Never Tell Them

by N L Hinkens

  Feeling increasingly uneasy, she reached for a Target bag peeking out from behind one of the boxes. She dumped the contents out on the bed and stared at the items in bewilderment. Was this the extent of Henry’s wardrobe: four pairs of pants, six long-sleeved tops, two pairs of pajamas, a ten-pack of superhero underwear and several pairs of socks?

  Fear fingered its way up her spine as she eyed the receipt. Why was all of Henry’s clothing brand new with tags?

  8

  Sonia hurriedly stuffed Henry’s clothing back into the plastic bag, her mind racing to make sense of what she’d discovered. Half-dreading what she might come upon next, she reached for another bag peeking out from beneath the bed and rooted around inside it. An Avengers toothbrush, a tube of Crest Kid's Cavity Protection Toothpaste, Velcro Spiderman tennis shoes, a pair of jeans, and a familiar-looking blue T-shirt. Frowning, she pulled it out and examined it more closely. Henry had worn it to dinner at her house—she remembered him dribbling ice cream all over the baby dinosaur on the front of it. It had evidently been washed since, so why hadn’t Ray put it away in the closet or a drawer, afterward? What was the logic in putting it back in a Target bag and shoving it under the bed? These weren’t the actions of someone who was moving in—more like the behavior of someone who was prepared to pick up and leave at a moment’s notice.

  She slid an unsettled gaze around the guest room, a disturbing thought pushing to the forefront of her mind. Had Ray been lying to her about his wife? What if Henry’s mother wasn’t dead at all? Could Ray have abducted his son in the throes of a nasty divorce? It wasn’t beyond the realm of possibility. Kids were abducted by non-custodial parents all the time. Considering how much Henry missed his mother, and how unattached he was to his father, the shoe seemed to fit. It would also explain why Ray had arrived at Celia’s house with none of Henry’s clothes or toys, other than what he’d purchased in a Target shopping spree. Gritting her teeth, Sonia got to her feet with a new resolve. She could justify snooping around if it meant rescuing an abducted child. The first thing she needed to figure out was whether Ray’s wife was really dead.

  Her chilled skin prickled as she pushed open the door to Celia’s old bedroom, half-expecting a larger-than-life Ray to step out from the shadows and accost her, even though logic assured her she’d left him lying in a hospital bed. She inhaled a ragged breath as she picked her way across the floor. Celia’s pink, fluffy slippers jutted out from beneath the unmade bed. A pile of miscellaneous coins and crumpled receipts sat atop the oak nightstand, next to a laptop. She lifted the lid and took a quick peek, but, as she’d suspected, it was password protected. Heart hammering, she reached for the receipts and uncurled them one-by-one: innocuous supplies from a local hardware store, a receipt for gas, and a coupon from a local pizza restaurant—nothing of consequence.

  Next, she opened the drawer in the nightstand and poked around inside it. Like most of the other items in the room, the contents of the drawer had Celia’s stamp all over them; a crocheted coaster, a scented sleep mask, a book of poems by Robert Frost—even a birthday card Jessica had made for her two years ago. Sonia grimaced as she closed the drawer, realizing too late that she should have worn gloves. She ran a critical eye over the rest of the room. Judging by what she’d seen so far, it was unlikely she would find any of Ray’s belongings in the closet or the dresser. The moving boxes neatly stacked at the bottom of the bed were her best bet.

  To her disappointment, the first box was stuffed to the brim with wrinkled sweatshirts and workout gear. She rummaged half-heartedly through it before closing it back up and moving on. The next box contained a miscellaneous assortment of men’s clothing. Opening the final box, she jerked backward on her heels, the odor of sweaty sneakers assailing her senses. Curling her lip in disgust, she closed the box back up and got to her feet, defeated. She still knew next to nothing about Ray or his past, other than what he’d told her—a version she harbored mounting doubts about.

