 317 steps.
“Just sit there. I’ll do everything.”
Mackenzie planted her butt on the wet soil and curled her knees in. She watched her mother start digging a hole.
Melody’s arms were toned. When she flexed, her biceps jutted out. She didn’t break a sweat. She was tall and imposing. Couldn’t she have hit him back before? Would he have stopped then?
Leaves rustled. Crickets chirped. The mountain of dirt beside Melody piled up. Hours later, Melody dropped the shovel and rolled the body into the hole. It fell in with a thud.
Mackenzie swallowed hard. What were Fiona and her mother doing now? Watching the television together? Eating dinner?
Melody scooped the dirt back into the hole to fill it up. Once she had finished, they stared at it. The patch of disturbed land looked innocent enough. Mackenzie knew she would never forget the sight of her mother breathing hard over her father’s grave.
Mackenzie looked down. A sob clogged her throat. She curled her toes in to catch the mud between them and squeezed hard. It felt soft and thick like dough. There was a fleck of blood on her smallest toe. She rubbed it against the soil until her skin burned.
“Sweetheart, you can never tell anyone about what happened.” Melody’s lips quivered. “No one. Not your friends, not your teachers, not the police, not your grandmother. It will put us in danger. This is just between us. No one can know. No one will understand. They will see us as monsters.”
“Yes, Mom.”
Melody offered her a hand. Mackenzie grabbed it and stood up. Together, they walked 317 steps back to their house.
She didn’t feel like a monster; she felt like a ghost.
One
