Part One
We were so bored that day. Jenna still in her cut offs and bikini top, refusing to let the Summer end. Under the bridge, smoking weed, pretending our senior year didn’t start in 2 weeks. SUMMER STILL BURNS she wrote. Spray painted graffiti to join the others. Blue, the only can she had. “What the fuck does that mean?” I asked her, laughing out smoke. “Dude, “she drawled, “you know what the fuck it means!” We both doubled over laughing, and I dropped the joint. It had been burning my fingers anyway. It joined the pile of garbage by my feet. I knew I had to get home before my Mom or there would be hell to pay. I was supposedly grounded.
They found the first baby the next day, by the creek, near the housing development on Sample street. The area my dad called the ghetto of Janesville. He always said stupid things like that. I was thankful again that he was gone. The baby looked to be maybe 5 months. In the mother that is, not 5 months old. No one claimed it. Some kids found it while throwing rocks, and I heard they had been playing with it for a while before they told anyone. That sounded so fucked up, but I wasn’t even shocked. A dead baby would be sort of typical in today’s world. Then we heard the rumors.
“It’s not human you know,” Jenna told me during lunch. “My mom heard it from that lady who works at the hospital that she knows. Mrs. Cairn?” The police went quiet, nothing on the news. I figured it was because it wasn’t important to them, just another dead baby, but then the white vans showed up. “CDC” my Mom said. “Government” said the lunch lady that I overheard. “Weird” was what we all agreed. Easy to forget though, unless they happened to find four more babies, which they did. Four more the same week. Cody had a picture on his phone. He said his cousin’s friend found one in the woods by Park Street. My stomach turned over when he passed the phone to me. Small, bloody, head too long, eyes open. Thank God it was blurry, or I think I would have thrown up.
That weekend, my Mom let me out for a short visit with Jenna, not knowing I hadn’t followed her stupid grounding anyway. But there were all sorts of rules. Rules about strangers, where we could go, not to talk to anyone. I agreed just to get the fuck out of the house. Jenna had weed. She always had weed because her stepfather always had weed, and he paid a little too much attention to Jenna. I didn’t ask questions that I didn’t want to know the answer to. We went to the bridge to smoke. That’s when I saw the graffiti. “Dude, did you do this?” I asked, turning to Jenna. She had her pipe and was trying to light it, tough to do with the breeze. SUMMER STILL BORNS it now said, the blue U written over in stark red, a giant O now, paint dripping like blood from a cut. The pipe almost fell from her mouth. “No fucking way” she said, a mix of dread and amusement in her tone.
When I got home, the pain started. I stayed in my room through dinner. Cramps I told my Mom, even though I had just had my period a week ago. I woke during the night, body wracked, feeling hot and misshapen. I think I passed out, then woke under the bridge. I squatted, nearly screaming, while a form tore from me. I passed out again, my underwear a ruin, a bloody pool between my legs. When I woke again, I was in my bed. A dream, I told myself, relief sweeping over me, until I got up.
Strangely, I was in no pain. None at all. But my sheets were a mess of red, with some green and brown mixed in, things I didn’t want to look at or think about. Blood, other viscous liquids, a few clots. Some pieces of…flesh? I looked away quickly, balling up the fitted sheet. My Mom wasn’t awake yet. I ran to the bathroom, and took a hot shower, repeating to myself that it was just my period. I threw all the sheets and my nightgown in our burning barrel, and added a bag of garbage. I would burn it after school.
That afternoon Jenna found me in the hall. “They found another one!” she said excitedly. “Can you believe it?” I stopped listening, my eyes starting to tear. I knew what she was going to say. Where she was going to say. “Gotta go” I said over my shoulder, and ran to the bathroom, locking myself in a stall.
After a few days, I had nearly convinced myself that it never happened. I had stopped listening to the talk, stopped hearing the details. I reasoned it had nothing to do with me. I avoided Jenna for days, until that next Monday. She missed school, so I texted her to see what was up. She just replied, “come over” and I said I would after school. I cut last period and headed to her house.
As soon as I saw her I knew. It happened to her too. If it had happened to her first, I’m sure I would have been judging her, assuming it was her stepfather. She cried and told me she hadn’t even had sex, not since last summer with Steve at the party. I held her. I kept my own secret locked tight. I was a virgin, so I believed her. She begged me not to tell anyone. “The bridge…” she said, breaking down in sobs. Of course it was the bridge, just like mine.
I kept this secret a long time. 15 years. There were a few more “babies”, 17 in total that we knew about. But with Fall, the Summer stillborns ended. Or at least we stopped hearing about them. It’s all in my head again though, as I head to Jenna’s funeral. She killed herself a few days ago. The details of how she did it don’t matter, but the letter does. The day before I heard about her suicide, I got a letter in the mail from Jenna. I had moved again, so I was surprised that she could find me.
Carly,
It’s them again. The Summer still borns. I see them. I can’t get them out of my head. They talk to me. I’m sorry, I just can’t do this anymore.
