Lake Thirteen (2 page)

I was startled out of my nap by the sound of my mother swearing loudly.

“This stupid damned road just circled back to the original one!” I could tell by her tone she was getting angry, the way she always did when things didn’t follow her plan. “Are we just supposed to drive around the side of the stupid damned mountain all night?”

“It’s okay, honey,” Dad answered, in the patented calm-Mom-down voice he’d perfected over the years, as I stretched in the back seat and looked out the window. “We’ll get there.”

The rain had stopped, but an eerie mist had come up. As I stared into the woods, the mist seemed to make shapes out in the forest, weirdly ghostlike, and I shivered. The dream had been so peculiar—it wasn’t weird for me to dream about Marc the way I had, but what was weird was how I’d seen him in the dream. Those old-fashioned pants and the cabin in the clearing—what was that all about? It didn’t make any sense, but then again, it was just a stupid dream. “Are we lost?” I asked, stifling another yawn.

“I think I’ve got it figured out,” Dad said with a cheerful laugh, looking at me in the rearview mirror. “The directions and the maps were bad, is all. I think it should be right around this next curve.”

I saw a wooden building out the side window, with a paved parking area in front of it. The porch light was on, shining yellow.

“That should be Iroquois Cabin,” Dad said as the road climbed even more steeply. “And up ahead…”

We went around the curve, and there it was, with a big sign in the grass where the road widened into an enormous parking lot: MOHAWK LODGE AND RESORT. It was a long, two-story wooden building, and a yellow porch light was on by the front door. There were some other wooden buildings on the other side of the parking lot. Dad made a U-turn and parked, the headlights of the SUV shining in the wispy mist that seemed to be rising out of the grass. Another yellow light cast light on the other side of the big building, and through the mist I could see that the lawn sloped gradually downward to the silvery surface of a lake, glittering in the moonlight.

I shook my head. It all seemed so—so familiar somehow…but that had to be my imagination.

Dad shut the engine off, and the other two vehicles also parked. He grinned at Mom and winked at me. “All right, I guess we should get all checked in, don’t you think?”

I opened the door and climbed out. The night air was heavy and damp enough to make me sweat, but it wasn’t that hot. I yawned and stretched, and followed my parents inside. Just inside the front door there was a small gift shop off to the right, with a cash register on the counter. An enormous room stretched out in front of me. An area that looked like a dining room was separated off from the main room by a split-rail fence, and there were some tables on this side of the fence as well. In the dining room, the outside wall was lined with windows—but I couldn’t really see anything other than mist through the glass. There were couches and rocking chairs spread out around an enormous fireplace, and stuffed animals lined the mantelpiece—I recognized a raccoon and an armadillo. Deer heads and some shiny fish were mounted on the dark paneled walls, glassy black eyes staring out over the room.

It kind of gave me the creeps.

A woman with long gray braids hanging from either side of her head came through swinging doors just past the fireplace that I assumed led to the kitchen. She was wearing a blue denim shirt, jeans, and a white apron. She was wiping her hands on the apron as she came toward us, a big smile on her face. “I was getting worried about you,” she said when she reached us. “I’m Lisa Bartlett. Welcome to Mohawk Lodge and Resort.”

“We’d have been here sooner but the directions—” Mom started to say, but Dad cut her off quickly.

“We’re here now, that’s all that matters.” He held out his hand. “Hank Thompson. This is my wife, Arlene, and our son, Scotty.”

“We’re very delighted to have you here,” Mrs. Bartlett said. Her smile hadn’t wavered at all, even when Mom had started to get a little bitchy about the directions. “Let’s get you all checked in. You’re the only guests we have right now—summer is our slow season.”

