Keep the Ghost

6. Detective

As a boy, I had trouble sleeping. My dad taught me how to count my breath: each exhale is a number. Up to ten, then you start over again. You’d be surprised how hard it is to count ten breaths without getting distracted. The point is to keep your mind focused, so you don’t worry and wander. Most of the time, people worry themselves into worse trouble than what they were worried about in the first place. 

That’s what Dad says, anyway. I’m doing a lot of counting, now. Harder than I ever counted before. 

Not under arrest, at least I don’t think. But I am deep in the police station, in a private little room with two chairs, a table, and a camera mounted on the ceiling. I watched them put Morgan in the room next door.

I breathe out. One. 

The door to the interrogation room opens. 

“Sean Reilly,” a man says as he enters. “I’m Detective Alvarado. I’m investigating the disappearance of Kayla McPherson.”

He’s about my height, six foot. Face pitted with decades old acne scars, black hair dusted with gray. Mexican, broad shoulders. He’s old, mid-fifties, and his mouth tilts downward in disapproval, although I haven’t said anything yet. 

Two. 

“You’re from Ireland, aren’t you?”

I nod.

Three. 

He pulls a silver pair of spectacles from his shirt pocket and places them on his nose. “How long are you here for?”

“Maybe a few years, until after college. Maybe forever, if I find a job here,” I say. My voice is very quiet; quieter than I mean it to be. 

Four. 

“And you’re a senior? So you’re graduating, then. Okay. And you stay in the same house as Kayla, correct?” As he speaks, he is preoccupied with the portfolio in his lap, arranging the pages within. He only glances up on the last word of each sentence.

“Yes,” I say. 

Five. 

“Must be strange, for an eighteen year old boy to find himself under the same roof as a nineteen year old girl, someone he isn’t related to, you know? Hormones, and all that?”

“There is some of that,” I admit. 

Six.

“Seeing each other half dressed, spending all that alone time together. Is that exciting?”

I nod, and can feel my cheeks turning red. 

Now, all his attention is on me. His hands rest on the table, across the halfway mark courtesy would designate as my half. “Did you like her?” he asks, leaning in. 

“She’s very dramatic. Very serious. She’ll be pissed at you for a week, and you won’t ever find out why.” Then I admit it: “But yeah, I liked her a little bit.” 

Seven.

“How much is a little bit?” he asks. 

“Well, I probably spent more time with Kayla than anyone else here in the States, you know?” 

“Did she like you back?” he asks, folding his hands on the white plastic table between us. A gold wedding band, silver watch. It bothers me that they don’t match. 

“Not like that,” I say. “But, it’s okay. I’m probably not going to be in this town after I graduate, so I didn’t plan on meeting any girls.” 

Eight.

“Did you kill her because she didn’t like you back?” he asks this like everything else, like it’s a normal question.

I lose count.

“Is she dead?” I ask.

Every time I lose count, I have to start over. 

Detective Alvarado leans back, grips the sides of his navy blazer and pulls it tight around his shoulders. Then he watches me for several moments, saying nothing. I think he’s waiting for me to confess, to spill my guts. I count all the way to ten again before he asks another question.

“Port Lavaca is a small place,” he says. “I know almost everyone who knows Kayla; I know their parents. I know who is trouble, and who isn’t. What I don’t know is you, or the girl we found you with. Who is she?”

One.

“I just picked her up,” I say. “She was walking across the causeway, looked like she needed a lift.” 

The detective smirks. “Is that right? Just met her? What a coincidence. Tell me the truth, Sean.”

Two.

“I did. Is Kayla dead? I need to know.” 

The detective leans back, says nothing. 

I continue: “Is that why I’m in here, all of a sudden? Did you find her?” 

Three.

He speaks: “My goal here is to be completely transparent with you. I’m going to tell you everything that’s on my mind, and you can be honest with me, or you can dig your hole deeper. I’m going to find the truth, either way. You said you got to the beach around five thirty in the morning. You also said that you didn’t get in the water, only Kayla did. You called her parents around nine. Why did it take you over three hours to call someone?” 

Shit. Lost count again. 

“I was scared,” I say. “I figured Kayla would come back. What if she was playing a joke? I didn’t want the police looking for her over a joke.”

He pulls a photograph from the file in his lap. It’s a picture of a neon blue life jacket—the life jacket Kayla wore, the one I lied about.

“We found this on the coast. See the writing on the back? That’s from the Emerald Point Marina up in Austin. Pretty unique. Kayla’s parents confirm they own one exactly like it, except theirs is missing. You said Kayla wasn’t wearing a life jacket. I say the odds that’s not their life jacket are a million to one. Wouldn’t you? Now, how did it get from Kayla’s home to being washed up on the beach?”

Damnit. No counting, now. How did that happen? What happened to Kayla?

“I took it,” I say quickly. 

“I believe that, but not for the reasons you may think. You said you weren’t going in the water,” he reminds me. 

Christ. Panicking, now, so I don’t say anything. He watches me. Can feel him summing me up. 

I smooth my hair twice in a row, too fast, too jittery. The detective cracks a grin. It’s obvious I’m freaked. 

He withdraws another photograph. I see it, but don’t. 

It’s antimatter; I see it, and it sees me, and we cancel each other out. Mind won’t register. Can’t. A tiny whimper betrays me, squeezes through the tension I ratcheted myself up with. 

The detective speaks: “You said Kayla got on the jet ski alone, but that was you. You killed Kayla the night before, and spent all morning staging this crime scene. After you tried to sink her body, you went home, took the drain plugs out of the jet ski and brought it to the beach. After it sank, you swam back to shore with the life jacket on. Then you told your story. If we never found her body, we’d assume she drowned. You cut her throat.” 

The picture on the table is Kayla. Her face stares up at me, blue and bloated. A deep, pale gash stretches across her throat.