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  Tattoo of a cross on her shoulder.

  Last seen on June 22 at the Dollar Daze

  store in Briarfield Plaza. Her blue Chevy truck

  with Tennessee plates found 50 miles west of

  Wilmington in Columbus County.

  If you have any information, please . . .

  Long ago they tattooed members of nomadic tribes to identify the body in case of death; the missing could be returned to the family for proper burial, to put the soul to rest. The system often worked, depending on time and the ways of weather.

  Today they use a more reliable system of dental records.

  But people will always go missing and prayers unanswered. Lost souls go wandering. We all know this, and bodies are calling to be found.

  You could say this is a ghost story in some way. A crime story. A classic kind of tale. Biblical almost, but not quite.

  Katy didn’t know that day would be a story. Katy didn’t know Jesse Hollowfield was watching for his chance. She didn’t know that at any moment the continental plates miles underground can shift, the earth crack apart, an unseen hand reach, grip, throttle the street, sending it all tilting as someone gasps, someone screams, maybe, if there’s time to comprehend the darkness reaching up, maybe to yank a whole world down. No one is ready for it when something snaps, eclipses the sweet blue world. And no one stays the same after a thing like that.

  It can happen, I tell you. Like this:

  You Believers

  Jesse Hollowfield and Mike Carter knew which cars had automatic locks. They sat waiting just behind the strip mall, patient as lions hunkered in the reeds, heads raised to sniff the humid air while watching gazelles herd, looking for the weak, the young, the one alone. The Datsun’s engine was running because when they shut it off, half the time the engine wouldn’t fire again, and it was hell to roll-start a car in the North Carolina flatlands when the sun can break your back with the heat.

  Katy didn’t see them—she had a things-to-do list in her purse: gas station, the library to drop off books, the drug store to pick up birth-control pills. She had left a note for her fiancé on the refrigerator door: “Be back when I can.” But driving by the strip mall, she saw the Dollar Daze sign and got the impulse to buy something new for her trip back home. She pulled into the side lot, where the sun wasn’t directly bearing down.

  Jesse gave a nod. “Check it out. That chick parked between the Dumpster and the ATM. That truck, what year is that thing? Looks old, but listen to that engine.”

  Mike watched the truck. The girl was bobbing her head a little, like she was singing. Mike leaned a little out his window, heard the sounds of a Bob Marley song coming from her truck. She had to be happy listening to that song. He said, “Maybe we don’t want an old truck. We need a good truck.”

  Jesse shoved Mike’s shoulder. “Listen to that engine. It’s tuned. Somebody takes care of that thing.” He nodded, whispered, “She’ll ride all right.”

  Katy sat in the truck, moving to the beat. Bob Marley’s music always made her think of beaches and beer.

  “Come on,” Jesse whispered. “Get out of the fucking truck.”

  Katy turned off the engine and stepped out into the sun.

  Careless, Jesse thought as she dropped the keys into her unzipped purse, dangling loosely from her arm. He leaned forward, his back straight, jaw tight, eyes fixed on the woman with nothing on her mind but where she thought she was going to go. He guessed her weight: 125-130. Tall but skinny. He’d take her truck and anything she had in that piece-of-shit fake-leather shoulder bag.

  Katy walked toward the store, hoping to find something cute in the racks of five-dollar tops and twenty-dollar jeans. She didn’t have much cash, and her card was maxed out. But she wanted to look good for her trip. She wanted her mom to know she was doing something more than tending bar these days. She’d tell her she was learning how to hang wallpaper; she was practically an interior decorator. Her mother would want to talk about wedding plans. She would want to look at Katy’s hand, touch the engagement ring as if she needed to see it was still there, proof that yes, Katy was finally settling down.

  Katy stopped, stood still in the heat. She’d be married in a month. To Billy. She was leaving the one she still wanted, Frank, behind. But she didn’t want to settle. And there was the new guy, Randy—Randy, who made her laugh; Randy, who’d get her high for free anytime she wanted. Randy had told her, “Sure, you go on and get married, but you and me both know you’ll never really settle down. You’ll always come running to Randy when you get those little bad-girl needs.” No one knew anything about Randy. Billy thought his only problem was Frank back in Chattanooga. He suspected that when she went back home, it was more about seeing Frank than her mom.