Dad and Mom followed her into the gift shop, and I wandered across the room to the split rails separating the dining area from the living room. I took the step down into the dining area and crossed over to the big plate-glass windows. I heard the front door open and close behind me as others in our little group came inside, and I could hear some talking but didn’t pay attention to any of it as I stared down the long lawn to the surface of the lake—Lake Thirteen. Something was nagging at me, but I couldn’t quite put my finger on what it was. Every time I thought I almost had a hold on whatever it was, it was gone. I sighed and pressed my forehead against the glass. There was a porch running along that side of the lodge, with a railing made of the same raw-looking split wood. I could see tables and chairs made from unfinished wood placed at even intervals along the porch, and there was a tire swing hanging from a pine tree just at the far edge of the lawn.

Everything seemed so familiar—like I’d been here before.

But that wasn’t possible. I’d never been to Mohawk Lodge before.

It didn’t make sense.

I shook my head and turned away from the window. I couldn’t help but grin when I saw my mom hugging the Wolfes and the Starks.

Our fathers were pledge brothers at Beta Kappa fraternity at the University of Virginia. Our moms went there, too—that’s where they all met. The three families took turns choosing the group vacation destination—last year had been our turn, and we’d chosen a beach house on Sanibel Island in Florida. We’d been taken a little aback when the Wolfes chose this place—they’d gone in the winter—but Mom and Dad were determined to make the best of it. I’d done some web searches—Mom’s passion for American history was going to require visits to nearby Fort William Henry and Fort Ticonderoga. With Lake Thirteen right here, the Hudson River a short drive away, and all kinds of hiking and bike paths through the woods, there would be plenty to do during the day.

At least, that’s what Mom kept saying, like she was trying to convince herself.

“I know it’s silly,” Mom had said one night over dinner, after the plans had been finalized, “but just the
name
makes me nervous. Lake Thirteen? It just seems unlucky, is all.” She shivered as she passed me a bowl of garlic mashed potatoes. I tried to hide a smile without much luck, and she made a face at me. “Laugh at me all you want, mister,” she wagged a finger at me. “But I’ve got a bad feeling about this trip. Mark my words, something bad is going to happen up there.”

Dad and I had exchanged glances and tried not to laugh at her. Mom had never really gotten past her bad feeling, but you’d never guess it by looking at her hugging Aunt Lynda.

“Dude!” Carson Wolfe gave me high-five as I walked up. Carson was short, maybe five-six at most, with dirty-blond hair, a round face, and big blue eyes. He lowered his voice as he looked at me over the top of his glasses. “Ghost hunting later, right? You up for it?”

I tried not to smile. “Sure.” I shrugged. “Why not? Where’s Rachel?” Rachel was his sister. She was a year younger than us.

He rolled his eyes. “She wouldn’t get out of the car.” He started to say something else, but I was distracted by a big hug from his mother.

Lynda Wolfe was a small woman, barely five feet tall, and looked like she didn’t weigh more than ninety pounds. Her thick black hair was parted in the center and pulled back into a long ponytail, the way it always was. Her skin was tanned, but her face looked different somehow in a way I couldn’t quite identify. “You’re such a big handsome young man now,” she said in her breathless way, her smile widening as she looked up at me. I smiled as her husband crushed my right hand and yanked my arm up and down overenthusiastically. David Wolfe looked like he’d gained some weight in the year since I’d seen him last, and he barked questions at me without giving me a chance to answer.

That hadn’t changed.

“Logan and Teresa are outside playing soccer,” their mother, Nancy Stark, said as she kissed my cheek and gave me a hug. Nancy Stark was the tallest of the three adult women, almost my height, and also really thin. She smelled slightly of roses. She also had a dark tan, and her brown eyes were warm.

Her husband, Jerry, shook my hand less vigorously than Uncle David had and started quizzing me about my tennis game. “Maybe we’ll have some time to hit the ball around some,” he said as my dad came back out of the gift shop with the keys to Iroquois Cabin.

I excused myself as my father greeted his old friends—the usual shoulder punches and affection in the form of insults they never seemed to grow out of—and slipped back out the front door. Teresa Stark, wearing an orange Longhorn Football T-shirt over a pair of white shorts, grinned at me and jogged over to where I was standing on the cement sidewalk between the front door and the parking lot. Behind her, her twin brother Logan swore—he hadn’t been able to stop the swing of his leg, and the ball went sailing down the sloping lawn past where Teresa had been standing. I willed myself not to watch him running and smiled as Teresa gave me a big hug.

