Introduction

From one of America's best-loved storytellers - the author of the #1 New York Times bestseller WHERE THE HEART IS - comes a tale of a small Oklahoma town and the mystery that has haunted its residents for years.

In 1972, windswept DeClare, Oklahoma, was consumed by the murder of a young mother, Gaylene Harjo, and the disappearance of her baby, Nicky Jack. When the child's pajama bottoms were discovered on the banks of Willow Creek, everyone feared that he, too, had been killed, although his body was never found.

Nearly thirty years later, Nicky Jack mysteriously returns to DeClare, shocking the town and stirring up long-buried memories. But what he discovers about the night he vanished is more astonishing than he or anyone could have imagine. Piece by piece, what emerges is a story of dashed hopes, desperate love, and a secret that still cries out for justice...and redemption.

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Excerpt

Chapter One

His early morning flight from Los Angeles had been delayed for nearly two hours because of fog. Plenty of time for him to back out, just let it all go. Once he even grabbed his bag and left the terminal, but he changed his mind. Again.

After boarding, he found himself seated next to an elderly woman who was weeping quietly. She was still crying when, twenty minutes later, she offered a whispered apology, but he pretended sleep. Whatever her problem was, he didn’t want to hear it. He had no interest in hearing people whine.

When she left her seat to go to the lavatory, he slipped from the first-class cabin and found an empty row near the back of the plane.

For a while he tried to read but gave it up when he felt a headache coming on. He hadn’t slept at all the night before, hadn’t even gone to bed. Instead, he’d spent the hours sitting on his balcony, trying to persuade himself not to make this trip.

Then, just before five that morning, he’d phoned to make his flight reservation, left a vague message on his receptionist’s answering machine and pulled a suitcase from his closet.

Now, with his stomach churning from too much airport coffee, his knees wedged against the seat in front of him, his body heavy with fatigue, he decided that when the plane landed, he’d give this up. Take the next available flight back to L.A.

But he didn’t.

After he picked up his rental, a Mitsubishi Eclipse, and a map at Tulsa International Airport, he headed east.

The Avis blue-chip car, the only convertible available, wouldn’t have been his first choice; he drove a Jaguar XK8 in L.A. But even before he drove out of the city, he realized he’d underestimated the Oklahoma heat, well over a hundred, with humidity so high that his shirt was plastered to his back despite the hot wind.

The two-hour drive took him through mostly empty country, the highway skirting towns called Coweta, Tullahassee, Oktaha—names that conjured scenes of Gene Autry movies.

He arrived in DeClare before dark, then checked into the Riverfront Motel, which looked just a little more inviting than the White Buffalo Inn at the edge of town or a decrepit hotel called the Saddletree a few blocks away.

His room was about what he expected. Drab and cramped, smaller even than the dorm room he’d lived in at Tufts for five years. Behind the drapes he found sliding glass doors leading to a balcony that overlooked a river backed by woods of towering pines.

He didn’t bother to unpack, but he hadn’t brought much anyway. He wasn’t planning to stick around long.

The motel restaurant was crowded, according to his waitress, because it was Thursday.

“Catfish night,” she explained, managing to turn “night” into a three-syllable word. “All you can eat for six ninety-five.”

“Is it baked?” he asked, a question she thought was hilarious.

“You’re not an Okie, are you? Only one way to fix catfish, and that’s to fry it. You want baked fish, be here for the Sunday buffet. We have baked cod then. But come before noon, ’cause when the churches let out, this place is packed.”

“I’ll be gone before Sunday.”

“Not staying long, huh?”

Though he’d already framed the lie, he hesitated. Another chance to back out.

“I’m here to look up some old friends of my parents.”

“Who’s that?”

He felt his heart quicken, his breath come short. But he was in it now.

“A family named Harjo.”

“Which one? We got Harjos scattered all over this part of the country. They’re all related, one way or another. Ben was the oldest, I think.”

“Where can I find him?”

“He’s dead, but his wife, Enid, lives way the hell out in the boonies. Can’t tell you how to get there. Your best bet is Teeve. She was married to a Harjo. He took off years ago, but she’s still close to the family. She runs the pool hall on Main Street.”

