by Kit Frick
“What the fuck?” Max’s face is twisted into something ugly.
“We’re only here because of Kaylee,” I say, snatching my towel from the sand and wrapping it around my shoulders like a cape. Max holds up his arm to shield his face from flyaway sand.
“Jesus, Anna.”
“It looked like you two hit it off.”
“Look.” Max shoves himself up to a slightly unsteady standing position. “I invited you to this party.”
“Yeah, well, that doesn’t mean something’s going to happen between us. Excuse me.” I turn away from him and start walking toward the ocean, toward the mass of people who might be Kaylee. It’s going to be dark soon; time for fireworks. I just want to find her and get out of here.
Kaylee finds me first. “Hey.” She’s standing suddenly beside me, hand wrapped around my wrist like a claw.
“I was looking for you.”
“What was that?” she hisses. “With Max.”
“That was Max being a drunken asshole.” Guess she was watching us. Fantastic.
“You kissed him,” she accuses.
“He kissed me,” I clarify. “And I told him to get lost.”
“You knew I liked him,” she pouts, as if this was my fault, as if I didn’t just tell Max the same thing two minutes ago. And suddenly it clicks. This is why I needed a break from Kaylee this summer. Not just because of the partying. When I’m with her, I’m this girl. The girl who lets herself get dragged to parties she didn’t even want to go to, who lets herself get sunburned, who gets towed down into spats over boys who aren’t even close to worth it. I feel petty and skin-crawly and pissed at Kaylee and pissed at myself for becoming this girl all over again.
I take a deep breath.
“I know,” I say, my voice soft. “I’m really sorry. I don’t know why he did it.” I glance then at the ocean. Swimming probably isn’t allowed after sundown, but no one seems to be regulating. The water is filled with slick, dusky bodies splashing and floating in the surf.
“Do you want to go in?” I ask, a peace offering. Something about the sight of all those shapes in the dark water makes my stomach twist, but I want to end this day with Kaylee on a good note. And we always take a dip before leaving the beach—it’s tradition.
Kaylee glances at the ocean, then takes a step back, away from the darkness seeping over the surf. Away from the bodies made faceless in the near-dark. “I’m not really feeling it,” she says. Her voice is tight.
“Fine,” I sigh, relieved in spite of myself. Suddenly I want to get as far away from the water as possible.
“I’m hungry,” she whines, tugging at my arm. She hasn’t forgiven me, but she’s going to drop it, at least for now.
“Me too. Did Becca and Zeb leave?”
She nods. “A while ago.”
“Then let’s get out of here. I saw a pizza place near the station.”
We collect the rest of our stuff and Max ignores us entirely as we start back down the beach toward the exit. Real classy. I notice Kaylee look over her shoulder once, then twice, and my heart squeezes for her.
Back on the train, Kaylee is silent. We eat our slices and smear the grease on thin paper napkins. When we pull into the station before Bridgehampton, Kaylee balls up her beach towel and presses it against the window, then props it beneath her head like a pillow.
“We’re almost there,” I say.
“I’m not getting off.”
“What do you mean?”
“I bought my return ticket to Brooklyn,” she says. “I’m not getting off at Bridgehampton.”
I lean the back of my head against the seat and stare up at the train ceiling. It looks dirty in that way soap can’t fix. I want Kaylee to go home, but not like this.
“I’m not into him,” I say. “Not even a little bit.”
“Whatever, I’m over it.” Clearly a lie. “I have to be back first thing tomorrow anyway; Mom needs me.” Possibly true, but who knows. Kaylee never did tell me how long she was planning to stay. The train starts to pull in at Bridgehampton, and I gather up my things.
“You sure?” I ask, even though I already know the answer.
“Positive,” she says through tight lips, eyes still fixed out the window.
“I’ll call you,” I promise.
“Yeah.”
I feel like shit. I sling my bag over my shoulder, strap biting into my sunburned skin, and make my way toward the exit.
