#Wattys2015 The Ghost of James Fitzpatrick

Chapter 40

Sarah threw her bike into the culvert again at the end of Zwicki's drive and walked purposefully across the brown, expansive front yard with eight pounds of nylon ski rope over her shoulder. The lawn was dotted with patches of snow, and though sky was pregnant with imminent precipitation, she knew it was too warm to be a snowfall.

She headed straight for the spot where she and Lucy had found the well on Tuesday, and immediately wrapped the rope around the neighboring oak tree. She fashioned it like a noose around its trunk. The tree stood bare for winter, but was as sturdy as a mountain.

She dragged the huge sheet of plywood from the top of the well, which moved easier now that she and Lucy had already ripped it from its web of roots and weeds. There she found the second, smaller board that covered the well like a Tupperware lid. Sarah threw it aside.

She wrapped the loose end of the rope around her waist, tied it into a knot, and pulled a small flashlight out of her back pocket. She shone it straight down into the well. It was as far down as it was from the top of her two story house to the sidewalk, and it was dark. Far below she spotted the same rocks she saw with Lucy three days before, and once again, saw the glint of the color red beneath its protective stone blanket of brown and gray.

Sarah tested the strength of the rope, and when confident her knots would hold, she shut her eyes tight, pushed her glasses up onto her nose and crossed herself in prayer. She then scooted backwards into the well, as a child would climb into a swimming pool from its concrete edge.

She awkwardly inched her way down the narrow well slowly by stepping down the sides of the old brick walls. Small chunks of old concrete dislodged themselves beneath Sarah shoes and made their suicidal drop to the rocks below.

If she were to fall, it wouldn't kill her, just more than likely break her leg and give Zwicki a perfect opportunity to simply cover her up with the plywood until her bones would be discovered in about a century when the city of Arden finally cleared the land for the mall she had always hoped they would build.

She pictured her bright white skeletal remains enveloped in her now comically baggy jeans, with her zip-front hoodie from Urban Outfitter's she had begged her mother to buy online, and her foot bones would all be held together by her socks and Converse. She would be holding the red box with her fleshless metacarpals.

Sarah arrived at the bottom of the well and went to work fast. She knew Zwicki would discover her missing, and could possibly even guess where she was headed. She glanced up above to the top of the well before beginning work.

Through the circular opening, about thirty feet above her, she could see the tips of the branches of the oak, and the gray sky beyond that. She planted her feet off to one side of the rock pile upon which she stood, and began to pick up and stack the large rocks against the opposite wall of the well in order to expose metal object.

The final rock Sarah removed from the top of the red box still sat comfortably in the dents it had created years before, when it had been dropped into the well from above. There was a silver handle on the box which was roughly the size of a loaf of bread.

Feeling the box in her hands only increased Sarah's sense of urgency to get out of the well. She looked up again at the circular opening above her. She kept imagining she would see Principal Zwicki's face above her looking down. Maybe he would be laughing, or holding a piece of plywood or rocks. All she saw was a small flock of birds pass quickly in then out of view.

She untied the rope from around her waist and looped it through the silver handle working as quickly as she could. She would pull the box up after she got herself out. She knew climbing up and out would be a much larger challenge than climbing down.

Sarah took the slack out of her rope and began to pull herself up using her feet against the wall. She thought of the rope in her hands and pictured her inner tube skidding gracefully behind her dad's ski boat, across the green glassy water of Myers Lake. She wondered if she and Josh would be on the lake next summer using this same blue rope.

Sarah looked up once again into the opening above her and felt the mist of light rain and fresh air. She was finally able to grab the top edge and pulled herself clumsily out onto the ground. Her shoulders burned, but she could not recall a time in her life when pain mattered less. She was relieved to be out of the well, but this was no time to luxuriate in her accomplishments.

She squatted and looked back down into the well and began to pull the box up the same time she felt her cell phone push itself halfway from the hip pocket of her jeans. She reached for it to shove it back down, but felt it slip clumsily from her grasp and make the silent and dreaded fall to the bottom of the well. She heard it hit the metal box, then the rocks below it.

Sarah shook her head at her own clumsiness, then put its loss out of her mind and began to pull on the rope. The box dragged along the rough bricks of the inside of the well, and bounced and banged as it made its way to the light of day after 37 years. When it was high enough for her to reach, she got on her stomach and pulled it up.

Sarah picked up the box, untied the rope from it, and thought it best to leave the blue rope where it lay. She began to walk hurriedly across the yard to make her way back to her bike, but then stopped suddenly and sat down. She set the box on the ground next to her and looked around the back yard to confirm she was still alone. She was breathing hard from her climb, and could see vapors explode from her mouth in bursts. She took one deep breath to slow herself down.

She had to know. She briefly examined the outside of the box and saw that two simple latches were all that held the lid closed. There were two of them - the sort that flip up and pull out.

The sky was getting dark above her but she still had enough light to confirm what exactly she had dredged up from Zwicki's past. Whether it was a much loved war medal or an old box of rusty bolts, she was about to find out.