Teresa was about five-eight and, like her mother, wore her brown hair cut short. She wore round gold-framed glasses on her pert little nose over her wide brown eyes. She smiled with her entire face, from her pointed chin to her round cheeks, her eyes crinkling in pleasure. She rarely wore makeup, and she wasn’t wearing any at the moment. She had beautiful skin that always seemed to glow, and she was always tanned golden from playing soccer and softball. She was effortlessly good-looking and never really seemed to care how she looked.

Both Teresa and Logan were soccer stars at their suburban Dallas high school, with a strong chance of getting college scholarships to keep playing. But while Logan was lazy about studying, Teresa was a straight A student with her sights set clearly on law school.

“You look good,” Teresa hugged me again. “It’s so good to see you!”

“You, too.” I replied, hugging her back. I still felt a little awkward around her, even though clearly the coming out e-mail wasn’t a big deal to her. I hadn’t thought it would be—Teresa had always hated injustice, which was why she wanted to be a civil rights attorney. That’s part of the reason I was so surprised she never answered me. “What do you think of this place?” I gestured with my hand, and out of the corner of my eye I thought I saw something at the tree line on the other side of the parking lot.

I turned my head, but there was nothing there at all.

“Are you okay?” Teresa asked, her smile fading into a frown.

I turned back to her slowly. “You didn’t see anything over there, did you?” I pointed, starting to feel more than a little foolish.

She shook her head. “No. No, I didn’t.” She peered at me over the top of her glasses. “You sure you’re okay?”

As she said the words, once again I had that weird sense of familiarity—

And for just a moment, the pavement changed into dirt and rock—

And just as quickly changed back.

I gulped.
What the hell was that?

“You look pale,” Teresa reached over and felt my forehead with her right hand. “You’re not hot.” Her eyebrows knit together. “You sure you’re feeling okay?”

“I didn’t sleep good last night,” I said, forcing a smile on my face. “I’m just really tired.”
And I’m seeing things.
I stole another glance over to the edge of the forest. There was nothing there, nothing at all.
You’re just tired,
I said to myself again.

“Okay,” she nodded, leaning in closer to me as Logan approached, the soccer ball tucked under his arm and a big grin on his face. “We don’t care about the gay thing, you know, you’re still Scotty, if that’s what you’re worried about, okay? We wanted to talk to you in person—not online, okay?” Impulsively, she planted a kiss on my cheek.

I hadn’t realized until that moment just how tense I’d been about it. I wiped at my eyes, turning my head slightly so she couldn’t see the sudden tears her words had caused. “Thanks,” I said softly as Logan slugged me in the arm.

“Come on, Scotty,” my mother called. “Logan, Teresa—we’ll see you at dinner.”

“See you guys in a bit,” I said, trying not to yawn, and I walked across the parking lot and climbed into the backseat of the SUV.

“Any trouble?” Mom asked as Dad started the engine.

“Nope,” I replied, closing my eyes and leaning back into the seat.

But I deliberately avoided looking at that spot in the tree line as we drove past it.

I was just tired, that’s all it was.

A short nap before dinner was all I needed, and I’d be fine.