  Determined not to give up on her quest to uncover any secrets Ray might be hiding, she made her way over to the closet and slid open the mirrored door. There was always a chance he he’d stashed some personal items inside. A black, canvas backpack on the floor caught her eye—modern and masculine. Definitely out of place in this old lady haven of fluff and bric-a-brac. After throwing a glance over her shoulder to reassure herself she was alone, Sonia swiftly unzipped the bag and viewed the contents: men’s jeans, boots, and a flannel shirt—in addition to a few basic toiletries, and a fancy-looking GPS.

  She closed the bag back up and then, as an afterthought, slipped her fingers into the zippered front pouch. Pulling out a map, she carefully spread it out on the floor in front of her. A yellow highlighter marked a trail into the Blue Ridge mountains, and a set of coordinates was neatly printed in blue ink along the edge of the map. A campsite, most likely. She snapped a quick picture of the coordinates to check them out later, then folded the map back up and returned it to the pouch. Other than surmising that Ray Jenkins liked to hike or camp, she still hadn’t learned anything of consequence about the man, or his presumed dead wife. Frustrated, she set about putting everything back the way she’d found it. Maybe Ray actually had lost his memory, but she wasn’t taking any chances. If he’d lied in the past, he might be lying now too.

  As she shoved the bag back into the closet, she caught a glimpse of several dilapidated women’s shoeboxes on the shelf above the clothing rack. The lid was propped open on one of them and she could see some papers sticking out. She had yet to find any documentation pertaining to Henry, or Ray’s wife, but maybe she could learn something about Ray from his mother’s records. Forgive me, Celia, she mouthed as she reached for the box. Fingering through it, she quickly realized it was full of old bank statements. Ray had mentioned something about his mother transferring several thousand dollars each month to an account he suspected was his brother Tom’s. Curious, Sonia scanned the transactions on the most recent statement. The sum of $4500 stuck out like a sore thumb in comparison to the other much smaller amounts that Celia withdrew on a regular basis. Sonia leafed through several more statements. They all showed the same transfer on the fifteenth of each month. Apparently, Ray had been telling the truth about something.

  She eyed the remaining shoeboxes, but a ghostly sense of claustrophobia was building, closing off her airways. She needed to get out of this house—the place smelled of dust, damp, death, and too many buried secrets. Skin prickling, she jammed the statements back into the overflowing shoebox and replaced the lid. She had crossed a line by prying into Celia’s personal finances. This was between Celia and Tom. It had nothing to do with Sonia’s quest to get to the bottom of Ray’s evasiveness and his strange relationship with his son. She glanced at her watch. Her mother would be wondering where she was by now. Time to wrap up her search and get back home.

  As she turned to leave, a sound startled her. Her heart leapt into her throat. Was that the back door opening? Surely Ray couldn’t have been discharged from the hospital already. Had he left of his own accord? All her fears about her mysterious neighbor came rushing back with a vengeance. What if he really had faked his memory loss? But to what purpose? And then another thought struck. What if this was Ray’s younger brother, Tom? It was possible the lawyer who’d settled Celia’s affairs had managed to track him down. Or maybe the police had got a hold of him. Either way, it would be hard to explain what she was doing in his mother’s bedroom.

  Silently, she got to her feet and tip-toed toward the open door, freezing at the thud of footsteps. Seconds later, Jessica burst into the room. ”Mom! What are you doing?” Her eyes darted behind Sonia as if looking for someone. ”Why are you in Ray’s bedroom? Is he here?”

  Sonia shook her head vehemently, trying to collect her thoughts. ”No, sweetie. He’s away on business. He asked me to pick up some stuff for Henry.” Her heart lurched in her chest. “Where is Henry?”

  “He’s napping. I went out to the garden to play on the tire
swing, and I saw your car. Why’d you park here?”

  “I thought it would be easier to throw everything in the car rather than carry it across the lawn,” Sonia said breezily. “Let’s go grab Henry’s stuff.”

  ”You’ve been here for ages,” Jessica said, following her down the hallway to Henry’s room. “What were you doing this whole time?”

  Sonia thought for a moment, wishing for the umpteenth time that her daughter hadn’t inherited her grandmother’s keen nose for information. She hated lying to her. Jessica got enough of that from Finn: lies about when he was going to call her, what he was sending her for her birthday, and when he was coming home on leave—none of which ever materialized. ”I was just sitting here thinking about Celia. It’s kind of sad without her.”