  “Let me take this one last trip,” she’d told Billy. She would party with old friends at the marina on Lake Chickamauga, the way they always did when she returned home. Frank would be there. “I need one more trip,” she had said. “One more trip back home, alone. I miss my mom.”

  Billy had told her she could go, but he had a bad feeling.

  “What?” she’d said. “Tell me your feeling; go on and say it.”

  Billy had lit a joint, said, “Frank.” He’d looked straight at her. “I can tell when you’re lying, Katy.” Then he’d left her standing in the kitchen while he’d gone on to work with a joint in his hand. Just another fight, she’d told herself. She’d take a drive, let it go. She’d make lasagna for him when she got home. He liked it when she took the time to make a real meal. He called them good-wife meals, and he’d tease her, say he saw past her wild streak, saw the happy, peaceful, good wife she wanted to be. And he was right. Maybe. She hoped he was right.

  She stared at the pavement and knew Billy had a right to be jealous. She knew she hurt him, but she just couldn’t resist the need sometimes to break a rule. To be a little bad. It gave her a rush, like leaping off a high dive. “I’m sorry,” she said out loud. She’d told Billy that a hundred times: “I’m sorry” for something; then she’d go on and keep doing what she wanted to do. She looked to the pavement and saw that her toenail was chipped; she’d get a pedicure before heading to Randy’s house. He noticed things like ragged nails. Billy didn’t give a shit, but Randy—and her mother—did. She looked up, saw the clerk watching her from the window. Katy smiled, gave a little wave, and went in.

  Shuffling through the racks of clothes inside, she kept thinking she shouldn’t spend the money. They couldn’t afford it. “I don’t know, I don’t know,” she muttered to herself as she rifled through hangers holding tops and skirts.

  Then the clerk was suddenly beside her, said, “Can I help you?”

  Katy jumped. “I don’t know,” she said. Then she looked at the woman, smiled, reached and squeezed the woman’s shoulder. “I’m sorry. It’s just I’m going a little nuts. I’m about to get married and all. Prewedding jitters, I guess.”

  The clerk nodded and said Katy had a pretty ring.

  “It was his grandmother’s,” Katy said. “The diamond’s not that big, but I like the little designs in the gold.”

  “You buying stuff for your honeymoon?”

  Katy shook her head and moved hangers across the rack. “Taking a little trip back home. I like it here, but sometimes I feel like Dorothy, want to click my heels, close my eyes, and go home. But then once I’m back there, I know I won’t like it. I’ll know I should be back here. No matter where I am, seems I always want to be someplace else.” Katy looked up and sighed. “Know what I mean?”

  The clerk, a sweet-looking older woman, smiled and said, “Tell me about it.” The clerk offered a little white top. “This will look great with your tan.”

  Katy took the top. It was cute, cut to show off her shoulders. “I just don’t know if I’m the marrying kind.”

  “Oh, you poor young girls,” the clerk said. “You just have too many choices these days.”

  “You sound like my mom,” Katy said.

  “I d
on’t mean to lecture,” the clerk said. “It just seems to me these days there aren’t any rules.”

  Jesse studied her truck. The Tennessee license plate said, “POSITIV.” Optimistic was good. They went along easy. And it could take days before her truck got into the system back in Tennessee. Perfect. He laughed and sang in a monotone, “Over the river and through the woods . . .”

  Mike lit a cigarette. “You one crazy motherfucker, man.”

  Jesse waved a hundred-dollar bill and motioned to Mike to move the car closer. “Now, you keep your mouth shut. If she asks, you look stupid, say we just gotta take the car to your granny’s house. Now move.”

  Mike’s hands trembled as he gripped the wheel. “Why’s it got to be my granny?”

  Jesse leaned forward, his eyes on the store. “Come on, we’ve got a job to do.”