All six of the adults were sitting in the lodge’s little bar, drinking too much and laughing a little too loudly as they relived the glory days of past vacations and their college days—stories we’d all heard so many times before on the first nights of previous vacations I could probably recite them word for word. Once the reminiscing started after dinner, the five of us had gone into the game room. The game room was a small space through a door off the big main room. It had its own little bathroom and a back staircase leading up to the second floor. There was a desk with an ancient desktop computer sitting on it in one corner, and the wireless router was right behind it. There was a dusty air hockey table and a battered foosball table against the wall by the staircase. Right behind the L-shaped couch was a stack of well-worn board games, with Trivial Pursuit, Life,
and Monopoly
on the top. And in front of the couch was a coffee table, its top scattered with old issues of
People, Us Weekly, Better Homes and Gardens,
and
Good Housekeeping.
There was a big picture window with the curtains pulled open along the wall facing the lake, but it was now so dark outside the glass might as well have been painted black. An enormous flat-screen television was mounted on the wall opposite the couch and a cheap plywood entertainment center set beneath it, with stacks of DVDs and ancient videotapes on its shelves—mostly Disney movies and other so-called “family” entertainment. Of course, there was just basic cable.

And the game room of the lodge was the only place on the entire property with Internet access. The wireless signal was pathetic—none of us could get online anywhere else on the property. But no matter how many times we complained about it, that wouldn’t change. And the zero-bars thing? Not just a dead spot—there was no cell service here, unless you drove down the mountain back to the state highway.

Mohawk Lodge and Resort was a bit on the rustic side, to say the least.

I was sitting at the round table off to the side of the room away from the window facing the lake, near the desk and the game tables. I frowned at my phone. Marc still hadn’t answered my last text, nor had he sent me an e-mail. I scrolled through my Facebook news feed, but no one had posted anything new since the last time I’d checked it. I typed in
I am so bored I could scream
but deleted it without posting it. I put my phone down and leaned back in my chair, staring up at the ceiling.

I’d taken a nap after we’d gotten settled into Iroquois Cabin, which was just down the mountain road a bit from the lodge—Dad had been right about that. The Wolfes were staying in Algonquin Cabin, which was even farther down the mountain, and the Starks were in Huron—I wasn’t quite sure where that was exactly. My room was huge, with its own bathroom and its own little back deck made of raw wood. I’d gotten a little creeped out when I checked it out—stepping out there, with its railing and three steps down to a dirt path that led back into the forest. It was the same feeling I’d had up in the parking lot at the lodge, like someone was watching me. But I knew that wasn’t possible, so I went back inside, locked the door, and put the chain in place. I unpacked quickly and lay down on the bed, closing my eyes and falling asleep almost immediately.

We hadn’t driven back up for dinner—Mom insisted we walk up the road. The path behind my room actually was a shortcut to the lodge but, “No taking the shortcut after dark,” she’d warned me as we climbed up the steeply inclined road. “No telling what’s out there in the woods.”

I thought about pointing out that the
road
also went through the woods but bit my tongue. It was amazing how dark it was—I could barely see more than a few feet in front of me. Dad had brought a flashlight he’d found in the kitchen, and he kept it aimed on the road ahead of us. But soon enough we went around the curve and could see the yellow light on the side door, and Dad switched off his flashlight.

The Wolfes and Starks were already there, talking and laughing. Mr. Stark and Logan pushed two tables together, while a girl who introduced herself as Annie Bartlett offered us menus. She was a pretty girl about our age but seemed a little shy. She had light brown hair that reached her shoulders, freckles across her pert nose, and pale skin. She was slender and was wearing a pair of low-rise jeans underneath a red T-shirt with Mohawk Lodge and Resort written across the front in black letters. I saw Logan smirk on the other side of the table as she gave him a menu, and Teresa rolled her eyes at me. I knew that smirk—I’d seen it on Logan’s face plenty of times before on previous trips.

Poor Annie was going to get the full blast of Logan’s lady-killer charm.

After she took our orders and went back to the kitchen, he whispered to me, “Ten bucks I can get in her pants before we go home.”

“Pig,” Teresa said, punching him in the arm. “You leave that poor girl alone.”

Logan winked at me when Teresa turned back to Rachel.

And after dinner, the adults went to the bar and we all came into the game room.

I picked up a worn deck of playing cards from the table and shuffled them, spreading them out into a game of Solitaire.

I wished someone would say something, anything, to break the horrible silence in the room.
We’re all bored
, I thought as I placed a red nine on a black ten,
and that always winds up getting us all into trouble.

