by Cat Clarke
Eventually Michel comes in and hands me the phone. He leaves the room to give me some privacy, and I immediately wish he’d stayed.
“Faith? It’s her….It’s really her.” Dad’s crying over the phone—I’ve never heard him cry like this, huge, gulping sobs. “The teddy bear…you remember that bear of hers?” He doesn’t wait for me to answer. “Well, somehow they got the sound chip to work! They played us the recording! Can you believe it?” Again he doesn’t wait for me to speak. “She’s…Oh my god, Faith…it’s really her! Laurel’s come home!”
I say, “That’s great, Dad,” and it sounds like he’s just told me his soccer team has won the league. My reaction is all wrong, so I try again. “It’s amazing.” A little better, but not much.
Dad clears his throat. “She’s been asking for you. She remembers. Isn’t that wonderful? Just wait till you see her, Faith. She’s a beautiful young woman…just like you.” It couldn’t be more obvious that the “just like you” is an afterthought.
“She’s really asking for me?”
“Yes! She wanted to know if you’re still obsessed with building sand castles!” Dad chuckles.
I was building a sand castle in the sandbox when she was taken.
“We showed her a picture of you, Faith. She couldn’t believe how grown up you are!”
This is all very nice, but there’s something he’s not telling me. “Where has she been? What happened to her?”
I hear muffled voices. Dad must have put his hand over the phone. I wonder if Mom’s been listening in this whole time. “We’ll talk about that when I get home, love. All that matters is that Laurel’s back—safe and sound.”
—
Dad tells me that Laurel will be staying in a hotel for the next few days. Mom will stay with her, but he’ll come home. The police need to talk to Laurel, and she needs to get checked out by a doctor and a psychologist and various other people. There’s a specialist counselor on her way up from London.
I’m not allowed to tell anyone yet—not even Thomas and Martha. (Of course I’m going to tell Thomas and Martha.) Apparently there’s going to be a press conference tomorrow afternoon. I wonder how they can possibly have all this planned out already.
“You can meet her tomorrow, love. How does that sound? Seeing your big sister?” Dad’s using his coaxing voice—the one that makes me feel like a child.
How does that sound? Utterly terrifying.
“I can’t wait,” I say.
Michel manages to convince me that making macarons will make me feel better about everything. For the past couple of years, the two of us have spent every Saturday afternoon in the kitchen together. Dad’s usually watching soccer or out on one of his bike rides.
It started off as a bit of a laugh. My pathetic efforts would often end up in the garbage, and Michel would take his perfect macarons into the veterinary practice and share them with his colleagues (after we’d eaten our fill, of course). It was Dad who suggested we start selling them at the local farmers’ market. At first we weren’t sure that people would go for them, but on the first day, we sold out within an hour. That was when we discovered that the French accent was definitely an asset. It was my idea that Michel should play up the whole French thing. Who wouldn’t want to buy authentic French macarons made by an authentic Frenchman who just happens to be very, very handsome?
Thomas texts when Michel and I are having our customary pre-macaron-making cup of tea. He wants to know why I haven’t been in touch all day. He’s worried I might be upset about what happened yesterday. I text back: Upset after all the sex, you mean? Thomas doesn’t like to talk about sex. I don’t have to worry about him bragging in the boys’ changing rooms. Not that he’d ever be in the boys’ changing rooms—he’s not exactly the sporty type. Thomas likes to think of himself as a tortured artist. He sketches and writes poetry and drinks far more coffee than can possibly be good for him.
I reply to Martha while I’m at it. I bet she’s been waiting patiently all day, trying not to check her phone every two minutes: Last night was good! Thanks again for covering for me. Speak later? I have news (not sex-related).
Martha texts back first: WHAT NEWS?
Thomas: I miss you. I roll my eyes at that; I can’t help it. Thomas does not do text banter, no matter how hard I try to lure him into it.
I’ll tell them both about Laurel tonight. They deserve to know.
