The Box in the Woods

THE TINY BELL ON THE DOOR OF THE SUNSHINE BAKERY TINKLED AS the group entered. There was a crepuscular quality to the bakery, lit only by the distant streetlights outside and the faint purple twilight. The cakes were dark figures in the glass case.

Patty turned on one of the overhead lights, which elongated the shadows. It was a cheerful kind of creepiness. It turned out that the lingering smell of cake was different, and maybe even better, than cake in the oven. Someone needed to turn it into a scented candle, pronto.

“Pick whatever you like,” Patty said as she lifted up the leaf in the bakery counter to step behind it. “I’ve got some leftover red velvet, a golden vanilla, and double chocolate.”

“Red velvet for me, please,” Janelle said. She was back at the counter, examining Patty’s work.

“You should come back in someday,” Patty said. “I’ll show you how I make the silicone molds. You seemed interested in that.”

Janelle’s head shot up upon hearing this.

“She’s like the Hulk,” Nate explained. “But instead of transforming when she gets mad, it’s when she sees crafts. And she doesn’t turn big and green. She just makes crafts. So not like the Hulk, really.”

Patty blinked slowly.

“Chocolate, please,” he added.

Stevie walked around the bakery and looked at the photos on the walls.

“This is your dad, right?” she said, pointing at one of the pictures.

“That’s him,” Patty replied, carefully lifting out a massive piece of chocolate cake for Nate. “Well spotted. How did you know?”

“He was in the group photo of the statue unveiling.”

“Oh yeah! My dad was in it, and the mayor and the sheriff and Mrs. Wilde, and I forget who else. Someone took the picture for a local guide, but they submitted it to Life and it was accepted. It was a huge deal. My dad hated having his picture taken. That picture and the one you’re looking at, those are really the only two good ones I have. He was a private guy, hardworking. Greatest Generation type. What kind for you?”

“Oh—chocolate?”

Patty chopped off another massive hunk of cake.

“Allison seemed really hopeful about the diary,” Stevie said. “But then, she said everyone just humors her?”

“She asks every new detective about that diary,” Patty said, passing the cake to Stevie. “If they haven’t found it by now, I don’t think they’re going to turn it up at this point, but it gives her something to hold on to, I guess. I don’t know if it’s better for her to have hope about that or let it go. It’s complicated. You said red velvet, right?”

Janelle nodded. Another heroic slice was produced.

Patty made herself a cup of tea and sat down at the table with them. She pulled the tie from her ponytail, letting her dusty-blond hair fall over her shoulders.

“So this is about a podcast, huh?” she said. “You want to know our stories? I’ll tell you mine, if you want.”

“Do you mind talking about it?” Stevie asked. “Even now?”

Patty shook her head. “It’s nothing I haven’t said before. I’m lucky to be able to tell the story. I would have been there that night. Todd, Eric, and Diane were my friends, my gang. The only reason I wasn’t there was because I was in trouble. I have survivor’s guilt. It feels like my duty to talk about it.”

Having said she was willing to talk, Patty drifted into silence for a moment. Stevie, Janelle, and Nate looked at each other and ate cake for a moment until Patty stirred herself.

“What is it you want to know? The usual stuff? Who, where, when?”

Put like that, it felt dirty and low. Stevie felt herself contract internally. This was what it felt like to talk to real survivors—it was something she would have to get used to, if not get comfortable with.

“What were your friends like?” Stevie asked. It seemed like the best way to ease into the nitty-gritty details.

“Fun,” Patty said without hesitation. “A lot of fun. Most of them. I’m going to sound like I’m a million years old, but it was such a different time. Everything was loose, free. A lot of it was really irresponsible, but we had a good time. Back then, I didn’t think about the future. In high school, I was . . . unfocused. Spoiled, if I’m being honest. I was terrible.” She smiled and shrugged apologetically. “My mother died when I was eleven—she had cancer. It was so horrific. My dad took care of me, but he didn’t talk much about anything. He was a war hero, actually. Military intelligence. He did something important in the war, behind enemy lines, in Germany. Serious stuff, the kind people write books about. It made him tight-lipped and stern. He made a good living, and between his salary and a little life insurance from my mom’s passing, we were very comfortable. He tried to care for me by giving me anything I wanted. I had fashionable clothes, whatever was the latest. I got all the records I wanted. I had horses. I got a car when I turned sixteen—a little MG convertible, which was very cool. We had the house with the big pool. I was that kid. While everyone else was thinking about their education and job, I was never thinking further than the next party, the next drama, the next new thing. I didn’t apply to college. That’s when my dad and I started to argue. We had some blowup fights my senior year. He wanted me to make a plan for my life, and he wanted me to stop hanging out with deadbeats. That’s what he called my friends.”