16 THEN
July
Herron Mills, NY
I STAY IN bed as long as I can stand myself. My skin burns, then itches, then burns, and I stink of stale sweat and sunscreen and pizza grease. At twelve thirty, the longest I’ve slept in since probably last summer, I finally drag myself into the bathroom and turn the shower on. I should have taken one before crawling into bed all sandy and gross last night, but why not end a day of bad decisions on one more mistake? Besides, I have no plans today and the Bellamys won’t be home until tomorrow. Guess I’m spending the afternoon doing laundry.
After I’m clean and my skin is slathered in aloe vera courtesy of the pool house bathroom closet, I strip my sheets and stuff them in my laundry bag along with everything else I’ve been needing to wash. Kaylee’s abandoned duffel bag glares at me from the corner of my room, and I paw through it. For such a big bag, she didn’t pack a lot. Just magazines, a Luna bar, and a few clothes I can return at the end of the summer. I shove it under my bed.
In the main house, I get the first load going and wander out onto the pool deck with some toast and a glass of orange juice. From across the grounds, a high-pitched drone fills the air. Someone’s mowing their lawn. It sounds like it’s coming from Windermere, but that can’t be right.
I open my messages and scroll through my last texts with Caden. He’d said they were going to the city for the weekend; it’s not quite two on Sunday afternoon, which seems a little early for them to be back. But maybe. My fingers hover over the screen, then I change my mind and switch off my phone. If he’s really mowing the lawn, he won’t hear his phone anyway. I’ll just pop over and see if their car’s in the drive.
I take the long way around the front of the house and down Linden Lane to Windermere. When I peer through the scrolls in the entry gate, Mrs. Talbot’s big black car is still gone, but the sports car, which I’ve since learned belongs to Caden, is there along with a gray pickup with mud-caked tires. ANDERSON & CO. is painted on the side in burgundy lettering. I’m sure they only took one car to the city, but for a moment, I’m puzzled. If the Talbots aren’t home, how did this work vehicle get through the gate? After a minute, it occurs to me that this must be Charlie, the guy who cares for the horses. Of course they’d still need to be fed and exercised and whatever else one does with horses while the Talbots are gone.
I push away from the gate, determined not to get caught peeking at Windermere uninvited twice in two weeks. It’s cooler today, and while I’m outside, I figure I might as well take a walk. I’m not consciously waiting for Charlie to finish up and leave. As I stroll casually down to the end of Linden Lane, past Magnolia House and Seacrest, that monstrosity of metal and glass, and then back around the other way, I’m not actively planning to slip through the trees and over to Windermere as soon as Charlie’s truck is gone. But by my third loop of the street, when it’s getting on three and the truck is lumbering away, that’s exactly what I do.
I find myself walking along freshly mowed grass on the side of Windermere. Caden must have pounced on their trip to get the job done. It looks a lot nicer back here now; you can actually see the work Caden’s been doing on the back patio, and instead of sprouting haphazardly from weeds, the stable looks purposeful and bright. I gravitate toward it, thinking I could go for a whiskey and Coke. I’m still on vacation until tomorrow. No one to judge me but me.
I wonder for a moment if the stable will be locked, trying to picture how Caden let us in in the dark the other night. But the doors are secured by a simple wooden bar th
at lifts right up.
“Hi, Jackie O. Pike.” I nod toward both horses, who are busy chewing feed inside their stalls. Jackie O. lifts her head and gives me a soft snort, but neither seems too bothered to see me in their domain. I head to the back of the stable, toward the unused stall with Caden’s whiskey stash. I swing open the bottom panel of the stall door, as I watched Caden do the other night, and crouch down to climb inside. My eyes take a minute to adjust to the dimmer light, then focus on the mini-fridge in the corner. Inside, I find several cans of Coke and a box of Thin Mints. The cookies are tempting, but I leave them alone and grab a can.
My eyes dart around the rest of the stall. On the floor against the side wall are three bottles of Glenlivet, two unopened and one half filled. But it’s the small table against the back wall that catches my eye. It’s old and wobbly and looks like a nightstand from a child’s bedroom set. On top rests a single envelope. Curiosity piqued, I set my Coke down on top of the fridge and swing open the stall’s top panel to get some more light inside, then walk over to get a better look.