Today’s macarons are a spectacular failure on my part. Michel’s are fine, though, so he makes another couple of batches (one batch of raspberry and one of salted caramel—my favorite). He realizes that I’m missing my macaron mojo and tells me we don’t have to go to the market tomorrow, that it’s totally up to me. He can go on his own or stay home—whichever I’d prefer. I don’t think it’s possible for me to love him any more than I do at this exact moment. I tell him I want to go to the market. I don’t tell him the reason why: this might be the last time that we get to do this—just the two of us. Maybe Laurel will want to come next week, and maybe she’ll be miraculously brilliant at baking, and her macarons will have perfect, shiny tops every time.
—
Dad arrives home early evening; he looks worn-out. He quickly hugs Michel, then he hugs me for the longest time. They say a few words to each other in French—speaking quickly so that I can’t even try to understand.
We sit down on the sofa and Dad talks. Laurel is slightly malnourished, with a serious vitamin D deficiency from lack of sunlight, but she’s physically okay otherwise. First impressions are that she’s in better psychological shape than anyone could have expected. But at the same time, she’s clearly traumatized; she lashed out at a police officer trying to take a cheek swab for DNA testing. It took an hour for Mom to calm her down, but she wouldn’t let anyone else near her. Apparently everyone was very understanding about it. After all, says Dad, Laurel has been through a terrible ordeal.
Dad doesn’t go into much detail, other than to say that she was taken by a very sick man who kept her locked up in a basement. A lot of people had suspected that was the case. Mom always maintained that maybe she was taken by a couple who were desperate to have a little girl—and maybe they were raising her as if she were their own and taking the best care of her. Nobody dared to disagree with her whenever she mentioned this theory of hers. They tended to nod and smile awkwardly.
“Did she escape?” I like the idea of Laurel escaping, being daring and brave. Fighting back.
Dad shakes his head. “He let her go.”
“Why?”
“We don’t know.”
“Why would you go to the trouble of keeping someone locked up for all that time only to let them go all of a sudden?”
“I’m just glad he did.”
I am, too. Of course I am. “Did the police catch him?”
Another shake of the head. “No. We don’t even know where she was being held. The guy blindfolded her, drove her to Stanley Street, and left her in the front yard. By all accounts, the couple living there got a bit of a shock when she knocked on the door. The police are doing everything they can to find the man, obviously. And Laurel’s trying her best, but it’s hard for her. She can’t really remember how long they drove for. And she can’t tell us much about where she’s been kept all these years—the bastard was clever about it.” Dad never swears in front of me.
“So this psycho’s still out there? What if he comes back?”
“The police think he’ll lie low—go into hiding. But they’re not taking any chances. They’ll be watching us, okay? There’s no need for you to worry about that.”
I sit back and try to process this information. The police have no idea who this man is. How is that even possible? I try to picture the sort of man who would do something like this. A man who would keep a girl locked in a basement for all those years. “He abused her, didn’t he?”
Dad looks at Michel, and Michel nods, and it makes me so angry that my father can’t make a decision by himself for once. “
Yes. He beat her, too.” Dad’s jaw is tight. “The abuse was…systematic.”
I close my eyes to blink away the tears.
“I’m not saying this to upset you, Faith. But you need to be prepared. What she’s been through…” He shakes his head and breathes out slowly. Then he sits up straighter and pats me on the leg. “But the most important thing is that she’s safe now. We can be a family again.” I think he’s forgetting that we can’t exactly go back to being the sort of family we were thirteen years ago.
Dad says we need to give Laurel time to heal, and that she’ll be getting the best help available—therapy and counseling and whatever she needs.
Mom and Dad have arranged for me to go see her tomorrow morning. It looks like I won’t be going to the market with Michel after all. There’s no point in arguing—they wouldn’t understand.
It doesn’t seem to have occurred to my parents that I might have slightly conflicted feelings about seeing my sister for the first time in thirteen years. That I might be nervous—even scared.