She took a long sip of her tea.

“You asked what they were like,” she said, refocusing. “Eric was sweet. Funny. A genuinely nice guy. Smart, too. A lot of people have made a big deal about the fact that he sold pot, but you have to understand . . . this was some low-level, high school, late-seventies stuff. He would have gone on to really good things if he had gotten himself together, which I think he would have. I miss them all, but I think about Eric a lot for some reason. Diane was one of my closest friends, but I can’t say I ever knew her well. Her parents owned the Dairy Duchess—it’s the diner down the street. She was tough, loved rock. Loved it. Especially Led Zeppelin. Loved going to concerts. I did too, but Diane was a real music person. She was Todd’s girlfriend, and Todd was . . . ”

Stevie saw Patty wrestling with her thoughts.

“I have a hard time reconciling this one,” she said. “Todd was not a good person, and I knew it, and I still liked him. He was the big man on campus—son of the mayor, captain of the football team. He felt like a big deal, which is ridiculous of course. At the time, though, it seemed so important. It’s so easy to get sucked in when you’re young. I should have stopped hanging out with him after Michael Penhale died, but I didn’t.”

“You think he had something to do with Michael Penhale’s death?” Stevie asked.

“Oh, he did it,” Patty said. “I’m sure of that. I was in his Jeep all the time—I knew how he drove. Fast, drunk, high. Someone saw him that night, and the police did nothing at all to investigate. And I saw the change in him after Michael Penhale died. He was always cocky, but after that he was unbearable. I could stand it because I was on the inside of the circle with him. I think I tried to tell myself it was just a terrible accident on a dark road. Todd didn’t mean to do it. I justified it in my mind by thinking that because it wasn’t intentional, it was . . . not okay, but not something that needed to be pursued? I’m not proud of any of this—I’m just telling you how it was.”

Janelle had stopped eating her cake. She was not the kind of person who could listen to a story like that and keep chowing down. Nate could multitask. Stevie was in the zone now, her mind moving through the facts.

“How did Sabrina fit into all this?” Stevie asked.

“I was never clear on why she started hanging out with us,” Patty replied. “She started sitting with us at lunch at the end of senior year. I think Diane brought her over, but I never knew why. Sabrina was kind of the queen bee of Liberty High.”

“Did you like her?”

“I think so,” Patty said. “It’s hard to say. I didn’t dislike her. We maybe made fun of her a little for being perfect, prissy. But she was nice. Didn’t seem to have a mean bone in her body. I wasn’t close to her. But it was Sabrina who inadvertently caused me to miss the trip into the woods that night.” Patty inhaled deeply and drummed her fingers on the table. “At that time, my life revolved around my boyfriend, Greg. We started dating early junior year. I was completely, totally, and utterly caught up in it. I barely thought about anything else. He was very handsome, but honestly, that’s all he had going for him. I built him up in my mind as this bold, interesting free spirit. What he was, in reality, was the town drug dealer until Eric took over and did a better job. Greg couldn’t even do that. He messed around with other girls. I knew it. We fought about it constantly, but I wouldn’t break up with him. At some point, he kissed Sabrina. She came and told me, which was decent of her. This was a few days before the murders. I was so upset I left camp, went home for a day, and cried and moped around. But honestly, it was boring being at home when everyone else was there. So I went back the next day. Greg apologized, so I forgave him, as usual. It was one of those teenage things—you fight and you kiss and make up. It was the Fourth of July, and we snuck into the woods and were . . . making up. I don’t need to say more than that. We were caught by the deputy head of camp and got put on house arrest. I worked with the kids during the day, but at eight o’clock each night I had to sleep in the nurse’s cabin and help out there if she needed it. At the time, it felt like the end of the world . . .”

She shook her head.

