Page 111 of You'll Be Sorry

She adjusted her hat, entered the fray.

“Hey, Austin.”

The fire chief immediately swiveled in her direction. Mandy kept her shoulders relaxed, her hands fully visible.

“I understand you have some questions you want answered.”

“Who did it?” Austin exploded. “I know someone here did it. Had to be one of us. Had to be!”

He swung his shotgun in the direction of the audience, half of whom leaned back in horror, while the other half leaned forward in anticipation. Dear Lord.

Mandy took several steps toward the dais. This close she could tell that Austin was indeed obliterated. Two decades of sobriety gone just like that. She knew it had been a hard night followed by a harder discovery, but this level of reaction…

“I don’t understand,” Austin was muttering. “That night. I swear it was a deer. And then…I was attacked by bears. But deer. Bears. Wild animals. I swear it.”

The shotgun shook noticeably in Austin’s hand. One of his crew took a step forward. Mandy waved the woman back.

“Tell me about the deer, Austin.”

“I didn’t see it. I was driving home. The storm. And then…lightning. Kawpooey! The tree exploded. An animal darted across the road. I tried to swerve, but…I wasn’t fast enough.”

“The storm, thirty years ago. That’s the night you’re talking about, Austin?” Mandy could already tell that a decent chunk of the room followed her line of thinking. In a town that remained defined by one moment, one family, how could it be any different? Which would make the tree in question the one near the end of the Dixon driveway, a giant oak that had been famously split in half.

“I pulled over. I did! Honest. To check.”

“You’d been drinking.”

Hollow chuckle. “Those days, not like I was ever sober.”

“So you were drunk, driving home in the middle of a thunderstorm, and you saw a tree get struck by lightning.”

“I wanted the deer to be all right. But when I got out of my vehicle—the deer didn’t look so good. I thought I should do something.”

“You wanted to help the animal,” Mandy prodded gently.

“Bears attacked me! Out of nowhere! I was looking down and then, just like that, I got knocked on my ass! Staring up at nothing but teeth and claws. I was gonna die, I swear I was gonna die.”

Austin jerked his shotgun unsteadily. Mandy extended a soothing hand.

“What did you do, Austin?”

“I made it back to my car and I shot at them! I didn’t want to hurt them, but I had to protect myself.”

Mandy was starting to understand. Such a sad and tragic tale. Such a sad and terrible night.

“Where did you get the gun, Austin?”

“My glove compartment.” He stared at her blankly. “Everyone keeps a pistol in their glove compartment.”

In the Live Free or Die state, he wasn’t necessarily wrong.

“Did you shoot at a bear, or bears?” Mandy emphasized the plural.

“I’m not sure. There was screaming. And so much rain, coming down in sheets. Thunder. Lightning. It was all so much, too much.”

Mandy nodded. She took up a casual position leaning against the raised dais just two feet from the swaying fire chief.

“You shot wild animals. Except you didn’t, did you, Austin?”