Michel tells Dad he should go lie down for a bit, and Dad gives me another hug. “I can’t believe it’s over. I didn’t think…” He shakes his head and murmurs something about a miracle before he trudges off to his bedroom.
Michel’s going to pick up the takeout. He asks me to go with him, but I say I’d rather be alone for a few minutes.
“It’s a lot to take in, isn’t it?” His brown eyes are full of warmth and understanding.
I nod. “Are you not…worried?”
“Worried about what?”
“I don’t know…That Mom and Dad might get back together?” I’m not saying it to be mean, I’m really not.
Michel smiles. “What are you trying to do? Make me paranoid? I’m not worried at all. Why? You think I should be?”
“I don’t know! Dad’s acting all weird.”
“Of course he’s acting weird! It’s been a pretty weird sort of day, don’t you think?”
“Did they tell her that they’re not together? Does she know about you?” I can’t believe I didn’t think to ask earlier.
Michel picks up his leather jacket—I think it must be older than I am. “She knows. Your mom wanted to wait for a few days before telling her, but John insisted.”
“And?”
“And…nothing! She was totally fine with it. So you don’t need to worry your pretty little head about it!” He moves to ruffle my hair, which he only ever does to annoy me.
I try to put myself in her shoes. Coming back to your family after all that time. You’d want things to be the same as when you left, wouldn’t you? But a lot can change in thirteen years. Your mother can wither away to nothingness, and your dad can get together with a lovely Frenchman, and your little sister can stop building sand castles and start building a wall around herself instead.
—
I go to my room as soon as Michel leaves, closing the door so Dad can’t hear. I call Thomas first. He’s annoyed that I’ve hardly been in touch all day, so I tell him immediately.
“Are you serious? This is a joke, isn’t it?” He’s never really understood my sense of humor. The fact that he thinks there’s even the remotest possibility that I would joke about something like this is baffling to me.
I say nothing.
“Oh shit. You are serious. Oh my god. What happened? Where has she…? Is she…?”
I tell him everything I know, finding it vaguely reassuring that he asks a lot of the same questions as I did. It makes me feel like less of a freak. And when he asks how I’m feeling about it all, I feel a surge of love for him.
Now I know I did the right thing, having sex with him last night. Because I hadn’t been sure about it at all. I was scared. I’d never have admitted that to him or to Martha. Luckily, losing my virginity turned out to be very unscary. It was mostly sweet and awkward and a little bit hilarious (for me, anyway) when Thomas got a cramp in his leg. I don’t know why people make such a big deal about it.
Thomas is a good listener. He never interrupts and hardly ever disagrees. He is, to all intents and purposes, a good boyfriend. Even if I will never understand any of his poems. And he writes a lot of poems.
I tell Thomas that I might not be able to see him after school for the next few days. I have no idea how things are going to go with Laurel. Is she just going to come home and move into her room right away? Because she does have a room in our house—Mom insisted when we moved. At least she didn’t insist on decorating it like Laurel’s old room—all pink and sparkly. It just looks like a nice guest room, with a few of Laurel’s possessions dotted around. Mom felt so guilty about moving. She hated the idea that everything wouldn’t be exactly the same when Laurel came home. (It was always “when,” never “if.”) The only reason she eventually agreed to the move was to release more money for the fund to find Laurel.
Thomas tells me to take as much time as I need and says that I should call him any time I need to talk. He tells me he loves me, and I tell him I love him too, and I hang up, feeling sane for the first time in hours.
Martha says, “I can’t believe it.” Over and over again. I give her a quick rundown of everything I know, which isn’t all that much now that I think about it, and she says “I can’t believe it” a few more times. She asks when I’m going to meet Laurel, and it makes me realize that I won’t be meeting her, because you can only meet a total stranger, can’t you? But meeting feels like exactly the right word in this case.
I hang up after promising to call Martha tomorrow. She didn’t ask how I’m feeling. Why would she? Laurel’s abduction has dominated (and ruined) my whole life, and now she’s back. Problem solved.