It’s a square greeting card envelope, made out to ZOE in neat block letters. My breath catches. I spin it over, but of course, it’s sealed.
I place the envelope back down and slide open the nightstand’s single drawer. Inside is a black flash drive with bright yellow polka dots. Otherwise, the drawer is empty. I look behind my shoulder, paranoid, as if my snooping might summon Caden from Manhattan. Or Zoe, from wherever she may be. Possibly from beyond the grave.
My fingers close around the flash drive. A heat that feels like adrenaline spiked with something much stronger floods my veins. My desire for a drink is gone; a new scrap of information about Zoe is a far better drug. I close my eyes, riding the high, and theories start to whirr. If Caden has a letter for her stashed in the stable, he must still believe she’s out there somewhere. That she’s going to come back for it. Or maybe this is some kind of simple shrine. A birthday card he never got the chance to give her and a flash drive with his favorite pictures of them together. Whatever it is, it’s obviously private. It obviously has nothing to do with me.
I grab both items, shut the stall doors behind me, and slip out of the stable and back through the trees to Clovelly Cottage. Pike gives me a little whinny on my way out.
* * *
In the main house, I place the pilfered items on the kitchen counter as my heart rate slows to almost normal. I’ll change my laundry over, then I’ll decide what to do. That takes about three minutes. Back in the kitchen, I stare at the envelope like it might reveal a set of instructions. It’s sealed, but only at the bottom where the tip of the triangle meets the envelope back. I run my finger along the underside of the crease. It wouldn’t take much to open it up.
I fill the kettle with water and place it on the back of the stove. You can steam an envelope open. That’s a thing, right?
While I wait for the water to boil, I take the flash drive and slip into Emilia’s office. She’s taken her laptop with her to Amagansett, naturally, but the giant desktop computer she uses for her graphic design work beckons. The flash drive is hot in my palm; I know it’s none of my business what’s on it, but … it feels like my business now. I take a step toward Emilia’s desk. In for a penny, in for a pound. The computer’s probably password-protected anyway.
It’s not. I guess when you run a home office with zero employees, there isn’t a big call for computer security. She probably keeps all her personal stuff on her laptop. While I wait for the flash drive icon to pop up on the desktop, my eyes rove over Emilia’s document folders. They’re mostly client files, sorted by project. Standard stuff. I click open a folder for Wayfare + Ramble, Zoe’s mom’s magazine. Inside are a small handful of project sub-folders that look like they date back years, to before I was even born.
The USB DISK icon pops up on the desktop, and I close out of Emilia’s documents. I double-click, not sure what I’m hoping—or not hoping—to find. There are two folders, labeled CTdocs and CTphotos CT is presumably Caden Talbot; seems fairly self-explanatory if not very creative. I open the photo folder first.
Inside is a list of fifteen or so images with generic file names like IMG_2252.JPG. I click to open the photo at the top of the list.
It’s a candid shot of a beautiful African American girl, eyes shut and mouth flung open in laughter. She’s Caden’s age, give or take. Maybe a little older. And she’s definitely not Zoe. Her hair is natural and long and tied back in a red and orange scarf.
I click open the second photo. In this one, Caden and the same girl are together, leaning toward each other across a table in a dimly lit coffee shop. Caden’s taking the photo; you can see his arm extended to hold out the phone. The photo has to be recent—Caden looks like himself, and besides, Martina’s podcast said he and Zoe had been together since the summer after ninth grade. If this was taken any time in the last five years, it was taken while he was with Zoe.
I scroll through file information on the remaining images. It’s consistent throughout. Created: Saturday, November 30, at 3:46 P.M. Last opened: Saturday, January 4, at 11:48 P.M. These are from last year—from exactly a month before Zoe vanished. Last opened four days after she disappeared. I click rapidly through the remaining photos. They’re all shots of the same girl, either alone or with Caden. They’re not explicitly romantic—no kissing, no bodies intertwined—but there’s something about the pictures that is indisputably intimate. I try to imagine why Caden would leave this in the stable for Zoe to find, in the nightstand drawer directly below the card addressed to her, but I come up empty.