“So that’s where I was the night it happened,” she said. “That’s why I didn’t go with them into the woods. I was bored out of my mind in the infirmary. I couldn’t even sneak out because the nurse had insomnia. She sat up all night in a rocking chair, embroidering. All I remember was waking up the next morning to someone screaming across the lake, then the nurse grabbed her things and started running. I ran too, because I wanted to see what was going on. And that’s when I saw him. Eric. It was . . . I can’t describe it. You don’t ever want to see anything like it.”

This, Stevie understood from personal experience. She had discovered two dead bodies at Ellingham. They had not died in the same manner, but it was something that did not leave you. Sometimes, especially when she was trying to sleep, Stevie’s mind went back to those moments—seeing a pair of feet, a figure on the ground, the stillness, the . . .

She felt herself turning inside, the start of anxiety spiral. Janelle, being aware, pushed Stevie’s cake closer toward her and nodded, indicating she should take a bite. Sometimes, this was enough. Leave the thought for a moment; break the cycle just long enough to get off the anxiety train.

“All I remember were people asking me questions,” Patty said. “I told the police the others had been out in the woods as well. Then my dad came and took me home. We all went home. Everything stopped—camp, life in general. The only thing that happened after that was a big gathering in town. Some of us met up on the football field at school. I was there with Greg. He was drunk and high, so the usual. We fought, which was also usual, and he got on his motorcycle—no helmet, of course—and rode off. There’s a sharp turn up the road from the school—a really nasty one. There are accidents there all the time.”

Stevie remembered the turn from that morning’s drive. It was almost ninety degrees, bordered on one side by a large wall of rock.

“He knew the turn well,” Patty went on, “but everything was so confused that week. He was too drunk, or too stoned, or just distracted . . . I don’t know. But he crashed. He died on the way to the hospital. My friends were all gone.”

Patty spread her hands on the table and looked at them.

“If therapy had been more common, my dad would have put me into it,” she said. “As it was, all he really understood was hard work and business. He talked me into getting serious about baking, since it was the one thing I really liked to do. He pushed me into culinary school, and it helped. I threw myself into it completely. You work long hours in bakeries and kitchens. You sweat it out. Mentally, I recovered by chopping and mixing and standing in front of stoves and ovens. I changed. My father fronted the money for me to open this place. I’m glad my dad got to see my business get off the ground before he died. That’s why I keep his picture up in here—he was my angel investor. He believed in me. I tried to make something good come out of the horror of it all.”

After a polite pause to let the gravity of what had been said settle, Stevie picked up her questioning. “What did you think happened?” she asked.

“I know there have been questions about the Woodsman, but that’s the only thing that ever made sense to me. That guy, or someone copying him. I don’t know if you watch much true crime, but there were a lot of serial killers back then. . . .”

Nate actually guffawed. That was the only word for it. This confused Patty for a moment, but she disregarded it.

“I think some sicko went into the woods and killed my friends, and we’ll always be replaying the events. We’re always going to be the town with the murders. It’ll never stop. After you, there will be someone else. It’s our story, and we have to live with it. But I try to make something beautiful here—something people can enjoy. I called this place Sunshine Bakery because that’s the vibe I want to give off. The truth is, this is a nice place, and the camp is a great place to spend the summer. I had so many good times there, before . . . you will too.”

It was clear from her body language and tone that Patty was done talking. She insisted on giving them a bag of muffins and brownies to take with them as they left. They stepped back out into the muggy night. The picnic had fizzled while they were inside. The food trucks were gone, and the square had mostly emptied out. Stevie could make out Carson, sitting alone at a table under the marquee, looking at his phone. A queasy feeling came over her—the burning shame of Allison’s upset.

Somehow, she had to manage this situation—the case, Carson, the feelings that were barely under the surface. The pain was so immediate for Allison and Patty. The past was not in the past for them, not really. The emotional current was alive and well, and the questions still lingered in the air.

She looked down the street, at the peaceful storefronts of Barlow Corners. This really was the perfect small town, with flower baskets hanging from the lampposts, everything tidy and quaint. She felt an internal quiver again, but this time, it wasn’t anxiety; it was something akin to excitement, edged with fear. As long as the case was unsolved, the phantom that haunted Barlow Corners remained—restless, waiting for someone to dispel it. As stupid as she felt being connected to Carson, maybe she really could be the one to bring this to a close.

Now Carson was up on his feet, and he was doing yoga by himself in the empty tent.

Stevie’s confidence vanished as soon as it had come. She was a teenager, saddled with a tech bro, trying to solve something she knew little about.