—
We eat our takeout (sushi) and Dad doesn’t stop talking about Laurel. We have coffee and I eat six macarons and Dad doesn’t stop talking about Laurel. We try to watch a movie, but Dad keeps mentioning Laurel, so we give up after half an hour. He apologizes, but that doesn’t stop him from talking about Laurel. He spends the rest of the night phoning family and friends—presumably the ones Mom hasn’t already called—to tell them the good news, and to swear them to secrecy about it. Not one of them asks about me.
I say I’m going to get an early night, and Dad nods enthusiastically. “Good idea, love. Big day tomorrow.” He hugs me and says he can’t wait to see “my two girls together, side by side.” Michel hugs me and tells me he loves me. I wonder when he’ll get to meet Laurel—there’s been no mention of him coming with us tomorrow.
When I go to close the blinds in my bedroom I realize that I can see where she’s staying. The neon blue H of Hilton peeks out from behind a high-rise office building. Laurel is in there somewhere, with my mother. Our mother.
A persistent buzzing rouses me from sleep. The intercom to the doorman. By the sound of it, someone really, really wants to come in. I stumble from the bedroom to find Dad taking the receiver off the hook and Michel hovering nearby, looking worried. Before I can ask what’s going on, the phone starts ringing. Then Dad’s cell phone, which is charging on the kitchen counter.
“Journalists,” Dad says. “Didn’t take them long, did it? Not much point having a press conference now.” He looks more resigned than upset.
I look at the clock on the kitchen wall. It’s not even eight. Michel yawns as he fills up the coffee machine with water. I hear my phone ringing from the bedroom and go to get it. I’m vaguely aware of Dad trailing behind me, saying, “They wouldn’t dare….”
I don’t recognize the number. Dad says, “Faith, don’t.” But I do.
“Hello?”
“Am I speaking to Faith Logan?”
“Who’s this?”
“This is Jeanette Hayes. Can I ask how you’re feeling this morning?”
Jeanette Hayes. Only slightly more popular than Satan in our family. Mom and Dad got along okay with some of the reporters over the years—one or two have even become friends—but Jeanette Hayes is most definitely not one of them. It started a couple of mont
hs after Laurel went missing. The campaign to find her was in full swing, and the story was still mentioned in one paper or another almost every day. Jeanette Hayes decided that the amount of attention Laurel’s case was getting was unfair. She wrote this big article about all the other children who had gone missing at the time—and there were more than you might expect. The headline was: THE FORGOTTEN CHILDREN. Hayes had this theory that Laurel’s case was getting all the attention because she was pretty and blond and middle class, and that my parents had “connections” to the media. She even went so far as to say that vital police resources were being taken up by the hunt for Laurel when they could have been put to better use elsewhere.
All that would have been bad enough, but she wrote another story a week later saying Laurel was probably dead and it was high time the whole country “got real” about it. Neither of these stories made her very popular. Other journalists were falling over themselves to disagree with her, to call her “unfeeling” and “heartless,” and to say that the reason she didn’t understand was that she wasn’t a mother herself. She even got death threats. It didn’t seem to bother her, though, because she went right ahead and wrote a book all about it. I used to look at it in the library when Mom’s attention was elsewhere.
The book was full of photos and stories of other missing children. In some cases, Hayes had interviewed their families, asking how they felt about their child’s plight being sidelined to a tiny column on page 12, while Laurel Logan’s was still splashed all across the front page. (“What’s so special about her?” said one father.) The rest of the book was a bit of a hatchet job on my family. She hadn’t even tried to talk to Mom or Dad to find out the truth.
There was a black-and-white photo of Jeanette Hayes on the back cover of the book. She was staring at the camera in a challenging sort of way. She looked like a serious journalist, I thought. But that was probably just the glasses perched on the end of her nose. I used to stare at that photo, wondering why she hated us so much. Wondering why she didn’t want Laurel to come home to us.