I navigate to the other folder, CTdocs. Before I can explore its contents, a shrill whistling sounds from the front of the house. My back stiffens, then I burst out laughing. The teakettle.
Inside the kitchen, I hold the envelope over the steam. This works in the movies. At first, nothing happens, and I move the envelope closer to the kettle mouth. After ten seconds, twenty, the paper wrinkles. The envelope comes undone.
I don’t stop to wonder if it worked because the envelope was only sealed at the tip, or if it was because it was sealed so long ago—presumably six months, if it lines up with Zoe’s disappearance. I just slide out the card and place the envelope gingerly on the countertop.
The card is made of thick, textured cream paper. I’m sorry is embossed across its front in rose-gold script.
Inside, I find the following message:
If you’re reading this, you came home, or you want to. I’m so sorry, Zoe. I promise I’ll explain everything.
—C
Hands trembling, I pull out my phone and take pictures of the inside and outside of the card, then the envelope front. Then I return the card to its place and seal it back up. The night we hung out in the stable, Caden told me he thinks Zoe might still be alive. Leaving a note for her makes sense. Of course she’d know about his spot in the unused stall. Maybe he’s been hoping, all these months, that she’d come home and find it.
Unless he left the card for someone else to find. Someone who agrees with Martina’s “boyfriend theory,” who thinks Caden knows something about Zoe’s disappearance. Maybe even had something to do with it. Leaving a note for Zoe would be pretty clever, if you had something to hide.
Back in the office, I return to the CTdocs folder. Inside is just one file, a Word document. I open it.
The text inside looks like it’s been cut and pasted from a series of emails between two accounts: [email protected] and [email protected], with dates ranging from August 20 to November 28 of last year. They’re clearly aliases, spins on the names of important historical figures. Someone didn’t want to use their school or personal accounts. The emails range from quick notes to make plans to intense academic discussions to impassioned letters between two people who want to be together—by October and November, they’re a hot jumble of feelings. I think I’m falling for you. I don’t know what to do. I can’t see you. I need to see you. I hate myself. I need to figure
this out.
The emails aren’t signed, and they never use their names. It’s clearly intentional, to preserve anonymity. But I can only assume that IdaBeWise is the girl from the photos and ThurGoldMarshall is Caden.
I rummage through Emilia’s desk for a flash drive. There’s an opened three-pack in the back of the top drawer, resting next to a stack of old photo prints bound together with a fraying rubber band. In the first photo, Emilia barely looks older than me. Her hair is cropped into a pixie cut that surprisingly suits her, and she has her arm wrapped around a friend with dark, waist-length hair who looks about ten years older and vaguely familiar, although I can’t place her. The two women are beaming.
I put Emilia’s photos back where I found them and turn my attention to the two flash drives still in the pack. With a tiny prayer I’m not going to get fired for this, I slip one out. Of all the brainless, invasive things I’m doing this afternoon, this seems like the least of my sins, but I’m still stealing from my employer. I pause, quickly calculating how long it would take me to walk to the CVS in town, buy a flash drive of my own, and get back to Clovelly Cottage. Not that long; forty-five minutes round-trip if I hustle. But I don’t have any idea what time the Talbots are due home. It’s already late afternoon; they could come back anytime. I slip Emilia’s drive into an unused port and copy the contents of both folders over.
* * *
I’m too late anyway. Halfway through the copse of trees, envelope and original flash drive clutched in my hands and visions of the unopened Coke can I left sitting on top of the mini-fridge dancing in front of my eyes, I hear voices and a car door slam. Caden and Mrs. Talbot are home. Fuck me. I spin on my heel and dart back the way I came, back across the deck and into the safety of the pool house. My heart is hammering, a wild bird in my chest. I am epically, epically screwed.