I love you. Be well.
Jenna
It’s in my pocket. I keep taking it out and reading it, the bus lurching and my tears making the words swim. I’m afraid to go, but for her I have to. She was my best friend back then. She was the one I cried to when I found out that I couldn’t have children. She said she couldn’t have any either, but she knew that I knew why. The doctor thought I had a botched abortion, I could see it in his eyes. I never told her that part. I kept a lot of secrets. For her, for myself. Jenna couldn’t keep them anymore, but I would keep them for both of us. For as long as I could stand.
Part Two
The bus reached town about 3:30 pm, with my stomach twisting tighter the closer we got. Walking down the steps of the bus, the world tilted slightly, and I must have too. The man behind me reached out a steadying hand but I jumped as if struck and jerked away, nearly falling. The town was almost the same as I remembered it. Maybe a little dingier. Less people. Washed out, a little more dead. I grabbed my bag and went to the closest motel I could find, locking the door behind me. Now that I was here I was having doubts about coming to the funeral. I wanted to hold on to my old childhood memories of this place, before it all happened, but other thoughts kept intruding.
The motel advertised a microwave and mini fridge in every room – a must for travelling on a budget. I should know. I spent several years drifting and grifting. I sat back on the bed, trying to think back to before this had all started. Dead babies and that night under the bridge. The red mess – and waking up in bed after, with another mess to make it all real. But what had happened in between? I tried to remember, closing my eyes. A hot white pain shot through my head. I could almost see…but it hurt too much. I lost the thread of it. I needed a drink.
The Shop-Rite was within walking distance, so I went to get motel-friendly snacks and a bottle of wine. Something cheap with a screw top. I was looking at the wines when I heard a noise behind me. I turned to find a woman in a wheelchair lurching towards me, her face pinched and red. She stopped too close to me and smelled the air like an animal. She leaned in conspiratorially and said, “you had one too didn’t you?”
“Excuse me?” I say, stepping back quickly into a display of beans.
“They didn’t all die you know.” She whispered. I saw twin tears race toward her chin.
I heard a man in the next aisle calling out, but I couldn’t stop looking at her. What the fuck just happened? As he rounded the corner he was saying “Val honey, where did you go? Oh, there you are. Honey you can’t wander like that!” When he saw me, a look of horrified wonder seemed to pass over his face and then was gone. He dragged her chair away, adding a quick “sorry” over his shoulder.
Val. Valerie Hale. The name slipped into my brain. Former prom queen. Head bitch. Mean girl. What the fuck had happened to her? I tried to put her words out of my head as I rushed my few items through the checkout and back to the motel. I couldn’t sit still. Her words rolled around my brain. “You had one too didn’t you?” I needed something harder than wine.
The Chance Creek Inn had been popular at one time but was just sad now. All the better. I wanted people around, but I didn’t want to talk to anyone. Unfortunately, as soon as I sat down and ordered, I felt a hand on my arm and heard a male voice. “Carly! Sweet jumping Jesus, it is you! “Turning, I saw a guy about my age, grinning like a fool. “Carly!” he practically yells again, then comes in for a hug. Cody – I recognize him immediately, though he looks very little like the kid who showed me the fuzzy picture of a dead baby that his cousin’s friend found all those years ago in study hall. Same bright blue eyes though, same shit-eating grin. “Heard you ran into crazy Valerie Hale today.” News travels fast. “What do you know about it?” I joked to him, wanting to hear what he would say. I hadn’t stopped turning her words over in my head since seeing her. (“They didn’t all die, you know.”)
Cody, I quickly found out, had stayed in town, divorced twice, and worked at the meat packing plant in Colton. He smelled of disinfectant and sweat, and he seemed to know plenty of gossip about Janesville. “What the fuck happened here Cody? Never mind, I don’t think I want to know.” “You mean Valerie? She hasn’t been the same since she lost her baby. Crazy as a bed bug that one. I can’t believe how bad I wanted to fuck her in high school!”, he says, then laughs. “Lost” her baby turned out to be an unsolved abduction. 7 years ago. The child had supposedly been born with multiple disabilities and was taken from its crib not long after she returned home from her hospital stay. No suspects. No leads.
6 more abductions that year, all unsolved. Why hadn’t I heard this on the news? He just shrugged at that question and tucked in to a whiskey. Over the course of two more hours and 5 more drinks each, I heard it all. The still born babies from high school, the second spate of these 7 years later, along with so many children born with disabilities, diseases, failure to thrive. Some people blamed the government, some the river pollution. Many families left. He leaned in and whispered conspiratorially, his breath a blast of alcohol, “Don’t ask questions Carly, they don’t like that here. Just don’t.” “Who is THEY?” I asked, but he wouldn’t say. His second wife had been one of the unlucky mothers. She blamed him, and they split up soon after the child died. He was too drunk by then to tell me much more. I left him on the bar stool, his head on the bar, and stumbled back to the motel. I couldn’t take any more of this. I kept looking back over my shoulder, feeling like I was followed. Feeling so alone. I crashed down on the bed and was asleep immediately.