Just the previous summer, on Sanibel Island, boredom was why we’d gone out in the boat moored to the house’s dock without permission and wound up marooned on a deserted barrier island, requiring rescue from the Coast Guard.

Our parents hadn’t exactly been thrilled about that one, to say the least.

I looked over at the brown couch, where Teresa was frowning in concentration at one end as she played Angry Birds on her iPad with the sound off, her tanned legs curled up underneath her. She looked up from the screen and caught me looking at her, responding with a big smile that lit up her face. She’d changed into a navy blue T-shirt and a pair of matching shorts.

Her right eye closed in a wink and her grin got wider.

“It’s so damned boring here,” Logan said, closing the cover on his own iPad and setting it down on the coffee table. He ran a hand through his already messy light brown hair. He blew out a breath and made a face at me, crossing his eyes, sticking out his tongue, then rolling his eyes. “Why the hell did they decide to come here in the summer? It’s a
winter
place. And there’s nothing for us to
do
.” He started bouncing his legs rapidly. He’d never been able to just sit around—he’d always been a bundle of barely contained energy looking for an outlet. Even when he was a kid he’d never been able to sit still. The Starks had banned him from caffeine and sugar, but that hadn’t helped much. That was why they’d put him into sports to begin with—to try to burn off some of that excess energy. It was the smartest thing they could have done. Logan loved playing sports, and he’d turned out to be a natural athlete—he had an uncanny command of his body and more than enough coordination to pretty much master any sport he tried.

If I was going to be completely honest, Logan was the one I’d worried about the most—he was such a straight-boy jock stereotype, always talking about all his girlfriends back home and flirting with every girl who got in range. If any of our little group was going to have a problem with me being gay, I’d figured it was most likely going to be him.

Like his twin, Logan had fair skin and light brown hair. Unlike Teresa, his hair was always out of control because he couldn’t be bothered to concern himself with it. He combed it whenever he got out of the shower and never gave it another thought the rest of the time. He just didn’t care. Logan was gorgeous and athletic—and girls
worshipped
him, if the comments and posts on his Facebook wall were any indication. All the years of playing sports and the weight training that went with it had given him the kind of body I would have gladly sold my soul to the devil to have. He was a couple of inches over six feet tall, with broad shoulders, a ridiculously narrow waist, and a defined stomach so flat and firm you could bounce quarters on it. His arms were thickly muscled, with veins bulging in his thick forearms and well-developed biceps. Years of running up and down a soccer field had given him strong, powerful legs and a round, hard butt. Like his twin, he didn’t care too much about his clothes—he seemed to always be in soccer shorts and tank tops or sweats, and about half the time his clothes clashed. Unlike Teresa, he was rarely, if ever, serious about anything. He was a bit of a clown and could always make me laugh. His handsome face was strangely elastic, and he could twist it in the most ridiculous ways. He was always making jokes, and he couldn’t stand just sitting around. He was up for anything, anytime—as long as it didn’t involve just sitting.

He was also a really good guy with a big heart. Just before we sat down for dinner, he’d given me a big hug and whispered in my ear, “You can be as gay as you want, bro, but I hate to disappoint you, man—I’m just not interested.” Then he laughed so loud everyone had turned to look, and I couldn’t help but grin back at him.

He really was a great guy—but I still felt bad for Annie Bartlett. He was a heartbreaker.

“You guys want to go ghost hunting?’ Carson Wolfe looked up from the book he was reading—
Ghosts of Louisiana: Stories of True Haunting
—dog-earing the page and closing it. He pushed his wire-framed glasses back up his stubby nose and grinned. “We could go see if that cemetery is haunted. I bet it is—the town dates back to colonial times. There’s bound to be a ghost or two there, don’t you think?”