After his dinner, and with enough fat in his system to grease axle rods, he walked to the center of town. Four depressing blocks scarred by struggle and failure. Buildings of crumbling native stone, many of them empty; a boarded-up movie theater, its marquee advertising a citywide garage sale; a bank wearing a new facade, the centerpiece a massive clock running an hour late.

Business owners battling the Wal-Mart east of town had tried to lure customers back by installing canvas awnings, camouflaging peeling paint with cheap brick veneer, placing wrought-iron benches on the corner of every block. But the awnings were tattered and fading, the veneer was flaking paint and the benches were covered with pigeon droppings.

The pool hall, closed by the time he got there, didn’t look as if it were faring any better than other businesses he’d passed along the way. The sign reading TEEVE’S PLACE hung crookedly over the door, and the plate glass window fronting the building bore a foot-long crack patched with caulk and masking tape.

Inside, a fluorescent bulb blinked in a tin ceiling pitted with rust. The long, narrow room was crowded with a makeshift counter, pool tables from another era, video games, vending machines and a game table with four mismatched chairs.

As he turned and started back toward the motel, a mud-splattered pickup drove by, a rifle mounted in the back window, a Confederate flag strapped across the grille, two pit bull pups chained in the truck bed.

If he’d been back home just then, he might have been cussing the traffic clogging the 405 or complaining of the heavy brown air dimming the sun or fighting the panic he felt when a tremor hit.

But at that moment, Los Angeles seemed like paradise.

Copyright © 2004 by Billie Letts

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Copyright 2006 by Hachette Book Group USA view abbreviated excerpt only...

Discussion Questions

From the Publisher:


1. In her novels Billie Letts beautifully captures the personalities in Oklahoma's small towns. Do you think DeClare, Oklahoma could be "Any Town, USA" or is it uniquely a small town in the state of Oklahoma?

2. Key themes in this novel deal with the question of identity and self-knowledge. Mark Albright (Nicky Jack Harjo) doesn't know who he is. What does he learn about himself during the course of the story? Does he change in any fundamental way from the beginning to the end of the book?

3. Some philosophies say that who we are is a question of genes. Others that we are formed by our upbringing, experiences, and culture. Does nature or nurture have a bigger impact on the characters in this novel?

4. Do you find the love relationship between Ivy and Mark/Nicky Jack believable? Why or why not?

5. We get to know Gaylene, posthumously, through what other people say about her and through her diaries. Are the two views of her similar or different? Why does she call herself "Spider Woman"?

6. What life lessons does Gaylene encounter through the crucial years she is writing in her diary? Does she change as a result of them?

7. What importance do you think race has in this novel: not much, some, or a great amount? What are some examples of racial discrimination faced by characters? Mark/Nicky Jack doesn't know he is part Cherokee. Is it important that he does know?

8. The book also raises some troubling issues faced by adopted children. What are they? Do you think an adopted child should be given his birth parents' identities? Why or why not?

9. Mark/Nicky Jack talks about having a careful plan for his life, and then fate dramatically changes that plan. He points out that Ivy has no plan at all, and she's drifting through life. What are the pros and cons of each character's approach to life? What is your own approach?

10. What do you make of the domino players? Why are they in the story? What do they contribute besides the title?

11. A frequent situation in the novels of Billie Letts is the dilemma faced by an unmarried pregnant woman about the child she carries. In this book, what choice does each of the unmarried pregnant women make with regard to her unborn child, and what are the consequences of that choice? Do you think each woman makes the best choice for her?

12. Because this is fiction, the author can create any ending she wishes for her characters. Do you agree with the fate she gives to each of the major characters? In particular, how do you feel about what happened to Carrie and her son Kippy? Are you convinced she would have taken his life along with her own?

13. Who would you say is the happiest or most "together" character or characters in this book? Why? Does "shooting the moon" make for happiness?

14. If there is someday a sequel about Mark/Nicky Jack and Ivy, what do you think might happen to them? Do you think their relationship will last?

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