My dreams were anything but peaceful. I was under the bridge again. I saw and felt the mass leave my body. Someone pushed me, held me down. I felt suffocated. When I woke up, I felt like there was something I was supposed to remember. I half expected to see the mess on the sheets, the reds and greens and…pieces, again. But they were clean.
Jenna’s funeral was in the afternoon. Thank God, as I was in no shape that morning to go anywhere. I put on my only decent dress and a light jacket and decided to walk the few short blocks there. A taxi would be too expensive, and unnecessary. I wanted to clear my head, but no luck. In the distance I could see the bridge that seemed to haunt me. Memories of Jenna flooded me as I walked in. I shuffled to the front of the room, drawn there but not wanting to be there. No open casket. Unbidden, the thought that I didn’t even know exactly how she had killed herself flitted through my head. I pushed it away.
Pictures, but no recent ones. I was even in some. The turnout was small, quiet. To my horror, her step-dad approached me, arms out. I reluctantly accepted the hug, then backed away. I felt eyes on me, and I glanced quickly around the room. Only sympathy looked back. He motioned to sit. “Carly, it’s so nice you’re here, she would have loved to see you...” he broke off, a sob stuck in his throat. He coughed. “I just, I don’t know what happened. I never meant for any of this to happen…” He told of how Jenna had almost seemed to sink into madness, slow at first, then a cannonball of pain and crazy ideas. She told so many stories that in the end, none of them were believable. He acted remorseful, complicit even. Her mom, I found out, was at home. Drugged to stave off hysteria, she couldn’t stop crying and just couldn’t attend. He stood to go, so I stood too, awkwardly offering condolences. He took my hand, and I realized he was passing me something. “To take the edge off…” he said, then offered me a strained smile and then I was outside, trying not to cry, trying to catch my breath. I opened my hand. Two joints and a pack of matches. I slipped it into the pocket of my light jacket. It seemed he hadn’t changed much.
I walked back to the motel, but I was still antsy, still unsure of why the fuck I came here. I decided to change my clothes and walk to the bridge, just for old time’s sake. I wanted to remember it like it was before. I walked under the broad structure, my eyes drawn to the newer graffiti, and to the red O I could still see bleeding through the rest. I sat and lit up, closing my eyes and coughing a little. Jenna’s face behind my lids, laughing, then a scream, a warning. But about what? What was she trying to tell me? “What did they do to us?” she screams and screams.
I woke to dark, cold, hard cement behind my back. I must have fallen asleep. I was lucky I didn’t set my clothes on fire. The lit joint was gone. I checked my pockets and the other one was gone too. Only the matches were there, proof I hadn’t imagined it. What the fuck? Did I smoke them both? I stood up, unsteady in the breezy night. A man I didn’t recognize shuffled nearby, picking through the garbage and muttering to himself. He didn’t seem to notice me or if he did, he didn’t care. I was afraid to walk back in the dark, but more afraid to stay there.
I felt like all eyes were on me, but when I turned to look, but when I looked at the few people passing, no one was turned in my direction. I felt strange, violated, confused. Then I noticed wetness in my underwear. I could just feel it. My period? I had so few these days. The doctor said it was due to anxiety. In my rush, I almost missed the note. Just inside the doorway as if slipped under in my absence. Lined paper, like a school kid. Blocky print, blue pen.
GO HOME. STAYING HERE WOULD BE BAD. THEY ARE HERE NOW. YOU SHOULDN’T BE. PEOPLE DISAPPEAR. DO YOU WANT TO DISAPPEAR?
A threat? A warning? Who left this for me? Cody? My head swam again, and I lay back on my bed, my period forgotten. I cried myself to sleep. When sleep hit me, my dreams were the same. The bridge. Pain. Jenna. But there was more. Something just on the edge of my vision, that skittered away when I tried to focus. The last thing I heard was “get her on the table!” I awoke with a start. A dull ache spread through me. I decided I was getting the fuck out, today. I would eat the cost of the ticket that was supposed to take me back tomorrow, if they didn’t let me change it. I could no longer take ANY of this.
The bus is a rhythmic background to my shattered mind. So many thoughts. So many theories, victims, villains. I feel like the answer is there, but I just can’t grasp it. I doze, then wake to something familiar. A slicing pain that almost makes me double over. I head to the bathroom before it gets as bad as I know it will. “Just a minute” I yell as someone pounds on the door some minutes later. I’ve been in here too long, but I’m almost done. I bite my hand to stifle a scream.
Were the eyes open this time? I don’t look, just push the lever and wash myself as best I can. I will never come back. Jenna must have remembered the things I am not strong enough to let myself see. If I want to have any kind of a life I need to forget. We all need to forget. I think if I ever did go back, they wouldn’t let me live. I flush away the evidence and prepare to forget all over again.
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