  Jessica nodded, looking pensive. ”I miss her too. I’m sad for Henry that he doesn’t have a grandma. But he can share mine.”

  Sonia flashed her a grateful smile. “That’s very sweet of you, Jess. All right, help me pick out some clothes for him.”

  After deliberating over the meager choices, Jessica made a clumsy attempt to fold Henry’s clothes, and then shoved them into one of the bags. ”I told you he doesn’t have any toys,” she said, her eyes zig-zagging around the room. “Now do you believe me?”

  “They’re probably still at his old house,” Sonia said dismissively, following Jessica down the hallway to the front door. She cast a darting glance into the family room as they went by and then hesitated. ”Why don’t you take this bag and run on home? I need to look for some paperwork for Henry’s preschool. Tell Grandma not to start dinner. I’ll order Chinese tonight.”

  “Yeah! My favorite!” Jessica chirped, skipping out the door, swinging the Target bag with Henry’s clothes in it.

  Sonia waited until she was sure her daughter wasn’t going to come running back to tell her something else she’d forgotten about, before slipping into the family room. The gloomy space sported a mismatched assortment of relics from the past: faded couches with sagging seat cushions, a small, squat TV, yellowing net curtains, a dome clock that chimed out time like a melancholic countdown to death itself, and enough dust in the air to mimic a double helix on a sunny day. Sonia wandered over to the bookshelf in the entertainment center to the left of the TV and glanced through some of the titles. Celia had always had a penchant for romance novels—maybe it was to compensate for the abusive relationship she had endured.

  Sonia was about to leave when she spotted some faux-leather photo albums in the cubby directly below the television. She reached for one and flipped it open, eying the pictures curiously. Most of them were black and white. Judging by the clothing and hairstyles, she guessed they were from Celia’s childhood. She skimmed through the album and then returned it to the shelf and grabbed another one. This one contained color photos, and someone had meticulously logged notes and dates next to each one; Tom’s first birthday, Tom and Ray at Outer Banks Beach, Ray’s first lost tooth. On and on it went. The carefully catalogued childhoods of two sons Celia had obviously adored. Whether or not there was any truth to Ray’s tales of an abusive father, there was no evidence in the photo albums that he had ever been in his sons’ lives. Either Ray was lying about that, or Celia had taken care to erase any trace of him.

  Sonia thumbed through to the final page, studying the expression on Ray’s face in the photo—the resigned look of a broken young man, just as he’d described. His brother, Tom, stood next to him, a whole head shorter, a hint of rebellion simmering in his eyes. Ray must have been about fifteen-years-old when it was taken—right before he left home. There were no more photos in the album after that. Perhaps Celia hadn’t had the heart to continue photographing Tom alone, or maybe Tom had refused to be the subject of any more staged photos hiding an ugly secret. Because if Ray was telling the truth, this entire album was a lie. Their abusive father had been in the background on every one of these occasions, the dark underside to the happy life Celia had tried to portray.

  Sonia snapped the album shut, her heart pounding in her chest. She understood only too well the desire to weave a fantasy over a brutal reality. She’d tried to do the same thing at first with Finn. It was easy for Ray to judge Celia for being too weak to leave. But would Sonia have had the fortitude to leave if she hadn’t had the unconditional support of her mother?

  She replaced the album on the shelf and cast one last searching glance around the room. A folded-up page of newspaper lying on the end table caught her eye. She reached for it, straightened it out, and read the headline:

  Five Years After Katie Lambert’s Disappearance.

  9

  Sonia folded the newspaper article back up, her thoughts suddenly firing in an entirely new direction. Ray had told her he was a freelance journalist—was he working on a story about abductions? He might even be a private investigator posing as a journalist—looking into the disappearance of Katie Lambert. She traced her fingertips across her forehead considering the idea. He could be using his mother’s house as a temporary base, with no intention of moving in long-term. That would explain why he hadn’t unpacked.

