The Drought Read Online Free PDF Page B

Three
     
    Junction, Texas
     
    Luke didn’t come back.
    The first few minutes were the longest of Barry’s young life. Afraid to hope, he stood sentinel at the opening of the drainage pipe, unaware he was holding his breath until his lungs started to burn and he had to gasp for air.
    Luke had called back only once, his voice muffled by his own body and distorted by the acoustics of the pipe. What they heard was, “I shee someting… I wink it’s uh… white.” Jar and Suzy had exchanged confused looks. Barry, his face still smeared with dried mud and sweat leaned into the pipe and yelled. “It’s the ball, grab it!” Sensing his friends’ eyes on him, he repeated what he heard. “I see something, I think it’s white.”
    Excited, Barry backed away from the hole, expecting Luke to come scrambling out with the ball clutched in his hands. The only sound that came out of the pipe was a low groan. It wasn’t loud enough to be a scream, it wasn’t clear enough to be certain it was anything. But what followed was worse; clear, uninterrupted silence.
    Desperate, Barry said, “Let’s give him a few more minutes.” The silence continued. It did not waver while Jar ran up the embankment and flagged down a car. It did not waver while they waited for the first emergency vehicle to arrive. The silence, like the heat, remained constant as night descended on Junction.
    Jar, Barry and Suzy sat under the bridge in a splash of light coming from one of the spotlights above them. Exhausted, they watched as the paramedics and the fire department tried unsuccessfully to find their friend Luke.
    The drainage pipe was designed to carry overflow from the Llano River to a low area nearly a quarter of a mile away, which provided more than 1,320 feet of pipe where Luke Casteel might be stuck. The Junction fire department didn’t have enough cable to probe the entire length. Emergency phone calls had been made and a sewage company clear over in San Antonio was sending a crew with a robotic camera and enough cable to root through from one end to the other.
    Five adults stood in a small cluster. At first glance, there was nothing overtly remarkable about any of them. Beth Riley, Jar’s mother, wore a waitress uniform and a look of pained fatigue across what once had been a very pretty face. She stood closest to Mrs. Casteel and spoke to her in soothing tones.
    Murphy Jobes, Suzy’s father, wore nearly two weeks worth of stubble, and had just come from Faces, the local bar. If he still had a license to drive, (which he didn’t) he would have blown over the legal limit at 10:00 a.m. that morning. He stood beside Mr. Casteel and discussed the Texas football season in a slurred voice.
    Of the five, Griffin Tanner would have drawn the eye, not only because of how he looked and dressed, but because there was a certain intensity about the man that demanded a second glance. He had been the last to arrive and stood outside the circle. Behind them, the gaping hole of the drainage pipe remained dark and motionless.
    Griffin Tanner’s presence drew Jar’s attention. In all the time he had known Barry, he had never seen his mother and Griffin Tanner standing in close proximity. Tanner had never been to the small trailer on 15th Street to drop off or pick up his son. Jar looked over at his mother. She stood farthest from Tanner and even then she was angled so she was slightly turned away. If she could have transformed herself at will into a brick wall she would have. He didn’t know what bad blood existed between her and Griffin Tanner but he knew if she’d had her way he and Barry would not be friends.
    Jar noticed an obvious detail he had missed for years: There was only one parent for each of them. He, Suzy and Barry had each lost a parent. As if sensing Jar’s eyes, Griffin Tanner glanced over in his direction. Before Jar could look away, their eyes locked together.
    A jolt of fear passed through him as Tanner’s intense eyes pierced