“Shut up already,” his younger sister Rachel said, almost absentmindedly. She didn’t even look up from her own iPad, still launching birds across the screen without missing a beat as she spoke. “Besides, you don’t know if there’s a cemetery here. And even if there is one, I doubt the locals would like us messing around in there at night. In fact, I can guarantee they wouldn’t—it’s disrespectful.” She waved a hand, still not looking up. Rachel was a pretty girl, with flawless white skin, bright blue eyes, and thick, dark curly hair. Like her brother, she’d been chubby when she was younger, and she’d had a rough time with acne for a few years. But she’d blossomed the year before the Sanibel trip. Now she had an amazing figure, with nice legs and curves that wouldn’t quit. Last summer, Logan had made a couple of passes at her, but she’d shot him down cold. “Let’s not forget the great boat-trip disaster of last summer.” She looked up and made a face at her brother. “Besides, cemeteries are kind of creepy. Not to mention, you know, snakes and things.” She gave a delicate, ladylike shudder. “No, thank you.”

“Don’t be like that, Rachel. If there’s a Cemetery Road, there
has
to be a cemetery—they wouldn’t call it that if there wasn’t one,” Carson insisted, his blue eyes wide open in excitement behind his thick glasses. “And I bet it’s an old one! Come on, it’ll be fun.” He looked around at the rest of us. “What do you say, guys?”

“I’m in,” Logan replied, standing up and stretching so that his T-shirt road up over his flat, defined stomach and the trail of light brown hairs leading down from his navel to the waistband of his shorts.

No surprise there
, I thought, trying not to stare at his ripped abs. Logan’s hands brushed against the low wood ceiling when he stretched. In his burnt-orange tank top and black nylon shorts, his legs bouncing in place, he seemed like an electrical wire wrapped up in a muscular teenager’s body. “I’ll see if Mom and Dad will let me take the SUV.” He got up and bounded out of the room before anyone could stop him or say anything.

The Starks lived in Dallas, in a gated community in a rich suburb. Uncle Jerry was a heart surgeon, and Aunt Nancy was a perfect doctor’s wife, a stay-at-home mom whose family was her number-one priority. She also did a lot of charity work for kids with cancer. The Wolfes, of course, lived in Beverly Hills (“9-0-2-1-0,” as Rachel liked to say with a big bored eye roll), and Uncle David owned a production company with several television shows currently on the air. The Wolfes weren’t filthy rich, but they were pretty well-off. Aunt Lynda didn’t work either—“She shops,” I’d heard my mom once say dismissively when she didn’t think I could hear her.

Yes, it’s going to be a long boring week,
I thought as Logan came bounding back into the room, brandishing the keys with a huge smile on his face. “Come on, let’s go!”

“You can stay here if you want, Rachel,” Carson said with a sly smile as he stood up. “You don’t have to come with.”

“Why not?” Rachel yawned and closed the cover of her iPad. “I’m sick of killing pigs. But I’m going to kill
you
if there are snakes.”

I got up and stretched. I wasn’t so sure this was a good idea, but figured how much trouble can we get into at a cemetery? Besides, my only other choice was to stay behind by myself and go listen to the boring college stories of the glory days at Beta Kappa.

Not much of a choice, really.

We trooped through the main room of the lodge. Our parents didn’t even look up at us as we passed by, focused instead on their card game and the story my dad and Uncle David were taking turns telling, big stupid grins on their faces. It was a story I’d heard a million times before—the Great Panty Raid on Delta Zeta sorority, when Uncle David had broken his ankle and had to limp out of the house while the sorority sisters threw things at him. But when we reached the front door, my dad called after us, almost as an afterthought, “You kids be careful, you hear? Don’t be getting into trouble.”

“Sure thing, Dad,” I said just before I went outside, waving back and smiling. The door shut behind me and I suppressed a shiver.

It was ridiculously still and quiet outside.

And it was
really
dark outside the cone of yellow light from the bare bulb next to the side door.

“They’re okay with us going to the cemetery?” I asked as we trudged across the parking lot. I wrapped my arms around myself and didn’t look over to the tree line. There was still mist, and it was cooler now than before, but there was still some damp to the air.