  Sonia racked her brain trying to remember more of the details surrounding Katie Lambert’s disappearance. It was hard to separate the facts from the gossip and speculation that had spread like wildfire at the time and continued unabated over the years. Sonia remembered Katie as a friendly girl with a mischievous grin and one too many ear piercings, who had worked in a local coffee shop in Booneville on the weekends. Her father was a successful contractor, and everyone in town knew the family. His suicide in the wake of Katie’s disappearance had shocked the close-knit community to its core—some even speculating that he was involved and had killed himself out of guilt. Sonia frowned as she stared down at the article in her hand. If Ray was investigating the story, he wasn’t going to get much information by hiding away from everyone like a recluse. It didn’t make sense.

  Her muddled thoughts drifted to Henry. Whatever Ray’s real reason for being here, his odd relationship with his son troubled Sonia more than anything. She set the newspaper article back down on the end table, positioning it as she’d found it. It was time to go home and check on Henry. After all, she was the one who’d been entrusted with his care while Ray was incapacitated. She couldn’t depend on her elderly mother or her eight-year-old daughter to keep him safe. Although exactly what danger he was in, and from whom, remained to be seen.

  After locking the back door, Sonia replaced the key in the planter and pulled her car into her own driveway.

  “We’d almost given up on you. I was just about to make the kids some grilled cheese sandwiches,” Evelyn chided, the minute Sonia walked into the kitchen. “How’s the patient?”

  “Doing surprisingly well. No apparent physical injuries, other than bruises,” Sonia replied, pulling open the junk drawer where she kept the takeout menus for local restaurants. “He has a concussion, but he’s perfectly coherent—other than the fact that he can’t remember anything from before the accident. He didn’t know who I was, and he didn’t remember he had a son. His doctor doesn’t seem overly concerned. He’s optimistic it will resolve itself in a matter of days.”

  “Well, that’s a relief,” Evelyn said. “I was fretting about having to give Henry more bad news. He’s suffered enough as it is.” Her piercing gaze locked with Sonia’s as she pulled out a chair and sat down at the farmhouse kitchen table. ”Jessica said you were over at Celia’s house.”

  Sonia gave a vague nod as she scoured the menu options. “I asked Ray if it would be all right to pick up some overnight things for Henry.”

  Evelyn tilted a quizzical brow. “Was Jessica right about Henry not having any toys?”

  Sonia hesitated, deliberating whether to share her findings with her mother. She didn’t want to alarm her unnecessarily, but she could use a second opinion on what she’d discovered. “Yeah, but it gets worse. Let me call in this order and then I’ll fill you in.”

  After she hung up, sh
e slumped down in a chair next to her mother. “Are the kids okay?”

  “They’re fine.” Evelyn said. ”Although they wolfed down a few extra cookies this afternoon. That little Henry acts like he’s never tasted sugar before.”

  Sonia pulled her hair back from her face and twisted it thoughtfully. ”I can’t help wondering if Ray’s wife is really dead. I mean, what if they were getting divorced and Ray abducted Henry or something? He hasn’t unpacked a single thing in the house. He hasn’t even hung up his clothes in the closet.”

  Evelyn blinked a few times. ”I … don’t understand. I thought Ray was unpacking that afternoon Henry came over to play.”

  Sonia grimaced. “He lied about that. He’s living out of moving boxes and plastic bags, almost as though he wants to be prepared to bolt at a moment’s notice. He also has a backpack with a change of clothes and a map of the mountains in it. I suppose it could be for hiking, but it looks more like something you’d put a laptop in. And I have no idea where any of Henry’s stuff is. The only clothes Ray has for him are some items he purchased at Target.”

  Evelyn was quiet for a moment. “Maybe Henry’s things are still at their old house.”

  “But why would he leave his son’s stuff behind—important things like his birth certificate?”

  Evelyn hesitated, a perturbed look on her face. “I don’t know—it’s all very strange.”

  “Yes, it is. And that’s what worries me.” Sonia shot a darting glance in the direction of the door as the kids ran by, chasing each other and shrieking. Lowering her voice, she continued. ”I found something peculiar in the family room.”

  Evelyn reached for the pearls around her throat, twisting them nervously. ”Were you snooping around in Celia’s house?”