  Mike nodded. He was the driver. He told himself that no matter what came of this, he was just the driver. They needed her truck to hit the pawnshop. Get guns, get cash from Jesse’s friend Zeke. Then Jesse could skip town and run back to Atlanta the way he always said he’d do, and Mike would have some cash to buy groceries for his granny, maybe fix his car, score some more weed. “A simple plan, man,” Jesse had said. But Jesse was always saying, A simple plan, man. Jesse made it all sound easy and clean. Mike knew him from juvy. Mike knew Jesse had been behind that dude in the laundry getting stabbed to death with a laundry pin. The guy was always wanting to suck somebody off for cash. But when he hit on Jesse, he hit on the wrong man. When the word got out about some fucker—even a fag—dying like that, stabbed two hundred times with a laundry pin, people said, “Man, that’s fucked up, even in here.” Jesse just shrugged, said, “Everything got a reason, man.” Mike wished he could be like Jesse, all fire and wires and sparks inside. But cool somehow, like the cool blue of a gas flame.

  Jesse laid the hundred-dollar bill on the dash, stretched his arms, and cracked his knuckles. With batting gloves stretched tight and smooth on his hands, he looked like he could be ready to knock a fastball out of the park.

  Mike watched the glass door of the store. It didn’t seem right to use his granny like bait. Jesse had said he wouldn’t hurt whoever they hit, but Mike knew Jesse’s need to hurt whatever he held in his hands. Except dogs—he had a thing about dogs. And kids. Little kids. Mike hoped maybe that girl inside would be lucky, have a dog in her truck. Jesse wouldn’t go after a girl with a dog there beside her. Mike looked toward the truck. Then he got to wondering if the truck color was called sky blue or robin’ s-egg blue. He’d always liked that color on a truck. He felt Jesse staring at the side of his face. Jesse had a look that really could burn. “How do you do that, man?”

  Jesse dropped back and leaned against the passenger door. “What?”

  “That thing you do with your eyes.”

  Jesse smiled. “Told you, man. I’m the devil. Don’t know why folks have such trouble believing a thing like that. They’ll believe just about anything but that.” In one quick move, he popped the glove box, reached under the papers, and pulled out a bag with a couple of tight little joints rolled and some loose weed. He looked Mike in the eye. “I knew you were stoned, you fucker. You get all paranoid and fucked up when you smoke. I told you, lay off this shit till the job’s done.”

  “I don’t get paranoid. I just think about things.” Mike watched the storefront while Jesse shoved the weed in the pocket of his jeans.

  “Here she comes,” Mike said as Katy walked out of the shop. She slipped her sunglasses on.

  Jesse watched her, thinking, Ignorant, not looking where she’s going, too busy digging for keys. Not seeing a damned thing.

  Jesse grabbed the hundred-dollar bill. “Amazing what some folks will do for a buck.”

  Katy stood outside the store, happy with what she’d bought: the little white top, a bra and panties, and a short black skirt that would show off her legs. Randy always said her legs were her best part—well, not her best part. Then he’d laugh. Katy looked back toward the store, saw the clerk standing there watching, thinking Katy was some kind of criminal or nut just because she’d wanted to use the restroom to change into the new underwear. The woman had backed off, looked at her like she was some kind of whore, said, “What kind of woman needs to change her bra and panties in a store?” Katy had just said, “Never mind,” and figured she’d change at the McDonald’s down the road. She knew Randy would like the matching black lace bra and panties. Randy liked it when she took extra care to dress for him. He liked most everything she did, except taking something without asking. Once it was just a cigarette from his pack on the table. And then the shirt. He’d been really pissed about her taking it when she’d left his house that night. But he was asleep, and there was a cool rain falling, and she needed something over her tank top. So she just picked up his shirt from the floor. She told him she’d return it, and he said that wasn’t the point. Now it was in the truck, just picked up from the cleaners because it was a Brooks Brothers. She’d take it back, and she’d surprise him with a nice clean shirt and new black lace underwear. The clerk came out of the store, said, “Miss, why are you standing here?”

  Katy laughed. “Ma’am, I’m just standing here thinking about a man. Don’t you remember just standing and thinking about a man?”

  “Well, I’d be more comfortable if you did your thinking someplace else.” Then she gave Katy a look that meant nothing but business and went back inside.

  Katy laughed and headed for her truck. She hoped Billy would work late. She’d need the time to get to Randy’s, the grocery store, then home to clean up and make that lasagna and run him a bath that would make him forget they’d ever had a fight. The good wife. She’d make him the good-wife meal. Just like her mother. But she didn’t want her mother’s life. So what the hell was she doing?

  She got in the truck, found her keys, and wished she had her cell phone. If she had her phone, she’d call Randy to say she was coming, and then maybe she’d call Billy to tell him she was making the lasagna he liked. She knew it was messed up. She looked at the keys in her hand, realized she was sitting there in a sweat, an idiot in a truck, baking in the heat.

  Katy flinched when Jesse opened the passenger door and jumped in.

  He tossed the hundred-dollar bill in her lap and smiled. “Mind giving me a ride?”

  “What?” The plastic bag of clothes crumpled to her feet.

  “I need you to follow that car. It’s kind of an emergency, and taxis won’t run to where we need to go.”

  She studied his face. Good-looking and smooth. “You’re sitting on my boyfriend’s shirt.”

  He lifted the shirt, smoothed it across his lap. “Sorry,” he said. Then he smiled a smile that was just a little bit devilish. “Come on.” He gave a little shrug like a boy. “It’s just a little drive.” Yeah, he was cute, and he knew it.

  She glanced back at the white Datsun rumbling behind the Dumpster. The driver looked like a kid, soft round face, big dark eyes staring at the man beside her.

  “Come on,” he said. She turned and looked into his eyes, green flecked with black and looking straight at her. She’d always had a thing for green eyes. She tried to guess his age, early twenties, she figured, younger than she was, but worn. He was hard-looking, like a man who didn’t eat enough real meals, a man who worked out in a basement. He had a scar on his cheekbone, a little crescent shape. But what a mouth, pretty lips that curved in just the right places. The kind of mouth that knew just how to kiss. Pushy but firm and soft.

  He smiled, leaned a little closer. “Yeah, I know. You like my face. I get that.” He picked up the hundred-dollar bill. “But I’m not looking for a date right now. I just need you to follow that car.” She liked the smell of him, clean but that man smell underneath.

  “Why should I follow that car?” she asked. Katy had tended bar for years. She was used to guys wanting things. Asking questions was the best way she knew to make them stall. Men, no matter what they were after, always li
ked a little time to talk.

  “Why?” The bill dropped into her lap, and he eased back into the seat beside her. “Don’t you need the money?”

  “Well, sure, but—”

  “Well, sure. Yes, you need the money. The thing is, my friend there, his name is Ronald, and I’m Brad.” He offered to shake her hand, and she almost took it, but she kept her hands on the steering wheel. “Okay, then, I understand your caution, some strange dude jumping in your truck—”

  She laughed. “Well, yeah.”

  He smiled. “You see my friend there, Ronald, he’s a little nervous. His granny, she’s sick, and she lives way out there in Whitwell. Out by Lake Waccamaw.”

  Then she grinned, sat up, looked around. “Is this a joke? Where’s Randy?”

  “I don’t know no Randy,” Jesse said. “What you talking about?”

  “Randy. My friend. He likes to play little tricks on me. He lives out by Lake Waccamaw. I drive out there sometimes.”

  “That’s nice,” Jesse said. “It’s real pretty country out there, isn’t it?”

  She nodded. “Yeah, there’s something pure out there. No tourists. Just trees and water and sky.”

  “And Randy,” he said. “But I guess you just drive out there for the nature and all.”

  She turned to him. “Look, I’d like to help you out, but I gotta get home.”

  Jesse shook his head and leaned closer. There was a softness to him, but a confidence. She liked that soft confidence in a man. She breathed that scent of him. He definitely knew what he had. He sat back and looked out her windshield as if this were just another conversation. “You got a chance to do something good here. I saw your license plate—POSITIV.’ You like to think positive, right?”

  “I try,” Katy said.

  “You like to do good things, right?”

  She nodded, looked back at the other guy in the car.

  Jesse sighed. “Well, Ronald’s granny, she’s sick, and he’s got these groceries in his trunk, and he’s gotta get the stuff to her, and if he makes it there, he can get a neighbor to work on the car.” He nodded, rocking in the seat beside her. “See, she’s waiting, and we’ve got these groceries in the trunk, and it’s a long ways out there through farm country. And that car, it’s always stalling out, and you got no idea how bad that can be in this heat.”